The general manager and the managing editor of the Juneau Empire have given their two-weeks notice, according to sources close to the newspaper.
Robert Monteith, who took over as general manager 13 months ago, and Emily Russo Miller, who started as a reporter and worked her way up to managing editor, will leave this month.
Miller has already found other work in Juneau.
Last month, the newspaper downsized the newsroom, laying off sports reporter Nolan Ainsworth, who has since been hired by KINY radio‘s newsroom. Michael Penn, the photographer who had been at the capital city newspaper for 24 years, was also laid off.
The newsroom is now staffed by four employees — the managing editor, who is the newsroom’s top employee, and three reporters.
As with most newspapers, the Empire has struggled to maintain circulation and profitability, as more and more digital outlets cover news, and as a younger generation grows up without the habit of a print edition arriving in the box each morning.
Beginning June 10, 2019, the Empire ceased printing Monday editions and shuttered the Capital City Weekly.
The newspaper had been owned since 1969 by Morris Communications, and was sold to Gatehouse Communications in 2017. In 2018, Gatehouse sold the newspaper to Sound Publishing, an owner of small newspapers around the Northwest.
Michael Prax, Tom Studler, and Fred Villa are the three Republicans whose names are being forwarded to Gov. Mike Dunleavy for filling the District 3 vacancy that occurred when Rep. Tammie Wilson resigned.
The North Pole area District met and interviewed applicants on Friday, Alaska Republican Party District 3 met to consider applications to fill the State House District 3 vacancy created as a result of the resignation of House Representative Tammie Wilson.
Michael Prax: Former member of the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly, founder of Interior Alaska Conservative Coalition, and longtime political activist since high school, who has worked to elect numerous candidates. Lifelong Interior resident, he comes from the more Libertarian viewpoint.
Thomas Studler: Currently legislative aide to Rep. Dave Talerico. He’s been involved in local party politics and attends many State Central Committee meetings, and been a delegate to state convention.
Fred Villa: Former associate vice president for Workforce Programs at UAF, where he worked for many years.
The names have been forwarded to the governor. Gov. Dunleavy has 30 days from the time Rep. Wilson resigned.
On Jan. 24, Wilson left her House seat to become a policy adviser at the Alaska Department of Health and Human Services. She has been interested in improving operations at the department’s Office of Children’s Services.
Liz Vazquez is joining the Department of Administration as the director of the Violent Crimes Compensation Board.
Vazquez has extensive government experience, including work with the State of Alaska, the federal government, and the Alaska State Legislature. She is also an attorney.
Vazquez started her career in public service in the federal government, in the General Counsel’s Office in both the Department of the Treasury and Comptroller of the Currency.
She had a long career with the State of Alaska as a prosecutor, assistant attorney general in the Department of Law; administrative law judge, and quality assurance coordinator in the DHSS Commissioner’s office. She also served a term in the Alaska State Legislature.
Vazquez’s law degree is from the Cornell Law School. She has two masters degrees in business administration and certifications from the National Judicial College in three subjects: Administrative Litigation, Dispute Resolution, and Mediation.
The Department of Administration said farewell to Kate Hudson for her many years of committed public service as the Director the board. In restructuring the office to better serve the interest of public safety, this position has been moved to Anchorage, where Vazquez will have a greater ability to work with other agencies that serve victims, such as Standing Together Against Rape and Victims for Justice.
Sen. Dan Sullivan took environmental hypocrites to task today during a hearing in the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on Wednesday.
He rebuked 16 Democrat senators for signing several letters to the heads of the nation’s 15 largest banks, calling on the institutions to refrain from investing on Alaska’s North Slope, particularly within the 1002 Area of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
“Unprecedented. I’ve been here five years. Over one-third of Democrats in the Senate sent a letter to some of the top bankers in America to further impoverish my constituents. Unprecedented,” he said. He went on to say he doesn’t tell other senators how to run their states, but this action by mainly Democrats is something he’s seen time and again.
“I’m beyond steamed on this one. I’m disappointed. It’s sad,” he said.
“Nothing fires me up quite like Senate Democrats, who represent states that have already degraded their environments with irresponsible development, telling Alaskans how to manage our pristine environment and seeking to further impoverish some of our poorest citizens,” Sullivan said.
