Category: Alaska News

An Oregon couple has sued a kennel founded by Iditarod winner Susan Butcher, saying they were injured during a 2024 dogsled tour.

Randall and Philippa Hall filed suit in Fairbanks Superior Court on Thursday against Trail Breaker Kennel of Fairbanks. 

According to the complaint, the Halls were riding in a sled basket during a tour and were “thrown to the ground” after their sled “hit a hazard that was on or at the edge of the trail, causing the sled to overturn.”

The lawsuit claims the crash was the result of the kennel and its employees and that the Halls suffered injuries that required medical treatment and caused long-term effects. 

The complaint does not specify their injuries but asks for unspecified monetary damages to be awarded at trial. 

The Halls’ attorney, Douglas Johnson of Anchorage, did not return a phone call seeking more information about the case.

Under Alaska law, victims have two years to file personal injury claims before the statute of limitations takes effect. The Halls’ case was filed 11 days before the 2-year mark. 

Tekla Monson is the eldest daughter of Butcher and David Monson and the owner of the kennel. 

Reached by cellphone on Friday, she said she was aware of the 2024 accident but wasn’t aware of the lawsuit until contacted by the Beacon and declined comment.

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The U.S. Forest Service has initiated a revision of the Tongass National Forest plan. 

At stake is whether the Forest Service will continue to shift its management strategy in support of a resilient climate, thriving Indigenous cultures, healthy fisheries, recreation, tourism and forest restoration — or whether it will backslide and try to bring back a bygone, unsustainable era focused on clearcutting the Tongass’ ancient trees at the expense of the communities and wildlife that depend on a healthy forest. 

Members of the public may weigh in on how they think the forest should be managed and what should be included in the environmental review accompanying the plan. One public comment period is just closing, but more comment opportunities are likely in the coming months.

Every national forest in the United States is governed by a Land Management Plan, also called a Forest Plan, in accordance with the National Forest Management Act of 1976. The Tongass National Forest Plan was originally developed over 25 years ago, in 1997, and was most recently amended in 2016. Forest plans provide a guide for future forest management by creating standards for projects and activities and identifying areas where those activities are appropriate. They must be revised every 15 years. 

This current Tongass plan revision process began in 2023 with initial listening sessions. We are now at the onset of developing an environmental analysis to look at different alternatives for managing the forest. The Forest Service is seeking public input to help guide the draft revised plan and the draft environmental impact statement, expected this fall.

Over the last several years, the Forest Service has made strides toward focusing its forest management approach on protecting the globally-important values of the Tongass National Forest while supporting communities in the region. It has done this by keeping the old-growth trees standing to store carbon as a bulwark against climate change, which supports Alaska Native ways of life and benefits healthy fish and wildlife populations that are important to locals as well as the millions of visitors that come to the region each year to enjoy this unique landscape. 

Earthjustice, the nonprofit environmental law organization, wants to see the Forest Service continue this approach in its revised forest plan and protect the old-growth trees of the Tongass, facilitate co-stewardship opportunities for Alaska Native tribes,and support recreation along with the region’s fishing and tourism economies. The alternative – a return to large-scale clearcutting of old-growth trees – costs taxpayers millions of dollars in subsidies to support a relict industry and harms sustainable economies and other uses of the forest that are important to the region today.

The threats to the Tongass’s wild, intact ecosystems have grown under this administration. The agency said it will ensure the plan is consistent with two forest executive orders, E.O. 14153, “Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential” and E.O. 14225, “Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production” aimed at maximizing mineral extraction and logging in Alaska.

 And then there’s the proposed repeal of the Roadless Rule, which safeguards our wildest national forest lands – including 9 million acres of the Tongass – against industrial logging and roadbuilding. Soon we should see the agency’s proposed rule and draft Environmental Impact Statement repealing roadless protections on the Tongass, the Chugach National Forest and many other unroaded forest lands in the Lower 48 – stripping protections potentially from a total of 45 million acres in national forests across 36 states and Puerto Rico.

