Starting Friday, the City and Borough of Juneau is reinstating 50 percent capacity limits at bars and gymnasiums. Indoor gatherings are once again limited to 50 people or less, with masks required, unless the gathering has an approved Covid-19 mitigation plan on file with the city. Already, the city has made masks mandatory in city-owned buildings, including the Augustus Brown Swimming Pool.
This, in a small city that has seen about 65 percent of its residents completing their vaccinations against Covid-19, and over 200 new vaccinations being administered per week. Over 78 percent of Juneau residents have at least one shot of the two-shot series. In addition, more than 1,545 Juneau residents have had a bout with the virus, and three have died, with their deaths attributed to the virus.
It appears herd immunity is difficult to attain even in such a compliant community.
Health officials say that there’s an uptick in coronavirus cases in Juneau, sparking these new mandates. Juneau saw 29 new cases of Covid-19 on July 20-21, and 16 new cases on July 22.
In addition to the capacity measures, personal service businesses in Juneau must now require appointments, and cannot have waiting areas inside.
The Legislature will gavel into special session on Monday, Aug. 2, but it’s not certain there will be many legislators in Juneau as the first day is predicted to be a technical session, with no quorum to conduct business.
Radical eco-leftist Tracy Stone-Manning’s nomination to run the Bureau of Land Management split the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, with a 10-10 vote to move her nomination to the floor. As such, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer will need to use his powers to “discharge” the nomination from the committee.
Stone-Manning has been a senior advisor at the National Wildlife Federation based in Montana, and was chief of staff to Democrat Gov. Steve Bullock. She was a senior aide to Democrat Sen. John Tester.
But when she was younger, she was supportive and actively enabled a radical Earth First! initiative that involved driving metal spikes into trees in order to harm loggers and discourage the forest industry.
The vote was along party lines, with Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski voting no. Murkowski said that in addition to the nominee’s troubling past involvement with eco-terrorism, Tracy Stone-Manning has shown no evidence she supports multiple uses of public lands.
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, praised Stone-Manning’s history of bipartisanship and said the charge of eco-terrorism was not to be believed.
Sen. John Barasso of Wyoming, the ranking Republican member of the committee, spoke afterward at length against her nomination:
“I come to the floor today to oppose the nomination of Tracy Stone-Manning to be the director of the Bureau of Land Management. This morning the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted on her nomination. Every Republican on the committee voted no. Before our business meeting was over, Senator Schumer came to the floor and praised this nominee to the skies.
President Biden and the Democrats have wrapped their arms around this nomination and they won’t let go.
So the question is – who is this nominee that the Democrats are embracing and every Republican voted against?
Tracy Stone-Manning, as a graduate student, collaborated with eco-terrorists. These are people who hammered hundreds of metal spikes – 500 pounds of metal spikes – into trees in our national forest in Idaho. Tree spiking involves hammering these rods into a tree.
Why did they do that? Well, they want to stop progress in terms of logging. They want to stop progress in terms of firefighting. Because if a logger or firefighter were to hit this rod with a chainsaw, the chainsaw would shatter. Devastating injuries have occurred as a result. If the saw is used in sawmills, and were to hit one of these as they’re planing through the tree to produce boards, the entire blade shatters. It’s been described to me by someone who has worked in one of these mills – it’s like a hand grenade going off – damaging people all around the vicinity. The results can be fatal, and there are examples around the country where this has actually happened.
Even the Washington Post has labeled tree spiking as eco-terrorism.
Tracy Stone-Manning, as a member of a radical group, edited, typed and then anonymously sent a profanity-laced letter threatening the U.S. Forest Service.Here are just a few quotes from the letter.
She typed, ‘You bastards go in there anyway and a lot of people could get hurt.’
She typed, ‘I would be more than willing to pay you a dollar for the sale, but you would have to find me first and that could be your WORST nightmare.’
She then mailed this threatening letter to the target of the tree spiking, the U.S. Forest Service.She and her circle were investigated.They were investigated for their involvement with this ring of eco-terrorists and this eco-terrorist attack.
She was subpoenaed. She was ordered to give hair sampling, palm sampling, handwriting sampling, fingerprint samples to the investigators.
She knew full well who the tree spikers were.She could have easily gone to the authorities to identify them.She did not.
She covered it up for years, refused to cooperate with investigators. Recently, in the last couple of months, Tracy Stone-Manning came before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.She came for her confirmation hearing.
