|
SEACC to file appeal of
Kensington record of decision
The Record of Decision for the Kensington Gold Mine Final Supplemental
Environmental Impact Statement issued by the Forest Service will be
appealed.
Kat Hall of SEACC, the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council said on KINY's
Capital Chat this morning this morning that the appeal will be filed today.
Hall says they believe the Forest Service has failed to protect the public's
interest in maintaining the ecological, cultural and recreational values of Berners
Bay.
The deadline for filing the appeal is 4:30 this aftertoon. (Monday)
The Forest
Service has up to 45 days to act on the appeal.
The record of decision approves a modification of Coeur Alaska's current
plan of operations. That includes elimination of tailings disposal along the
Lynn Canal side in favor of disposal in Lower Slate Lake.
That change is pending issuance of permits by the Army Corps of Engineers,
the Environmental Protection Agency and the Alaska Department of Natural
Resources.
The decision includes proposals by Coeur and Goldbelt to construct marine
access terminals at Cascade Point and Slate Creek Cove to transport workers
across Berners Bay.
The project is expected to create more than 200 jobs during the two year
construction phase and then average 225 employees during the 10 to 15 year
life of the mine.
The company hopes construction can start next summer with the mine in
production by this summer.
The underground mine is about 45 miles north-northwest of Juneau.
Alaska Club to proceed with Valley swimming pool...downtown
expansion set
The Alaska Club is moving ahead with its plans for a swimming pool in the Valley and expansion of its downtown facility.
The Alaska Club purchased the Juneau Racquet Club in 2001 and started expansion about a year later.
The company's Mary Hughes says the plans announced today are the final phase of the expansion.
Alaska Club President Andrew Eker
was asked about the impact on their plans if the city and borough eventually decides to proceed with tentative plans to build a second pool in the Valley.
He pointed out that there's been talk about that for ten years. He says if they build it tomorrow, then they'd probably have second thoughts about theirs.
Eker said the space downtown is about 13-hundred square feet on the first floor now leased by the federal government's General Services Administration.
The plan calls for creating a new free weight area in the downstairs space and renovating the upstairs to expand the locker and shower areas.
Eker says that space will be available March 1st. At that time, the landlord will start to prepare that space. He hopes to have it available some time in April.
Renkes'
resignation delayed until replacement found
JUNEAU (AP) - The governor's office says Gregg Renkes will continue working
as attorney general until his interim replacement is in place.
Renkes announced his resignation on Saturday. The announcement came after
four months of criticism over alleged ethics violations while Renkes helped
put together a coal deal between Alaska and Taiwan.
The governor's spokeswoman, Becky Hultberg, says Renkes was originally going
to step down today (Monday). Hultberg says Renkes plans to submit a formal
letter of resignation today, but Governor Frank Murkowski has asked Renkes
to finish out the week.
Hultberg says the governor wanted to ensure a smooth transition once an
interim attorney general is named.
Hultberg says a replacement will be named by the end of the week. She says
there is NO short list of candidates being released at this time.
Renkes owned stock in K-F-x Incorporated, a company with a patented
coal-drying process that would have been a part of the agreement between
Alaska and Taiwan. Renkes sold his stock, valued at more than 100-thousand
dollars, after news reports of his ownership surfaced in October.
House fire claims three lives
in Copper Center
Three people perished in a house fire in Copper Center
Saturday.
State Troopers from the Glennallen Post responded to Mile 102 of the
Richardson Highway before seven that morning.
The Troopers' Greg Wilkinson says the house was a total loss.
He says the residence is normally occupied by a family of three. The remains
of three people were found at about 9:30 Saturday night in the ashes of the
home. Wilkinson says the three are believed to be the three members of the
family who were living in the home.
The bodies were transported to Anchorage for exam today by the State Medical
Examiner to establish positive identification and possible cause of death.
The State Fire Marshal sent investigators to the scene. Initial indications
are that the fire may have started in the vicinity of a wood fired furnace.
Wilkinson says the deaths bring the total fire fatalities in the state this
year to six.
Two Nondalton men go through ice with ATV's and drown
Two men from the
western Alaska village of Nondalton drowned over the weekend.
State Troopers in Dillingham were notified by the village health aid before two Sunday morning.
The Troopers Greg Wilkinson says they were told that 24 year old Abram "Beau" Wilson, Junior, .and Nick "Steve"
Carltakoff, 22, were missing and apparently drowned in the New Halen River near
Nondalton.
