ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – Come rain or shine, Memorial Day weekend must go on in the Last Frontier.

Among the many plans put into action for the extra long weekend, one thing no one in Alaska planned for is to let a little rain slow them down. Despite some cloudy weather in the weekend’s forecast, lots of people made plans to take full advantage of everything the state has to offer.

Folks like Charles Fualaau from Seattle don’t just tolerate the rain — they thrive in it.

“I’m born and raised in Washington so we love the rain where I’m from … a vest keeps me just fine,” Fualaau said. “We didn’t think there was going to be a lot to do in Alaska, but there are — surprisingly — there are quite a few things, at least sightseeing, and it’s free, right? So, it’s lovely.”

Fualaau came up from the Lower 48 with his wife and six children just for one day Friday, flying in early in the morning and flying out late at night. He said though their time was limited, they made sure to soak up every second they were here, even going so far as to let the children weigh in on scenic destinations.

From Beluga Point to Bird Creek Campground, Alaska has no shortage of scenic destinations. Whether it’s whale-watching, sightseeing, or even just packing up the car and hitting the open road, for many, Memorial Day weekend is often the first chance of the year to soak in the great outdoors.

Corbin and Ruby Fraizer and their 17-month-old daughter Ivy are spending the weekend at Thumb Cove. For the longtime Alaska couple, making it a point to get outside for adventures isn’t just important for their own wellbeing, it’s an Alaskan right of passage they now enjoy passing down to their daughter.

The Fraizers said with Anchorage winters being particularly long, Memorial Day weekend is often their first chance to do so.

“We’ve been pretty cooped up over this winter and this is the first chance that most of us can get out and get wild,” Corbin said.

“Yeah, everybody’s been cheering us on at the grocery store, seeing us unload the vehicle and stuff,” Ruby added. “We’ve had a couple people be like [thumps up].”

Scott Comeaux, along with his wife and daughter, have made a yearly tradition of spending time together at Bird Creek Campground every Memorial Day weekend.

“It’s our family time,” Comeaux said. “When you’re at home, you get distracted by all the electronics and the TV, but you come out here and none of that stuff is here. It’s just nature and us, and it helps us to kind of grow as a family.”

No matter how residents and visitors choose to spend the holiday weekend, the underlining theme from those all throughout Southcentral Alaska is to spend it with family, and as anyone in Anchorage will say, there’s no better place to do so than in the great state of Alaska.

Copyright 2024 KTUU. All rights reserved.

Updated: 15 minutes ago Published: 15 minutes ago

The Alaska Supreme Court has upheld the state’s decision to suspend the dental license of a man who became internationally infamous after extracting a tooth while riding a hoverboard.

Former dentist Seth Lookhart has been convicted of numerous crimes, including Medicaid fraud and standard-of-care violations that almost killed two patients.

Sentenced to 20 years in prison with eight suspended, he sought to retain his dental license after it was revoked by the Board of Dental Examiners.

When the revocation was upheld by a lower court, Lookhart appealed to the Alaska Supreme Court, which ruled Friday.

Lookhart is also appealing the criminal convictions that resulted in his prison sentence; that appeal remains pending in the Alaska Court of Appeals.

In Friday’s decision, the Supreme Court said the state dental board did not violate state law or abuse its discretion when it revoked Lookhart’s license after a “fraudulent scheme of staggering proportions that jeopardized the health and safety of his patients.”

Among the court’s five justices is Jennifer Henderson, the judge who heard the initial case against Lookhart in 2017.

That case was the result of an extensive investigation by the state’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, the Office of Inspector General, the FBI, and the Drug Enforcement Administration.

In the subsequent trial, prosecutors demonstrated that Lookhart improperly used IV sedation — which was reimbursed by Medicaid at higher rates than local anesthesia — and extracted teeth more often than was necessary.

After Lookhart was convicted in criminal court, the state Division of Corporations, Business and Professional Licensing sought to strip him of his license.

An administrative law judge concluded that Lookhart had shown an “astonishing range of misconduct” and agreed with the division’s conclusion that if Lookhart’s case didn’t warrant revocation, “no future case will.”

