Ketchikan: Flash Back - In Flash Back, the 20th Annual Wearable Art and Runway Fashion Show held Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Grace Kirkwood flashed back to when she met her beloved dalmatian, Dot. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Red sea urchin Photo by Richard Strathmann, Courtesy Friday Harbor Laboratory

Ketchikan: New Sea Urchin Plant Would Mean Jobs for Ketchikan By DICK KAUFFMAN - Speaking before the Greater Ketchikan Chamber of Commerce last Wednesday, Pat Cassin spoke about his efforts in looking for a site location for Pacific Sun Products, a sea urchin processing company out of Ventura, California.

Cassin, a commercial diver involved in construction, salvage and the urchin fishery for the past 20 years, moved to Southeast in 1995 and to Ketchikan in 1999.

He said, "If I took you out on a boat, dressed you in a $2,000 dry suit, loaded you down with another 110+ pounds of lead and dive gear; then asked you to jump off into 60 feet of sea water, you might feel a bit uncomfortable. That's where I've been for the last 20 years." You might want some training, or at least advice from those with the experience and those already in business.

Ketchikan is a unique place to do business and you [Chamber members] are the ones with the experience said Cassin.

Cassin said the urchin business is in trouble right now. Looking around the room, he said some of you helped in getting the urchin fishery business started along with help from the Borough Assembly and donated help from Craig, Wrangell and Petersburg. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

National: Feinstein seeks to limit budget earmarks By EDWARD EPSTEIN - California Sen. Dianne Feinstein has proposed curbs on the growing and controversial congressional practice of inserting projects for constituents and supporters into spending bills at the last minute. Good-government advocates say earmarks, which grew last year to include nearly 15,000 projects tucked into bills without hearings or disclosure to other members, sap public confidence in Congress and is rife with the potential for abuse. Criticism of the practice also reached a crescendo in recent months, with disclosure of the $328 million "bridge to nowhere" in Alaska and the millions of dollars of earmarks inserted into bills for military contractors who bribed Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of San Diego County. Cunningham resigned after pleading guilty. - More... Monday - February 06, 2006 Top Stories U.S. News U.S. Politics Alaska Ketchikan

National: Intensive inspection of W.Va. mines set for Monday By DENNIS B. RODDY AND CINDI LASH - All 70 of West Virginia's mine inspectors and more than 200 federal counterparts will be in the field Monday, attempting to inspect every coal mine in the Mountain State.

The unprecedented move will cover each of the state's 350 deep mines and 200 surface mines. The aggressive round of inspections was ordered after Gov. Joe Manchin called for operators to delay each shift yesterday for an hour-long review of safety regulations. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Analysis: Victory in Iraq still up for grabs, military analyst says By LISA HOFFMAN - Iraqi and foreign guerrillas have proven themselves masters of political and psychological warfare, but remain far from prevailing in the bomb-and-run war they continue to conduct.

That is the conclusion of an exhaustive study of the insurgency in Iraq just concluded by one of the most respected U.S. military experts, Anthony Cordesman, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

National: Two killers closer to first military executions since 1961 By LISA HOFFMAN - President Bush now faces a decision that no commander in chief has confronted in more than 40 years - whether inmates on the U.S. military's death row should live or die.

Bush became the first president since John Kennedy to be faced with that choice when, after years of review, the military recently delivered to the White House recommendations that two convicted multiple murderers be executed for the crimes they committed while in the service. - More....
Monday - February 06, 2006

National: Fish tale -- two pals vie for tiniest find By DAVID PERLMAN - A friendly international debate over the world's smallest fish has turned into a biology lesson on why it pays to be tiny.

Two ichthyologists - one in Seattle and the other in Switzerland - recently claimed in separate scientific publications to have discovered the smallest vertebrate animal ever known. And small they both are. - More....
Monday - February 06, 2006

National: Student files suit when essay gets him sent to psych ward By EMILY KAISER - David Riehm's high school creative writing essay takes the reader along through "a dream within a dream" in which the narrator kills his creative writing teacher. The blood splattering on the narrator's face is followed with his last thoughts before turning the gun on himself. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

National: 'Nut Case' trial set to begin By JIM HERRON ZAMORA - Sunny Thach had just helped his wife carry their laundry inside when he remembered one more bag of baby clothes still in the car and went to retrieve it.

