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Friday
January 01, 2016
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2016: Happy New Year
Prince Rupert, one of several Ketchikan peafowl owned by the photographer. Peacocks (males) have their full set of new tail feathers in time to welcome in every New Year. Each year the males drop their old colorful feathers in August - September and immediately begin to grow in another colorful set just in time to welcome the new year.
Front Page Photo & Graphic By MARY KAUFFMAN ©2015
Select your favorite Photo of the Month. The photographer with the most likes for the month will receive $100. Only LIKES on the SitNews' Facebook page will be counted. If you don't use FB, email your choice to the editor.
(Submit your photograph to be featured on the SitNews' front page. Email photo to editor@sitnews.us include your name and a brief photo description.)
Fish Factor: 2015 Fishing Picks and Pans - By LAINE WELCH - 2016 marks a quarter of a century for this weekly column that targets Alaska’s seafood industry.
At the end of every year, I proffer my ‘no holds barred’ look back at the best and worst fish stories, and select the biggest story of the year.
The list is in no particular order and I’m sure to be missing a few, but here are the Fishing Picks and Pans for 2015:
Most eco-friendly fish feat: The massive airlift/barge project led by the Dept. of Environmental Conservation that removed more than 800,000 pounds of marine debris from remote Alaska beaches.
Best new fish service: ‘Print at home’ fishing licenses (and more) by the AK Dept. of Fish and Game.
Biggest fish fake: Genetically modified salmon – Frankenfish
Best fish financial potential: Mariculture for more shellfish, sea ‘vegetables’ –shrimp?
Worst fish kick the can: The Dept. of Natural Resources’ stall on a salmon vs. coal mine water rights decision at the Chuitna watershed in Upper Cook Inlet. DNR awarded a small reservation to protect salmon while allowing more time for PacRim coal to prove that building Alaska’s largest coal mine won’t hurt salmon and the ecosystem.
Biggest fish raised eyebrows: Pacific Seafoods Processing Association among the appellants in a lawsuit against DNR’s decision to grant water reservation rights for the first time to a private entity, the Chuitna Citizens Coalition (See above)
Biggest fish hurry up: Electronic Monitoring Systems to replace fishery observers on small boats. Not much extra bunk space on a 40 footer.
Biggest fish phonies: Kenai-based sportfish enthusiasts bankrolling an effort to ban setnet gear in ‘urban’ areas in the name of conservation. Their claims that setnets are an “outdated gear and devastating, indiscriminate killers” ignore 10 years of ADF&G data showing that 99.996 percent of setnet harvests is salmon.
Best fish quick fix: The JDBeltz, by Anne Morris of Sand Point - a horizontal Vicky knife holder that prevents leg pokings.
Best fish sigh of relief: Federal fish managers allowing the use of pots, instead of longlines, to catch black cod. The gear shift prevents whales from stripping the pricey fish from hooks, leaving only the lips. Fishermen call it “getting whaled.”
Best fish visionary: Tidal Vision LLC of Juneau, for their eco-friendly method of extracting chitin from crab shells, a first in the USA. Uses for chitin range from fabrics to pharmaceuticals and are too numerous to mention.
Best fish fighters: The Genuine Alaska Pollock Producers (GAPP) for fighting tirelessly to get tasty, ‘kid approved’ fish meals into school lunch programs, and for getting the pollock name corrected on federal food lists to guarantee the fish is top quality.
Best fish energy booster: Bob Varness of Juneau for the first in the nation electric powered passenger boat, the E/V Tongass Rain, set to be out on the water doing eco-tours this summer. Next up: all electric fishing boats.
Best fishing career builders: University of Alaska/Southeast, Kodiak College for low cost courses in vessel hydraulics, electronics, maintenance and repairs, fish technicians and more – most are available on-line; Alaska Sea Grant’s Marine Advisory Agents.
Best Fish Givers: SeaShare, on its way to donating 200 million fish meals to food bank networks since 1994.
Trickiest fishing conundrum: Sea otters vs. crab and dive fisheries in Southeast Alaska .
Best fish boosters: Juneau Economic Development Council for ramping up visibility of the local fishing/processing sector, and envisioning big opportunities in mariculture and fish ‘co-products.’
Fondest fish farewell: Ray RaLonde, who retired from Alaska Sea Grant after decades of creating and nurturing the state’s fledgling mariculture industry. - More...
Friday AM - January 01, 2016 |
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Alaska: TOP 5 ALASKA SCAMS OF 2015 - With the arrival of 2016, Better Business Bureau has tallied the year’s top scams with the help of Scam Tracker. Investigators collected reports from more than 10,000 consumers nationwide and processed the data using a heat map so that users can see what scams are happening in their area.
