APRN Alaska News

Colonel Brian Duffy

The sequester cuts take effect at midnight, but what it may ultimately mean is still a moving target. The Commander at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson, Colonel Brian Duffy says he would like to be hopeful that Congress will still find a resolution before the late night deadline.

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Photo from People Mover Facebook.

President Obama announced Friday morning that Congressional leaders had failed to reach a agreement to avoid sequestration. This triggers automatic spending cuts to balance the budget. Communities around the country are bracing for the cuts, including Anchorage.

Officials with the Municipality expect sequestration to impact the People Mover bus system. Lance Wilber, the Director of Public Transportation for the Municipality of Anchorage, says that’s because his department’s budget is heavily supported by federal grants.

“Roughly 20 percent of our operating budget is supported by operating dollars from the federal government. And we use those funds to really keep our system on route. On the capital side, it’s more significant — roughly 70 to 80 percent of our capital improvements are supported by the federal transit administration.”

Wilber says sequestration could slow down bus and bus stop improvements as well customer service upgrades. According to officials at the Anchorage Police Department, grants that support DWI and Seatbelt patrols could be reduced, as well as those that provide funding to fight Internet Crimes against children and support task forces on human trafficking and illegal drugs.

Anticipated sequestration reductions for the 2013-2014 Anchorage school District budget equal about 6-million dollars, and were included in recent budget cuts. Chad Stitler, ASD budget director says the district is watching department of defense reductions at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson closely because they could impact the district down the road.

“As the federal footprint in Alaska is reduced, we expect that will also reduce the population and the enrollment inside of the district and so we’ve considered that along with the actual immediate impacts of the sequestration.”

The district gets a little less than 10 percent of their funding from federal monies. Most sequestration cuts would probably take time to trickle down the local level — until the end of 2013 or the beginning of 2014.

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A group of North Slope villagers filed suit Thursday in federal court against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. According to Brian Litmans, with the environmental law firm, Trustees for Alaska, seven residents of Nuiqsut claim that the Corps violated the Clean Water Act in issuing a permit to Conoco Phillips to fill almost 60 acres of wetlands for the oil company’s Colville Delta 5 project.

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The Alaska Federation of Natives has changed its bylaws to give tribes more votes during conventions. The move separates tribal votes from tribal corporation votes.

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A state Superior Court decision could sidetrack state administration plans to change water protection statutes.  Earlier this week, the court decided in favor of the Chuitna Citizens Coalition in a case involving what is termed “instream flow” rights to Middle Creek,  on the West side of Cook Inlet.  The Coalition filed for instream flow rights in 2009, saying that wild salmon populations in the creek need to be protected.  But the state Department of Natural Resources failed to process the application.  Later, DNR approved a temporary water use permit for PacRim Coal to remove water from the same creek, with the Coalition application pending, so the Coaltion appealed to the courts. The court has decided that DNR failed to follow its own rules.

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This week we’re heading to a northern part of Alaska’s Pandhandle, Haines. The community of over 1800 people is a gateway between the U.S. and Canada. Daniel Lee Henry is a long time community member in Haines.

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Last year the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recorded eleven billion-dollar weather events.  That brought the total for the last two years to 25.  The average up until then had been less than four.  Climate change is already here and it’s not changing back any time soon.  Communities are going to have to become more resilient, and for some
that means a closer look at local food.  One of the top experts on sustainable and climate-resilient “food-sheds” will be the guest on the next Talk of Alaska.

HOSTS:

• Steve Heimel

GUESTS: 

• Gary Paul Nabhan, Chair, Sustainable Food Systems Program in Southwest Borderlands Food and Water Security, University of Arizona College of Social and Behavioural Science, Tucson
• Callers Statewide

PARTICIPATE:

• Post your comment before, during or after the live broadcast (comments may be read on air).
• Send e-mail to talk [at] alaskapublic [dot] org (comments may be read on air)
• Call 550-8422 in Anchorage or 1-800-478-8255 if you’re outside Anchorage during the live broadcast

LIVE Broadcast: Tuesday, March 5, 2013 at 10:00 a.m. on APRN stations statewide.