 All of this is happening at a time when commercial timber sales on the Tongass are beginning to ramp up again, including large, old-growth sales. The Forest Service is reviving a massive old-growth logging project that covers more than 40,000 acres on the southern part of Revilla Island east of Ketchikan in the Tongass. The Forest Service’s own analysis for the timber sale shows that the trees are worth more standing than they are cut down; none of the old-growth logging proposals considered in the South Revilla analysis are projected to appraise positively, meaning they would cost more to taxpayers than they would bring in.

More large, old-growth sales can be expected if the Roadless Rule is successfully repealed.

Instead of taking these steps backward and putting the old-growth forests and roadless areas of the Tongass on the chopping block, the Forest Service should continue the direction of recent years. Protecting the old-growth trees and roadless areas of the forest makes sense for the climate, the region’s economy, and the people who live here.  

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An Alaska Superior Court Judge has set a new trial date for former Rep. Gabrielle LeDoux, R-Anchorage. 

LeDoux, who was accused of elections misconduct in 2020, will face trial in June, according to an order signed Feb. 24 by judges Catherine Easter and Thomas Matthews. A preliminary hearing will take place May 5.

The state’s case against the Anchorage Republican has been repeatedly delayed — first by the COVID-19 pandemic emergency and then by procedural issues.

It reached trial in 2024, but that ended in a mistrial after the jury deadlocked on all 12 counts facing LeDoux. Jurors were unable to decide whether LeDoux had illegally tried to convince people to vote in her district despite knowing they lived outside her district.

Two of LeDoux’s former associates, Lisa Simpson and Simpson’s son Caden Vaught, reached plea deals with prosecutors and testified against the former legislator.

Since the mistrial, prosecutors and the defense have been arguing about the proper language of jury instructions for the next trial. Judge Josie Garton issued an order on that issue on Feb. 17, clearing the way for the trial to proceed.

LeDoux represented Kodiak in the Alaska House from 2005 to 2009 and an Anchorage district from 2013 to 2021.

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Representatives of major oil field operators on Alaska’s North Slope said Thursday they are bullish on the region’s future as a major producer for decades to come. Their optimism was reinforced in part by a record-breaking oil and gas lease sale held this week by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

For ConocoPhillips, Alaska’s largest oil producer, the most prominent source of future development is the company’s massive Willow project, said Marc Lemons, the company’s Alaska vice president of development and execution.

“Willow is a once-in-a-generation project,” Lemons said in a presentation at Meet Alaska, an Anchorage conference held annually by the Alaska Support Industry Alliance, a trade organization.

Willow, a project in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska on the western side of the North Slope, is set to tap into reserves estimated about 600 million barrels, with production peaking at 180,000 barrels a day, according to company estimates.

Lemons said the company is devoting $8.5 billion to $9 billion to Willow development. The project is about halfway to completion and on track to start producing oil in early 2029, he said.

Meanwhile, Lemons said, smaller projects will also boost North Slope output.

ConocoPhillips’ Nuna field started producing in 2024, with output that is now about 10,000 barrels a day but is expected to be double that in the future, he said. Next up for ConocoPhillips is boosted production at the neighboring Coyote field, where peak production is expected to be 13,000 barrels a day, he said. Another development, Narwal, is located near the large Alpine field, and ConocoPhillips continues to invest in its longstanding program to produce oil from West Sak, a reservoir within the Kuparuk region.

A busy exploration season is also underway to find the next generational project, he said.

“We have one of the largest exploration seasons planned in many years,” he said. It includes seismic surveys and drilling within the National Petroleum Reserve.

ConocoPhillips was one of the major participants in the just-completed federal lease sale held in the National Petroleum Reserve. The sale drew a record $163 million in high bids, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced on Wednesday.

Lemons said continued exploration in the petroleum reserve is a high priority for ConocoPhillips.

“Exploration is a 10- to 20-year play, and it is high risk,” he said. “But it’s necessary for the long-term stability of the North Slope.”

