Avalanche forecasters say spring’s slow-moving arrival in Southcentral Alaska has led to potentially dangerous conditions for hikers heading into the mountains for the Memorial Day holiday weekend.

The Friends of Chugach Avalanche Center posted an alert Thursday warning of a large slide blocking the road to the Crow Pass trailhead in Girdwood. Many popular trails within the Chugach National Forest, such as Byron Glacier and Crow Pass, continue to pose an avalanche hazard risk “as we can’t quite shake this cold, wet spring,” according to the alert from the nonprofit group affiliated with the Chugach National Forest Avalanche Center.

Avalanche forecasters last week warned hikers to be aware of numerous large avalanches releasing as spring conditions slowly arrived. Trails will continue to be dangerous as long as there’s snow covering higher terrain, they said.

“One of the biggest hazards during spring is not just traveling on steep slopes, but traveling below them,“ the avalanche center wrote in an alert last month. ”Many popular summer trails pass directly beneath avalanche paths. As temperatures warm, the snowpack weakens and avalanches can release naturally, running all the way to valley bottoms and across trails that appear dry and safe.“

The avalanches can carry heavy, wet snow “capable of burying a person, even far from where the slide started,” the alert said.

The forecast for the Anchorage area calls for continued cool, mostly cloudy and occasionally rainy weather with the potential for sun on Monday.

Opinion: Alaska’s win-win constitutional solution

Published 1:30 am Thursday, May 21, 2026

Alaska’s Legislature just wrapped another budget cycle with the same tired script. Cut the Permanent Fund Dividend to fund government, or cut government to fund the dividend.

Every proposal forces Alaskans to lose so someone else can win.

Senator Robert Myers captured our fiscal crisis perfectly in a recent article: “Our constitution says we are supposed to manage our resources in such a way we maximize the benefits to all Alaskans. The problem is we have defined it in such a way as to mean only the maximum revenue to the state.”

The constitutional insight points toward something Alaska has never tried: a solution where everybody wins.

Ten percent of the Permanent Fund could provide Alaska families with home mortgages at 2% interest rates. The Fund would earn market returns through mortgage payments. Families would save $330,000 over the life of a typical loan. No losers. No trade-offs. No raids.

Alaska’s Permanent Fund holds more than $80 billion. Ten percent—$8 billion—could fund mortgages for 23,000 Alaska families. Current mortgage rates hover around 7%. The program would offer 2% rates to Alaska residents buying homes in Alaska.

The math favors everyone. A family borrowing $350,000 at 7% pays $2,300 per month and $830,000 in total over 30 years. The same loan at 2% costs $1,300 monthly and $470,000 total. The family saves $1,000 per month and $360,000 over the loan’s life.

Meanwhile, the Fund earns 2% annually on mortgage payments instead of hoping for higher returns in volatile markets. Stable, predictable income backed by Alaska real estate.

The program serves exactly the constitutional purpose Senator Myers described: maximum benefit to all Alaskans rather than maximum revenue to government. Jay Hammond designed the dividend as a “resource dividend” to connect Alaskans to their resource wealth. Home ownership extends the connection to where Alaskans live and build futures.

The political advantages matter more than the economics. Homeowners vote across party lines. A program saving families $330,000 on their largest expense creates a constituency defending it aggressively. Compare the Permanent Fund Dividend — legislators cut the PFD every budget cycle because families have no organized way to fight back.

The program also addresses Alaska’s most serious long-term challenge: keeping young families in the state. A $330,000 mortgage savings gives families a powerful reason to stay and build lives here rather than seeking affordable housing elsewhere.

Traditional housing programs fail because they require subsidies competing with other budget priorities. The mortgage program requires no state spending. The Fund provides the capital. The mortgages provide the returns.

Alaska’s current fiscal mess stems from treating Permanent Fund earnings as government revenue rather than people’s wealth. The mortgage program reverses the relationship. Instead of government spending Fund earnings on itself, the Fund serves Alaskans directly.

We can keep fighting over who loses, or we can try something where everybody wins.

Evan Swensen, an Alaska resident since 1957, is publisher of Publication Consultants and author of “What’s The Money For,” which examines constitutional solutions to Alaska’s fiscal crisis.

Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) ordered lawmakers into a special legislative session beginning Thursday to address his alternative tax strategy for a proposed liquefied natural gas megaproject that has drawn some pushback from within his own party.

Dunleavy issued a proclamation late Tuesday bringing lawmakers back to the Capitol in Juneau to continue work on HB 381—his tax plan supporting development of the proposed $46.2 billion Alaska Liquefied Natural Gas project, or AKLNG. The multi-year initiative includes a gas treatment facility on Alaska’s North Slope, an 807-mile pipeline, and a natural gas export facility in Cook Inlet. …