News

In this July 8, 2021, photo, adjunct history professor and research associate Larry Larrichio holds a copy of a late 19th century photograph of pupils at an Indigenous boarding school in Santa Fe during an interview in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The U.S. Interior Department is expected to release a report Wednesday, May 11, 2022, that it says will begin to uncover the truth about the federal government’s past oversight of Native American boarding schools. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan, File)

Over 500 boarding school deaths found so far

The U.S. Interior Department released a report Wednesday on Native American boarding schools

  • May 11, 2022
  • By FELICIA FONSECA Associated Press
  • State News
In this July 8, 2021, photo, adjunct history professor and research associate Larry Larrichio holds a copy of a late 19th century photograph of pupils at an Indigenous boarding school in Santa Fe during an interview in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The U.S. Interior Department is expected to release a report Wednesday, May 11, 2022, that it says will begin to uncover the truth about the federal government’s past oversight of Native American boarding schools. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan, File)
Gubernatorial candidate Bill Walker stands in the Peninsula Clarion office on Friday, May 6, 2022 in Kenai, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)

‘We need to invest in ourselves’

Walker highlights infrastructure opportunities, centrist status in campaign visit to peninsula

Gubernatorial candidate Bill Walker stands in the Peninsula Clarion office on Friday, May 6, 2022 in Kenai, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
A landslide blocks Lowell Point Road in Seward, Alaska on Sunday, May 8, 2022. (City of Seward)

Blasting work to begin on Seward landslide

The Kenai Peninsula Borough will facilitate a town hall for Lowell Point residents Friday

A landslide blocks Lowell Point Road in Seward, Alaska on Sunday, May 8, 2022. (City of Seward)
A wildfire burns near Milepost 46.5 of the Sterling Highway on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, near Cooper Landing, Alaska. (Photo courtesy Cooper Landing Emergency Services)

Mop-up efforts continue at Cooper Landing fire

The fire was first reported on Tuesday evening

A wildfire burns near Milepost 46.5 of the Sterling Highway on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, near Cooper Landing, Alaska. (Photo courtesy Cooper Landing Emergency Services)
Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Sen. Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, and Senate Finance Committee Co-chair Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, speak with Sen. Lyman Hoffman, D-Bethel, during an all-day debate on the state’s budget on the floor of the Alaska State Senate on Tuesday, May 9, 2022.

Senate OKs budget with $5,600 payments to Alaskans

Senators add nearly $1 billion in amendments

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Sen. Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, and Senate Finance Committee Co-chair Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, speak with Sen. Lyman Hoffman, D-Bethel, during an all-day debate on the state’s budget on the floor of the Alaska State Senate on Tuesday, May 9, 2022.
Kenai Peninsula College Kenai River Campus valedictorian Sophia Nelson speaks at her virtual class graduation on Thursday, May 5, 2022. (Screenshot)

KPC graduates look to future

Students awarded diplomas in virtual ceremony

Kenai Peninsula College Kenai River Campus valedictorian Sophia Nelson speaks at her virtual class graduation on Thursday, May 5, 2022. (Screenshot)
Demonstrators in support of abortion rights stand at the intersection of the Kenai and Sterling highways on Saturday, May 7, 2022, in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Erin Thompson/Peninsula Clarion)

Locals rally for abortion rights

A leaked draft opinion signaled the Supreme Court’s intent to overturn Roe v. Wade

Demonstrators in support of abortion rights stand at the intersection of the Kenai and Sterling highways on Saturday, May 7, 2022, in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Erin Thompson/Peninsula Clarion)
Friends of Alaska National Wildlife Refuge Vice President and Outreach Chair Poppy Benson collects litter from the side of the highway at the refuge in Soldotna, Alaska on Friday, April 30, 2021. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)

Spring cleanups sweep across area

Events are taking place this month

Friends of Alaska National Wildlife Refuge Vice President and Outreach Chair Poppy Benson collects litter from the side of the highway at the refuge in Soldotna, Alaska on Friday, April 30, 2021. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)
A wildfire burns near Milepost 46.5 of the Sterling Highway on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, near Cooper Landing, Alaska. (Photo courtesy Cooper Landing Emergency Services)

Emergency services responding to wildfire near Cooper Landing

The fire is located at Milepost 46.5 of the Sterling Highway

A wildfire burns near Milepost 46.5 of the Sterling Highway on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, near Cooper Landing, Alaska. (Photo courtesy Cooper Landing Emergency Services)
A recent photo of Anesha “Duffy” Murnane, missing since Oct. 17, 2019, in Homer, Alaska. (Photo provided, Homer Police Department)

Police arrest man in murder, kidnapping of Anesha “Duffy” Murnane

Ogden, Utah, man knew Murnane when he lived in Homer in 2019

A recent photo of Anesha “Duffy” Murnane, missing since Oct. 17, 2019, in Homer, Alaska. (Photo provided, Homer Police Department)
A member of the Gannet Glacier Type 2 Initial Attack Crew uses a drip torch during a burnout operation at the Swan Lake Fire on June 18, 2019. (Photo courtesy Alaska Division of Forestry)

Wind, dry conditions trigger burn suspension

Burns of all sizes requiring permits are prohibited, including burn barrels, lawn burning and brush piles

A member of the Gannet Glacier Type 2 Initial Attack Crew uses a drip torch during a burnout operation at the Swan Lake Fire on June 18, 2019. (Photo courtesy Alaska Division of Forestry)
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy speaks at the Soldotna Senior Center with Executive Director Loretta Knudson-Spalding on Friday, May 6, 2022. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)

