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Alaska: State Warns Inlandboatman’s Union its decision to Strike is Illegal, Unprotected ; IBU Urged to Return to Negotiating Table - Alaska Department of Administration Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka this evening is calling on the Inlandboatman’s Union (IBU) to end its strike, return to the negotiating table, and remove the portions of its contract offer that the State believes are unlawful and likely constitute an unfair labor practice. 

“The state did not want a work stoppage, nor does the State believe the strike is necessary to reach an agreement. If anything, it will be detrimental to negotiations and is going to seriously harm the communities and Alaskans served by the ferry system,” said Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka. 

It is the position of the State that the latest contract proposal from the IBU contains one or more unlawful provisions. The IBU has within the last 24 hours removed one of those unlawful provisions. We continue to urge the IBU to return to the bargaining table and work toward an agreement that is fair to the employees it represents, fair to the other State of Alaska employees, and fiscally responsible in today’s budget environment.

The consequences for going on strike over an unlawful contract proposal could be extreme for the IBU and State employees represented by IBU and their families. - More...
Wednesday PM - July 24, 201

Alaska: Inlandboatman’s Union on Strike After Impasse; AMH Vessels will not be Sailing Until Further Notice - The Inlandboatmen’s Union of the Pacific said yesterday, barring a settlement, a strike could come as early as Wednesday afternoon, July 24th - and this afternoon the union representing Alaska Marine Highway System workers are on strike.

The other two unions, the AFL-CIO affiliated International Organization of Masters, Mates & Pilots and the Marine Engineers’ Beneficial Association have both negotiated a one-year extension to their contracts and are not involved in the strike.

Following the Inlandboatman’s Union of the Pacific initiatating a strike this afternoon, the Alaska Department of Transportation announced Alaska Marine Highway Vessels will not be sailing until further notice.

Quoting today's announcement from the Alaska DOT, "At this time, we are focused on the safety of passengers, crew and vessels. We are reaching out to ticketed passengers to work with them to reschedule, or offer refunds for tickets. We are working to return ships to safe harbor with adequate shore side support."

The IBU said in a July 23rd statement received by SitNews today, that hundreds of public ferry workers who operate Alaska’s vital Marine Highway conducted a democratic vote this week – and decided by a margin of 86% to reject the package of harsh measures proposed by Governor Dunleavy’s administration, that included the following:

• Cancelling 28 negotiated settlements reached during almost three years of contract bargaining.
• No wage increases in over 5 years
• A one year contract instead of the normal and more efficient three year contracts.
  
• Failing to respect employees who work away from their families for weeks at a time.
• The use of expensive and wasteful mandatory overtime instead of hiring more workers.
• Poor treatment by management has resulted in most new hires quitting this year.

On top of these issues at the bargaining table, the IBU said the Alaska legislature is threatening the entire ferry system by: - More...
Wednesday PM - July 24, 2019

Alaska: State of Alaska, Inlandboatman’s Union at Impasse After Multiple Rejected Contract Offers; State met with the IBU 38 times over two-and-a-half years, desires contract that is “fair and equitable to both IBU employees and the State” - The State of Alaska and the Inlandboatmen’s Union of the Pacific (IBU), one of three unions that represent Alaska Marine Highway System state workers, remain at impasse after IBU’s rejection of numerous contract offers the state says were fair and fiscally responsible. The IBU represents approximately 430 unlicensed crewmembers on our state ferries who perform the unlicensed work on vessels, including the deck, engine and hospitality side of ferry operations. The IBU remains the last of the three unions to agree to a contract. 

“Contract negotiations have been ongoing since December 2016 and, every offer – including concessions on pay increases, lump sum payments, and benefit enhancements – has been turned down by the IBU,” said Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka. “Over the course of two-and-a-half years, the State met with the IBU 38 times, only a few of them with the Dunleavy administration, and participated in mediated sessions to address its requests in good faith. It is our goal to agree to a contract that is fair and equitable to both IBU employees and the State. We bumped up our last offer 25% because we do not want to disrupt coastal operations in the height of Alaska’s tourism season.”  

The Department of Administration is responsible for negotiating state worker union contracts. One of the existing contract terms the union seeks to eliminate is the current cost of living differential (COLD) which ensures equity by preventing employees who live out-of-state from receiving a higher salary than their counterparts who live in-state. The IBU wants all out-of-state employees to get the same salary as Alaskan employees. The IBU further requests uncommon wage increases – increases most other unionized state employees have not received – and that the State continue covering health care costs with no contribution from IBU employees. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Alaska: Bill funding capital budget falls one vote short, another vote planned; SB2002 will be taken up again later this month in effort to achieve supermajority support - For the second time, legislation that would fund the capital budget ahead of a key July 31 deadline to receive $1 billion in federal funding for highway and construction projects fell short of achieving necessary supermajority support.

Senate Bill 2002 passed 29-to-7 Tuesday, just one vote shy of a three-quarter supermajority. That represents four additional supporters for the capital budget compared to Sunday.

