Public Safety

A Juneau resident took home a sick mountain goat kid with crusty skin lesions after hiking Perseverance Trail last weekend and contacted the Alaska Department of Fish & Game. Officials say the goat had a highly contagious viral skin infection that can transfer to humans and pets.

“It’s very important that people — if they see a sick or a dead wild animal — that they call Fish and Game, and not try to take it home themselves,” said Kimberlee Beckmen, the wildlife health veterinarian at ADF&G. “It’s also illegal to pick up wildlife and take it home.”

Beckmen said the goat had contagious ecthyma. It’s not always fatal in sheep and goats, but it’s usually more severe and deadly in lambs and kids. It causes skin lesions to develop around openings in the body. 

“When it covers their face, their eyes, their mouth, they can’t eat,” she said. “This recent case — the poor animal was starving to death and was completely dehydrated. It could not see out of its eyes.”

She said the goat probably would have died from the infection within a couple of days, and ADF&G euthanized the animal over the weekend.

In people, the infection is called orf and it’s typically mild. A lesion usually appears within a week of exposure. Beckmen said it’s not fatal to humans or dogs, and the lesions typically go away on their own after several weeks. The virus can transfer when the scabs make contact with openings in the skin. 

But Beckmen said hunters can still eat the meat of an infected animal if it’s handled properly. 

“We recommend that people wear gloves when they’re harvesting their animal and butchering it, and if they see any lesions on the skin or anything unusual, they want to make sure that they clean their knives off before they cut into the meat,” she said. 

ADF&G officials said they get calls about the infection popping up every once in a while. Carl Koch, the department’s area biologist in Juneau, said his team collected a dead goat kid with ecthyma near the Flume Trail in December. He said the department received a call in October about twin goats with the early stages of an infection, and thinks the two that died recently could be them. 

Beckmen said this is not an outbreak or an unusual occurrence. Sporadic cases have appeared in Dall sheep and mountain goats across Alaska since the 1980s, and she said the state is not currently concerned about it affecting those populations.

ADF&G requests that people report ecthyma cases to the wildlife disease surveillance hotline at 907-328-8354, by emailing dfg.dwc.vet@alaska.gov or calling the local ADF&G office. People can also report sick or injured wild animals through the department’s web form.

Koch said the person who took the goat home last week had called the department and left a message while out on the trail, but didn’t get a response since it was Saturday. He said people can call the police non-emergency number at (907) 586-0600 if they don’t hear back from ADF&G about a time-sensitive wildlife issue over the weekend.

Two of Alaska’s largest news organizations and two top reporters did not commit defamation when they described a former state employee’s statements about rape, a state judge ruled on Tuesday in Anchorage.

Jeremy Cubas, a former aide to Gov. Mike Dunleavy, sued Alaska Public Media, the Anchorage Daily News, Nat Herz and Curtis Gilbert last year. American Public Media, a national organization, was also named in the suit.

Cubas resigned in 2023, shortly before the publication of an article that described comments he made in two podcast episodes. He filed suit almost two years later, seeking more than $5 million in damages and lost wages.

Cubas specifically challenged two parts of the article — a paraphrase that said Cubas “said it’s fine for a man to force himself on his wife” and the statement that Cubas “made comments about rape.”

In a 22-page order, Judge Christina Rankin said the second statement “is an accurate quote of Cubas’ own statement” in the podcast.

“Defendants used accurate, direct quotes from Cubas in the article. Therefore, Cubas can prove no set of facts that Statement Two is unfairly abridged, mischaracterized, distorted, or littered with slight inaccuracies,” Rankin said.

For the first statement, which was a paraphrase rather than a direct quote, Rankin concluded that it is “a fair abridgement” of Cubas’ words.

Cubas had argued that his belief that it is impossible to rape one’s wife — something he said during the two podcast episodes — is not the same as saying it is fine to “force yourself” on one’s wife.

Cubas’ core argument, Rankin concluded, was that the wording of the paraphrase was such that it implied Cubas believed it was OK for a spouse to “violently rape one’s own wife.”

“However, it is the alleged defamatory statement itself that the Court needs to review for truth, not the plaintiff’s inflamed version of the statements,” Rankin wrote.

She concluded that given the context given in the article, a reasonable reader would not share Cubas’ perceived implication but would instead “believe what defendants assert he said.”

Cubas did not return a voicemail message seeking comment on Wednesday.

Because Rankin concluded that the article is accurate, she did not take up Cubas’ other arguments, which included the idea that Cubas was not a public figure and that the reporters had malice against him.

“The court recognizes that this was good, solid journalism,” said Ed Ulman, president and CEO of Alaska Public Media. “The opinion lays things out thoroughly, but in the end it was simple. Truth is a defense in a libel case.”

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate on Wednesday confirmed Aaron C. Peterson of Anchorage to be a federal District Court judge in Alaska.

The vote was 58 to 39, with seven Democrats voting yes.

