Jess Beattie and Savannah (Sven) Cuthbertson, now Beattie, were married on the Klehini River on Aug. 3. Jess wore a psychedelic floral shirt. Sven, a stunning wedding gown and Xtra Tuffs. The party set out from 36 Mile Haines Highway in nine rafts and two packrafts in search of the ideal location. The Beatties found the perfect delta…
20 years ago:
Haines and Klukwan schools were among 304 statewide that met adequate yearly progress (AYP) requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act. The state Department of Education announced the results this month, along with a list of the 193 schools that failed to demonstrate adequate proficiency.
Haines students have exceeded math and language proficiency requirements in each of the three years that testing has been mandated, said superintendent Charlie Jones. “We’re…
It’s not news that political campaigns are rife with bogus ads, fake stories, and unsubstantiated attacks, but the level of subterfuge in this election cycle has unfortunately reset the bar. A Republican-backed super PAC is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to create and post mailers in support of someone named Carol Hafner, who is listed as a Democrat on the Alaska Senate race ballot, despite living in South Dakota. Hafner’s son Eric, supposedly running…
Readers may have received mailers promoting Carol Hafner as a progressive Democrat for the U.S. Senate in Alaska and attacking candidate Mary Peltola as a “MAGA lite.”
Trouble is, Hafner has never visited or lived in Alaska. A quick search online reveals that she has made other longshot forays into politics in both Alaska and Wyoming, taking about 14% in the Democratic primaries there. It’s also a family affair: her son Eric is simultaneously running…
My name is Jeff Ivaniszek, and my family has a cottage on Lutak Spur Road. I would like to remind folks about bear safety. Please remember that bears are wild animals and not pets. Give them distance, especially sows with cubs. I’m worried that someone is going to get hurt at the Chilkoot River bridge or while fishing in the river. And please remember your bear spray and hike/fish with other people.
Thank you for…
Sunday, August 2
A citizen turned in a found debit card on the Haines Highway. The owner was contacted and picked up the card.
A caller at 31.5 mile on the Haines Highway requested information and updates about wildfires.
A caller on FAA road reported a person tried to shoot a bear in front of their house.
A caller in the 300 block of Lynnview Drive reported a loud, intoxicated person in the area.
An…
Former mayors back in the race
Former mayors Doug Olerud and Jan Hill are seeking a return to office.
Olerud and Hill are the only candidates so far to officially enter the race for mayor. That could yet change, and individuals have until Aug.…
In addition to banning outhouses in the townsite, the Haines Borough assembly also approved a 30-day window for letters of interest in managing the Port Chilkoot Dock. The body also discussed potential conditional use permit fees for heliports during its two-hour meeting on Tuesday.
Bears
By: Yereth Rosen, Alaska Beacon
Gov. Mike Dunleavy on Wednesday introduced a new natural gas pipeline bill that he characterized as a compromise between conflicting philosophies on oil and gas taxes that he wants lawmakers to pass during the ongoing special session.
The new bill would nearly eliminate property taxes that would be charged on the operator of a yet-to-be-built gas pipeline. Dunleavy and Glenfarne, the Texas-based investment company that is now the main sponsor of the gas pipeline project, have argued in recent months that such concessions are a major requirement for the project to be built.
The special session is due to end in less than two weeks. Lawmakers are still evaluating the proposal, but on Monday members of the Senate’s bipartisan majority expressed reticence to make quick decisions on a gasline bill.
Dunleavy’s new bill contains a concession to a tax previously sought by the Senate majority. It would also impose a small corporate income tax on certain private oil- and gas-producing corporations. Those companies, also known as S corporations or pass-through corporations, are currently exempted from such taxes in Alaska law. For now, the main corporation that would be affected is Hilcorp, a privately held Texas-based company that operated the Prudhoe Bay field and other North Slope assets that used to be owned by BP. Several legislators view Hilcorp’s exemption from corporate income taxes as a loophole that should be closed.
The governor said legislators should pass his bill in what is now the third special session he has called on the subject.
“I have never been in favor of new taxes on Alaska’s producers, and I still am not,” Dunleavy said in a statement. “This bill is a compromise that removes a significant barrier to moving the gas line forward. Given the robust discussion and work that has already gone into this bill, I am hopeful the legislature can swiftly pass a bill that will help the AK LNG project get the financing it needs to start construction as soon as possible.”
The 2% tax rate Dunleavy proposed on petroleum-producing S corporations is significantly lower than the lower than tax rates legislative leaders have previously proposed, which went up as high as 9.4%.
Officials and energy companies in Alaska and elsewhere have been pushing since the 1970s — even before oil began flowing through the Trans Alaska Pipeline System — for a second pipeline to deliver the North Slope’s vast but stranded natural gas resources to markets. None of the plans has been economically feasible, even though politicians at various points over the past decades declared that construction was imminent.
The current iteration of the gas commercialization plan calls for a pipeline to run about 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay to tidewater at Cook Inlet, where the product would be liquefied for shipment by tanker to markets. The estimated price tag is $65 billion to $70 billion, according to legislators.
A bill considered during an earlier special session, House Bill 381, proposed to grant the property tax concession, but it also included several conditions for any LNG sponsor to meet, such as timeline assurances, labor protections, alternative sources of state revenue and required financial support of local school districts.
The bill also included a bracketed income tax with rates up to 9.4% on petroleum-producing S corporations such as Hilcorp — significantly higher than the 2% that Dunleavy is now proposing.
That bill passed the state Senate narrowly last month but was rejected by the House.
