It has become embarrassingly obvious that the downtown boat harbor expansion is an unnecessary monstrosity, a huge and ugly pimple on the once pristine face of our stunning waterfront. That this project was driven by hubris and vanity – not by need or by prudence – is nowhere as evident as in the Haines Borough’s recent decision to seek $20…
The people who pushed the Haines Borough to save Mosquito Lake School are now looking very, very bright. With only five students enrolled, the Klukwan School is in jeopardy. Like what happened at Mosquito Lake, with fewer than 10 students, the village school is now facing the loss of state funding needed to keep it open. If that happens, the…
Many people in Haines will respond to news of $20 million to rebuild Lutak Dock as great news and a Christmas present from Uncle Sam. They’re wrong. It’s neither of those things. The taxpayer bailout of the dock amounts to a corporate subsidy to Alaska Marine Lines and others in the shipping and freight business. It’s also a huge slice…
My friend Pizza Joe is overworried about Fort Seward. Our local government, on the other hand, has been underworried about the Fort for about 70 years, so things have a way of balancing out. Joe is particularly concerned the Alaska Indian Arts building will decay past saving. That’s not likely. AIA has been empty now for a couple years, but…
The lead story in last week’s Chilkat Valley News reported that Haines teachers are paid less than other public school teachers in Alaska. The story was true, but it wasn’t news. Haines teachers have been paid comparatively less than teachers elsewhere in Alaska for decades. We’ve been over this ground previously, many times. First let me say that I believe…
The Chilkat Valley News headline last week read, “Glacier Bears defend state champ title.” But what Glacier Bear runners achieved in the past few years is bigger than that. Boys and girls teams from Haines High School have won a combined four state championships and five regional championships in three years. That’s an unprecedented number of consecutive titles in any…
There are few bald eagles to be seen along the Chilkat River, and that’s thunderously worrisome, as they didn’t show up last year, either. We are, after all, the “Valley of the Eagles,” a motto once emblazoned across Chamber of Commerce stationery and used for decades to lure visitors here. “The largest gathering of bald eagles in the world” was…
Some folks might be surprised that I’m endorsing Brenda Josephson and Debra Schnabel for Haines Borough Assembly. Neither of them, after all, share my politics. Neither is progressive, or even liberal, at least in the popular definition of those terms. I have my reasons for supporting these two. Here they are: Experience is the most important attribute of an elected…
Sometimes ideas must be worded in a certain way for their truth to sink in. Amy at The Bookstore said to me this week, “The bear problem won’t be fixed until the garbage problem is fixed.” Whoomp. There it is. The garbage problem, as it relates to bears, has two main parts: 1) Bears breaching the landfill, and 2) Improper…
One of the ironies of the recent “improvements” along Chilkoot River road is that money spent there for nothing could have gone to provide something very important at Chilkat State Park – access. I recently drove to the end of the Chilkat park road to share a bonfire and a sky full of stars with a friend, but it wasn’t…