Citing improper arguments by the prosecution, the Alaska Court of Appeals on Friday overturned the murder conviction of a 25-year-old Ketchikan man who was found guilty about five-and-a-half years ago.

In January 2012, then-19-year-old Devin Rossiter was convicted of second-degree murder for the March 2011 stabbing death of 45-year-old Nick Stachelrodt.

Rossiter never denied stabbing Stachelrodt. He claimed during his jury trial that he acted in self-defense after Stachelrodt confronted him at the Vallenar View Trailer Park.

On the evening of March 12, 2011, then-18-year-old Rossiter had been drinking with friends at a residence in the trailer park. He wanted a cigarette, and went door-to-door asking for one. One of the doors Rossiter knocked on belonged to John and Mary Stachelrodt, the victims’ parents.

John Stachelrodt told the teen “no,” and went back inside. Soon after, the prosecution said, Nick Stachelrodt arrived at the home and found the teen going through his parents’ car. According to court records, Stachelrodt grabbed Rossiter to talk to him and remove him from the vehicle, and that’s when Rossiter stabbed Stachelrodt.

According to KRBD’s 2012 coverage of the trial, defense attorney Sam McQuerry told the jury that Rossiter feared for his life, and believed he might be raped, killed or kidnapped. The defense argued that Rossiter should be convicted of manslaughter, rather than murder.

The prosecutor, James Scott, repeatedly told the jury in his closing statements that the only way the jury could find Rossiter not guilty of murder is if they believed Stachelrodt deserved to die. A PowerPoint presentation included slides that also made that claim.

The jury deliberated for two days before returning with a guilty verdict.

In its order reversing the conviction, the Alaska Court of Appeals cited the prosecution’s closing arguments and PowerPoint presentation. The opinion states that both “grossly mischaracterized the law of self-defense.”

According to the opinion, a claim of self-defense means a jury must decide whether a defendant used deadly force as a reasonable response to an actual threat, or the reasonable belief that they are threatened. Whether the victim “deserved to die” should not be part of that decision, according to the court opinion.

The judge in the case was Superior Court Judge Trevor Stephens. The opinion states that even without an objection from the defense, the judge should have intervened when the prosecutor made those statements.

The appeals court also states that the prosecutor improperly argued that Rossiter’s claim of self-defense was a ruse made up by the defense attorney.

The appeals court states that the cumulative effects of the prosecution’s improper arguments undermined the fairness of Rossiter’s trial.

John Skidmore, director of the state’s Department of Law Criminal Division, said Monday that his office is reviewing the case to determine whether to re-try it. He said it is likely that the case will go to trial again. If that does take place, Rossiter will be eligible for bail.

Pink salmon are showing up in unexpected places around the Homer area.

Fish can be seen swimming through Beluga Slough in the middle of town, a saltwater marsh with no historical salmon returns.

Dead pinks litter the slough’s muddy banks at low tide and several fish are still swimming around.

Alaska Department of Fish and Game Area Management Biologist Glenn Hollowell said there have also been reports of fish in other systems around Homer and along the outer coast of the Kenai Peninsula.

“We’re seeing very large numbers of fish in a variety of places around Kachemak Bay. Some of the creeks at the back of Little Tutka Bay have really unusual numbers of pink salmon associated with them, as does Diamond Creek,” Hollowell said. “Seldovia Slough also has a lot of pink salmon in it right now.”

Pinks are a two-year fish and Hollowell thinks the large numbers of pinks showing up in odd places is merely a reflection of 2015’s record-breaking return.

Several reports came in that year of fish straying into small water systems that typically can’t support salmon.

“A lot of the smaller systems had just the right number, and if you combine that with the warm winter, which was pretty wet, those little systems were perfect incubators for pink salmon, and that’s what we’re seeing right now,” Hollowell said.

Hollowell said the mild winter likely allowed eggs in Beluga Slough to hatch the following spring, creating a small run in the marsh.

People can be seen gathering near the slough to take a look for themselves.

Emily Springer, who studies the fishing industry and is married to a commercial fisherman, grew up around Homer. She’s never seen anything like it.

Springer took her kids and a friend’s family to Diamond Creek a few miles outside of town just to watch the fish.

“I just thought it was really interesting, and I thought she’s a fisherman and she might think it was interesting too to bring her own kids down there and go check it out and just see how far up the creek these salmon had gotten,” Springer said. “They got all the way up to where the waterfall is.”

For those asking whether we will see another return in 2019 to Beluga Slough and other systems, Hollowell said it depends on the weather this winter.

“We might continue to see pink salmon in Beluga Slough if we see wet, warm winters,” he said. “However, if we get some bitterly cold winters, like is more than norm for this area, some of those fry and eggs might have a really tough time, and we might see this return drop back to historical levels where it’s essentially undetectable.”

There were no official counts of how many fish made it up the slough, but Hollowell estimates that about 2,000 pinks may have spawned there.

Fish and Game is taking samples of ear bones to find out if the pinks may be hatchery fish, but Hollowell doesn’t expect that to be the case. He said the 2015 return around Kachemak Bay was “overwhelmingly” comprised of wild fish.

The U.S. Senate passed an annual Defense bill Monday night that includes icebreakers and more missile interceptors, which Sen. Dan Sullivan championed. The bill does nothing to block President Trump’s effort to ban transgender people from the military, a ban Alaska Sullivan opposes.

Sullivan told reporters just before the vote that he’s been talking to the sponsor of a stand-alone bill to block the transgender ban. Sullivan, a Marine reservist, said what’s important is the training standards for recruits.

“We shouldn’t care what your sexual orientation(s) are, or any other element of who you are,” Sullivan said. “If you’re patriotic and you want to serve your country and you meet those high standards, then I believe you should be able to serve.”

The defense bill senators passed would allow as many as six new icebreakers and up to 20 additional ground-based missile interceptors at Fort Greely. The bill, though, doesn’t guarantee funding. Sullivan did not predict the likelihood that money for the ships and interceptors would be included in the annual appropriation bill.

