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Vol. 49, Issue 188
In the news Man dies while water-skipping over opening in ice NOME — A western Alaska man died after attempting to skip his snowmobile over open water. Alaska State Troopers say 27-year-old Travis Fagerstrom of Golovin died Sunday night in water outside the coast village. Troopers say Fagerstrom, accompanied by friends, had been using his snowmobile to water skip across a 30-foot opening in ice when he fell through. Searchers responded to the area by boat. They found his body with drag hooks at noon Monday and pulled it from the water. Golovin is on the Seward Peninsula about 70 miles east of Nome. The village is on Golovin Bay, which opens to Norton Sound.
Grand jury indicts Anchorage man in 2018 child’s death ANCHORAGE — A 32-year-old Anchorage man has been indicted in the death of a child in his care 11 months ago. Anchorage police say Richard Vickery was indicted on counts of second-degree murder, manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide. Police on June 12 took a call of a child choking at an east Anchorage home. Responding officers administered CPR to the 6-year-old boy until medics arrived. The boy was transported to a hospital, where he died two days later. Homicide detectives investigated and determined the cause of death to be suspicious. An Anchorage grand jury indicted Vickery on Friday. He turned himself in to police on Monday. His attorney, Wallace Tetlow, did not immediately respond to a phone message left before office hours Wednesday. — Associated Press
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School district contract negotiations stalled Spring Creek inmates riot over early cell check
By VICTORIA PETERSEN Peninsula Clarion
School district employees rejected contract proposals from the Kenai Peninsula Borough District Wednesday evening, following an all-day contract negotiation. “We rejected proposals because they don’t meet our needs for the rising cost of health care,” David Brighton, president of the Kenai Peninsula Education Association, said. Brighton said he felt that progress toward an agreement was made. Pegge Erkeneff, communications liaison for the district, said there will be another bargaining session at 10 a.m. on Monday. For the last year, contract negotiations between the school district and two employee associations, Kenai Peninsula Education Association and Kenai Peninsula Support Association, which represent non-tenured teach-
By Brian Mazurek Peninsula Clarion
Kenai Peninsula Borough School District administration, members from the Kenai Peninsula Education Association and the Kenai Peninsula Education Support Association meet at a collective bargaining session to continue contract negotiations for employees who have been without contracts for a year, on Wednesday, in Soldotna. (Photo by Victoria Petersen/Peninsula Clarion)
ers and support personnel, have snagged on the rising cost of health care. A previous agreement effective through June 2018 remains in use for the employ-
ees without contracts. After months of negotiations, district and employee associations could not come to an agreement, so in February, an arbitrator held a hear-
ing to help guide contract negotiations. At the Wednesday meeting, the school district offered a proposal for each employee See STALL, page A2
House panel votes Barr in contempt By MARY CLARE JALONICK, LISA MASCARO and JONATHAN LEMIRE Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The House Judiciary Committee voted Wednesday to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt of Congress, escalating the Democrats’ extraordinary legal battle with the Trump administration over access to special counsel Robert Mueller’s Trump-Russia report. The vote capped a day of ever-deepening dispute between congressional Democrats and President Donald Trump, who for the first time invoked the principle of executive privilege, claiming the right to block lawmakers
House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler, DN.Y., moves ahead with a vote to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt of Congress, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Committee Chairman Jerfrom the full report on Mueller’s probe of Russian inter- rold Nadler of New York deference to help Trump in the clared the action by Trump’s Justice Department a clear 2016 election.
