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Scientists and staff with the U.S. Forest Service are hopeful that the blackheaded budworm outbreak that began three years ago throughout the Tongass National Forest is beginning to decline. Data collected earlier this year revealed not only the extent of the damage done by the half-inch insect but evidence showed the worms are dying off. Elizabeth Graham, an entomologist with the Forest Service, said in a news conference on July 20 she has seen firsthand that there is lower activity of the bug...
Alaska public school teachers short of supplies this year have a new source to turn to for funding, and it’s not the local school budget. Each teacher could receive $650 to $750 from the state in federal pandemic relief money. Alaska’s Department of Education and Early Development will devote $2 million in federal pandemic relief money to fund teacher requests. “By helping teachers directly with their classroom needs, DEED is supporting our teachers in our shared mission to provide an excellent education for every student everyday,” said de... Full story
The state government is taking aim at eliminating one of the most common barriers for people who want to open child care centers in remote communities: The state requirement for a special internet connection called a “static IP address.” Every device connected to has its own Internet Protocol, or IP, address. While most device addresses can change, static IP addresses don’t. They can be costly and hard to get in remote parts of Alaska where internet access is a known challenge. Would-be child care providers in remote parts of Alaska have said...
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The state board of education last Wednesday delayed action on a proposal that would bar transgender girls from participating on high school girls’ athletic teams in Alaska, with several board members saying they wanted more time to consider the issue. Opponents of the proposal called it discriminatory and unconstitutional and said it would likely lead to litigation. Supporters, including Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, said it is needed to ensure fairness in girls’ sports. The board heard more than 2 1/2 hours of publi...
Telecommunications company GCI will end its longtime email service next year, a move that will force customers to transition to new email providers. Spokespeople with GCI, Alaska’s largest telecommunications company, said the service will end sometime in mid-2024. At that point, customers will no longer be able to access or use their gci.net account, according to a draft fact page posted online. “We will provide our customers formal notice at least six months in advance of email deactivation deadline,” GCI spokeswoman Heather Handyside said...
WASHINGTON — The Department of Education and the White House announced Friday that more than 800,000 federal student loan borrowers will have their remaining debt wiped out. The $39 billion in debt relief will come through fixes to mismanagement of the agency’s income-driven repayment plans. Many long-time borrowers, including those who had been making payments for 20 years or more, were denied relief they were eligible for under the repayment plans. Qualified payments that were made were not accounted for. “For far too long, borrowers fell...
Proposed ballot measures would raise Alaska minimum wage, add mandatory paid sick leave, as well as limit campaign contributions and state spending on party candidate nominations. The Alaska Division of Elections received the proposals last week. One proposed ballot measure would make a series of changes to state labor laws. It would raise the hourly minimum wage — currently $10.85 — to $13 in July 2025, $14 in July 2026 and $15 in July 2027, and annually according to inflation after that. It would require employers with 15 or more employees to... Full story
The spendable portion of the Alaska Permanent Fund is dwindling and could be exhausted entirely within three years, fund leaders were told during a regular quarterly meeting on Wednesday, July 12, in Anchorage. Deven Mitchell, CEO of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp., presented the results of limited modeling that estimates the fund’s performance over the next three years. Under the “low” scenario, the fund would be unable to pay for state services or dividends by summer 2026. The “mid” scenario calls for the spendable portion of the fund to b... Full story
After the past few years when resignations and retirements far outpaced new hires, the Alaska Marine Highway System was able to hire as many new onboard crew as it lost in the first six months of this year. It showed a net gain of two workers, adding 47 and losing 45, though most of the new hires were in entry-level jobs and not the critical experienced positions that remain vacant. The lack of enough crew to fully staff the state ferries has been a problem, keeping the Kennicott tied up this summer and creating spot shortages the past couple...
The Haines Borough is challenging the U.S. government’s official count of its population, saying the Census Bureau undercounted the town’s population by about 20%. The money threatens millions of dollars of federal funding over the next decade. The 2020 Census reported Haines’ population as 2080, down from 2,508 10 years earlier. That immediately raised red flags for borough officials. “If we had lost almost 500 people, you would feel it in our town,” said Haines Borough clerk Alekka Fullerton. “You would see it in empty houses, in schools, an...
Supporters of Alaska’s ranked choice voting system are again alleging that opponents of the system are violating state campaign law. On Monday, Alaskans for Better Elections filed a complaint against former Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kelly Tshibaka, a nonprofit that she operates, and Alaskans for Honest Elections, which is campaigning to repeal ranked choice voting in Alaska. The complaint alleges that Tshibaka and her nonprofit, Preserve Democracy, have been lobbying and campaigning without registering with the commission or s... Full story
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Backers of an effort to repeal Alaska’s ranked choice voting system violated campaign finance rules and obscured the source of their funding, including forming a church that could have allowed donors to gain tax advantages for their contributions while skirting disclosure mandates, a complaint alleges. The complaint was filed by Alaskans for Better Elections, which was behind the successful 2020 ballot measure that replaced party primaries with open primaries and instituted ranked choice voting for general ele...