University of Alaska officials are considering a 5 percent tuition increase in each of the next two academic years.

UA has seen its tuition steadily increase over the last several years, including a 5 percent increase last year.

Colby Freel chairs the Coalition of Student Leaders. He said increases like this have become an expectation for UA students, but that they understand the strain the state and university are under.

“We want our education here in Alaska, we want to receive the quality learning that we get, so we’re willing to pay for it,” Freel said.

The university has seen state funding decline by $61 million since 2014 and enrollment drop by 14 percent since 2011. Among the austerity measures, the university has cut about 50 academic programs and reduced faculty and staff by more than 900 positions.

The University of Alaska Board of Regents discussed the tuition increase during its meeting that wrapped Friday in Juneau. The board’s final vote on tuition is expected at its November meeting.

The board also discussed Strategic Pathways, the massive plan to restructure and save money amid ongoing budget uncertainty in Alaska.

UA President Jim Johnsen has spent the better part of the last year meeting with staff, faculty, students and community members to figure out what needs to happen to cut costs while maintaining quality.

“How do we serve the state effectively as our budgets are being cut by the state?” Johnsen asked at the meeting. “How do we step up in workforce development, how do we step up in research and economic development and diversification and building a culture of education in Alaska? How do we achieve those goals in this very challenging context?”

The final recommendations on Strategic Pathways will be presented to the board for a vote in November.

Regents also approved a $50,000 compensation bonus for Johnsen on top of his $325,000 base salary after evaluating his performance and approving his employment contract. Johnsen said the bonus will be donated back to the university through student development and cultural initiatives.

A local mine executive urged the Juneau Assembly to reconsider a resolution urging federal action on transboundary mining, and the Assembly did on Monday night.

The resolution would have urged the federal government to invoke a treaty to enforce protections for Alaska resources from upstream mines in British Columbia. Recently, the borough assemblies of Sitka and Ketchikan passed a similar resolution. In 2015, the Juneau Assembly did, too.

Heather Hardcastle of Salmon Beyond Borders said transboundary mining should be tackled at the highest levels between Ottawa and Washington.

“This by no means is an anti-mining resolution,” Hardcastle said. “This is a chance to get binding protections in place that only come about in an agreement between two nations.”

Juneau Deputy Mayor Jerry Nankervis put the brakes on the resolution.

“We were all on the Assembly provided a letter by a gentlemen in our community speaking to this resolution and what he believes to be inaccuracies in it,” Nankervis said. “And I am also concerned about the message we’re sending with this.”

The letter he referred to was an email from Mike Satre, an executive with Hecla Greens Creek Mine. The email urged the Assembly to work through Gov. Walker’s efforts on transboundary mine safety at the state and provincial levels rather than trying to invoke international treaties.

The Assembly pulled the resolution and sent it to its Committee of the Whole for reconsideration next month.

Hecla owns one mining site under exploration in British Columbia. It’s in a watershed that empties just south of the Alaska border. Greens Creek is one of Juneau’s biggest private employers.

The Alaska ferry Taku’s next life will be as a floating hotel.

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Portland-based KeyMar LLC made the winning bid of $300,000 for the 54-year-old ship.

Marine Highway System General Manager John Falvey said KeyMar beat out two other bidders, who wanted to scrap the ship.

“Their plan is to do some renovation on the Taku and turn it into a destination hotel and waterfront activities center,” Falvey said.

The competing companies offered $50,000 each. The bidding deadline was Sept. 15.

The Taku is tied up at Ketchikan’s Ward Cove. Falvey says it will be towed to Portland after the sale goes through and the new owner takes possession. That date has not been set.

Falvey said the ferry system has removed the Taku’s art and safety gear.

“Half a million dollars’ worth of equipment is being distributed to active ships in the fleet as needed, as we speak. And some of the equipment will be used for the two Alaska Class ferries,” Falvey said.

Those new, smaller ships are being built at the Ketchikan Shipyard.

State officials have been trying to sell the Taku since spring of this year. It was first priced at $1.5 million, then at $700,000.

The latest minimum price was not made public. Falvey said it was $350,000, more than the winning bid, but close enough.

The Taku was built in 1963. It was tied up in 2015 as the ferry system looked for ways to balance its budget.

Local elections like the one coming up on Oct. 3 in Fairbanks are notorious for drawing low voter turnout. But observers say this year’s city and borough elections may be different, because the two marijuana-related propositions on the ballots are likely to draw more voters to the polls in what observers say will likely be a close election.

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University of Alaska Fairbanks political science professor Amy Lovecraft believes the two ballot propositions that will ask voters to outlaw marijuana businesses in Fairbanks and the borough will fail. She said that’s because it’s not easy to reverse a law that’s been on the books for more than a year now.

“Once you have a law in place, even if it’s a poor law, it almost always is more difficult to get rid of it than it was to get it instated the first place,” Lovecraft said.

Jerry McBeath, a retired UAF political science professor, he sees it differently. McBeath predicts the groups pushing city Proposition A and borough Prop 1 will prevail. He said, as of Friday, they’d been more vocal and had conducted more events to promote their cause.

“Most of the events seem to be in the direction of asking people to vote yes,” McBeath said. “And I haven’t seen any notices about people on the other side – those recommending a vote no.”

But McBeath said if this election goes the way of most, that’s likely to change this week and next.

“What tends to happen in Fairbanks is during the last week of the election, we’re snowed under an (by) avalanche of last-minute publicity,” McBeath said.

McBeath said voters who support banning marijuana-related businesses are probably mainly social conservatives who generally are highly motivated and have an impressive history of organizing and getting their voters to the polls on election day.

“Given what is likely to be a low-turnout election, the most strongly organized and mobilized groups have an advantage,” McBeath said.

