Sitka school leaders say the budget scenario is worse than they thought, which could lead to a reduction of up to 16 staff, depending on which budget scenario the Sitka School Board ultimately chooses. While the board did not make a decision at its meeting on Wednesday (4-1-26), the message from the audience was clear.  

The Sitka School Board is staring down the barrel of a budget deficit next school year that has continued to grow.

At a meeting on April 1, the group considered three possible scenarios that would leave them with a balanced budget. The plan with the most severe staff reductions would cut 16 staff, including 10 teaching positions. The best case scenario for staff would still cut 12 positions. Some of those cuts would be teachers who are already retiring, but their positions would not be refilled.

School Board President Phil Burdick said the situation was “dire” no matter what they choose.

“We have no money. There is no money coming from the state. All scenarios look like we can either spend down our fund balance and all of the Secure Rural Schools we think we’re going to get, and the Secure Rural Schools money we have,” Burdick said. “And if we don’t, then we are going to cut deeply into staff. That is a super rough synopsis. No money, staff cuts.”

Cutting more positions could mean keeping some money in savings, depending on how much the district receives in federal Secure Rural Schools money–that’s a federal program that supports schools surrounded by federal lands which don’t contribute to the local tax base.

The budget deficit is worse than what was presented to the board a little over two weeks ago. At that time the district anticipated a status quo budget would leave them with a deficit of between $1.2 and $2 million, depending on whether the district’s health  insurance costs increase. 

But since then, district staff discovered a “significant error” in their accounting spreadsheets to the tune of around $800,000 in unaccounted for expenses. Superintendent Deidre Jenson pointed to several reasons for the error – a late audit, a rushed budget process, and historical knowledge lost from staff turnover, as well as an antiquated budget system on an Excel spreadsheet. 

“[In the] hurried process, then things get missed a little bit. We don’t double check quite as easily or thoroughly. And that’s where some of this has come up,” Jenson said. “[A] hurried process just makes for room for errors.” She said the district does not have an accounting system that actually helps build the budget, and investing in a new program would prevent issues like this from occurring in future years.

The news leaves the district with even less wiggle room in the budget for next year. Sitka’s assembly has already committed to fund schools to the cap or maximum allowed by state law, plus additional non-instructional funds. The district had already instituted a spending freeze, and is anticipating some savings from that- all scenarios suggest spending the full amount, around $500,000. So the question now is whether to spend most of the money the district anticipates it will receive from Secure Rural Schools. The federal funding pool that could be as much as $1.7 million, but 2025 and 2026 disbursement amounts are not yet confirmed, and are still subject to assembly approval.

Educators and administrators advocated on behalf of their schools to the board, calling for them to choose the scenario that cuts the fewest staff. Many, including Blatchley Middle School science teacher Alex Dailey, said more cuts just weren’t sustainable. 

“If you look in the last 12 years, you’ve gone from over 100 teachers to 66. You know, that’s a third of the colleagues that I work with,” Dailey said. “I started in 2020, and the number here was 94 when I started. That’s a third of the people that I’ve worked with that I’ve seen go.”

“To cut us down is going to be brutal for our kids. There’s hope on the horizon. We don’t know who the governor is going to be next, but it’s guaranteed it’s going to be friendlier to education, whoever it is,” Dailey continued. “Please, hold out, until then for us and for our kids”

Some board members, including Paul Rioux firmly opposed the scenario that would cut the most staff.

“I’m definitely a hard no on one, and I think that it’s irresponsible for us to not take a look at if we have another $700,000, what would it be possible to keep,” Rioux said.

Keet Gooshi Heen music teacher Susan Brandt-Ferguson said the board should spend the money now and not save it for a rainy day. 

“So you might think that it’s risky business to maybe be short on the expenses…It’s risky to not keep these teachers,” Brandt-Ferguson said. “Please understand budgeting with a school district is so different from budgeting for a family, budgeting for a business, budgeting for an assembly. We can’t make money. We are always at the mercy of someone else, and so all we can do is spend the money that you have, or that you think you probably will, maybe, hopefully have. That’s your job. Please spend it.” 

But board member Tom Williams felt the opposite approach was the risky one. 

