NOTN- A Landslide struck around Endicott Arm, just South of Juneau early Sunday, producing 10 to 15 foot waves according to the Alaska Earthquake Center, they say the waves were observed across the region.
According to the Alaska Earthquake Center the local Tsunami rolled through Endicott Arm just after 5:30 AM following a significant landslide in the region, where several tens of millions of cubic meters of rock struck the water.
No damage or injuries have been reported.
By: James Brooks, Alaska Beacon
Adam Crum, commissioner of the Alaska Department of Revenue, will leave his job Aug. 8, according to an announcement published Friday by Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s office.
A person familiar with Crum’s plans said he intends to run for governor in 2026, joining seven other Republican candidates. No independents or Democrats have filed for the primary election, which is 13 months away.
Asked whether he will run for governor, Crum said by text message, “I’ve accomplished a lot to put Alaska on sound economic footing. I’ll have a formal statement on my last day, August 8th. Stay tuned.”
Crum has been part of Dunleavy’s cabinet since the governor took office in 2018. He initially served as commissioner of the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services, occupying that position during the COVID-19 pandemic and during an executive order that split the agency into two separate departments.
In 2022, Dunleavy named Crum as revenue commissioner, and he assumed a seat on the board of the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp., whose revenues are the No. 1 source of general-purpose dollars for state services and the Permanent Fund dividend.
Jason Brune, former commissioner of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, now fills a public seat on the Permanent Fund Corp. board.
Brune said he knows Crum has been considering a run for governor but could not confirm his plans.
“His departure is a big loss for the state,” Brune said by text.
“It was an honor working with him for the five years we served together,” he said, referring to the time they spent on the Dunleavy cabinet.
In a written statement Dunleavy praised Crum’s performance during his time with the state.
“Commissioner Crum has been an exemplary leader whose unwavering dedication and innovative approach have significantly benefited Alaskans,” Dunleavy said. “During his time leading both the Department of Health and Social Services and the Department of Revenue, Adam consistently prioritized Alaska’s economic well-being, public health, and fiscal stability. His collaborative spirit and commitment to serving our communities have made a lasting, positive impact.”
The governor’s office said an acting commissioner will be named soon.
By: Corinne Smith, Alaska Beacon
The state of Alaska has filed an appeal with the U.S. Department of Education after federal officials said the state failed a test measuring the differences in funding between school districts, which put more than $80.8 million in federal aid at risk.
Each year, the state receives federal funding called “impact aid” intended to compensate districts with federally owned lands, which reduce the tax base to support schools. The state can put that funding toward its own funding for schools — which the state has done in the past — but only if it can pass what’s known as a disparity test.
Federal law requires there to be no more than a 25% gap between per-student revenue in districts near the highest in funding and districts near the lowest. The department found Alaska’s disparity to be 26.88%, given the state’s complex funding formula.
But Alaska has rejected the finding, filing a formal appeal on July 14 and submitting districts’ finance data to argue their expenditures meet the standard. The test puts federal funding at stake, according to the state, which this year amounts to an estimated $80.8 million.
Deena Bishop, commissioner of the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development, said in an interview last week that she feels good about the state’s accounting and a successful appeal.
“I’m confident that we did meet it,” Bishop said of the requirements. “If I base it off of the last appeal and how Alaska was able to share how transportation costs are truly that disparate, then I think we will do fine.”
The state failed the same disparity test in 2021, based on 2019 state data, and successfully appealed. This time, the state submitted 2024 data for evaluation.
“So a little bit of it is a huge math problem at the beginning,” Bishop said of the appeal process. “We wrapped our arms around it and figured that out, and then made an argument on … why we did it that way, given the background of those costs in Alaska.”
Bishop said Alaska sees high costs in rural school districts — especially for transportation, but also basic supplies and operating costs.
“The cost to do business is highly diverse in Alaska. If you just took the cost of a head of lettuce or a gallon of milk, you know, in Anchorage, as compared to Teller, it’s not just three times (higher in Teller). It could be up to five times. And really building and construction materials, supplies, all of those are such a significant increase due to the way you can only get in by barge or plane. So it’s just … again, understanding why we pay such large differences in different places in Alaska.”
