Clarise Larson

Voters will be asked this fall whether Juneau’s School Board President Deedie Sorenson and Vice President Emil Mackey should stay in their seats on the board or get ousted from them. 

On Thursday, Juneau’s clerk’s office announced that a local effort to recall the pair had gathered enough signatures to get the two questions onto the Oct. 1 ballot — nearly 2,400 signatures each. 

Charles VanKirk, one of the leaders of the recall effort, called it an important step toward accountability.

“We want to hold our elected officials responsible and have them be accountable, so hopefully, there will be answers given rather than the public just being ignored,” he said. 

The group argues that both Sorensen and Mackey failed to do their duty as board members when the district faced a multimillion dollar deficit earlier this year. 

This spring, the school board voted to address that deficit by closing some schools, consolidating grades and reducing staff. 

But VanKirk said those decisions weren’t in the best interest of the students or staff and weren’t what the public wanted.  

“We feel hopeful that the recall will be successful, and that the opportunity exists for different people to be on the school board,” he said. 

Sorensen and Mackey are both set to serve their terms through 2025, and they are the only board members eligible to be recalled from the board.

In response to the certification, Mackey said he’s deeply concerned about what message this will give to people who want to run for a seat on the board in this and future elections. He said the effort has been riddled with misinformation from the start. 

“The damage that this is doing by just misinforming people on its face is extremely counterproductive to the welfare of the school district,” he said. 

He said he thinks the root issue behind the recall effort is the board’s decision to close Thunder Mountain High School. He argues it has little to do with him and Sorensen as individual board members. 

“In my opinion, every person that signed that affidavit either was ignorant or willfully misleading the public as to the facts of what led to the budgetary decisions,” he said. “They use the budget as an excuse to get it on the ballot. But it’s always been about Thunder Mountain.”

Sorensen said that, as a former teacher in Juneau, every board decision she makes is what she believes is best for student’s education. She said she stands by her budget decision, but thinks the recall effort is hardly about that. 

“I think that people are angry. A certain group of people are extremely angry about the closure of one of the high schools,” she said. “And with the recall, I think that there’s some attempt to assign blame.”

She and Mackey said they will continue to advocate for themselves as board members and the decisions they made. 

The next step is for the city clerk to transmit the certified petitions to the Assembly at its next meeting. There, the Assembly will need to pass a motion to include the questions on the ballot.

Kroger and Albertsons plan to sell 18 grocery stores in Alaska, including Juneau’s Safeway in the Mendenhall Valley, as part of the plan to merge the two grocery giants.

The CEOs of Kroger and Albertsons shared a joint video statement following the announcement. Albertsons CEO Vivek Sankaran said the sales will help keep prices low and give more options to shoppers. 

“This merger is the right thing for our customers and our associates,” he said. “For our customers, we strengthen the American retail landscape and thoughtfully selected stores to ensure customers continue to have a choice of where to shop.”

A list released on Tuesday includes Carrs, Eagle and Safeway stores across Alaska — and more than 550 other stores across the U.S. 

The merger plan still needs to be approved by regulators. But, if that happens, the 579 stores on the list will be transferred to C&S Wholesale Grocers, LLC. C&S operates grocery stores across the country, including Piggly Wiggly, and is the nation’s largest wholesale grocery supplier. 

Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen said the list is a significant step toward completing the merger. 

“Divested stores are not closed stores,” he said. “C&S is committed to operating these stores as they are today.”

Despite the excitement expressed by the CEOs, the plan has seen a lot of pushback since it was announced in the fall of 2022. 

Local municipalities, state lawmakers and Alaska’s U.S. delegation have called to block the merger, arguing it could cause more food insecurity in rural places in Alaska, drive up prices and limit options.  

And the Federal Trade Commission and attorneys general in states like Washington, Illinois and California have filed suits to stop the merger.

In a statement, Rep. Mary Peltola said she would “continue to support the FTC’s efforts to block this merger.” 

If the merger is approved, the divestiture of the stores will be roughly $3 billion. The companies say there are no plans to lay off employees at the stores.

The average sales price for a single-family home in Juneau was nearly $510,000 in 2023 — which makes it the second year in a row that Juneau had the most expensive average in Alaska. That’s according to a study released by the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development this month.

Brian Holst, the executive director of the Juneau Economic Development Council, said that doesn’t surprise him. 

“It is not good for the working folk of Juneau, but it isn’t a big surprise because Juneau’s housing costs have historically been high,” he said. “I’m not surprised to see us near or at the top.”

Rents are high, too. Juneau ranked fifth in the state for the highest average rental costs for a two-bedroom, at $1,561 a month. That’s a 5% increase from the year before. 

Other necessities are also costing more, too. 

According to the study, which comes out annually, Juneau’s costs for things like health care and groceries are similar to places like Seattle and San Francisco. Overall, the study cited Juneau’s cost of living as just shy of 28% above the national average. 

Holst said there are a lot of reasons things cost more in Juneau, like land availability and the cost to ship things here. For housing, he said one big factor that often gets overlooked is the demographic changes that are happening in Juneau. 

“Our aging population occupies a lot of housing. When you look at Juneau over the last 10 years, basically our population is about the same as it was 10 years ago, but we have a lot more senior citizens,” he said. 

Holst said that as Juneau’s population continues to age and stay in their homes, prices will keep increasing. 

“The changing demographics are limiting the supply of housing. So, the price of housing goes up as the supply is limited,”  he said. “Simply, we have not built enough housing to keep up with the demand.”

Assembly member Ella Adkison said there’s no one right way to fix the problem — or she would have already pursued it. 

“I don’t think a one-size-fits-all option, but I think we have to be doing frankly everything we can do,” she said. 

