Oil
Strokes
Coloradoans consider limiting drilling
Prep swimmers seek to make wave
Nation/A5
Sports/B1
CLARION
Clouds and sun 61/42 More weather on Page A2
P E N I N S U L A
Friday, August 31, 2018 Kenai Peninsula, Alaska
Vol. 48, Issue 286
$1 newsstands daily/$1.50 Sunday
Woman charged with killing babies
In the news Anchorage approves ban on distribution of plastic bags ANCHORAGE (AP) — Anchorage is banning stores from distributing disposable plastic shopping bags in the city and will require retailers to charge customers a 10-cent fee for paper bags. The city assembly adopted the plastic bag ban and paper bag fee Tuesday that take effect in March, the Anchorage Daily News reported . The ban will apply to all retail businesses, including grocery stores, restaurants and pharmacies. Smaller plastic bags usually supplied by grocery stores for produce, meat or bulk items are exempt from the ban. Retailers can keep the money from the paper bag fees, according to the ordinance. Businesses that do not charge the fee could face fines. Supports say the move will reduce litter and encourage customers to bring reusable bags to stores. Bringing with him more than a dozen plastic bags recently collected from Anchorage streets, Assemblyman Christopher Constant pushed for the strict ban at the meeting Tuesday. “The waste stream is voluminous and we have an opportunity to break the cycle,” Constant said. Opponents said the measure it would place a burden on businesses and customers. Assemblyman John Weddleton said banning all plastic bags regardless of the thickness would be too much. Thicker plastic bags were not at the heart of the problem, he said, also noting the increase use of paper bags could negatively affect the city’s carbon footprint.
Man shot, wounded in Anchorage ANCHORAGE (AP) — A man suffered life-threatening injuries when he was shot on a downtown Anchorage street. Police shortly before 4 a.m. Thursday received a report of shots fired at west Sixth Avenue and C Street. They found a man in the street who had been shot more than once in the upper body. He was rushed to a hospital. Officers determined the injured man had been in a fight with another person who shot him and may have fled on a motorcycle. Police are asking for witnesses with information on the shooting or surveillance video.
Index Opinion................... A4 Nation..................... A5 World...................... A6 Sports......................B1 Classifieds.............. B5 Comics.................... B8 Check us out online at www.peninsulaclarion.com To subscribe, call 283-3584.
By DAN JOLING Associated Press
Carol Bannock, Elizabeth Appleby and Karolee Hansen scour for trash along Ryan’s Creek Trai on Thursday, in Kenai. (Photo by Victoria Petersen/Peninsula Clarion)
Kenai combats trash with lunchtime event By VICTORIA PETERSEN Peninsula Clarion
The city of Kenai is sponsoring three lunchtime events that city planner, Elizabeth Appleby, hopes will promote a cleaner, more engaged city. The events, called TRASHersize, focus on cleaning city trails on a typical lunch break. The city provides all the bags, gloves and water needed for the event. Appleby said she created the event for a number of reasons, including high-
lighting Kenai’s city trails, working with the community to create a cleaner place to live and creating an informal setting where residents can interact with city employees. The Kenai Planning and Zoning Department receives complaints about litter. While Appleby said that most of the complaints she receives aren’t focused on trails, she said there is still a need to clean the city’s trails. “The complaints I’ve gotten have not really been specific to trails, but given it’s only me and one other person in Planning
and Zoning enforcing these complaints, I thought trying to interact with residents with informal ways to combat the trash issue would help give a boost to staff dollars and time in the city,” Appleby said. Karolee Hansen joined the first TRASHersize event the city hosted on Thursday. “I just want to do something to make Kenai more beautiful and cleaner,” Hansen said. Carol Bannock works in the Kenai City Parks and Recreation Department. See KENAI, page A2
ANCHORAGE — A woman has been indicted on murder charges in the deaths of her two baby daughters two years apart. A Fairbanks grand jury Wednesday indicted Stephany Lafountain, 23, in the death of a 4-month-old girl in 2015 and a 13-month-old girl in November 2017. Both girls’ deaths exhibited signs of being suffocated, police said. The girls were referred to by their initials and their names were not released. At a news conference, Fairbanks Police Chief Eric Jewkes called the cases an “unimaginable tragedy,” but did not discuss a possible motive. Fairbanks police arrested Lafountain on Thursday afternoon. She was jailed at Fairbanks Correctional Center. Online court records do not list Lafountain’s attorney. She was scheduled to be arraigned Friday. Lafountain last year was married to a soldier and living on Fort Wainwright Army Post. The Fairbanks Police Department investigated the Nov. 20 death because the mother and the child were civilians, authorities said. Online court records indicate was divorced in February. According to police, Lafountain called emergency responders just before 6:30 p.m. to say her child was not breathing. The child was taken to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital See CHARGE, page A2
