Loading summary
Transcript97 lines
- [00:00]
A
Support for Alaska Public Media On Demand.
- [00:03]
B
Comes from Siri, an Alaska Native corporation with operations and investments spanning five continents, 45 states and two U.S. territories.
- [00:19]
C
I had many calls from our tribe members. Half of them want to stay, half want to go.
- [00:24]
B
Residents from the village of Kipnuk contemplate whether to rebuild or relocate after last fall's devastating storm. From Alaska Public Media, this is statewide news on Alaska News nightly for Tuesday, February 3rd. Good evening. I'm Casey Grove. Also tonight, the construction industry sounds the alarm over missing federal matching funds for transportation projects.
- [00:45]
D
When funding comes late, the construction industries and agencies can shift from planning mode into scramble mode.
- [00:52]
B
Those stories and more tonight on Alaska News Nightly.
- [00:59]
E
The PFD application is open. Just a small amount of your PFD.
- [01:04]
F
Will help share local news and stories.
- [01:06]
D
About Alaskans with Alaskans across this great state.
- [01:10]
F
When you choose Alaska Public Media through.
- [01:12]
B
Pick click give the Yukon Kuskokwim village of Kipnuk is at a crossroads. A powerful storm last fall destroyed homes, contaminated water and left residents with a critical decision. Rebuild in the same spot or move to higher ground. As Alyona Nydin with the Alaska Desk reports, the conversation is just getting started.
- [01:33]
G
Hypnik resident Raina Paul fights back tears as she talks about how the remnants of Tefun Holon ravaged her village and why relocating is so important for the next generation.
- [01:43]
E
We want them to have a livable life too safe Al ram due to Kirtner to good.
- [01:53]
G
Paul is speaking in English and then Yupik. She says we have to pick land that is safe if we are to relocate. She shared her thoughts at a recent meeting in Anchorage where more than 50 Kipnik residents discussed the future of their community. Village Council President Daniel Pol says it will be up to the residents to decide what's next.
- [02:13]
C
I had many calls from our club members. Half of them want to stay, half want to go. The relocation decision will be upon my tribal members, their votes and their voice inputs.
- [02:25]
G
Kipnak is about 4 miles inland from the Bering Sea coast and was once home to about 700 people. Nearly everyone evacuated after the October storms, many to Anchorage or Bethel. Paul says about 100 residents are back now working to rebuild, but there is a lot to do. The storm demolished about 150 homes, wiped out vital infrastructure and left lands and water contaminated. During the meeting, residents spoke predominantly in ubic, asking what relocation could look like.
- [02:57]
C
Who's dealing with the land? Is anybody working on the land?
- [03:01]
G
They asked about how to choose a new site and secure land ownership and they pondered what it would take to set up critical infrastructure at the new place. Village Council Vice President Chris Alexei says that would include a school, airport and health clinic.
- [03:17]
C
This isn't going to be an easy process to do, but we have to do that.
- [03:24]
G
Village officials say working through these questions and through the relocation process can take years. For Newtok, it took decades and well over $100 million. And in Kwiggelingog, the other village hit hardest by the storm, residents have already voted to relocate. But it is unclear when it will happen and how much it will cost if Kipnik decides to move. One potential option is going to Chiching, a spot on higher ground between Kipnik and Chifornuk. It is a historical settlement now owned by Chifornik's Chiformit Corporation. Vice President Larry Kayakryuk says Chifornik relocated itself many years ago and thinks that's why it didn't suffer more damage in the storms. He says his village is open to a conversation about helping its neighbors. In Kipnak.
- [04:10]
B
We have a lot of families from.
- [04:12]
C
Not just Kipnik, but in Greenluk, Dundee.
- [04:16]
B
Du Lap, Kong, Nightmud, so I think our community is receptive to hear what they have to say, he says.
- [04:27]
G
Residents from multiple villages have familial ties to Chiching. Kipnik elder David Carle says he remembers growing up in Chiching. His family called it Rock Mountain. He says he supports relocating there because the ground is more stable than in Kipnik.
- [04:42]
C
Being an elder, we're not thinking about ourselves, who we are now. We just want to fight for our upcoming generations.
- [04:51]
G
But for Daniel, Paul, Kipnik is home, and he hopes to live there again one day.
- [04:56]
C
For me, I'm gonna stick with Kipnik, regardless of how the situation is. I was raised there, and I'll stay there.
