Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson speaks in May 2022 at the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference. (Photo by Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon)
Former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson said Thursday in Fairbanks that he intends to run for governor in 2026, becoming the 13th candidate and 12th Republican in next year’s race.
Incumbent Gov. Mike Dunleavy is term-limited and unable to run again, which has caused an unusually large number of early entries into the governor’s race.
Only one Democratic candidate, former Anchorage state Sen. Tom Begich, has entered the race. Other Democrats say they are awaiting the possible run by former Democratic U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, who had the highest favorability rating among top candidates, according to one poll this summer.
Republicans face no such obstacle. In addition to Bronson, the Republican field of candidates includes former state Sen. Click Bishop of Fairbanks; Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom of Eagle River; Anchorage businesswoman Bernadette Wilson; podiatrist Matt Heilala of Anchorage; Matanuska-Susitna Borough Mayor Edna DeVries; former teacher James William Parkin IV of Angoon; current state Sen. Shelley Hughes of Palmer; Bruce Walden of Palmer; former Alaska Revenue Commissioner Adam Crum; and former Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor.
All of those candidates have filed letters of intent or statements of candidacy with the Alaska Public Offices Commission, which allows them to fundraise and spend money on a campaign.
They have not yet registered with the Alaska Division of Elections, which officially places a candidate on the August primary ballot.
Republican Henry Kroll of Soldotna, who has not registered with the Public Offices Commission, is the lone candidate to have registered with the Division of Elections.
The deadline to file with the Alaska Division of Elections is June 1, 2026.
In Alaska, the top four vote-getters for a state office, regardless of political party, advance from the August general election to the November general election.
Wilson has vowed to withdraw from the election if she finishes in the top four but isn’t the top Republican. She has encouraged other Republicans to take similar vows in an attempt to consolidate support for the top Republican front-runner in the general election.
Bronson, who delivered brief remarks in Fairbanks before participating in a panel discussion with six other Republican candidates, said he supports increased spending on infrastructure and the Permanent Fund dividend, saying he would like to see a constitutional amendment that would mandate a dividend paid according to a formula that was used from 1982 through 2016.
That would require spending an additional $2 billion per year for dividend payments above what lawmakers and Dunleavy approved this year. As a whole, the state’s operating budget is currently $5.9 billion. Bronson did not explain how he intends to pay for the increase.
An experienced pilot, Bronson was elected mayor of Anchorage in 2021, months after the incumbent Democratic mayor resigned during a sex scandal and amid a conservative backlash against COVID-19 mitigation efforts imposed by the Anchorage assembly.
He served a single term and was endorsed for re-election by Dunleavy and U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan but lost in 2024 to current Mayor Suzanne LaFrance.
Bronson’s time in office was marked by major conflicts with city employees, public health officials and the assembly. In 2023, the city manager Bronson appointed and fired, sued him and the city, alleging illegal and unethical acts. The assembly settled that case in 2024 for $250,000 after Bronson left office.
In January, Dunleavy appointed Bronson to manage Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport. After less than eight months, he announced his resignation from that job in August.
Elayna Cunningham, a college student interning at Koahnic Broadcast Corp., records a program on July 10, 2025, at the Anchorage, Alaska, studios of KNBA, the flagship station for National Native News. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen)
Elayna Cunningham, a college student interning at Koahnic Broadcast Corp., records a program on July 10, 2025, at the Anchorage, Alaska, studios of KNBA, the flagship station for National Native News. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen)
NOTN- Months after Congress eliminated federal funding for public broadcasting, 14 Alaska stations have been granted temporary relief.
Eligible stations were then presented with two potential funding options: they could partner with a Tribe, either through a 638 compact or 638 contract, or they could go through a grant process.
Stations will likely be funded through a program that supports tribal stations, but they won’t receive the temporary funding until after the federal government Shutdown.
In a press release, Senator Lisa Murkowski announced the funding, calling it a critical but short-term measure to keep rural stations operating after Congress rescinded $1.1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
“This funding will help some of Alaska’s most rural radio stations make ends meet for now.” Murkowski said, “But it is one-time funding, and the job isn’t done until every station in Alaska has stable, long-term support.”
Stations set to receive funding include KNBA in Anchorage, KBRW in Barrow, KYUK in Bethel, KDLG in Dillingham, KUCB in Unalaska, and others serving communities from the Aleutians to the Arctic.