Lovecraft concedes that’s the conventional wisdom, but she says that’s mainly true for partisan elections with candidates or causes that are closely associated with either Republicans or Democrats.

“That’s what makes this particular election difficult,” Lovecraft said. “Because we’re not talking about a party or party competition. We’re talking about an issue.”

Lovecraft believes many conservatives, even those who are inclined ban commercial pot, will vote no once they realize that if the propositions pass, they will shut down more than 30 businesses, eliminating dozens of jobs and cutting off a source of tax revenues for Fairbanks and the borough.

“The marijuana economy is up and running in Fairbanks – and in the borough as a whole, but particularly in Fairbanks,” Lovecraft said.

Both McBeath and Lovecraft agree that turnout will be even more crucial than usual on Oct. 3 because local elections draw fewer voters than the larger statewide events. Fairbanks City Clerk Danyielle Snider said the 2016 election – which included a race for mayor, three council members and four ballot questions – drew only 16.5 percent of the electorate, down from just under 18 percent that turned out for the 2015 election.

“I think that we’ll have a better turnout this year but, y’know, it’s pretty sad,” Snider said.

Borough voters have done a bit better recently, with nearly 18 percent turning out last year and just over 25 percent in 2015. But borough Clerk Nanci Ashford-Bingham also thinks this year’s turnout will top the usual sparse showing at the polls, given the number of people who’ve been coming into the clerk’s office asking for in-person absentee ballots and other information.

“We’ve had such a steady stream right now that it’s an indication that it’ll be probably an above-average turnout for us,” Ashford-Bingham said.

In-person absentee voting began last week and as of Monday was also being offered at city clerks’ offices in Fairbanks and North Pole.

Editor’s note: Voters who live in the borough outside of the cities of Fairbanks and North Pole will get different ballots than those who live in those two incorporated cities. Fairbanks voters’ ballots will include uncontested candidates for two City Council seats. North Pole voters’ ballots will only list two candidates for a City Council seat. For more information, go the borough clerk’s Oct. 3, 2017 Regular Municipal Election page. 

Defenders of the Obama health care law are applying as much pressure as they can to get Sen. Lisa Murkowski to vote no on the latest attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and all eyes were on Murkowski at the Capitol Tuesday.

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Murkowski hasn’t announced how she’ll vote on the latest bill, known as Graham-Cassidy, but she was one of only three Republicans to vote against the last health care repeal bill, so she seems one of the most likely of her party to vote “no” again.

Another factor: Gov. Bill Walker just signed a letter asking Senate leaders to dump Graham-Cassidy. Reporters asked Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C) what he thought of that.

“I don’t know the governor of Alaska,” Graham said. “Here’s what I would tell him: If you think you don’t like this bill, just watch (what) you’re getting coming, pal.”

Graham said his bill would send money directly to the states, with a lot more flexibility. He predicts the Obama health care law will fail.

“Chaos is going to reign. So I tell the folks in Alaska, we trust you with the money better than we trust a bureaucrat,” Graham said. “I hope you’ll take us up on the offer and look at it and reconsider.”

Before any changes to existing law are made, Alaska must have a clear understanding of how the proposed changes impact Alaskans. pic.twitter.com/dwoEHYvU1S

— Governor Bill Walker (@AkGovBillWalker) September 19, 2017

One option Murkowski had faith in may be off the table. The chairman of the Senate health committee was working on a bipartisan bill to stabilize the insurance markets, but Tuesday he announced an impasse.

Graham’s bill would end the subsidies for buying insurance on the exchanges, and it would stop the enhanced federal match for Medicaid expansion. It also has a per person cap on federal Medicaid funds. Instead, the states would get block grants and flexibility to design their own programs, starting in 2020.

The Congressional Budget Office hasn’t scored the bill yet, but the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities has done its own analysis. The left-of-center think tank said the block grants in the bill would fall substantially short of what states get now. CBPP Senior fellow Aviva Aron-Dine said all the ACA repeal bills would hit Alaska especially hard, because they don’t take into account the high cost of health care in Alaska and they remove the funding for Medicaid expansion. She said Graham-Cassidy does much the same.

“Alaska is once again one of the most harmed states, one of the states that faces more than 35 percent cut in its federal funding, relative to current law, just in the block grant, and then is hit by the (Medicaid) per capita cap,” Avon-Dine said.

By her estimates Alaska would get $255 million less in 2026. The bill doesn’t continue the block grants beyond that, so Aron-Dine counts Alaska’s loss as $844 million in 2027.

That’s if the bill even comes up in the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell doesn’t sound certain.

“If we were going to act,” McConnell said, “We would have to act by Sept. 30.”

That’s the deadline for a process called “budget reconciliation.” After that, it will take 60 votes to pass a health care bill, and there are only 52 Republicans in the Senate.

Murkowski is telling reporters she wants to see how the bill would affect Alaska. She told NBC she’s open to voting for it if she’s convinced Alaska will not be disadvantaged. She said she still waiting for that data.

Sen. Dan Sullivan’s spokesman said Sullivan is still studying the bill, too.

Stories are posted on the APRN news page. You can subscribe to APRN’s newsfeeds via email, podcast and RSS. Follow us on Facebook at alaskapublic.org and on Twitter @aprn

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Murkowski could swing Senate for latest ACA repeal

Liz Ruskin, Alaska Public Media – Washington D.C.

Defenders of the Obama health care law are applying as much pressure as they can to get Sen. Murkowski to vote no on the latest attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act. All eyes were on her at the Capitol Tuesday.

Alaska sees 26 percent drop in health insurance rates

Associated Press

Some of the highest insurance rates in the nation just got a little bit cheaper. Premera Blue Cross Blue Shield is the sole provider for the Alaska individual health insurance market. It announced Tuesday that its rates will decrease 26.5 percent for 2018.

Transgender troops: Sullivan says let them serve

Liz Ruskin, Alaska Public Media – Washington D.C.