Recently, the Assembly increased funding for a city loan program for purchasing mobile homes. And it continues to put money toward the city’s affordable housing fund, which gives money to developers to help get housing projects off the ground. 

Adkison said that, as a person in her 20s, she knows firsthand how the lack of housing affects young people in Juneau. 

“I do get it. I have so many friends who are in really tight spots, and it’s a problem that every Assembly member is aware of but I’m acutely aware of,” she said. “It’s not something that will happen quickly, and I can’t promise next year, ‘boom it will be affordable to live here.’”

But she said things are happening, and she has hope those efforts will start to pay off soon.

Dozens of jobs previously cut from the Juneau School District due to a lack of funding are now being added back for the coming school year. That comes after Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed this year’s state budget, which included a one-time funding boost of about $175 million for school districts.

On Saturday, the Juneau Board of Education voted to recover the equivalent of about 40 full-time positions, including several elementary and secondary staff positions, paraeducators and staff for the district’s homeschool program, HomeBridge.

The board also voted to put some money into savings and to cancel a $1 million loan it planned to take out from the city. All of this is being paid for with $5.2 million that the district is getting from the state.

Lyle Melkerson, the district’s director of human resources, said the added positions will have a direct impact on students, including lowering the ratio of students to teachers.

“What it will look like, I don’t know. We will assign staff where they are necessary, where they are needed to support our kids,” he said. “There is no student who should come to school and have a classroom without a teacher.” 

The funding won’t reverse the district’s consolidation plan for the fall. It comes months after the school board contentiously voted to close some schools, consolidate grades and reduce staff to resolve a multimillion dollar deficit.

Board Vice President Emil Mackey said putting some of the money into savings would give the district a cushion going into the next year. But he warned the board that the money wasn’t coming from a reliable source.

“There’s no promise that this governor will ever, ever sign another one of these one-time increases again until he’s politically bashed over the head for not supporting education,” he said. 

In total, the board voted only to spend about $3.6 million out of the $5.2 million from the state.

Last week, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed this year’s state budget into law, including a one-time funding boost of about $175 million to school districts.

The Juneau School District gets a $5.2 million slice of that. But this money comes months after the Juneau Board of Education controversially voted to consolidate schools and reduce staff to offset a multi-million dollar deficit.

This additional state money won’t reverse the  plan for the upcoming school year, but the board now gets to decide what budget items could be added back.

During a meeting Friday, Juneau Superintendent Frank Hauser reminded the board that the money isn’t necessarily a reliable source beyond this coming school year. 

“The additional state funding would be one-time funding and not guaranteed for FY2026,” he said.  

Friday’s meeting was just the first of two on the topic. This Saturday, the board will meet again to make a final decision on which items will be added back for the coming school year.

Some of the things on the table include recovering several elementary and secondary staff positions, paraeducators, custodians, or HomeBRIDGE and IT staff.

Board Vice President Emil Mackey expressed support last week for ensuring the district had an adequate number of IT support staff. 

“We need responsive tech support for our HomeBRIDGE students, for our teachers, for our students,” he said. “Because anytime you cannot connect to the internet, no matter what you’re teaching, that is lost teaching time.”

Board President Deedie Sorensen said she thinks that ensuring that there is enough custodial and maintenance staff should be a priority. 

“While we focus on being able to have teachers to provide education, we sometimes forget about what it takes to keep the buildings open and operating and clean,” she said. 

The rankings the board made last week are still subject to change. The list for Saturday’s meeting includes more than a dozen different priorities that could be added back.

Jo Dahl has been getting her hair done at the Little Mermaid Beauty Salon in Douglas since 1985. For the past 14 years, that’s meant weekly visits.

For decades, the salon has been a staple for people on and off the island to get their hair cut, curled or colored since it opened in 1963. 

“I always got really good service and she knew how to handle my curly hair, which isn’t so curly anymore,” Dahl said. 

But, on Saturday, Dahl was there for the last time. Following her appointment, the salon closed for good. 

Surrounded by mermaid decor, including figurines and posters, Dahl sat in her chair wearing a black cape with slightly damp hair. Jo Paddock-Betts grabbed a few strands of it at a time to put into rollers. 

Paddock-Betts has owned the salon for 41 years, taking over from the previous owner in 1983. Over the years, the location has bounced around a few times, but it never strayed from Douglas. Now, it’s attached to an auto body shop, across the street from the Methodist church. 

“It’s a small enough community, and there’s plenty of parking,” she said. “Back in the days when I first had this salon, the auto body shop here was owned by a guy named Woodsy. And we used to advertise together — we’d do ‘Woodsy’s perm and lube.’ People would get their oil change while they were getting a perm.” 

With only a handful of places to get your hair cut by a professional, Paddock-Betts said she’s had clients come from way out the road just for a trim. 

But, after four decades, she said ready for something new. She’d been trying to retire for a few years now and was hoping to hand over the business to someone else. But, nobody was biting, and she just decided it was time to close its doors. 

“I had to come to the point where it was okay for me to say ‘It’s okay. Douglas will be here when you’re gone,’” she said. “When an institution like this has been here since 1963, that’s 61 years of a business that has thrived.”

Paddock-Betts said it’s a bittersweet moment — she’s grown quite a number of friendships with her clients, like Dahl. She said that’s what she’ll miss the most, and she’s grateful to everyone who supported her. 

“It’s been a challenge to let go of not only the love for Douglas and Juneau for all the people who come here, but for the community it’s a loss,” she said. “It’s a huge loss — but I’ve loved every minute of it.”

Paddock-Betts and her husband plan to stay in Douglas, but spend their retirement traveling. 

Now that the business is closing, Dahl said she’s not quite sure where she’s going to go to get her hair done instead. But, she does have some ideas. 

“Where am I gonna go to get my hair done? Her kitchen. She’s gonna do my hair for me,” she said, laughing.