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With one week left to file, candidates are still being sought for a number of Wrangell’s municipal committees and elected seats. As of Tuesday, four residents have put in their names for the October 3 ballot, ahead of the August 31 filing deadline. Assemblyman Mark Mitchell will not seek another term on that body, but will be running instead for one three-year term on the Port Commission. Current commissioner Walter Moorhead has not yet submitted his name for another term. For the Wrangell School Board, Jessica Rooney has also put herself up f...
Candidates are being sought for Wrangell’s various municipal committees and elected seats. Beginning August 1 and extending through the remainder of the month, the city clerk’s office will be accepting declarations of candidacy and signature petitions for the October 3 ballot. Two three-year terms on the Borough Assembly are coming up for election, with the seats of Stephen Prysunka and Mark Mitchell both expiring. Two seats on the Public School Board – one a full three-year and the other an unexpired two-year term – are likewise up for ele...
Towering over town as it does, Mount Dewey is just about impossible to miss while in Wrangell. The feature draws visitors about 400 feet up to its summit throughout the year, with a viewing platform there offering a unique view both of the town and of the surrounding islands. The quarter-mile boardwalk trail winding its way up to the platform also offers glimpses of the Back Channel, scattered muskegs and the industrial park. It makes for a short but active climb, and so has proven popular with...
On Monday evening more than a month of hard work for two of Wrangell's July 4 Royalty candidates came to an end, with the year's queen and princess each crowned. Future high school senior Charley Seddon was crowned queen, after selling 46,463 tickets during the month of June. Named the celebration's princess, recent Wrangell High School graduate Hailie Davis sold 44,330. A tight race throughout, together the girls raised over $90,000 for the competition. A longstanding tradition for the town's I...
It was out of the workplace and into the streets for many Wrangell city staff last Thursday, as two dozen unionized workers began a strike over prolonged contract negotiations. The City and Borough has been negotiating for a new collective bargaining agreement with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1547 since the summer of 2014, when the previous CBA expired. The process has at times been tumultuous, with court proceedings through the fall of 2016 being settled prejudicia...
It was out of the workplace and into the streets for many Wrangell city staff Thursday morning, as two dozen unionized workers began a strike over prolonged contract negotiations. The City and Borough has been negotiating for a new collective bargaining agreement with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1547 since the summer of 2014, when the previous CBA expired. The process has at times been tumultuous, with court proceedings through the fall of 2016 being settled by...
June 14, 1917: The School Board has elected Miss Edith Carhart principal of the Wrangell Public School for the coming term. Miss Carhart is not a stranger in Wrangell, having been principal of the school here during the term of 1909-10. She was re-elected but preferred to return to the States. She has had 17 years experience. For the past three years she has been principal of the Fobes school at Snohomish, Washington Miss Tressa Curtin has been elected teacher of the primary department. Miss Curtin has had 11 years as a teacher, seven of which...
A new principal has been hired for Evergreen Elementary School and is expected later this summer. A selection panel made up of Wrangell Public Schools teachers, paraprofessionals, the secondary schools principal and superintendent have unanimously approved the hire of Gail Taylor for the position. Taylor is currently the elementary principal with Haworth School District in Haworth, Oklahoma. Relating her background, Taylor explained she is a graduate of Southeastern Oklahoma State University...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly rejected a last best offer on terms for a new collective bargaining agreement put forward by its public employees’ union. Negotiators with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1547 arrived in Wrangell last week to meet with members of the bargaining unit ahead of a special meeting June 8. Meeting with most of the Borough Assembly, an offer package was put forward for their consideration. The city negotiating team and IBEW bargaining unit have been at odds over the terms of a new CBA since t...
June 14, 1917: The School Board has elected Miss Edith Carhart principal of the Wrangell public school for the coming term. Miss Carhart is not a stranger in Wrangell, having been principal of the school here during the term of 1909-10. She was re-elected but preferred to return to the States. She has had 17 years experience, and always been reelected wherever she has taught. Miss Tressa Curtin has been elected teacher of the primary department. Miss Curtin has had 11 years as a teacher, seven of which were spent in the Fobes School at...
In My Opinion I am the art teacher for Wrangell Middle and High School, and I’m very proud of that position. As an art teacher I try to get my students to see things differently; I encourage them to see outside the box. I want them to see themselves as artists and to learn to be creative. Not everyone can see their own potential. They have to learn how. I think we used to teach that here in Wrangell. I think our school district is changing and not for the benefit of the students. I see a pattern in this district of people leaving Wrangell (Elem...
Dan Wickman, 73, left this earth on May 1, 2017. Born September 29, 1943 in Wrangell, Alaska to Robert and Helena Wickman, Dan was a Native Alaskan and member of the Tlinget tribe, as well as a Vietnam War veteran. He was an avid crabber, fisherman, and hunter and had an unparalleled knowledge of construction related skills: electrical, plumbing, heating systems, and remodeling. Dan was captain of the Wrangell Fire Department, an EMT, and EMT instructor and a member of the Southeast Alaska EMS...
Wrangell Medical Center is gearing up for its 10th annual golf tournament and fundraiser dinner, proceeds from which will go toward several initiatives of its Foundation. Coupled with Saturday’s banquet and auction, the Brian Gilbert Memorial Golf Tournament is one of the biggest drives benefiting the WMC Foundation each year, with the weekend last year raising just under $30,000. The Foundation is the hospital’s philanthropic arm and in the past such weekends have supported two of the Foundation’s ongoing initiatives. One of these is its cance...
