Rashah McChesney

 

Ten canoes landed at the Douglas Harbor Wednesday, marking the end of a 6-day journey from Angoon to Juneau.

In what organizers called the unofficial beginning to the biennial Celebration festival, hundreds of people waited at the harbor to cheer the weary, but exuberant, travelers after their long journey.

KTOO’s Rashah McChesney rode along for the last leg of the journey; here’s an audio postcard from her morning on the water.

This and several other events mark the beginning of Celebration festivities which will run through Saturday in Juneau.

Live television coverage of Celebration on 360 North and 360north.org begins at 6 p.m. Wednesday. Celebration coverage continues from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. through Saturday. For more Celebration news coverage, go to ktoo.org/celebration.

 

 

 

Hundreds of Alaska Natives and a handful of other cultural groups gathered for a processional and grand entrance during the first day of Celebration on Wednesday.

The biennial festival of Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian tribal members kicked off on Wednesday with a Ravenstail and Chilkat weavers presentation in Juneau and will end Saturday with a grand exit.

In the interim, dance performances will be held every morning and days will be filled with art exhibits, lectures, film showings, music and language lessons as Alaska Natives in Southeast celebrate.

Here is a selection of images from the grand entrance.

Click on any photo to view the full slideshow.

Live television coverage of Celebration on 360 North and 360north.org begins at 6 p.m. Wednesday. Celebration coverage continues from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. through Saturday. For more Celebration news coverage, go to ktoo.org/celebration.

Members of the One People Canoe Society finished the last leg of their weeklong journey from Angoon to Juneau on Wednesday.

Their arrival marked the unofficial beginning of Celebration, a biennial festival of Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian tribal members organized by the Sealaska Heritage Institute.

The Princeton Hall, a Juneau-based 65-foot boat, joined the flotilla throughout their journey along with several other safety boats. The boats provided food, shelter and safety to the canoes which came from several Southeast Alaska communities.

The Hall was a safety boat for a canoe piloted in honor of Alaska Native veterans.

Click on any photo to view the full slideshow.

Live television coverage of Celebration on 360 North and 360north.org begins at 6 p.m. Wednesday. Celebration coverage continues from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. through Saturday. For more Celebration news coverage, go to ktoo.org/celebration.

At about 2 p.m. Tuesday, Eleanor Laurent walked by a window in her Douglas home and saw huge clouds of black smoke billowing from her shed.

Thinking it was her husband Jim Laurent’s burn barrel, she asked him if there should be a fire in the couple’s front yard.

He sprang into action, grabbed a garden hose to attack the flames and sent her to take the couple’s daughter and dog out of harm’s way

“He had me drive his truck down and our car down and Abigail and the dog down to the street and I called 911 on my cell phone and I kept losing connection with them. It was a little stressful there for a few minutes but then they got here and now we have no more shed.”

The couple’s cat is still missing.

“Hopefully our cat — I’m sure she’s outside somewhere — hopefully she’ll come home after all of this. She’s very skittish, so I’m sure she’s a couple of miles from here by now,” Eleanor said.

While no one was injured, Jim said the fire took a lot. It destroyed their shed and their boat, which was parked nearby.

By the time he got outside, he said he couldn’t get within 5 feet of the building because of the unendurable heat.

11-year-old Abigail’s new bicycle was parked inside, as was Jim’s dirt bike and all of his tools.

Eleanor said it was Jim’s quick actions that kept the fire away from the family’s home.

“Yeah, I gotta say he was Johnny on the Spot,” Eleanor said. “I wouldn’t have known what to do first, but he was totally on it. He had me flip all the breakers first thing and then, he was, I’m really proud of him, he was totally right on it.”

The family is getting ready to move to Idaho in August.  Eleanor said she hopes the loss won’t impact their plans. But, she said, she’s thankful that her neighbors in Douglas showed up to help as soon as the flames were visible.

The fire was almost completely extinguished about an hour later, though smoke was still visible for miles.

Juneau voters have been approving and renewing temporary sales taxes for 33 years.

They’ll probably be asked again in the October municipal elections ahead of a 3 percent temporary sales tax’s 2017 sunset date. In committee Monday, the Juneau Assembly took a step toward putting that sales tax in front of voters again.

It makes up about one-quarter of the city’s budget. The city could collect more than $26 million from the tax next year. The funds are spent on government operations, capital improvements, school activities and general government spending.

Next Monday, the full assembly will consider the ordinance. It would put two questions to voters: Should the tax should be renewed again? And, should it be permanent?

Another question that could end up in front of voters is whether food should be taxed the same as everything else. Deputy Mayor Jesse Kiehl asked assembly members to consider a lower tax on food.

“I asked the finance director to estimate what the loss of city revenue would be if we reduced the sales tax on food by 1 percent. In effect, 5 percent on tissues and t-shirts and cell phones and 4 percent on groceries,” Kiehl said.

The city could lose just over $1 million annually, according to a spreadsheet the finance director circulated in committee.

The assembly has considered reducing or completely scrapping its sales tax on food. That discussion was coupled with the body’s controversial decision to scale back seniors’ sales tax exemptions last year.

Assembly member Jamie Bursell said there could be a backlash if the sales tax structure changed again.

“I think that we would have a large number of people, specifically the seniors in town looking at this, like, if we’re saying $1 million is something we don’t really need, we can lower that tax rate, then why did the exemptions get taken away in the first place? I’m just thinking that they would come back with that,” Bursell said. “My question is, do we need $1 million or don’t we?”

Proponents of reducing the tax on food say they want to make it easier for low-income Juneau residents to survive.

Kiehl told assembly members that food is one area of spending for a family that cannot be avoided.

“Frankly, that we tax groceries at all is — my Yiddish grandmother would have called it a shanda. It is for shame,” he said.

The committee also voted to send an ordinance to raise the sales tax on retail marijuana from 5 percent to 8 percent to the full assembly. The city estimates it could raise up to $455,000 extra.

The assembly’s next meeting is May 13.

A cleaning crew at the Juneau Arts and Culture Center found destroyed display cases and artwork littering the floor Friday. It was the aftermath of what the Juneau Arts and Humanities Council is calling vandalism and burglary.

The lobby was covered in broken glass and some merchandise is missing. The council says staff offices were also vandalized. The council first publicly reported the incident in an Instagram post at about 8 a.m. Friday.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BGMqfp4nosl/

Juneau police on the scene said they had no information about the investigation. They hope to identify the burglars through security footage, according to the council.

Staff hope to open at 4:30 p.m. for their First Friday event.

In an email, council President Eric Scott says staff will be cleaning and taking an inventory of the stolen items all day.

He says anyone wishing to help should contact the center at meredith@jahc.org.