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Saturday
November 27, 2004

Front Page Photo by Carl Thompson

'Tongass Fall'
Front Page Photo by Carl Thompson

    

Columnist

jpg Dave KifferDave Kiffer: DRIVEN TO DISTRACTION - "Ave (Hail) Automobius, God of Traffic and Parking."

I often find myself muttering that tribute whenever I safely pull into traffic. Usually it means that some unseen hand has parted the Red Sea and allowed me to finally enter the flow after a lengthy wait. In the old days, drivers used to occasionally allow someone else to enter the traffic stream but today we are in a such a big hurry that such archaic manners have been left behind at the last light. - More...
Saturday - November 27, 2004

Viewpoints
Opinions/Letters

letter KIC Tribal Council Voting Procedures by Stephanie Rainwater-Sande - Saturday
letter RE: Predator control by Mike Sallee - Saturday
letterBuilding Permit? by Joe Wood - Saturday
letter More Viewpoints/ Letters
letter Publish A Letter

November 2004
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Alaska: Moratorium on Certificates of Need until new regulations, standards enacted - Until new regulations and standards for the Certificate of Need (CON) Program are developed and implemented, Health and Social Services Commissioner Joel Gilbertson today declared a moratorium on final actions on all pending and new CON applications.

A Certificate of Need is required for certain health care facilities, such as hospitals, nursing homes, residential psychiatric treatment centers, and imaging centers; and requires justification for the need for the facility in the healthcare marketplace. The CON Program is designed to promote responsive health facility and service development, rational planning, and cost containment. CON project reviews help ensure that proposed services will be of good quality, acceptable to the public, and will meet the public need while preventing excessive, unnecessary, or duplicative development of facilities or service.  Projects that cost over $1 million are subject to the CON law.

"In recognition of the inadequacy of current regulations, in fairness to all parties who have submitted a CON application or may be prepared submit an application in the near future, and in the interest of assuring that all future CON decisions are made on the basis of current best practices, I am declaring a moratorium on taking final action on CON applications until such time as the new regulations and standards are in place," said Gilbertson.

CON applications currently in process or any new applications received during this period will continue to be processed by department CON program staff in accordance with state law. However, no final action on the applications will be taken during the period of the moratorium.

"I cannot predict with certainty when the new regulations will be effective, but my expectation is that our current project now underway to develop new regulations will be substantially complete by June 30, 2005, the end of the current fiscal year," said Gilbertson. - More...
Saturday - November 27, 2004

jpg researcher Paul Matheus

UAF researcher Paul Matheus holds the skull of a prehistoric steppe bison...
Photo courtesy University of AK Fairbanks
Alaska: Pleistocene bison decline found in ancient DNA by Carla Browning - Scientists have published a study showing it was climate change, not overhunting by man, that caused a major decline in bison over much of their ice-age range, centered in Beringia. By extracting ancient DNA from over 400 fossil bison - more than half from Alaska - the researchers were able to reconstruct the population dynamics of bison in North America over the past 130,000 years, including the history of their migration, colonization and extinction.

The study is led by scientists at Oxford University's Ancient Biomolecules Centre. The recent findings and their implications are the subject of an article in the Nov. 26 issue of the journal "Science" titled "Rise and Fall of the Beringian Steppe Bison." Paul Matheus, a paleobiologist with the Alaska Quaternary Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, is a co-author and provided many of the Alaska samples and radiocarbon dates.

According to the authors, ancient DNA shows that bison migrated from Asia to North America via the Bering Land Bridge around 136,000 years ago, with their population doubling about every 10,000 years. According to their findings, "The analysis depicts a large diverse population living throughout Beringia until around 37,000 years ago, when the population's genetic diversity began to decline dramatically." - More...
Saturday - November 27, 2004

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June Allen Column

photosKetchikan, Alaska - Let There Be Light! -- Citizens Light & Power and then KPU - At the Incorporation of the City of Ketchikan back in the summer of 1900, the little town on Tongass Narrows was powered largely by optimism and resolve. The Alaska Gold Rush of '98 had focused the eyes of the world on the nation's Last Frontier. The courageous and confident were among those who "rushed" north to participate not just in the search for gold but in the founding of a great new American territory. Ketchikan's pioneer founders moved quickly to develop such modern amenities as electric lights and indoor plumbing. - Read the rest of this story by June Allen....
Tuesday - November 16, 2004

arrow The State Capitol and Its Marble and keeping the capital in Juneau

arrow A Legendary Mountain of Jade; Just one of Alaska's Arctic Wonders

arrow John Koel, Baker to Banker; An eccentric philanthropist

arrow Harold Gillam: A Tragic Final Flight; Ketchikan remembers the search

arrow Ketchikan's 'Fish House Tessie'; She was proud of the nickname

arrow Fairbanks: Golden Heart City; A story of its founding

arrow Remembering 'Swede' Risland (1915-1991);The town's most memorable logger

arrow Read more feature stories by June Allen...


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