For Santos, an Australian company, the next expected milestone will be the startup this year of production at the huge Pikka field.

Pete Laliberte, Santos’ vice president of business development, said the first phase of Pikka’s development will tap into reserves of about 400 million barrels, with production peaking at 80,000 barrels per day.

Future phases of Pikka development are expected to tap into an even bigger resource, he said. “We’re just getting started” he said.

Laliberte said optimism about future North Slope oil prospects is seen in other companies’ actions.

The geologic feature called the Brookian Sequence, which includes the oil-bearing Nanushuk Formation, has been “driving the overall, like, renaissance on the Slope,” he said. Santos and other companies have shown they can be successful at drilling there, and the wider industry has taken notice, as demonstrated in the record National Petroleum Reserve lease sale.

“Right now, all of a sudden you’ve got a lot of international companies, and the big ones, taking notice of this and taking notice of the, and taking notice of the Brookian plays,” he said.

The Spanish company Repsol, which is Santos’ partner in Pikka, was one of the major bidders in the lease sale. In partnership with a Royal Dutch Shell subsidiary, Repsol bid about $90 million in the sale, according to preliminary results.

For Hilcorp, the privately held independent energy company that since 2020 has been the operator of the Prudhoe Bay field, the concept of development expansion is different.

As company vice president Denali Kemppel described it to the Alliance audience, Hilcorp’s longstanding business strategy has focused on revival of old legacy fields that larger companies sell off.

That has been the case on the North Slope, where Hilcorp began acquiring assets and operator positions from BP since 2014. When BP departed the state in 2020, it sold all of its remaining Alaska assets to Hilcorp, including its share of Prudhoe and the Trans Alaska Pipeline System.

Although its assets are old, Hilcorp is in the midst of a renewal program that is boosting their output, Kemppel said.

Part of that program is a project reinvigorating the Prudhoe Bay field. Called Project Taiga, it is a collaboration between Hilcorp and the other Prudhoe partners, ConocoPhillips and

“It involves building new roads, building new pads, infrastructure,” she said. “And so when we think about Project Taiga, what we think about is potentially 150 to 200 new drill wells. We think about, potentially a billion barrels of oil.” She said that new oil will be potentially starting to flow in 2028.

Hilcorp has also demonstrated success at Milne Point, a BP-developed field that the smaller company began operating in 2014, Kemppel said.

Since Hilcorp took over, Milne Point’s production has tripled from 2014 levels, she said. “We think this is just a real success story for the North Slope,” she said.

The oil revenue and production forecast crafted by state officials reflects the companies’ optimism.

A revised forecast issued earlier this month by the Alaska Department of Revenue anticipates a significant increase in North Slope oil production in the coming year. Production that is expected to average 457,000 barrels per day for the 12 months ending on June 30 is expected to increase to an average 517,800 barrels per day for the coming fiscal year, largely because of Pikka’s startup, according to the forecast.

North Slope production is expected to rise to an average 678,800 barrels per day by fiscal year 2034, thanks in large part to both Pikka and Willow, according to the new forecast.

While expected 2034 production is much lower than the 2 million barrel-per-day peak achieved on the North Slope in 1988, it is higher than production in all the years since 2009, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. 

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The operator of Alaska’s massive Red Dog mine says it wants to use the sun to help power the sprawling zinc operation, which currently burns expensive, imported fossil fuels.

If built, a newly proposed 8.8-megawatt solar farm at Red Dog would have slightly more capacity than the state’s largest existing farm, in the Susitna Valley north of Anchorage.

Unlike some of the state’s other large mines, Red Dog is completely off grid in a remote area of Northwest Alaska, hundreds of miles from the gas-, coal-, and oil-fired plants that power urban areas. That means the mine relies on millions of gallons a year of pricey, barged-in diesel for energy.

The new solar array and an accompanying battery system, according to mine operator Teck Resources, would boost energy supply in summer months, when power demand surges. And it’s expected to lower costs by reducing the amount of diesel Red Dog burns — roughly 40,000 gallons each day.

