3rd Avenue Radicals, a group of civic activists that is trying to protect the 3rd Ave. area of Anchorage from total and irreversible decay, says it has on camera evidence of security firm vehicle occupants dumping drug paraphernalia on the ground near the homeless encampment at 3rd Ave. and Ingra Street. The video shows occupants of the vehicle smoking something in manner that appears to be how fentanyl is smoked. It can be seen in this video:
“Video footage of an Allied Universal Security officer illegally parked smoking fentanyl directly in front of a security camera in his company vehicle with a passenger at 1:40am Sunday morning,” the Facebook page 3rd Avenue Radicals posted. “In the second clip (see comments) at 1:49am you can see the rear passenger open the door and throw the fentanyl foils all over the ground.”
In that second video, it appears that someone in the back seat of the Allied Universal vehicle opens the door and dumps some foil on the ground.
“Additional footage (not posted) shows the vehicle return around 3:30am, engage in questionable activity with other people and vehicles, then proceed into the camp with a package and not return for nearly 90 minutes,” the Facebook group reported. “We attempted to report this activity to the Allied Universal call operator, but they hung up on us.”
A photo posted beneath the video showed what appears to be an up-close image of smashed foil on a street that the group says is the evidence of what they say happening on video. Anchorage police were called, took photos of the foil, took a statement from observers, and opened a case, said Rob Cupples, of 3rd Avenue Radicals, which describes itself as a “benevolent insurgency of neighbors creating positive change along East Third Avenue.”
Foil on asphalt is evidence of something, perhaps illegal drugs, caught by 3rd Ave. Radicals
“This is one of the companies the Muni has contracted with to maintain security and safety at buildings including City Hall and the Loussac Library. Talk about the fox guarding the hen house,” the group said.
Fentanyl use is an extremely potent and dangerous drug. Even a tiny amount can induce life-threatening effects. Because it is used as an adulterant in other drugs like heroin, users may be unaware they are ingesting it. Fentanyl depresses the nervous system and can rapidly lead to an overdose, respiratory arrest, and death, especially when mixed with other drugs.
Alaska had a reported 146 fentanyl overdose deaths in 2020 and 253 in 2021. According to the Department of Health and Social Services, fentanyl accounted for 49% of all drug overdoses in Alaska in 2020.
Cupples, of 3rd Ave. Radicals, has been giving updates regularly on Facebook about the deteriorating conditions at the encampment, which is similar to those camps of mainly drug and alcohol addicts now found in every major city in America, as well as many medium-sized cities and towns.
Zone abatement notices are now posted on the fence at 3rd and Ingra, dated the Oct. 16, which means the campers need to be out by the Oct. 26th, 10 days after the date on the notice.
Over 400 people on Friday and 350 on Saturday attended the second Alaska Covid Alliance conference. They signed up for the conference, held in the main sanctuary at Mountain City Church in Anchorage, to hear about the effects of the Covid, the issues with spike protein on the human body, concerns with long Covid, the plans of the World Health Organization, and other related topics, including the role of artificial intelligence in medical policy decisions.
Top speakers from the world of Covid research and experts such as Dr. Peter McCullough of Texas and Dr. Ryan Cole of Idaho, spoke about the side effects of Covid, and the Covid vaccines. Dr. Cole attended the first Alaska Covid Alliance conference in 2021.
During this conference, people learned about the risk of heart attacks, and why young athletes are suffering from myocarditis — and some are dying.
Dr. McCullough, who spoke for two hours on Friday about myocarditis and how to get rid of the spike protein, recommended a call to action, including:
Dropping all vaccine mandates immediately.
Prohibiting forms of pressure, coercion, or threat of reprisals for vaccination.
Banning all forms of vaccine discrimination.
Pausing Pfizer/Moderna/JNJ vaccines until a thorough safety review.
Beginning vaccine injury treatment centers at major medical centers.
Pivoting to early Covid-19 treatment at community and academic medical centers.
