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P E N I N S U L A
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2014 Soldotna-Kenai, Alaska
Vol. 44, Issue 118
50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday
Doubt dooms study of rail link to North Slope
Question Do you think the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend program should be protected in the state constitution? n Yes; or n No. To place your vote and comment, visit our Web site at www. peninsulaclarion. com. Results and selected comments will be posted each Tuesday in the Clarion, and a new question will be asked. Suggested questions may be submitted online or e-mailed to news@peninsulaclarion.com.
In the news Alaska sets new wind chill record of -97 degrees
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ANCHORAGE — The National Weather Service says a new Alaska wind chill record of -97 degrees has been set in remote Howard Pass in the Brooks Range. The Weather Service’s Facebook page says the threshold was broken at 3:39 p.m. Friday. A temperature of -42 degrees with a sustained northern wind of 71 mph was recorded. Howard Pass is uninhabited. Meteorologist Eddie Zingone in Anchorage said Saturday the area had wind chills of -90 or below for much of the day. Zingone says a National Park Service sensor picked up the reading, and other nearby sensors are rare. The agency says the previous record of -96 degrees was set in Prudhoe Bay/ARCO on Jan. 28, 1989. The Brooks Range has winter weather and wind chill advisories in effect until 6 a.m. Sunday. — The Associated Press
Inside ‘We should not allow a tiny minority of shoddy scientists and science and extreme ideologues to compete with scientific facts.’ ... See page A-2
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Photo by Kaylee Osowski/Peninsula Clarion
Reps. Kurt Olson, R-Kenai, and House Speaker Mike Chenault, R-Nikiski listen to David Caswell talk about making the Honor and Remember Flag a national symbol to recognize those who have died as a result of serving in the U.S. military. The representatives heard from a handful of central peninsula residents on Saturday at a town hall meeting in Soldotna.
Locals get face time with reps By KAYLEE OSOWSKI Peninsula Clarion
Local representatives listened to central Kenai Peninsula residents’ concerns and comments about various state and peninsula issues at a town hall meeting Saturday. About one dozen people stopped by the meeting at the George A. Navarre Borough Administration Building in Soldotna where Reps. Kurt
Olson, R-Kenai, and House Speaker Mike Chenault, RNikiski, heard public comment that focused on the fishing and energy industries. Robert Ruffner, with the Kenai Watershed Forum, Brian Gabriel Sr., Kenai city council member and commercial fisherman, and Megan Smith, a Cook Inlet setnetter, all testified to the representatives about their disappointment with the Board of Fish and the meet-
ing process. Ruffner said while the Kenai Peninsula Borough is doing well in its efforts, the State of Alaska is failing the central peninsula with king salmon habitat preservation. “I think we’re going to lose those fish if we don’t have some pretty extraordinary measures,” he said. Chenault said he’s also frustrated by the process and with no attempt to protect habitat, other species will
start depleting as well. Gabriel said the structure of the meeting was problematic and items concerning habitat should have been on the forefront of the agenda. This year’s meeting was the first Smith attended. She was part of the public use committee and she thought the group had generated a lot of good ideas, but at the meeting they “got slaughtered.”
