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Thursday
July 07, 2016
Independence Day Fireworks
A glimpse of Ketchikan's Fourth of July fireworks as viewed from above the Plaza Mall area.
Front Page Feature Photo By ALDRIN DRAKE ESCANO ©2016
Alaska: Interior Issues Final Regulations for Any Future Exploratory Drilling in U.S. Arctic Waters - Today, U.S. Department of the Interior’s Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management Janice Schneider, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management Director Abigail Hopper and Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement Director Brian Salerno announced final regulations the department says will ensure that any future exploratory drilling activities on the U.S. Arctic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) are conducted under the highest safety and environmental standards and subject to strong and proven operational requirements.
In response to today's announcement, Alaska Governor Bill Walker (I) said in a prepared statement, “We will look very carefully at the regulatory package to understand the implications for companies interested in exploring in the Arctic. One risk profile does not fit all projects. Flexibility is necessary to accommodate different types of programs. After the time the Interior Department has spent on this regulatory package, I hope the administration moves to expedite Chukchi and Beaufort lease sales.”
“With the United States as Chair of the Arctic Council, we are committed to demonstrating our leadership in governance and activities in the Arctic Region,” said Assistant Secretary Schneider. “The regulations we are issuing today support the Administration’s thoughtful and balanced approach to any oil and gas exploration in the Arctic region. The rules help ensure that any exploratory drilling operations in this highly challenging environment will be conducted in a safe and environmentally responsible manner, while protecting the marine, coastal, and human environments, and Alaska Natives’ cultural traditions and access to subsistence resources.”
According to the U.S. Department of the Interior, the Arctic-specific regulations focus solely on OCS exploratory drilling operations from floating vessels within the U.S. Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. These rules require oil companies to ensure proper internal controls and planning for oil spill prevention, containment and responses – all issues identified by previous Interior reports regarding Shell’s 2012 exploration activities in the Arctic. The regulations codify and further develop current Arctic-specific operational standards to ensure that operators take the necessary steps to plan through all phases of OCS exploration in the Arctic, including mobilization, maritime transport and emergency response, and the conduct of safe drilling operations while in theater.
“The unique Arctic environment raises substantial operational challenges,” said Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper. “These new regulations are carefully tailored to ensure that any future exploration activities will be conducted in a way that respects and protects this incredible ecosystem and the Alaska Native subsistence activities that depend on its preservation.”
“I am reviewing this rule to determine whether the department took into account the substantive comments it received from Alaskans, including comments that were intended to resolve real defects in the draft proposal,” U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) said in a prepared statement. “What we know already is that one company invested nearly $8 billion to complete just one well while operating under guidelines that inspired this rule – which means it is hardly a recipe for successful production in the Arctic.”
Murkowski, the Chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, also said the rule finalized today by the Department of the Interior revises and adds new requirements to regulations for exploratory drilling and related operations in the Arctic OCS. While claiming to increase safety and environmental standards, Interior’s rule appears more likely to reduce investment and harm energy production in the region.
“This rule should be a positive sign for the administration’s willingness to offer new leases in the offshore Arctic, but instead it continues to hint toward an even more uncertain future for the regulatory regime in this region,” Murkowski said. “I am dismayed by the regulatory onslaught the administration is launching on American energy production in its final days.”
Murkowski said the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas contain an estimated 23.6 billion barrels of oil and 104.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. According to a 2014 poll, Murkowski said an overwhelming majority of Alaskans support the development of those resources.
Specifically, the final rule requires operators to develop an Integrated Operations Plan addressing all phases of a proposed Arctic OCS exploration program and submit it to BOEM in advance of filing an Exploration Plan. The regulations require companies to have access to – and the ability to promptly deploy – source control and containment equipment, such as capping stacks and containment domes, while drilling below or working below the surface casing.
Operators also must have access to a separate relief rig able to drill a timely relief well under the conditions expected at the site in the event of a loss of well control; have the capability to predict, track, report, and respond to ice conditions and adverse weather events; effectively manage and oversee contractors; and develop and implement an Oil Spill Response Plan designed and executed in a manner that accounts for the unique Arctic OCS operating environment, and is supported with the necessary equipment, training, and personnel for oil spill response on the Arctic OCS.
“Conducting safe and environmentally responsible Arctic exploratory drilling operations presents a variety of technical, logistical and operational challenges,” said Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement Director Brian Salerno. “This rulemaking seeks to ensure that operators prepare for and conduct these operations in a manner that drives down risks and protects both offshore personnel and the pristine Arctic environment.”