He also mentioned that the time has come to ban transgender programs for youth and drop transgender elective surgery funding for adults.
This year’s conference attendees were primarily non-medical people, with only about a dozen medical professionals, including doctors, in the crowd.
The Alaska Covid Alliance gave out three “Noble Prize” awards — two of them were to local restaurants that defied the Covid closure mandates put in place by former Mayor Ethan Berkowitz in 2020: Little Dipper Diner and Kriner’s Diner, and the third award was given to Dr. McCullough for his courage in standing up to the government.
Later, Dr. McCullough posted on social media a photo of himself and Anchorage Dr. Ilona Farr, who he credited for having courage to treat Covid patients with early therapeutic remedies, and for taking heavy fire from the medical establishment, including Anchorage doctors who tried to have her medical license revoked.
Dr. Ilona Farr and Dr. Peter McCullough, at the Alaska Covid Alliance conference in Anchorage on Friday.
McCullough wrote, “Proud to stand with Dr Ilona Farr who treated thousands of Alaskans for high risk C19 with multidrug therapy. Sadly shamed Anchorage doctors attempted to interfere with Farr’s standard of care by reporting her to the medical board. Farr prevailed. #CourageousDiscourse.”
Farr was one of the speakers, and her topics included censorship, supply chain challenges, and Covid injuries, and the “80th Percentile Rule.” 80th percentile regulation, enacted in 2004, requires health insurers to pay out-of-network providers for services at an amount equal to or greater than the 80th percentile of charges in a geographical area.
Dr. Ryan Cole of Idaho focused on blood clots, sudden death, vaccine injuries, and future mRNA vaccines. Dr. Jordan Vaughn of Birmingham Ala. spoke about treatments for long Covid and blood clots, and Dr. Diane Counce, an Alabama neurologist, spoke about neurological injuries from Covid and the Covid vaccines.
Dr. Stewart Tankersley, a family physician, spoke about the vaccine effects on reproduction and the impact on the military. James Taylor of the Heartland Institute, spoke to the issue of government control, and how Covid policies were a trial run for things to come.
Republicans have flipped Louisiana’s top office from blue to red. Attorney General Jeff Landry, who was backed by former President Donald Trump, won the Louisiana governor’s race, giving Republicans the office after Louisiana has been ruled by Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards for eight years.
With more than half of the votes, the 52-year-old Landry won’t face a runoff. This brings the total number of states with Republican governors to 27.
“Today’s election says that our state is united,” Landry said Saturday night, speaking to supporters. “It’s a wake up call and it’s a message that everyone should hear loud and clear, that we the people in this state are going to expect more out of our government from here on out.”
Landry has been the elected state attorney general since 2016 and has used his office to defend traditional values, including banning chemical and surgical castration of children, supporting the state’s ban on abortion, and he has fought against the rise of pornography being pushed on children in schools and public libraries.
Louisiana is has a strong resource-based economy, natural gas and oil, timber, fishing and agriculture. Louisiana is also the primary producer of salt in the United States.
The state has about 10% of U.S. total marketed natural gas production and holds about 7% of the nation’s natural gas reserves. Louisiana has 15 oil refineries that account for nearly one-sixth of the nation’s refining capacity, with the ability to process nearly 3 million barrels of crude oil per day.
It’s not uncommon to see deer swimming from one island to another in Southeast Alaska. But last week Alaska Wildlife Troopers out of Ketchikan discovered two Sitka blacktail deer far from shore and evidently quite exhausted, having overestimated their long-distance swimming abilities. One of the deer approached the Troopers’ boat and swam right to the swim step to ask for a lift.
The troopers loaded the shivering deer onto their boat and gave the animals a lift to the next island, where they released them onto the beach.
According to the wildlife trooper narrating the reel, the troopers were in the middle of Clarence Strait, which separates Prince of Wales Island on the west side, from Revillagigedo Island and Annette Island, on the east side, when they discovered the deer four miles from the nearest shore.