The U.S. Department of Education notified the state that it failed the test on May 16, as first reported by KTOO. Bishop said it will take time to resolve. The 2021 appeal was resolved at the end of that fiscal year, in 2022.
“It is a long process, because I think they’re very careful at it,” she said. “You want to spend the time on it. They did spend the time to understand Alaska.”
In the meantime, the federal impact aid payments will continue to school districts.
DEED spokesperson Bryan Zadalis said by email those funds will continue through the appeal process. “School districts will continue to receive Impact Aid funding directly from US-ED through their regular processes of application approval and funding availability,” he said.
The results of the disparity tests add uncertainty for the state, and for Alaska schools.
That’s based on the state’s complex funding formula for schools – which includes federal, state and local contributions.
Alexei Painter, who directs the division of state government that analyzes the budget for the Legislature, said the Legislature passed a budget that funds whatever the state’s portion is in that funding formula. If the state passes the disparity test, it allows the state to deduct the federal impact aid dollars from the state school funding.
But if the state fails the test, Painter said, “that money doesn’t go away. It just goes directly to those districts.”
If the federal impact aid isn’t flowing through the state government, it no longer is distributed based on the state funding formula. That’s potentially a big problem for the state.
“If we fail, we can’t make that deduction,” Painter said in an interview Wednesday. “The result of that is that what the state would owe to pay the full formula would go up by $80 million.”
That’s because the state would still be required to distribute the remaining state aid according to formula, but it would have less revenue to do it.
Painter explained that the issue is further complicated by Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s budget veto of $50 million for the state’s education funding this year.
Under the original budget bill passed by the Legislature, the state had an open-ended commitment to provide school funding according to the formula. But in issuing the veto, Dunleavy crossed out the language, replacing it with a dollar amount.
“The governor vetoed that appropriation from an open-ended one to a fixed dollar amount,” Painter said. That means that if the state fails the disparity test, “that cost goes up by $80 million, and now the veto impact is $130 million.”
The Legislature is set to take a vote on whether to override Dunleavy’s veto of school funding during a special session, scheduled for Aug. 2.
Painter said that if the Legislature votes to override the veto, it would fund the education formula – including the $80.8 million.
Depending on the override vote and the appeal, the impacts to school districts could vary widely across the state, he said. The division issued a memo in June on the potential impacts.
Some districts that receive the federal impact aid because they include federal lands, like the Lower Kuskokwim or Fairbanks school districts, could see millions more. But others, like the Matanuska-Susitna or Anchorage districts could see millions less, as the state would not have enough money to fully balance its part in the funding formula.
“I would just assume the Legislature will address this in some way,” Painter said. A veto override would be one way to address it. Another way would be to provide more money for school districts after the Legislature reconvenes for its next regular session, in January, in a supplemental budget bill.
If the state loses its appeal and the Legislature doesn’t act, it could be a problem for districts.
“Otherwise there’s just a lot of uncertainty for districts,” Painter said. “Even if the department’s ultimately successful, in the meantime, it just adds uncertainty for districts.”
Sen. Löki Tobin, D-Anchorage and chair of the Senate Education Committee, said in a phone interview that she was glad the state has appealed. But she argued that the disparity is being driven by a lack of funding on the state’s part for public schools.
“That is ultimately on the shoulders of our state and also of our local communities, and with a decade of flat funding, it is clear why our school districts’ budgets are getting tighter, the deficits are getting larger,” and the disparity is growing, Tobin said.
Zadalis said no date has been set yet for a hearing on the appeal.
AP- A small plane that crashed in 2023 while carrying moose meat for hunters in remote western Alaska, killing the husband of former U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, was overweight for takeoff and encountered drag from a set of antlers mounted outside, federal investigators said in a report released Tuesday.
The National Transportation Safety Board, in its final report on the crash that killed Eugene Peltola Jr., who was the only person on board the aircraft, listed several factors among its probable cause findings. They included decisions by Peltola to fly the plane above its maximum takeoff weight and affix a set of moose antlers on the right wing strut that caused a drag, along with turbulent flight conditions in the area.