These regulations complement the previously announced Final Well Control Rule, released in April. While the Well Control Rule applies across the entirety of the OCS, including the Arctic OCS, many of the provisions of the final Arctic regulations announced today go beyond the scope of the Well Control Rule and address the unique challenges posed by the Arctic operating environment, especially provisions that put in place systems and processes to further reduce risk and provide rigorous safeguards for Alaska’s North Slope coastal communities and the sensitive Arctic environment. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
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Thundering Wings
By Artist Nathan Jackson
Ketchikan, Alaska, 2016
The original Thundering Wings was carved by Nathan Jackson and installed in 1993. Deterioration took its toll and in 2014 the carving was removed and Jackson began work to recreate the sculpture.
The new piece was installed VERY early in the morning of July 4th, 2016 in order to surprise and delight Ketchikanites with its reappearance during the July 4th parade. Master Carver Nathan Jackson lives and works in Ketchikan.
Photo courtesy Ketchikan Arts & Humanities Council
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Alaska: Congressional Report About Contaminated Lands Conveyed to Alaska Native Corporations; Effort Establishes Step Towards Cleanup - The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) recently delivered a report to Congress that details the development and current status of the most comprehensive inventory to date of known contaminated sites on lands conveyed to Alaska Native corporations through the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA). In addition, the report also provides recommendations for fully addressing cleanup of all the conveyed contaminated sites.
Over the years Alaska Native communities have expressed health, safety, and economic concerns related to the presence of hazardous materials or other forms of contamination on lands conveyed to them under ANCSA, which called for the transfer of about 44 million acres to Alaska Native corporations for economic development. The BLM’s comprehensive database is meant to help guide cleanup of contaminated sites across Alaska by identifying, on a preliminary basis, the parties responsible for the contamination, if known; describing whether cleanup has started; and determining what information is still needed to clean up currently unresolved sites.
“By working with Alaska Native corporations, the State of Alaska and other Federal agencies, the BLM has developed a powerful tool to effect change and move toward cleanup of these sites,” said BLM Alaska State Director Bud Cribley. “While the BLM’s role here has been limited to handling the government’s land transactions, we are proud to bring our expertise to this part of the project.”
To prepare the inventory, the BLM started with information found in the Contaminated Sites Program Database, a publicly available source of information developed and managed by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC). Additional database information was obtained from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), U.S. Air Force (USAF), and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Formerly Used Defense Sites (FUDS) program.
In addition, the BLM facilitated nine meetings with Alaska Native corporations across the state to gather input and verification of sites, which was essential to updating and improving the inventory database for the report.
The end result is an inventory with what is known about each site and its regulatory status, including 1) the entity to which the BLM conveyed the property; 2) location of the contaminated site; and 3) the type and amount of contaminants that may be present. Before it can be considered final, the inventory needs to be refined with further regulatory and site characteristics, when that information becomes available. Once finalized, the inventory will provide Alaska Native entities and the appropriate Federal and State regulators with the information they need to help address these contaminated sites. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
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Alaska Science: Sheefish a shiny surprise on interior river By NED ROZELL - Fishing at the spot where this long, squiggly stream mixes with a floury channel of the Tanana River, Alison Beamer feels a thump.
Alison Beamer displays a sheefish Jason Clark helped her land on the Zitziana River, which she paddled up on a Tanana River trip.
Photo by
Ned Rozell
Line squeals from her spinning reel as a creature as long as her arm flashes beneath the surface. After a few runs east and west, the fish tires, becoming still beneath the clear surface. Beamer's canoe-mate Jason Clark nets and dispatches the fish. He then threads it on a stringer.
Beamer holds the sheefish up in the sunlight. It's a stunning fish none of us has seen before, though the the lobster of the north is common enough in northern Alaska rivers. Its long, polished silver body gleams purplish in the sun. Its mouth is U-shaped and seems big as a bucket.
This giant member of the whitefish family is found only in a few dozen river systems of North America and Asia. North of the Arctic Circle, in the Selawik and Kobuk rivers, elder sheefish can get to 60 pounds. Beamer's fish is maybe five pounds, but it seems too large to live in a river narrow enough to throw a rock across.
Sheefish sometimes migrate, but not like salmon. This fish, from the Minto Flats population of sheefish, probably spent the winter in the Zitziana or another river close by. Other populations of sheefish, like those on the Selawik and Kobuk rivers, winter in the brackish waters of Hotham Inlet and Selawik Lake, according to Kenneth Alt of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
Sheefish can live to be 30 years old, about as long as a fortunate raven or walrus. With their sheer size, they seem out of place in this world of northern pike and grayling, as early explorers of northern Canada noted when they called sheefish poissons inconnus, unknown fish. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
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Columns - Commentary
MICHAEL SHANNON: Comey and the FBI Blink After Email Investigation - FBI Director James Comey's news conference on the conclusion of the Hillary Clinton investigation reminded me of another staged media event in a hostile environment almost 50 years ago.