SUBSCRIBE: Get Talk of Alaska updates automatically by e-mail, RSS or podcast.

TALK OF ALASKA ARCHIVE

Alaska has one of the fastest growing senior citizen populations in the country, yet affordable housing for seniors is at a minimum. In December, a group of state and community leaders got together in Anchorage to discuss options for providing senior housing to meet growing demand. The Alaska Senior Housing Summit has outlined the challenges ahead and the strategies needed to overcome them.

The so called Silver Tsunami is lapping at Alaska’s shore, and care providers are worried that there won’t be sufficient programs — or enough funding — to meet it. The graying of Alaska is more pronounced than in other areas of the country. Alaska leads all states in having the fastest growing senior population of persons age 65 or older, which now accounts for 13.6 percent of state residents.

One of the top priorities for Alaska’s seniors is housing. Denise Daniello, with the Alaska Commission on Aging,  did not want to comment on tape, but  says senior housing needs to encompass the full range of care, from helping independent seniors stay in their own homes to creating living facilities for seniors with special needs. With limited funding, that is going to be a tough task

Daniello  says older Alaskans are no longer moving out of state. they came here as baby boomers and stay. As more and more boomers age, the state’s senior population will grow with them over the next 25 years.

Mark Romick is director of planning and program development for the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, which plays a multi-faceted role in senior housing .

   “The demand for senior housing is like every other housing component of the market. It’s based on people’s ability to pay, and suffice it to say, that there is a fairly substantial need, well over four or five hundred units in the next ten or twenty years,” he says.

Most senior housing funds come from two pots of money AHFC manages from the federal Housing and Urban Development agency. [Senior Housing Grant Development Fund and AHFC's Senior Housing Development Loan Fund.] Romick says in general projects for low income seniors are financed through grants, but assisted living or medium income facilities have to rely on private financing or loans. AHFC offers rental assistance, or vouchers, to low income renters of any age, but the waiting list is long, often years. And the sequester is expected to add to the crunch by shrinking that program, according to HUD spokesman Lee Jones

 ”The number of available vouchers is going to be reduced by about 125, 000 nationally. That obviously shrinks the resource base for people who need that kind of assistance, ” according to Jones.  He says cuts to HUD appropriations could begin when discussions on the FY 14 federal budget start.

Since the majority of Alaska’s senior housing projects target low income seniors, middle income seniors suffer. They have too much money to qualify for rental assistance or low income housing, but they can’t afford market rate rents. AHFC data indicates about 2 /3 of Alaska’s seniors can’t afford urban rents. A brief white paper released this [february] month by the state department of Health and Social Services identified some funding strategies that could be used to develop “graduated income” housing to accommodate residents of mixed incomes.   Mark Romick says that will take some changes:

 ”I think it’s pretty obvious that alternative sources need to be developed. Private financing is a huge component of that. There is not enough money available through the state or federal government to address the housing need of all the seniors that might need an affordable place to live. People are going to have to be more creative about how they address the financing of senior housing in the future. ”

One group of seniors in Fairbanks is a jump ahead of the game. Karen Parr says the Raven Landing retirement community there was created, funded and designed at the instigation of a group of retired teachers who wanted to stay in Fairbanks, but couldn’t find middle income senior housing in their city. Parr says Raven Landing is a model for communities looking for solutions.

“The thing that’s so good about Raven Landing that is kind of unique, is that it was created by a group of local residents who planned it to suit this particular group of people, this kind of people. It’s kind of an Alaskan version of a continuing care plan.”

The city of Fairbanks helped to buy the land, and in 2008, the first building with 20 units opened. Another 20 units became available last year, and twenty more opened up last month. AHFC has provided grants and loans for each of the apartment buildings while individual and corporate donations help support the Retirement Community of Fairbanks non profit which operates the complex. RCF is now in the process of getting funds to build a community center. I’m Ellen Lockyer

[25senior housing lockyer pack feb. 25]

Alaska has one of the fastest growing senior citizen populations in the country, yet affordable housing for seniors is at a minimum. In December, a group of state and community leaders got together in Anchorage to discuss options for providing senior housing to meet growing demand. As KSKA’s Ellen Lockyer reports, the Alaska Senior Housing Summit has outlined the challenges ahead and the strategies needed to overcome them. [:21]

The so called Silver Tsunami is lapping at Alaska’s shore, and care providers are worried that there won’t be sufficient programs — or enough funding — to meet it. The graying of Alaska is more pronounced than in other areas of the country. Alaska leads all states in having the fastest growing senior population of persons age 65 or older, which now accounts for 13.6 percent of state residents.