The project also aims to curb Red Dog’s greenhouse gas emissions — a company-wide goal for Teck and other global mining corporations.

The solar farm would be built at a pivotal moment for the mine.

Red Dog has been a major economic driver in rural Northwest Alaska for some three decades, sustaining high-paying jobs and substantial revenue for the borough government. But it’s running low on ore and is slated to close in 2032.

To keep the mine running, Teck has been studying whether tapping into two new mineral deposits could be profitable. The company plans to spend between $150 million and $180 million on the extension project this year alone. And future power demand is expected to exceed existing supply, the company said in a recent submission to state regulators.

The solar array could add capacity if the company decides to mine the new deposits. But it also would support mine closure, Teck said. After Red Dog stops operating, the company expects to continue treating more than one billion gallons of wastewater annually, according to the mine’s reclamation plans.

The solar farm would supply about 2 megawatts of electricity during the summer, according to Teck. That’s a fraction of the roughly 25 megawatts that Red Dog typically needs.

But “it is currently the most direct, achievable, and timely option for delivering a meaningful portion of required capacity,” Teck said.

The project would “return the most value” if Teck extends the mine’s life, a company spokesperson, Treena Wood, said in an email. But the extension project “must still advance through the planned project stages” independent of the solar proposal, she added.

Teck still anticipates a few more years of exploratory drilling and analysis before deciding whether to move ahead with the extension.

The solar farm, however, would likely happen a lot sooner: Teck wants construction to start by June. That’s a crucial deadline because lucrative federal tax credits created under the Biden administration expire in July — and without those incentives, the solar farm would not be financially viable, according to Teck.

Teck’s rush echoes a separate push by Anchorage’s urban utility, Chugach Electric Association, to build a solar farm on the west side of Cook Inlet in time to qualify for the credits. That project could produce up to 10 megawatts of power.

Other, larger-scale renewable energy projects — namely big wind farms — have stalled in Alaska as federal support and investment opportunities have dried up under the Trump administration.

But Red Dog’s proposal aligns with a global trend of mining companies moving away from fossil fuels to power their operations. And it shows that even in a political climate hostile to wind and solar, renewables are still attractive purely for economic reasons, according to Phil Wight, an energy historian and professor at University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Teck’s plans offer a glimpse of “what is economically rational in the private sector,” he said.

Other large mining companies operating in Alaska have warned in recent years that the state’s high energy costs and reliance on fossil fuels could thwart future investment.

Mines use huge amounts of energy to dig up ore and then crush and grind it to separate out valuable minerals. They’re among the state’s biggest power consumers. And electricity is among their biggest operating expenses.

Looking to cut costs, some companies that operate Alaska mines have been encouraging the state’s cooperatively-owned urban utilities — particularly in the Interior, where the grid runs partly on pricey, oil-based fuel — to expand their limited use of wind and solar power.

Red Dog would be the first large mine in the state to draw substantial energy from an on-site solar array.

The farm would span 30 acres, partly on land owned by Northwest Alaska’s regional Native-owned corporation, NANA.

A Canadian company, Tugliq Energy, would build and operate the project, according to Teck.

Teck and Tugliq are working out a contract that would set the price and other terms of power purchases, said Wood, the Teck spokesperson.

Tugliq is responsible for funding the project, she added. She declined to provide a cost estimate.

Northern Journal contributor Max Graham can be reached at max@northernjournal.com. He’s interested in any and all mining related stories, as well as introductory meetings with people in and around the industry.

This article was originally published in Northern Journal, a newsletter from Nathaniel Herz. Subscribe at this link.

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Alaska Division of Parks managers will enforce a tour-permit regulation prohibiting large buses in the Chilkoot Corridor this year. 

The change dates back two years, when the Alaska Division of Parks announced a new commercial tour-permit regulation prohibiting buses with capacity over 15 passengers in the Chilkoot Lake State Recreation Site. 

Regional parks superintendent Brady Garasky said this week that state parks told permit holders the enforcement would begin in 2025, but decided to extend the sunset period an additional year because of  “feedback from operators.” 