One lawmaker on Wednesday said Dunleavy’s new bill, just like any oil tax legislation, should not be rushed.
“It would be wildly irresponsible to pass complex oil and gas legislation without due diligence to understand the consequences,” said Rep. Zack Fields, D-Anchorage.
Leaders of the state Senate majority caucus, in a statement on Monday, expressed skepticism about the need for any further concessions to help Glenfarne’s plan.
“For more than fifty years, Alaskans have worked to bring our gas to market, and every member who has served in this building shares that goal. The Senate has done its part in good faith, passing two bills that would let this project move forward while protecting the people we answer to,” Senate President Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, said in the statement. “A decision of this scale will outlast all of us, and it deserves to be made with care rather than in haste. We are ready to evaluate the project further once the producer, Glenfarne, and the Administration bring us the numbers this year. These are Alaska’s resources, and they must work first and foremost for Alaskans.”
The special session is scheduled to end on Aug. 25.
By: Alix Soliman, KTOO, Clarise Larson, KTOO and Corinne Smith Alaska Beacon
As the Mendenhall River swells with glacial outburst floodwater, hundreds of people living in the suburban valley below spent Tuesday night and Wednesday preparing to evacuate or hunker down. The National Weather Service predicts the flood will crest Thursday.
Officials managing the flood response recommended residents evacuate by 3 p.m.
On Marion Drive, Ann Lind plans to watch the flood from her second-story balcony overlooking the Mendenhall River.
“I got lawn chairs up there, and we’ll just be sitting there, and that’s where I’ve been every year,” she said.
Lind said her crawl space flooded last year when water leaked through the HESCO barriers and a drainage pipe failed. She said she’s staying again this year to protect the property.
“Because if I wouldn’t have stayed last year, I never would have known that I was flooding back there, and the flooding would have been way worse,” she said. “Within 30 minutes of me calling for help, I had nine guys and five pumps back there.”
She said she’s more confident her home won’t flood this time after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers placed an industrial-sized pump just beyond her lawn to send water that leaks through the flood wall back into the river.
Although she plans to stay behind with her 17-year-old daughter, she said her other kids and pets will evacuate – heeding official advice.
Downstream from Lind’s place, on Meander Way, Locke Brown said he and his wife are optimistic about flood protection this year. Last year, the pair’s crawl space and garage flooded.
“If we had these pumps on the roads sitting here last year, I think we probably wouldn’t have had any water in the house,” he said.
They said they’re grateful for the pumps and bolstered flood wall provided by the Army Corps this year — but they’re not taking any chances. They said that once the water rises high up on the barriers, they plan to evacuate to a camper they have set up outside of the flood zone.
Locke is retired from the U.S. Coast Guard and his wife still works for the Coast Guard.
“We’ve made our living saving people when they know they should have left,” he said.
Locke said the prudent thing is to leave since there’s a possibility the barriers could fail.
“It’s one of those unknowns. You just — what do they say? — Prepare for the worst and hope for the best,” he said. “We just feel like, at this point, we’re just driftwood. Whatever happens is gonna happen, and we’re just gonna have to deal with it when it’s over.”
Just a few blocks over, on Gee Street, Benson Bullock said he’s not too worried. He’s patching a pair of waders in his garage, but not for walking through floodwaters.
“Hopefully, if it’s not too crazy, I’ll be going fishing,” he said.
Bullock had a few inches of water in his garage during the catastrophic flood in 2024, but his house has never flooded. Bullock says he plans to put sandbags in front of the garage before the flood crests.
“We have stuff moved and cleaned up,” he said. “We moved my boat, we’ll move my wife’s truck, and we’ll just have my truck here in case we decide to leave.”
On View Drive, many residents say they’re planning to stay to try to protect their property and look out for their neighbors.
View Drive is a forested cul-de-sac that forms a peninsula jutting into the Mendenhall River. It’s been hit the hardest by past floods. For a second year in a row, the street has been left without the protection of the flood wall constructed by the City and Borough of Juneau and the Army Corps. Officials have said in the past that the street has porous soil and have doubts that the homes could be protected.
Mandy Mallott lives at the end of the cul-de-sac. She bought the house from a family she babysat for when she was growing up in Juneau. It looks out over Stroller White Mountain, where her father died in 2005.
“It’s a very spiritual place to us,” she said. “It’s a private place, and we’ll do what we can to protect it.”
She and her family spent Tuesday evening moving their belongings up onto shelves in their garage. Last year, she worked with her neighbors to have contractors put up their own HESCO barriers around a few properties, and she said her home didn’t flood.
Although a federally sponsored buyout for her home and others on View Drive might be on the table — Mallott said she’s emotionally tied to the place, and sees a long-term solution designed by the Army Corps as her best option.
“That emergency tunnel fix gives us all a lot of hope,” she said.
Mallott and her family are tribal citizens, and she said she’s grateful for the dozens of sandbags that the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska dropped off on Tuesday.
Residents of the Riverview Senior Living facility were about 50-50 split on whether to evacuate on Wednesday afternoon, said its Executive Director René Bryant. This year, new HESCO barriers are now standing between the Mendenhall River and the two-story assisted living and memory care facility.
She said the roughly 70 residents have a choice whether to stay or evacuate, and they are providing transportation to a nearby emergency shelter at St. Paul’s Catholic Church after an early dinner on Wednesday evening. Bryant said additional transportation to evacuate will be provided Thursday if needed.
“We are respecting everybody’s rights, while contacting family members to make these decisions as well,” Bryant said.