One of the top priorities for Alaska’s seniors is housing. Denise Daniello, with the Alaska Commission on Aging, *did not want to comment on tape, but* says senior housing needs to encompass the full range of care, from helping independent seniors stay in their own homes to creating living facilities for seniors with special needs. With limited funding, that is going to be a tough task

[Daniello would not comment on tape, but she says older Alaskans are no longer moving out of state. they came here as baby boomers and stay. As more and more boomers age, the state's senior population will grow with them over the next 25 years.]

Mark Romick is director of planning and program development for the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, which plays a multi-faceted role in senior housing .

[CutID: <Worktapes> 27seniors romick 3 use first.wav

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["The demand for senior housing is like every other housing component of the market. It's based on people's ability to pay, and suffice it to say, that there is a fairly substantial need, well over four or five hundred units in the next ten or twenty years. "]

Most senior housing funds come from two pots of money AHFC manages from the federal Housing and Urban Development agency. [Senior Housing Grant Development Fund and AHFC's Senior Housing Development Loan Fund.] Romick says in general projects for low income seniors are financed through grants, but assisted living or medium income facilities have to rely on private financing or loans. AHFC offers rental assistance, or vouchers, to low income renters of any age, but the waiting list is long, often years. And the sequester is expected to add to the crunch by shrinking that program, according to HUD spokesman Lee Jones

[CutID: <Worktapes> 27seniors jones.wav

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Title: 27seniors jones

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In-cue: the number

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["The number of available vouchers is going to be reduced by about 125, 000 nationally. That obviously shrinks the resource base for people who need that kind of assistance. "]

Since the majority of Alaska’s senior housing projects target low income seniors, middle income seniors suffer. They have too much money to qualify for rental assistance or low income housing, but they can’t afford market rate rents. AHFC data indicates about 2 /3 of Alaska’s seniors can’t afford urban rents. A brief white paper released this [february] month by the state department of Health and Social Services identified some funding strategies that could be used to develop “graduated income” housing to accommodate residents of mixed incomes. Again, Mark Romick

[CutID: <Worktapes> 27seniors romick 4 use last.wav

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In-cue: i think

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["I think it's pretty obvious that alternative sources need to be developed. Private financing is a huge component of that. There is not enough money available through the state or federal government to address the housing need of all the seniors that might need an affordable place to live. People are going to have to be more creative about how they address the financing of senior housing in the future. "]

One group of seniors in Fairbanks is a jump ahead of the game. Karen Parr says the Raven Landing retirement community there was created, funded and designed at the instigation of a group of retired teachers who wanted to stay in Fairbanks, but couldn’t find middle income senior housing in their city. Parr says Raven Landing is a model for communities looking for solutions.

[CutID: <Worktapes> 27seniors parr.wav

Time: 21s

Title: 27seniors parr

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In-cue: the thing

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["The thing that's so good about Raven Landing that is kind of unique, is that it was created by a group of local residents who planned it to suit this particular group of people, this kind of people. It's kind of an Alaskan version of a continuing care plan."]

The city of Faribanks helped to buy the land, and in 2008, the first building with 20 units opened. Another 20 units became available last year, and twenty more opened up last month. AHFC has provided grants and loans for each of the apartment buildings while individual and corporate donations help support the Retirement Community of Fairbanks non profit which operates the complex. RCF is now in the process of getting funds to build a community center. I’m Ellen Lockyer

Gov. Sean Parnell’s oil tax proposal is steadily making its way through the Senate.