Sean Alexie, 22 of Nondalton, was also on the scene and said Wilson attempt to drive an ATV across the river at about ten Saturday night.
When Wilson fell through the ice and disappeared with the ATV, Carltakoff mounted another ATV and attempted to rescue Wilson.
Carltakoff and his vehicle also fell through the ice in same
area.
Alexie went out to the same area on foot and also fell through, but Wilkinson says he was able to bust through the ice, working his way back to shore where he ran to the village to get help.
An extensive recovery effort for the missing men was launched and both bodies were recovered by 4:30 Sunday afternoon.
Funding for airport, mine
buildings and land survey highlight Assembly agenda
The Assembly tonight takes up an ordinance appropriating just over
$4,700,000 for new and existing capital improvement projects at the Juneau
International Airport.
New projects on the list include $1,000,000 to purchase of land for airport
expansion, just over $1,650,000 for phase one of the wildlife hazard
management plan, and $1,800,000 for phase one of the ramp reconstruction.
The Assembly will consider appropriating $80,000 to fund a survey of
city land located above the
Lemon Creek Correctional Facility.
The Hidden Valley area is foreseen as a new source of gravel.
The Assembly will take up a ordinance appropriating $1,480,500 as partial
funding to construct the mental health ward for adolescents and adults at
Bartlett Regional Hospital.
The project is part of the Bartlett 2005 Capital Improvement Project with
funding provided by the Alaska Department Of Health And Social Services and
the Denali Commission.
This ordinance was held over from the meeting of January 24th in order to
clarify the requirements of the grant.
The 1.4 million dollar Denali Commission grant will allow construction of
the ward to be completed.
The Assembly is scheduled to make official their denial of two
appeals of the Douglas Breeze Inn expansion.
The Smuggler's Cove Neighborhood Association appeal of the Planning
Commission's Spuhn
Island preliminary subdivision plat was pulled from tonight's
agenda. The finding made by the Assembly is still being prepared by
the city attorney.
Also on tonight's agenda is an application for a $10,000 federal grant to perform
stabilization work on buildings at the Jualpa Mine Camp Historic District
Located In Last Chance Basin.
The Historic Resources Advisory Committee has identified the project as a
priority for historic preservation.
This is a federally funded matching grant; 60 percent federal and 40 percent
CBJ.
CBJ's match will be the volunteer time donated to the project.
The Assembly meets tonight at 7 in their chambers at City Hall.
CBJ budget work begins
Work on the next City and Borough of Juneau budget is underway.
That according to Manager Rod Swope who says he sent out instructions to
departments to produce a maintenance level budget.
He said they have to consider for inflation and there may be a few emergency
considerations including increasing fuel costs which are estimated at
$200,000 over budget.
Its too early to tell, but Swope doesn't think they'll be looking for any
serious cuts.
He's hoping to provide relief to taxpayers.
Swope would like to explore that possibility if a proposal presented by
Governor Murkowski to help local governments underwrite retirement costs is
approved by the Legislature.
He says that would mean about a million dollars each year for the next two
years for Juneau.
Office of Children's Services
subject of Juneau town hall meeting
As part of the Children's Justice Act Task Force, the Citizen Review Panel
will hold a second in a series of town hall meetings in Juneau tonight.
(Monday)
The panel is taking public comment and gathering information on how the
child protection system is working in Alaska as mandated by federal law.
Virginia Walters, who chairs the panel, says its federally mandated to
review the Office of Children's Services.
The first town hall meeting was in Wasilla. She says they got some pretty
good ideas there and expect to get more from Juneau residents.
The forum is from 7 to 9 this evening in the Egan Room of Centennial Hall.
Ward Cove land transfer before
Ketchikan Assembly
KETCHIKAN (AP) - The Ketchikan Borough Assembly today (Monday) will again
consider transferring land at Ward Cove to the Ketchikan Cold Storage
Association.
In January the assembly voted against transferring more than four acres of
Ward Cove land to the nonprofit association.
Under a new version of the land transfer arrangement, the association will
need an anchor tenant before executing a construction contract. And the
association will have to provide a plan designed to minimize competition
with existing facilities in Ketchikan.
The association hopes to build a cold storage facility to store salmon,
herring and other seafood for value-added processing.
The borough land would serve as a local match for grant funding.
Air violations by cruise
ships decrease
JUNEAU (AP) - The Department of Environmental Conservation says air
pollution infractions by cruise ships operating in Southeast waters have
rapidly declined over the last four years.
