Community

Twenty-seven-year old Juneau resident Larry Brandon Blatnick Jr. was killed Tuesday when his motorcycle struck a vehicle.

The accident happened near 12th Street and Egan Drive. Police say they received multiple 911 calls about the collision at 1:20 p.m. Police then shut down Egan Drive between West 10th Street and Highland Drive. Traffic was rerouted onto Glacier Highway for more than 3 hours.

Capital City Fire and Rescue declared Blatnick dead at the scene. He had been thrown off his 2001 Honda motorcycle.

According to police, Blatnick was driving outbound on Egan Drive at the same time a 2001 Subaru was turning left from Egan inbound onto 12th Street.

A witness told police that the motorcycle slowed down temporarily and then sped up suddenly, striking the front passenger-side fender of the car.

Police say 41-year-old Juneau resident Laura Hosey was driving the car. She was not injured. Police say she displayed no signs of intoxication.

The investigation into the fatality continues.

For a link to our initial coverage of the accident, click here.

Eric McDowell, long-time Juneau resident and founder of the research firm McDowell Group has died at the age of 69.

McDowell died Monday in a Seattle hospital of complications from a staph infection.

He established McDowell Group 40 years ago in 1972. It now has offices in Anchorage and Bellingham, Washington.

He was known for pioneering research on a number of Alaska topics, including cost of living, the seafood industry, and the Alaska Visitors Statistics Program. McDowell Group managing principal Jim Calvin says McDowell’s tourism research techniques are still used today and are “really some of the most complex research conducted in the country to gauge visitor industry activity in destinations such as Alaska.”

McDowell conducted the first geographical differential study of the state in 1985, which has since been replicated. Calvin says McDowell “probably had the broadest understanding of socio-economic, cultural conditions in Alaska than anyone else, really. He was just a wealth of knowledge and experience. Alaska’s a very different place from the rest of the country and it takes very different research and analysis techniques to really understand what all of the economic and other factors are at work and drive the cost of living in our varied communities across the state.”

Alaska Commerce, Community and Economic Development Commissioner Susan Bell was hired by Eric McDowell in 2001. She worked on both the visitor industry and cost of living studies.

“As I’ve come to work for the state of Alaska I see that they are still landmark projects,” she says.

Calvin says McDowell was most passionate about McDowell Group studies done for Alaska Native organizations. And while the company is well-known for its survey research on a wide variety of topics, Eric McDowell always refused to conduct political party and candidate surveys.

On a personal level, McDowell was passionate about basketball, and still played nationally in senior games. He was a singer, songwriter and guitarist, who performed regularly at the Alaska Folk Festival. He also was a commercial salmon troller. Bell calls him the “quintessential fisherman.”

“It’s something he did throughout his life; it’s something his family participated in. He was very proud of Alaska seafood. He worked with organizations like ASMI on the marketing programs; he worked with a lot of corporations throughout the state on their marketing and their product development, and on ice processing machines and in other ways,” Bell says. “I think that was something that was a thread throughout his whole life. It was meaningful and he was first and foremost a fisherman.”

Eric McDowell was born in Juneau and raised in Haines. He had bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and a Masters of Business Administration and Marketing Research from the University of Oregon. He also was a certified and practicing alcohol recovery counselor.

Services are pending.

The U.S. and Alaska state flags will be lowered to half-staff to honor the victims of the Wisconsin shootings.

A white supremacist gunned down six people at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wis., on Sunday. Police killed the shooter.

President Obama ordered U.S. flags lowered until sunset Friday.

The governor’s office says in a release that state flags must also be lowered in accordance with the order.

The temple president and two police officers are being hailed for saving lives during the shootings at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin that killed six worshippers.

Officials say temple president Satwant Singh Kaleka stared down the gunman Sunday. They say he fought back and even tried to stab the man with a butter knife before taking two fatal gunshots to the leg. The fight gave women and children inside extra time to seek cover.

Oak Creek Police Lt. Brian Murphy was ambushed, shot nine times and left for dead. But he told his colleagues wounded worshipers needed their attention more. He remains in critical condition.

And when Officer Sam Lenda came under fire in the temple parking lot, he shot back, downing the gunman who refused to drop his weapon.

Mary Louise Rasmuson, one of Alaska’s most well-known women, died in her home yesterday in Anchorage. She was 101.