His bill advanced out of the Senate resources committee on Wednesday, with a few changes. Instead of setting the base tax rate at 25 percent, it bumps it to 35 percent. It offset that by increasing a tax break for oil produced from new areas, and giving oil companies a $5 per barrel credit. Like the governor’s bill, it gets rid of a mechanism that would raise taxes on oil companies when profits are high. Parnell described the changes as a positive step forward at a press conference on Thursday.

The new version of the oil tax bill’s impact on the state’s revenue is close to Parnell’s original version. According to the bill’s fiscal note, the bill would cut taxes on oil companies by up to $900 million over the next year. Parnell’s would cut taxes by roughly the same amount.

The new version of the bill got support from all members of the resources committee, save one. Sen. Hollis French, an Anchorage Democrat, still had questions about the effect the bill would have both on oil production and revenue, and he had concerns about the pace of the review process.

“The amendments we’ve adopted make some significant changes. The CS [committee substitute] we put in front of us last Friday basically revamps the governor’s bill and adopts some significant new measures. I don’t feel like we’ve fully vetted that. The fiscal notes, which we’ve all received this afternoon, have not been discussed by the committee,” said French. “And so, I believe that the totality of the circumstances are that this is rushing through this committee to the next one, and I don’t feel confident of the work.”

Sen. Peter Micchiche, a Republican from Soldotna, countered that a previous committee had already spent time with the bill, and that more hearings are still to come.

“Some of us have spent hundreds of hours processing this bill in two different committees,” said Micciche.

The bill is now being heard in finance, the last Senate committee that will review the plan.

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So far, eight Republican governors have decided to split with their party and accept federal funding for Medicaid expansion in their states. Today, Sean Parnell announced that he won’t be joining them, at least for now.

On Thursday, Parnell said that he will not ask legislators to put any money toward broadening the health program and opening it up to more low-income Alaskans. His concern is that the federal government could end up reneging on promised funds, given the current fiscal climate in Washington.

“So if we expand the Medicaid population and the federal government fails to keep its financial commitment, the state would likely have to backfill forward-lost federal dollars to cover beneficiaries of the expansion and to protect the health coverage of everyone currently in the program,” said Parnell.

Parnell plans to revisit the prospect of Medicaid expansion in December, when he rolls out his annual budget proposal.

If Medicaid were expanded in the state, it’s projected that it would extend coverage to 40,000 Alaskans. Under a provision of the Affordable Care Act, the federal government will cover the full cost of growing the program for the first three years. After that, the state share would gradually go up to 10 percent.

Because the federal government will start offering extra money for Medicaid expansion in January, putting off a decision on the program means that Alaska will be opting out of that funding for the first six months that it is available.

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The saga has been going on for decades, and Wednesday evening, the dozen or so residents in D.C expected nothing more than a photo-op with Secretary Salazar.

They were pleasantly surprised Thursday morning.

“We’re closer now than we ever have been,” said Stanley Mack, mayor of the Aleutians East Borough.

By Mack’s count, he’s been fighting for a connector road from King Cove to Cold Bay for thirty years.

Standing outside the Interior Department Thursday morning, Mack called the meeting with Salazar excellent, saying he’s confident Secretary Salazar will reevaluate a Fish and Wildlife decision that blocked the land transfer.

It’s not certain he’ll reverse the decision. Mack called Salazar a hard negotiator, and even harder to read.

Della Trumble said Secretary Salazar needed to hear the human factor; that the environmental review had not taken lives into consideration.

She said she’s more optimistic now, if for no other reason, the meeting went longer than planned.

“We initially had half an hour meeting, but he did allow us a little over an hour,” she said. “And I feel, just optimistic, that hopefully he’ll take a closer look at this issue. He said he understands it a lot better from us being here.”

The Borough and city of King Cove paid for the trip to Washington.

The state would cede 41,000 acres, and the King Cove Corporation would cede 16,000 more. In exchange, they’d receive a 200 acre easement in the wildlife refuge. That easement would allow for the construction of a ten mile, one lane, gravel road.

Residents say they need it for emergency medical services; that flying in and out of King Cove is too dangerous and too often cancelled.

