Boat Parade
Dear Editor: I just wanted to thank all the mariners so much for their gift to us in this challenging year. All their hard work, imagination and whimsy brought me great joy while watching the light and magic show pass by town.
Wishing everyone a well-deserved, better 2021!
Rebecca Osborn, Sitka
Masks and Freedom
Dear Editor: I just came from a major grocery store. Customers and employees were wandering and/or standing around without protective masks. This caused a hazard to me and a liability to the store. The city also has a liability, since the Assembly has not made masks mandatory. Allowing some citizens to carelessly expose other citizens to a disease is much like allowing some citizens to drive without insurance or brakes.
Perhaps a better analogy is a person who does not keep his dog on a leash, resulting in a neighbor getting bitten. Let’s keep the COVID virus on a leash.
Those who argue that a mask mandate infringes on Constitutional freedoms, do not know the history or philosophy of freedom, as understood by the Founders.
The Founders thought that my freedom ends at the boundary of your freedom. I am not free to willfully spread a disease to you, an act that severely infringes on your freedom. Such an act is an assault. The founders studied John Locke, a British thinker who explored the political history of freedom. Locke’s conclusion was that freedom is social.
The greater good for society is the greater source of freedom. Individual freedom is protected by law to the degree that it does not endanger the freedom of others. A mask mandate goes far to protect our freedom from COVID 19 and to protect us from those who would submit the greater good to selfishness.
John Welsh, Sitka
Cooking for a Cause
Dear Editor: Filling a neighbor’s freezer is a cherished tradition for many Alaskans. The Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association and the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust recently hosted our first virtual fundraiser event, Alaskans Own Cooking for a Cause, with the twin goals of supporting our local fishermen while ensuring that all Alaskans have access to healthy seafood during challenging times.
Thanks to the support of donors, partners, funders and generous Sitkans, the Cooking for a Cause event reached all our fundraising goals. Thank you, Sitka! At this virtual event, guests enjoyed a home-cooked, gourmet meal prepared with virtual instructions given by Chef Colette of Ludvig’s Bistro. Big congratulations to Connor Dunlap who was the prize winner of the photo contest, winning a $50 gift certificate to Ludvig’s Bistro.
All proceeds from the Cooking for a Cause event went to ALFA and ASFT’s seafood donation program. So far in 2020, the seafood donation program has provided over 533,000 donated seafood meals (or 302,000 pounds of seafood) to more than 100,000 families facing food insecurity throughout Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.
ALFA and ASFT would like to thank the many sponsors who made this event such a success.
Huge thanks to Colette Nelson and the family of Ludvig’s Bistro for providing a virtual cooking class that helped all participants create a savory and delicious meal. Thank you to filmmakers Aaron and Karin Minks and Hannah Guggeneheim. Thanks also to film editor Ben Gordon and the talented musicians who provided entertainment for the dinner, John Petraborg, Stephanie Patton and Peter Apathy.
The list would be incomplete without thanking our stellar volunteers Emmy Garish and Sarah Rasmussen and staff members Danya Ortega and Allie Martin who helped package boxes. And of course, thank you to all of our local media – KCAW, KIFW, The Sitka Sentinel, and Sitka Soup. This event could not have happened without you!
An immense thank you goes to our outgoing ALFA/ASFT Summer Fellow/Outreach Coordinator, Lauren Mitchell, who was an integral part in making this event a success. Thank you so much, Lauren!
A huge thank you to our corporate sponsors, including: Alaska Pure Sea Salt, NSRAA, Current Navigation, Pizza Express, Skookum Canvasworks, The Work and Rugged Gear Store, Wintersong Soap Company, Galanin & Klein, Old Harbor Books, AKO Farms, Spenard Builders Supply, AC Lakeside, Christine Harrington CPA, Orion Sporting Goods, Highliner Coffee, Cleo Brylinsky, Artists Cove Gallery and Alaskans Own.
The donated seafood from the seafood donation program was sourced from a variety of Alaska-based fishermen and suppliers, including Seafood Producers Cooperative and Sitka Sound Seafoods in Sitka, and Northline Seafoods in Bristol Bay. The seafood donations were made possible by funding from Catch Together, Multiplier, The Alaska Community Foundation and affiliate Sitka Legacy Fund, First Bank of Alaska, Hames Corporation and Market Center, Sealaska, Silver Bay Seafoods and a host of additional individual and business donors.
This program would not be possible without our many partners including the Sitka Mutual Aid, the Wave Foundation, Chignik Intertribal Coalition, and the Armed Services YMCA of Alaska along with several local volunteers.
With the waitlist for food assistance growing this winter and the ongoing economic impacts of COVID-19, we will be continuing our Alaskans Own Seafood Donation Program and Cooking for a Cause fundraiser into 2021. You can learn more about the seafood donation program here: http://www.thealaskatrust.org/seafood-donation-program and Alaskans Own Seafood here: www.alaskansown.com. Please call 907-747-3400 with any questions.
Thank you so much to all the fishermen, donors, sponsors and community members who made this fundraiser possible and who continue the Alaska tradition of filling the freezer of our neighbors. If you or loved ones are facing food insecurity, please call 747-7509 for more information on how to sign up for the weekly ALFA/ASFT Sitka seafood donation program.
In gratitude,
Linda Behnken,
ALFA Executive Director
Willow Moore,
ASFT Executive Director
Natalie Sattler,
Alaskans Own Program Director
The Big Rock
Dear Editor: On Dec. 7 I had a severe attack of happy nostalgia and just had to write in the Sentinel about The Big Rock on Lincoln St. and its symbolism. And I made a mistake.
I was wrong when I stated “So little is known.”
Sitka is blessed with – among many things – truly awesome histories. On signs. All over the place. Most of them I have not read. Yet.
My goal for the last week of this miserable 2020 is to locate and read every sign from the tip of the Sitka National Historic Park to the end of Lincoln Street, starting on The Big Rock.
Wonder what I’ll learn? Warm memories of the best holidays, dear Sitkans.
Nancy Yaw Davis, Sitka