Sunday, all 23 members of the Alaska House Majority voted to pass legislation that would fund the capital budget ahead of a key July 31 deadline, part of an effort to prevent the state and private sector from missing out on nearly $1 billion in federal funding. Eight members of the Republican minority prevented the bill from receiving the supermajority vote needed to fund the capital budget. The vote was 25-to-8, as seven members of the minority were not in attendance for Sunday's vote.

Senate Bill 2002  passed the Senate 19-0 on Sunday and was sent to the House. 

“The capital budget bill that failed to receive a three-quarter supermajority vote Sunday is completely separate from debate surrounding the Permanent Fund and the amount of this year’s dividend,” House Speaker Bryce Edgmon (I-Dillingham) said. “We urge every member absent today to return to Juneau for a reconsideration vote and to set aside the issues that have been unnecessarily dragged into this politically charged debate. There is still a chance to pass this budget, which is absolutely essential to our citizens and econom.”

With the special session ongoing, the legislation remains alive. House Speaker Edgmon committed yesterday that the Alaska House of Representatives will, by the end of July, hold a vote to rescind previous action on S.B. 2002 to get the thirtieth vote, either from members who initially voted no or from the four absent members. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Alaska: DOJ to Host Webinars on up to $167 Million Available to Improve Crime Victims Services for Alaska Native Villages, American Indian Tribes - The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Alaska will host a Department of Justice webinar that will review application procedures and the benefits to Alaska Native villages and American Indian tribes of awards to be made under the Department’s Fiscal Year 2019 Tribal Victim Services Set-Aside Program.

Those benefits include funding to support the establishment of new - as well as coordination and expanding existing—victim service programs that address the needs of a wide variety of crime victims in tribal communities.

Cruising to the popular destination of Ketchikan.
Front Page Feature Photo By JOHN FLORA ©2019

The webinar takes place tomorrow, July 24, 9:30-11:30 a.m. Alaska Daylight Time and will be facilitated by the Department’s Office for Victims of Crime and Office of Tribal Justice.

“Alaska Natives suffer disproportionate rates of domestic abuse, sexual assault and other violent crimes,” said U.S. Attorney Bryan Schroder. “We encourage all of our native communities to participate in these webinars to learn how they can take advantage of these funds to provide and improve services to crime victims.”

This year’s solicitation builds on last year’s Tribal Victim Services Set-Aside Program, which directly funded 153 tribal applicants totaling an estimated $87.3 million (and another $20 million awarded in FY 2018 to fund other tribal victim services programs). The FY 2019 Tribal Victim Services Set-Aside Program allows applicants to select objectives and activities that are relevant to their specific community’s victim service needs.

Alaska Native Villages and American Indian Tribes are encouraged to register and participate in any of the remaining online webinars: - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Alaska: The Village Where Every Cop Has Been Convicted of Domestic Violence By KYLE HOPKINS, ProPublica - When Nimeron Mike applied to be a city police officer here last New Year’s Eve, he didn’t really expect to get the job.

Mike was a registered sex offender and had served six years behind bars in Alaska jails and prisons. He’d been convicted of assault, domestic violence, vehicle theft, groping a woman, hindering prosecution, reckless driving, drunken driving and choking a woman unconscious in an attempted sexual assault. Among other crimes.

“My record, I thought I had no chance of being a cop,” Mike, 43, said on a recent weekday evening, standing at his doorway in this Bering Strait village of 646 people. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Alaska: Cops in One Village Have Been Convicted of 70 Crimes. Here’s What They Had to Say About It. By KYLE HOPKINS, ProPublica - No gun. No training. $14 an hour.

If there were better jobs to be had, city police officers in this Bering Strait village say they’d apply for them. But working as a village police officer is one of the few options available. Especially for those with fresh criminal records or felony rap sheets.

“I made a change in my life. I don’t use drugs. I don’t drink,” said Officer Delbert Acoman, 45, who has served a total of 292 days behind bars and amassed 18 criminal convictions including burglary and assault over the years.

ProPublica and the Anchorage Daily News reported Thursday that at least 14 Alaska villages, including Stebbins, have hired police with criminal records, a violation of state hiring requirements. In eight other communities, tribes have hired tribal police officers convicted of domestic violence or sex crimes. The findings are based on the first-ever database of Alaska VPOs and TPOs, created by contacting city governments and tribes in 57 villages. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Alaska: Alaska researchers will apply hibernation insights to human health By MARMIAN GRIMES - A new five-year, $11.8 million National Institutes of Health grant will help University of Alaska scientists translate their knowledge of hibernating animals into treatments that advance human health.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks Institute of Arctic Biology will lead the newly formed Center of Transformative Research in Metabolism. University of Alaska Anchorage researchers will also participate.

Hibernating animals, such as arctic ground squirrels and black bears, undergo unique changes in their metabolism — the processes that build and break down materials in living cells and provide them with energy. These changes allow the animals to survive long periods of reduced activity and body temperature with no health problems.

Understanding these adaptations could reveal ways to treat certain human health problems, such as atrophy in unused and aging muscles, obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.

The center will build on the university’s long history of research into northern animals that hibernate through Alaska’s winters.