The Case of the Dog-Paddling Deer made for some of the best law enforcement recruiting video in America. Watch it here:
See the video at the Alaska State Troopers’ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/reel/859897198716008?mibextid=kcDB8O
As war breaks out in Gaza after the attack by Hamas on Israel, the president of the free world didn’t want Americans to forget about George Floyd on his birthday — George Floyd, the domestic violence perpetrator, drug user, and thief, who died during an arrest in Minneapolis in 2020, after using counterfeit money at a local store.
President Joe Biden issued a statement celebrating the life of Floyd.
“George Floyd should be alive. He should be celebrating his 50th birthday with his young daughter Gianna, family, and friends. He deserved so much more,” Biden said in his statement.
“Today, we join his family to honor his life and legacy. And we remember the tragedy and injustice of his death that sparked one of the largest civil rights movements in our nation’s history and inspired the world,” Biden said.
Between 1997 and 2005, Floyd served eight jail terms on various charges, including drug possession, theft, and trespass. For instance, Floyd was convicted of possessing half a gram of crack cocaine in 2004
“George Floyd’s murder exposed for many what Black and Brown communities have long known and experienced — that our nation has never fully lived up to its highest ideal of fair and impartial justice for all under the law,” Biden said.
“A year and a half ago, Kamala and I stood with the family of George Floyd, civil rights leaders, and law enforcement officials, and I signed an executive order, which applies key elements of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act to federal law enforcement. This order bans chokeholds, restricts no-knock warrants, establishes a database for police misconduct, and directs other measures to advance effective and accountable policing that increases public safety. It is putting federal law enforcement on the path to becoming the gold standard of effectiveness and accountability,” Biden said.
Derek Chauvin, a 20-year veteran of the Minneapolis Police Department, was convicted in the murder of Floyd, after his chokehold resulted in Floyd’s death.
“My order also directs the use of federal tools to support similar reforms in state and local agencies. Across our Administration, we have made significant progress in fulfilling the requirements of my executive order, making policing safer and rebuilding trust in American communities,” Biden said.
Since Biden became president, crime has soared in cities across the nation, in part because of the Biden border policy, which has allowed millions of undocumented criminals to enter the United States.
In the nation’s major cities, homicides were 42.6% higher in 2022 compared to 2019, according to the America First Policy Institute. In the past year, robbery has increased by 13%, larceny by 20%, motor vehicle thefts by 21%, and residential and nonresidential burglaries by 6% and 8%, respectively.
But Biden was not focused on stopping crime. He was focused on police reform.
“But we know that implementing real and lasting change at the state and local levels requires Congress to act. I will continue to do everything in my power to fight for police accountability and urge Congress to pass meaningful police reform and send it to my desk. I will sign it,” he said.
On Thursday, the Anchorage Police Department received reports of a bomb threat at Mears Middle School. An adult male who allegedly made the threat had left the school by the time police arrived. He was found and arrested down the road from the school.
The suspect, 43-year-old Matthew Geitz, was charged with making a terroristic threat. He is detained at the Anchorage Jail. No bomb was ever located at the school.
The Anchorage Police Department is working with the Anchorage School District and the investigation is ongoing. Geitz has had a number of protective orders against him, according to his Alaska court record.
On Friday, an Anchorage Police Department School resource officer responded to Stellar Secondary School concerning a weapons-related threat made on social media against the school by a student.The officer contacted the student, who was taken into custody.
It was ultimately determined there were no weapons brought to the school, nor did the student take any additional steps after making the threat to hurt anyone. Charges for the student were forwarded to the Division of Juvenile Justice.
Former Alaska House member Liz Snyder, a Democrat who represented a portion of midtown Anchorage from 2021 until 2022, and then moved back to her home state of Florida, has some explaining to do to the Alaska Public Offices Commission about why she used campaign money to pay her husband a “thank you gift” for services rendered on her campaign.
According to a formal complaint filed by civic activist Jay McDonald, Snyder and her husband, Sam Snyder, converted campaign contributions into personal income during her first run for office in 2018, eight years after she moved to the state and began her political activism. She also fudged the reporting requirements for campaign debts that she owed.