“What’s the risk of funding a school year, and we don’t have the money to finish it, and those teachers don’t get a paycheck after December? Is that more of a risk than being conservative and funding what you have?” Williams said. “[If] the money doesn’t come in, what’s the impact to that family? I think it’s worth being honest up front with what you have, not necessarily what you hope to get.”

Both he and board member Amanda Williams voiced discomfort with building a budget on Secure Rural Schools money the district has not received yet. 

More numbers are still up in the air, like where health insurance costs will land. The board did not make any decisions at its meeting, and agreed to meet again on April 23 to discuss the budget further. The board is required to finalize its budget and submit it to the assembly by May 1. 

Maxine Duncan felt like something was bothering her teenage daughter. It was just about a month into the 2022 school year.

“I was just like, maybe she’s just having a bad day, but those days added up…When finally I asked her, I said, ‘What is wrong with you? What is wrong?’ I said, ‘Did something happen to you?’” Duncan recalled. “And then she started crying, and she said, ‘Yes.’”

Duncan’s daughter asked KCAW not to use her name but gave her mother permission to speak on-the-record. She told her mother she’d been sexually assaulted by a fellow student at Mt. Edgecumbe High School.

“And even in that initial moment of her opening up to me, and I knew it was bad, I didn’t ask her to tell me the story right then there,” Duncan said. “I said, ‘Hold on one moment, I’m going to call your dad so you don’t have to keep repeating yourself.’”

The family reported the assault to the Sitka Police Department immediately, and the police officer told them he would notify the school and initiate an investigation.

Duncan said over the next several weeks, they had three in-person meetings with school leadership. In that time, she said no safety plan was implemented, and getting information about the investigation was challenging. Throughout that process, she said her daughter was met with skepticism from school leaders.

“When a student reports a sexual assault, the expectation is not perfection, it’s protection,” Duncan said in a statement she shared with KCAW.

She says it was unclear what steps the school was taking to keep her daughter safe and their requests for information were getting them nowhere. In that time, Duncan’s daughter’s grades slipped, and she took to hiding in bathrooms between classes, skipping lunch and cheer practice to avoid the student in common areas. 

“They would have sent him home faster if he had started a fight than had put my daughter’s life in endanger,” she says. “Not only when it happened, but for the next three and a half weeks, while he wasn’t even being on restriction, and any type of little guidance that we got, it was never to make us feel safe.”

And she said the school’s protocol for responding to sexual assault allegations was also unclear. Peeling through the school’s handbook and website didn’t help. KCAW found the same problem.  

According to federal law, Duncan and her family should not have been left in the dark. Title IX, the 1972 federal civil rights law prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools, including sexual harassment and assault. Kayleigh Baker is an attorney and senior supervising consultant with TNG Consulting, an organization that specializes in risk management in higher education, including Title IX. Baker says in 2020, Title IX regulations were updated to include detailed guidance on the formal grievance process.

“When we have an allegation, and a complainant files what is called a formal complaint, requesting an investigation, then the school has to do several things as dictated by these regulations, which are binding on all schools in the US,” Baker said. “The process is pretty rigid, and it’s pretty robust.”

If the grievance process is followed, Baker said there’s information that has to be provided to both parties before interviews can occur. Appeal rights must be offered, and before an investigation is finalized, all parties have the right to review and comment on any evidence that was collected. The final investigation report should include that feedback.

“Then they also get a copy of that investigation report before a separate individual, who was not the decision maker and who is not serving as the Title IX coordinator, makes a determination as to whether or not policy is violated,” Baker said. (Editor’s Note: The requirement for an independent reviewer was removed in a 2024 update to Title IX, but those updates were vacated by a federal judge in 2025, reverting the regulations back to the 2020 standards).

The accused has rights too. Under Title IX, until the investigation concludes they cannot be punished and must have equal access to educational services, so the decision to allow the student to attend events was in line with the law.

An emergency removal can only occur once the school has done a risk analysis and determined the student poses an immediate threat to health and safety- she says that’s a very high bar to meet. However, Baker said schools can still separate students as part of the investigation process. 

“There could be changes made to residence halls assignments, or perhaps changes made to academic class schedules, or perhaps staggering of dining hall times and some other things too,” Baker said. “Certainly the issuance of no contact orders or no contact directives are all very common supportive measures that can still be enacted.”