In Alaska, only a third of children meet the state’s goals to be ready for kindergarten. But the state’s share of funding for Head Start, a mostly federally funded child care and health program that promotes school readiness specifically for low-income families, is lower than it was a decade ago. This year, the Legislature earmarked $5 million for an increase so the state’s Head Start programs could match federal contributions, but Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed most of it, slashing the increase to $1.5 million. It’s left program directors like Ma... Full story
Alaskans are having a harder time accessing child care now than they were five years ago, an expert told a new task force charged by Gov. Mike Dunleavy with developing a plan to make child care in the state more available and affordable. The task force, which Dunleavy formed in April, had its first public meeting on June 28 via Zoom with about 60 people, including the dozen task force members, in attendance. The group has until the end of December to deliver an initial plan to address the state’s child care challenges. At stake is the w... Full story
The state ferry Columbia, after a week in the shop to repair leaky pipes and its bow thrusters, was expected back at work starting Wednesday, June 28, with its regularly scheduled run from Ketchikan to Bellingham, Washington. The vessel was pulled from service on June 20, missing two southbound stops and one northbound stop in Wrangell. The 50-year-old Columbia left Haines that day — without any passengers — and headed straight for the Vigor shipyard in Ketchikan for repairs, canceling all stops along the way. “There’s a manifold down in the...
The Alaska Marine Highway System, which five months ago embarked on improving its hiring process to address chronic crew shortages, is unable to say how many new employees it has hired since then. The push started after a consultant’s report in January determined the state had hired just four out of 250 job applicants the over prior 12 months. The crew shortage forced the state to pull the Kennicott, the second-largest operable ship in the fleet, off this summer’s schedule and keep it tied up at the dock in Ketchikan. Asked how many new emp...
A Kake resident was reported missing Friday night after failing to return from a fishing trip, prompting a search over the weekend, according to Petersburg Fire/EMS/SAR Director Aaron Hankins. A U.S. Coast Guard press release identified the missing man as Timothy Wilson Jr., 70, last seen Friday morning departing aboard a 15-foot Lund near Pup Island. Coast Guard Sector Juneau received a relayed report from the Alaska State Troopers at 8:30 p.m., Friday, of an overdue boater. Using a cell phone...
The Columbia state ferry has cancelled its sailings for at least a week due to a mechanical issue, affecting stops at ports between Haines and Bellingham, Washington, according to a service notice by the Alaska Marine Highway System (AMHS). The primary interruption to service is a seven-day period starting Wednesday, with a sailing from Ketchikan to Bellingham and back through Southeast Alaska cancelled, the AMHS notice issued Monday notes. The decision is due to a "mechanical issue with the ves...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed Alaska’s $6 billion state budget into law Monday after vetoing more than $200 million from the document approved in mid-May by the Alaska Legislature. The governor’s biggest single cut was half of a $175 million one-time funding boost for K-12 public schools. Lawmakers intended the addition to partially compensate for inflation-driven cost increases. Because school districts have already had to set their budgets for the coming year, Dunleavy’s veto leaves some of them facing additional budget cuts or the prosp...
On Tuesday afternoon, cellphones across the state beeped with emergency tones as the Alaska State Troopers attempted to find two-year-old Karma Brown, who briefly went missing in Fairbanks. Brown was found safe within 40 minutes, but not before Alaskans from Adak to Metlakatla were alerted via the national Wireless Emergency Alert system. “The Amber Alert was deliberately sent statewide due to family connections of the suspect to multiple areas of the state. In most instances, Amber Alerts are sent within 300 miles of the location of the a... Full story
The company behind the controversial Pebble Mine in Southwest Alaska has agreed to pay nearly $6.4 million to a group of shareholders who claim they were misled by corporate leaders. Vancouver-based Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. reached the settlement with the named plaintiffs, according to documents filed last week in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The settlement is the product of two lawsuits, later consolidated, alleging that Northern Dynasty and the Pebble Limited Partnership had defrauded investors through... Full story
JUNEAU - A fire in the engine room of a small cruise ship in Alaska's Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve prompted the evacuation of dozens of passengers and crew on Monday. No injuries were reported, and the fire was extinguished, the U.S. Coast Guard said. The fire on board the Wilderness Discoverer was reported to the Coast Guard around 7:30 a.m. UnCruise Adventures, which operates the ship, said 78 passengers and crew members were on board at the time. All 51 passengers and most crew...
The U.S. Forest Service is still seeking volunteers to fill out seats on the South Tongass Secure Rural Schools Resource Advisory Committee (SRS RAC), but with the deadline to apply fast approaching the committee is at risk of not having enough members to hold meetings. According to the Forest Service, RACs review proposals for projects on National Forest System lands, provide advice to the department, and vote on recommendations for the allocation of federal Secure Rural Schools Act funding to...
Alaska lawmakers reached a compromise on the state budget and adjourned after a one-day special session last week, approving a $1,300 Permanent Fund dividend for this fall with the possibility of a second, smaller payment next year if oil revenues exceed projections. The amount of the PFD and the capital budget — construction and maintenance projects in legislators’ home districts — were the final items that forced legislators into a special session after the regular session ended May 17 without a budget. The governor called them back to work...
This month, Alaska Airlines unveiled a new design that replaced the Salmon Thirty Salmon art known by many Alaskans. The new art still features salmon, but this time from an Indigenous perspective. Crystal Worl, Tlingit artist and business owner from Juneau, created the new design in the style of formline art. Worl said she hopes that the plane will inspire non-Indigenous people to learn about the rich cultural history between Native Alaskans and salmon - and she was excited to share that histor... Full story