That meant last year, tour operators like Alaska Mountain Guides and the Chilkoot Indian Association’s Alaska Nature Tours could continue to run school buses through the popular tourist destination, with the understanding that in 2026 the vehicles would be prohibited.

Garasky said all commercial operators were notified of the initial permit stipulation and of the extension. 

The Chilkoot area has long been a point of contention with multiple user groups, both local and tourists, vying for limited space. 

The corridor, from the bridge at the mouth of the Chilkoot River up to the lake, is also a popular, but unofficial, bear-viewing area. 

Last summer a sow with four cubs drew big crowds, including instances of tour buses stopping in the road to let passengers out for bear-viewing, which Garasky at the time said was a permit violation. 

The stated rationale for the change, however, isn’t just about bears, Garasky said, and the goal won’t be to lower the overall number of visitors at the park. Rather, state parks staff hope requiring smaller vehicles will disperse visitors along the corridor and ease congestion issues. 

Large buses dropped off big crowds in concentrated areas, and the vehicles themselves took up multiple parking spaces and area on the road. In some instances those vehicles blocked access for other users like anglers, who were unable to find parking, Garasky said. 

Parking could yet be a challenge if tour operators replace buses with multiple smaller vehicles. 

Large bus operators have not said what their plans are. 

The Chilkoot Indian Association’s Zach Wentzel, who heads CIA’s tourism initiative Discover Deishu, said he would not talk about the permit stipulation or plans for the Alaska Nature Tours vehicle fleet. 

Alaska Mountain Guides also declined to comment. 

Other local tour operators said they would be unaffected. Karen Hess said she and her husband Duck would no longer be operating tours, and Joe Ordonez of Rainbow Glacier Adventures said all of his company’s existing vehicles were below the size limit. 

In addition to the congestion challenge, the change is also being pitched as a benefit for the road infrastructure itself, which Garasky said was not built for heavy vehicles and shoulders and culverts are showing signs of wear. 

The large-vehicle ban only applies to commercial tour permit holders. Non-commercial users can still drive personal-use large vehicles into the recreation site. 

Garasky said that for the time being, the large-vehicle ban is likely to be the only major change to area regulations. 

“This is a fairly significant change to the commercial operating stipulations so we want to give it time to monitor it and see if it has the intended impact,” Garasky said. 

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The Alaska State Board of Education moved to establish a special committee to review ongoing issues and make recommendations to improve operations at the state-run boarding school, Mt. Edgecumbe High School.

After a turbulent year of budget cuts, staff and administrative changes and more than 100 students disenrolling this year, a delegation of lawmakers made an impromptu visit to the school in February to investigate. Legislators have pressed school officials and the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development, which operates the school, for explanations and improvements. Their interest has spotlighted the school’s ongoing maintenance needs and sparked a conversation about ways to increase support for remaining students.

The state Board of Education is charged with administering the school, along with DEED. The school normally serves roughly 400 students, the majority of whom are Alaska Native and from rural communities across the state.  

After hearing a presentation about the issues at Mt. Edgecumbe at their annual meeting in Juneau on Mar. 10, board members voted unanimously to establish an ad-hoc committee. The committee will be tasked with reviewing concerns related to student disenrollment, student services, academic performance and school climate before it presents recommendations to the full board in October. 

After the vote, board chair Sally Stockhausen said the new committee will interface with the board and the current local Mt Edgecumbe High School Advisory Board — a local board that advises the superintendent. The specifics will be negotiated in the coming weeks and months.

“This is brand new. We’re going to figure it out,” Stockhausen said. “My basic understanding is they will come to us with recommendations, and then we’ll decide how that’s going to work, and if and what type of action we’ll take based on that.”

Within the next 30 days, officials with DEED will be tasked with assembling the new committee. It may include representatives from the local advisory board, parents, students, staff members, alumni, an education expert and tribal representatives.