Since that hearing and the statements that she made to the committee, an affidavit she swore under oath and signed, since that time – several people involved in her original case have come forward to the press and to the committee to set the record straight from the record of the story she told the committee at the time.The lead investigator on this case wrote a letter to Chairman Manchin and me.
That investigator, who has worked as a special criminal investigator for the United States government for 28 years, been a long time member of the U.S. military – served in Vietnam, and retired as a criminal investigator because of death threats made to him and his family by the group that worked on this eco-terrorism.
He wrote to the committee that she was the ‘nastiest of the suspects.’ He said she not only had knowledge of the plan to spike these trees, she was one of the planners.
He wrote to us, ‘It became clear that Ms. Stone-Manning was an active member of the original group that planned the spiking of the Post Office timber sale.’ Then just last week, one of the convicted tree spikers – one of the people that actually went to jail because of that, he came forward in an interview with the press.
In an interview with E&E News, the convicted tree spiker confirmed Tracy Stone-Manning knew of the plan to spike the trees ‘well in advance.’ According to the investigator’s letter, Ms. Stone-Manning’s lack of cooperation set back the initial investigation many years.
Eventually, when she was identified and received an investigation target letter, she had to make a decision.
The lead investigator said she only agreed to testify after she was caught, and after her lawyer negotiated an immunity deal.
Tracy Stone-Manning helped plan the tree spiking. She covered up for the terrorists and their activity for years. She refused to cooperate with the authorities. She only testified when she was caught and given immunity. After all of this, she created a story and lied to our committee about the incident.
On a sworn affidavit in her committee questionnaire, she said it was it was an ‘alleged’ tree spiking and that she was not the subject of an investigation. I specifically asked her, ‘Did you have personal knowledge of, participate in, or in any way directly or indirectly support activities associated with the spiking of trees in any forest during your lifetime?’
Her response under oath was ‘no.’
Both the cop – the criminal investigator – and the criminal – the man who went to jail for this – both came forward after her hearing to say Tracy Stone-Manning was lying to the Senate.
Over the past 30 years, she has made contradictory statements about this eco-terrorist incident. In 2013, she told a Montana State Senate Committee she was intimidated into sending the letter by a stranger. Yet in courtroom testimony she admitted the tree spikers were her friends. She was one of the ring leaders of the group. Mr. President, there are many qualified Democrats who could run the Bureau of Land Management. Within the federal government, this is the group that oversees an eighth of all of the land in the United States.
It is astonishing to me that Democrats are digging in to defend a proven liar and an eco-terrorist collaborator.
Senator Schumer came to the floor today and made it very clear that he will support this deeply flawed nominee. Will other Democrats do it as well? Will other Democrats that have millions of acres of BLM land in their states join him? Things have certainly changed since, and it’s interesting what has happened to the Bureau of Land Management nominees because Preside Obama’s BLM director, Bob Abbey came forward. He said her actions ‘should disqualify her’ from leading this important agency.One Biden administration official admitted to NBC News that her nomination was ‘a massive vetting failure.’
There will be more to say about this nominee when an attempt is made to discharge her out of the committee – if they get to that point – the cloture vote on the floor and again her vote on confirmation. Lots to be said, more information will come out.
It is hard for me, as the ranking member of that committee, to imagine a nominee more disqualified than Tracy Stone-Manning.
She collaborated with eco-terrorists.She lied to the Senate.She continues to harbor extremist views that most Americans find reprehensible.
I strongly oppose her nomination.
I urge all of my colleagues to do the same.
Tracy Stone-Manning is unfit to serve.
Her nomination will now go to the Senate for a full vote.
Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan has asked President Joe Biden to withdraw the nomination, but it appears that Stone-Manning will be confirmed by the thinnest of margins.
The legislative working group tasked with presenting a long-term solution to the state’s fiscal imbalance has met a few times, but has little to show for their work since convening July 7. Many of the financial presentations that have been staged for the group have been heard numerous times during the regular session.
Now, the working group will begin meeting every day until the Aug. 2 special session, and may continue meeting even after that session begins, until the group has a product to offer the Legislature.
The Thursday, July 22 meeting will be a public meeting, beginning at 2:30 pm with an overview of constitutional amendment proposals. The governor has requested that the Legislature allow the voters to decide if the Permanent Fund dividend calculation formula should be in the State Constitution. Documents are at this link. The meeting will beteleconferenced at this link.
Friday, July 23 will be an “internal work session,” not open to the public. More of these private meetings will continue Saturday and Sunday.