Officials with the cruise line Holland America announce an Alaska-themed float at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in Juneau on Sep. 30, 2025 (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
The cruise line Holland America will have a large Alaska-themed float in the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, the company announced Monday during a ceremony in Juneau.
A mock-up of the proposed Alaska-themed float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, sponsored by Holland America, is displayed in Juneau on Sep. 30,2025 (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Alaskans haveoccasionallyparticipated in the parade in New York City, which is celebrating its 99th anniversary this year, but the company believes this will be the first time that the state will be represented by a float in the event.
The announcement came on one of the last days of Holland America’s summer cruise ship operations in Alaska’s capital city. Juneau will continue receiving occasional large cruise ships through October.
“The float will be named simply ‘The Land of Glaciers, Wildlife and Wonder,’” said Leanne Jones with Holland America official during a ceremony announcing the float and a $5,000 donation to Trail Mix, a local trail-building nonprofit in Juneau.
“This marks the first time Alaska will be featured in the iconic holiday event, and the first time Holland America Line has ever participated in this parade,” Jones said. The parade is scheduled to start at 4:30 a.m. Alaska time on Thursday, Nov. 27.
A rendering displayed Monday shows a howling wolf, black bear and a moose at the back of the float. The main platform is a glacier and river with leaping salmon.
“Well, that’s a pretty exciting announcement,” said Juneau Mayor Beth Weldon. “And you know, after Macy’s parade, we do have a Fourth of July parade in Juneau.”
The Juneau cruise dock is seen on Sep. 30, 2025 (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
A copy of the Homer News is seen in 2015. Newsroom employees at the News and the Peninsula Clarion submitted their resignations on Monday, Sept. 29, 2025, to protest the actions of the newspaper’s ownership. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Reporters and editors at the Homer News and Peninsula Clarion announced their resignations on Monday, citing a decision by the papers’ corporate owners to bow to political pressure to amend an article about a vigil for the slain far-right activist Charlie Kirk.
The resignations, which include two editors and two reporters based in Homer and Kenai, were scheduled to take effect in two weeks, but managers at Carpenter Media Group fired all four immediately.
Carpenter Media Group, an international chain, owns the News, Clarion and the Juneau Empire, as well as the Yukon News and hundreds of other newspapers in the Lower 48 and Canada.
The resignations follow a similar mass resignation at the Juneau Empire earlier this summer.
When combined, both actions leave Carpenter Media Group with a single in-state Alaska reporter among its three newspapers.
Mary Kemmis, senior vice president of Carpenter’s publications in Alaska and Canada, did not return phone calls seeking comment on Tuesday, nor did Chloe Pleznac, the reporter who authored the original article.
Jake Dye, a former reporter for the Peninsula Clarion and one of the people who resigned this week, said by phone that Carpenter’s handling of the story was “problematic in a lot of ways.”
Since his killing, conservatives, including many Republicans, have held rallies to memorialize Kirk.
After a vigil in Homer, Pleznac published an article describing Kirk as a “far-right political activist and Christian-Nationalist icon,” and went on to describe his “often racist and controversial views” before going on to detail the vigil.
Soon after the article was published, Rep. Sarah Vance, R-Homer, published a letter on official state legislative letterhead that criticized the characterization of Kirk and the Homer News coverage and said in part, “If the paper continues to treat community events as opportunities for partisan spin, the consequence will be financial as well as reputational.”
After the letter, which was reprinted on her legislative Facebook page, Carpenter officials rewrote the article without consulting editors or reporters at the Homer News, according to the staff who resigned.
Vance did not answer a phone call and text message Tuesday asking about the incident.
In their resignation letter, Carpenter’s Alaska reporters and editors said they don’t have an issue with Vance’s perspective but “what we do have a problem with is Carpenter Media management changing a story at the behest of an elected official. We believe this destroys the credibility the public has placed in us as reporters and editors.”
The worry, the resigning staff said, is that having once caved to political pressure, Carpenter Media will invite further attempts to steer news coverage by political officials and people who are part of the story.
“We cannot do our jobs knowing that pressure from an elected official can mean our stories are edited without prior consultation with us,” the resignation letter says.
Vance’s letter to Carpenter Media comes amid nationwide pressure by Republican and conservative officials to clamp down on language deemed critical of Kirk. Some states have launched investigations of university officials and other public employees for comments made on social media.