The U.S. Senate passed an annual Defense bill Monday night that includes icebreakers and more missile interceptors, which Sen. Dan Sullivan championed. The bill does nothing to block President Trump’s effort to ban transgender people from the military, a ban Sullivan opposes.

Walker administration appoints climate adviser, promises new policy “soon”

Rachel Waldholz, Alaska’s Energy Desk – Anchorage

Nikoosh Carlo began work this month in a newly created position: senior adviser for climate.

University of Alaska students may see 10 percent tuition hike over next two years

Adelyn Baxter, KTOO – Juneau

University of Alaska officials are considering a 5 percent tuition increase in each of the next two academic years.

Fairbanks’ anti-commercial marijuana ballot measures likely to boost turnout for October election

Tim Ellis, KUAC – Fairbanks

Local elections like the one coming up on Oct. 3 in Fairbanks are notorious for drawing low voter turnout. But observers say this year’s city and borough elections may be different, because the two marijuana-related propositions on the ballots are likely to draw more voters to the polls in what observers say will likely be a close election.

After mining exec weighs in, Juneau Assembly holds off on boundary mine resolution

Jacob Resneck, KTOO – Juneau

A local mine executive urged the Juneau Assembly to reconsider a resolution urging federal action on transboundary mining, and the Assembly did on Monday night.

Ferry Taku sold, will become floating hotel

Ed Schoenfeld, CoastAlaska – Juneau

The Alaska ferry Taku’s next life will be as a floating hotel.

State appeals court overturns 2012 Ketchikan murder conviction

Leila Kheiry, KRBD – Ketchikan

Citing improper arguments by the prosecution, the Alaska Court of Appeals on Friday overturned the murder conviction of a 25-year-old Ketchikan man who was found guilty about five-and-a-half years ago.

Pink salmon found in odd places near Homer

Aaron Bolton, KBBI – Homer

Pink salmon are showing up in unexpected places around the Homer area.

The Walker administration has said for more than a year that it’s working on a new set of policies to address climate change.

Those policies have yet to materialize.

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But Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott told an Anchorage audience Tuesday that a plan is coming soon, and he announced a new climate point person in the executive branch.

Mallott told a gathering of ocean researchers in Anchorage that climate change is an urgent challenge for Alaska. He pointed out that indigenous people have been some of the first to feel the impacts, both in Alaska and around the world.

“Without question, the First Peoples of our state live in the places where climate change is most affecting lives,” Mallott said.

But in the big picture, Mallott said, “we are all indigenous to island Earth.”

After his talk, Mallott said the Walker administration is still hammering out a strategy that will build on the state’s last big climate policy push, under former Gov. Sarah Palin.

“There’s a lot of work going on, and we hope to be able to bring it to focus within the next couple of months,” Mallott said.

But at least a few things are clear: for the first time, Mallott said, any plan must include cuts to carbon emissions. And, he said Alaska has to look at the big picture.

“Continuing development of petroleum resources is very important to our economy and our state’s near-term future,” Mallott said. “But at the same time, we need to begin planning for a future in which carbon-based fuel and energy is ultimately phased out.”

Mallott said he expects the governor to announce an administrative order on climate policy “soon.”

That’s been the administration’s line for awhile now.

But there has been at least one formal step this year: This month, Gov. Walker appointed Nikoosh Carlo to the newly created position of senior climate adviser.

“I think I probably took a deep breath and paused for a long time,” Carlo said, laughing about her reaction when asked to tackle climate policy. “It’s such a huge issue.”

Originally from Fairbanks and Tanana, Carlo most recently worked with the U.S. State Department’s delegation to the Arctic Council. She also ran the commission that wrote Alaska’s official Arctic Policy.

Carlo said her first step will be outreach: bringing together local and tribal leaders, industry and citizen groups. She said it’s going to be a long process.

“But I’m excited,” Carlo said. “I think the interest to address this issue is definitely there within the state. I think we’re all going to come together on this. We have to.”

Rey Soto-Lopez said when he was in prison, he felt berated with a constant refrain.

“’You lied so therefore you’re a liar,'” he recalled. “‘Oh, you broke a rule? You’re never going to change. You’re always gonna be a manipulator.’”

But that’s not who he wanted to be.

When he was convicted of second degree murder in 2001, he was thrown into a correctional system that, in his opinion, wasn’t focused on helping people prepare to reenter the community. Soto-Lopez said even just waking up wearing a yellow jumpsuit constantly sent the message that he would never be trustworthy.

“Control and punishment, at least for me, has never changed my attitude,” he said. “It has managed my attitude but it never really changed my internal perspective and attitude.”

Soto-Lopez knew he didn’t want to leave prison as the same person who entered. His old way of thinking wouldn’t solve any of his problems.

“I didn’t want to commit another crime. I wanted to figure out why I was so rebellious, so angry, so resentful,” he recalled. “I wanted to realize and understand my addiction, my criminal mentality. I wanted to figure out what was going on with me.”

But how do you do that in prison, when everything seems to tell you that you can’t change? Soto-Lopez found those few people who told him something different.

“It was that one chaplain who would come by when I felt bitter and angry, and I was resentful and acting out and would show me love when I least deserved it. When I least merited it. Was there to stand by me and believe in me not matter what, to say ‘Man, I believe that something good could come out of you.'”

With that support, he started a decade-long process of taking classes like anger management, parenting, and understanding victim impact.

Classes focused on behavior and attitude are offered at most correctional centers in the state, but they aren’t mandatory.

Research shows the classes can be effective and change how people think – and they reduce recidivism by about 25 percent, if they are taught by well-trained teachers. The most effective programs focus on anger management and problem-solving.

But Monica Hinders, who manages the education programs at Spring Creek Correctional Center in Seward, said inmates don’t always sign up for them with the intent to change.

“Some just enroll because they know they look better on paper,” she said. “And so they are preparing for parole board or to get a furlough to get out of here.”