The next public meeting will be Monday, July 26 at 3 pm, with presentations from the different members on their proposed fiscal plans.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, they’ll go back into “internal conversation,” otherwise known as executive session.
Thepublic will be able to provide testimony next Thursday, Friday, and Saturday:
Thursday, July 29, 6-9 pm: Anchorage
Friday, July 30, 6-9 pm: Mat-Su
Saturday, July 31, 1-4 pm Fairbanks
At this point, the public doesn’t have the information to inform their testimony and it’s unclear when the public will be given the draft proposals.
Sunday, Aug. 1, the co-chairs hope to wrap up “if we have anything to show for it,” according to the group’s schedule.
Monday, Aug. 2 is the first day of special session. The House Speaker and Senate President may gavel in and out in a “technical session” if there is nothing from the working group to look at, and this could be the case for many days after special session starts.
The working group’s co-chairs are Sen. Lyman Hoffman, the longest serving legislator in Alaska history, and Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tompkins. Both are Democrats.
The group is trying to solve the problem created by Senate Bill 26 four years ago. That bill created a structured “draw” from the Permanent Fund Earnings Reserve Account to help pay for government. But SB 26 did not address how the Permanent Fund dividend would be paid, and since SB 26 passed, the dividend has been relegated to a “what’s left over” status, in violation of Alaska Statute.
As one of her parting gifts to the new mayor, former acting Mayor Austin Quinn-Davidson had the municipality’s website remodeled, to put the focus on social media, specifically her “Acting Mayor” Facebook newsfeed, and a chart showing the progress of Anchorage residents who had been vaccinated.
This is what it looked like the day that Mayor Dave Bronson took over as mayor:
What the Municipality of Anchorage website looked like in June, just before Bronson took office, with an emphasis on the mayor’s Facebook page and vaccine progress.
It was a devolution from the prior municipal website, which was user friendly. Must Read Alaska can’t show you that page because the Muni has scrubbed those versions from the web. There is no backup copy of the old website. Some have suggested this was an act of sabotage against the new mayor.
Now, the 11th-hour design dumped on Bronson is being dismantled bit by bit. No more is the emphasis on the mayor’s Facebook page. And gone is the pie chart showing how many people have gotten the Covid-19 vaccine and how close it is to the former acting mayor’s 70 percent goal. View the Muni.org website here.
Only two features remain: A Twitter feed and a “Top Requests” menu. Everything else a person might want is buried in a menu on the upper right-hand corner.
Sources in the Bronson Administration say the website was left a mess. Further investigation shows that is the case, that the Muni.org website is not secure and those entering information into the website search functions are putting their information at risk:
On Saturday, a drug-addled man at the Anchorage Loussac Library was observed overdosed on heroin in the first-floor bathroom. He had pills and marijuana in his pockets, and his feet were bare and bleeding. An ambulance took him away.
That bathroom is the same one used by four-year-olds on their way upstairs to check out a book at the city’s largest library.
This is not an uncommon occurrence in city libraries these days. The same places that are comfortable and semi-private places for studying and reading are also comfy corners for people to shoot up.
Libraries have morphed into day shelters for drug addicts, homeless, and mentally ill people, and increasingly they are not places where children can go to learn to read. The mission has drifted badly as libraries are dual purpose druggie hangouts and book dispensaries.
It’s in this environment that Sami Graham has emerged as the kindly leader to help steer the Anchorage Public Libraries in a new direction. After all, Mayor Dave Bronson was elected to take the city in a “new direction,” according to his campaign slogan. Why not start with the headquarters for Drag Queen Story Hour?
But Graham, the mayor’s nominee to run Anchorage Public Libraries, is running into a wall of protest from the professional librarian syndicate. The “professional librarians” are petrified that if someone without a library science degree is chosen to run the libraries, their control, and their gate-keeping over these important and well-paying jobs will be diminished. Fifty of them have sent letters to the Anchorage Assembly saying Graham must not be confirmed under any circumstance. It’s going to be a fight between the librarian cartel and the rest of us.
Graham doesn’t have a master’s degree in library science, they argue, and that’s clearly a part of the job requirement. She has two other masters degrees — one in educational leadership and one in counseling, which could come in handy with the current clientele these days. But no master’s in the “science” of libraries.
Graham, a retired school principal, has managed libraries, librarians, buildings, staff, and crises in that role. She has taught reading to all ages. She is a counselor.