The three publications were owned by Georgia-based Morris Communications until 2017, when they were purchased by New Jersey-based GateHouse Media. Later that year, they were sold again to Washington-based Sound Publishing, a division of Canada-based Black Press.
In Juneau, the entire reporting staff of the Juneau Empire — including seasonal interns — resigned simultaneously amid complaints about low pay, benefits and a lack of institutional support.
The former editor of that newspaper has since gone on to help start an independent, nonprofit newsroom for capital-city news.
Dye, by phone on Tuesday, said he’s not sure what’s next for either himself or the Peninsula Clarion. Journalism in Alaska as a whole is in a dim spot amid budget cuts to public media, he said, but he’s trying to stay optimistic.
“There’s not a lot of light at the end of the tunnel, but I guess I truly believe that somehow, things are going to work out for the state and for us,” he said.
NOTN- Juneau officials are preparing to partner with the U.S. Coast Guard to help meet housing needs tied to the planned 2029 arrival of the icebreaker Storis.
Deputy Mayor Greg Smith said the Coast Guard has identified a deficit of 71 housing units for personnel.
“Juneau needs over 1000 units, if not closer to 1500 just for our population. But knowing that, making this a successful home port for the Storis is a tremendous need and priority for us.” Said Smith.
On Monday, the Assembly authorized the city manager to work with the Coast Guard on a memorandum of understanding, which is a formal document outlining the intent of two or more parties to cooperate on a project or transaction, and to consider city-owned property for potential development.
“The Coast Guard is going to put out a request for information, and ask local developers, We need this much housing, what could you offer? what can you provide to help fill this need?” Smith Said, “Our city manager said we also have some property that could go and potentially help address this need as well. She identified Pederson Hill as well as Telephone Hill as city owned land that could be used. It’s not simply for Coast Guard housing.”
The Coast Guard is expected to issue a request for information to local developers outlining housing needs. Smith said demonstrating city support is critical to ensuring the Storis is successfully homeported in Juneau and not relocated elsewhere.
Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people gather in Juneau for the opening of Celebration on June 5, 2024. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
A top official for the U.S. Department of the Interior has revoked a legal opinion that formed part of the legal basis for two new casino-like tribal gaming halls in Alaska, putting their future in question.
Writing in a memo to the head of the National Indian Gaming Commission and the top attorney at the Interior Department, MacGregor said that the Biden-era opinion “does not reflect the best interpretation of applicable law.”
The opinion overruled by MacGregor applied only to Alaska and declared that tribal authority applied under many circumstances to land allotments that were given to individual Alaska Natives by the federal government.
That’s a system similar to what’s in place in the Lower 48.
The state of Alaska opposed that view, holding to the position that the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 extinguished almost all “Indian Country” in Alaska and that the state holds primary jurisdiction over land owned by Alaska Natives, Alaska Native corporations and Alaska tribes, with the exception of the Metlakatla Indian Community.
Millions of acres potentially affected
The settlement act left almost all Alaska tribes with no federal trust land on which to exert sovereignty. There are, however, more than 17,000 parcels of up to 160 acres that have been granted to individual Alaska Natives since 1906 and are held in federal trust. Collectively, they represent as much as 5 million acres of land.
Until the Biden-era opinion, it was believed that most — if not all — of that land was outside tribal jurisdiction. After the opinion, the Native Village of Eklutna and the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska went ahead with plans to build casino-like facilities on allotments in their traditional territory. It was the first significant move to take advantage of the new interpretation of federal law.
The Native Village of Eklutna opened the Chin’an Gaming Hall in Birchwood, outside Anchorage, earlier this year. The Tlingit and Haida gaming hall, on Douglas Island, is under construction.
Now that the Biden-era opinion has been revoked, it isn’t clear whether the gaming halls are legal.
It’s still possible — albeit much more difficult — for tribes to exert jurisdiction over an allotment. But before the Biden administration’s opinion, Eklutna and the Tlingit and Haida Central Council had tried for decades to open casino-like gaming halls on allotments and had their applications rejected.
Before the Biden administration changed things, only Klawock and Metlakatla could operate casinos, and because of state laws regulating gaming, they do not offer table games like poker and blackjack. Instead, rows of slot-machine-like electronic devices fill their gaming halls.