During the Vietnam War Commander Jeremiah Denton had been shot down on a bombing raid and was being held in a Hanoi prison camp. In May 1967 Denton was marched out by his captors to face a battery of television cameras. The goal of the propaganda event was to "prove" to gullible leftist journalists that the prisoners were well treated in Hanoi.
During his forced testimony Denton fooled his captors by blinking out the Morse code letters that spelled "torture." This was the first proof the Pentagon had that POWs were being tortured.
Denton paid the price for his courage by suffering more beatings.
In some ways the stakes at Comey's event were as momentous as those at Denton's: Potential duress, hostile leftist environment, psychological pressure and anxiety about his future. And although the final conclusion let Hillary off the hook, for a while it looked as if Comey was trying undermine the general tone of exoneration by using facts to contradict her lies and the administration's predetermined outcome for the investigation. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
WILL DURST: Who will win the Donald Trump Veepstakes? - Now that the presumptive nominees are set, the presidential campaign has officially entered its "begging for money like we're raising bail for our little sister who's being held in a Turkish prison" stage. And a pre-convention lull has descended upon the proceedings like a moist blanket of sulk. Not to be confused with the post-convention lull, which will be similar but ratcheted up by a desperation factor of four.
Both campaigns have stalled like interstate highways under construction during rush hour on a holiday weekend, and stumbling on any actual new news is similar to finding football cleats in the Ballet Russe dressing room. ,
The big discussion right now is a little something called the "Veepstakes," with all of Washington debating who the candidates should pick to make them more electable. You got your "top tier" list, your "short" list, and the "we're only floating their names because they endorsed us and we need their mailing list" list.
So it's time to play the only game in town, guessing who goes on the bottom of the bumper sticker, this week focusing on the Donald, which is tricky, because he's insulted at least half the field of prospective suitors. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016 |
Editorial Cartoon: Cop Shootings
By Steve Sack ©2016, The Minneapolis Star Tribune
Distributed to subscribers for publication by Cagle Cartoons, Inc.
President Obama: "We are better than this." - Today, President Obama spoke on the fatal shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. - Read or listen to the President's remarks ...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
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An Open Letter to Our Community By Ken Tonjes - We all know that living in a small town is wonderful, but it comes with its own set of perils. Sometimes it is nice that news travels fast, but on the flip side, so does misinformation. Just a few well-meant but not entirely accurate conversations around the campfire and before we know it, misinformation is being spread around town. Most recently, the grapevine is saying that Ketchikan Medical Center is no longer performing elective surgeries because we don’t have anesthesiologists. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
Part 13: “OIL COMPANY” WALKER, “OIL CAN” ORTIZ, AND OIL COMPANY SOCIALISM By David G Hanger - On the editorial page of the June 25 weekend edition of the KETCHIKAN DAILY NEWS in an unattributed editorial blurb the DAILY NEWS harshly criticized numerous members of the state house of representatives for resisting “Oil Company” Walker’s effort to take Alaskans’ Permanent Fund Dividend. This cavalier willingness to deprive so many others of so much displays fundamentally the willful ignorance the DAILY NEWS and its staff has about the financial crisis, i.e. the “Coghill Abomination,” that faces this state today; and it also gives us a very clear idea of the type of decisions Bob Sivertsen would make, i.e. to sell us all down the river at the earliest possible opportunity. - More...
Thursday PM - July 07, 2016
AST K9 Lutri By A.M. Johnson - Did not the local enforcement dispose of the drug dog on reason that having marijuana legal the dog was not worth the cost? Seems logical that a dog such as the one in this story would be a deterrent IF used daily at the ferry terminal, airport, and incoming mail (Postal office). FedEx, and UPS. - More...
Monday AM - July 04, 2016
No Aircraft for Iran By Donald Moskowitz - Boeing Co. recently cut a deal with Iran Air to sell it 100 Boeing 737s and 777s worth about $25 billion, which is a nice contract for Boeing and its employees. - More...
