Peninsula Clarion, September 28, 2014

Page 1

Dividend

2014 PFD

Look inside to find deals from area businesses

$

1884.00

Look inside for great deals and special savings from your local businesses and retailers

THE

Book of Savings

C

M

Y

K

Sunday

Football Soldotna runs away from West Valley Sports/B-1

www.peninsulaclarion.com

CLARION P E N I N S U L A

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014 Kenai Peninsula, Alaska

Vol. 44, Issue 308

50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday

‘Never stop training’

Firefighters wrap-up week-long conference with run, competition By DAN BALMER Peninsula Clarion

Photo by Rashah McChesney/Peninsula Clarion

(left) Chugiak Volunteer Fire and Rescue firefighter Joe Lindquist hands a stretcher to Tell Spragg, firefighter with the Petersburg Fire Department as the two work to pull a mock victim out of a wrecked car Friday during the 2014 Alaska Fire Conference. Dozens of firefighters opted for a 2-day extrication training class held at the Reddi Towing and Salvage yard in Kenai.

C

M

Y

K

When a call comes in, first responders need to be ready for anything at anytime. The 2014 Alaska Fire Conference wrapped up Saturday with 250 firefighters from across the state on the Kenai Peninsula to receive fire training while also learning from national fire instructors. The theme of the conference was “Physical Preparedness and Operational Readiness,” two mantras firefighters live by, said keynote speaker Dave McGrail, assistant Chief from the Denver Fire Department. McGrail addressed the firefighters who attended at the opening ceremony Sept. 17 at Kenai Central High School.

He spoke about how firefighters can achieve excellence by building strong teams within their departments. Those teams must have the desire to serve, courage to act and ability to perform, he said. State and local politicians welcomed the firefighters at the opening ceremony and thanked them for their service. Lt. Governor Mead Treadwell, who lost his father in a fire, said his father opened a fire station on the last day he was alive. “Never stop training,” Treadwell said. “You are on the front lines protecting live and property. I encourage you to pay attention to what goes on in government. We know how important your needs are.” See FIRE, page A-2

Three compete in KPB mayor’s race ‘People ... know me and what I stand for’

Stories by Kaylee Osowski

‘I’ve done a good job’

Being prepared for a natural disaster is at the top of his priority list. In the race for the Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor’s seat, Carrol Martin’s platform is to better protect borough residents against natural disasters and ensure they have the necessities to survive if an event were to cut the area off from suppliers. “A safe, secure food supply, wildfire remediation and green belt-parks and recreation work together as a 3-in-1 plan and the borough should be encouraging Kenai, Soldotna, the (Kenaitze Indian) Tribe and Alaska (Division of) Forestry to work together,” he wrote in an email. Martin is retired, but is an active volunteer in the community. He has a colorful past that has included a variety of work and life experience. “I’m (100) percent confident I can win as I have worked all Photos by Rashah McChesney/Peninsula Clarion over the Peninsula and many people in each community (left) Carrol Martin, Mike Navarre and Tom Bearup have all been campaigning for the Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor’s seat. See , page A-

Today’s Clarion Obituaries..................... A-3 Opinion......................... A-4 Alaska........................... A-5 Nation........................... A-6 World............................ B-1 Cops/courts.................. A-8 Sports........................... B-1 Community................... C-1 Weddings...................... C-1 Dear Abby..................... C-2 Crossword..................... C-2 Horoscope.................... C-2 Classifieds................... C-3 Mini Page...................... D-8 TV...................... Clarion TV

Sunny 55/35 For complete weather, see page A-12 Check us out online at www.peninsulaclarion.com To subscribe, call 283-3584.

It’s incumbent upon me to go out ... to earn the respect and the respect of the people.’ Kenai Peninsula voters last elected him to office in 1979 as mayor of Soldotna. Now Tom Bearup, 67, is running for Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor. Between his time as the Soldotna mayor and now, Bearup has run for multiple offices in Arizona — most recently for Pinal County Arizona Sheriff

in 2012. The paper trail that ties Bearup, an Arizona native, and his family between the two states is extensive and shows that Bearup has spent much of his

His confidence in continuing in his current position is high. “I think that I’ll be re-elected because I believe that I’ve done a good job and I think that people are recognizing that,” said Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Mike Navarre. He said he has the most experience and believes that he is the best qualified to serve as borough mayor. “I carry out the responsibilities and I take the job seriously and I work hard at it,” he said. “I educate myself on the issues and I utilize the expertise that’s available to me.” Navarre, 58, said he is running again because he still has some things he would like to accomplish with the current management team, and if the borough elects a new mayor, Navarre is concerned the learning curve of the job will delay progress. “I think that anyone who hasn’t been in the position before would tend to underestimate the job and responsibilities that go along with it,” he said. Navarre was first elected as mayor in 1996 and then again in 2011. He thinks with relationships he has built in his positions, he can best influence stakeholder and legislative-level decisions on the Alaska LNG Project. The project proposes Nikiski as the site for a liquefied natural gas plant and terminal. “It takes a long time to build relationships,” he said. “I’ve been living in the community consistently my whole life, except for college and a couple years I spent in Fairbanks. … So I have a lot of good, strong contacts that I built at the state level, at the national level.” In the mid-1970s Navarre said he quit college and went to Fairbanks with a plan of getting a job on the North Slope. Instead, See NAVARRE, page A-10

adult life split between the two states. However, his most recent attempt at landing a public office in Arizona has led some to questions about his authenticity

Tom Bearup has a long and complicated history of public and private sector work between Alaska and his native state of Arizona. During the course of this mayoral campaign, a number of questions have been raised about it. Here are some of the facts:

Running for Sheriff Bearup and his wife, Adele Bearup, were in Mexico working with orphans in 2012, when he decided to run for sheriff See HiSTORY, page A-11

Paid Advertisement

C

M

Y

K

as an Alaskan, Bearup said. “If you choose to live here, you should be an Alaskan,” he said. “If you have lived some place else and come here, you’re making that decision to come here and our time here has been about 15 years total.” It’s not the first time his residency qualifications have been questioned. He tried to run for Arizona House of Representatives in 1984, but hit a snag when it came to residency requirments. Arizona requires candidates for state legislature See BEARUP, page A-11


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.
Peninsula Clarion, September 28, 2014 by Sound Publishing - Issuu