That’s what can be seen in Birchwood and what is expected at the casino in Juneau.
MacGregor’s Sep. 25 memo says any action taken by the Interior Department or the National Indian Gaming Commission — which regulates gaming halls and casinos on tribal land — “should be reevaluated in accordance with this revocation.”
Birchwood gaming hall remains open
Aaron Leggett, President of the Native Village of Eklutna, said afterward in a written statement that its tribal gaming hall “remains open for our guests and continues to provide meaningful benefits to our Tribe, the surrounding community, and our state.”
Eklutna sought to build the gaming hall to provide jobs and an economic boost for tribal members and the local community, according to tribal leaders..
Leggett said the tribe is reviewing the new order.
A spokesperson for Tlingit and Haida declined to say whether construction will continue on its gaming hall, which is located on Douglas Island, on a road that leads to Juneau’s municipal ski area.
“Tlingit & Haida is aware of the U.S. Department of the Interior action to withdraw the solicitor’s decision. We also anticipated the action,” said Tlingit and Haida President Richard Peterson in a prepared statement. “We are reviewing internally and remain committed to exercising our Tribal sovereignty to preserve sovereignty, enhance economic and cultural resources and promote self-sufficiency and self-governance for Tribal citizens.”
State attorney general pleased by decision
The state of Alaska opposed the Biden-era opinion and has repeatedly fought the Native Village of Eklutna in court over its plans to open a tribally operated gaming hall.
Alaska Attorney General-designee Stephen Cox expressed support for the reversal in a written statement.
“We are encouraged that (the Department of the) Interior has returned to a position grounded in Alaska’s unique history. The Supreme Court has often said, ‘Alaska is the exception, not the rule.’ Today’s action respects that principle and restores the jurisdictional balance Congress intended and courts have repeatedly affirmed,” Cox said.
Asked to clarify whether the state believes that the Eklutna and Juneau casinos are now illegal, Department of Law spokeswoman Patty Sullivan said by email that MacGregor’s memo calls for a re-evaluation.
“Therefore,” she said, “it is for Interior to undertake the re-evaluation process and for the state to see the result of that re-evaluation process.”
It’s also not known how the new decision will affect two in-progress lawsuits that have challenged the Eklutna gaming hall. One suit, filed by neighboring landowners, is being considered by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals after a lower-court ruling went in favor of Eklutna.
A second lawsuit, filed by the state of Alaska against Eklutna, is on hold, pending the result of the Ninth Circuit case.
Tlingit and Haida’s gaming hall has not yet been the subject of lawsuits, but attorneys and other observers familiar with the issue say they expect that hall will be the subject of litigation as well.
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy shakes hands with Rep. Andrew Gray, D-Anchorage, following the annual State of the State address on Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, in the Alaska Capitol. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Senate Bill 113, passed by the Alaska House and Senate in May by a combined vote of 42-18, would have required internet companies to pay corporate income taxes based on the location of their sales, not the location of their server farms or offices.
That shift, already enacted by 36 other states, would have required companies like Netflix and Hulu, which do not have any in-state business presence, to pay corporate taxes based on sales to Alaskans. That shift was expected to generate between $25 million and $65 million per year for the state treasury once fully implemented.
In House Bill 57, which increased the state’s per-student public school funding formula, lawmakers included provisions that directed much of that money to vocational and technical instruction, as well as grants intended to help elementary school students improve their reading.
Without SB 113, those programs will not receive additional money.
In 2022, Dunleavy and the Legislature collaborated on the Alaska Reads Act, legislation intended to boost the reading skills of young Alaskans. Initial results have shown some benefits, and funding in SB 113 was intended to expand upon that effort.
But in a message accompanying Monday’s veto, Dunleavy said he will not approve any tax measures unless they are part of a larger plan intended to bring state income and expenses into line over the long term.
Dunleavy said he wants to see a “truly durable fiscal plan” that includes “not only revenues but also clear guardrails: spending limits, statutory and regulatory reviews, and policies that make Alaska the most competitive state in the nation for investment and new business growth.”
Dunleavy called SB 113 “a simple tax bill that does not consider the comprehensive fiscal approach outlined above.”
The Legislature could override Dunleavy’s veto of SB 113, which would require 45 votes when lawmakers reconvene for the regular session in January, but that’s a level of support larger than the bill received when it originally passed.