Downdrafts, “along with the overweight airplane and the added drag and lateral weight imbalance caused by the antlers on the right wing, would likely have resulted in the airplane having insufficient power and/or control authority to maneuver above terrain,” the report states.
The Piper PA-18-150 Super Cub crashed Sept. 12, 2023, northeast of the small western Alaska community of St. Mary’s. Peltola had days earlier taken five hunters, a guide and equipment from the community of Holy Cross to an airstrip at St. Mary’s. The group set up camp next to the runway, which was near hilly terrain and about 70 miles (113 kilometers) northwest of Holy Cross, the agency said.
The day before the crash, the group got a moose and made plans with Peltola, via satellite messaging devices, for him to transport the meat, the NTSB said. On the day of the crash, Peltola had already picked up a load of meat and had returned for another. He did not use scales to weigh the cargo, the agency said.
Two hunters were at the site when the crash occurred and provided aid to Peltola, the agency previously reported. Peltola died of his injuries within about two hours, the agency said.
“Given the remote location of the accident site, which was about 400 miles from a hospital, and accessible only by air, providing the pilot with prompt medical treatment following the accident was not possible,” Tuesday’s report states.
The agency said carrying antlers on the outside of a plane is a common practice in Alaska but requires formal approval from the Federal Aviation Administration, with a notation in the plane’s logbooks. “There was no evidence that such approval had been granted for the accident airplane,” the report states.
Peltola was a former Alaska regional director for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and worked for decades for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He had received his commercial pilot’s license in 2004, requiring him to use corrective lenses at all distances, according to an FAA database.
His death came almost exactly a year after Mary Peltola was sworn in as Alaska’s lone U.S. House member, following a special election for the seat. Mary Peltola, who is Yup’ik, was the first Alaska Native in Congress.
She won a full, two-year term in November 2022 but lost her reelection bid last November. She has kept a relatively low public profile since then.
By: Jonathon Dawe, Wrangell Sentinel
For the first time in 38 years, the Wrangell Native community has raised new totem poles in town, with four days of events planned Thursday through Sunday, July 17-20.
Unveiling the five new poles marks a significant revival of a centuries-old Tlingit tradition. The event honors the carvers and apprentices who transformed logs into cultural masterpieces, continuing a legacy nearly lost to time.
By the early 1900s, most of the town’s 30 to 40 totem poles had decayed or fallen, and the art of pole carving faded. The last totem pole raised in Wrangell was the Sun House Totem in 1987, carved by Steve Brown and Wayne Price, according to organizers of this week’s events.
Last week’s celebration symbolized a broader cultural resurgence that began with the 2013 rededication of Chief Shakes House and the 2015 completion of the WCA’s Carving Shed on Front Street, the organizers explained.
The new poles were funded in part by the U.S. Army (Gunakaadeit Pole) and organized by the Wrangell Cooperative Association.
The poles and their stories
Each pole tells a story rooted in Tlingit and Haida traditions:
Bear Up The Mountain Pole: A Naanya.aayí X’atgu Hít narrative of survival during a great flood.
Gunakaadeit Pole: A Naanya.aayí X’atgu Naasí Hít tale of a man using a sea monster’s skin to feed his community.
Underwater Sea Bear Pole: A Sik’nax.ádi legend of a mythical good-luck creature.
Killer Whale Grave Marker: A Kayaashkeiditaan tribute to Shx’atoo, who died during the U.S. Army’s 1869 bombardment of the Native village at Wrangell.
Kadashan Pole: A replica of a 1940 pole, originally gifted by Haida relatives to honor intermarriage with Tlingit women in the 1830s.
Master carvers and apprentices
Leading the project are master carvers:
Joe Young (Haida, Yahgw’laanaas clan), who learned from his grandfather Claude Morrison and carved the Bear Up The Mountain and Gunakaadeit poles.
Tommy Joseph (Tlingit, Kaagwaantaan clan), a renowned woodcarver behind the Underwater Sea Bear Pole.