Trisha Trumble’s point, another King Cove resident in D.C., said weather in the Aleutians can change on a dime, making one flight safe, and the next dangerous. She recounted to Secretary Salazar the crash she survived in 2010.

“The pilot stated that we were coming in and getting ready for landing. We were going about 60, we hit an air pocket and it dropped, it made the whole plane drop, he looked at the speedometer and we’re going 120. He was lucky enough to bring it up and crash that plane perfectly on the runway which then turned sideways. We went down the runway sideways,” she said.

She drove the point home by stressing how close death was.

“And then there was fuel shooting out, and if we didn’t have a gravel runway and it was pavement, any spark would made the plane blow up.”

The residents would be allowed to use the road for everyday use, but it could not be used for commercial purposes. There would be a cable barrier preventing people from driving off road on ATV’s to hunt birds.

Nicole Whittington-Evans is the Alaska Regional Director for the Wilderness Society.

“A one lane gravel road with a 10, 15, maximum 20 miles per hour limit on it, from King Cove to Cold Bay will be approximately 35-40 miles, it’s going to take an hour and a half to two hours for a person to drive that road, in good weather,” she said by phone Thursday afternoon.

She said the federal government paid for a hovercraft that could take residents from King Cove to Cold Bay in twenty minutes. The Borough stopped operating the hovercraft in Cold Bay, and moved it to Akutan.

Mayor Stanley Mack said the hovercraft cost more than $1 million dollars per year, and it was unsafe in high seas and strong winds.

“The 1.2 million hovercraft was just the sporadic operation of the hovercraft. We could not operate it. It was costly and unreliable – totally,” he said.

The Department of Interior will not decide the fate of the road before Salazar’s 30 day public interest review deadline of March 18th.  He could resolve the issue before the Senate confirms his successor, Sally Jewell.

Senator Lisa Murkowski, who supports the road, met with Ms. Jewell Wednesday morning, a normal part of the confirmation process.  Senator Murkowski said she did not ask for any assurances on the land transfer.

“I want Secretary Salazar to do the right thing, plain and simple. I don’t think he should let this hang over and let … He needs to right this wrong that his agency has put forward. And I want him to correct that,” she said. 

Even though she puts the onus on Secretary Salazar, Ms. Jewell could feel the punishment. If Secretary Salazar does not override the decision before stepping down, Senator Murkowski threatened to hold up the nomination of Ms. Jewell.

Parliamentary rules allow any Senator to stall any proceedings.

Della Trumble said even though she’s optimistic after the meeting with Secretary Salazar, she’s prepared to continue fighting.

“We’ve always maintained, before you make a decision on this, please, please talk to us,” she added. “And the other point is, we can send a plane load this large every week, because there are so many stories about why this road is so important.”

They’re unlikely to get another meeting with the Interior Secretary.

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Hundreds of union workers turned out to testify before the Anchorage Assembly Wednesday night, against an ordinance that could limit unions.

Cars driving by honked their horns in support of protesters at the corner of Denali & 36th outside Loussac Library.

That’s where I found Kimberly holding a red and black sign in support of unions and her dad, a union member who works for the Anchorage School District.

“I know he works very hard for what he does and so I wanted to support him for that because he supported me for so long .”

Kimberly’s Dad, Tom says his job isn’t at stake, because he’s not a municipal employee. But Tom says if the Mayor’s proposed ordinance is passed, he’s afraid his job could be next.

“I think the big fear is the reduction in the standard of living for your middle-class people. And we’re just tired of seeing the erosion of the middle-class. We want to make the middle-class strong. That’s why this country became real strong is because of the middle-class, not because we have rich and poor with nobody in between.”

Tom and Kimberly did not want us to use their last names. Near the library entry, it was a sea of more red and black signs and a saxophone serenaded protesters.

Officials estimate there could have been around a thousand people at the hearing which took place in the Anchorage Assembly chambers at the Loussac library. The Wilda Marston Theatre was opened with live broadcast from Assembly Chambers, and others crowded into the entry to sit and stand around a T.V. Inside the Assembly Chambers, It was standing room only and a line to testify stretched from the podium to the back of the room.

