Robert Woolsey, KCAW - Sitka
Robert Woolsey is the news director at KCAW in Sitka.
Hoonah Sound’s Herring Spawn-on-Kelp Fishery Will Remain Closed in 2015
The herring spawn-on-kelp fishery in Hoonah Sound will remain closed in the 2015 season - for the second year in a row. The Alaska Department of Fish & Game announced the closure this week after forecasts for the area predicted herring numbers far below the threshold required for commercial harvest.
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Settlement Signed In Sitka Gender Equity Dispute
The Sitka School District has reached a settlement in a gender equity dispute over the community’s new ball field.
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AK: Looking Inside
On AK we often travel to wild and strange places and meet the people who live there. Today's journey is no different, except the place is inside each of us. Earlier this year Sitka had a tarot card reader in residence. The Tarot, it turns out, is mystical -- but not magic. Like professional therapy, it's really about looking into a mirror, as tarot skeptic Robert Woolsey discovers.
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Landslide Destroys Restoration Projects Near Sitka
High rainfall this month is being blamed for a major landslide near Sitka. The U.S. Forest Service reports that a 100-acre slide came down in the Starrigavan Valley, about ten miles from town. Although there was no structural damage in the event, hundreds of thousands of dollars of watershed restoration projects in the valley have been wiped out.
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Groups Hope MSA Update Won’t Move Fish Conservation ‘Backwards’
A number of regional fishing associations are joining forces to strengthen the Magnuson-Stevens Act.The Sitka-based Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association announced last week (9-9-14) that it’s reached an agreement with the Alaska Marine Conservation Council and several east-coast industry groups to form the Fishing Community Coalition. The new organization wants to ensure that Congress makes protecting fish stocks a priority as it prepares to reauthorize the nation’s most important law governing the harvest of seafood in federal waters.
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Not My Town! ‘Grizzly Trade’ Ambles Through Places, Personalities of Southeast
It’s got a Vietnam vet with a big heart and anger management problems, a small-town newspaper reporter, and a hippie radio station. Throw in some meth-fuelled wildlife crime and a few cruise ships and you have the makings of an adventure mystery set in Southeast Alaska. Dale Brandenburger is a former biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish & Game who’s combined decades of journaling and a knack for storytelling into a new novel called Grizzly Trade.
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Heat Pumps Tap Ocean’s Thermal Energy
Using seawater to heat large buildings in Alaska is no longer a pipe dream.
Andy Baker, an engineer with YourCleanEnergy LLC, helped design an ocean-sourced heat pump system for the Alaska Sealife Center in Seward which will pay back the community’s investment in less than nine years — just in fuel savings.
King Salmon Trolling Ends On Slow Note
After an unprecedented two extensions, the summer king salmon season for trollers in Southeast is over.
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Court Orders Review of A Controversial Fisheries Observer Program
A U.S. District Court judge has ruled that a newly-implemented fisheries observer program in the Gulf of Alaska may have become unreliable, and is sending federal managers back to the drawing board to fix it.
Dee Daniels Vocal Jazz Workshop Gets Underway
The Dee Daniels Vocal Jazz Workshop is underway this week in Sitka. For the last two years, Daniels has interrupted her touring and teaching schedule to live at the Sitka Fine Arts Camp, and coach a half-dozen students of widely-ranging ages and ability.
Former Sitka Principal Found Not Guilty On All Counts
Joe Robidou has been found not guilty on all counts. A Sitka jury of seven women and five men delivered its verdict in favor of the former school administrator at about 6 p.m. Monday evening.
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Online Realtor Says Sitka Tops State In Livability
Sitka has won a spot on top of yet another list. The online realtor Movoto says Sitka is the most liveable community in Alaska. Just ahead of Anchorage and Juneau.
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How Can We Improve Our Food Security?
The reliability of the food supply is not something most communities devote much thought to. Agriculture, transportation, and grocery stores all work pretty well – even in relatively isolated parts of Alaska like Sitka. And depending on where you live, there can be abundant wild foods. But a recent report called “The Sitka Community Food Assessment” reveals that our food system is vulnerable – especially to the unpredictable costs of fuel. Lisa Sadleir-Hart coordinated the assessment about what Sitka – and communities like it – can do to become more food-secure.
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Two Rescued As Troller Goes Aground In Heavy Surf
Two crewmen were rescued safely after their troller ran aground in heavy seas in Sitka Sound early Monday morning. The 52-foot steel-hulled troller Mirage radioed a distress call at about 3:30 AM. The boat had gone aground on the southern shore of Low Island, in surf and strong winds.
Gasline Official Says In-State Project Is No Pipedream
With an oversupply of natural gas in the country, Alaska is exploring the construction of a relatively small, low-pressure gasline within the state’s borders – while still holding out hope for a much larger project should prices improve.
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Where No Shop Class Has Gone Before
This is not your grandfather’s shop class. Late last month a group of high school and college shop teachers and a few of their students gathered for a three-day workshop in Sitka’s state-of-the-art Design and Fabrication Lab. The use of 3D printers and other computer-controlled equipment has revolutionized shop, and turned one of the most remote classrooms in the building into the coolest place in school.
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Herring Seiners Hit Target – And Then Some – In Quick Saturday Opener
The 2014 Sitka Sound sac roe herring fishery is over. The 48 permit holders caught the last remaining fish in this year’s harvest limit – and then some – in a wild 45-minute opener Saturday afternoon right in front of downtown Sitka.
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AK: Machine Shop
Manufacturing – like everything else – is becoming more computerized, but instead of replacing craftsmanship, digital technology is opening up possibilities for students to create things in ways that simply weren’t practical five or ten years ago. Three kids at Sitka High School are building a tool – really just a customized piece of metal – to do an unsung, but important, job in the community. And their collaboration points toward a future where we’ll make stuff differently.
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Glacier Bay’s Bears A Remnant Of The Ice Age
Brown bears are one of the most intensively-studied species in Southeast Alaska. Much of the focus is on population management for hunting. But one scientist studies bears for their sake and not ours. Tania Lewis is the terrestrial wildlife biologist at Glacier Bay National Park. She’s made some breakthroughs in both behavior and genetics, and she can’t help but sing about it.
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Sitka Teacher Wins White House Award
A Sitka educator has won a Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science. Rebecca Himschoot teaches science at Keet Gooshi Heen Elementary. She’s one of two Alaskan teachers honored by the White House this year, and one of only 102 teachers nationwide who receive the recognition, which includes a $10,000 cash prize from the National Science Foundation. Amy Laufer, a math teacher at Kasuun Elementary in Anchorage, also won the award.