Dunleavy drops in for senior center celebration

The center celebrated the purchase of two new Meals on Wheels vehicles

Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy speaks at the Soldotna Senior Center with Executive Director Loretta Knudson-Spalding on Friday, May 6, 2022. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)
A landslide blocks Lowell Point Road in Seward, Alaska on Sunday, May 8, 2022. (City of Seward)

Cleanup underway for 300-foot-wide Seward landslide

The slide buried a large part of Lowell Point Road along Resurrection Bay

A landslide blocks Lowell Point Road in Seward, Alaska on Sunday, May 8, 2022. (City of Seward)
President Jimmy Carter holds up the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which declared 104 million acres in Alaska as national parks, wildlife refuges and other conservation categories, after signing it into law at a ceremony at the White House in Washington, on Dec. 2, 1980. Carter on Monday, May 9, 2022, took the unusual step of weighing in on a court case involving his landmark conservation act and a remote refuge in Alaska. Carter filed a amicus brief in the longstanding legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the refuge, worried that the latest decision to allow a gravel road to provide residents access to an all-weather airport for medical evacuations goes beyond this one case and could allow millions of acres (hectares) to be opened for “adverse development.” (AP Photo, File)

Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

Carter filed an amicus brief in the long-standing legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the refuge

  • May 9, 2022
  • By MARK THIESSEN Associated Press
  • State News
President Jimmy Carter holds up the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which declared 104 million acres in Alaska as national parks, wildlife refuges and other conservation categories, after signing it into law at a ceremony at the White House in Washington, on Dec. 2, 1980. Carter on Monday, May 9, 2022, took the unusual step of weighing in on a court case involving his landmark conservation act and a remote refuge in Alaska. Carter filed a amicus brief in the longstanding legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the refuge, worried that the latest decision to allow a gravel road to provide residents access to an all-weather airport for medical evacuations goes beyond this one case and could allow millions of acres (hectares) to be opened for “adverse development.” (AP Photo, File)
Christina Burns, librarian for the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District, packs food for the day at her home in Anchorage, Alaska, around 4 a.m. on Tuesday, May 3, 2022. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)

‘Starved for new listings’

Low inventory, local landscape fuel housing crisis in Seward

Christina Burns, librarian for the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District, packs food for the day at her home in Anchorage, Alaska, around 4 a.m. on Tuesday, May 3, 2022. (Camille Botello/Peninsula Clarion)
Courtesy photo / Dasha Pearson Dasha Pearson, second from right, with her sister Natalia Dontsova, center, and father Alexander Dontsov, second from right, in Seattle on March 8, 2022. Pearson’s family fled Ukraine when the war started, and now they and other displaced Ukrainians are trying to find a home in Alaska.

Fleeing war, Ukrainians are finding a home in Alaska

Many have family, others just can’t go home

Courtesy photo / Dasha Pearson Dasha Pearson, second from right, with her sister Natalia Dontsova, center, and father Alexander Dontsov, second from right, in Seattle on March 8, 2022. Pearson’s family fled Ukraine when the war started, and now they and other displaced Ukrainians are trying to find a home in Alaska.
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks during a Tribal Nations Summit during Native American Heritage Month, in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus, on Nov. 15, 2021, in Washington. Haaland on Thursday, May 5, 2022, announced the members of a commission that will craft recommendations on how the federal government can better tackle unsolved cases in which Native Americans and Alaska Natives have gone missing or have been killed. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

US panel to focus on Native American missing, slain cases

The panel includes members with diverse experiences and backgrounds

  • May 6, 2022
  • By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN and FELICIA FONSECA Associated Press
  • State News
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks during a Tribal Nations Summit during Native American Heritage Month, in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus, on Nov. 15, 2021, in Washington. Haaland on Thursday, May 5, 2022, announced the members of a commission that will craft recommendations on how the federal government can better tackle unsolved cases in which Native Americans and Alaska Natives have gone missing or have been killed. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
Peter Segall / Juneau Empire State Sen. Josh Revak, R-Anchorage, sat down with the Empire in Juneau on Friday to discuss his bid for Alaska’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Revak was personally close with the late Don Young, and has earned the endorsement of Young’s widow.

Revak runs to replace Rep. Young

State senator wants to follow in Young’s footsteps.

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire State Sen. Josh Revak, R-Anchorage, sat down with the Empire in Juneau on Friday to discuss his bid for Alaska’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Revak was personally close with the late Don Young, and has earned the endorsement of Young’s widow.
Anne Sears, the new lead investigator for the federally-funded Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative, speaks during the annual rally at the Alaska State Capitol on May 5, 2022. (Michael S. Lockett / Juneau Empire)

Hundreds gather for missing and murdered Indigenous people

More and more attention is being paid nationwide to the staggering violence rates.

Anne Sears, the new lead investigator for the federally-funded Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative, speaks during the annual rally at the Alaska State Capitol on May 5, 2022. (Michael S. Lockett / Juneau Empire)
In this Oct. 1, 2017, photo, North America’s tallest peak, Denali, is seen from a turnout in Denali State Park, Alaska. National park rangers in Alaska on Friday, May 6, 2022, resumed an aerial search for the year’s first registered climber on North America’s tallest peak after he didn’t check in with a friend. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer, File)

Rangers locate climber’s body on Alaska’s Denali

Rimml began his climb April 27 from the Kahiltna Glacier base camp at 7,200 feet, officials said.

  • May 6, 2022
  • By MARK THIESSEN Associated Press
  • State News
In this Oct. 1, 2017, photo, North America’s tallest peak, Denali, is seen from a turnout in Denali State Park, Alaska. National park rangers in Alaska on Friday, May 6, 2022, resumed an aerial search for the year’s first registered climber on North America’s tallest peak after he didn’t check in with a friend. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer, File)