Mayor Dan Sullivan proposed the ordinance, which would would impact approximately 22-hundred municipal employees, about three weeks ago. It eliminates raises based on longevity and performance, links pay to a five-year average of the consumer price index and limits benefit choices. It also eliminates the option of a strike. But it’s centerpiece is the introduction of managed competition, a process in which a public agency competes with private firms to provide public services. Fire and police departments as well as emergency services would be exempt from managed competition. Public testimony was emotional, as one municipal employee after another got up in front of the Assembly to tell them the ordinance was a bad idea. Municipal worker Roy Smith, who said he’s live in Anchorage for nearly 30 years and worked for he city nearly a decade, said the ordinance was evil.

“Almost as evil as, what do I want to compare it with? How bout the movies, how bout Star Wars — Darth Vader and the Dark Side of The Force. This is wrong. I know you mean well. And I’ll tell you what, when I hear the radio spot that’s being aired I hear the warm fuzzy stuff in my head, but down here in my gut, this is what tell me the truth — I feel sick.”

Smith was referring to a radio ad that began airing last week featuring Mayor Sullivan talking about his proposed ordinance. Assembly member Dick Traini asked Smith this about the radio ad:

“How do you feel about your tax dollars being utilized to bring that message out to the public? 28-thousand tax dollars in tax payer’s dollars. (Audience)Boooo, booo. (Smith) Thank you very much. I don’t feel good about it all, not at all, not one bit.”

Julius Matthew, a resident of Eagle River, says he’s been a member of the IBEW for 30 years. He says he’s offended by the Mayor’s so-called ‘Responsible Labor Act’.

“There’s nothing responsible about it whatsoever. This is not about money or trying to control the spending of money. This is about control. So Sullivan wants control over thousands of hard-working men and women that have banded together in the form of unions to protect their families against guys like Dan Sullivan.”

Elstun Lauesen, the husband of former Assembley member Harriet Drummond, who is now a statehouse representative for Anchorage, said the Mayor was playing a financial game that was doing more harm than any contracts.

“This Mayor, with the complicity of Miss Frasca, for successive years, brought in budgets under the cap. And when you bring in budgets under the cap, the cap drops. They have created a structural deficit of 28 million dollars.”

Assembly member Honeman asked Laueson for a solution.

“I suggest that you sit down and negotiate in good faith with the working men and women of the municipality and negotiate a contract.”

Cindy Calzada read her brief testimony from a small piece of paper.

“AO37 is a terrible ordinance which begins the destruction the livelihood of working people in this city. More than that, it dishonors and disrespects the memory of all those who fought and died for union rights we have today. With this bill you begin the systematic dismantling of what the working class built over centuries of fighting. You will begin a downward spiral that will put us back to the sixties.”

Ordinance 37 is scheduled for a vote of the Assembly on March 12th.

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The Gastineau Channel Historical Society presents a $5,000 check to organizers of the Empty Chair project in Juneau. On the far right are sisters Mary Tanaka Abo and Alice Tanaka Hikido, whose brother John inspired the proposed memorial to Juneau’s Japanese American internees. Photo by Casey Kelly/KTOO.

A proposed monument in Juneau to Japanese Americans interned during World War II got a big boost last weekend.

The Gastineau Channel Historical Society donated $5,000 to the Empty Chair Project, and a fundraising concert raised nearly $2,000. Organizers have been collecting funds for about a year and need about $6,000 more to meet their $40,000 goal.

Third generation Japanese American violinist Steve Tada and pianist Nancy Nash performed several compositions, including Michio Miyagi’s “Haru no Umi” at the Empty Chair benefit concert on Saturday.

Sisters Mary Tanaka Abo and Alice Tanaka Hikido sat in the front row as honored guests. Alice Tanaka was nine-years-old in 1942 when the entire family was taken from Juneau and placed into internment camps.

“We were identified with the enemy when we were not the enemy at all,” she said.

Brother John Tanaka, who died several years ago, inspired the Empty Chair project. He was valedictorian of Juneau High School’s class of 1942, but could not attend graduation after the family was taken from the Capital City. The school set up an empty chair at the ceremony to acknowledge that John Tanaka was not there.