Monday AM - July 04, 2016
WISH Situation is Dire By Diane Gubatayao - By now it is well known that since September 2015, Women In Safe Homes (WISH) has been on probation with the Council on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault (CDVSA), the State agency responsible for funding and administrative oversight of 18 shelters throughout Alaska. The original probation document cited nine systemic issues involving staff, participants and community partners. I do not believe it is productive at this time to debate the merits of the probation. I trust that a State agency comprised of a Commissioner and assistant State Attorney General, among others, has done due diligence before imposing such a serious sanction. To their credit, many associated with WISH have made the effort to meet the requirements outlined by CDVSA. However, we have learned recently that the situation is dire with the exit of five Board members and some staff, and continued problems with WISH management and leadership highlighted by CDVSA. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 29, 2016
GOVERNOR, THE NEXT CUP OF COFFEE IS ON ME By Richard Peterson - Earlier this month, I wrote a commentary on whether or not the 2014 “Unity Team” would keep its promise to steer away from litigation against Alaska tribes and instead work towards improving tribal relations. Today’s commentary is a follow-up to express my gratitude to the Walker Administration for not appealing the recent Alaska Supreme Court decision in State of Alaska v. Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. This important court ruling affirms that Alaska tribal courts, some of whom already handle custody, adoption, and paternity for tribal children, can also decide child support. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 29, 2016
PART 12: “OIL COMPANY” WALKER, “OIL CAN” ORTIZ AND OIL COMPANY SOCIALISM By David G Hanger - Voting for Bob Sivertsen for state representative in the upcoming election is the equivalent of pouring gasoline on a fire that is already out of control. I have nothing personal against Bob Sivertsen. I hear he is a moderate conservative “who hasn’t run into a local social program he hasn’t enthusiastically supported.” But what Bob calls ‘leadership’ I call sheepishness, and that limitation is a disaster in the making because these folks up north who call themselves Republicans are anything but, yet Bob Sivertsen will still follow that bunch wherever they go. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 29, 2016
Local radio dropping RUSH By A.M.Johnson - The following is written as a public service. Recently KTKN radio station announced that effective July 1st, the station with locations in Ketchikan, Sitka, and Juneau have or are dropping the Rush Limbaugh program from their schedule. Inquiry as to the reason was given the fiscal disappointment of revenue. When asked if there was a political venue related to the action, I was assured that there was and is no such pressure. When the question of what is anticipated to replace the Rush programming that will result in equal or additional revenue during the three hour period, there was no response other than Drop by the station sometime by the general manager. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 29, 2016
RE: Public restrooms on docks closed too early By Douglas J. Thompson - Regarding the letter from Mr. Phil Borngraeber published recently in Sitnews: We have ten harbor employees and probably more with their 'summer help'. They are costing Ketchikan's taxpayer between ninety and one hundred forty thousand dollars per year each. We pay for a multitude of vehicles for them and all expenses. The department is supposedly run by Corporan under Amylon. Somewhere along the way as I have pointed out before they have decided they no longer need to work to collect their salary. Case in point is Mr. Borngraeber letter showing they once again "contract out" the most simple menial tasks that they themselves should be doing. It is ridiculous that cleaning Harbor Department bathrooms is approved for contracting out. With the overstaffing it should easily be handled and could even be done with 1/3 of the employees currently employed to no discernible benefit in that bloated department. - More...
Monday AM - June 27, 2016
Gov Walker's 5th Special Session By Marvin Seibert - We are now in the grips of Governor Walker's calling for a 5th special session. Special sessions were not instituted till the governor of a state gets his way. Taxes being considered will have a devastating effect on the people who can afford it the least. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 22, 2016
Public restrooms on docks closed too early By Phil L. Borngraeber - Just in the last two weeks I have been among the many local folks riding, walking, taking the kids or dogs out for relaxation and exercise. But wait, no matter how great the weather is, don't plan on using the restrooms at dock 4 or 2 after the ships have left. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 22, 2016
Please abide by leash laws By Mishele Rhein - In light of summer and the added outdoor activities at the local beaches, I would like to encourage the locals and our numerous summer guests to abide by the leash laws. Don’t get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoy watching my dogs run, play and dig with abandon on the sandy beaches as well, but doing so on a leash. Being a dog owner, I understand the need to get out and exercise man’s best friend, but to be honest, I am growing weary of being assaulted by “friendly” dogs when the owner is truly no where to be seen. I am not sure what’s worse, missing dog owners or oblivious dog owners. The latter being the friendly passers by greeting you a wonderful afternoon while their dog is running circles around you and your now distracted leashed dog. Everyone tends to think their dog is “amiable enough” and “its no problem.” Even though my exuberant animals feel the need to greet everyone, everyone does not feel the need to greet them. Just tonight I went for a walk and was greeted (whether I wanted to be or not) by no less than three dogs before I even got to the beach. One of which had a leash trailing but no person holding the other end and the fourth dog came to investigate upon exit and felt the need to walk us part way home. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 22, 2016
The 1967 Fairbanks' Flood By John Calhoun - I was living in the Northward building at the time of the 1967 Fairbanks' flood. We were able to get power from a building across the street by a long cord hooked up to an electrical panel to provide emergency lighting in the halls and stairwells. - More...
Wednesday PM - June 22, 2016
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