She says despite that, even just the basic social skills a person learns in a classroom, like listening and speaking respectfully during structured conversations can make a positive difference. Participants have to analyze real world situations together and reflect on how they would react and why. Some classes, like ones on parenting, also focus on improving the participants’ ideas of self worth.

Sometimes listening to a teacher drone on isn’t always helpful, she said. “But the interactions with other inmates and just having the trust in each other to be honest and open and hearing the other views and that kind of thing. In here, if these guys are able to sit in a classroom and get along and not fight and not do what they sometimes like to do — that’s a win.”

And for some people, like Soto-Lopez, those small wins add up. Using the social skills and self analysis tools he learned by taking different types of programs, he was eventually able to take vocational classes, too.

Now, he’s been out of prison for three months, lives in a halfway house, and is holding down a job with the Ironworkers Union in Anchorage.

Soto Lopez practices his new skills in a welding booth at the Union’s office, melting a thin metal rod against two plates to attach them together. He’s preparing for his next certificate exam.

“If you don’t do it right the first time, you gotta redo the whole thing all over,” he said. “That’s why you practice over and over before you take the test because you only get one shot at the test.”

He knows that now, because he sees the world differently, he’s getting a second shot at life on the outside.

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The luxury cruise liner Crystal Serenity, which stopped in Nome last month, won’t be coming around to Alaska again for at least two years. The passengers it unloaded in New York City Saturday morning will be the last on its Northwest Passage route until at least 2020 — or possibly ever.

According to Crystal Cruises, the ship was booked full last year with nearly 1,000 passengers, but the numbers weren’t quite so high this summer, with around 20 percent fewer bookings. At 32 days, the Northwest Passage cruise is one of the longest operated by the company. It’s also one of the most expensive, with fares ranging from around $20,000 to over $120,000 per person.

These price tags are an indicator of the economic boost such a ship brings with it. Robert Hafner is executive director of the Nome Chamber of Commerce. And he said the impact in Nome is more far-reaching than you might think:

“The gift shops tend to go out and buy from a lot of the local people to supply their gift shops with the goods they need to sell to the tourists. We know the restaurants that provide the catering,” Hafner said. “Buses that are hired require the bus drivers there — which, because the bus is being used, they have to buy fuel. There’s a big trickle-down effect to a cruise boat that a lot of people don’t really look at.”

Hafner said the absence of the Serenity in the coming years could be significant.

“A lot of our businesses, they ramp up for it. They buy extra gear getting ready to supply those customers,” Hafner said. “That kind of money that’s not flowing through our community, even if it’s just one day, we need. And that’s too bad that at this time they are not intending to come back.”

For local businesses and artists on the ground last month, results were mixed. Angela Hansen, who coordinated vendors for the Berry Festival in Anvil City Square, said Native carvers did especially well; a number of passengers off the Serenity purchased large, expensive pieces.

And Hannah Katongan, who was working a fundraiser for her basketball team, said their food was very popular:

“Dedicated Donna, she had to go back and make more Akutaq (Eskimo ice cream). And then we had reindeer stew — that sold out as well.”

But overall, Hansen said about two-thirds of the total revenue still came from locals.

For Pingo Bakery and Seafood House, right on the square, it was a busy day — “Iditarod busy,” as chef and owner Erica Pryzmont said. But her business approach was the same.

“Any day, whether you think it’s going to be a big day or not, your goal is basically to make as much food as you can to meet the demand without making crazy too much,” Pryzmont said. “The trick is: You never know what the cool food of the day is going to be.”

Pingo sources much of its food locally, especially fish. Though cruise-ship passengers contribute to the local economy, large vessels like Serenity can also pose a threat to the wildlife harvested for food and goods.

Austin Ahmasuk is a marine advocate for Kawerak, and in workshops he’s led throughout Western Alaska, he said communities have reiterated:

“We should not underestimate the potential impacts from increased shipping: discharge in all of its forms, impacts potentially from noise disrupt our marine life,” Ahmasuk said. “And then impacts from oil spills, of course, affect food security.”

The environmental advocacy group Friends of the Earth gave Crystal Cruises an “F” on its 2016 Cruise Ship Report Card. The assessment factors in sewage treatment, air pollution reduction and water quality compliance.

According to Ed White, an environmental specialist with the State of Alaska’s Cruise Ship Monitoring Program, Serenity was nearly in full compliance with state requirements when inspected earlier this year.

But Ahmasuk said that could be misleading, since those requirements only apply to the state waters near shore. Although there is a sewage treatment system on board the ship, he said, “outside of 12 miles they can simply turn that thing off and discharge raw blackwater, greywater.”

John Stoll, vice president for land operations with Crystal Cruises, said the ship takes a number of environmental precautions, including low-grade fuel, freezing garbage, and:

“We actually have a reverse osmosis machine on board, so we make our own water on board. And then as far as black- and grey-water, we wait to displace that as well — we’ll keep that on the Shackleton (the British icebreaker accompanying the Serenity through the Northwest Passage) — so we don’t disperse any of that while we’re in the northern regions,” Stoll said. “So, again, there’s a real concerted effort on behalf of the ship to make sure we’re as clean as we can possibly be in that part of the world.”

Such efforts — expensive ones, as Stoll noted — may not be required for Crystal with Serenity away from the Arctic.

And with a big source of economic stimulation absent, Hafner argues that Nome should shift its focus: away from cruises and towards attracting smaller boats, by investing in more amenities like shower facilities, a laundromat, and more reliable internet services.

“The people of Nome need to really search our souls and see how our economy is changing here, and what we can do to sustain ourselves as a city so that we can go forward,” Hafner said.

With the cruise season winding down in Alaska and finished in Nome, the city will have to see what soul-searching opportunities come through next year.

A strong chum salmon run is helping pay for upgrades to a Sitka hatchery. Returns are also good at a much larger aquaculture operation not far away.