The memorial will be a slightly larger than life-size bronze replica of the empty chair at Juneau’s Capital School Park, located next to the old Juneau High School. Project organizer Margie Shackleford has been friends with Mary Tanaka since childhood.

“We can’t always redress everything, but we can at least acknowledge that an injustice occurred,” Shackleford said.

The Tanakas’ father, Shonosuke, operated the City Café in downtown Juneau for more than 50 years. In the early 1940s, the territorial capitol was home to about 6,000 residents, and the restaurant was open 24 hours a day to serve miners, fishermen and other laborers.

Alice recalls that federal agents came for her father just a day after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

“They took all the men, actually. It wasn’t just my father, but all the immigrant-born men,” she said. “Then shortly after that they were taken away from Juneau. We didn’t know where they were going to be taken to, so, there was a lot of unknown.”

While their father was interned in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the Tanaka children and their mother were sent to Camp Minidoka in Idaho, where they would spend the next three years.

“It was a small room that we shared with a pot-bellied stove, and that was our home for the duration of the war,” Alice Tanaka Hikido said.

“And then we had all of our meals in the mess hall, did all of our showering and bathroom needs in what they called the laundry room. So, it was kind of communal living.”

Violinist Tada, whose family lived in the Seattle area, had relatives taken to Camp Minidoka as well.

“They published what was called a ‘Memory Book’ and it has group photos of everybody’s family in front of their barracks,” he said. “And it kind of reads like a school yearbook. They had social clubs, they tried to have dance bands, and morale builders, and they even had Boy Scout troops.”

After the war, the Tanakas returned to Juneau, where Alice says her father re-opened the City Café with community support.

“He had to take a loan out from the bank, and the bank gave him the loan unconditionally,” she remembers. “And suppliers were family friends who told my father that he didn’t have to pay his bills until he had a cash flow that made it possible.”

Seattle artist Peter Reiquam has a design concept for the Empty Chair memorial. Shackleford says it will include the names of all the Japanese Americans taken from Juneau during World War II.

“Plus a Japanese symbol for remembrance and memory, and a text telling a story of the empty chair,” Shackleford said.

With the funds raised at the benefit concert, organizers are confident they’ll be able to dedicate the memorial in the summer of 2014.

• Juneau Empty Chair Project website

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Alaska has one of the fastest growing senior citizen populations in the country, yet affordable housing for seniors is at a minimum.  In December, a group of state and community leaders got together in Anchorage to discuss options for providing senior housing to meet growing demand. The Alaska Senior Housing Summit has outlined the challenges ahead and the strategies needed to overcome them.

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Photo by Dan Bross, KUAC – Fairbanks

The Junior North American sled dog championships are underway in North Pole.  Among young mushers competing is a group of middle and high school students who flew in with their dogs from an interior village to race.

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A routine traffic stop in downtown Homer Saturday afternoon turned into an emergency situation when an Alaska State Trooper found a methamphetamine laboratory inside a vehicle.

In a criminal complaint filed at the Homer Courthouse, Trooper David Chaffin wrote that he pulled over a silver 2000 Oldsmobile sedan at about 2:47 p.m. Saturday afternoon at the intersection of Waddell Way and the Sterling Highway, after the driver failed to signal for a right-hand turn.

Chaffin says that when he contacted the driver – 26-year-old Homer resident Timothy Igou – he noticed what appeared to be a handgun on the front seat. A pat down of Igou revealed a glass pipe that the suspect admitted was for smoking methamphetamine, and a small baggie of what the officer suspected was methamphetamine.

Although it’s not detailed in the criminal complaint, Troopers spokesperson Megan Peters says Chaffin soon suspected that Igou was operating a mobile laboratory for making methamphetamine in the vehicle.

“It was determined there was what we felt was a meth lab,” she said. “We have haz-mat crews come in and deal with that because the substances can be very volatile. That’s why the road was closed down for such a length of time.”

The hazardous material crew was called in from the federal Drug Enforcement Agency in Anchorage, says Peters, and the area around the Homer Post Office was closed off until 10 p.m. while the crew dismantled the lab.