I’ve always wondered what went through my 16-year-old mother’s mind when she found out she was pregnant. Did a doctor tell her how easy it would be to end my life? That no one would have to know, not her boyfriend, not even her parents? Did she worry about being shamed and embarrassed? About not living up to someone’s expectations?
Unfortunately, this scenario occurs millions of times every year in the United States, but it’s a situation that I, by the grace of God, escaped from unscathed.
My mother chose to give me life. She was undoubtedly given an opportunity to choose a path that the world tells women is an easy way out – a quiet exit from pregnancy where no one would never know of her “mistakes.”
But she didn’t take that route. She took the hard path, and I’m here today because she did.
Because of her selflessness, I’ve lived to give birth to three beautiful children of my own. I get to tell my story today because my biological mother chose life, and because God blessed me with wonderful adoptive parents, David and Charlotte Richards, who exemplified what it meant to be kind, loving, and gracious.
Because of my personal history, I value the sanctity of life to the very core of my being.
Over the weekend, I had several Right to Life supporters contact me because they had been told that I voted against a pro-life bill. I shared my testimony with them, and we talked about creating a culture of life in Alaska.
I told them about our House Finance team’s efforts last year that stripped abortion funding from the state budget – and how we fought and won the battle to keep that amendment in place through the entire budget process. I told them how much the cause of life means to me.
Ronald Reagan’s phrase, “trust but verify,” is a reminder to Americans that we shouldn’t simply believe everything we hear.
These engaged Alaskans may have trusted what they had initially heard about my vote, but they also did what every conservative should be willing to do: they called me to verify.
These open-minded, kind, compassionate people now know that they have a true pro-life advocate working on their behalf – not just one who screams loudly at others and files dozens of bills without any plan to bring them to light.
Kelly Merrick represents Alaska’s 14th District, Eagle River, in the Alaska House of Representatives.
You’ve heard the saying “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” to explain how you can succeed by working hard and using your own resourcefulness, without the help of others.
One Democrat in Congress wants you to know that it’s impossible to pull oneself up by shoelaces or bootstraps — that it is a physical impossibility.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York City, lectured a room on Wednesday during an Oversight Committee hearing:
“You know this idea and this metaphor of a bootstrap started off as a joke?” Ocasio-Cortez asked the room. “Because it’s a physical impossibility to lift yourself up by a bootstrap — by your shoelaces. It’s physically impossible. The whole thing is a joke,” she said emphatically.
In case you didn’t quite grasp what she was getting at, here’s the video of the congresswoman, who later that day skipped the State of the Union address by President Trump.
During the public testimony at the Regulatory Commission of Alaska concerning the purchase of BP assets in Alaska by Hilcorp, Rick Whitback, representing Power the Future, gave the commissioners encouragement and a warning about the testimony that was going to be given by the environmental lobby over the next six hours.
Whitbeck’s 3-minute testimony upset the environmentalists who spoke after him, and during a break in the six-hour public hearing they could be heard cursing him with the F-bomb.
Those opposing the sale said they want to see Hilcorp’s financial details first to know if the company is wealthy enough to take over BP’s assets on the North Slope. One testifier, a former newspaper writer who is now with the left-leaning Alaska Grassroots Alliance, said Hilcorp should be required to build light rail from the valley in exchange for the RCA approval of the sale.
Here’s the testimony by Whitbeck, state director for Power the Future, that got the Left so distraught:
I appreciate the opportunity to put my comments on record. My name is Rick Whitbeck and I am a 35-year Alaska resident who serves as the State Director for Power The Future, a national non-profit focused on energy workers and their importance in national security, American energy independence and energy dominance, as well as employees’ roles in Alaska’s cornerstone industries.
Throughout this hearing, you are going to be inundated with the same drivel over and over. That some poll said that some number of Alaskans want Hilcorp to open its books – and you know what they say about polls – you can write one to obtain any result you want. You’ll also hear that Hilcorp isn’t worthy of carrying on the 50-year BP legacy in the state, for some litany of reasons. All of which are factually unfounded, but instead, based on an unhealthy and near-lunatic fringe level of anxiety and fear.
What these commenters really are deviously implying– on all accounts – is that in your role as Commissioners, you lack the objectivity, clarity of purpose and intelligence to do your jobs without this horde of angry, always-disenchanted malcontents besieging you with how to do it right. News flash. You’re good. They need to get over themselves. – Rick Whitbeck, Power the Future
The facts are clear. Hilcorp has complied with all legal requests from state and federal agencies to-date. They’ve opened their books to the extent required by law. They’ve provided written and oral testimony, business plans and content as requested.