On Monday, Stockhausen appeared before members of the House Education Committee as part of the confirmation process for her reappointment for another five year term on the state board. She answered some questions about the board’s oversight of Mt. Edgecumbe High School, and said board members are working to improve communication with the school. 

“We used to always have the superintendent come and give a verbal report. And at some point it kind of just shifted, and it became, we would get written reports. So we did ask for that to come back,” she said.

Stockhausen said she’s also requested updates from the local advisory board to the full state board of education.  

“The advisory board’s role is to advise the superintendent, but it would be good, I think, to add a component where that could come back to us,” Stockhausen said. “We just need some communication improvements.”

Board hears update on conditions at Mt. Edgecumbe

Mt. Edgecumbe High School Superintendent David Langford and Deena Bishop, state education commissioner, have given a series of presentations to lawmakers in recent weeks following legislator’s visit to the school on the conditions and improvements being made at the high school.

On Mar. 10, they gave a similar presentation to the state board, which is charged with managing the school. 

Langford and Bishop described the state’s recent efforts to address the school’s budget deficit and maintenance needs at the school this year, after budget cuts, reductions to staff and a change in administration last year.  

Langford said those efforts include significant upgrades to the kitchen, dorms and common areas, and more facilities upgrades are planned for this summer, including replacing dorm roofs and ventilation systems. DEED also hired a new contractor to run the residential dorms, and have created more opportunities for student input and leadership in school operations.

“This is a problem decades in the making of funding not coming through, projects not being managed, maintenance not being kept up, and funding being cut. I think six, seven years ago, we had seven maintenance people, and today we have one-and-a-half,” Langford told the board on Mar. 10. “And keeping up with a campus that size, with one and a half people, they do an amazing job, but they just can’t do everything that needs to be done. So it is a funding issue for Mt. Edgecumbe.”

Bishop emphasized that the administration is making improvements, and the school is moving in a positive direction. 

“A lot of school issues are adult issues and not children issues,” Bishop told the board, pointing to management of the school. “I would say a lot of these concerns were more about adults than they were students and what they were receiving. So I do believe that you know that we’re moving forward with sorting out the adult issues, and moving forward in the right direction for kids.”

Following the board meeting, board member and Mt. Edgecumbe alumni Pamela Dupras said she was shocked by the photos Langford presented of school facilities before some upgrades were made in August, including rusted kitchen appliances, leaks, and broken and worn dorm furniture. 

“A picture is worth a thousand words, and I was shocked to see the condition of the dormitory, the kitchen, and within a short period of time that has been resolved,” Dupras said. “So I’m curious to see, I want to know what the deeper story is and why this is necessary. So I am glad that we will have an ad hoc committee that can look further into it.”

Stockhausen said in an interview at the meeting only that the maintenance needs had been “longstanding,” and that the ad-hoc committee will be reviewing them. She said she has confidence in Langford managing improvements. “I think Mr. Langford is doing an outstanding job addressing all of those, and it’s just a steady, steady improvement,” she said. 

Lawmakers and the local advisory board have raised concerns about Langford being superintendent of both Mt. Edgecumbe and the Chatham School District, which serves approximately 175 students across rural schools in Southeast Alaska, particularly considering the challenges at Mt. Edgecumbe. 

Langford has maintained he is able to fulfill the duties of both roles of superintendent. At the board meeting, Langford said in an interview he is looking forward to working with the new ad-hoc committee.

“I’m very, very hopeful that all the attention is going to result in really good things for the school and for the students,” he said. “One of their directives is to investigate academic performance, which I think is really important, and maybe something really good can come from that. And they’re also tasked with looking at buildings and funding and all the current issues that we’re addressing. So I don’t see any problem with it at all. So looking forward to having people come and visit and go through the school and give recommendations.”

But Langford admitted reporting to four school boards is a challenge. He currently reports to the state board of education, the local advisory board, the new ad-hoc committee, as well as the Chatham school board.

