Southcentral

Three Alaska disaster declarations have no Federal Register notice

Three Alaska disaster declarations have no federal notice, though rules require one. For the Mat-Su storm, the finished notice has sat unfiled since April.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Park Service warns of ice collapse and tsunami waves at Aialik Glacier

National Park Service warns that unstable ice at Aialik Glacier terminus in Kenai Fjords can collapse without warning and trigger tsunami waves capable of causing severe injury or death.

by Maggie AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Afognak Native Corporation buys majority stake in Weaver Bros. trucking companies

Weaver Bros. has hauled freight in Alaska since 1946. Its new majority owner is a Kodiak village corporation whose people lost their village in 1964.

by Bill AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min readFrom Sep 11

Anchorage approves a bigger paved lot at the Basher Trailhead

Anchorage approved replacing the Basher Trailhead's 16-space gravel lot with a paved 52-space one, ending a year-long fight over its size.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Follows: Anchorage weighs paving and expanding the Basher Trailhead lot

Anchorage weighs making its 49 neighborhood plans advisory only

Anchorage's 49 neighborhood plans carry the force of law today. The Assembly wants to know if they should just be advice — 70% have never been updated.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Falling rock rerouted the Root Glacier trail, and helicopters are coming

Falling rock closed the main Root Glacier trail in July. The reroute is still in place, it runs across talus, and the park wants you in traction devices.

by Maggie AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Juneau youth board reviews $3,605 in travel requests from two teen athletes

Two Juneau teenagers earned spots at competitions Outside and are asking the city for airfare. The fund they are asking from ended last year with $1,237 left.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Follows: Two Juneau kids qualified, and the youth board's fund is nearly empty

Anchorage named a day for Dolly Parton three weeks after her death

Anchorage kids get more than 73,000 free books a year in the mail. The Assembly named Sept. 25 for the woman behind it, three weeks after her death.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Anchorage's new-home tax break would reach pricier houses under a revision

Anchorage's proposed tax break for first-time buyers of new homes would reach pricier houses under a revised version up Tuesday, ending a cutoff at the average.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Students wait for the bus on the shoulder of Rabbit Creek Road

Kids wait for school buses on the shoulder of Rabbit Creek Road, where traffic runs 52 in a 45. The state is studying whether to build them a path.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min readFrom Jul 1

A Wainwright corporation will sweep Energy Department offices for bugs

A Wainwright village corporation's subsidiary will sweep Energy Department offices for hidden microphones and cameras, under a $2.35 million contract.

by Melinda Communities.News1mo ago1 min read

Wasilla council commits to planning a regional dispatch center outside city limits

Wasilla agreed to help plan moving its emergency dispatch center out of town. The reason for the hurry is a fire station going up on Bogard Road.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Follows: Wasilla weighs $569,600 for round-the-clock Fire/EMS dispatch at MatCom

Wasilla council pulls airport master plan from introduction, delays public hearing

Wasilla's council postponed but didn't drop a plan to nearly double its airport runway, from 3,700 feet toward 6,000, at an estimated $279 million.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Follows: Wasilla weighs a plan to nearly double its airport runway

Seward council approves five-year lease moving food pantry to senior center

Seward City Council approved a five-year lease moving He Will Provide Food Pantry from City Hall Annex to the senior center starting Jan. 1, 2027, gaining more space and a better kitchen.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Troopers identify driver who left Ester street light crash

Alaska State Troopers identified a driver who knocked down a street light near Chena Ridge Road in Ester and left the scene without reporting the crash.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Talkeetna residents ask Mat-Su commission to oppose Front Street water tank site

Talkeetna's wells have too much arsenic. The borough's fix would clear 1.4 acres of woods with a bear trail through it, and neighbors want another site.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Search resumes on Kasilof River for man missing after boat overturns

A 67-year-old Kasilof man is missing after his boat overturned on the Kasilof River Sunday. The search resumed Monday by air, boat and on foot.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

State moves to permit an antimony ore crusher near Port MacKenzie

The state tentatively approved an air permit for an antimony ore crusher near Port MacKenzie, without publishing any estimate of what it would put into the air.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Fire at Whittier's new cruise terminal forces ships from the dock

A fire at Whittier's new cruise terminal Monday forced a tour boat and a cruise ship off the dock and closed the only road into town for hours. No one was hurt.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

APD's new drone notice leaves annual-report questions unanswered

APD disclosed a drone at Sunday's standoff, but the five-line notice leaves the warrant and footage questions missing from its annual report

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Anchorage can build housing with this grant now. Residents asked for teardowns

Congress just let Anchorage spend block grant money on new housing for the first time in 50 years. The residents who showed up asked for demolitions.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Alaska has $272 million to change rural health care. The requests reached $2.5 billion.

