Author: Andi McDaniel

Some of the best recipes in the world can’t be found in cookbooks. At Dog Point Fish Camp, traditional ways of gathering and preparing food are learned hands-on. Andi McDaniel spent the weekend there to investigate.

“Resource damage” isn’t a very pretty term, but that’s what the Forest Service says is happening to fish habitat in the Starrigavan Valley. Increased all-terrain vehicle traffic in the last couple of years has churned up new – and unauthorized – trails in the valley. And the tributaries and stream bed of Starrigavan creek itself are bearing the brunt of the impact. The watershed is home year round to juvenile coho salmon and dolly varden trout, and is an important spawing area for pink salmon and steelhead. KCAWs Robert Woolsey recently took a walk through the valley with Forest Service fisheries biologist Perry Edwards.

The fuel distribution company Delta Western progressed towards its goal of installing a new fuel dock on Japonski Island Tuesday. During their last meeting, the Planning and Zoning Commission approved changes to zoning language that will pave the way for a facility there.

Sitka Counseling and Prevention Services is one step closer to moving onto the Sheldon Jackson College campus. The Planning Commission last/Tuesday night signed off on a minor subdivision of the campus that could become the mental health agency’s residential treatment program. But first, the Planning Commission has to approve the project, something they failed to do during Tuesday’s meeting.

Sitka kindergarteners will begin the next school year on the same daily schedule as last year. The Sitka school board Tuesday night (6-17-08) defeated a controversial plan to extend the kindergarten day by forty-minutes, but agreed to reconsider the idea later this fall in the hope of reaching consensus on how best to improve student achievement in the early grades.

Work has begun on Sitka's first off-leash dog park. The Dog Owners Group (DOG) started to put up the fences for the park last Saturday (6-14-08) at the Turnaround. The work party was open to the public, but not all the public who showed up were totally behind the project.

Devoted paddlers from Sitka and beyond donned their spray skirts Saturday (6-14-08) to compete in the second annual Sitka Sound Ocean Adventure Race. Andi McDaniel brings back this report.

A proposed minor subdivision of Sheldon Jackson campus property, that could become the site of a residential treatment program, won the approval of the Sitka Historic Preservation Commission Wednesday night. It now heads back to the Planning Commission for final approval. But while the project made it through another administrative hoop, it has sparked a community-wide discussion of how college property is disposed of.

Summertime means the arrival of another crop of broadcasting interns in Alaska. KCAW is pleased to welcome UC Berkeley journalism student Andi McDaniel. The first test for a Raven Radio intern is to master digital recording and editing; the second is to produce a finished story, no matter how trivial – all within a week. McDaniel has passed both benchmarks with exceptional style, and has demonstrated that by using reliable sources and a strong technique, even a trivial story can still be a good story. She got the following scoop just hours after stepping off the airplane in Sitka.

Three local fisheries programs have received a small financial boost from the Sitka fish box tax. The Sitka assembly last Tuesday divided up over $37-thousand dollars from the tax, which is collected by charter operators when they package fish for clients. The final amounts were $2500 Armstrong-Keta, $25,000 NSRAA, and $10,000 Sitka Sound Science Center