But as the nominee to run the Anchorage Public Libraries, she faces opposition from what has become a library mafia — the American Library Association and its local representatives. If Graham’s name was Barack Obama, these librarians would probably let it go, because, according to the data, librarians are almost exclusively registered Democrats.
The ALA is leading in the culture wars on America, condoning such events as Drag Queen Story Hour in children’s libraries and allowing porn to be distributed on publicly funded computers, visible and audible to those in the vicinity. There is hardly a library management in America that doesn’t require successful applicants to be indoctrinated and educated into the group-think by those already in the library field.
If they let Graham be the librarian, it’s the end of the need for the library science degree. For them, it’s equivalent to letting lawyers practice without law school and the bar exam. They see themselves as certified professionals, like civil engineers or medical doctors.
Libraries have changed over the past half century. They were once places for families with children, but increasingly are warming shelters or, in hot climates, cooling shelters for the mentally ill or strung out.
Librarians now manage not only books, but movies, internet, computers, access to research materials, micro-fiche, and ensuring their operations are safe. Few of them see their job as helping children develop a love of reading. They are running what has become essentially a content retail outlet — books and material going in and going out.
Increasingly, parents don’t trust those staffing urban libraries to look out for the values of families or to provide for their safety, with a growing presence of mentally ill and drug addicts leaving needles in the restrooms or in the stacks.
There are solutions, such as creating stand-alone libraries for children and their parents, but these are expensive. Librarians can also trespass people off the property and stop providing social services, or create a very separate place that is just for adults to do what some adults want to do.
Will the syndicate of librarians and the wretched results they’ve allowed to be normalized be broken? Or will the Anchorage Assembly say no to Graham, allow libraries to continue their fast decline, as they put the interests of the radical left above the interests of Anchorage children?
Suzanne Downing is publisher of Must Read Alaska and Must Read America.
“This invitation to investigate our own country under the authority of this Council is an insult to the American people and a mockery of actual human rights atrocities being committed around the world”
U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, sent a letterto Secretary of State Antony Blinken today, urging him to rescind the Biden Administration’s invitation for investigators from the United Nations Human Rights Council to scrutinize the United States’ human rights record.
Sullivan said the Biden Administration’s intent to rejoin the council following America’s withdrawal from its seat during the Bush and Trump administrations is “misguided.”
Sen. Sullivan pointed out that the council’s membership includes some of the world’s most egregious human rights abusers, including China, Cuba and Venezuela. A
He also said that the council has been silent and ineffectual in the face of violent suppression of peaceful demonstrators in Cuba, chronic human rights abuses in Iran, and genocide and unprecedented surveillance of its citizens committed by the Chinese Communist Party.
The Sullivan letter reads:
Dear Secretary Blinken:
I write today with significant concern over the recent decision by the Biden administration to extend an official invitation to Special Rapporteurs from the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to visit the United States and scrutinize our country’s record on human rights.
As I know you are well aware, UN Special Rapporteurs are typically dispatched to areas of the world to investigate allegations and conduct fact-finding missions in countries accused of gross human rights violations. Historical examples include but are not limited to Iran, Somalia, North Korea and Belarus – all nations, unlike the United States, routinely threatening and suppressing individual liberties and freedoms.
Additionally, the idea that the United States should rejoin the UNHRC – a body that includes Communist China, Socialist Venezuela and Communist Cuba – is misguided. The U.S. rightly withdrew from its seat on the Council during the Bush and Trump administrations because of the body’s shameful history of routinely enabling chronic human rights abusers within the Council’s own ranks. This membership includes the Chinese Communist Party, which is actively engaged in government sponsored genocide against the Uyghur people and continues to widely censor, abridge, monitor, and surveil its citizens to a degree rarely seen in human history. Socialist Venezuela, also on the UNHRC, continues to brutally suppress the freedom of expression, association and assembly of its people. Finally, the Communist Cuban regime – also a member of the Council and designated by the Department of State as a state sponsor of terrorism – is currently in the throes of a violent state-driven crackdown on its citizens who are bravely and peacefully protesting in the pursuit of freedom. This invitation to investigate our own country under the authority of this Council is an insult to the American people and a mockery of actual human rights atrocities being committed around the world.
In our meeting prior to your confirmation, we had a robust discussion on the importance of Biden administration officials refraining from embarking upon an “apology tour,” criticizing decisions made by past administrations abroad – something I also spoke at great length with U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield prior to her confirmation. While I agree with your statement that “great nations such as ours do not hide from our shortcomings; they acknowledge them openly and strive to improve with transparency,” I would also remind you that our country is resilient and, as Americans, we have a long history of addressing our shortcomings on our own as we strive towards a more perfect union. We certainly don’t need to provide propaganda opportunities to the countries on the UNHRC led by Communist and authoritarian governments with deplorable records on human rights, and that is exactly what your invitation will do.