She says it’s not unheard of for law enforcement officers to find a meth lab that is small and mobile.

“There (are) different ways that people can make methamphetamine,” she said. “They can be small enough to fit in a backpack or they can be large enough to fill up an entire garage.”

Igou was arrested and transported to the Homer Jail, where he is being held without bail. He is charged with Fourth Degree Misconduct Involving a Controlled Substance but Peters says further charges are likely pending an ongoing investigation.

According to Alaska Court records, Igou was convicted of Fourth Degree Assault in January and was sentenced to one year in jail, with nine months suspended and credit for time served.

All criminal suspects are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

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Federal prosecutors say four Anchorage residents have been indicted on multiple charges, including identity theft, for using the identities of people in the prison system to file false income tax returns and get refunds. The four named in the indictment are 46-year-old Steven McComb, 42-year-old Michael Sexton, 47-year-old Paulando Williams and 44-year-old Helen Maloney.

Prosecutors say Sexton had not yet been arrested.

According to prosecutors, the conspirators submitted about 100 false tax returns seeking more than $213,000, of which the U.S. Treasury issued refunds totaling more than $110,000.

With both of Shell Oil’s Arctic drill rigs headed to drydock for repairs, the company says it’s suspending its 2013 drilling season.

Spokesperson Curtis Smith says the New Year’s Eve grounding of the Kulluk drill rig prompted Shell to reassess its plans.

“This was our decision, and our decision alone,” Smith says. “[It was] based on, among other things, our strong desire to incorporate learning from our 2012 operations, and to ensure that our assets and our employees are really prepared to work again in the Arctic in the future.”

Last year’s drilling season was plagued with problems. The company had trouble getting its oil spill containment barge certified. Then the Noble Discoverer nearly ran aground in Unalaska. The year ended with the grounding of the Kulluk in shallow offshore waters near Kodiak.

But Shell did drill the beginnings of two exploratory wells in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas, and it plans to finish those in the future.

Alaska’s congressional delegation hailed the decision to suspend operations as a sign that the company is committed to safety.

Environmental groups also praised the decision, but interpreted it differently. Mike LeVine is senior counsel for the ocean conservation group Oceana.

“This announcement, while it comes as no surprise, reflects a crisis of confidence for the company,” LeVine says. “And the government agencies charged with regulating it.”

The Coast Guard, the Department of the Interior and the Justice Department are all investigating aspects of Shell’s Arctic operations, but LeVine called for them to go further.

“The government must take this opportunity to reassess the standards that govern the decisions it makes about our Arctic Ocean resources, the way it makes those decisions, and its oversight of multinational companies that are beholden to their bottom line and have shown clearly they are incapable of operating with the care Alaskan waters deserve.”

Shell will continue to do scientific research in the Arctic this summer, and may also try to do some prep work at its drill sites.

In the meantime, the company is focused on getting its damaged rigs to drydock in Asia. The Kulluk started retracing its route back to Unalaska on Tuesday.

Shell hopes to complete the 800-mile journey in less than 10 days, although that’s dependent on weather.

From Unalaska, the massive drill rig will be loaded onto an even more massive ‘heavy-lift’ vessel. That ship will take the Kulluk to dry dock in Asia for repairs.

The Noble Discoverer is still in Seward, but it will also be picked up by a heavy lift vessel in the near future.

APRN’s Annie Feidt contributed reporting to this story.

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This month has been a busy one for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s winter storms reconnaissance project. The agency tracks developing winter storms in the North Pacific with an airplane equipped to eject data gathering instruments into the atmosphere. That data is quickly fed into weather models to help refine the forecasts for potentially damaging storms that will hit Alaska and the Lower 48.

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Alaska’s Redistricting Board is awaiting the outcome of a United State Supreme Court case that could remove some federal restrictions from state redistricting plans. Wednesday, the nation’s highest court heard arguments over whether states with a history of discrimination need to get Department of Justice approval for state voting maps. Although the federal Supreme Court case was brought by an Alabama county, it has implications for Alaska.  The state of Alaska filed a brief in support of the plaintiffs, while the Alaska Federation of Natives filed a brief in support of the federal government.

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