Barring some unforeseeable change or revelation, I’m voting for experience in the borough election. I’m voting for the two candidates who’ve been here at least 20 years, have served previously on the assembly and other governmental bodies and have learned a thing or two about the town and how best to govern it. I have nothing against the other two…
Of all the things to fear in the world, I’m not afraid of China or particularly impressed by it. But I might be in the minority on that. With the fall of Kabul, a new Facebook meme this week regurgitated something former President Jimmy Carter said to President Trump in 2019 about our country’s wasteful spending on war. “We have…
I drove north last weekend to see my shadow, to use fifth gear again, to look out at something that was not familiar. I wasn’t disappointed because thankfully, Canada’s still up there, all sunny and civil and kind. Oh, Canada, land of immaculate campground restrooms and free firewood, land of public trails and parks and ice rinks and drivers who…
I asked park ranger Travis Russell this week what was the main goal of the recent work along the Chilkoot River. He said, “To fix the road.” Unfortunately, the road was never the issue at Chilkoot. The issue was people and how to protect resources there – including world-class bear-viewing and sport-fishing – amid an exponentially increasing number of visitors.…
By winning an Olympic gold medal in swimming as a high school student, Lydia Jacoby rocketed herself to the planet of Alaska Women Sports Gods. Libby Riddles lives there. So does Kikkan Randall. But if recent history is any measure, the place could get crowded soon. Since the 1972 passage of Title IX, federal legislation that gave young women the…
It’s time for Haines to break it off with large cruise ships. Twenty-six years after building a downtown dock to lure them here, it’s clear they’re not coming. And we should be glad for that. With COVID-19, the mega-ships have proved themselves virtual germ baths, as if that wasn’t already clear during norovirus and other ship-board outbreaks. Moreover, projections about…
Note to future Haines Borough Assemblies: You’re probably involved in thievery if you’re using the 1 percent sales tax for tourism promotion and economic development for purposes other than funding your tourism department and the Haines Economic Development Corporation. The theft of this fund by assemblies and managers is a little-noticed but sad story: Little noticed because most people in…
“Behind every great fortune lies a great crime.” Honore de Balzac Rich jerks in space went viral on Facebook a few weeks back. Except that most of the memes used a less polite word for jerk. One said, “My mom watched Neil Armstrong walk on the moon. I saw the guy who killed bookstores float around in space.” No…
National Geographic magazines once came with great maps. One of them detailing the Midwest states I hung over my bed in a tiny room I shared with three guys on a floating cannery offshore Togiak, Alaska. In far-flung, gray and barren Togiak, I needed reassurance I was still somehow attached to civilization, or at least to Wisconsin. I picked up…
(This essay contains material included in my letter-to-the editor on Lutak Dock published in July 8 CVN.) At the Haines Borough’s July 24 open house meeting on rebuilding the Lutak Dock, the public heard a lot of grandiose statements by the Haines Chamber of Commerce, Southeast Conference and others about how important the dock was to the town, state, and…