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Packrafting sees boom in popularity
Area teams ready for week two
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CLARION
Sun, showers 66/47 More weather on Page A-2
P E N I N S U L A
Friday-Saturday, August 22-23 Soldotna-Kenai, Alaska
Vol. 44, Issue 278
50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday
Kenai adds e-cigs to smoking ordinance
Question Are you excited for back-to-school time? n Yes! n I am, but my kids aren’t as enthusiastic. n No, summer went by too fast.
By DAN BALMER Peninsula Clarion
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 Ex-Marine waives extradition from Alaska
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SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — A former Marine charged with murder after the body of his alleged lover was found in an abandoned California mine shaft has waived extradition from Alaska. The Desert Sun reports Thursday that 24-year-old Christopher Lee can be immediately returned to California where he faces a firstdegree murder charge. He was arrested in Anchorage on Sunday, a day after 19-year-old Erin Corwin’s body was found 140 feet down a mine shaft near Twentynine Palms — where her Marine husband is stationed. Authorities say Lee admitted conducting Internet searches on human body disposal. Corwin was in the early stages of pregnancy when she disappeared on June 28. Her friend told investigators that Corwin and Lee were having an affair and that the unborn child might be Lee’s. —The Associated Press
Inside ‘Whoever tries to harm Israel’s citizens — they are marked for death.’ ... See page A-8
Index Opinion.................. A-4 Alaska.....................A-5 Nation.................... A-6 World..................... A-8 Religion.................A-10 Sports.....................B-1 Recreation............. C-1 Classifieds............ C-3 Comics.................. C-8 Check us out online at www.peninsulaclarion.com To subscribe, call 283-3584.
File photo by Rashah McChesney/Peninsula Clarion
Karl Kircher and Steven Bishop pitch setnet caught fish from a skiff near the mouth of the Kasilof River at 1 a.m. July 17 during an overnight commercial fishing period in Kasilof.
Winding down Cook Inlet setnetters end season By MOLLY DISCHNER Morris News Service-Alaska Alaska Journal of Commerce
The last of the Upper Cook Inlet East Side setnetters pulled their nets out of the water for good Aug. 6 after harvesting almost a million fish this season. Setnetters harvested about 930,300 salmon in the Kasilof, Kenai, and East Forelands sections and the Kasilof River Special Harvest Area this summer, about one-third of the 3.1 million salmon caught commercially in Upper Cook Inlet. The setnet harvest included about 704,272 sockeye, 216,233 pinks, 6,461 coho, 2,055 kings, and 792 chums. Ultimately, setnetters in the Kenai and East Forelands sections had six openings this summer; Kasilof section setnetters had 14, while the Kasilof Special Har-
vest Area was open for 17 periods. Kasilof section fishermen did not participate in the final Aug. 6 fishing period because they had already reached the one percent rule, which stops the setnet fishery once the sockeye abundance trails off. The total Upper Cook Inlet harvest is on par with 2013, when commercial fishermen also harvested about 3.1 million salmon, although that was a nonpink year, and the total is less than the 1966-2012 average of 4.1 million salmon. Those estimates, from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, are based on daily call-in numbers, and could change based on fish ticket data at the end of the summer. ADFG Area Management Biologist Pat Shields said that looking at the department’s most basic charge — meeting
escapement goals — the season was a success, although he noted that restrictions and reduced harvests were difficult for all fishermen. ADFG started the season with restrictions in sport, commercial and personaluse fisheries to help protect early run king salmon, including reduced fishing time in the Northern District direct king fishery, and reduced fishing time for the Kasilof personal-use fishery. Those appeared to pay off. “Many of the early run king salmon goals were made,” Shields said. On the Kasilof, the management plan allows for an early opening if the sockeye run starts off strong enough; this year that occurred, but managers waited a few days to open up because of early run king concerns, Shields said. See SEASON, page A-12
