Alaska News Nightly: January 29, 2014
Planned Parenthood Suing Over Abortion Funding Reg; Fire Destroys Fairbanks Apartment Building; Judiciary Committee Explores Omnibus Crime Bill; Bill Aims To Arm VPSOs As Danger Levels Rise; House Passes Bill Extending PILT, Alaska’s Village Safe Water Program; State of the Union Address Irks Alaska's Delegation; From Paying $1,000 A Month For Health Care To $100; Senate Panel Hears Bill On Elementary School Reading Programs; Richardson Highway Opens North Of Mile 19; Can You Guess When The Road To Valdez Will Reopen?; Baranof Goat Study Unlocks Clues To Island’s Paleo Past; Nauman May Be The Only Woman In This Year’s Yukon Quest, But She’s One Tough Rookie
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Officials Unsure When Richardson Highway Will Reopen
The state Transportation department now says they don't know when the flooded highway through Keystone Canyon outside of Valdez will be passable again.
Capacity Building Grants For Sustainability
Learning to run an effective and efficient charitable organization does not happen overnight. As previously relied upon funding streams disappear, it’s imperative the nonprofit community finds innovative and sustainable ways to continue providing our much needed and relied upon services.
For many of us, writing a grant for $3,000 dollars isn’t worth the effort.
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Vote on Anchorage Labor Law Set for November Ballot
The Anchorage Assembly finally set a date for a vote on a referendum that would repeal a controversial labor law last night (Tues. 1/28). It won't happen until fall.
Begich Pledges To Restore Veteran Benefits
Veterans and military members in Alaska and around the country have been outraged at Congress since December, when lawmakers passed a budget that would trim their retirement benefits, starting in 2015.
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USDA Under Secretary Patrice Kunesh Visits Bethel Region
Patrice Kunesh, Under Secretary of the USDA Rural Development, visited the Bethel region Tuesday to see some of the department’s projects in action.
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Drug Court Could Offer Jail Alternative
A Fairbanks substance abuse counselor is pushing for the state to consider an alternative to jail for drug offenders. The effort is in response to a steady stream of young heroin addicts, some of whom end up in jail.
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Temperature Records Fall Across Alaska
Temperature records fell across the state yesterday. With highs in the 40s, 50s and 60s, much of the state is experiencing weather that feels more like May or June than January.
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Warm Winter Brings Open Water To Y-K Delta
Record warm temperatures have depleted Alaska’s snowpack and melted river ice. And residents of the YK Delta have noticed more open water in recent weeks. It’s not technically breakup, but in many places, it sure looks and feels like it.
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Biofuel Could Help Lessen Rural Energy Costs
The community of Tok hosts a thick, growing forest of spruce trees, and a thinning, shrinking population of people and businesses. Like elsewhere in rural Alaska, high-energy costs and a lack of jobs are causing people to leave. But the trees may be the solution to bringing people back.
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NIOSH Tackling Fishing Industry Injuries
For more than 20 years, NIOSH has been working to prevent accidental deaths in the fishing industry. Now, these safety experts are tackling injuries – the kind fishermen are used to getting every season.
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High Tech Trackers Gather Info On Cook Inlet Kings, Reds
The Alaska Board of Fish will begin deliberations on the Cook Inlet fisheries in Anchorage next week. One of the more difficult issues before the board is the declining King salmon runs and demands by sports fishing interests to shut down the commercial catch of reds to let every precious king into the Kenai River system.
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Alaska News Nightly: January 28, 2014
Begich Pushing To Restore Veteran Benefits; USDA Under Secretary Patrice Kunesh Visits Bethel Region; Drug Court Could Offer Jail Alternative; Temperature Records Fall Across Alaska; Warm Winter Brings Open Water To Y-K Delta; Biofuel Could Help Lessen Rural Energy Costs; NIOSH Tacking Fishing Industry Injuries; Board Of Fish Ponders Low Salmon Run Solutions
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9 People Apply For Alaska House Vacancy
Nine people have applied to fill the vacancy in the Alaska House left by last week's resignation of Beth Kerttula, a Juneau Democrat.
Sea Lion Lunges At Sitka Fisherman
A 19-year-old Sitka man had a run-in with a sea lion at Seafood Producers Cooperative on Saturday. Alaska State Troopers say the man was sitting on the railing of a fishing vessel when a large bull pounced. The sea lion jumped out of the water and attempted to bite him — on the behind, causing the man to fall forward into the vessel.
Alaskan Wishes Granted by the Alaskan Community
Meet three-year-old Owen from Salcha, Alaska. Owen is battling Langerhans Cell Histiocytosis (LCH), a life-threatening blood disorder.
During treatment, his port for chemotherapy prevented him from taking baths at his grandparents' house—something he once loved to do.
Read more. Lawmakers Begin Review of Gasline Project
Gov. Parnell's bill taxes natural gas at a rate of 10.5 percent starting in 2022. It allows for those taxes to be directly paid in gas instead of money. It expands the powers of the natural resources commissioner and the revenue commissioner to work out a deal with all the other parties involved.
State, Valdez Officials Assess Richardson Highway Avalanches
Valdez remains cutoff by road from the rest of the state due to avalanches and flooding over the weekend. Progress has been made in clearing some of the debris on the Richardson Highway, but crews still have a long way to go.
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Sullivan, Treadwell Address Variety of Topics At Anchorage Chamber of Commerce
Two of the Republican candidates vying for U.S. Senator Mark Begich’s job, presented their records and thoughts on a range of issues for the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce lunch crowd today.
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Researchers Explore Polar Vortex
With unseasonably warm weather reaching all the way up into the Brooks Range in Alaska and bitterly cold weather dipping deep into the Lower 48 states, everybody wants to know more about the Polar Vortex – the jet stream that wobbles around the Arctic. Last month in San Francisco a team of scientists with the Byrd Polar Research Center came out with a study that takes one more step toward better understanding that wobble by putting a lot more detail into high-latitude weather records of the past.
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