Author: kfskadmin

City employees, attorneys and a committee of local residents fielded questions this week on the formation of a new Petersburg borough. Several residents of the proposed borough asked about what benefits the new borough would provide to them, what taxes they would have to pay and challenged the city's reasoning behind pursuing the new borough government.

The company hoping to build a hydro-electric power plant on the mainland north of Petersburg has updated its plans for the development. Officials with Cascade Creek LLC say they are reducing the potential impacts of the project by choosing an underwater power line in Thomas Bay. The company also says it plans to reduce the hydro plant’s impact on Swan Lake, the high mountain lake that will be used for generating power.

Residents in Coffman Cove are hoping to restart ferry service to their community on northern Prince of Wales and have traveled to Wrangell and Petersburg this fall seeking support for the idea. A new port authority formed by Coffman Cove residents could offer service between that community Wrangell, South Mitkof Island and Ketchikan. Another independent ferry authority has tried a similar service and could not keep it running.

City officials and local volunteers are celebrating the start of construction of a new fire hall and emergency medical services building in Petersburg. Elected leaders, city staff and volunteers with the fire department and EMTs held a ground breaking ceremony Thursday at the site of the new 18,000-square-foot building on Haugen Drive. Petersburg Mayor Al Dwyer thanked the governor and Petersburg’s legislators for the eight million dollars in grants the city has received from the state, which looks like more than enough to finish the project. Overall the building could cost around six and a half million dollars including the site preparation, design work, construction and furnishings. The new building will move the department’s trucks and ambulances out of their current cramped quarters in the municipal building on main street. It will also have offices for paid personnel and training space for the volunteers who fight fires, make ambulance calls and do search and rescue missions. McGraw’s Custom Construction of Sitka is building the new fire hall. The building should be complete by October 1st of next year. Joe Viechnicki spoke with the city’s project coordinator Tom Reinharts following the ground breaking.

Alaska Congressman Don Young is hoping to block U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval of genetically engineered salmon, or at least require industry to label the new farmed fish product. Young has introduced two separate pieces of legislation in response to a Massachusetts company’s application for FDA approval.