KCAW

Note: The opinions expressed in commentary on KCAW are those of the author(s), and are not necessarily shared by the station’s board, staff, or volunteers.

Hi – I am Tory OʼConnell Curran, and this is my opinion.

I want to take a minute to cut through the endless political mailers, ads, and social media posts we are all drowning in to warn Alaskan voters about a spoiler candidate for US House of Representatives, Eric Hafner. Hafner is listed on the general election ballot as a Democrat and his name is at the top of the choices for US Representative on our ballot form in House District 2. Don’t be fooled! Eric Hafner has no ties to Alaska and has never been here. He holds a South Dakota address and a NY phone number where he is in federal prison until 2036 for pleading guilty to threatening to kill or injure elected officials, police, judges and their families. He and his mother are known for running in US House offices in states of which they are not residents or have never visited and have run as both republicans and democrats. A dark money GOP SuperPac financed his primary campaign. He is a spoiler!

Fortunately, we have a great choice! Bill Hill is an independent candidate endorsed by the Alaska Democratic Party, Alaska AFL-CIO, the National Education Association, the Alaska Firefighters among many others. Bill was born in Kokhanok and is a lifelong Alaskan, commercial fisherman, former construction worker, and a 25-year educator as teacher, principal, and superintendent. The Alaska Superintendents Association named Bill Hill the state’s superintendent of the year in 2022 when he was working for the Bristol Bay Borough School District.

Bill is running to put Alaskans first. Unlike Nick Begich, our current Representative, Bill will work to ban congressional stock trading, end special tax breaks for billionaires and large corporations, and vote against forever wars lowering costs for working families. I am a registered Democrat, and I am voting for Bill Hill. Unfortunately, because Hafner is listed as a Democrat, recent polling shows he may get 7% of the vote! Outrageous! It is important to get the word out about this – your vote is too precious to waste on someone who couldn’t even serve if elected. High costs and DC corruption are clearly linked, and it is time for a real change in DC. That is why I am supporting Bill Hill for House of Representatives. Early voting starts Tuesday October 20th in Sitka and Election Day is Tuesday November 3rdd. I am voting early this year to ensure my vote counts. With deference to the great Barbara Jordan “the stakes are too high for voting to be a spectator sport”! Thank you and see you at the polls!

Leaders and supporters of Sitka’s Parks and Recreation program are developing a plan for its future, and they want the community’s feedback. Parks and Recreation Manager Kevin Knox and Monique Anderson, a landscape architect at Anderson Land Planning, joined KCAW on the Morning Interview to discuss the 20-year master plan and an upcoming open house hosted by the Sitka Recreation Foundation and the city on Thursday, October 22, from 4-7 p.m. at Harrigan Centennial Hall. Listen to their conversation here:

At the far north end of Pelican’s one-mile boardwalk, Heather Bryant greets customers coming through the big front doors of the Pelican General.

Bryant is like a ray of sunshine, asking customers about their lives while making them a latte or scanning the items in their carts. She and her husband Barry — who happens to be mayor of the small Southeast Alaska fishing village — along with their 14 children, had been visiting Pelican for years from the Lower 48. In 2023, they decided to permanently relocate, launching the store to fill a gap in the remote Chichagof Island community, where residents had gone more than 15 years without a local grocery store.  

“It was apocalyptic in this building when my husband and my son came,” Bryant said, gesturing to the shelves around her. “They wore headlamps. It was like whoever was here just took everything off the shelves. It was just an old building that used to be a grocery store, and it was just sitting there for almost 20 years.”

Now, three years in, the 100 or so residents that call Pelican home can walk down the boardwalk and get everything from fresh produce, eggs, and milk, to frozen pizzas, potting soil, and fishing supplies. 

“We try to have a spattering of things that you can just grab if you need it in a pinch,” she said. “We’re like, I don’t know, a 7-Eleven or ampm. You know, one of those little quick stops, but not, but are, because the prices are like a quick stop.” 

When customers were asked to describe the so-called “quick stop,” a few descriptors come up a lot: convenient, incredible, wonderful, great. 

Prior to the store’s grand opening, residents and fishermen alike had to plan weeks ahead, order groceries from Costco and Fred Meyer about 90 miles away in Juneau, and wait for a ferry or float plane to show up with the goods. 

“And you had to hope that they put the meats and stuff in the freezer, and they didn’t refrigerate your bananas,” said 31-year-old customer Quintin Hafendorfer. “Stuff like that happened all the time.” 