The school district has begun advertising for a new principal at Evergreen Elementary School, after its board accepted the resignation of current principal Deidre Jenson on Monday. Once the school year ends, Jenson said she will be heading north this summer with her husband, Joel. “We’re heading to Deering, Alaska,” she explained. There, Jenson will be a principal and special education instructor for the Northwest Arctic School District. Two of the Jensons’ children have already graduated, while arrangements are being made for a third to rema...
Wrangell Cooperative Association has created a new position for tourism development, hiring Rachel Moreno for the job. The move is one intended to better coordinate the Tribe’s participation in the visitor industry, a growing segment of the economy regionally despite declines in other sectors. According to state labor statistics, tourism accounted for nine percent of all employment earnings in Southeast for 2015. The sector made up about 17 percent of all jobs, and is currently the fastest-growing. About 500 average annual jobs were added last...
A relatively recent resident to Wrangell took a novel view of the place, in February self-publishing a fictional adventure set here. K.E. Hoover’s book West of North follows character Josh Campbell, a man who has come to Wrangell looking for a new start at life. He makes some new friendships – and new enemies – in the process, learning to live in the Alaskan wilderness. “It’s a thriller in addition to an adventure story,” Hoover explained. One of the characters is loosely based on his own father, Jack Hoover, a resident of Wrangell. ...
Wrangell Public Schools has adopted a final draft budget for the coming year. Meeting Monday evening at Evergreen Elementary School, the board voted to approve the third draft, which projects expenditures totaling $5,860,894. Attendance for the year is anticipated at 273 students. Costs since the first draft was put forward in February have come down by about $134,000 in expected benefits, due to lower insurance rates. “It's fairly straightforward, which is not always the case for the budget,” school superintendent Patrick Mayer explained. Som...
In its monthly meeting the Wrangell Medical Center Board learned progress continues to be made in drawing up plans for a new hospital. Hospital chief executive officer Robert Rang informed the board that architects with Juneau firm Jensen Yorba Lott are still hammering out designs, following a site visit in mid-March. At the moment the contractors are trying to reconcile staff’s “wish list” for a future facility with applicable standards, minimizing the building’s footprint where possible. On the financial end, the accountant at BDO in Anchora...
The Wrangell Borough Assembly passed on first reading several ordinances related to marijuana, including an additional excise on that cultivated on the island. Under one proposed code change, a new section would affix a $10 tax per ounce on "the sale or transfer of all marijuana from a marijuana cultivation facility ... to a retail marijuana store or a marijuana product manufacturing facility." "The cultivator pays the tax," explained city clerk, Kim Lane. It and the other ordinances were put...
At its 27th Annual Fundraiser Dinner on Saturday, the Wrangell Chamber of Commerce announced its honors list for 2017. There were five nominees for this year’s Wrangell Citizen of the Year: school board member and Wells Fargo Bank employee Aleisha Mollen; Sourdough Lodge proprietor Bruce Harding; Alaska Vistas operator Sylvia Ettefagh; Dr. Lynn Prysunka at Alaska Island Community Services; and Evergreen Elementary School secretary Renate Davies. Of the candidates, Prysunka was awarded this year’s honor, having served the community as a fam...
January 18, 1917: On Tuesday evening a banquet was given at the Wrangell hotel by several of the business men in honor of the Wrangell basketball team. Cash Coulter was apparently the one who originated the idea, and saw that it was carried out. It was one of the most pleasurable events that has taken place in Wrangell this season. Hon. P.C. McCormack acted as chairman, and as soon as the guests were seated made a few appropriate remarks explaining why the banquet was given, and praising the basketball team giving Wrangell a lot of advertising...
Wrangell Public School District unveiled its first draft for next year’s operating budget at its board’s Monday evening meeting. Overall, the school district’s budget is projected to be 2.3 percent higher than the FY17 revised budget, coming in at $5,953,642. As with other city departments, the new fiscal year is slated to begin July 1. Accounting for the rise, step-and-column increases are anticipated to raise the teacher and support salaries budget by about $48,000, with another $96,000 increase in payroll benefits associated with a 10-pe...
For Wrangell, the past year was one mixed with successes and setbacks, shared tragedies and uplifting moments. Sales taxes collected over the spring and summer tour seasons neared all-time highs, with the visitor industry experiencing a good season overall. On the other end, fishermen experienced one of their worst harvests of the summer, which after a disappointing 2015 season has put the fiscal pinch on a number of local families, boat builders, and associated sectors. As 2017 dawns, concerns...
John, 80, passed away on December 23, 2016 in Yuma, Arizona. He was born in Marshall, Texas to Virginia Bell Hall and John Bryan Hall, Jr. on May 25, 1936. He graduated from Marshall High School in 1954 and East Texas State University in 1958, whereupon he moved to Saint Mary's, Idaho in search of good fishing. He taught math and shop there for two years and then moved to Seward, Alaska in search of even better fishing. Turns out the fishing in Seward was great, but the earthquakes were a...
Alaska's two senators jointly welcomed a new addition to their Southeast team. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan issued statements December 22 congratulating Chere Klein to serve at the South Southeast delegation representative office in her home town of Ketchikan. "The district office is kind of the eyes and ears of the senators when they're back in D.C.," Klein explained of the post. "Our main business is doing casework, and that's helping constituents around the district with any kind of...