Sen. Robert Yundt, R-Wasilla, sponsored the amendment that would have diverted SB 113 funding to education. He did not answer a phone call seeking comment on Monday afternoon.
Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage, sponsored SB 113 in the Senate and lambasted the governor’s decision in a written statement.
“SB 113 was a common-sense, bipartisan solution to help close our revenue gap without costing Alaskans or Alaska businesses a penny,” Wielechowski said. “The Governor had the opportunity to stand with Alaska families, students, and communities – but instead, he chose to side with tech corporations that profit from Alaskans and utilize our infrastructure, while paying nothing back to our state.”
Wielechowski said that the bill would have modernized Alaska’s corporate tax structure using reforms already adopted by other states.
“Every Alaskan knows Alaska is facing a revenue crisis, and that our education system needs critical resources. This bill would have been a step towards closing those gaps without taxing Alaskans while asking these corporations to contribute to the state that they use for their business ventures,” Wielechowski said. “The Governor’s veto sends the message that outside corporations come before Alaska’s schools, Alaska’s workforce, and Alaska’s future.”
Asked whether the governor had a comment about the veto’s effects on education funding, his communications director responded by email.
“Governor Dunleavy continues to encourage lawmakers, as he has done for the past several years, to work with him on a durable and comprehensive fiscal plan,” said Jeff Turner, the communications director. “Passing more taxes without spending limits and policies that give existing businesses the confidence they need to expand and new businesses the confidence they need to invest in Alaska will make our state less competitive.”
SB 113 was the last bill awaiting gubernatorial action this year. Of 33 bills passed by the House and Senate this year, Dunleavy vetoed nine, or 27%, the highest proportion since statehood. Legislators overrode two of Dunleavy’s vetoes during a special session in August.
Patrick Sullivan stands by an acid seep on July 15,2023. Sullivan is part of a team of scientists who tested water quality in Kobuk Valley National Park’s Salmon River and its tributaries, where permafrost thaw has caused acid rock drainage. The process is releasing metals that have turned the waters a rusty-looking and opaque. (Photo by Roman Dial/Alaska Pacific University)
When scientists Patrick Sullivan and Roman Dial were heading to a remote area in the Brooks Range in 2019 to map the spread of woody plants there, they were looking forward to seeing a celebrated river that author John McPhee described decades ago as having the “clearest, purest water I have ever seen flowing over rocks.”
What they found in the Salmon River, a waterway that flows through Northwest Alaska’s Kobuk Valley National Park, was much different than what McPhee described in his landmark 1976 Alaska book “Coming Into the Country.” The waters Sullivan and Dial found were reddish-orange and murky from loads of minerals flowing into them.
The Salmon River and its tributaries had become transformed into “rusting rivers,” a phenomenon caused by climate change in permafrost regions.
“The permafrost is thawing, and it’s essentially acid rock drainage that’s occurring. These sulfite minerals are being exposed to oxygen and water for the first time in thousands of years and it’s releasing acid which is leaching metals out of the rocks to the streams,” said Sullivan, who heads the Environment and Natural Resource Institute at the University of Alaska Anchorage.
The problem goes beyond aesthetics, according to further research by Sullivan, Dial, who is at Alaska Pacific University, and their colleagues.
The Salmon River, a designated wild and scenic river, and its tributaries are so tainted by acid-rock drainage that their concentration of metals is considered toxic to chronically exposed aquatic life, they found.
Water samples taken in the summers of 2022 and 2023 found that the river and almost all of its tributaries were carrying metals at levels above U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state of Alaska standards, according to a recently published study by Sullivan and his colleagues. A variety of metals were showing up in amounts dangerous to aquatic life: iron, cadmium, aluminum, nickel, zinc and copper, their study found.
The “rusting rivers” pollution is similar to the kind of pollution that can happen from hardrock metals mining. But unlike the case with mining, it is happening in the absence of human development, and it is happening over diffuse spots, whereas a single point source at a mine that could potentially be controlled.
“This wild and scenic river in the heart of Kobuk Valley National Park, it’s about as protected as you can get and as remote as you can get. And it’s kind of falling apart,” Sullivan said.
The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, summarized the situation in its title: “Wild, scenic, and toxic.”
There are places around the Arctic where rust-red rivers have been that way for centuries, like Canada’s Arctic Red River, also known in the Gwich’in language as Tsiigehnjik, meaning “iron river.”