“We’re going to understand the novel insights that they provide and be able to translate that into human applications,” said UAF professor Kelly Drew, who led the effort to obtain funding.

Knowing more about hibernating animals may point to new treatments for metabolic diseases in humans, according to IAB Director Brian Barnes, a UAF professor who has studied arctic ground squirrels for more than three decades. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Another flying machine, the dragonfly, has not changed much in 300 million years, except it is no longer as large as a raven.

Humans have for a long time admired the design of this creature, one that can fly backward and zigzag with abrupt turns.

Aerospace scientists at the University of Colorado once leashed live dragonflies inside a wind tunnel. By observing smoke added to the wind, the researchers noticed the dragonflies twisted their wings on each downstroke. The smoke curled off the top of their wings, reducing air pressure there and providing more lift than is available to any aircraft with static wings.

A few years ago, scientists at Harvard, the University of Chicago and Columbia developed a mathematical model in an attempt to predict and duplicate the complex patterns within dragonfly wings.

Each veined dragonfly wing, “a model of evolution and biological engineering,” is as unique as a human fingerprint, wrote Harvard Ph.D. student Jordan Hoffmann, a mathematician who likes to find order in systems that seem to have none. His team came pretty close to nature’s design.

Worldwide, there are about 3,000 species of dragonfly. Thirty types live in Alaska. The largest in the state is the lake darner, a cool blue dragonfly that turns dark when the air is chilly. The delicate treeline emerald flies around cold ponds north of the Brooks Range, miles farther north than any tree. The azure darner patrols the extreme northern coast of Alaska, just a few yards from sea ice and the Arctic Ocean. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Analysis: The politics of fear: How it manipulates us to tribalism By ARASH JAVANBAKHT - People have always used fear for intimidation of the subordinates or enemies, and shepherding the tribe by the leaders. Recently, it appears that Pres. Trump has used fear by suggesting in a tweet that four minority congresswomen go back to the places they came from.

There is a longstanding history of employing the fear of “the others,” turning humans into illogical ruthless weapons, in service to an ideology. Fear is a very strong tool that can blur humans’ logic and change their behavior.

Fear is arguably as old as life. It is deeply ingrained in the living organisms that have survived extinction through billions of years of evolution. Its roots are deep in our core psychological and biological being, and it is one of our most intimate feelings. Danger and war are as old as human history, and so are politics and religion.

I am a psychiatrist and neuroscientist specializing in fear and trauma, and I have some evidence-based thoughts on how fear is abused in politics.

Like other animals, we humans can learn fear from experience, such as being attacked by a predator. We also learn from observation, such as witnessing a predator attacking another human. And, we learn by instructions, such as being told there is a predator nearby. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

TOM PURCELL: Our Childish Politicians Need Kindergarten Lessons - We could use a hearty dose of Robert Fulghum wisdom about now.

Our political discourse is at a fever pitch. Our allegedly esteemed elected leaders are carrying on like unruly children - shouting and pouting and becoming increasingly strident with their political opponents., 

If they wish to carry on like children, they need to learn some kindergarten wisdom.

"All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be, I learned in kindergarten," wrote Fulghum in his famous 1988 essay, "All I Really Need to Know I Learned In Kindergarten."

"Share everything," he writes.

Too few of us realize it, but we share many things. Most of all, we share a magnificent representative republic - and every one of us shares the incredible responsibility of running it by voting and participating in public discourse.

Our politicians must embrace our shared responsibility by discussing and debating political ideas civilly - by working out political agreements as well-mannered adults. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

DICK POLMAN: Mueller's Testimony: Impeachment Accelerant or Anticlimax? - Remember the now-distant days when we Americans who closely track Donald Trump's lies and lawlessness waited in great anticipation for "Mueller Time"? 

That historic reckoning seemed virtually assured - until Trump's servile attorney general, Bill Barr, falsely spun the Mueller report as a total exoneration of his client. Barr's bumper-sticker mantra, amplified by his client's relentless tweets, infested the mainstream media bloodstream and struck a chord with a public that hasn't bothered to read the densely circumlocutions report.

So it's quite possible that Robert Mueller's long-awaited open testimony, slated for Wednesday in front of the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees, will be a yawner. Indeed, he recently warned that "the report is my testimony." But key House Democrats believe (or hope) that if the special counsel merely recites the most crucial passages on TV, that he will somehow bring the report to life and seed more grassroots support for impeachment.

If that were to happen, fine. But it's a sad commentary on our attention-deficit, sub-literate culture that the powerful substance of the Mueller report has not sufficiently resonated. Only three percent of Americans have reportedly read the entire thing, and only 10 percent say they've read some of it.

If Mueller's public testimony moves the needle, fine. But legal experts with federal prosecutorial experience know already how damning it is - regardless of whether Mueller remains characteristically reticent under questioning. - More...
Tuesday PM - July 23, 2019

Political Cartoon: Robert Mueller testifies
By Bruce Plante ©2019, Tulsa World
Distributed to paid subscribers for publication by Cagle Cartoons, Inc.