JUNEAU -- After shining a light on the dire condition of facilities at Mt. Edgecumbe High School, legislators are advancing a measure that would make the state-run boarding school eligible for the same state grants for building maintenance and...
An Anchorage doctor and his wife have put almost $1.3 million of their own money into his campaign for Alaska governor, an extraordinary act that puts him atop early fundraising totals in figures published this week by the Alaska Public Offices Commission. With more than $1 million remaining in the bank after early spending, Republican […]
Dozens of demonstrators rallied at the Alaska State Capitol on Wednesday ahead of Alaska Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan’s annual address to the legislature, criticizing the senator for supporting the Trump administration over Alaskans and Alaskan values. “We do not consent!” The crowd cheered together, waving signs with messages like “Unmask ICE,” referring to the […]
Lawmakers held a series of hearings with officials from Mt. Edgecumbe High School, the largest state-run boarding school in Alaska, following a tumultuous year of budget and staff cuts, administration changes and a wave of student disenrollments. Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka opened his remarks at a Feb 12 Senate Finance Committee hearing saying lawmakers need […]
As oil giant ConocoPhillips forges ahead with construction of one of Alaska’s largest oil fields in decades, a new battle is emerging over a deal to protect a nearby caribou herd from the development. After approving the Willow project three years ago, the Biden administration quietly signed an agreement with the nearby Iñupiaq village of […]
Alaska’s legally required campaign ad disclaimers do not violate the First Amendment, the state supreme court ruled Friday, deciding a six-year-old dispute between the Alaska Policy Forum and state campaign regulators. Justice Dario Borghesan wrote the 61-page decision on behalf of the court, which ruled unanimously and upheld minor fines against APF that were issued […]
Conservation organizations and an Iñupiat group have filed legal challenges to the Trump administration’s renewed push for oil and gas development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and an …
This story was originally published by ProPublica. When county clerk Brianna Lennon got an email in November saying a newly expanded federal system had flagged 74 people on the county’s voter roll as potential noncitizens, she was taken aback. Lennon, who’d run elections in Boone County, Missouri, for seven years, had heard the tool might […]
The state’s proposal for a highway safety project southeast of Anchorage threatens one of the region’s premier and irreplaceable trails. For those unfamiliar with the project, the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities wants to build a 20-mile-long, four-lane highway from Rabbit Creek to Bird Flats, to purportedly make the highway safer. What especially […]
At the Alaska Beacon, we’re constantly trying to figure out where we should put our attention. There’s always more news than there are people to report it. Every Thursday, the Alaska Legislature publishes its committee schedule for the coming week. Public notices alert us to meetings and events. The governor’s office occasionally lets us know […]
Lawmakers put tough questions to officials with the Office of Children’s Services in early February, following a state audit of a 2018 law and legislative reform effort to improve the state’s handling of foster care found that it “did not effectively increase services for Alaskan children.” “I’m frustrated,” said Rep. Justin Ruffridge, R-Soldotna and member […]
Federal fishery managers have approved the first-ever mandatory caps on at-sea interception of chum salmon, a fish species critical to Indigenous communities along Alaska’s river systems. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council on Wednesday voted in favor of new limits for the pollock fleet to reduce the amount of chum salmon accidentally caught in trawl […]
A fast-moving forum in Juneau on Wednesday hosted 10 of Alaska’s 12 Republican candidates for governor, but the size of the field in the hourlong event meant there was more flavor than meat in the soup du jour. All but two of the candidates effusively praised incumbent President Donald Trump, but despite that support, most […]
The U.S. House of Representatives voted 219-211 on Wednesday to end President Donald Trump’s national emergency at the Canadian border and end tariffs on Canadian imports. House Joint Resolution 72 goes to the Senate, where lawmakers have already approved a separate measure that sought to end the markup on Canadian goods. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski […]
The Alaska Legislature on Wednesday approved a 30-day extension for the state of disaster covering the fall 2025 storms that battered the state’s west coast. The extension allows the state to continue spending money from its disaster response fund as it continues cleanup and repair efforts from two storms in October. Hundreds of Alaskans were […]
It may be the most enduring love story in the shorebird world, two birds coming together from different parts of the hemisphere. Hudsonian Whimbrels are famously faithful, often mating for life and returning each May and June to the same stretch of Arctic tundra to breed. Their courtships begin in the air. Males launch into […]
In her annual speech, Alaska’s chief justice of the Supreme Court told lawmakers the state is making significant progress on the court’s backlog of criminal cases, but there is more work to be done. Susan Carney gave the annual State of the Judiciary address to members of the Legislature on Monday. She is now in […]
Alaska public school students would be required to learn hands-only CPR under a proposal advancing through the state legislature. In a 19-0 vote on Wednesday, the Alaska Senate approved Senate Bill 20, which requires the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development to “adopt curricula to instruct public school students on hands-only cardiopulmonary resuscitation.” Conventional […]
Students and school officials from across Alaska visited the Legislature — from the North Slope, to the Yukon Flats, to Yakutat and Hoonah — to make what has become an annual plea to lawmakers to invest in the state’s public education. “I have been in this building every February for 20 years, and for 20 […]
Fifteen Democratic-led states have dropped a six-year-old lawsuit challenging the legality of a federal plan that allowed oil and gas drilling in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The states announced their plans in a notice filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska, where the […]