Hidden gem: Kasilof Historical Museum details area history By VICTORIA PETERSEN Peninsula Clarion
In Kasilof, everything revolves around the river. A visit to the Kasilof Historical Museum shows that it’s been that way for thousands of years. From the early Alaska Native Dena’ina people to the cannery workers, fox farmers and commercial fisherman, the people of Kasilof are reliant on its waterway. Driving too fast, passersby might miss the museum. It sits near the intersection of Kalifornsky Beach Road and the Sterling Highway and the first thing that greets visitors is an old, rusty road grader sitting near the road. Pulling in, a village of cabins, boats, equipment and other items of historical importance appear out of the foliage. “The way we are situated here, people drive so fast they don’t see us,” Alicia Morgan, vice president of the Kasilof Regional Historical Association and one of the museum docents, said. Inside the main building, visitors can sign in and admire artifacts like beaded moccasins made by Dena’ina, ropes made from area roots, salmon cans with colorful vintage labels and more. The main building, called the McLane Center, was originally the infirmary for the Kasilof cannery. Built in 1882, the cannery was the second one built in the state and the first one built in western Alaska. After it served its purpose for the cannery, the building became a schoolhouse in 1932. Kasilof resident Enid McLane was chosen to be the
first teacher. She lived north of the Kasilof River and lived with her children at the school during the week to avoid crossing the river every single day after work. Visitors can read about how McLane had to cross the river in the spring by jumping from one ice chunk to another. When Tustumena School was constructed in 1959, the McLane Center became the community library. There are eight historic buildings on the grounds, Morgan said. The Watchman’s House is one of the newer additions to the museum. The home was built in 1891 and used until the 1970s. After it was abandoned it was damaged by Adam’s leaning wheel grader is the first thing drivers see from the road when passing by the campers visiting it. In 2009, it Kasilof Historical Museum on Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2018, in Kasilof. (Photo by Victoria Pewas transported by trailer from tersen/Peninsula Clarion) the mouth of the Kasilof River to the museum to be preserved. Today, people can walk through the home, and other cabins on the grounds, and see what life might have been like at the time of its use. One of the main attractions of the museum is what has been By ELIZABETH EARL half of the forecasted 69.7 million fish for this left behind from Kasilof’s fox Peninsula Clarion season. Cook Inlet’s fishermen have harvested farming days. In the 1920s, about 965,000 pinks, significantly more than the when the population was only 465,000 in 2016. The vast majority of those — Though pink salmon harvests are ahead of around a dozen people, fox about 838,815 pinks — have been harvested in what they were in 2016, the last comparable farming was the cash crop of Lower Cook Inlet, largely the southern district run-size year, they are still significantly below the area. Fox farming has exbays around the lower edge of the Kenai Peninthe forecast level. isted in Alaska since Russian sula south of Kachemak Bay. The Port Graham As of Aug. 28, Alaska’s commercial pink colonization, and in Kasilof, Section alone has harvested 345,648 and the salmon harvest was 38.2 million fish, about 4 the silver black fox was covTutka Bay Special Harvest Area has harvested percent ahead of the harvest in 2016. Pink salmeted for its look and feel in high 269,165, both of which have pink salmon hatchon have a two-year life cycle, with large runs in fashion. There were seven fox eries nearby. even years and smaller runs on odd-numbered farms along the Kasilof River Pink salmon harvest varies in other areas of years, so the harvests are compared on every between 1920 and 1940. Fox the state. Kodiak’s harvest of pinks so far is beother year as compared to year-over-year like farming died out during the other species. Two years ago, the pink salmon hind the forecast but significantly better than in Great Depression, but can still runs returned so small that the U.S. Secretary the 2016 disaster year. The Alaska Peninsula and be remembered at the museum, of Commerce declared a fishery disaster on the Aleutian Islands and Bristol Bay are both behind where people can peruse cabSee FISH, page A2 Gulf of Alaska pink salmon fisheries. ins and kennels used for the The total harvest so far is slightly more than See VISIT, page A2
Pink salmon harvest below forecast, slightly up from 2016