Hafendorfer has spent nearly his whole life in Pelican, and he wears a lot of hats. He works for the city, running the power plant and water treatment center, “and the sewer plant. And then other duties as assigned.”

When the isolated community went more than a month last winter without a ferry or seaplane to bring in supplies or even Christmas presents, he said the store was there, providing customers with food. That’s a good enough reason for him to be a loyal customer.

“Me and my fiance, we come here pretty much every day, even just to wander the aisle and just be like, ‘Yeah, look, I need something and I can go get it.’ It is incredibly convenient to be like, ‘I ran out of mushrooms yesterday.’ I can come down here and get mushrooms and not have to wait for the planes to fly.” 

Every summer, Allan Engstrom hand trolls out of Pelican on his 38-foot Bertram, the “Katherine.” The boat is named for what he calls “the Holy Trinity of Katherines in my family:” his grandmother, sister, and daughter. 

He said he tries to do all his summer shopping at the general store, perusing the aisles and ordering the “best mocha on the outer coast.” 

“It means I don’t have to load up [in Juneau] and manage five months of supplies on my boat at once,” Engstrom said. “So it’s absolutely convenient, and it’s good for the community because it brings fishermen to town. Like the fuel dock and the ice machine, this is a third leg of that trifecta of things Pelican has to offer fishermen, and they’ve done a great job.” 

But beyond the convenience, customers say Pelican General is so much more than a store. What began as just a few shelves of basic supplies has grown, aisle by aisle, into a community hub for locals, tourists, and fishermen alike, with movie and craft nights, couches to sit and read on, free Wifi, and a coffee shop. 

“There are a couple heartbeats of Pelican. This is certainly a big one,” said Keri Eggleston, who lives in Pelican year-round with her husband and their two kids. 

Her husband is a commercial fisherman and she works at the local fish processing plant and does Tlingit language documentation work in the off-season. She said living in an isolated community can be hard at times, and the store helps. 

“It’s what makes it possible to be here, really,” Eggleston said. “The cafe, the store, the community center: those things are critical, I’d say, to living here. It really wouldn’t feel like a community without the store.”

While customers are thankful for Pelican General and the Bryant family, Bryant said it wouldn’t be possible without the customers. 

“Everyone is a part of the store,” she said. “Even though we are doing it, this is something the town can be proud of, and them being proud of it is part of making it what it is.” 

Bryant said she and her husband have always had an open door policy, and she wants everyone who enters the store to feel like they’re just part of her family coming in to grocery shop. 

“It’s really turned into an extension of who we are and what we believe in, and I just want it to be a blessing to this community,” she said. “This is going to sound really cheesy, but it’s like a big hug from the Bryants. Really, that’s what this is.” 

Joann Torgeson and Pat Kehoe from Sitkans for Peace and Democracy join KCAW for the Morning Interview. The community can stop by the Crescent Harbor net shed 11 a.m. Saturday (10-17-26) for more information about early voting for the upcoming midterm election. After, the group will make their way to the roundabout for a No Kings protest at 11:30 a.m. Listen to the conversation here:

A committee directed with making recommendations for improvements at the state run boarding school in Sitka has delivered its findings to the Alaska Board of Education and Early Development.

It’s been nearly a year since a group of parents, educators and alumni sounded the alarm about conditions at Mt. Edgecumbe High School to the Alaska Board of Education and Early Development. With concerns about mental health, aging facilities, and a significant enrollment drop-off, the board tasked an ad hoc committee with investigating the issues over the past summer, and making recommendations for improvements. 

At the board’s quarterly meeting in mid-October in Sitka, student Xander Swanson called last year “a hard one”, citing everything from leaks and worn out beds, to inconsistent rules and poor communication. But he and others said some conditions have gotten better – with infrastructure improvements, a re-written student handbook, and new administrators.

“One change that’s seen is the communication with students and staff is on another level. This matters more than you might think,” Swanson said. “When students feel heard, we show up differently. We take ownership of our school.” 

Superintendent David Langford also told the board that things are looking up with millions of dollars to put toward facility improvements– $24 million over the next few years including around $10 million for dining hall renovation. Langford said the cafeteria food has improved already, and the school is offering more than quadruple the student activities available last year. 

While enrollment was down to 350 students at the start of this year, Langford said the number of students leaving campus is substantially lower than this time last year.

“I’ve been emphasizing with all the principals and teachers, everybody on the campus, that really what we’re interested in is keeping the students we have long term, and, to-date, the students that are leaving Mount Edgecumbe up to this point is 65% lower than it was a year ago, so I think that speaks to everybody working together at a whole new level for students.”  