But for the Salmon River, the change was abrupt.
The Bush pilot who ferried Sullivan and Dial to the site in 2019, who described the river’s appearance as similar to sewage, said it had just happened that year.
The toxicity findings are potentially ominous for fish health.
The timing of the change suggests that thaw-induced acid rock drainage could be one of the many factors depressing western Alaska salmon runs, the study found.
The Salmon River in Kobuk Valley National Park is seen from the air on Sept. 7, 2020. (Photo by Ray Koleser/Provided by Patric Sullivan)
Salmon runs have been disastrously low in the region for the past few years, sometimes precluding even traditional subsistence harvests that are relatively small in scale but hugely important to culture and food security.
At the very least, the timing is a coincidence, Sullivan said. “It’s identical to what you would expect if these degrading streams were impacting spawning success,” he said, pointing out that most of the chum salmon that returns to the Kotzebue Sound area do so at the ages of four of five years, after emerging from the spawning rivers and swimming around in the ocean.
There is too little evidence for now to definitely link the rust-tinted waters of the Salmon River to poor salmon runs, Sullivan said. That is largely because there is too little known about that river’s fish populations, though the name suggests that the river was important to salmon in the past, he said.
It appears to have been that way in the 1970s, when McPhee was there boating there, fishing, camping and collecting information for his book.
At that time, the water was so clear that the riverbed was “as distinct as if the water were not there,” McPhee wrote. Those clear waters chock-full of oval-shaped salmon swimming upstream to spawn, he wrote. “Looking over the side of the canoe is like staring down into a sky full of zeppelins,” he wrote.
The recent proliferation of rusting rivers is not limited to Alaska and other parts of the Arctic. There are affected high-altitude areas that have permafrost, glaciers or both, including Switzerland and neighboring parts of the Alps, Peru and parts of Colorado.
In Alaska, the rusting rivers phenomenon is more pronounced in the western part of the North Slope than in the eastern part, Sullivan and Dial have found. Their past studies linked the vegetation changes in the northwest to more pronounced warming on the Chukchi Sea side of Alaska’s Arctic than on the Beaufort Sea. That spread of woody plants is detrimental to tundra caribou that eat lichen and moss, and could help explain the decline in the Western Arctic caribou herd, which has a habitat that is changing more quickly than that of the Porcupine caribou herd on the eastern North Slope, they found.
After Sullivan and Dial encountered multiple rusting rivers during their plant studies, they felt compelled to alert fellow Alaskans about the situation.
They penned a 2022 column for the Anchorage Daily News. And they embarked on their further studies, which wound up generating a small National Science Foundation grant, creating partnerships with scientists at other universities who are experts in biochemistry and, ultimately, the newly published study on toxicity.
But before then, when they were expecting to see the same conditions that McPhee did in the 1970s, Sullivan packed a fishing rod with the gear he took on the trip to the Salmon River.
His attempts to fish in the murky, opaque water proved futile, however. “I think I tried for, like, five minutes and then I quickly realized that I was wasting my time,” he said.
That experience suggests that there might be further ecological impacts of the cloudy, rusted waters, he said.
“I think it would be very hard, for instance, for a bear to fish for a salmon just because of the turbidity. Raptors would have a really hard time catching a fish if they were fishing there,” he said, citing the suspended solids that make the water opaque.
For now, Sullivan and other scientists are using satellite imagery to spot other rivers and streams that might be similarly affected. The imagery is useful not just for spotting acid-tinted streams but the point sources in the tundra, he said.
It would be helpful to have more research on the region’s fish to explore whether they are carrying metals in their bodies, he said. Another topic of study could be the response of chum salmon in the region, as the species does show the some ability to shift habitats, he said.
Yet to be determined, Sullivan said, is how long this rusting river situation will last.
“It’s possible that this will kind of run its course over some period of time. And once the unweathered sulfite minerals have been oxidized, then it’s likely that the stream will turn back to clear again,” he said. “But we have no idea when that process might reach its conclusion and how many new acid seeps might develop.”
A hiker walks on May 30, 2018, on the trail to the Tongass National Forest’s Tern Island campsite in Wrangell, Alaska. (Photo by Xavier Rivera/U.S. Forest Service)
The Trump administration is planning to close some U.S. Forest Service offices in Alaska under a national reorganization announced this summer by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.
