2016: A Year of Connections Lost and Found

As the new year approaches, Raven News has a tradition of looking back on the stories that shaped our listening region. But it’s difficult to write a cohesive narrative for 2016. Whether across the aisle or in the street, the year was rife with political and social conflict – some divisive, some unifying. The big moments of the year were defined not so much by how people came together, but where they freely expressed their differences.

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2016 didn’t start off with a bang. Rather, with a  blip. In February, the fiber optic cable serving Sitka and Angoon sustained heavy damage and the Internet cut out. Emmett Williams, a local filmmaker, found himself in a crunch. “The lack of Internet has deeply affected my life,” he said, “But luckily,  [my clients] find it cute and quirky that I live on this island in Alaska.”

Missed connections are part and parcel to life in a remote place. It’s a fate we accept, along with dark winters and bears. But bridging an inconvenient gap isn’t just a story for this moment. In a lot of ways, it was the story of this year.

Take the Blue Lake Dam. When the expansion project was approved, the price of oil was high (peaking at $146/barrel). Sitkans were using a lot of energy, more than the city could provide. Under that climate, Utility Director Bryan Bertacchi said that a big expansion of the dam made a lot of sense to the planners. During an hour-long call in show this month, he said, “They really thought load would be at about 140 million kWh a year. Right now, load is about 105 million kWh. About a third less. So if the load moved the way everyone thought it would, we’d be giving everybody a cut in electric rates right now.”

Instead, there have been two rate hikes this year, as mild winters and cheap fuel reduced the demand for hydropower far below supply. And this energy gap is furthering the financial gap in the city’s wallet. The FY18 budget deficit is projected to be $2.35 million. 

Earlier in the year, a Citizens’ Task Force recommended raising the cap on the mill rate to bring in more revenue. The Assembly suggested a 2 mill bump, with half going to the electric fund. Voters, like Megan Pasternak, rejected it. “Personally, when I’ve got money problems, I buckle down and cut something,” she said.

That has already happened in Sitka. This year, Assembly shrank local government by six positions and cut $1 million dollars in the General Fund. The newly opened Sitka Public Library is now closed on Sundays. But it’s not enough, especially as the state tightens its belt and passes down less money to local communities. City Administrator Mark Gorman said, “We’ve got to look out three years to ensure that we have a soft landing here and do not stimulate a recession in Sitka.”

Navigating the divide was a major theme at the polls this year as well. Elections happened at every level of government – from the local school board to the White House – and brought a wave of politicians courting votes in our listening region. That included presidential candidate Rocky De La Fuente, who resented Donald Trump’s early campaign remarks about Mexican-Americans and joined the race. He came to Sitka to caucus. “All my life, I’ve been an underdog. All my life, I’m a minority.We have two type of people: we have the hard-working people that work and we have the government that’s trying to do everything they can to stop us. Imagine if  we can all be working with the same objective,” he said.

If candidates sought to make their voices heard, voters did too. The day after Donald Trump was elected, there was a pro-gun rally at the roundabout. Marshall Albertson brought his semi-automatic, in support of the second amendment and gun owners. “They say we’re a bunch of racists, we’re a bunch of homophobes, xenophobes, sexists, and that’s not true,” Albertson said.

Skyler Wright attended a gathering for those troubled by the election and demonstrations up the street. “Why are you marching down the street with weaponry? That can’t be anything but threatening to me,” she said.

Sitkans also raised their voices in solidarity with the Standing Rock camp, where protesters have been opposing the Dakota Access Pipeline. And after a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, a group held hands in a circle at Totem Square. One speaker, who did not state her name, said “This is not the act of one lone gunman. This is the act of a racist, homophobic, misogynist, supremacist society. We can change that. We have to step into the uncomfortable place, of that one moment where somebody says something and you just want to let it slide. That moment is one step towards changing this.”

Her message speaks volumes about how tough it can be to speak up and have a conversation amid great difference. Sitka’s two hospitals are attempting this very thing. Hospital leadership is concerned about the financial sustainability of Sitka Community Hospital and hired an outside consultant to formally explore a collaboration with SEARHC. Raven News will be following this closely and hosting a call in show in the spring.

Conversation is also taking place across the aisle in the State House. While the Senate has a Republican Majority – Bert Stedman was re-elected this year – the House has a bipartisan coalition, whose membership includes Representative Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins. The Sitka Democrat was also re-elected and while campaigning, said, “[If] you have a bipartisan coalition, you start to govern from the middle. You put aside the really divisive, ideological, kind of performative, theatrical political issues. And you just focus on the meat and potatoes stuff that needs to get done, that’s going to be in the interest of Alaska in the long term.” The legislative session begins on January 17th, 2017.

This year also brought some closure to major events of the year before. In the wake of a devastating landslide last August, the city has more data on landslide risk and over the next two years, FEMA will be funding a comprehensive landslide map of the whole community. On August 18th, the one-year anniversary, the city placed a memorial bench and stone at the site of the Kramer Avenue slide in honor of William Stortz, Elmer and Ulises Diaz. Pastor Paul McArthur reflected on how the landslide shook local faith in the stability of the land.