Peterson is in his mid-40s and was born in Anchorage. He’s an Air Force veteran and has worked at the state Department of Law since 2012. Earlier, he clerked in the Alaska Superior Court, for now-retired Superior Court Judge Michael Spaan.

“Judge Spaan approached his work diligently, with humility and always respecting every litigant that appeared before him,” Peterson said at his Senate confirmation hearing last year. “I took so much away from that clerkship, and I’ve carried those lessons with me every day since.”

Peterson, once he’s sworn in, will be the first judge to go through an advisory committee Sen. Dan Sullivan established to help select candidates for Alaska’s federal court.

He’ll be Alaska’s first new federal judge since U.S. District Court Judge Joshua Kindred resigned amid allegations of impropriety with law clerks and attorneys. Like Peterson, Kindred had the support of both U.S. senators and was nominated by President Trump.

Peterson’s swearing-in will bring the number of judges on Alaska’s U.S. District Court to two. The court still has one vacancy.

Kipnuk resident Rayna Paul fought back tears as she talked about how the remnants of Typhoon Halong ravaged her village — and why relocating is so important for the next generation.

“We want them to have a livable life too,” she said, and then continued in Yup’ik, “Safe-alriamek cucuklirarkaugukut relocate-ararkaukumta,” which means, “We have to pick land that is safe if we are to re-locate.”

Paul joined more than 50 Kipnuk residents at a meeting on Saturday to begin discussing the future of their village after last fall’s powerful storm destroyed homes, contaminated water and forced nearly everyone to leave. Now the residents face a critical decision: rebuild in the same spot or move to higher ground?

Kipnuk Village Council President Daniel Paul said the community is divided.

“I had many calls from our tribal members, half of them wanna stay, half wanna go,” he said. “Relocation decision will be upon my tribal members, their votes and their voice inputs.”

Kipnuk is about four miles inland from the Bering Sea coast and was once home to about 700 people. Most remain evacuated in Anchorage or Bethel, except for a group of roughly 100 residents who are back in the village working to rebuild. There’s a lot to do. The storm demolished about 150 homes, damaged boardwalks, disturbed gravesites and left lands and water contaminated with spilled oil and other hazardous materials.

On Saturday, the community began discussing its future.

Sheryl Musgrove, who directs the climate justice program under the Alaska Institute for Justice, told residents that it’s up to them to decide whether to relocate.

“It’s a decision of the community alone,” she said. “No one can force you to move, but then again, others can’t force people to stay there either.”

Residents spoke predominantly in Yup’ik, asking what relocation could look like. Some asked about how to choose a new site and secure land ownership.

“Who is dealing with the land?” Larry Kalistook asked. “Is anyone dealing with the land?”

Others pondered what it would take to set up critical infrastructure in a new place. Village Council Vice President Chris Alexie said figuring out a school, an airport and a health clinic would be a start.

“Those are the most important things, and water and sewer systems also,” Alexie said. “It’s not going to be easy but we’re going to deal with this.”

Alexie said that working through the relocation process could take years.

For Newtok, it took decades and well over $100 million. In Kwigillingok, the other village hit hardest by the storm, residents have already voted to move. But it’s unclear when it will happen and how much it will cost.

If Kipnuk decides to relocate, one potential option is going to Cheeching, a historical settlement on higher ground between Kipnuk and Chefornak. It’s now owned by Chefornak’s Chefarnmute Corporation.

The corporation’s vice president, Larry Kairauiuak, said Chefornak itself relocated back in the 1950s — and he thinks that’s why it didn’t suffer more damage in the storms.

“If the elders at that time had not decided to move to our current location, we would have been in the same situation as Kipnuk with the typhoon,” he said. “We’re grateful for our leaders at that moment to move to higher ground.”

Kairauiuak said his village is open to a conversation about helping Kipnuk, and the corporation will hold a meeting with shareholders on March 7.

“We have a lot of families from not just Kipnuk but in Kwig, Tuntutuliak, Kong, Nightmute,” he said. “Our community is receptive to hear what they have to say.”

Kairauiuak said residents from many villages in the region have family ties to Cheeching, so that’s why it’s important for Chefornak residents to have a chance to weigh in on the future of that land.

Kipnuk elder David Carl said he remembers growing up Cheeching — his family called it “rock mountain.” It’s about 10 miles from Kipnuk and he supports moving there because he said the ground is more stable.

“They will make a wise decision if they relocate to the site right there,” he said. “Being an elder, we’re not thinking about ourselves, who we are now, we just want to fight for our upcoming generations.”

But for Daniel Paul, Kipnuk is home and he hopes to live there again one day.

“For me, I’m gonna stick with Kipnuk, regardless of how the situation is,” he said. “I was raised there, and I’ll stay there.”

Paul said discussions will continue and residents have a lot of factors to weigh. But Kipnuk leaders also feel a sense of urgency. He said the village expects only one substantial influx of federal funding. To make the best use of it, he said, they need to decide soon whether they want to stay or move.

