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Djokovic nabs Wimbledon title
Cali swimmer biten by great white
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CLARION
Few showers 64/50 More weather on Page A-2
P E N I N S U L A
MONDAY, JULY 7, 2014 Soldotna-Kenai, Alaska
Vol. 44, Issue 238
50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday
Question Do you think municipal officials should be exempt form state financial disclosure rules in favor of local ordinances? n Yes 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.
Taking aim
In the news
Dozens of Alaskans compete in weekend archery tournament
Herring return in significant numbers to Auke Bay C
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JUNEAU — Pacific herring are returning to Auke Bay to spawn in the most significant numbers seen in decades. Whether the fishery is becoming healthier won’t be seen until scientists see if the eggs are fertilized and if they survive. The Juneau Empire reports Lynn Canal herring stocks have been depressed for decades. For the past seven years until recently, first Lynn Canal and then Southeast herring stocks were under consideration for listing as an endangered species, but neither population was deemed distinct enough for the listing. The herring fishery closed in Lynn Canal and around Juneau in 1982. Marine ecologist Michelle Ridgway says she has seen more female herring this summer, but is still looking for males. Other challenges for the fishery include water quality and temperature. — The Associated Press
Inside ‘We will not allow extremists, it doesn’t matter from which side, to inflame the region and cause bloodshed’ ... See page A-6
Index Opinion.................. A-4 Nation.................... A-5 World..................... A-6 Sports.....................A-8 Classifieds........... A-10 Comics................. A-14 Check us out online at www.peninsulaclarion.com To subscribe, call 283-3584.
By DAN BALMER Peninsula Clarion
Photos by Dan Balmer/Peninsuala Clarion
Above: Merv Ellers from Wasilla aims for a target with his composite bow at the Independence Day Marked 3-D Archery Shoot at the Kenai Peninsula Archery Range Sunday in Soldotna. Top right: Gerald Bickford from Anchorage lines up his shot and prepares to release his arrow at a 3-D Rinehart moose target at the Independence Day Marked 3-D Archery Shoot Tournament.The statewide tournament drew 76 archers for the two-day competition.
With a traditional longbow in hand, Kenai resident John Lindgren felt like a kid again walking through the woods target shooting during a two-day archery tournament in Soldotna over the Fourth of July weekend. His form slow and deliberate, Lindgren placed a carbon arrow on the string and pulled back and held for several seconds to line up his shot before he fired a strike through a bull moose that stood 40 yards away. If the moose weren’t a life-size foam 3-D target, it would have been a kill shot, struck in a vital artery. “It’s a fun sport similar to playing a round of golf except you walk through the woods and shoot arrows at targets,” Lindgren said. Lindgren was one of 76 archers from around the state that competed in the annual Independence Day Marked 3-D Archery Shoot Saturday and Sunday, hosted by the Kenai Peninsula Archery Club at its 53-acre range in Soldotna. Club treasurer Steven Latz said the Independence Day Shoot is the biggest and most popular in the state. It attracts See BOW, page A-7
Tram conductor gives Tlingit lessons on ride By MARY CATHARINE MARTIN Capital City Weekly
JUNEAU — John Perkins starts his daily journeys up Mount Roberts with a few lessons in basic Tlingit. Then he gets out his drum and breaks into song, prompting his passengers on the Goldbelt Mount Roberts Tram to join in. “Hoo ha hoo ha haa oh hei,” everyone sings. He points out an eagle’s nest, and a deer. (“We should probably put (the deer) on contract,” he jokes as AP Photo/Capital City Weekly, Mary Catharine Martin people begin pointing and takJohn Perkins, pictured with his drum, educates tourists on the ing pictures.) uses of Sitka spruce trees, hemlock trees, and red alder trees, At the top, he tells the tourJune 26. Perkins is a Goldbelt Mount Roberts Tram conductor.
ists “Gunalcheesh ho ho” (thank you very much). He’s at the top of the tram for a few minutes, dancing, singing and encouraging the little girl of a family from India to join in. She asks to borrow his drum and smiles hugely and shyly as her parents take her picture. On the way back down, Perkins recites a poem, “Thunderbird Child,” that he wrote in honor of his sister. He tells people about traditional uses for Sitka spruce, hemlock and red alder. “From the beach to the woods, we gather our goods,” he said. “There’s Sitka spruce for an achey tooth, bruises, boils and burns ...”
For the relatively small window he gets to teach people about Tlingit culture, Perkins conveys quite a bit of information. Perkins, now 53, was raised in Petersburg in the 1960s and 70s, one of 11 siblings, 10 of whom were boys. His Tlingit name is Daku’dane, and he is an Eagle of the Shangukeidi (Thunderbird) clan. “What I tell people down South is, we were so poor we were forced to eat king salmon, king crab, Dungeness crab, prawns ... (later,) I realized we were never poor, just broke,” See TRAM, page A-7
KPBSD works to Sitka roofers find battle relics save energy, money By SHANNON HAUGLAND Daily Sitka Sentinel
By KAYLEE OSOWSKI Peninsula Clarion
With rising energy costs, the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District continues to try to reduce energy consumption to save money. While utilities make up slightly more than 4 percent of KPBSD’s fiscal year 2015 budget, the district and the borough have implemented programs and projects to save money and
energy throughout the years. In fiscal year 2008, the district started an energy conservation program. The money saved through the program is reallocated for educational purposes. Through the program each school is given back 25 percent of the cost avoidance based on energy consumption or usage by site. Since the program began, schools have earned $489,678
SITKA — Roofing volunteers or amateur archaeologists? The workers on the Hames Center reroofing project thought of themselves as both last week after finding about 20 rusty iron balls, about one inch in diameter, mixed in with the river-run gravel weighting down the old roofing system.
See ENERGY, page A-2 C
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The layer of smooth pebbles that was an integral part of the flat portion of the athletic center’s roof when it was built in the 1980s is being removed as part of the roof renovation now under way. After the workers noticed the metal balls mixed in with the gravel they began speculating on their origin. The theory now being investigated is that the balls were grapeshot or canister shot fired by cannons in the
1804 Battle of Sitka, and had remained on the bottom of Indian River the next century and a half, until the gravel was dredged out for construction projects Both grapeshot and canister shot are small metal balls fired as a cluster from a cannon, and having the effect of a shotgun, scattering projectiles over a large area. Brant Brantman, parttime facilities manager at the See RELICS, page A-2