Alaska has 217 preliminary rural health awards worth about $209 million — enough to replace equipment and add services, but not to replace Medicaid coverage.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago4 min read

Anchorage put $100,000 into five public art projects, Hillside mural among them

Anchorage is putting $100,000 into five public art projects, including a Hillside mural its arts commission ranked first among eight applicants.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Anchorage seeks ideas for its Darwin sister-city partnership

Anchorage residents can suggest what the city should do with Darwin, Australia, its sister city since 1982. Ideas are due to the commission by Sept. 30.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

A Merrill Field WWII memorial crumbles with no one responsible

A WWII memorial at Merrill Field is cracking and dark, repairs run about $100,000, and the only money in sight is a $17,000 grant meant for something else.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Anchorage assessment appeals hit a record, and the board filled up to cope

Anchorage owners filed a record 1,990 assessment appeals this year, quadruple last year's, and the board filled every seat for the first time in 20 years.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago1 min read

Follows: Anchorage tax appeal hearings continue into September, past the board's stated season

Kodiak staff urge keeping Beaver Lake land as the borough hunts for housing sites

Kodiak's manager wants to open Beaver Lake land to housing. The borough's own planning staff say keep it — and the commission said no in 2019.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Anchorage coded most sampled spending to the wrong account, audit finds

Anchorage miscoded 72% of sampled spending, an audit found — because nobody ever wrote down what the city's accounting categories actually mean.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min readFrom Aug 13

The court found an obvious error in his commitment and upheld it anyway

Alaska's Supreme Court found an obvious error in a homeless man's commitment and upheld it anyway. The ruling came two and a half years after he was released.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago3 min read

Anchorage police shoot carjacking suspect after East 37th Avenue standoff

Anchorage police say the man officers shot on East 37th Avenue had, hours earlier, pistol-whipped an older man unconscious and stolen his truck.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Fairbanks votes Oct. 6 on capping taxes, moving elections and hand counts

Fairbanks voters decide Oct. 6 whether to cap borough taxes, move elections to November and count ballots by hand. Any of it locks for two years.

by Maggie AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min read

Mat-Su considers banning plate readers before it has them

Mat-Su votes Tuesday on banning license plate readers it doesn't own — the same night Anchorage debates regulating the ones it already has.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min readFrom Sep 1

South Anchorage council asks state and city for interim school-route safety projects

Fifteen pedestrians were killed on Alaska roads last year, the highest rate in a decade. One Anchorage council is asking for whatever can be done fast.

by Walter AlaskaNews1mo ago2 min readFrom Aug 24

The any-bull option closes in Unit 13C after three moose filled the quota

The any-bull option closes in Unit 13C at midnight Tuesday after three bulls filled the quota. The subunit's allotment dropped from five last year.

by Bill AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min read

Troopers find two asleep in sedan towing stacked logs, cocaine in driver's lap

Troopers pulled alongside a log-hauling sedan in Soldotna and found the driver and passenger asleep, cocaine in his lap, they say. He's presumed innocent.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min read

Water damage in the Kenai Senior Center overhang halts work and adds $45,000

Contractors reroofing the Kenai Senior Center entry found rot underneath. Everything but the beams comes off, and the city needs $45,000 to finish.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min read

Wind gusts to 50 mph are coming, and the trees still have their leaves

Wind gusts to 50 mph hit Anchorage from Tuesday morning through Wednesday. The trees still have their leaves, which is how the outages happen.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min read

Mat-Su power bills climb about $15 a month, with more increases expected

Mat-Su electric bills rose about $14.50 a month this quarter as power costs climbed, and the co-op expects about 5% annual increases for three years.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min read

Kodiak's only bid to replace a key sewage station came in at twice the estimate

The only bid to replace the pump station handling 80% of Kodiak's sewage came in at $16.3 million — more than double the city's estimate of $7.2 million.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago2 min readFrom Sep 10

A builder across from a Soldotna school pushed its snow into the street

A builder across from a Soldotna elementary school left no room for snow, so it went into the street. The city says snow storage is required.

by Walter AlaskaNews2mo ago1 min readFrom Sep 9