Graphic courtesy BBB
“Scammers are elusive,” says Tyler Andrew, President and CEO of BBB serving Alaska, Oregon and Western Washington. “With Scam Tracker, consumers and law enforcement can track fraud in real time and report it so that no one else falls victim.”
The top 5 scams hitting Alaska are as follows:
1. Sweepstakes: “You’ve won millions!” That’s the bait from lottery and sweepstakes scams. The caller tells the “winner” all they need to do is pay a few thousand dollars in taxes and fees, then the jackpot is theirs keep. Often the consumer never entered the contest to begin with. Genuine lotteries simply subtract any fees or taxes from the prize.
2. IRS Scam: Consumers receive threatening phone calls from someone claiming to be with the IRS. The caller tells the consumer he owes taxes to the government and will be thrown in jail unless he pays. The IRS says they never call people who owe money; instead, they notify debtors via mail.
3. Imposter Scam: Like the IRS scam, fraudsters pose as a federal agent or law enforcement and then contact unsuspecting consumers to try and obtain their personal information. If the scammers succeed, they’re able to steal identities and commit fraud.
4. Debt Collections: Fake collection agencies call and claim consumers owe credit card debt. They try to gather personal information such as Social Security and bank account numbers.
5. Credit Cards: Scammers tell consumers they are eligible for a lower interest rate. The consumer provides the scammer their credit card number and security code to “verify” their identity.
In Southeast Alaska in 2015, the BBB received one imposter IRS Scam report from Prince of Wales Island. In the Juneau area, one Sweepstakes, Prizes/Gift Scam was reported to the BBB.
According to the BBB Scam Tracker, a total of 93 scams were reported statewide by Alaskans in 2015.- More...
Friday AM - January 01, 2016
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Courtesy Canine Company |
Pet Resolutions: Five New Year Resolutions Every Pet Parent Should Make for 2016 - This year, why not resolve to do something for yourself and the family pet.
"Our pets can't improve their diet or get more exercise on their own," says Renee Coughlin of Canine Company. "They depend upon us to make their lives healthy, safe and happy."
She suggests five resolutions every pet parent can make to help their furry family members thrive in 2016:
1. Schedule a health check with your veterinarian. An annual screening is the best way to catch health problems early. Keeping up with routine vaccinations also ensures your pet is protected against serious diseases.
2. Make grooming a routine. To keep skin and coat healthy, pets should be brushed several times a week. Shampoos and haircuts are needed every six to eight weeks, depending upon coat length. If big tasks are too time-consuming, schedule regular appointments with a professional groomer to keep pets healthy and comfortable.
3. Monitor diet and exercise. Our pets need regular exercise and quality nutrition to maintain good health. Schedule playtimes, walks or romps every day to keep pets moving. Consult your vet about the best food for your pet's age and activity level. - More....
Friday AM - January 01, 2016
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Columns - Commentary
DANNY TYREE: The Top Stories of 2016: You Saw Them Here First - This is not the year-end column I had intended to write.
But over supper at McDonald's, my son Gideon (my favorite 7th-grader) lamented that I write too many serious columns (like my Veterans Day and Christmas essays) and insisted I should concentrate on more tongue-in-cheek romps.
To keep peace in the family, I dusted off my crystal ball, made some extrapolations based on the trends of 2015 and cobbled together a batch of not-completely-unlikely prognostications for 2016. The headlines:
1. Miss Universe Pageant host Steve Harvey is also hired to announce winner of 2016 presidential campaign; viewers unsurprised when "Dewey defeats Truman" is the result.
2. Pope Francis continues his progressive reforms of the Catholic Church, with innovations such as Nerf rulers for Catholics school nuns, fill-in-the-blank Mad Libs confessional forms, FitBits geared for playing bingo and drone delivery of communion wafers; Saint Peter allegedly riled by the pontiff's publication of "10 Coolest Afterlife Hacks."
3. Queen Elizabeth II, the longest-reigning British monarch, explores the possibilities of uploading her consciousness to an immortal robotic body; Prince Charles explores the possibilities of having the British Navy conquer a country just for him.
4. Anthropologists in Gobi Desert discover a single temporary crown for a bicuspid and announce yet another cousin species to Homo sapiens; grant application promises, "Let us find a premolar to go with it, and we can tell you who brought tater salad to the family reunion."
5. U.S. officials continue to do thorough job of vetting refugees; one official overheard saying, "Wait! You mean that guy from last week has a conjoined twin? Son of a gun! He didn't mention that!"
