Rosemarie Alexander

Recent heavy rains likely mean Juneau will have plenty of water to produce hydroelectric power this winter.

“Our fuel is rain and snow, so even though we all like sunshine and nice weather, we need the rain,” says Alaska Electric Light and Power generation engineer Scott Willis.

He watches water levels in the lakes that produce electricity for Snettisham, Lake Dorothy and Salmon Creek hydro projects. He says it’s been a dry two years.

“Prior to this weekend, our lakes were lower this year than last year at this time. And last year we didn’t fill any of our lakes,” Willis says. “But just this three-day storm put us ahead of last year.”

The Snettisham area got nine inches of rain between Friday and Monday. Crater and Long lakes provide the energy for the turbines. Crater Lake rose 21 feet and Long Lake rose 15 feet over the weekend. Prior to the rain storm, Long Lake had been rising only six to eight inches a day.

“Snettisham gets about three times more precipitation than we do in town. So if we get an inch and a half in town that’s four or five inches out at Snettisham,” Willis says.

Snettisham is the workhorse of A-E-L & P’s generation system, and provides most of Juneau’s electricity. The rest comes from Lake Dorothy and Salmon Creek hydro projects. Lake Dorothy grew seven feet, and Salmon Creek rose 10 feet over the weekend.

While none of the lakes have filled, Willis says he expects there’ll be plenty of water to run Juneau’s hydro this fall and winter, especially since September and October are usually wet months. When lake levels are low, the company has to supplement hydro with expensive diesel fuel.

A graph of lake levels is at www.aelp.com.

Juneau voters will be asked to approve two bond issues this fall to pay for school projects.

The CBJ Assembly Monday night agreed to use bonds for a ground source heat system at Auke Bay Elementary School and new artificial turf at Adair Kennedy Park. The questions will be on the October 4th municipal election ballot.

Auke Bay School is being renovated. While a ground source heat pump would initially cost more than the proposed heating oil system, it would save the school district money in the long run, as well as reduce carbon emissions.

To minimize the cost of the $1.4 million general obligation bond to taxpayers, the district plans to apply interest earned on completed elementary school renovation projects to the debt service. That means a small property tax reduction for 2012, according to city manager Rod Swope.

As for the impact on taxpayers over the life of the bond:

“Assuming an interest rate of 3.5 percent, the amount of debt service for this proposal would require an annual property tax levy of $1.21 per $100,000 of property tax value for a 10-year period,” Swope said.

The second ballot question is for a $1.9 million general obligation bond for new turf at Adair Kennedy Park. The school district also plans to put interest earnings toward the debt service.

Swope says it would cost property taxpayers $1.04 per $100,000 of assessed value for the 10-year life of the bond.

The Adair Kennedy field was the first artificial turf installed in Juneau. Swope says the city was told it would last about 20 years, but it’s reached the end of its useful life at 10. In addition, vandals burned the field in several spots earlier this summer.

Both school projects qualify for 70 percent reimbursement by the state’s School Construction Bond Debt Reimbursement Program.

The U.S. Postal Service says 25 rural Alaska post offices will remain open after all.

Douglas is not on that list, according to Senator Mark Begich’s office.

USPS Alaska District Manager Diane Horbuchuk says 25 post offices off the road system are in the clear. The agency last month targeted 3,700 post offices nationwide for possible closure, as a way to reduce costs and expenses. Thirty-six were in Alaska.

Begich arranged a meeting Monday so rural health care providers and other community groups could give postal service officials more information on the impact to rural communities. Horbuchuk announced the agency had already made the decision to spare Alaska’s most remote post offices.

Horbuchuk said those communities will receive letters to that effect this week.

She said the review of the remaining 11 sites, including Douglas, should be completed by the end of the week.

The Juneau-Douglas Crimson Bears left another football team scoreless this weekend.

In the first Railbelt Conference game of the season, the Crimson Bears varsity toppled the North Pole Patriots by a score of 57-0. The Juneau-Douglas junior varsity also beat the North Pole JV by 38-6.

The games were played in North Pole and heard in Juneau on KJNO radio and the KATH-TV website.

Quarterback Phillip Fenumiai says the varsity offensive and defensive lines really did “their thing” and the entire team was “clicking on all cylinders.”