The state dental board adopted the judge’s recommendation that Lookhart’s license be revoked, but Lookhart appealed to Superior Court, arguing that the board’s decision didn’t follow prior precedent.

Superior Court Judge Frank Pfiffner upheld the revocation, concluding that “no Alaska case is factually comparable to the sheer scale of malfeasance here,” and that even though there was no prior precedent, the board’s decision represented a proper use of discretion under state law.

Lookhart’s attorney argued to the Alaska Supreme Court that state law narrowly constrains the board, and that without precedent, it wasn’t able to act.

Writing on behalf of the court, Justice Jude Pate disagreed.

While state law obliges the board to be consistent, “there is simply no prior case comparable to the scope of Lookhart’s egregious dishonesty and misconduct,” he wrote. “The board did not abuse its discretion in concluding that revoking Lookhart’s license was an appropriate sanction.”

Attorney Chester Gilmore, representing Lookhart, did not return a phone call or email seeking comment on Friday.

Attorney General Treg Taylor, speaking on behalf of state prosecutors, said in a written statement, “This case involved the most widespread misconduct of any licensing matter in recent memory, if not ever, in Alaska. We’re pleased that Dr. Lookhart will no longer be able to exploit vulnerable patients for his personal gain.”

Originally published by the Alaska Beacon, an independent, nonpartisan news organization that covers Alaska state government.

The Indian Health Service provides medical and dental care to the Indigenous peoples of Alaska and elsewhere in the nation. What it does not provide, however, is veterinary care for animals living with the IHS’ human clients.

A bill introduced by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, is an attempt to change that.

The bill, called the Veterinary Services to Improve Public Health in Rural Communities Act, was introduced by the Alaska senator last week. It would add veterinary services to the federal agency’s duties. That is important in rural Alaska, she said, where regular veterinarian care is notoriously scarce and where diseases in wild animal populations pose threats to domestic animals like dogs and, potentially, people.

The bill would direct the IHS to work with tribal organizations to provide veterinarian services, including spaying and neutering of pets.

A top concern is rabies, which is common in Alaska fox populations but also found in other animals and thus poses risks to people.

“Unfortunately, in Alaska we are experiencing more frequent rabies outbreaks in wild animal populations. Rural communities are disproportionately at higher risk of rabies transmission to humans due to uncontrolled dog populations in remote areas of Alaska — which is particularly concerning given the challenges of providing health care in many rural and remote villages,” Murkowski said in a statement. There are vaccination and voluntary veterinary services trying to address the problems, but those “are simply not able to meet the growing need for services. My bill would help bolster the veterinary workforce in Alaska, creating healthier and safer communities across the state,” she said.

Alaska Native children, research shows, are at elevated risks for dog bites, which could, in turn, expose them to rabies or other diseases that can spread between animals and people, also known as zoonotic diseases. A 2013 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that Alaska Native children’s rate of hospitalization for dog bites was about twice that of the general U.S. child population. Indigenous children in the Southwestern and Northern Plains states also had high rates of hospitalization for dog bites, the study found.

Dog bites and exposure through them to rabies and other diseases is a problem in Indigenous communities throughout the circumpolar north, and “dog bites have become an important  public health burden” in those places, said a 2022 report by Canadian researchers that synthesized 257 individual studies.

Rabies is endemic, meaning entrenched, in the Arctic fox and red fox populations of northern Alaska, Western Alaska and the Aleutians, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. But rabies has been found in other wild animals, such as caribou and polar bears, according to the department.

Last summer, North America’s first confirmed case of a rabies-infected moose occurred in the Bering Strait-area village of Teller. The moose, found wandering in and around the community, was euthanized and found to be carrying the Arctic fox variant of the rabies virus, which is different from the red fox variant, the Department of Fish and Game said.

Among the provisions in Murkowski’s bill is a directive for the veterinary officers from the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps to provide services to the IHS, a directive for a study about the feasibility of delivering oral rabies vaccines in Alaska’s Arctic region and inclusion of the IHS as a coordinating agency in the National One Health Framework, which is addressing zoonotic diseases and federal agencies’ readiness to respond to them.