Rasmuson was a fixture in Alaska arts and history as one of the state’s most generous supporters of arts, education, history, culture and science.

She championed the effort to establish the Anchorage Museum of Art and History in 1968.

Before coming to Alaska, Rasmuson was an assistant principal in Pittsburgh, PA. She left that position to become a member of the Women’s Army Corp when the U.S. joined World War II. She eventually became the fifth commandant of the WAC in 1957.

According to the Rasmuson Foundation, military historians credit her with major achievements including increasing the WAC’s strength, insisting on effectiveness in command, working with Congress to amend laws that deprived women of service credit and benefits, and expanding the range of military opportunities open to women.

Many point to Rasmuson as a champion for women. She served in the military for 20 years. She received a Legion of Merit award with two oak leaf clusters for her work integrating black women into the WAC. She was also awarded the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps Service Medal, the American Campaign Medal, World War II Victory Medal, Occupation Medal and National Defense Medal. At an event honoring her, former U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry said, “When you hear about women seizing new opportunities to serve, remember that they march behind Colonel Rasmuson.”

Rasmuson moved to Alaska in 1962 after marrying Elmer Rasmuson, then chairman of National Bank of Alaska.

She was active in a number of organizations in Alaska. In 2009, she was inducted into the Alaska Women’s Hall of Fame.

According to the Rasmuson Foundation, Mrs. Rasmuson remained active with many organizations and most recently had been serving as honorary chair and patron of the Veterans’ Memorial Project.  She has also served on the national board of American Cancer Society, U.S. Army Alaska Citizen’s Advisory Committee, and led the Anchorage March of Dimes Campaign. She was affiliated with Zonta, American Association of University Women, Alaska Native Sisterhood, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Virginia Mason Board of Governors, Palm Springs Desert Museum and Seattle Art Museum, amongst many others. She was a lifetime member of Association of U.S. Army and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

The family has invited everyone to the funeral mass, Sept. 1o at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial gifts be made to Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, 625 C Street, Anchorage, AK, 99501.

Bartlett Regional Hospital has earned accreditation through the Joint Commission.

The non-profit independent organization accredits more than 19,000 health care organizations and programs in the U.S.

The Joint Commission has given the city-owned hospital its trademarked “Gold Seal of Approval” for compliance with the Commission’s national standards for hospital quality and safety.

According to Joint Commission spokesman Bret Coons, the Bartlett survey was unannounced and took place earlier this month. He said the Joint Commission conducts on-site surveys every 18 to 36 months and last visited Bartlett in 2009.

“Ideally this is enough of an unannounced time frame that the organization is working to constantly keep their accreditation standards in full compliance,” he said.

Once on-site, Joint Commission surveyors rate a range of hospital functions from the care environment to emergency services, medication management, medical staff, and treatment as well as a number of other criteria, Coons said. The surveyors also follow a patient through care, in what’s called Tracer Methodology.

“The tracer allows the surveyor, or surveyors, to actually follow a patient’s experience at the organization. Now whether that’s done through files or actually a patient that is being treated onsite at the time the survey is going on is up to the surveyors and the organization as well,” he said. “Obviously you’d have to get permission from the patient.”

Among other benefits, the Joint Commission says accreditation strengthens community confidence in a health care organization, helps recruit staff, and is a prerequisite for insurance reimbursement for some procedures.

Trauma Center certification
Earlier this week, BRH was certified by the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services as a Level IV Trauma Center. That means the Juneau hospital can provide initial evaluation, stabilize critical patients and transfer them to higher level trauma centers.

Data indicates a 25 percent increase in survival rate of seriously injured patients when they are treated at a designated trauma center, according to HSS. The highest designation in Alaska is level two at the Alaska Native Medical Center in Anchorage. Alaska has the second highest trauma death rate in the U.S.

Plans to renovate an old theater building in Juneau have fallen through.

The Juneau Housing Trust and the owners of the Gross 20th Century Theater failed to reach agreement on a plan that would have resulted in more affordable housing and a performing arts theater for the downtown.

The Housing Trust made an offer on the building. But Bob Banghart, chief curator at the Alaska State Museum who has worked on the project for years, says the building owners came back with a price that was out of reach.

The project would have provided 22 housing units, and there were plans to remodel the art deco theater on the building’s first floor.