new sign of the president’s “blanket defiance” of Congress’ constitutional rights to conduct oversight. “We did not relish doing this, but we have no choice,” Nadler said after the vote. The White House’s blockade, he said, “is an attack on the ability of the American people to know what the executive branch is doing.” He said, “This cannot be.” But Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said it was disappointing that members of Congress “have chosen to engage in such inappropriate political theatrics.” Barr made “extraordinary efforts” to provide Congress and the public with informaSee BARR, page A3
Officers at Spring Creek Correctional Center in Seward have regained control after 62 prisoners barricaded entry to their housing unit and began destroying property, according to a press release from the Alaska Department of Corrections. Prisoners initially barricaded the Hotel Mod housing unit at 9 p.m. on Tuesday night, and correctional officers immediately locked down the facility. After accounting for the well-being of all staff and prisoners, Special Operations Response Teams from Kenai and Anchorage were deployed to the scene and arrived at around 3 a.m. Superintendent Shannon McCloud from Wildwood Correctional Facility in Kenai said on Wednesday that nine correctional officers from Wildwood were sent as part of the response team and have since returned to Kenai. “They were trained for these kinds of incidents and knew what to do and how to handle the situation,” McCloud said. The inmates were protesting an early cell inspection. They damaged fire suppressant systems, plumbing, computer lines and glass, corrections officials said. “Officials at the prison estimate the damage at roughly $100,000,” Corrections Department spokeswoman Sarah Gallagher said in an email response to questions. See RIOT, page A3
Soldotna advocate fights for Alzheimer’s awareness By Brian Mazurek Peninsula Clarion
A local Soldotna resident was honored as Advocate of the Year by the National Alzheimer’s Association during their annual forum last month in Washington, D.C. The annual forum brings together thousands of advocates from around the country to celebrate their activism in local communities. This year Cindy Harris of Soldotna was declared Advocate of the Year for her pivotal role in putting Alaska on the map when it comes to Alzheimer’s advocacy. Cindy Harris has spent
Cindy Harris, right, receives the Advocate of the Year Award from the Alzheimer’s Association during its annual forum in Washington, D.C. on April 1. (Photo courtesy of Cindy Harris)
more than four years as a volunteer advocate with the Alzheimer’s Association.
Even before that she was no stranger to Alzheimer’s and the impact that it has
House passes bill, partially repeals SB 91 By Alex McCarthy Juneau Empire
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The Alaska House of Representatives voted Wednesday to repeal and replace parts of Senate Bill 91, the controversial criminal justice legislation that some have pointed to as gasoline on the fire of the state’s current crime wave. The House Judiciary
Committee, chaired by Rep. Matt Claman, DAnchorage, presented the bill basically as a compromise of many of Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s proposed criminal justice bills. Rep. Tammie Wilson, R-North Pole, said on the House floor Wednesday that the bill increases sentencing ranges for many felony charges, imposes further protec-
tions regarding solicitation of minors and cracks down harder on drug dealers. At the same time, provisions in it are aimed to help people get back on their feet after struggling with substance abuse or being in prison. Claman, Rep. Tammie Wilson, R-North Pole, and other members of the See SB 91, page A3
on families and loved ones. Harris lost her mom to Alzheimer’s in 2014, and her aunts all suffered from the disease as well. “It’s been in my family since before it had a name,” Harris said. “So I’m trying to find a cure before it gets to me.” The death of Harris’ mom would end up being the catalyst for her activism in fighting the disease. What Harris quickly realized, however, was that she had to start from the ground up. Before Harris reached out to the Alzheimer’s Association in 2014, Alaska did not have much of a presence in the organization, she said. During her
first year of volunteering, Harris organized the first local event for The Longest Day, which is a worldwide fundraising initiative from the Alzheimer’s Association that takes place every year on the summer solstice. The first year consisted of Harris and a couple other volunteers grilling hot dogs and handing out informational packets at Soldotna Creek Park. A year later, Harris got in touch with the organizers of the annual Golf Fore a Cure tournament that takes place at Birch Ridge golf course, and the two events have been combined ever See FIGHT, page A2
Alaska Senate passes “skinny” capital budget JUNEAU (AP) — The Alaska Senate has passed what a key lawmaker calls a skinny capital budget that largely leverages federal dollars for infrastructure and water projects. The total package, which includes some supplemental spending items for the current budget year, totals about $1.4 billion. The vast majority of that is federal money. The measure includes about $70 million for de-
ferred maintenance, $3 million for current-year costs due to nursing shortages within the Department of Corrections and $2.5 million for a south Denali visitor center. It also allows the Alaska Gasline Development Authority to accept up to $25 million in third-party funds for ongoing work on a federal review of that project. The bill passed unanimously and next goes to the House.