In the 2018 campaign cycle, Snyder used her husband Sam as her campaign treasurer. Sam is an environmental activist who worked for a salmon-focused nonprofit while in Alaska, and is a director at True Blue Strategies, a political consultancy. Upon filing her first campaign registration on April 4, 2018, Liz indicated her Sam as the treasurer, and he remained so until the end of the 2018 cycle.
Liz Snyder narrowly lost in 2018, to Republican Rep. Lance Pruitt, (and she narrowly won by 11 votes against him in 2020 and served part of one term before moving back to Florida.)
Liz Snyder’s first 30-day campaign disclosure covering the reporting period from Feb. 2 through July 20, 2018 indicates that the report was filed by herself.
Liz’s first 7-day campaign disclosure, covering the reporting period from July 20 through Aug. 11, 2018 indicates that it was filed by Samuel Snyder.” There was no payment to Sam logged on this report, nor was there a debt to Sam logged on this report. This became an important point in the complaint.
Liz Snyder’s next two campaign disclosures covering the reporting period from Aug. 12 2018 through Oct. 27, 2018, filed by Liz Snyder, again with no payment or debt to Sam, her husband and treasurer.
Liz Snyder’s final “year end” campaign disclosure covering the reporting period from Oct. 28, 2018 through Feb. 1, 2019 indicates that it was filed by Samuel Snyder.
In that report, on Dec. 4, 2018, check #157 for $2,000 was listed as an expenditure for “Sam Snyder (APOC Consulting), NA.” The explanation for the expenditure was, “Thank You Gift for APOC Support.”
It’s important to note that this expenditure is logged as a check to Samuel Snyder, and not a check to “SDS Consulting” which is the corporation owned by Sam.
Around this same period of time, an independent expenditure group named “[Mark] Begich for Alaska” was created, and it used SDS Consulting. In its first filing, the group recorded a debt of $5,500 on Aug. 29, 2018 to “SDS Consulting (Sam Snyder)” for “APOC Compliance and Filing Support.”
This group’s later filings show that the debt of $5,500 to “SDS Consulting (Samuel Snyder)” was paid in full on Nov. 5, 2018 with check #90 along with the description “APOC Filing Support – Clears debt from 9/24.”
This shows that Sam Snyder was providing these kinds of services for a fee.
According to Alaska Administrative code 2AAC 50.321. (a)(6), there are reporting requirements for “expenditures that are incurred but not paid.” At the time that an expenditure is incurred it becomes mandatory to report it.
Subsequent APOC rulings have further clarified that even if a candidate does not know what the debt amount is going to be, the candidate is required to report the estimated debt amount and tie it to the initial date it was incurred.
The way that Jay McDonald sees it, if Liz Snyder hired Samuel Snyder for the purpose of APOC Consulting and filing, she is required by 2AAC 50.321. (a)(6) to report the terms of that agreement at the date that agreement began.
Because Sam Snyder began filing her APOC reports on July 21, 2018, McDonald says it is reasonable to assume that their agreement began at some undisclosed point in that period and the agreed upon or projected debt should have been reported at that time.
But instead, no debts or payments were recorded to Samuel Snyder until the final year end report.
McDonald said that he cited reports filed by “[Mark] Begich for Alaska” in his complaint document because it proves that Sam Snyder provided this service professionally, that he knew that the requirement to report the debt for his service exists, and that he filed this debt correctly in that instance with Mark Begich’s group.
“If Samuel Snyder provided a legitimate and legal service to Liz Snyder it was never disclosed as a debt and Liz Snyder is in violation of 2AAC 50.321. (a)(6),” McDonald wrote in his complaint.
One of the problems McDonald pointed out is that Liz Snyder appeared to be actually paying Sam Snyder, but calling it a “thank you gift,” something that is not an approved expenditure to a close family member who shares the same household.