I respectfully ask you to rescind this invitation and publically recognize this important fact: the United States has done more to liberate men, women and children across the globe from tyranny and oppression – literally hundreds of millions of people – than any other country in human history.
Bernie Bradley was sitting at the front door at high-top at Bradley House Restaurant, sipping a Coke as customers streamed through the door on Tuesday night.
In front of her, she had a petition and a map of Anchorage neighborhoods.
“Do you live in Meg Zaletel’s district?” she would ask customers who were coming through the door to dine at her well-loved establishment, just five days before she shuts her doors for good.
She was picking up dozens of signatures on the petition to recall Zaletel from the Anchorage Assembly.
Zaletel and other left-wing members of the Assembly are who Bernie holds responsible for having to shut her restaurant’s doors. Due to the numerous government mandates and shutdowns of restaurants over the past year, she can’t get workers to help in the kitchen or to serve customers, and she’s emotionally exhausted by the whiplash of open-shut-and-limited-capacity mandates; she made the decision earlier this year that it was time to let it go.
Bradley told Must Read Alaska she has sold the restaurant to another popular local restaurant owner, who she hopes will open up a new concept restaurant and continue the tradition in some respect, even if under a different name.
A lot of local history is ending this week. The Bradley House is on property that was purchased by Bernie’s parents in 1962. Her parents (Irish dad, Okinawan mom) moved the family house to the second level in 1964, and ran various businesses on the first floor, including a bar. That bar had the same liquor license she uses today. Her parents started Oriental Gardens restaurant officially in 1966.
“By the time my dad stopped building the restaurant had in addition to traditional dining areas….26 single table private dining rooms, 7 banquet rooms, 8 teppanyaki tables, a cocktail lounge with dancing & live music. It was a 25,000 square foot building with seating for 700. It was a south Anchorage landmark for decades. It burned completely in May of 1996,” she said.
Bradley House opened in 2000 and reactivated the Oriental Gardens liquor license. It was intended to be a bar with some greasy finger foods, “but South Anchorage customers made the concept change with affectionate tenacity. the food, cocktails, flower beds, deck, waterfalls, changing menus, sound berm, summer outdoor food/bar service, restroom cleanliness, and much more…were repeatedly requested and the reward has been uncanny South Anchorage loyalty,” Bradley said.
Bradley House was packed on Tuesday night with every table full and people even sitting at tables under umbrellas on the deck in back as the rain came down, and the remaining wait staff was working orders as fast as they could. Customers were greeting Bradley and many seemed like they wanted to be there to support her during her final week in the restaurant business after a lifetime of restaurants.
The final night for Bradley House is July 25, 21 years after Bernie Bradley raised a destination restaurant from the ashes of the old Oriental Gardens.
The Associated Press reports that U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland will visit Alaska in September.
Haaland committed to U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan during her confirmation meetings that she would meet with residents of King Cove, where community members have been denied by the Interior Department a short gravel road to a life-saving airport.
Sullivan and Murkowski both voted to confirm Haaland on March 15, although at this point it’s unclear which of them will serve as host lawmaker to the radical leftist former New Mexico U.S. Representative. Both Sullivan and Murkowski have received considerable criticism from conservatives for their vote to confirm her.
Justice Department attorney Michael T. Gray told AP that Haaland will travel to Alaska after an appeals court hearing on the Interior Department decision on Aug. 4, and Gray said people in the community are too busy with subsistence fishing to entertain her now.
Haaland “will not complete her review of this matter until she has an opportunity to visit King Cove in person and meet with the people of King Cove and other stakeholders,” Gray told AP.
King Cove and Cold Bay are separated by the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, and the Department of Interior has opposed allowing a one-lane gravel road between the communities so that King Cove residents who need medical care can get to the all-weather airport.
Allowing the road to Cold Bay was one of the promises made by former President Donald Trump, but that decision was stopped by federal judges.
A federal District Court decision released on June 1 resoundingly shut down the Interior Department’s second attempt at an illegal land exchange with the King Cove Corporation to make way for a road through vital protected wetlands in Izembek National Wildlife Refuge. For the second time, the courts prioritized birds over human life when they told road advocates that the slice through the refuge was unacceptable.