See REPS, page A-10
FAIRBANKS (AP) — A North Pole legislator wants money to see whether a railroad extension to far northern Alaska is feasible, but his colleagues dismissed the idea as welfare for university projects. Rep. Doug Isaacson proposed spending $2 million on a feasibility study by the University of Alaska Fairbanks analyzing a potential railroad connection between Fairbanks and Deadhorse. House Transportation Committee members reacted skeptically, The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported. Isaacson said the rail extension could lead to new oildrilling and mining opportunities and reduce the high cost of doing business on the North Slope. “We’re so addicted to oil, that’s all we can see,” Isaacson said. “We need to diversify. This can help with getting new oil, this can help with getting new mines open, this can help with expanding other economic opportunities for the state, (this) would be a very, very, very good use of money.” Rep. Eric Feige, R-Chickaloon, said such an extension could make sense in the future, See RAIL, page A-10
Exploration off 38%, producing mines strong BY TIM BRADNER Morris News Service-Alaska Alaska Journal of Commerce
JUNEAU — Mining is good for Alaska’s economy, but while the state’s six producing mines are holding up well, and some even expanding, a sharp 38 percent drop in exploration spending last year is having ripple effects. Overall, mining employed 4,600 Alaskans directly last year and the overall employment impact totaled 9,100 including indirect jobs created by the spending. Direct payrolls of mining companies totaled $630
million in 2013. The 2013 total employment and payroll numbers are down a bit from employment in 2012, however, which is likely due to the falloff in exploration. Minerals companies spent about $180 million in exploration in 2013 compared with $275 million in 2012. The data was gathered by McDowell Group, a Juneaubased consulting firm, for the Alaska Miners Association and the Council of Alaska Producers, two minerals industry trade associations. The information was presented to the House and Sen-
ate Resources committees in Juneau Feb. 5, by Karen Matthias, director of the producers’ council, and Deantha Crockett, executive director of the Alaska Miners Association. McDowell Group’s 2013 figures were released that day. On an upbeat note, one of Alaska’s producing mines, the Fort Knox Mine near Fairbanks, achieved another milestone in December 2013, when the mine produced its six millionth ounce of gold, Matthias said. Fort Knox is a large surface mine northwest of Fairbanks that began production in 1996.
In another development, the Greens Creek Mine in Southeast Alaska secured federal approval for an expansion of the mine tailings storage facility, Matthias said. It will be in construction this year and, when completed, will give the mine the capacity to store tailings if new resources are added to the mine, she said. Greens Creek is an underground silver mine on Admiralty Island near Juneau. Some more sobering news for the industry, however, was the decision by Anglo American, a large mining company, to withdraw as a partner in the
large Pebble copper/gold project near Iliamna, southwest of Anchorage. Pebble’s owner, Northern Dynasty Minerals, is now looking for another partner to develop the mine. As for exploration, lower gold prices explain most of the drop, Matthias said. Prices for that metal have dropped from almost $1,800 per ounce in September 2012 to about $1,200 a year later, she said, and haven’t changed much since. Silver has also declined. Base metals like copper, zinc See MINES, page A-10
Lawmakers to mull over bill for concealed carry on campus By MATT WOOLBRIGHT Morris News Service-Alaska Juneau Empire
Fittingly, the bill introduced Friday that would prohibit the University of Alaska Board of Regents from banning concealed weapons on campus actually is the result of campus discussions. Intern Hans Rodvik approached Sen. John Coghill, RNorth Pole, about the proposal earlier this session. The Senate majority leader agreed to carry SB176 under one condition — Rodvik would be in charge of seeing it through the legislative process. “The university created a policy contradictory to state
law,” Coghill said. “We’re asking them to give us a good reason the right to bear arms should be infringed.” In addition to barring the University of Alaska Board of Regents from prohibiting the concealed carry of firearms, the proposal forbids any policy from being adopted that is not identical to state law. “We’re talking about the fundamental right to keep and bear arms,” said Rodvik, a junior political science major at the Anchorage campus. “The Board of Regents is flat out ignoring the constitution and state law.” A news release from Coghill’s office states: “Current state law does not prohibit law abiding citizens from carry-
ing concealed firearms on UA Campuses.” The bill does allow for exceptions, however. For example, university officials can prohibit firearms and knives in restricted areas in certain buildings — areas that require some sort of security clearance before entering. University officials can also ban the discharge of a firearm, so long as the policy allows for the firearm to be used in a selfdefense situation. “The Alaska Constitution affords us many rights, including the right to carry a firearm,” Coghill said in the news release. “Individuals do not lose See BILL, page A-10 C
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Photo by Dan Balmer/Peninsula Clarion
Happy birthday, George A U.S. flag in front of the Nikiski Fire Department ripples in the wind Sunday. Today is President’s Day, a federal holiday honoring the birthday of the nation’s first President George Washington.