But former school staff member and parent Blossom Teal-Olsen said some of those improvements don’t tell the full story. Cuts to mental health support and staff and teacher turnover need to be addressed. 

“Our children need mental health support at a time when there’s no mental health support given, and there’s been cuts to those positions. And historically, if anyone, and I’ve been a former worker there, if you ever make a wave, you are out,” Teal-Olsen said. “So look at look at how many teachers have left. Look at the turnover within the dorms. Look at the how the nursing staff interacts with administration. That’s the true story. There. That’s where change needs to happen.”  

Reviewing and strengthening mental health supports for students is on a list of 22 recommendations the ad hoc committee delivered to the state board later at the same meeting.

The committee developed the list after reviewing roughly 250 survey results from students, parents, and staff. It touches on everything from improving dorm room policies and communication with parents, to establishing a process for collecting information from students who withdraw from the school. 

Paul Reid is a project coordinator with the Office of Education Advocacy, and he facilitated the ad hoc meetings. Board Chair Sally Stockhausen asked him whether they were ready to discuss the plans for addressing the recommendations. 

“I kind of viewed that as ‘This is going to be handed off to the to the admin and to the staff and the students here’ to assure that some of that these recommendations are considered, as they continue to develop,” Reid said.

Stockhausen said she could hear a lot of the recommendations already reflected in both Langford’s report and at a recent school advisory board meeting. However, she wanted to keep tabs on future improvements with a regular report to the state board.

“I would like it to stay in the forefront of our minds and not become another thing that we put on the shelf [and say] ‘Well, that was nice that we did that,'” Stockhausen said. “So I would like to see in in a format that addresses these at our meetings, that we get a regular update on what has been done so far.” 

And board member Kimberly Bergey said the update should be digestible so students and families have a roadmap for where the school is headed. 

“The student voice in this process is going to be critical to the long-term success of the school,” she said. “And so, figuring out how we can make sure that that student voice is included in the the next steps in the process is going to be critical.”

The board did not take formal action on the recommendations at the quarterly meeting. 

The 10th Annual Alaska Day Brewfest is Sunday, October 18, 2026 from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. at Harrigan Centennial Hall. Garry White with the Sitka Economic Development Association joined KCAW for the Morning Interview to discuss the event. Listen here:

Rural Alaska Students and One-Health Research (RASOR) program coordinator Rosie Cunningham, and University of Alaska professor Ellen Chenoweth joined KCAW for the Morning Interview to discuss the educational opportunities available for students at Sitka Whalefest this November. Listen to the conversation here:

Sitka’s new mayor and assembly members took their oaths of office at the Sitka Assembly meeting Tuesday night (10-13-26). The group also said farewell to outgoing mayor Steven Eisenbeisz, who served in the role since 2020.

Eisenbeisz served two terms on the assembly before he was elected to the mayor’s chair. After three terms at the helm, he did not seek re-election this year. 

At Tuesday’s meeting, he read from a prepared speech. In it, he thanked city staff, fellow assembly members, and his family for their support. He said people often run for a seat on the assembly to change the world, but the first budget cycle hits hard. Then, over time, they slowly realize the system isn’t broken.  

“Every administration leaves a small mark in the process,” Eisenbeisz said. “I’ve always looked at it with a lens of longevity. It is my intent to grow old and die here, and the decisions that I have made will directly affect the quality of life in the hopefully faraway future.”

Eisenbeisz’s departure was met with some tears. Assembly Member JJ Carlson, who has served as deputy mayor under Eisenbeisz, said they’ve both grown a lot since they met in the second grade. She thanked him for his leadership and said he leaves big shoes to fill.   

“You’ve built this team,” Carlson said. “You’ve built us to be the leaders of this community. And I really appreciate that time and that patience you’ve had with us to find our way, and not just do it as a mirror to you, but that support that you’ve given, and I’ve seen you do it to all of us, and there’s just lots of appreciation.”

Following Eisenbeisz’s recognition and a short recess to share cake, Sitka’s newly-elected mayor Kevin Mosher was sworn into office. He said he learned a lot from Eisenbeisz and expects the new body to continue to make respect a priority.

“I’ve been so fortunate to work with the assemblies I have, especially these last couple years,” he said. “It has been an absolute honor. You know, you look around and you see other assemblies or city councils, and they bicker, and that doesn’t happen [here]. We speak and discuss fervently for our opinions, but at the end of the day, we agree and we are kind and friendly to each other. And I just want to thank the assembly for that.” 