- [05:05]
G
Paul says the meeting was just the first step in the relocation discussion, and residents have a lot of factors to weigh. But Kipnic leaders also feel a sense of urgency. Paul says the village expects only one substantial influx of federal funding. To make the best use of it, he says they need to decide soon whether they want to stay or move in Anchorage. I am Alyona Knighton, foreign.
- [05:37]
B
Of vetoes by governor Mike Dunleavy last summer has Alaska's construction industry on edge. Industry groups are pushing state lawmakers to quickly pass an appropriations bill that they say would unlock hundreds of millions of dollars in federal matching funds. Alaska Public Media's Eric Stone reports.
- [05:55]
A
Last year, lawmakers needed money, so they went searching for funds. They took millions from efforts to improve access to Juneau, $138,000 from the so called Bridge to Nowhere in Ketchikan, even $766 from efforts to explore a bridge over Kinnik arm from Anchorage. It was about $70 million in all. And it was supposed to go towards a federal transportation match that would unlock a total of $700 million in spending. Here's Representative Ashley Carrick, a Fairbanks Democrat, talking about it last April.
- [06:22]
D
At the end of the day, we're.
- [06:24]
H
Really just pulling out of the couch.
- [06:26]
E
Cushions, the little pennies we can find.
- [06:28]
D
Here and there for small bits and.
- [06:30]
E
Pieces of the overall budget picture.
- [06:33]
A
But then Governor Mike Dunleavy vetoed those transfers. He said a lot of the money lawmakers identified had already been spent. So for now, without that money approved in the budget, contractors are ringing the alarm bells.
- [06:44]
D
You are introducing unnecessary risk and disruption to this process.
- [06:49]
A
That's the head of the Associated General Contractors of Alaska, Alicia Kressel, speaking to the House Finance Committee. For now, Transportation Commissioner Ryan Anderson says he's less alarmed. He told lawmakers state has its match covered for the current fiscal year, but that money runs out around the end of June.
- [07:04]
B
It's after July 1st that additional that that we'd be missing out on. So we're really right now focused on that.
- [07:10]
A
And Crystal says that's true. But she says not knowing whether that money will materialize after July 1, she says that makes it harder for construction contractors to gather the right supplies and equip, assemble their workforce and be ready to hit the ground running. So she says any further delays getting the money out the door could risk the 2026 construction season.
- [07:28]
D
When funding comes late, the construction industries and agencies can shift from planning mode into scramble mode.
- [07:35]
A
Lawmakers have so far appeared receptive. Leaders of the House and Senate finance committees say they plan to move quickly on a supplemental budget that would provide the matching funds. They say they'll likely draw from savings to do it. And Senator Burt Steadman, the Sitka Republican who orchestrated the couch cushion shaking last year, says the state's tight budget this year they're looking for more spirit change floating around state government.
- [07:56]
C
Last year was not some aberration. It was not some off the cuff idea. It was methodically sought out and well researched by Ledge Finance and both finance committees. And this year will be the same.
- [08:09]
A
But this year he says he's hoping for different results. Reporting in Juneau, I'm Eric Stone.
- [08:18]
B
Still to come on Alaska News Nightly, scientists at Poker flat outside Fairbanks launch rockets at the Aurora.
- [08:23]
I
And if you're flying rockets in space, if you're doing that and you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong.
- [08:28]
B
That's ahead. Stay with us.
- [08:30]
D
I'm Shelby Herbert, a reporter with the Alaska Desk. That's a joint reporting effort from Alaska Public Media and kuac, where I work in Fairbanks, and other public radio stations in Anchorage, Haines and the Allusions. It allows us to connect to the issues happening in communities all across the state. You can hear our stories during The Morning News, Alaska News nightly or online at AlaskaPublic.org the Alaska Desk is only possible with the support of grants and listeners like you. Thank you.