Statute “very clearly and in plain terms states that ‘campaign contributions held by a candidate or group may not be converted to personal income of the candidate.’ If Liz Snyder and Samuel Snyder filed their 2018 taxes jointly as a married couple, then Liz Snyder claimed $2,000 from her campaign as personal income. There is no exemption to this statute that invalidates this statute which applies to how Liz Snyder converted her campaign funds into personal income. Liz Snyder violated AS Sec 15.13.112(b)(2) even if she were paying Samuel Snyder for services rendered,” McDonald said in his complaint.
“Statements that Liz Snyder made in public further complicate matters. In public posts she made to Facebook Liz Snyder claims that she paid Samuel Snyder $7 per hour. $2,000 divided by $7 per hour comes out to 285.7142857 hours of labor from Samuel Snyder. The year end report that the check to Samuel Snyder was paid on began 10/28/2018 and the payment to Samuel Snyder was on 12/04/2018, 38 days later. That would come out to just over 7.5 hours of paid labor every single day with no breaks in that period, which is unlikely,” McDonald said.
“Furthermore, 2 AAC 50.384(a) required that Liz Snyder disbursed all campaign funds no later than 02/01/2019. According to the year end report filed by Liz Snyder, her final campaign funds were not disbursed until 07/19/2019, which is 5 months and 18 days past the statutory deadline,” he wrote in his complaint.
The Snyders have since left the state. In August of 2022, while Liz Snyder was still taking a check from the state government as a legislator, Sam Snyder bought a home in St. Augustine, Fla., for $575,000. Liz did not run for reelection, but ended up back where she came from, still taking a check from the State of Alaska. Her term actually ended in January, 2022.
McDonald paid a process server to serve the Snyders at their home close to the beach in St. Augustine, Fla.
McDonald earlier this year filed a complaint against another newcomer-lawmaker, the radical Democrat Rep. Jennie Armstrong. in that complaint, Armstrong started trying to raise money to pay down her debt to campaign lawyer Scott Kendall, although she had never disclosed the debt personally or in her campaign reports.
The estimated fine for the Armstrong could be as high as $385,000, according to calculations assessed by APOC staff.
Seattle-based REI will cut 275 retail jobs, including 19 in Washington state and an unknown number in Alaska, where REI has a store in Anchorage and one in Fairbanks.
The cuts come at a time when, one by one, REI stores have unionized over the last year. In February, the company, run as a nonprofit, laid off 8% of its workforce, and this round of layoffs will eliminate 2% of the jobs, for a total of 10% downsizing this year alone.
The company is changing its brick-and-mortar business model, said Mary-Farrell Tarbox, REI vice president of stores, in an email to to employees Thursday. It will hire seasonal workers and part-timers as a part of the change — jobs that offer 16 to 24 hours per week.
“Our current operating model for stores is more than a decade old,” Tarbox wrote. “There are many areas that are out of date and no longer serving our employees or REI’s mission and business.”
The “Lead” role in stores was chosen for cuts, according to the Tarbox email, as it is “the most inconsistently used role across the fleet and [we] are retiring it effective immediately.”
United Food and Commercial Workers Union has been organizing in several of the stores, making demands of a company that is, by its actions, struggling to compete. New York, Berkeley, Cleveland, Chicago, Boston, Durham, N.C., Maple Grove, Minn., and Bellingham stores are now unionized.
The REI Union wrote that the union will be pursuing legal recourse because the company is required by law to negotiate with the union any major layoffs. It’s unclear if 2% of the workforce will be seen as a major layoff by the courts, but litigation appears on the horizon.
The REI union wrote, “instead of honoring the expertise their most veteran employees bring to the Co-op, REI made the callous decision to lay off tenured staff even while they are still hiring new staff at lower wage rates. REI executives are sacrificing their most loyal employees to cut labor costs– a decision that not only betrays the values the co-op was founded on but eliminates years of expertise that REI customers have come to rely on when they shop.”