TJ Young (Haida, Yahgw’láanaas clan), lead carver for the Kadashan pole.
Apprentice carvers, including Mike Hoyt, Tony Harding, Linda Churchill and Susie Beebee, also contributed, ensuring the tradition’s future.
“What an incredible experience to witness the community, literally pulling together to stand Kadashan pole in Totem Park.” Tlingit &Haida said in a Facebook post.
“This is more than art – it’s healing,” said Joe Young. “We’re reclaiming our history.”
AP- Alaska Airlines has resumed operations after the failure of a critical piece of hardware forced the airline to ground all its flights for approximately three hours, but the effects will linger into Monday, the company announced.
The carrier issued a system-wide ground stop for Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air flights around 8 p.m. Pacific time Sunday. The stop was lifted at 11 p.m., the Seattle-based company said in a social media post. More than 150 flights have been canceled since Sunday evening, including 64 Monday.
The airline said “a critical piece of multi-redundant hardware at our data centers, manufactured by a third-party, experienced an unexpected failure.” That affected several of the airlines key systems, but hacking was not involved, and the airline said the incident was not related to any other events like the attack involving Microsoft’s servers over the weekend or the recent cybersecurity event at its Hawaiian Airlines subsidiary in June.
“We appreciate the patience of our guests whose travel plans have been disrupted. We’re working to get them to their destinations as quickly as we can,” the airline said in a statement.
The airline also said it is working with its vendor to replace the hardware at the data center.
Alaska Airlines led all airlines in cancellations Monday, according to the FlightAware website. Many of the cancellations were at the airline’s major hub of Seattle, but it also canceled flights at airports all over the country.
The Federal Aviation Administration website had confirmed a ground stop for all Alaska Airlines mainline and Horizon aircraft, referring to an Alaska Airlines subsidiary. But the FAA referred all questions to the airline Monday.
The National Transportation Board last month credited the crew of Alaska Airlines flight 1282 with the survival of passengers when a door plug panel flew off the plane shortly after takeoff on Jan. 5, 2024, leaving a hole that sucked objects out of the cabin.
In September, Alaska Airlines said it grounded its flights in Seattle briefly due to “significant disruptions” from an unspecified technology problem that was resolved within hours.
By: Yereth Rosen, Alaska Beacon
Health insurers must provide speedier responses to prior authorization requests for certain medical treatments and services, under a bill that went into law on Monday without Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s signature.
The measure, Senate Bill 133, requires insurers to notify patients within 72 hours whether the requested services are authorized in cases when requests are sent by fax or by other routine means. In cases of expedited requests, the insurer must provide answers within 24 hours, under the bill.
The bill, which passed unanimously in both the Senate and House, is intended to prevent delays in patient treatment, said the main sponsor, Sen. Jesse Bjorkman, R-Nikiski.
“Alaskans should not have to fight with their insurance company to get the care they need,” Bjorkman said in a statement. “This bill makes the process quicker, clearer, and fairer for everyone.”
The bill was officially sponsored by the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, which Bjorkman chairs.
It was supported by medical organizations, including the Alaska Hospital and Healthcare Association, the Alaska State Medical Association and the Alaska Native Health Board.
It also got some qualified support from Premera Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alaska, the state’s largest health insurer.
In a March 25 letter to Bjorkman and members of the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, Premera said that the version that emerged through the committee process had “some reasonable sideboards as well as incentives that will help plans modernize and improve their prior authorization systems so that these systems optimally serve providers, patients and plans alike.”
Premera said in its letter that it requires prior authorizations for care in only about 2% of cases, unlike insurers that “have been exceedingly aggressive in this space,” requiring prior authorization for up to 20% of all claims.
The bill has some exceptions, caveats and special provisions. For example, it does not prevent insurers from requiring generic versions of medicines prescribed by providers. It also has a section giving guidelines for insurers to grant exceptions for cancer patients who are covered by “step therapy” protocols. Those protocols provide patients with the least expensive medications first before advancing to more expensive medications.
