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P E N I N S U L A
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2014 Kenai Peninsula, Alaska
Vol. 45, Issue 41
50 cents newsstands daily/$1.00 Sunday
Not going to waste
Question Are you ready for some snow? n Yes, winter is no fun without it. n No, I’m enjoying this mild weather. 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.
Electronics collected for recycling By BEN BOETTGER Peninsula Clarion
In the news
dock price for their fish, with prices set about six months in advance to provide more stability, as well. In exchange, they’re expected to pressure bleed salmon, keep the fish on ice and meet other production standards intended to ensure a high quality product. Initially the program started with salmon, but now customers can purchase eight species. Sitka Salmon Share’s fish is processed in state before it’s shipped Outside. In each of the communities where the fish is delivered, customers receive their shipments at home. Mink said that end of the operation is kept efficient, and it costs about 60 cents to 70 cents per pound to deliver the fish. In addition to getting fish, customers can see photos and videos of the boats catching them. Mink and his partners also work to educate them about how Alaska’s fisheries work when sometimes the catch is unpredictable and “nature is
16 volunteers from nonprofit recycling advocate ReGroup spent this Saturday at Soldotna’s Central Peninsula Landfill for ReGroup’s 7th annual electronics recycling drive. Jan Wallace, secretary of ReGroup and organizer of the drive, said that 125 local households, as well as six businesses and government agencies and three non-profits, brought nonfunctioning electronic devices, also known as e-waste, to be recycled. “We had 120 monitors, a substantial number of computer towers, laptops, cell-phones, and quite a few microwave ovens,” said Wallace. According to Total Reclaim Environmental Services, the recycling company that will process ReGroup’s shipment of e-waste, most of the material extracted from e-waste is returned to manufacturers to be reused for its original purpose. Before this happens, the material will pass through many hands. Wallace said that ReGroup has been careful in ensuring that these hands will be responsible ones. ReGroup chose to work with Total Reclaim because of their e-steward certification, given by the waste-management watchdog group Basel Action Network. Named after the Basel Convention, a 1989 treaty signed in the Swiss city of Basel to control international hazardous waste trafficking, the Basel Action Network gives this certification to recyclers who meet standards of safety and environmental responsibility. Total Reclaim is Alaska’s only e-Steward certified recycler.
See MARKET, page A-10
See RECYCLE, page A-10
Murkowski seeks another look into guard probe
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JUNEAU (AP) — U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski is asking the Department of Defense inspector general to re-examine the evidence and conclusions it reached in investigating the Alaska National Guard. In 2013, Murkowski requested an investigation into allegations of misconduct within the guard. The inspector general notified her in May that the allegations could not be substantiated and later released a heavily redacted report. But in a letter to the inspector general Friday, Murkowski said it seems highly irregular that that inquiry and another by the National Guard Bureau’s Office of Complex Investigations would reach such different conclusions. The guard bureau found victims did not trust the system because they lacked confidence in the command. Murkowski asked the IG to examine the rigor of its investigation and release an unredacted version of its report.
Inside Peter Kassig ‘lost his life as a result of his love for the Syrian people and his desire to ease their suffering. We will work every day to keep his legacy alive as best we can.’ ... See page A-5
Keeping vigil
Soldotna resident Colleen O’Connell kneels down next to her granddaughter, Colbie Broyles, 3, during a candlelight vigil Thursday at Farnsworth Park in Soldotna. The vigil, attended by nearly 100 people, was to raise awareness for homeless youth.
Fishermen hands-on with marketing Efforts find sales opportunities in niche markets across U.S. By MOLLY DISCHNER Morris News Service-Alaska/ Alaska Journal of Commerce
From Sitka to Kodiak, small, independent commercial fishermen are taking an increasingly hands-on role in marketing their own fish. Rhonda Hubbard and her husband Jim of Seward started selling and processing their own fish more than two decades ago. Since then, she’s seen more fishermen do the same. Hubbard said that the markets many of those fishermen reach, like farmers’ markets in the Lower 48 and other small sales opportunities, are niches that traditional processors often can’t fill. “There’s a lot of people that would like to get better access to good quality seafood,” Hubbard said. Direct marketing is one way to eliminate much of the separation between people who eat fish and people who catch fish. It can be challenging, though;
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‘I think that there’s a tremendous amount of growth that I see in this type of marketplace, and I only think that more and more fishermen are going to enter into these types of relationships.’ — Nic Mink, founder, Sitka Salmon Shares Hubbard said she wears many hats to make her business work, and the regulatory process can be cumbersome. Now, community supported fishery programs that provide a link between catcher and consumer are on the rise, offering many of the benefits of direct marketing, without requiring that all fishermen also act as businessmen. Nic Mink founded Sitka Salmon Shares, a Southeast community support fishery, or CSF, after living and working in Sitka. He works at Butler University, and teaches about sustainable food systems.
While living in Stika, he saw the opportunity to develop a new market for the salmon, and other fish, being landed there. “This became a theory-meetspractice kind of project,” he said. Sitka Salmon Shares supplies Midwest consumers with wild Alaska fish. Fishermen receive a premium, and customers gain access to better fish than is typically available in local supermarkets, Mink said. Sitka Salmon Shares has about eight fishermen who regularly deliver catch, and another three or four who do so less often, Mink said. They’re paid well above
Prison program offers skills for outside success By CINTHIA RITCHIE Morris News Service-Alaska/ Chugiak-Eagle River Star
Index
Photo by Dan Balmer/Peninsula Clarion
The classroom at Hiland Mountain Correctional Center was serene and airy with silver-soft light filtering across the room. Bright nature murals sprawl across the walls and large windows overlook a treefilled courtyard. Suddenly, women shuffled in, a dozen sneakered feet, a dozen yellow-orange pants and loose shirts with HMCC stamped across the back in bold, black letters. The women were Hiland inmates attending workshop sessions as part of the Success Inside & Out agenda. In its ninth year, the program highlights tips and coping strategies for pre-release inmates, offering panels and classes in such areas as probation tips, educational horizons, child custody and re-
entry support. Hands down, the most popular event was the fashion show, which offered do’s and don’ts for prospective job seekers. Six inmate models walked the runway in everything from a too-short and too-tight skirt (a definite no) to a sleekly cut skirt and matching jacket (yes, please). Yet it was the workshops, not the runway, that offered life-changing skills and potentials. Kathleen Madden facilitated “Inspire Yourself to Action in Your New Life,” a hands-on class prodding inmates to ask a few hard, and honest, questions: Where do they want to be in five years and, more importantly, who do they want to be? Ann Severson needed inspiration. She’s slated for release soon and needs something to keep her going, to keep her strong.
mous meetings. Casonya Cuevas was looking for meaning. “I want to actually be able to say that I have lived, and not merely existed,” she said.
Voices of experience
AP Photo/Chugiak Eagle River Star, Cinthia Ritchie
In this photo taken Oct. 25, Hiland Mountain Correctional Center inmates listen as former inmates offer tips for transitioning out of prison life.
“It’s hard to say no,” she to finish college, find a way to said. support a family and continue Michelle Schmidt wanted attending Narcotics AnonyC
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Powerful stories were told in “Probation Tips for Success,” an afternoon panel that featured former Hiland inmates Dana Hilbish and Rachel Burkhart, along with Lana Grist of the Department of Corrections Division of Probation and Parole. Hilbish and Burkhart both stressed that the transition from prison to outside life was far from easy. Hilbish, who served 21 years for murder and tampering with evidence, was released last January. The only thing keeping her back out of prison, she said, is her sobriety. See SKILLS, page A-10