- [09:01]
B
A Tuksuk Bay man who allegedly assaulted and kidnapped a tribal police officer at gunpoint has been arrested and brought to Bethel to face multiple felony charges. Alaska State troopers say he avoided being captured for nearly two months. Troopers say a Matsu based SWAT team helped them arrest 44 year old Adrian Kylukiak last week. Trooper spokesperson Austin McDaniel says no one had to fire their weapons and no injuries were reported to troopers during the operation. The state issued an arrest warrant back in early December after Kylukiak allegedly took tribal police officer Gregory Carle hostage at gunpoint. Another tribal police officer was able to defuse the situation, but Kylukiak was not arrested at the time. He was charged with felony kidnapping, weapons misconduct and assault in the incident. Troopers say Kylukiak fled the community multiple times to avoid attempts by troopers and tribal police to arrest him. Kylukiak is currently held at Yukon Kuskokwim Correctional center in Bethel. State Education Commissioner Dina Bishop is overturning a unanimous Fairbanks North Starborough School board vote that denied an application for a new charter school. The commissioner's decision was written by a designee who said there was nothing in the record to legally justify the rejection. The local school board voted down the application in October. The committee backing Pearl Creek Steam, which wants to open the charter school in the fall, then appealed to the state education commissioner. The Fairbanks school board had identified errors in the committee's proposed budget, which contained itemized expenses that did not add up to the sum listed in the application. Board members raised numerous other concerns, including the school's plans for food, transportation and admissions, as well as how much it would rely on volunteers to function. The board's decision also pointed to financial impact, with district administrators, saying the school would cost the district about $2.8 million. The commissioner's decision counters each of the local board's findings saying the board's rationale did not align with what's laid out in regulations governing charter school applications. The decision says an application is the starting point in a process that results in a final agreement between the local board and school in response to the budgetary errors. For example, the commissioner's decision says the level of detail required by the board was not necessary at the application step. The decision does not grant the final go ahead. It instead advances the application to the state education board's next meeting, which is scheduled for March. That is considered the final agency action. Though the state board's decision could be appealed in Superior Court. The federal government has begun a scoping process that could lead to wide ranging changes to federal subsistence management in Alaska. The only in person meeting for collecting public comment in the scoping process is tonight in Anchorage. Kotz's Desiree Hagan reports that the Trump administration and the review's instigators want more alignment with state rules, which would hurt rural residents. Subsistence hunting and fishing rights.
- [12:13]
H
Subsistence is a single word for a complex concept. It's a broad term that includes the harvesting, use and sharing of wild plants and animals for a variety of purposes and is rooted in Alaska native culture. Subsistence is at the core of Matthew Anderstrom's existence. He lives in the rural southeast community of Yakutat.
- [12:37]
J
Our ground beef is at $11 a pound. Our milk is about $22 a gallon. And I know we're not alone in this struggle. So if we don't have those subsistence foods, then we lose the ability to even live here anymore.
- [12:54]
H
In May, the Safari Club International, a conservation and big game advocacy group, sent an 18 page petition to the federal government. The letter asked for changes to the federal Subsistence Management Program, which sets policy and bag limits for hunting, fishing and trapping on federal lands in Alaska. The group wants more hunting access. John Sturgeon is chairman of government affairs for the Safari Club's Alaska chapter. Sturgeon says the Safari Club's petition instigated the scoping review. He wants more state influence on hunting and subsistence management.
- [13:33]
J
Well, that's one of our very biggest priorities. We think the state should be much more involved.
- [13:38]
H
The Safari Club petition asked the federal program to, quote, require deference to and consultation with the state and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. That lines up with something President Donald Trump said in an executive order last year. Trump called for the feds to offer hunting and fishing opportunities in Alaska that are, quote, consistent with similar opportunities on.
- [14:06]
J
State land and in an executive order to have a section on on subsistence. Federal Subsistence Board and then also the Secretary of the Interior shortly after that, had one kind of saying the same thing. They want to see the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, the state of Alaska, have some meaningful input.
- [14:25]
H
This is a red flag for subsistence advocates like the Alaska Federation of Natives, which opposes potential changes to the subsistence program. Here's why. Alaska is the only state that has a dual management system for subsistence. It means that hunting and fishing are managed by both the state and the federal government. And there are key differences between the two systems. For one, on federal lands, residents of rural Alaska communities have priority when there aren't enough salmon or caribou or deer to go around. But on state lands, there's no such priority. The state has an equal access rule, which means all Alaskans are given equal access to fish and game, whether they live in a large city like Anchorage or a small community like Kivalina. That's because of a 1989 Alaska Supreme Court ruling that found a rural priority on state lands violated the Alaska Constitution.
- [15:32]
J
A subsistence priority for everybody, all residents is a subsistence priority for nobody. And you can quote me on that.
