City Manager for Juneau, Alaska, Katie Koester, joins FOX Weather to talk about how locals are handling the recent flood and avalanche threat and how emergency crews are prepared to handle impending situations.
HAINES, Alaska – An avalanche closed part of a highway in the borough of Haines, a small town about 90 miles north of Juneau in Alaska’s panhandle on Tuesday night — the latest debris slide in the region after days of heavy rain triggered avalanches in Juneau last week.
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Barricades have been placed at Mile 10 of the Haines Highway and crews will begin to assess the damage during the daytime on Wednesday, Alaska Department of Transportation officials said.
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(Alaska Department of Transportation/Facebook / FOX Weather)
Earlier Tuesday, the department released a few photos of the highway’s condition and issued a travel advisory before the avalanche and reported that rain-on-ice conditions were making road conditions very difficult.
RECORD SNOW BURIES JUNEAU SCHOOL AND PROMPTS FIVE-DAY CLEANUP
Drivers were urged to stay off the road.
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Relentless rain from an atmospheric river has pounded the southeastern part of the state, which has begun to melt a historic amount of snow that fell across the region over the holidays, triggering days of avalanche warnings.
More than 7 feet of snow has fallen across the Alaska panhandle, with the bulk coming after Christmas Eve.
Evacuations were issued in Juneau last week after several large avalanches were reported on the Thane and Mount Juneau avalanche paths Friday.
Governor Mike Dunleavy issued a disaster declaration on Saturday for both the ongoing storms and the record-shattering snow.
Another day of heavy rain is expected, but the precipitation will finally begin to decrease later Wednesday.
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Check back for more details on this developing story.
JUNEAU, Alaska (KTUU) – The Supreme Court of Alaska will be taking up the case of the State of Alaska, Division of Elections v. Daniel J. Sullivan, Jr.
The oral arguments will be held Monday at 10 a.m. via Zoom, according to an order and opening notice.
The document also specifies that a decision is expected to be made before noon on Tuesday.
According to documents from the Division of Elections, the state must start printing ballots at noon on the same day.
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This comes after an Anchorage Superior Court Judge ordered Dan J. Sullivan on to the ballot Friday.
See a spelling or grammar error? Report it to web@ktuu.com
A new home under construction in Potter Valley in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)
This June, two very different offers reach Alaska families, and both amount to the same thing: $10,000. The difference is everything.
Bill Walker, running for governor, would hand every eligible Alaskan a one-time $10,000 check and then end the Permanent Fund dividend for good. Ask one question: Where does his $10,000 come from?
It comes from the Permanent Fund, the people’s own money and the savings Alaskans built for their children. Walker would spend that endowment once to pay Alaskans to give up the yearly dividend forever.
Think about what that does. It cancels the annual check that gives a family a reason to keep an Alaska address and replaces it with a single payout. You hand people their own savings, call it a gift and cut the tie that held them here in the same motion. It is the oldest mistake in governing money: raid what you have saved to buy a moment’s applause and call the spending generosity.
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A plan that spends the people’s savings to send the people away is not bold. It is foolish.
Now consider the other $10,000. Through Alaska Housing Finance Corp., the state offers families up to $10,000 to build a new, energy-efficient home. AHFC raids nothing. It earns its own way. Over the years, it has returned more than $2 billion to the state treasury, and it spends some of that income the way any good business does: to win a customer.
Here, the customer is an Alaskan who wants to own a home, put down roots and stay.
That is the oldest sound move in business: Invest a little of what you earn to bring in someone who stays. The homeowner remains, the community gains a family and the corporation keeps earning. The money spent comes back. A plan that puts earnings to work to bring people home is not charity. It is clever.
Same amount. Opposite source. Opposite wisdom. One spends savings; the other spends earnings. One pays Alaskans to leave; the other pays them to stay. One empties the state; the other fills it.
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This Homeownership Month, the choice is the size of a single check, and the whole question is where the check comes from and what it asks of you. Ten thousand dollars of your own fund, to wave you goodbye. Or $10,000, earned and reinvested, to help you stay and build.
Evan Swensen is the publisher of Publication Consultants in Anchorage and the author of “What’s the Money For: A Permanent Fund Mortgage Proposal.”
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