Editor’s note: KYUK’s Julia Jimmie provided Yup’ik translations for this story.

The North Douglas boat launch will soon reopen to the public after being closed for more than two weeks due to damage to its parking lot. 

In mid-January, Juneau Docks and Harbors staff closed off a portion of the launch’s parking lot on North Douglas Highway that provides access to the boat ramp. That’s after they discovered a large sinkhole that developed near the entrance.

Matt Creswell, Juneau’s harbormaster, said the closure was made out of an abundance of caution. 

“Luckily, this did happen in January instead of in the middle of the busy summer boating season,” he said. “The use is fairly minimal out at North Douglas. However, there are some die-hards that are out there quite often, and it’s used as a cabin access point as well.”

Sonny Mauricio, a spokesperson for the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, said the damage was likely caused by erosion to a culvert pipe that runs beneath the highway, which the state maintains. The state is handling the sinkhole repairs.

He said the department plans to temporarily repair the damage and reopen the launch to the public by the end of this week. He said it’s still unclear how extensive the damage is to the area.

“We plan on going out this week to cover it with big metal plates that will stay there until the spring allows us to go out and do some more permanent repairs,” he said. 

Mauricio said the department will share details about a more permanent fix in the coming months.

As the city’s Emergency Programs Manager, Ryan O’Shaughnessy leads emergency planning, response and recovery for the City and Borough of Juneau.

KTOO’s Mike Lane recently caught up with O’Shaughnessy to talk about lessons learned from the major storm events in December and January and how the department operates.

Listen:

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Mike Lane: Ryan, what is your vision for CBJs Emergency Management Department and how did these new roles, avalanche advisor and tech fit into that vision?

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Yeah, that’s a great question, Mike. My vision for CBJs emergency programs is really one of whole community engagement. our team really relies on strong partnerships with all kinds of different agencies for avalanche specifically, as well as for, you know, the flooding we experience in the summertime and any other hazard that we may face. You know, Juneau is an islanded community, and it really takes all of us – the public, our government agencies, our nonprofits, our private sector – to participate in emergency management.

Mike Lane: Right. Okay. Do you think you’ll be hiring for more roles in your department soon, like a geo hazard or landslide specialist, climate adaptation specialist, etc?

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Those are great questions, Mike. I can’t speak for the Assembly on the allocation of funding for our division, but you know, we have a lot of work cut out for us. There’s, there’s no shortage of hazards in our community, our hazard mitigation plan cites many, many hazards ranging from everything from downtown fire to tsunami and earthquake, glacial lake outburst flooding, regular flooding. So there’s no shortage of hazards. And you know, we have identified in our hazard mitigation plan a lot of actions that we can take to mitigate those. But those do come with, you know, staff requirements.

Mike Lane: How do you see this past disaster declaration went? How do you think it it all unfolded? Was it organized? Was it chaos? What was it?

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Organized chaos is where we like to live. You know, the practice of emergency management is taking those emergency scenarios and trying to bring some order to them. So, you know, I think we accomplished the objectives that we set out with which, you know, as always, we’re going to prioritize preservation of life, life/safety for the public, and protecting critical infrastructure. So always, always learning, right? There’s always things that we can do better. And we are continuing to reflect on this most recent event with our partners and internally and try to enact some lessons, some lessons learned.

Mike Lane: Excellent. Speaking of lessons learned: what did you see in this last episode of disasters that you’re now reevaluating how you’re going to do it later? Was there something that you went, “Oh, we got to change this.”

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Yeah, I think there’s, there’s lots of stuff. A lot of, a lot of takeaways specific to avalanche. But, you know, we’re constantly looking for those things in emergency management, right? We’re training, we’re preparing, we’re executing and responding to disasters, and then the next phase of that cycle is to reflect and evaluate. Based on that evaluation, we again, we train and we plan. And you know, this disaster specifically, I think one of the core challenges was it affected everything about our community. You know, a lot of times when we see stuff like the flooding in the summer is a great example. It’s localized to an area. Whereas this disaster, it literally blanketed our community. People were tired. Both the people affected by it, the people working to respond to it, were tired from shoveling at their own homes. Everybody was exhausted. It impacted travel and the facilities we were able to use. So it was a challenging one, and some some unique and interesting lessons being learned for sure.

Mike Lane: Is there anything you’d like to add to this?

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: I never miss an opportunity to plug emergency alerts. Signing up for emergency alerts is absolutely the best way to stay informed and up to date on on anything going on related to this hazard and other hazards in our community. 

Mike Lane: How would one do that?

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: The easiest way to sign up for emergency alerts is to text “CBJ” to the number 38276. 

Mike Lane: 38276.

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Yep. And you just type and just the in the message, just send “CBJ” and that’ll sign you up for emergency alerts. 

Mike Lane: Awesome. 

Ryan O’Shaughnessy: Alternatively, you can go to the CBJ website. Right there on the homepage, there’s a button that’ll get you signed up.