- [15:39]
H
Calcipit is the vice chair of the Southeast Regional Advisory Council. Casapit has been involved with the federal subsistence management program since its inception in 1990. He called the subsistence review ridiculous and believes it's an attempt to strip rural and tribal residents of their subsistence rights. Alaska Fish and Game Commissioner Doug Vincent Lang says the state of Alaska supports the review. The federal scoping review could lead to new rulemaking for many areas of federal subsistence management, including the makeup of the federal Subsistence board and regional advisory councils, clarifying inconsistencies between state and federal rules, special actions and emergency closures, and determining what areas are considered rural. The 60 day comment period began in mid December. February 13th is the deadline for public comment in Kotzebue. I'm Desiree Hagan.
- [16:45]
B
Poker Flat research Range just outside Fairbanks saw its first rocket launch of the year last week. And more are coming. NASA affiliated scientists are performing a series of studies targeting the aurora, what it's made of and how it acts in different conditions. The Alaska Desk's Shelby Herbert has this story from the launch site.
- [17:05]
D
I pull up to the remote Poker Flat rocket facility around midnight, just before the gate's locked and in a warm office building. Inside the sprawling facility, a group of scientists. Scientists are hurriedly calibrating equipment, scribbling equations on dry erase boards and burning lots and lots of rocket fuel, as graduate researcher Salmaya Muthurangan calls it donuts and coffee. It is. It is fundamental pink donuts. In particular, the researchers say the donuts always have to be pink on a launch night. Scott Bailey, who heads up the project, says he's big on traditions, not superstitions. But a lot can go wrong on a night like this.
- [17:49]
I
To do rocketry, you have to learn to live with disappointment. Think of all the things that have to work, all the stuff on the rocket, the instrumentation, the batteries that power it, the radio that communicates the data down. Everything has to be perfect.
- [18:02]
D
This is the first in a series of NASA affiliated launches planned for the next few weeks. The missions will explore little understood aurora related phenomena, like something called black aurora, which look like dark structures that drift along the regular aurora. They happen when auroral particles temporarily thin out or shut off in the upper atmosphere. Another mission will gather information on how disturbances in the atmosphere distort auroral sheets, which look like folds in the aurora. It'll consist of two rockets that cross an arc together. But on this cold January night, Bailey's team of Virginia Tech researchers will use their rocket to gather data on a type of gas, a compound the aurora creates when it breaks up nitrogen molecules. The project is called Polar Nox, with the N and O capitalized to represent.
- [18:58]
H
The chemical symbol for nitric oxide, not.
- [19:02]
I
Nitrous oxide, which is laughing gas, nitric oxide.
- [19:06]
D
So what they'll do is point the rocket at the star Algonib, launch it to an altitude free of nitric oxide, and use an ultraviolet instrument aboard to pick up tiny losses in starlight when it's obscured by the nitric oxide. That'll tell the scientists how much of the compound exists at different heights above Earth's surface. Bailey says that data is critical to understanding the atmosphere as a whole, how.
- [19:34]
I
Air moves pole to pole and around the globe. Things like the polar vortex, things like the jet stream, all these things, it's all related. If nitric oxide is created and lowers the amount of ozone in the stratosphere, then there's less ozone to do the job of cooling the atmosphere. So that will change the circulation from equator to pole. It's all connected.
- [19:54]
D
Bailey says the mission's success isn't guaranteed. But he says you can be committed to success and, and still have fun.
- [20:03]
I
And if you're flying rockets in space, if you're doing that and you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong.
- [20:08]
D
At 4am a crowd of guests and staff huddled together in the bitter winter wind to watch the launch. There was a second flash, followed by a roar. If you missed the polar nox, launch or blinked before takeoff like I did. More poker flat launches are coming this month. Those are planned for the window of time between February 7th through the 20th. Reporting in Fairbanks, I'm Shelby Herbert.
- [20:48]
B
Those who knew and loved Marlene Johnson say she was in constant motion, either behind the scenes or on the forefront of the major issues that have shaped life for Alaska Native people for more than 60 years. The Tlingit leader died last week at the age of 90. KNBA's Rhonda McBride looks at her life and legacy.
- [21:06]
F
Here is Marlene Johnson's recipe for leadership. In her own words.
- [21:11]
E
Alaska Natives I don't care where you're from, need to be involved. They need to sit on boards. They need to sit on commissions. They need to go to meetings. They need to be heard.