Angie Bowers walks toward a concrete-and-metal channel next to the Sheldon Jackson Hatchery.

“These are our adult spawning raceways. So the returning salmon come up here and this is where we’re able to crowd them up and harvest them and either take their eggs or often times, if they’re not ready, we’ll put them back in that far raceway for another day,” Bowers said.

Bowers oversees the hatchery as aquaculture director for the Sitka Sound Science Center, where it’s located.

It raises pinks and cohos, as well as chums, and is part of the center’s hatchery training program.

Bowers said this year’s run was better than expected, but it wasn’t a big surprise. The hatchery tripled its chum release to about three million, four years ago. And the species has its strongest returns in its fourth year.

“It wasn’t a great return, but they’re a lot more valuable than the pinks that we’ve harvested in the past. So it was a good boost for our cost recovery,” Bowers said.

The hatchery brought in around 16,000 chums this year, from the raceway or a recovery seine fishery. It’s a small number compared to larger hatcheries and commercial harvests.

But it made 10 percent more than its $100,000 recovery goal. And that’s enough to move forward with an important addition to its egg room.

“These are all our chum incubators, so each box has about 180,000 eggs in it right now. And eventually, probably in about three weeks, we’ll pull all those out and we pick all the dead out and then they get reseeded back into the boxes,” Bowers said.

The addition is pretty simple. It’s a sump, a concrete-lined hole in the floor that will collect and reuse the egg room’s water.

That might not sound like a big deal. But Bowers said it’s important, since the operation gets its fresh water from a variable source.

“In the past they’ve had a lot of mortality in incubation because of the high silt load in Indian River. And so having the ability to put those eggs on full re-circulation whenever we see a storm coming, or eventually, when there’s low water in the river and we can use conservation measures for the wild fish that are there,” Bowers said.

The science center’s hatchery is not the only place seeing strong runs.

“Chum salmon returns were very good throughout the whole state. This is close to a record year for chum returns,” Steve Reifenstuhl, general manager of the Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association, said.

The Sitka-based non-profit group runs large, multi-species hatcheries that release fish around the region.

Reifenstuhl’s operation has had mixed chum returns this year, depending on the site. But generally, it’s been good.

“We are seeing a bit of optimism this year. It’s been several years since I’ve felt this sunny at the end of the season. And I think there’s some good things to come in the next few years for the fishery,” Reifenstuhl said.

Reifenstuhl said there’s been no problems with cost-recovery fisheries. And some commercial openings have brought in more chums than usual.

A program is leading representatives of Arctic nations to Alaska, Canada, Iceland and Greenland to look at the microgrids in remote communities.

The Arctic Remote Energy Network Academy, or ARENA, is in the middle of its pilot year and gives participants a look at innovative remote energy networks. They hope to gather information and contacts that could benefit their communities.

This week, some academy participants are in Finland to present at the Arctic Energy Summit, which begins today and continues until Wednesday.

In March, participants stopped by Yellowknife, Canada for a week. In June, they visited Kotzebue, Fairbanks and Nome.

One participant — George Roe is a University of Alaska research professor affiliated with the Alaska Center for Energy and Power, one of the organizations behind ARENA — visited Kodiak. And next, they’ll go to Iceland.

Roe said networking is a big part of the program.

“It’s a great opportunity for us to be interacting and building strong, respectful peer relationships internationally at the grass roots level,” Roe said.

The Lower 48 can learn from successful remote energy systems and move toward greater resiliency, he said, especially if they figure out how to encourage private investment instead of relying on grants.

Kodiak Area Native Association economic development project manager Tyler Kornelis’ goal is to build his network and learn about the different technologies out there.

Kodiak boasts an isolated grid that uses wind and hydropower to provide its residents with affordable, green energy. Kornelis said both the city of Kodiak and the city of Port Lions tap into that grid, but the other communities of Akhiok, Karluk, Larsen Bay, Old Harbor and Ouzinkie do not.

“They’re not all 100 percent diesel but in general they have costs of power that on average are more than double what we’re paying in Kodiak here,” Kornelis said. “Our success is great, but you can’t lose sight of the challenges that these communities that are so close to us are having.”

Kornelis would like to bring back his experiences and connections to push forward some of the communities’ projects and goals.

“It’s a huge priority for the communities in the Kodiak region to not only produce more energy, ideally with renewable resources, but also to find ways to reduce their energy consumption through conservation or energy efficiency activities,” Kornelis said.

Kornelis said the last site visit with be Reykjavik, Iceland, where they’ll focus on geothermal heat.

Iceland meets most of its energy demands with hydropower and geothermal power, said Ludvik Georgsson, the director of the United Nations University Geothermal Training Program.

Kornelis said they’ll show participants how Iceland uses geothermal power for green houses, spas, and electricity generation.

Georgsson encourages Alaskans to look for geothermal resources in the vicinity of their communities.

“You have, for example, hot springs not far away from Nome, which could be utilized for heating or greenhouses and production of vegetables for the local society instead of having to import it all from far away,” Kornelis said.

ARENA participants will fly to Iceland to meet with Georgsson and his colleagues in November.

Declining state support has Fairbanks city and borough government up against a financial wall. That was the message Tuesday from local officials to the chamber of commerce.

“BAM! This is what the state’s done to us as far as finances,” city chief of staff Mike Meeks said.

Meeks said the city has seen state assistance drop from an average of $1.7 million annual to $866,000 this year — and it’s expected to further dwindle.

“If you assume we’re going to zero, what’s the next step?” Meeks asked.

Noting that the city is already under-funding infrastructure maintenance, and that the police department is operating short staffed, Meeks said the administration and council have spent months looking for things to cut and the public has not come forward with any ideas, except for tapping the city’s permanent fund.