“All these boards, that’s probably the hardest part of my job,” Langford said, and added that he was attending the two-day state board meeting and also attending the Chatham school board meeting taking place online in the evening. “So yeah, that part of it is a bit much. But okay, it’s part of the job. I’m up for it. People have a right to have their voices heard and be a part of the process. So I’m happy for that.”

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Members of Mt. Edgecumbe High School’s local advisory board are urging the state to re-open hiring for the superintendent of the state-run boarding school. 

In a Mar. 6 letter, the local board asked the Alaska State Board of Education and the education commissioner to immediately re-open the superintendent position. The state board is responsible for overseeing the school, and the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development is charged with operating the high school. 

Last year, DEED launched a superintendent hiring search after a group of Mt. Edgecumbe teachers and staff wrote a letter of no confidence in the former superintendent, who then resigned. DEED hired David Langford to serve as superintendent starting in July. 

Local advisory board members said in the letter they were not consulted in DEED’s hiring process, as required by policy. “We believe the position should be filled through a thorough, equitable and transparent hiring process,” they wrote. 

In the year since Langford’s hire, the school officials made significant budget and staff cuts, hired a new contractor running the student dorms, and seen a wave of student disenrollments prompting lawmakers to make an impromptu visit and spotlight maintenance needs, student services and public attention on the school. 

The local board also raised concerns that Langford is superintendent of both the Chatham School District and Mt. Edgecumbe High School at the same time. That means he is directing Mt. Edgecumbe High School through a period of change and challenges, while at the same time managing the Chatham School District, which serves approximately 175 students across four Southeast Alaska communities. 

“Additionally, we believe that it is imperative to assert that the Superintendent for MEHS remain a sole and dedicated role and not have shared leadership responsibilities of any other schools or districts, so that the full attention and undivided professional focus needed can be committed to this position,” the letter said. 

Members of the local board did not immediately respond to an interview request on Thursday.

Sally Stockhausen, chair of the state board of education, responded to the local board in a letter on Mar. 13, and said that a new special committee created by the board will be reviewing its concerns, gathering input and reviewing options including issues related to governance and leadership. 

At the state board meeting in Juneau on Mar. 10, board member Pamela Dupras, also a Mt. Edgecumbe High School alumni, asked Deena Bishop, education commissioner Langford to address the request and ongoing concerns. 

“Because we have been receiving emails, and the emails ask for recall for the superintendent, and then the second part of that was the committee,” Dupras said, referring to the new committee to focus on the school. 

Langford acknowledged the local board had wanted to have input in his hiring process. He said he was first hired by the Chatham School District and later learned about the issues at Mt. Edgecumbe and wanted to help. Last month, Langford testified to lawmakers that he was approached by former Wasilla Sen. Mike Shower to run both districts. 

Langford said he only agreed to sign on to both superintendent roles with the permission of the board of Chatham School District. 

“From my perspective, it’s worked out very, very well. I think Chatham has a lot of benefits, having me being closely connected to DEED and all of you,” he told the state board. “Just being the superintendent of Chatham, I probably wouldn’t be sitting here right now. So that’s been a really big benefit.”

Bishop told the state board she addressed some of the local advisory board’s concerns at their last meeting on Feb. 26. But she said re-opening superintendent hiring would be a “critical error,” and defended Langford’s experience and leadership.

“Folks that know me know when there’s time to hire we do engage a larger group. But this was critical. School needed to be opened,” she said.

Bishop said the department rushed to hire Langford and make several needed facilities improvements in order to open the school in August, including upgrades to the kitchen and student dorms. 

“So mistakes were made. We rushed on some things, not on others, but I think we’re moving forward in a great place. And I respect people’s opinions. I’ve read that letter as well,” she said.

Bishop said she understands the local advisory board’s concerns, and acknowledged that they had no input in hiring, but asked for time and trust in Langford to continue as superintendent. 

“I would just ask parents, I would ask community members, I would ask legislators, as I have, to investigate a little bit more and see — are we moving forward with good things for young people? And we are. Are we working through the issues adults have? We are. But I don’t want adult concerns and issues to overshadow what we do for children, and what we are held to do with this mission of education.”

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