What you won’t hear from these annoying critics is that Hilcorp is capable, ready and willing to take an asset that BP was looking to rid itself of, and enhance its future operations. This is a clear free-market win for Alaska – Hilcorp will run Prudhoe Bay and the other assets in ways BP didn’t want to going forward. They will keep employees working and keep families in Alaska. They will allow communities to have continued involvement from the hundreds of energy workers who make up large portions their very societal fabric.
Adding delays to this buy/sell process will add anxiety to employees who already have been under pressure for many months. Let’s have this process move forward, denying the dissident voices what they really hope to accomplish, which is having oil and gas stay in the ground, revenues failing to hit state and local coffers, and paychecks failing to be paid, without any regard for the families affected by their egregious actions.
Let’s go back and just ask the employees involved what they think of that above-mentioned poll. I know their answer. 100% of them will want to continue what they’re currently doing – safely, efficiently, effectively and responsibly developing Alaska’s oil and gas reserves, just under the Hilcorp banner.
Please consider the workers. They are Alaska’s greatest resource. They deserve protection from this mob of protestors who gnash their collective teeth, questioning your aptitudes, abilities and judgment, while having nothing factual to stand on.
The RCA is the ultimate authority deciding if a major portion of the sale of BP assets to Hilcorp can go through.
Over the hours of testimony, about 100 people spoke. During the first half of the day, the testimony swung in favor of the sale, but as the day wore on, the anti-sale group took over and won the day with more people either opposed to the sale, or saying there needs to be more information.
DIGITAL CONVERSION PROJECT AFTER 6 YEARS IS HALF BAKED?
Commissioner of Administration Kelly Tshibaka says state has given more than $4.6 million to Alaska Public Broadcasting Inc. over six years to convert rural public broadcasting stations from analog to digital so they will be in compliance with federal law. But despite her department’s efforts, she can’t find out how many are actually converted.
Of the 76 to 115 sites APBI said it “converted” or “deployed” (mailed) conversion equipment to, APBI has no record of which sites are actually transmitting digital signal as of November, 2019, when APBI did not have its contract renewed with the state.
“There is no accurate record of which communities actually have equipment installed,” Tshibaka said. She said her department has anecdotal information that shows that equipment was sent to some communities, but either wasn’t installed or wasn’t maintained by APBI.
For years, Tshibaka said, the State believed that a list of sites labeled as “deployed” or “converted” by APBI means those communities are successfully transmitting digital signal and receiving public media over those digital communications system, but there is no way to knowing if that is accurate because APBI and Alaska Public Broadcasting Commission have been unresponsive.
Tshibaka said that the Alaska Public Broadcasting Commission itself had not met since last June, even though her department is willing and able to provide administrative support to help the commission, so it can fulfill its statutory duty of applying for grants.
It appears that more than 100 of the stations in rural Alaska remain to be converted to digital. But in her presentation, Tshibaka had put a big question mark in that spot, because the information her department has assembled in its investigation has come up against a commission and a public-private corporation that has been resistant to being transparent.
Democrats in the committee room were appalled at the presentation.
Reps. Zack Fields and Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins said it proved the Dunleavy Administration is hostile to public broadcasting, and Kreiss-Tomkins abruptly left the room to call APBI Executive Director Mollie Kabler to get some points for a rebuttal.
When he returned, he said that the commission and the corporation had a bad relationship with the Dunleavy Administration, and that he wanted to put a stop to the presentation about the performance of the publicly funded entity.
“It feels so unconstructive to have such an antagonistic attitude. It feels as though bad faith or incompetence is being ascribed to the corporation or commission. It’s unfortunate we’re going down this rabbit hole. I suspect a lot of this will be refuted and I suggest we stop doing it,” Kreiss-Tomkins said.
Mollie Kabler, the executive director of APBI, had made a presentation earlier in the week asking the committee to give her corporation more funds. She lives in Kreiss-Tomkins’ district and has been in charge of the contract for its entirety. Kreiss-Tomkins was defending a friend, laying the blame for APBI’s failure on the Dunleavy Administration.
Rep. Zack Fields criticized Tshibaka for her pronunciation of Kwigillingok, saying it was little wonder their equipment wasn’t working since the commissioner of Administration was not pronouncing their community’s name correctly.