Seven cruise companies in 2000 paid more than 347-thousand dollars for 12
air violations in Juneau and were charged 120-thousand dollars in suspended
violations.
Ten violations were reported in 2001. But violations dropped to fewer than
one or two annually for 2002 through 2004.
The state for five years used a quarter of a million dollars from a
cruise ship illegal dumping case to pay for a smokestack emissions
monitoring program.
The five-year program requiring cruise companies to pay for air quality
monitoring ended last year and the state will assume responsibility.
A 175-thousand dollar contract covering air pollution monitoring over the
next three years and part of 2008 is up for bid.
North Pacific Fishery Management
Council meeting in Seattle
SEATTLE (AP) - Fisheries officials meeting in Seattle this week could adopt
regulations to protect the seafloor off Alaska from damage caused by fishing
trawlers.
The North Pacific Fishery Management Council is expected to make a decision
Wednesday and Thursday on the final alternative for its ``Essential Fish
Habitat Environmental Impact Statement.''
Spokeswoman Susan Murray says this culminates more than five years of work
to protect Alaskan corals, especially around the Aleutian Islands.
She says the decision could result in the closure of more than 386-thousand
square miles to protect essential fish habitat.
On the Web: www.fakr.noaa.gov/habitat/cie/review.htm
Pilot rescued from Chugach Mountains
ANCHORAGE (AP) - The Alaska Air National Guard came to the rescue of a pilot
and his passenger stranded in a remote location in the Chugach mountains.
The two were flying a Maule M-5 on Saturday evening when it experienced some
type of mechanical failure.
The pilot was unable to take off from Lake George and return to Lake Hood,
where the flight originated.
Alaska National Guard official Mike Haller says the pilot had filed a
flight plan. The search was begun after the Federal Aviation Administration
declared the flight overdue.
A helicopter was sent to the area and located the two. They were taken to
Alaska Regional Hospital to be checked out as a precaution.
Buried ice slab delays railroad's track alignment
ANCHORAGE (AP) - An Alaska Railroad track alignment project not far from Chugiak High School is being held up by an unusual ice slab.
Engineers say the slab in a black spruce forest is 700 or 800 feet long, nearly 44 feet thick at its center, and tapered at its ends.
It is buried just a few feet beneath the surface at its thickest point and about 20 feet under at one end.
Railroad project manager Greg Lotakis says the ice slab has delayed straightening a curve in the railroad tracks through Beach Lake Park.
Permafrost experts say if the railroad had laid track on the slab as if it were ordinary ground, the surface work would cause the ice to melt and the tracks to sink.
The railroad and its consultants are deciding whether to keep the section cool so it remains frozen or to excavate the ice and haul in gravel to fill the hole.
The railroad is straightening tracks between Anchorage and Wasilla to cut the travel time, reduce risk of derailment and save money.
Hunt proposed to thin moose
population in Anchorage Hillside
ANCHORAGE (AP) - The state is considering a moose hunt to decrease the
number of moose on the Hillside above Anchorage.
The last time there was a moose hunt in the area was in 1983. Now, the state
is considering another one.
The Board of Game will consider the proposal at its meeting in March.
State biologist Rick Sinnott says there are so many moose now in Chugach
State Park that some are starving, others are being hit by cars.
If the plan passes the board, it still would have to be approved by park
officials, who have rejected similar hunts in the past.
Kenai girl wins Alaska Junior Miss competition
SOLDOTNA (AP) - Elena Bird of Kenai is Alaska's new Junior Miss.
Bird was one of 18 high school seniors in the competition Saturday night.
She won a three-thousand dollar cash scholarship.
In June, she'll travel to Mobile
(MOH-beel), Alabama, to compete in the 48th annual America's Junior Miss pageant.
Lack of snow doesn't stop Ski for Women
ANCHORAGE (AP) - Anchorage's lack of snow didn't stop the annual Ski for Women event yesterday (Sunday), but it did stop the skiing.
Organizers changed the annual Super Bowl Sunday event into a walk through the forest of Kincaid Park.
More than 500 women and girls walked or ran over a two-point-five-mile course that was supposed to be white but instead is marked by frost, ice, grass and gravel.
Organizers say it was the first time poor winter conditions forced the ski racer to forgo skis.
The annual race collects donations for Anchorage's Abused Women's Aid in Crisis program.
More than a thousand people registered for the free event this year and donated something.
Many of the participants sport costumes and this year there were
mosquitoes, crabs, birds and fruit.
(Copyright ©2005 Alaska Juneau Communications - KINY Radio)
|
