KFSK Midday Magazine

Senate Finance Committee co-chair Senator Bert Stedman talks with KFSK's Shelby Herbert about Alaska's budget; the Petersburg Indian Association voted to appoint Christine Yatchmenoff to the council's sixth seat; a 91 year old cruise tourist is suing the Ketchikan Borough for negligence after his mobility scooter tipped over on a public bus.

The Petersburg Borough Assembly will consider raising the maximum taxable single purchase from $1,200 to $5,000 at their meeting tonight; the Ketchikan School District delivered lay off notices to 52 teachers last week, but expects to recall most of the if state and local funding for education comes through; Alaska Congresswoman Mary Peltola continues to be one of the Democrats most likely to vote against her party.

Lawmakers in Juneau have finished their session, passing dozens of bills and finalizing the state's operating budget; classical musicians The Rice Brothers will perform tonight in Petersburg; Ketchikan's only 24 hour public homeless shelter stopped offering overnight services Wednesday.

The Stikine River federal subsistence Chinook salmon fishery closed yesterday and will remain closed for the next month; the Ketchikan Borough was scammed out of more than half a million dollars earlier this month; Petersburg residents work together in an attempt to finish the biggest puzzle in the world.

Alaskans will likely receive roughly $1,650 each this fall for their Permanent Fund dividend; Petersburg High School's track and field team has been training hard ahead of their Region V meet in Ketchikan this weekend; Petersburg volunteer fire department Captain Dan Bird was named the winner of a state fire fighter award last week.

The Petersburg School Board will look at a second draft budget for the coming year at tonight's meeting; researchers look at whether a hatchery-only king salmon sport fishery would be possible in Southeast Alaska; a Senate bill signed into law last month gives injured commercial fishermen and boat owners in Alaska access to higher insurance reimbursements.

Alaskans who sued the state last year over long wait times for food assistance are asking a federal judge to order the state to speed up processing; a farm near Kodiak is planning to test the feasibility of growing three kinds of kelp; a looks at what people can expect during Petersburg's Little Norway Festival this week.

The Alaska Legislature shot down one of Gov. Mike Dunleavy's nominees to the state Board of Education this week; Alaska officials announce the launch of a campaign aimed at combating fentanyl; late last month, the U.S. Coast Guard decommissioned the Anacapa. The cutter was stationed in Petersburg for more than three decades.

Goldmines in Canada near the border of British Columbia can negatively impact fisheries downstream in Alaska. A report from a nonprofit says some operate like a Ponzi scheme; The FBI arrested a cruise ship employee in Juneau after he allegedly stabbed people with scissors aboard the Norwegian Encore; the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for women, infants and children, known as WIC, will now include more low-mercury fish.

GCI customers in Bethel and across the state have been complaining of interruptions in phone services; a look at how the sale of Peter Pan's seafood processing plant in King Cove will affect this year's salmon season in the region; Petersburg residents marched downtown Sunday in observance of Alaska's first Missing and Murdered Indigenous People Awareness Day.