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CLARION P E N I N S U L A
JULY 6, 2014 Soldotna-Kenai, Alaska
Vol. 44, Issue 237
FANTASTIC
50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday
Left: Robin and Vinni Catalano ride a flag-bedecked motorycle Friday during the annual Independence Day parade in Kenai. Middle: Charlie Mitcheltree watches bubbles floating in the wind. Bottom: Liam Miller and Nathaniel Villa eat corn on the cob during a carnival at the Kenai Park Strip.
FOURTH
Binkley Street updates going as planned By KELLY SULLIVAN Peninsula Clarion
Less than one month after the opening of the first roundabout at the intersection of Binkley Street and Wilson Lane, the downtown improvement plan is still on track. Construction is moving steadily toward Redoubt Avenue, the second intersection of Soldotna’s three-tiered Binkley Street improvement plan. In the first week of July, workers are laying the concrete for the widening of both sidewalks between Riverview Avenue and Redoubt Avenue, said project manager for the Binkley Street Improvements Lee Frey. “There is a lot of new sidewalk between Redoubt and See BINKLEY, page A-2 C
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In Pebble suit, tribes seek to intervene
Clarion photos by Rashah McChesney
In Kenai, thousands celebrate America’s Independence Day By KELLY SULLIVAN and RASHAH MCCHESNEY Peninsula Clarion
Before the Independence Day parade began in Kenai, Trading Bay Drive was a loudly chaotic jumble of star-spangled puppies, sugar and sun-soaked kids and last-minute parade float preparation. On Main Street and along the Kenai Spur Highway camp chairs and candy bags, miniature U.S. flags and picnic blankets piled up as more than 1,000 people found spots to watch the annual parade. An almost undetectable breeze, early sum-
mer sunshine and a nearly cloudless sky lured spectators to the parade and a festival at the Kenai Park Strip where fried food, raffles, children’s games and a beer garden drew young and old to Kenai’s festivities. Three Kirby brothers, Levi, 4, Noah, 7, and Malachi, 5, stood side-by-side on the Fidalgo Avenue sidewalk as their mother, Joy Kirby, coaxed them into staying out of the road. The boys — like so many of hundreds of children in the street — often darted into the paraderoute to grab candy. See FOURTH, page A-2
‘You learn to regulate the candy so the kids at the end get some too.’
- Charlie Mitcheltree, longtime parade-goer
Peony industry growing on the Kenai Peninsula By KELLY SULLIVAN Peninsula Clarion
Peony growers on the Kenai Peninsula are preparing for a future of internationally competitive production and cultivating a new population of growers. At the annual Central Peninsula Alaska Peony Growers Association Farm Tour June 28; 30 Alaskans made a circuit of central Kenai Peninsula farms involved in the statewide industry of peony growers. Some came from as far north as Fairbanks, others from the Matanuska-Susitna Valley, Homer and Cordova. The tour included stops
at Cook Inlet Gardens, Cool Cache Farms LLC and Echo Lake Peonies, all members of the newly formed Alaska Peony Market Cooperative. The cooperative’s bylaws were ratified at the beginning of this year, said President Ben Carpenter and owner of Cook Inlet Gardens. The organization is made up of eight Kenai Peninsula peony farms in varying stages of development. Members of the cooperative support each other financially and professionally, Carpenter said. “Not only can the less experienced gain insight from longtime growers, but each farm re-
quires similar products that can be resourced together to reduce expenses,” he said. Marketing peonies is a time consuming and costly activity, Carpenter said. It makes sense to spend resources advertising and marketing flowers for the cooperative rather than each individual farm doing the same activities individually, he said. Additionally, the cooperative makes the Kenai Peninsula market more viable, Carpenter said. While one farmer may not be able to grow enough flowers to supply to a major buyer, multiple farms working together can provide higher volumes of flowers.
Revenue for the cooperative is returned to each member on a “patronage basis,” Ben Carpenter said. Each member is in business to make a profit so the goal is to keep administrative costs low and return the highest amount of revenue back to the members, in proportion to how many flowers they produced. “It is a long lasting product,” he said. “One plant can live up to 80 years, potentially outliving its cultivator.” Cook Inlet Gardens currently has 240 1-year-old plants growing on an eight-acre plot of land, said Cook Inlet Gardens co-owner Ameye Carpenter said. C
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This season the couple will be planting another 5,000 plants on their property, Ameye Carpenter said. However it will take at least another two years for their current crop to reach maturity. Once the buds are big enough for harvesting, the 240 plants alone will bring in $5,000 annual revenue, Ameye Carpenter said. While the Carpenter’s business is in it’s beginning stages, other Alaska Peony Market Cooperative members have been improving production for years. Richard Repper, owner of See PEONY, page A-11
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A consortium of tribes is seeking to intervene in support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in a lawsuit challenging EPA’s authority to potentially block the proposed Pebble Mine. United Tribes of Bristol Bay petitioned EPA in 2010 to look at the potential impacts the project could have on the Bristol Bay watershed. EPA earlier this year concluded that large-scale mining in the region posed significant risk to salmon. And the agency initiated a rarely used process through which it could See PEBBLE, page A-11
Inside today Some showers 60/52 For complete weather, see page A-12
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