After hearing about the potential health concerns of electronic cigarettes at its preview two meetings, the Kenai City Council Wednesday night passed an ordinance for e-cigs to be regulated the same as smoking tobacco. The council brought the ordinance back for reconsideration after it failed at the Aug. 6 city council meeting. The ordinance, proposed by Kenai Mayor Pat Porter, included the smoking of plant-based material to not be allowed in public, referring to marijuana. Kenai Municipal Code prohibits smoking tobacco in a restaurant, bowling alley or medical facility. Adding e-cigs to the code does not ban use in bars, or private establishments. On Aug. 6 after nearly an hour of discussion following testimony from eight members of the public, including Soldotna Mayor Dr. Nels Anderson and Dr. Jim Zirul, with council member Brian Gabriel absent, votes to postpone and pass the ordinance failed. Vice Mayor Ryan Marquis said he didn’t dispute the health issues regarding e-cigs. The concern he had was government telling a business how they should regulate their shop. He was the lone no vote on the ordinance Wednesday. “I believe it is the right of a local business to decide and let patrons decide if they want to allow (e-cigs),” he said. “That’s where democracy works best. This is an issue of freedom.” Council member Bob MolSee CITY, page A-5
Murkowski, Begich talk rec fishing at roundtable Senators have differing opinions about Magnuson-Stevens Act reauthorization timeline By KAYLEE OSOWSKI Peninsula Clarion
U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Mark Begich, D-Alaska, joined panelists at the Kenai River Classic Roundtable in a discussion about recreational fishing and the reauthorization of the MagnusonStevens Act on Wednesday at the Soldotna Regional Sports Complex. Currently the MSA only addresses saltwater fishing in federal waters. While it provides a management process for commercial fishing, it lacks a focus on recreational fishing, said moderator Phil Dyskow, who serves on the Marine Fisheries Advisory
Committee and the board of directors for the Center for Coastal Conservation. “What they’ve done is simply used the same policy developed for commercial fishing and applied it to recreational fishing,” he said. The lack of a recreational policy has created “crisis conditions” throughout the nation, he said. In an effort to resolve the issues that have developed and balance the user groups, Dyskow said, a national recreational fishing policy needs to be developed. A broader understanding of the economic and social values must be seen and the reauthorized MSA needs to address recreational fishing, he said.
I’m looking forward to trying to get this thing done before the end of the year. It’s going to be tough … but we’re going to try to push.’ — Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska In Washington D.C., lawmakers have completed the second draft of the reauthorization of the MSA. Begich expressed optimism that congress would finish work on the MSA by the year’s end. “I’m looking forward to trying to get this thing done before the end of the year,” Begich said. “It’s going to be tough …
but we’re going to try to push.” He said while more “tweaking” needs to be done with the second draft, it cleared up many issues from the first. Murkowski said she doubts it will be possible to finish it this year. She wants it to be done correctly because lawmakers won’t get another chance at the act for a while.
“We’re not going to see passage of Magnuson-Stevens in this Congress,” she said. … “But what we can do, what we must do is use this time to develop the good strong policies going forward, so that we do have a balanced and a proportional Magnuson-Stevens that takes us well into the future.” Both said it will be rapidly reintroduced in January if it doesn’t pass by the end of 2015. “If we can get a better product because we have a national recreational policy incorporated into it, that might be the better course of action,” Murkowski said. Panelist Mike Nussman, See POLICY, page A-12
Teen charged as an adult in Delta Junction fires FAIRBANKS (AP) — A 16-year-old Delta Junction boy stole alcohol from a lodge, burned it down and sold the booze out of his vehicle, according to state prosecutors. Vasiliy Bill Malyk has been waived to adult status and will be prosecuted as an adult for fires that destroyed Clearwater Lodge and a Delta Junction home, the Fairbanks Daily
News-Miner reported. He is being held without bail at Fairbanks Correctional Center. Malyk is charged with nine felony counts, including arson, theft and evidence tampering. Clearwater Lodge, a 55-yearold structure near the banks of the Delta Clearwater River, burned May 15. Prosecutors said Alaska State Troopers investigators could
not immediately determine how the fire started but on June 24, but they interviewed a man who said he has secretly recorded a conversation with Malyk in which the youth acknowledged a role in the crime. The witness told troopers he confronted Malyk about alcohol he was selling from his vehicle. “(The witness) stated Malyk C
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told him he was there and that he’d take the fall before tatting out the others that helped,” Trooper Steven Lantz said in the criminal complaint. The witness told troopers he erased the recording because he was afraid of retaliation. A second fire on June 17 burned the home of a couple on vacation. Three rifles, jewelry and a laptop computer were
stolen from the home. The charred wreckage revealed two fire-ignition points and piles of burned and unburned paper, troopers said. Troopers arrested Malyk on Monday, and he acknowledged setting the home fire to cover the theft, prosecutors said. He also “confirmed his presence” at the lodge the night of the fire See CHARGE, page A-12