Additionally, the bill gives insurers up to 14 working days to obtain more information from providers if they determine that there is a lack of sufficient information for decisions on prior authorization requests.
The new law goes into effect on Jan. 1, except for a portion that directs the state Division of Insurance to start drafting regulations. That portion went into effect immediately.
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, has joined a group of Republican senators urging the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to release federal education funds already approved by Congress for the 2025 fiscal year.
In a letter sent to OMB Director Russell Vought, the senators asked the agency to fully implement the Fiscal Year 2025 Full-Year Continuing Resolution Act, which includes funding for several education programs supporting students, educators and adult learners.
“The decision to withhold this funding is directly contrary to President Trump’s goal of returning K-12 education to the states,” the senators wrote. “This funding goes directly to states and local school districts, where local leaders decide how this funding is spent, because as we know, local communities know how to best serve students and families. Withholding this funding denies states and communities the opportunity to pursue localized initiatives to support students and their families.”
The funding in question includes grants for Supporting Effective Instruction, 21st Century Community Learning Centers, Student Support and Academic Enrichment, English Language Acquisition, Migrant Education, and Adult Basic and Literacy Education, including integrated civics and language programs.
Murkowski and her colleagues argue the funds are essential for local school districts and adult education providers, especially those that support English learners, workforce training, and after-school care. They also emphasized the bipartisan nature of these programs, writing, ” We share your concern about taxpayer money going to fund radical left-wing programs. However, we do not believe that is happening with these funds. These funds go to support programs that enjoy longstanding, bipartisan support like after-school and summer programs that provide learning and enrichment opportunities for school aged children which also enables their parents to work and contribute to local economies.”
The letter was also signed by Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Susan Collins (R-ME), John Boozman (R-AR), Katie Boyd Britt (R-AL), Deb Fischer (R-NE), John Hoeven (R-ND), Jim Justice (R-WV), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and M. Michael Rounds (R-SD).
The senators said they welcome further collaboration with OMB and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, writing, ” We want to see students in our states and across the country thrive, whether they are adult learners, students who speak English as a second language, or students who need after-school care so that their parents can work. We believe you share the same goal.”
They urged Vought to reverse the decision and release the congressionally approved funding without further delay.
A full copy of the letter is available on Sen. Murkowski’s official website, or on her Facebook page.
If you’re an Alaskan and believe a government agency or public official is doing something seriously wrong, something that puts public safety or welfare at risk, you now have a clear and official way to ask for an investigation.
Alaskan residents now have a more transparent process to request an Investigative Grand Jury to probe suspected systemic wrongdoing by public figures or public entities in Alaska. This effort aims to empower the community and ensure that public trust in government is maintained.
This Department of Law initiative formalizes a process that follows rules created by the Alaska Supreme Court by dedicating a new webpage, standing up policies and procedures, and assigning attorneys to examine criteria to facilitate the convening of an Investigative Grand Jury in situations where citizens present evidence on matters that jeopardize public welfare or safety.
“The Alaska Constitution guarantees that an Investigative Grand Jury will have the authority to investigate matters of public welfare or safety, and that this right shall never be suspended,” said Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor. “This new, transparent process ensures that every Alaskan’s voice can be heard when it comes to safeguarding our community and holding our government accountable.”
An investigative grand jury is a group of citizens that are tasked with investigating potential criminal activity or issues of public welfare and safety within a specific jurisdiction. Unlike a trial jury, its role is not to determine guilt or innocence, but rather to investigate potential wrongdoing and decide whether there is sufficient evidence to issue an indictment or make recommendations for action.
Back in 2022, the Alaska Supreme Court updated the rules around Investigative Grand Juries. The Court gave the Attorney General and the Department of Law the responsibility of reviewing citizen requests and determining whether they should go forward. But until now, there wasn’t a public-facing process for how to do that.
If a citizen investigation involves actions, sections or offices within the Department of Law, a neutral prosecutor will be appointed to advise the Investigative Grand Jury.
The Department of Law says this is just phase one of a broader effort to make Alaska’s legal system more open and responsive to public concerns. More improvements and public input opportunities are expected to follow.