- [21:22]
F
That was Johnson talking with the late Native journalist Nellie Moore in 2011 on on the 40th anniversary of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. Today, ANCSA remains the largest land claim settlement in the nation's history, one that Johnson helped to steer through Congress.
- [21:41]
E
The Alaska Native perspective needs to be heard, and they need to know that we aren't sitting back there on a stump doing nothing, that we are just like everybody else. We have a brain and we use it. We have muscles and we use it. And we have respect for each other. And we don't call other people names like they sometimes call us.
- [22:01]
F
The 1960s was a tough time to be an Alaska Native and a woman.
- [22:07]
E
The men had the voice. They were out front, but somehow Marlene became a voice among all those men. I also wondered, how did she do it Back then?
- [22:20]
F
Irene Rowan had a front row seat in Washington, D.C. she worked for the federal government and became part of an ANCSA support group called Alaskans on the Potomac.
- [22:31]
E
She was royalty. People looked up to her. She was rich. She was rich with knowledge and with enthusiasm.
- [22:41]
F
Rosita Wuerl says Marlene Johnson was one of a kind.
- [22:45]
E
She exemplified what we know and recognize as a leader, and they don't come along very often.
- [22:55]
F
Worl, who is president of Sealaska Heritage Institute, says Johnson had a leadership style all her own, someone always ready to listen even if she didn't agree.
- [23:07]
E
And I don't think people thought of her as a woman or a man. They just admired her leadership capabilities.
- [23:15]
F
Johnson's granddaughter, Vera Starbard, says this was an amazing accomplishment for a woman who navigated times that were far from being gender and colorblind.
- [23:26]
J
She always insisted on being taken seriously, but at the same time she had to figure out how to maneuver in that world let her voice be heard when literally some people would not hear it.
- [23:38]
F
Starbard says people forget that Johnson was a single mom who not only raised six kids but was also a businesswoman. She co owned a regional air taxi service in her home village of Hoonah and became one of the first women to chair a Native corporation, a job she held on Sealaska's board for a decade. She also helped to found many of the educational organizations and nonprofits that make up today's social service safety net.
- [24:07]
J
People don't realize how different Alaska would be without her. Certainly Alaska Native lives without ancsa.
- [24:16]
E
We would be back where we were in the early 60s, where discrimination would still be here. I'm a firm believer of that.
- [24:26]
F
In a 2009 interview with researcher Dr. Thomas Thornton, Johnson said Native corporations with their wealth and resources helped to change the way Alaska Natives were treated. She recalled her days when her family moved to Juneau in the late 1940s so she could go to high school. Johnson said she and her girlfriends would go out late at night on a mission.
- [24:49]
E
I shouldn't confess doing anything wrong in my life, but a few of us that were considered breeds would go down the street and ripped the signs off of the bars. And there's bars all the way up and down South Franklin street that aren't there now. That said, no Coasties, no Indians, no dogs allowed.
- [25:08]
F
But somewhere along the line, she made the transition from activist to diplomat. Emil Nadi, the first president of the Alaska Federation of Natives, said that she was pivotal in the land claims fight.
- [25:21]
C
It was just part of that age chauvinism, but she stood on her own for qualifications. She wasn't put there because she was a woman. She was put there because she was an effective advocate.
- [25:36]
F
Nadi visited Johnson not long before she died, and when he realized her time was nearing its end, he felt a wave of loneliness. Because there are only about a dozen people, he says, who really know the story of ANCSA.
- [25:50]
C
There are 500 stories. Everybody who was involved has a story. You look at the same event, see it different, so you get all kinds of stories. But in there somewhere is what really happened.
- [26:03]
F
Now there is one last member in that land claims band of warriors. But Rosita Worl says Johnson will always be remembered.
- [26:13]
E
The night before she left us, we had despicable, spectacular northern lights that said to me, those are our warriors ready to embrace this leader in the spirit world.
- [26:26]
F
In anchorage, I'm Rhonda McBride.
- [26:41]
B
That's all for this edition. The of of Alaska News nightly. We had reports tonight from Alyona nydin and Rhonda McBride in Anchorage, Eric Stone in Juneau, Evan Erickson in Bethel, and Patrick Gilchrist and Shelby Herbert in Fairbanks. If you want to send us a news tip, question or comment, email us@newsalaskapublic.org Our audio engineer is Crystal Hyde. Kirsten Dobroth is our producer. And I'm Casey Grove. Good night. This is statewide news on Alaska Public Media.