“If you can’t pronounce it you can’t maintain it,” he said.
Update: Must Read Alaska has verified that Tshibaka pronounced Kwigillingok correctly.
Fields, earlier this week, had pounded the Dunleavy Administration for an $8,000 a month sole source contract that the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority has with Clark Penney.
But during the hearing today, he did not mention any problems with the sole-source contract that the state has had with APBI to convert all the rural communities to digital signals.
In fact, it’s not Tshibaka’s responsibility to install and maintain the equipment; it’s APBI’s contract to perform the work. But the Democrats were shocked that the presentation had information they didn’t want to hear about public broadcasting grants.
Tshibaka’s presentation showed an email exchange between APBI’s technical manager and the tribal leader of Kwig from November, 2019:
Technical Manager, APBI: “I understand the ARCS DTV system in Kwigillingok is still not operating….We have not been able to schedule a technician to come out there over the past several months as we had hoped, due to scheduling and availability issues. … we may be able to send areplacement part, however that would require someone in Kwig to remove the suspect part, packand ship it to us, and take the replacement to the site and install the equipment per our directions.”
Kwigillingok’s Tribal Leader Response: “…we have been promised the technician will be scheduled togo on site visit to make some technical assessments, this is getting exhausting of having to listen todelays! WHO DOES THIS!”
Larson Bay equipment from APBI remains on a shelf since it was sent to the village in 2015.
FACTS, NOT FEELINGS
Tshibaka’s presentation showed the difficulty in getting either APBI or its commission APBC to be responsive with information about how it had spent the $4.6 million that was to be used to convert all the 185 rural stations over the pst six years.
Efforts to call each community, using the list of point-of-contacts provided by APBI, resulted in “most of the listed contact numbers were not functional,” Tshibaka said. That indicates that APBI itself had not contacted the communities to monitor the status of their equipment, one could infer from Tshibaka’s statement.
“At this time it is unknown how many of the 185 communities have operational updated digital ARCS systems,” Tshibaka said. “APBI has reported 115 sites out of the 185 sites have been deployed, but it also provided a spreadsheet to DOA of a status of the 185 communities and it shows that 97 sites have been deployed, in contrast to the 115 sites APBI claims.
APBI provided another list to DOA of 98 sites that had been deployed and another list of 77 sites that had been converted, she said.
Deployed means the equipment was sent to the community, while converted means it was successfully installed and is operational.
Dillingham has the equipment deployed, Tshibaka said, but it lacks funds for the electricity to run it so it’s not installed and “converted.”
Larson Bay has the equipment, but no one qualified to install it.
Tshibaka said installing it and getting it operational is APBI’s responsibility — but it appears APBI washed its hands of the problem after mailing the conversion box to the village.
APBI is funded by the state to operate a hotline to help communities troubleshoot problems when their equipment doesn’t work.
The contract with APBI was several contracts, she said, to provide management fees, installation labor, equipment and management of the hotline. Of the $4.6 million, $1.671 is going to the management fee, with $2.96 going to equipment, or “wireless acquisition.”
Committee Chairwoman Rep. Jennifer Johnston said it is evident that time has moved on from Downton Abbey, and public broadcasting is an aging service. “It’s time to modernize,” she suggested, adding that this is a chance to take a look at the whole “old approach” system and “energize” it.
Alaska Sens. Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski both voted on Wednesday to acquit the president for the charges brought by the House Democrats.
Sullivan released a video to explain his vote. In it, he says that the one thing that all seem to acknowledge is that it was a partisan exercise from the outset.
“Nearly everyone—both in the House and in the Senate, and when you look at the sweep of American history—agree on one thing: that purely partisan impeachments are not in our nation’s best interest.
“The Framers of our Constitution, like Alexander Hamilton, actually highlighted this as a specific danger to the Republic. They feared, as do I, the weaponization of impeachment as a regular tool of partisan warfare.
“If that were to happen — partisan impeachment every few years – it would incapacitate our government, undermine the legitimacy of our institutions, and tear our country apart for decades to come,” Sullivan said.
“Nevertheless, the House still took the dramatic and consequential step last fall of launching the first purely partisan impeachment in U.S. history. That’s a precedent we should not endorse,” he said. His entire remarks are in a short video released on Wednesday:
