Quinton Chandler, KTOO

In 2015, Juneau gained more young people and seniors, cost of living fell slightly, unemployment remained steady and the housing market was still tight.

Those are highlights from a report compiled by the Juneau Economic Development Council on changes to Juneau’s economy between 2014 and 2015.

In the housing market, prices rose and turnaround times for single-family homes and condominiums were still quick. According to the JEDC, home sales went up 10 percent last year.

Juneau City Manager Rorie Watt is concerned there aren’t enough vacancies for residents to shop around and find the homes they want.

“The general comment is that our housing market is stuck and we’re not seeing enough investment to keep our housing stock up to a good standard,” Watt said. “We’re not seeing enough investment to bring enough housing onto the market.”

He’s also concerned with the availability of good jobs in town and the ability for workers to find appropriate housing.

He couldn’t say how many new housing units were actually built last year. The number of new homes built in Southeast in 2015 was down by more than 38 percent.

Watt said this is a sign of concern for the region’s future.

“But then I would also point out that in Juneau, we had a pretty good year last year for new housing permits, and I think that’s probably a reflection of our ability to diversify our economy over the years,” he said.

Watt said Juneau’s economy is more balanced and less dependent on the state. He said the city’s role in addressing the problem will be selling city property and starting programs to encourage housing development.

“Our first step six months ago was hiring our housing officer, Scott Ciambor,” he said.

“I can tell you, his phone is ringing off the hook because there are a zillion things people want to talk to the city about with regards to housing.”

In population trends, JEDC reported Juneau grew slightly between 2014 and 2015. It’s grown steadily for the last 10 years.

Last year, the number of people aged 20 to 39 grew and people aged 40 to 59 shrank. The number of people 60 and older also grew.

Watt said the increase in seniors is no surprise. He pointed out there’s also been a strong increase in school-aged children and says he isn’t sure what the increase in young adults will mean for Juneau.

“I think that’s good because one of our overriding concerns is that younger people, and their ability to find employment, and to be able to afford to live here … is one of our concerns,” he said.

“So, I’m happy to see a little bit of growth in that sector.”

The cost of living in Juneau has been decreasing for at least two years. In 2015 the cost of living was 28 percent higher than the national average. Watt saw no surprises there.

As recently as 2012, U.S. News & World Report identified Juneau as the 10th most expensive U.S. city to live in.

The JEDC report shows unemployment fell slightly to 4 percent. But, there was also a 4 percent drop in state employment — the largest decrease in a decade.

Watt said that was expected.

The report predicts an even bigger loss in state jobs this year.

The newly elected members of the Juneau School Board will be busy learning how the board operates shortly after election results are certified Tuesday.

Dan DeBartolo and Steve Whitney were the winners in the race for two school board seats that will be vacated by board members Lisa Worl and Barbara Thurston.

School board President Brian Holst said once they’re sworn in, Whitney and DeBartolo will continue an orientation they started as candidates.

“A further, deeper orientation to try to catch them up with all the different aspects of policy, the way we operate as a board, and responsibilities, the budget, et cetera,” Holst said.

Holst said right now, the board is updating the Juneau School District’s policies. He said in their first board meeting on Oct. 19, the new members will have an opportunity to voice their opinions on policy.

“An example of that we’re going to be dealing with at our next meeting is around bullying,” Holst said.

Holst said on this particular issue the board will be considering recommendations developed by both the district’s administration and by students.

“Then a few meetings from now, the entire set of policies are going to be up for a vote,” Holst said. “(That’s) really important because after that our job really becomes making sure the administration implements the policy.”

Other than policy, perhaps the most important item Holst said the board will consider in the near future is the district’s budget.

He said after the new members are sworn in, the board will hold an election for officers and the new members will be asked which committees they’d like to join.

Holst added that those committees include the: Facilities Committee, Program Evaluation Committee and special committees that work closely with other organizations.

“(With) the Alaska School Board Association, with our Indian Studies Program, with our Early Literacy Council, with (the) Native Education Advisory Council, the Teen Health Center …” Holst said.

The new school board members are scheduled to be sworn in during the Oct. 19 meeting.

The Coast Guard reported a boat operator fell asleep Saturday morning and ran his vessel aground in Peril Strait.

The strait is south of Chichagof Island and north of Sitka. Officials said four people were aboard the 41-foot recreational vessel Pirate Son.

The passengers called the grounding into the Coast Guard around 10:30 a.m. None were injured in the accident.

Coast Guard Petty Officer Kelly Parker said the Alaska State Troopers reached the vessel first.

“It was actually a state trooper vessel that was actually on scene — state trooper vessel Courage,” Parker said.

Coast Guard officials said state troopers made contact with the vessel about 20 minutes after they received the distress call.

Parker said the troopers gave the Pirate Son’s operator a breathalyzer test but didn’t find any trace of alcohol.

Troopers helped the four passengers transfer from the grounded vessel into their own skiff which they took to Sitka.

The Coast Guard did not know the Pirate Son’s homeport.

Juneau Docks and Harbors said the vessel was not moored in any local harbors on Saturday.

Sitka’s Harbor Department could not be reached for comment.

Unofficial election results have Steve Whitney and Dan DeBartolo winning the two open seats on the Juneau School Board.

Four candidates competed in the race. The two candidates with the most votes win.

DeBartolo finished first with 2,886 votes and Whitney came in second place with 2,577 votes Tuesday night. Jason Hart had the next highest number of votes, followed by Kevin Allen.

Both of the winning candidates were traveling on business as the votes were counted.

DeBartolo said he saw the results right before his flight landed in Juneau. He said he is grateful to all the candidates and he is looking forward to the new position.

“For my part, I’m going to be reaching out to the school board to see how soon they need us to plug in so I can hop in with both feet and start making a difference,” Debartolo said.

Whitney was at a hotel in Anchorage when he saw the results. He said the race was grilling but he enjoyed the process.

“I’m very grateful for all the forums we have. I think it’s a great way to vet candidates in Juneau,” Whitney said. “It really helps the public process. Having money is less important than actually going and facing all the different groups.

The results are unofficial. Absentee and questioned ballots still need to be counted. The results will be reviewed for certification next Tuesday.

India has formally joined the Paris climate change agreement, handing over its country’s official ratification documents to the United Nations on Sunday.

India’s ambassador to the U.N., Syed Akbaruddin, smiled as he delivered the ratified agreement to the international body’s office of legal affairs. The ceremony was held in front of a banner depicting Mahatma Gandhi and recognizing Oct. 2, the Indian peace leader’s birthday, as an international day of non-violence.

Indian President Narendra Modi, who chose the date purposely, referenced Gandhi in a celebratory tweet.

The message of Gandhi Ji inspires all of us. India will always work with the world to overcome climate change & create a green planet. https://t.co/IgGDJwPG4m

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) October 2, 2016

The climate change plan was initially agreed upon by more than 180 countries at the Paris climate conference in 2015, but under its terms, it will not become binding until it is ratified by 55 countries that contribute a total of at least 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

The 55-country requirement has already been fulfilled — India is No. 62 — but the emissions percentage still falls short. Even with major polluters like the U.S. and China signing on early, and including India’s addition, the current signatories account for about 52 percent of global greenhouse emissions, according to a statement released by the U.N. on Sunday.

India currently produces about 4.5 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, and the country is developing quickly. The Paris agreement requires all countries who ratify it to come up with a national plan to limit global temperature rise, and as part of its plan India has set a goal of producing 40 percent of its electricity with non-fossil fuel sources by 2030.

India also promised to plant or preserve enough tree cover to act as a sink for at least 2.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide, and has called on the U.S. and other fully developed countries to share technologies that help decrease emissions.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon released a statement congratulating India and thanking the country for it’s “leadership” which he said “moves the world an important step closer” to making the international climate agreement binding.

At last month’s U.N. General Assembly, Ban pushed for member countries to accelerate their domestic political agendas in order to join the agreement as quickly as possible. His term as Secretary General ends this year and once the plan goes into effect countries that have ratified cannot exit the agreement for four years, which would make it more difficult for the next U.S. administration to reverse policies and promises made by President Obama.

The United States officially ratified the Paris climate agreement in September. Of the top 10 global emitters of greenhouse gases according to the 2015 Paris conference, only the U.S., China and India have submitted their ratification documents. Among the top global emitters of greenhouse gases, the 28 countries of the European Union — which is counted as one entity for the purposes of the treaty — and Russia have yet to officially agree to the plan.

Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

Donald Trump’s campaign is responding to a New York Times report that the real estate mogul claimed hundreds of millions of dollars in losses on tax returns in 1995 — an amount that could have allowed him to legally avoid paying income taxes for many years.

The 1995 tax records obtained by the newspaper show Trump as having reported a $916 million loss on personal income tax returns during that year.

Times reporter Susanne Craig, who’s written about the Republican candidate’s business ventures, received three pages of returns via mail from an anonymous source: “The first page of a New York State resident income tax return, the first page of a New Jersey nonresident tax return and the first page of a Connecticut nonresident tax return.”

The Times hired tax law experts to analyze the documents, which the outlet notes, are “a small fraction of the voluminous tax returns Mr. Trump would have filed in 1995.”

Those consultants determined that “tax rules especially advantageous to wealthy filers would have allowed Mr. Trump to use his $916 million loss to cancel out an equivalent amount of taxable income over an 18-year period.”

Under federal law at the time, a declared loss of that size could have allowed Trump to avoid federal taxes for as much as 18 years in a row, according to tax experts interviewed by the newspaper, “enough to wipe out more than $50 million a year in taxable income” over that stretch of time.

The report suggests he may have benefited most from the “net operating loss” tax provision that, in short, allows for a range of business losses to be used to nix an “equivalent amount of taxable income from, say, book royalties or branding deals.”

The possibility of an 18-year-long tax avoidance is in line with IRS rules from 1995 that permit such net operating losses to be used to nullify taxable income earned in the three years before the net operating loss, in addition to the 15 years after the loss.

In a statement released Saturday, the Trump campaign didn’t dispute the Times’ claims, but calls Trump a “highly-skilled businessman who has a fiduciary responsibility to his business, his family, and his employees to pay no more tax than legally required.” It goes on to say that Trump has many hundreds of millions in property, sales, and local, state and federal taxes — without explicitly mentioning income taxes.

After almost 14 hours of rare Twitter silence, Trump himself rang a similar tune in response to the Times report.

I know our complex tax laws better than anyone who has ever run for president and am the only one who can fix them. #failing@nytimes

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 2, 2016

Trump’s income tax history is impossible to verify, because he’s broken a decades-long tradition for major-party presidential nominees and refused to release his tax returns. He says he’s being audited by the IRS, although there’s no legal prohibition on releasing his taxes while under audit.

Over the past several months, the Republican presidential candidate’s finances have been subject to severe scrutiny, especially considering his penchant to tout his business record and wealth, albeit without talking specifics, nor much of a public record to go on.

In Monday’s debate, Democratic rival Hillary Clinton raised past records showing Trump did not pay income taxes in a couple of years in the late 1970s. Trump did not dispute that and responded by saying, quote, “that makes me smart.”

It’s true that none of the report suggests any illegal activity on behalf of Trump.

“The tax experts consulted by The Times said nothing in the 1995 documents suggested any wrongdoing by Mr. Trump, even if the extraordinary size of the loss he declared would have probably attracted extra scrutiny from I.R.S. examiners.”

Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.