“That permanent fund is sitting about $128 million, and it generated $4.6 million in cash that we use to fund this government,” Meeks said. “If you did not have that money, that means you would not have that $4.6 million and we would be coming to you saying, ‘We’re either gonna cut services, or we have to raise your taxes $4.6 million.”

The Fairbanks fund was set up with money from the sale of the city’s municipal utilities in the late 1990’s. It’s primarily invested in bonds and equities.

Meeks said the situation has inspired a proposition on the October 3rd municipal ballot that asks voters to approve replacement of up to $1.7 million in lost state revenue sharing with property tax increases.

“We’re only going after what the state has done to us,” Meeks said. “We’re trying to make that up.”

The Fairbanks North Star Borough is also in a tight spot due to declining state support. Borough mayor chief of staff Jim Williams outlined a precipitous drop.

“Revenue sharing from the state has been very, very nice when we were fat with cash coming from oil money in the $4 to $4.5 million range, and then just plummets right off starting FY15 through to FY18,” Williams said. “That’s trending down towards zero right now.”

Short of voters increasing a cap that limits tax revenue, Williams listed a range of areas facing cuts, including public works, libraries and parks and recreation. Williams said the biggest long term issue is not saving for infrastructure maintenance and replacement, largely covered by the state in the past.

“So the question is, under the old business model which obviously isn’t working now because the state’s running out of cash, how are we going to finance this going forward?” Williams said. “Because we’re gonna have to pay the piper.”

Williams lists numerous borough facilities, including school, park and fire service infrastructure that are aging out, and will need replacement at a cost estimated at between $306 hundred million.

Cooling Pacific Ocean temperatures have triggered a La Niña Watch for the northern hemisphere. The Climate Prediction Center and the International Institute for Climate and Society issued the watch, which is based on below normal sea temperature readings in the eastern equatorial Pacific. National Weather Service Alaska region climate science and services manager Rick Thoman said, like its warmer brother El Niño, La Niña has weather driving potential for Alaska.

“That area south and southeast of Hawaii influence where those big tropical thunderstorms form,” Thoman said. “La Niña, which we now think is likely to occur this year, helps keep those big tropical thunderstorms back over the western Pacific.”

Thoman said those storms influence the jet stream as it crosses the Pacific, typically leading to high pressure over the Bering Sea.

”And then that works its way into the North Pacific and that allows Alaska to be on the cool side,” Thoman said.

Thoman said it also trends inland Alaska toward drier conditions, especially over the first part of the winter, but he cautions that La Niña doesn’t lock in a colder than normal winter.

“About half of La Niña winters have been significantly colder than normal and a couple more have been near-normal, so we tilt our odds, but no guarantees,” Thoman said.

Thoman noted that Alaska’s warmest winter on record was set in 2000-2001, during a weak La Nina.

Security consultants say they discovered an unsecured online database with information on nearly 600,000 Alaska voters last week.

The database had more detail than what would have already be publicly available through the Alaska Division of Elections. Analysts at Kromtech Security found the information online without any password requirements, meaning it was accessible – for a time – to anyone with a web browser.

Jeremiah Fowler is a security analyst for Kromtech. He says his company contacted the database owners, who have since added protections to secure the information.

“We have an aging electoral system that’s struggling to keep up with technology in the digital age, so there’s a lot of risk and a lot of ways this data could be used,” Fowler said.

The database included common information like names, dates of birth and marital status, but it also had more personal details, such as household income, ages of an individual’s children or whether they are a homeowner.

Fowler said another vendor had compiled the database on Alaska voters and bypassed security options on their server, including requiring login credentials or a password, to make it easier for their clients to access.

Clients that buy access to such databases are often political groups trying to better target their campaign resources. But Fowler said neither the vendor or the company that owned the data on Alaska voters would name their client.

And Fowler said it’s hard to know whether anyone accessed the information while it was not secure or what someone might do with it.

“When it comes to cyber crime, I’m surprised and surprised again, by the creativity and the lengths people will go to commit crimes,” Fowler said.

While the database included roughly 60,000 more names than the number of registered Alaska voters in the state’s records, such compilations often include duplicate or outdated entries.

Fall colors are just past their peak in Southcentral Alaska. And that timing doesn’t have much to do with weather conditions. The formula for producing deep reds and bright yellows is pretty simple: it’s all about the sun angle.

Brian Brettschneider, with our Ask a Climatologist segment, said that’s because the green leaves get their color from chlorophyll, a molecule used in photosynthesis.

Interview transcript:

Brian: When the chlorophyll production shuts down in the fall, those other colors which are kind of always there, but overwhelmed by the green, then they stand out with the green no longer in effect.

Annie: And how does weather and climate play into when the leaves change?

Brian: Interestingly, I get asked this all the time. (People) say, ‘Oh, it’s been a warm summer, it’s been a cool fall, it’s been wet, it’s been dry, that’s really going to effect the colors of the leaves.’ Really, it makes very little difference. When the leaves change colors in the fall is primarily related to the sun angle.

So the leaves, they track the sun over the summer and the fall and they know when that solar energy is getting less and less. It’s that solar energy that drives photosynthesis and when it becomes too hard for the plant to do that it shuts down, the chlorophyll production drops off and you end up with these other colors.

There’s a little bit on the margins that the weather affects when it’s going to happen, but more importantly, the weather affects what the intensity and the duration of color is going to be. So if you have a few hard freezes in September, it’s going to shorten the length you’re going to have those colors, they’ll turn brown and fall off. If it’s sunny and cool but not freezing cold fall, those colors will be a little more intense, and they’ll last a little longer. So it’s not a driver of when it occurs, but it’s a driver of the extent and the duration and the intensity is going to be.

Annie: When the colors do change, does that alter the climate at all?

Brian: It does. In April and May, once green-up occurs, there’s a noticeable increase in atmospheric moisture, because as part of the process of photosynthesis, the leaves are transpiring moisture to the atmosphere. So you end up with a more humid, more moist atmosphere, which in the summer allows for thunderstorm production in the Interior. Once the chlorophyll production shuts down in the fall, that transpiration of moisture goes way down, so you end up with less moisture in the atmosphere that was contributed from the leaf production.