He was shot dead in his front yard minutes later, begging for his life as his wife and toddler looked on, by robbers who took $31. His slaying, police say, capped a bloody 10-week crime spree in late 2002 and early 2003 that included five slayings and scores of robberies throughout Oakland, Calif., by six alleged killers who called themselves the Nut Cases. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Viewpoints Opinions/Letters KETCHIKAN DOCK EXPANSION: THE BENEFITS By Jerry Cegelske - Monday Police Officers of Ketchikan By Phillip L. Alderson - Monday To Freeman's Family & Friends By Rick Watson - Monday Eye-Opener By Jacob Martin - Monday Unleashed dogs By Karen Ramsey - Monday Were the Democrats really out of line at the State of the Union Speech on Tuesday? By Cindy Schwartz - Monday Open Letter to Sealaska Shareholders By Martha Gallagher - Monday Dock expansion By Tracey Stall - Monday Democrats Misbehaving! By Virginia Atkinson - Monday Ketchikan's Drinking Water By Don Hoff Jr. - Monday Federal Subsistence Management Board Meeting By Charlotte Tanner - Monday Reasonable? By Bob Harmon - Monday Moral Integrity By Alan Lidstone - Monday Mentality of this town By Andrew Hamilton - Monday Thank you from the voters! By Roberta "Bobbie" McCreary - Monday am More Viewpoints/ Letters Publish A Letter Political Cartoonists Political Cartoons Ketchikan Monday, February 6th, at 5:30 - The Newtown Historical District Association will provide a venue for Q&A at a special meeting at St. John's Church Announcement Monday, February 6th, at 5:30 pm - Ketchikan Borough Assembly Regular meeting - City Council Chambers Agenda & Information Packets Teleconference meetings - Legislative Information Office - Check the Calendar January Calendar Today's Forecast Current AK Weather Map City Police Report AK Troopers Daily Dispatch Classifieds & Announcements February 2006 Click on the date to read the stories published on that day. S M T W T F S    30 31 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28         Front Page Archives

Laine Welch: A Symphony of Seafood - Yukon king salmon from two small companies in tiny, far away Alaska villages were the favorites at the Symphony of Seafood event last weekend in Anchorage.

Ray's Gourmet Smoked Yukon King Salmon scooped the coveted People's Choice award. The salmon, which is smoked with a "secret blend of specially chosen woods," has been marketed under the Boreal Fisheries label for over 20 years by the Darling family of St. Mary's, AK.

Yukon King Seafoods of Marshall, AK again topped all others for its Smoked Cajun King Salmon. The savory, smoked chunks won the People's Choice award at last month's Symphony in Las Vegas, and won first place in the Smoked Category at the Anchorage event. Placing second and third in the Smoked Category were two smoked sockeye salmon cream cheese spreads (one with Cajun spices) by Ocean Beauty Seafoods, under its Echo Falls label. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Dave Kiffer: Talk of the Town - The jet crash near A&P recently remains the big topic of discussion in Ketchikan.

Everywhere I look I see groups of people huddled together talking about the crash, describing what they saw, what they heard or passing on the latest "info" that they have.

It started minutes after the crash as the word of it spread across town even as the first sirens were ringing from the hillside. I stepped out a college class a couple of minutes after 1 pm last Wednesday and students in the hall were already passing the words "military jet crash" and "A&P."

The crash had occurred just before 1 pm. In the age of text messaging and cell phones, we have finally reached the point where the minute something happens we indeed - to quote a 1950s television program - "are there." - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Michael Reagan: Congressional Pork and Swinish Behavior - Last Tuesday night President Bush offered an olive branch to the Democrats while making a series of proposals to strengthen the nation at home and abroad.

The Democrats, devoid of any alternatives to the president's proposals, or programs of their own, responded in the only way they know how: they bashed Bush, a tactic they seem to have learned from their current den mother, Cindy Sheehan, and her fellow loonies.

The swinish behavior of the Democrats during the State of the Union address was appalling. They were sitting on their hands, scowling, taking credit for killing badly needed reform of a Social Security System heading towards the poor house by applauding when the President recalled their appalling failure to rescue the system, along with their efforts to show themselves not as the defeatists they are but as "supporters" of the troops fighting the war they want desperately to lose so they can blame it on the president. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006

Ann McFeatters: U.S. oil dependence: Are we finally serious? - At least Karl Rove didn't tell his boss to wear a sweater when the president told Americans they are "addicted to oil."

Three decades ago during the Arab oil embargo when former President Jimmy Carter ordered the lights turned off on Washington's famous monuments (as he wore a sweater), Americans freaked out as the price of a barrel of oil rose from $4 to $12. Today's cost is about $70. Consumption has gone up, not down, and use of foreign oil in America has almost doubled in that time.

Everyone notices the irony, of course, of the president, a former Texas oilman (once an oilman, always an oilman?), urging less dependence on oil. For the first time in a major speech outlining his demands, he did not mention his burning desire to take oil and gas from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But part of his plan is to open up pristine areas for oil and gas development for the use of U.S. oil companies.

Nonetheless, it was time for the American president to warn Americans their addiction is a terrible thing. - More...
Monday - February 06, 2006