Mosher has served on the assembly since 2018, and ran one unsuccessful bid for mayor in 2022. He won the mayor’s seat with nearly 58% of the vote in last week’s municipal election. 

Incumbent JJ Carlson and newcomer Sherri Blankenship were also sworn in at Tuesday’s meeting. The assembly then voted 5 to 1 to appoint runner-up Darrell Windsor to fill Mosher’s vacant assembly seat until next year’s municipal election. Carlson voted against the appointment, saying she preferred to advertise for letters of interest. 

Visiting Scientist in Residence Fellow Ries Plescher, a PhD candidate at the University of Oregon Department of Earth Sciences, will be at the Sitka Sound Science Center through November 10. His research looks to understand when and where landslides and debris flows occur in Southeast Alaska. Plescher and Zofia Danielson, SSSC’s managing scientist, join KCAW to discuss what Plescher will work on during his one-month stint in Sitka and where the community can find him to learn more. Listen to the conversation here:

A group of birders stood still, their eyes fixed on the knotted roots of a spruce tree.

“Looks like a little brown fluffy golf ball,” said Chase Coleman, the research and education coordinator at the Sitka Sound Science Center. “It’s gonna be low to the ground.”

The group is looking for a Pacific Wren. Coleman, who’s been leading birding groups through Sitka National Historical Park, said the bird is small and difficult to spot.

“But they make themselves incredibly known by their sound,” Coleman said over the wren’s persistent chirps.

Since July, Coleman’s been guiding birdwalks once a month in partnership with Sitka National Historical Park. The early morning strolls are a chance for Sitkans to slow down and notice the world around them. 

“When they sing, they really want that prospective mate to hear it, and then [say] ‘Hey, choose me, listen to my song. It’s better than everyone else’s,'” he said of the Pacific Wren’s song. He said the forest is home to so many small birds.

“This big spruce tree almost acts as a huge, high-density apartment complex,” Coleman said.

It was a misty morning. A thick cloak of fog hugged the coastline. But Coleman said the dreary weather might’ve been a good thing for the five birders who woke up early.

“The visibility gets lower, the weather gets a little dicey. They might have to fly down and make a little pit stop,” Coleman said.

Gulls scattered across a spit jutting out into the ocean where the birders point their binoculars and cameras. 

“They’re always looking for their next meal, a carcass that’ll wash up,” Coleman said.

He said gulls are often overlooked, thought of as a snack-centric species, always pecking around for crabs and shellfish. But, just like bears or bald eagles, they’re a necessary part of Southeast’s ecosystem.

“They’re dragging carcasses up to the forests. They’re eating it and then defecating. They’re doing all these things to help that nutrient cycle happen and occur, and help the Tongass be what it is,” Coleman explained.

He said gulls are opportunistic creatures, and bald eagles are no different.

“A lot of times bald eagles are seeing what the gulls are picking up, eating. They’re wondering, ‘Hmm, could that be a meal for me?’ And if it is, then you’ll see them kind of fly right into the flock that’ll flush all the gulls out because they’re like, ‘Ooh, I cannot compete with that big bald eagle,’” Coleman said.

The birders walked over barnacle-covered stones, thick clumps of seaweed, and salmon carcasses along the beach. In the brush above the tideline, a black tail deer munched on dried-out fireweed. Also hiding in the thicket was a song sparrow, a small bird just a few inches tall. 

“It’s saying, ‘Hey, by the way, this is kind of where I live. This is where I get my food. Don’t come any closer to me because if you do, I’m gonna fly away,'” Coleman said.

Next, he led the crew up into the woods.

“I almost feel like we’re walking into a big football stadium,” Coleman said.

As they moved toward the river, the excitement (and volume) of the gulls feasting on the salmon run grew. Kaasda Héen was moving swiftly with all the recent rain. Birds flew upstream, plopped down on the water, and floated downriver with their fish before circling back again.

The birders soaked up the sights and sounds of the gulls before taking the trail back into the forest. But before they went home for the day, the group stopped to check out one more spruce tree next to the parking lot.

“So that was a wren, and then that little doot-doot, that was a chickadee,” Coleman explained. “This little kind of more aggressive, louder sound, that tut tut-tut, that’s the wren.”

Coleman said you don’t need a background in ornithology to identify birds. He said there’s a lot to learn from books or neighbors about the birds in Sitka’s skies and on the forest floors. 

“It’s about us going out and finding pleasure in these kind of more mundane, maybe overlooked things. And if you have that mindset, it makes going outside a lot more fun,” he said.

With walks the first Sunday of every month, the group is excited to see what birds will flock to the Tongass as winter approaches.