Fenumiai had 290 yards passing, most of that in the first half. He threw three touchdown passes. The 6-foot 2-inch junior explains the plays:

“Two touchdown passes were to Sean Niumataevalu. One was on a post route. That’s where you just go up seven yards and just aim for a spot 45 degrees down field,” Fenumiai says. “The second one was on a drag. He just came across the middle of the field from slot and he made a play after he caught the ball and ran 70 yards.”

Fenumiai’s third touchdown pass was to first-year player Alec Calloway, in what he calls a go route.

“Straight down the field,” Fenumiai explains. “I threw it up to him and led him in strides so he didn’t have to stop for the ball, and he scored a touchdown.”

Senior Fullback Lah Fifita also scored a touchdown on a 1-yard run in the second quarter. Kohl Jaeger and Gary Speck each had 6-yard touchdown runs in the fourth quarter.

The Patriots were missing several key players, due to illness, injury and violating a team rule.

Fenumiai says the Bears knew that going into the game, but they still expected more because they had scrimmaged the Patriots in football camp this summer.

“I didn’t think we were going to go by them with such ease this game, but defense did their thing, actually got us the ball back when we wanted it,” he says. “Offense, we were just clicking on all cylinders. I don’t think North Pole knew what hit them.”

The Crimson Bears sacked the Patriots’ quarterback Moo Rogers twice and limited him to 97 yards passing and rushing.

The varsity Bears amassed 125 points in their first two games of the season. Last week they beat the Thunder Mountain Falcons 68-0.

Photos by Gail Fenumiai

The body of a Juneau woman was found in a ditch Friday morning near the intersection of Valley Boulevard and Mendenhall Loop Road.

Juneau police have identified her as 48-year-old Marilyn Williams, born on February 26, 1963.

A witness on his way to a bus stop saw the body and called police. Capital City Fire and Rescue also responded. A medical team pronounced her dead at the scene, according to police spokeswoman Cindee Brown-Mills.

“It doesn’t appear to be foul play at this point,” Brown-Mills said. “They’ve requested an autopsy.”

The body will be sent to the state medical examiner’s office in Anchorage for the autopsy.

During the investigation, police closed off Valley Boulevard at Diane Street and Kiowa Drive for about an hour, as well as the outbound lane of Loop Road between Floyd Dryden Middle School and Valley.

Brown-Mills said Williams was found face down in the ditch just before Kiowa. She was dressed in a jacket, jeans, shoes and a hat.

Williams lived close by. Her family members have been notified.

The case remains under investigation.

The Thunder Mountain Falcons take on the Homer Mariners in Juneau Thursday.

The Alaska high school football season got underway last week. The varsity Mariners beat the Valdez Buccaneers 52 to 14; the Falcons lost to the Juneau-Douglas Crimson Bears 68 to zero.

Players and coaches say they’ll be ready for tonight’s contest, which is a non-conference game.

TMHS football is just in its third season. Expectations are high, considering the team’s success last year when the Falcons even made the small schools’ division playoffs – losing to Soldotna.

But 13 members of that team graduated. Head coach Bill Byouer says the junior varsity and varsity number about 45 players this season, when everybody’s eligible and healthy.

With only 23 varsity players…

“We’ve been conditioning quite a bit,” Byouer says. “They’re not going to be coming off the field too much. And I’m hoping they survive without getting an injury, and we’ll be good.”

Most of the sophomores have already moved up to the varsity, says Falcons’ JV coach Tom Jollie.

His team scored two touchdowns against the Crimson Bears last week. It was still a lopsided contest at 52 points for JDHS and 12 for TMHS, but Jollie’s freshman development program seems to be working.

“We’ll keep working them and working them. You know physically they’re able to move up, it’s more just learning the technical portions of it,” Jollie says. “I’m not big on the win-loss record at the JV level; I want to see them improve because that means they’re ready to go to the varsity.”

TMHS had hoped to have permanent bleachers this season, but Byouer says a glitch in the contract has delayed them. That means portable uncovered bleachers will have to be set up for each home game.

“They will have those bleachers and everything set up starting in October. So we’re not going to have bleachers out here at the present time besides the portables that we get,” Byouer says.

The Homer Mariners and Thunder Mountain Falcons junior varsity kick off Thursday at 5 o’clock. The varsity squads take the field at 8 p.m.