“What was interesting for us in Sitka is that we tend to think of the mountains as being our place of safety. But our place of safety was that which had now turned against us. And for me that was the opportunity to relate the words from the Psalm: The Lord is our strength and our refuge, a very present help in time of trouble. Therefore I will not fear even though the earth gives way and the mountains slide into the sea,” he said.

The city also settled with Franklin Hoogendorn, a teen tased in the Sitka jail, for $350,000 and began to replace its aging infrastructure. Most of the city’s electric grid hasn’t been renovated since the 1980s. Failed parts resulted in over half a dozen short outages this year and a complete shutdown of the Green Lake Dam in October.

For Matt Hunter, Sitka’s new mayor, it’s a bit like keeping on top of your home appliances. “If you have a home, you need to replace the hot water heater sometimes. Then you need a new washing machine. Then your dish washer goes out!,” he said. “It’s an endless cycle of things that need to be fixed. The problem is we have a lot of old stuff that was kind of built at the same time.”

Hunter isn’t the only new official in Sitka. This year also saw the hire of a new city attorney, Brian Hanson, to replace Robin Schmid, who was dismissed following a poor evaluation. There’s a new Chief of Police, Jeff Ankerfelt, who took over after Sheldon Schmidt was eased out. Janelle Vanasse started as Superintendent of Mt. Edgecumbe High School. The Sitka Tribe of Alaska hired a new general manager, Lisa Gassman, and elected its first female council chair, Kathy Hope Erickson. Of her election, Erickson said, “Can you believe it? Being 64 and being at a new beginning. It can happen any time in your life.”

Sitka women made headlines in the worlds of fisheries, education, and food as well, with Linda Behnken appointed to the International Pacific Halibut Commission, Rebecca Himschoot to the State Education Board, and Colette Nelson as Alaska’s contestant in the Great American Seafood Cook-Off. The centerpiece of her dish was ivory king salmon, a no brainer for the former fisherman. “A lot of this is about talking and representing the seafood. For me, I can talk until the cows come home about salmon and how the king salmon run,” Nelson said.

This year’s weak salmon return was disappointing for fishermen, and may have contributed to an increase in bear encounters. A sow and her two cubs creating a food cache were killed by wildlife troopers and there were five maulings in the area this summer alone. Forest Service fish technicians had just seconds to react when a sow charged them on Appleton Creek. District Ranger Perry Edwards said, “Maybe the bear had been defending that fishing spot and was at the point where they were like, “One more creature comes by my fishing spot and and I’m going to give them a what-for that they will always remember.” Edwards, also a biologist, speculated that an increase in the number of sows with cubs, combined with a poor food supply, created a perfect storm for stress in the population.

While it was bad news for bears, this year brought good news for Sitka’s cruise ship industry. Traffic is up, exceeding 1 million passengers in Alaska. Holland America and Celebrity are bringing more ships to Sitka next summer, taking advantage of the Old Sitka Dock. Smaller enterprises, like Alaskan Dream Cruises, continue to blossom. Marketing Director Zak Kirkpatrick said the industry has room for ships both big and small. “Some people want this educational enrichment, they want a Native village. Other people say, ‘Hey, I’d like a large room and to be able to go to the casino, or have more of the party life.’ We always say, ‘There’s no bad way to see Alaska.'”

While traveling themselves in Anchorage, the Sitka High Basketball team became hometown heroes when they alerted tenants to a fire. Thanks to the players and their coach, all 11 occupants got out safely. Local emergency responders and the Coast Guard performed a number of rescues and recoveries this year, including the body of 37-year-old hiker Michael Hansen. His parents said that the caring of Sitkans made all the difference in grieving for their son.

“One of the little grocery stores we were in what night and I just wanted some soup. They said, ‘Just take the soup, take what you need.’ Just everytime you turn around someone is there to help you. I’ve never seen such generosity of spirit and love you can feel. We will just never forget this community. It’s given us so much peace,” said Hansen’s mom, Ruth.

As the year came to a close and December brought a flurry of snow, acclaimed Tlingit weaver Terri Rofkar died of cancer at the age of 60. In an interview she gave in 2013, she talked about how the traditions of weaving would continue on long after her passing. “Here I was feeling like the carrier of the culture,” Rofkar said. “And I realize now, ‘Whoops, this basketry, this weaving, it’s been going on for thousands and thousands of years. I’m the one that’s fragile. The art will continue on.’”

It’s wisdom like Rofkar’s that reassures us that no matter what happens, amid triumph and tragedy, victory and loss, the sun always comes up tomorrow. The world doesn’t cease to turn and the desire to create doesn’t stop. This year, for instance, a whole cedar tree became a canoe under the steady hand of local carvers at Sitka National Historical Park. David Katzeek was there for the canoe steaming and said, “A canoe is not just a vessel that goes over water. It represents a people’s journey in life.”

That journey will continue into 2017. From all of us at Raven News, Happy New Year and thanks for listening.