With unionization on the march at REI, the union management doesn’t seem to connect their actions with the company’s management decisions. Instead, the union has been heralding its organizing victories:
The REI Union has written extensively about its unionizing efforts, but appears to not understand the consequences for workers.
“But let us be clear: because we unionized in SoHo, these layoffs are *illegal.* REI has a legal obligation to negotiate with their unionized workers over ANY restructuring plan. REI has broken the law by unilaterally implementing these changes in the eight unionized stores,” the union wrote on social media.
In a response to other social conditions, such as out-of-control shoplifting and other crime, REI decided to close its store in the Pearl District of Portland, a location that last year recorded the highest number of break-ins and thefts in the past 20 years, despite adding security. That store will close in February, which will also add to the downsizing of the REI footprint.
REI has more than 16,000 employees are 181 locations in 41 states plus the District of Columbia.
More than two-thirds of active duty service members are within the overweight or obese ranges of the body mass index, otherwise known as BMI, according to American Security Projectreport released this week.
The report found that:
68% of active-duty service members are overweight or obese. “Obesity is the leading disqualifier of military applicants and a primary contributor to in-service injuries and medical discharges,” the report says.
Military obesity across the active duty has more than doubled over 10 years, from 10.4% in 2012 to 21.6% in 2022. Eating disorders increased by about 79% between 2017 and 2021.
Despite being a chronic disease with several FDA-approved treatment options, antiquated body composition policies and stigma prevent effective treatment of obesity within the Armed Forces, the report says. Recently, there has been a push to stop using the body mass index as the standard for military fitness, and this report appears to support that.
The removal of body mass statistics from military recruitment and disability reports used by Department of Defense stakeholders and Congress “resulted in incomplete and misleading conclusions. This data is needed to identify at-risk populations and design effective, evidence-based interventions.”
Data from the Department of Defense, which is calculated using the person’s age, height, and weight, shows fatness has doubled in 10 years. During the same period, more than half of young Americans are obese and being too fat is now the top reason people are disqualified from joining the military.
The report makes these recommendations:
The Defense Health Agency should promote and enforce awareness, diagnosis, and treatment of obesity as a chronic disease across the armed services.
Body composition and military appearance regulations should be wholly reviewed and brought in line with evidence-based research. Policies allowing commanders to arbitrarily assign or exempt obese service members from medical intervention should be rescinded.
All services should seek to close the gap between high recordings of obese BMI during military health and fitness evaluations and low obesity diagnosis and treatment rates.
All service members with obesity should be referred to a credentialed obesity physician, registered dietitian, or bariatric physician for accurate diagnosis and treatment.
Military reports on disqualifications, disability, and medical discharge should include BMI data until overweight and obesity diagnoses reflect real obesity rates of the force. Body mass data should be reintroduced within annualized reports evaluating recruitment, retention, and retirement trends.
The Defense Health Agency should significantly improve frequency of military obesity reports or broaden the pool of researchers and academics who can access military weight data.
“The growing prevalence of obesity in service members reduces the readiness of the all-volunteer military, but it isn’t a moral failing; it’s a health crisis. Framing obesity as an issue of insufficient willpower or discipline prevents soldiers from seeking and receiving treatment, makes commanders and healthcare workers less inclined to intervene, and worsens health outcomes across the services,” the report notes.
According to the study, obesity varies across services with the Air Force having a reported obesity rate of 11%, while the Navy has a reported rate of 27%. Active Component men are twice as likely to have obesity as Active Component women.
Pacific Islanders have the greatest risk of obesity, with 41% obese, while Asian-descent personnel have the lowest, at 14%. Enlisted personnel, including combat support (military police/intelligence), combat arms (infantry/artillery), and combat service support (transport/maintenance), are 7% more likely to experience obesity than officers, according to the report.
The author, Courtney Manning, is a National Security Research Fellow at the American Security Project, leading ASP’s research on military recruitment and readiness, strategic competition with China, and emerging technology risks. She holds a master’s degree in international security policy from Columbia University and a bachelor’s degree in international relations from the University of Denver Korbel School.