The Forest Service, which is part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, currently has offices in Anchorage, Juneau, Cordova, Valdez, Girdwood, Seward, Craig, Hoonah, Ketchikan, Petersburg, Sitka, Thorne Bay, Wrangell and Yakutat. It isn’t clear how many of those offices will remain open after the reorganization.
The status of the Forest Service’s tourist-focused visitor centers in Portage, Juneau and Ketchikan also isn’t clear.
Contacted for details, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Agriculture said by email on Friday, “Some aspects of the reorganization will take place over the coming months, while others will take more time. We will continue to provide updates as the reorganization moves forward.”
They added, “We recognize this may be difficult, but we are hopeful that affected employees will remain with us through this transition as we work to improve and continue delivering benefits to the people and communities we serve.”
In a July memo outlining the basic details of the plan, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said she intends to close the Forest Service’s nine national regional offices “over the next year” but “will maintain a reduced state office in Juneau, Alaska, and an eastern service center in Athens, Georgia.”
Research stations, like the Juneau Forestry Science Laboratory in Auke Bay, will be closed and “consolidated into a single location in Fort Collins, Colorado.”
Nationally, Rollins said she intends to scatter more than half of the Agriculture Department’s 4,600 Washington, D.C.-based administrators to five regional hubs; one each in Utah, Colorado, North Carolina, Missouri and Indiana.
A sign advertising the cashing of Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend, or PFD, checks hangs outside a business in Anchorage, Alaska, Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen)
AP- The truck that arrived ahead of schedule at Allyssa Canoy’s home in Fairbanks brought enough heating fuel for the frigid winter months ahead — and a surprise bill for $2,600.
Canoy and her two sons have checks arriving that will cover that expense and leave some money for the boys, too. Starting Thursday, Alaska plans to begin distributing to residents their annual dividend derived from the state’s $83 billion oil wealth fund, a sort of bonus that Alaskans get for living in the state.
For some, it’s extra spending money for a new set of tires or a vacation to a sunnier clime during the long, dark winter. For others, it’s a vital supplement in a state where the cost for internet service, gas and groceries can be sky-high.
Here’s what to know about the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend:
This year’s payout is one of the lowest in 20 years
Alaskans are getting $1,000 per person — the lowest amount since 2020, when they each received $992. The payout has been below $1,000 only two other times since 2006.
There used to be a formula for calculating the amount, tied to the fund’s market performance. But lawmakers widely consider that formula unaffordable and within the last decade have abandoned it.
Politicians now set the amount. It’s often one of the last items settled during sensitive budget negotiations. Lawmakers must weigh the check’s size against other programs and public needs, including education, and in 2018 began using earnings from the fund — long used to pay dividends — to also help balance the budget.
This year, $1,000 is what lawmakers argued they could afford while also backing an increase in K-12 funding and trying to limit draws from savings.
Had the old formula been followed, residents would be getting about $3,800 each.
The Alaska Permanent Fund is nearly 50 years old
Voters created the fund in 1976, during the heady, early years of oil in the state. The goal was to save some of Alaska’s mineral wealth. The fund has grown through investments, and while the state constitution protects the fund’s principal, its earnings can be spent.
Dividends have been paid since 1982. Proponents saw them as a way to ensure Alaskans maintained a vested interest in the Alaska Permanent Fund.
More than 600,000 of Alaska’s roughly 740,000 residents are set to receive this year’s check. To qualify, one must meet residency and other requirements.
For some Alaskans, the check is a nice extra. Some put it into college funds or savings accounts or donate to charities. Others rely on it for necessities, such as heating oil, winter tires or snowmachines, which are critical modes of transportation in rural villages where residents rely on hunting or trapping.
Canoy, a single mom of two, is selling her home and downsizing. She had planned to fill her home’s fuel tank as a gift to the new buyers at closing, but the fuel truck came early while she was away. So instead of putting the $3,000 her family is receiving toward other projects, as she’d hoped, she’s using it to pay that bill. She plans to let her sons spend the remaining $400.
Canoy said she lives comfortably and sees the dividend as a blessing. Still, she wishes lawmakers would find a better way to set the amounts — “at least to just give Alaskans maybe a little peace of mind that, yeah, we’re actually doing everything that we can to make sure that you guys get the most out of the permanent fund dividend.”