During a speech in Anchorage today, a top Interior Department official said kick-starting oil development in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR, is a priority for the Trump administration.

“The untapped potential of ANWR is significant. But it is the Trump administration that had the guts to step up to the plate and facilitate production,” Vincent DeVito, the Interior Department’s Counselor for Energy Policy, told a conference for ocean researchers in Anchorage today.

DeVito occupies a new post created by the Trump Administration, advising Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on developing oil and other resources from federal land and waters.

Last week, the Washington Post reported the Trump administration is pushing to allow seismic testing in the Arctic Refuge. Seismic testing would provide new information on where and how much oil is in the Refuge.

After his speech, DeVito told reporters he thinks the Interior Secretary is on firm legal footing as he pursues a new assessment of the Refuge’s oil potential.

“I’m confident that everything that the Secretary decides can withstand a legal challenge,” DeVito said.

If the Trump administration is challenged in court, it wouldn’t be the first legal battle over the issue. The state of Alaska unsuccessfully sued the Obama administration to allow seismic testing in the Refuge in 2014.

In his speech, DeVito also talked about increasing oil development in a different swath of federal land in the Arctic — the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, or NPR-A.

“It is time to use NPR-A how it was originally intended to be used,” DeVito said. “This is land that is supposed to be used for oil production. But many politicians — not Secretary Zinke — and exuberant interest groups basically took it offline.”

Today, over half of NPR-A is off-limits to oil leasing, but the Trump administration is now reviewing that policy. Environmental groups argue that parts of the Reserve should remain off-limits because they contain critical wildlife habitat.

Advocates on the left are cranking up the pressure on Sen. Murkowski to vote against the latest bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

Listen now

Some groups have online ads. A group called “Save My Care” is airing a television spot.

One national feminist group has hired an airplane to tow a banner over Anchorage Thursday.

“The banner will say ‘Murkowski don’t back down. Protect our care,'” Karin Roland, chief campaigns officer for the group UltraViolet, said. She said her group will have similar banners flying in Arizona and Maine, aimed at Senators John McCain and Susan Collins. They and Murkowski were the only Republican senators to vote against health care repeal in July.

“We wanted to pull out all the stops to make sure this message is heard and seen in the skies,” Roland said.

Murkowski hasn’t said how she’ll vote on Graham-Cassidy. The bill would

• end the obligation to buy insurance, for individuals and employers
• stop the subsidies for people who purchase their own plans and
• eliminate the money for Medicaid expansion.

Instead, states would get block grants until they end in 2027 and a set amount per Medicaid patient.

Murkowski said she’s waiting for the data to see how the bill will affect Alaska. Some liberal advocacy groups are happy to supply numbers.

Topher Spiro of the Center for American Progress in Washington, D.C. has tweeted that at least four studies of the bill are out to help Murkowski make up her mind.

Murkowski said her vote would depend on the numbers for her state. Here are AARP’s estimates of the Medicaid cap:https://t.co/NSZBy3Qlfm pic.twitter.com/AlegMfROnX

— Topher Spiro (@TopherSpiro) September 21, 2017

“And they universally show big cuts for Alaska,” Spiro said.

One study Spiro cited shows the annual cut for Alaska would be $844 million starting in 2027.

Emily Nenon in the Anchorage office of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network said her group had protesters in in front of Murkowski’s office this week with “just say no” signs.

“We absolutely have many volunteers that have been calling in to (Senate) offices,” Nenon said. “We’ve been getting reports of voicemail boxes being full and then (hear) ‘Oh! The voicemail box has been cleared out. Time to start the calls again.'”

Nenon criticized the bill for weakening protections for people with pre-existing conditions.

“For anybody that’s had a cancer diagnosis, that’s just a terrifying thought, to not be able to access insurance at all,” Nenon said.

Planned Parenthood has activated its base, too. The Graham-Cassidy bill would defund the group, meaning Planned Parenthood clinics could not get reimbursed for the Medicaid patients they treat. Northwestern chapter CEO Chris Charbonneau said Planned Parenthood’s objections to the bill are broader than that. She wants Murkowski to know its Alaska supporters are watching and ready to “show her some love” for voting no again.

“I think the whole nation is counting on her to be sure that she does what people need this time around,” Charbonneau said.

Murkowski is hearing from the right side of the political spectrum, too. Ron Johnson of Palmer said he and other conservative activists have placed calls urging her to vote yes on Graham-Cassidy. Not that Johnson thinks it’ll do much good.

“I don’t think anything we can do is going to change her mind,” said Johnson, a Republican district chairman.

Last month, after Murkowski’s first votes against health care repeal, Johnson tried to get the Alaska Republican Party’s central committee to condemn her votes, on the grounds that they went against the party platform. But Johnson said a threat to withdraw party support isn’t going to faze her.

“Sen. Murkowski is untouchable,” Johnson said. “She’s got more money than she knows what to do with. Her campaign war chest funded the Republican Party in Alaska last election cycle, rather than the other way around”

Campaign finance reports show Murkowski’s campaign and her political action committee gave the state party about $400,000 ahead of last year’s election.

Both Alaska senators declined to give interviews for this story. A spokesman for Sen. Dan Sullivan said he had a full slate of meetings, including one at his office that included Murkowski and the prime sponsors of the repeal bill, Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-N.C. and Bill Cassidy, R-La.

But Sullivan did make time Tuesday to discuss the bill with Neil Cavuto on Fox News.  Sullivan said he’s still studying the bill, but he had some nice things to say about it.

“If you’re for federalism, if you’re for the 10th Amendment, this has a lot of attraction,” Sullivan said. (The 10th Amendment reserves powers to the states.)

A spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says he’s committed to bringing the repeal bill to a vote next week.