6. A college president is forced from office for continuing to allow graduates to toss caps into air after receiving diplomas; this insidious form of hate speech OBVIOUSLY makes light of the GRAVITY of the situation facing African-American students.
7. President Obama responds to Donald Trump's plan to spy on mosques by spying on Pentecostal churches; undercover agent declares, "I have had it with these %$#@ snakes in these %$#@ worship services!" - More...
Friday AM - January 01, 2016 |
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PETER FUNT: News Certain to Occur in 2016 - Other than global warfare, politics, economics and fantasy sports, there really isn't much news to recap from 2015. So, looking ahead, here's a handy precap of news certain to occur in 2016.
JAN. 1 — President Obama issues the first ever Virtual New Year's Forecast (VNYF), which, when viewed through tinted cardboard glasses, appears brighter.
JAN. 12 — Bestselling author Bill O'Reilly reveals two new book projects: "Killing Gophers" (How backyard violence inspired a new generation of gardeners) and "Killing Time" (The painstakingly documented story of how O'Reilly waits for Martin Dugard to finish writing).
FEB. 9 — In Dixville Notch, TV host Steve Harvey announces that the New Hampshire primary winners are Martin O'Malley and Rick Santorum.
FEB. 28 — The Academy Awards telecast features 26 commercials for FanDuel. One ad exclaims, "Feeling left out because you don't follow sports? Make your Oscar picks, bet as little as a dollar, and you could win $75 million!"
MAR. 24 — Yale University issues new guidelines for coloring Easter eggs.
MAR. 28 — At a Brooklyn news conference, Hillary Clinton announces she will charge the DNC a $200,000 speaking fee each time she is required to debate Bernie Sanders or "the guy from Maryland."
APR. 11 — Rick Santorum drops out of the presidential race after the Real Clear Politics average shows him with .001% of the GOP vote.
APR. 12 — A headline in Politico asks: "Who Will Pick Up Most of Santorum's Supporters?"
MAY 17 — Canada's parliament debates whether to build a wall to stop undocumented Vermonters from bringing maple syrup into the country.
JUNE 6 — On Capitol Hill, 34 members of the GOP caucus begin a hunger strike, vowing not to eat mixed nuts at happy hour until Donald Trump ends his presidential campaign. - More...
Friday AM - January 01. 2016 |
Editorial Cartoon: 2016 Resolution
By Rick McKee ©2016, The Augusta Chronicle
Distributed to subscribers for publication by Cagle Cartoons, Inc.
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 Ketchikan Board of Education By A. M. Johnson - School Board President Ms. Michele O Brien's letter in retort to Ms. Moran makes one's eyes cross. This writer read Ms. Moran's offerings complete with backup documentation, in addressing Ms. Moran's view of the current school board's activities. Is there some item or part addressed that is incorrect or false? I find in reading the newspaper articles following school board meetings the meeting's news reporting content is woefully lacking in academic content. - More...
Tuesday PM - December 29, 2015
U.S. Capitol Christmas Tree By U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski - Alaskans came together in a year-long effort to provide the first tree from Alaska to stand tall as the “People’s Tree”. The U.S. Capitol Christmas tree currently gracing the West Lawn of our nation’s Capitol traveled over 4,400 miles from the Chugach National Forest by land and sea by the generosity of Alaskans who provided everything from ornaments to cranes to trucks, and many months of their time and care. You can see the labor of love Alaskans shared in the thousands of ornaments on the tree that were made out of recyclable materials and creative flair from people across the state. - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
RE: Smoke and Mirrors By Michelle O'Brien - In response to the recent letter by Agnes Moran, my question would be: If you are so keenly interested in education, as you seem to have been in the last five years, why have you not run for the Board of Education? - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
Fear and loathing in the USA By Norbert Chaudhary - When I last dared to turn on my TV, talking heads were shouting in apocalyptic language that our leaders were destroying our country by wasting time and money on climate change rather than doing everything possible to make us "safe from the terrorists." - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
Scorched earth logging By Joseph Sebastian - Last November in Petersburg, Alaska's newest environmental group, "The Greater Southeast Alaska Conservation Community " [gsacc.net] gave a slide show on the latest industrial clearcut logging now taking place on Sealaska land, state forest land and other land grant interests. The show consisted of images from a recent overflight and Google-Earth satellite overviews of Sealaska lands on the Cleveland Peninsula and P.O.W.'s Election Creek, and other examples .Needless to say, the push by Senator Lisa Murkowski to privatize land from the Tongass National Forest in order to rapidly clearcut and export round logs as fast as possible, was shocking, upsetting and holds dire consequences into the future. - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
DOI IG to audit possible use of federal funds by State for predator control By Rick Steiner = The U.S, Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Inspector General (IG) announced Monday (attached) that in its upcoming 5-year audit of annual funding provided by DOI to the Alaska Department of Fish & Game (ADFG), it will address issues raised in a complaint filed last year that Alaska is using federal funds to support its controversial predator control program, in direct violation of federal policy. - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
Get a Healthy Start to the New Year By Susan Johnson - Every year, millions of Americans make New Year’s Resolutions. Do a Google search, and you’ll find health related resolutions are among the most common: lose weight, exercise more, eat healthier, stop smoking, drink less, watch less TV, reduce stress. - More...
Tuesday AM - December 22, 2015
Smoke and Mirrors By Agnes Moran - The administration and school board of the Ketchikan Gateway Borough School District (KGBSD) have been creating discord with the Borough Assembly over “in-kind contributions” to draw the community’s attention away from what it should be focused on, student achievement. Under this administration and school board our children are failing to thrive. - More...
Friday PM - December 18, 2015
Boundary Waters Treaty By Frederick Olsen, Jr. - The United Tribal Transboundary Mining Work Group (UTTMWG) issued a letter to Alaska Governor Walker requesting that the Governor stop the process of developing a Statement of Cooperation with British Columbia on the SE Alaska Transboundary Rivers until his office formally requests the involvement of the US Department of State under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909 to help protect the rivers vital to our economy and traditional cultures and way of life. - More...
Friday PM - December 28, 2015
State Budget By Lance Clark - Maybe I'm doing the math wrong, I hope, but there's approximately 750 thousand people in Alaska and our state budget is around $11 billion a year. That turns out to be $14,667 per person. I have no idea how we can even pretend we can afford that. - More...
Wednesday AM - December 16, 2015
Alaska is Cold By John Suter - President Obama is going to send Alaska its share of refugees. Now is not the time to increase cost in the state budget that will incur by bringing in these refugees to the state when the state must do all that it can do to cut cost to balance the budget. A way the state can cut cost is to offer these refugees a free one way airplane ticket with a hand full of cash to fly to another state like California where they have hot dry deserts that is a similar type of country to where they came from and they will feel more at home. They need to know that Alaska is cold by their standards year around and they would not be happy here when they could live in sunny California that welcomes them with open arms of welfare, health care and everything else that they may need. - More...
Wednesday AM - December 16, 2015
Dave Kiffer Truckin' By Melissa Muller - Dave Kiffer hit all the high points with his recent column "Ktown Economy just keeps on Truckin'. With the state's economy going up in smoke, it's time to do more than straight thinking. There is a new high tide mark being set and Ketchikan needs to roll with it. - More...
Wednesday AM - December 16, 2015
Hillary Clinton Plans a Corporate "Exit Tax" By Wiley Brooks - This is Mrs. Clintons answer to stop American Companies from re-incorporating overseas. For too many politicians the answer is always the same - “we’ll punish those “expletives” for making a profit. An “exit tax” will just be added to the cost of the products we buy and make it more difficult for American companies to compete in the global market. - More...
Wednesday AM - December 16, 2015
Revenue options: Thanks for participating By Dan Ortiz - To me, government by the people and for the people is more than just a theoretical concept. I believe this famous phrase from President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address must be put into practice for government to work. That’s why I’ve been going door to door, mailing out surveys and holding meetings in the communities I represent. At our town meeting on December 1st, I shared my revenue survey results and asked attendees to fill out a questionnaire on Governor Walker’s proposed endowment fund model. - More...
Friday AM - December 11, 2015
Open Letter: ADF&G Commissioner Cotten By Rick Steiner - You may have seen the Fall update released last week by NPS on the Denali wolf population, which showed a slight increase in numbers, but a continued decrease in viewing success. This year, only 5% of the park visitors were able to see wolves, thus some 500,000 paying visitors were deprived this opportunity. - More...
Friday AM - December 11, 2015
REDDI report followup By Shawn Kimberley - Almost immediately after posting my letter, I was contacted by the Captain of the Alaska State Troopers. The gentleman I spoke with was the commander of the entire southeast region. After a fairly long conversation, I would honestly say that I believe that he is a good man and a good leader. After our conversation I feel like he is here to help improve all aspects of our community. We discussed the situation thoroughly. What came out of that conversation was a complete surprise to me. Not only was the outcome something positive, But it restored my faith in the Alaska State troopers organization. He did not try to make excuses, He did not try to dance around the subject. Instead he owned up the actions, or in my opinion the lack of action. And was very polite and thankful to me for my part in trying to help correct a dangerous situation. - More...
Friday AM - December 11, 2015
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