Duncan said her family didn’t receive any of that documentation at the time. After about a month had passed, a school administrator called them to say the investigation was complete and, Duncan said, the student was expelled. KCAW reviewed a letter that the family received from the state, which said the student had been charged with sexual assault. KCAW was unable to confirm the outcome of the charges since the student was a minor at the time. Duncan says at that moment, they didn’t want to pursue the case any further. Her daughter just wanted to feel like a high school student again.

More than three years have passed, and Duncan’s daughter is an adult now, and she wants to review the school’s files on her case. But when she reached out for documents, she got pushback. After being denied a couple of times, they finally secured their records from the city only after providing in-person identification, and the school could not find any relevant records to share with them, and directed them to the Sitka Police Department for investigation records.

If Title IX had been followed, a file from the grievance process including all of the collected evidence would still be available. Her family submitted a request under the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act and waited 45 days. In early March, Superintendent David Langford  responded to their request via email, saying, “We have sent all the records we have. This is an event that happened years ago. If it was a serious incident it would have been reported to police,” and suggested they contact police for a case number.

Baker said it’s a common misconception in K-12 schools that if a police investigation is initiated, the school has done its due diligence, but it hasn’t. Schools are required to do an independent investigation that’s separate from a police investigation under Title IX. And they must keep files from those investigations for seven years.

“Not only do I wish that more administrators recognized that this school has an independent obligation to conduct an investigation and provide a process and provide support,” Baker said. “But I want families and students to know that as well, right, that going to law enforcement does not mean that you’re not entitled to a process at your school.”

KCAW reached out to school leadership and the Commissioner of Education, Deena Bishop for comment on this case and to learn more about how Title IX is currently being implemented at the school. In a response to our inquiry on March 19, Bishop said Mt. Edgecumbe takes all reports of sexual misconduct and their obligations under Title IX seriously.

Bishop said based on the available information the report was taken seriously by staff at the time and referred to the proper authorities. She said supportive measures were offered to Duncan’s daughter consistent with school practices, and the alleged student withdrew from the school shortly thereafter. 

However, Bishop said in reviewing the files, she and Superintendent Langford identified gaps in their Title IX process that were “concerning.” Specifically, that during and after leadership transitions between Spring and Fall of 2022, including the hiring of a new superintendent and principal, it was, “not clear how certain Title IX responsibilities and records were transferred during that period.” 

Bishop said she and Langford are expediting efforts to meet and exceed federal requirements, performing a review of their procedures to ensure they are in compliance with Title IX and expanding training for staff, including the Title IX coordinator. She said moving forward the school’s superintendent will assume that role. On March 20, the school’s website was updated to include information on Title IX, including how to report discrimination or harassment, to its homepage.

Duncan’s daughter gave permission for KCAW to use her voice in this piece. 

“As a teenager, you’re taught that if something bad happens…there are systems meant to protect you,” she said, reading from a statement.

“You’re told there are clear rules, clear processes and people who will step in when something goes wrong. But when I tried to rely on those systems, I saw how easily those clear rules were treated like suggestions instead of obligations.”

She and her family say they don’t want to see the school punished, they want accountability and policy change. They want to see the law applied.

“These protections exist because survivors before me fought for that civil right,” she said. “It’s a right I should have had, and having it properly applied could have lessened the emotion impact that I will carry for the rest of my life.

Commissioner Bishop said her office will continue to review the school’s records to determine whether more information around the case can be identified. Meanwhile, the Duncan family has obtained legal counsel and is looking into their options.

Phoenix Johnson works in political advocacy and education now, but around two decades ago, fresh out of the United States Air Force, she was planning on a career in medicine.

“Getting into the medical field was almost out of survival,” Johnson says. “I’ve always cared about people…I was a suicide intervention skills instructor, the youngest in the Air Force to do that. It hurts my heart to see people hurting, and I’ve hurt, and I haven’t had help when I needed it, and being an eldest sister, you know, I just kind of feel like that’s just ingrained in me.”

She was 26 when she moved to Ketchikan in the summer of 2011. The next year, she took a job in a lab run by Ketchikan Indian Community, an opportunity that felt deeply personal to her. 

“I’m biracial. My mom is Indigenous, and my dad was a Coastie…And that’s how they met [when] he got stationed up in Alaska. And so I thought, ‘What a neat opportunity to be a part of my mother’s tribal community, and to give back and help people.'” 

Johnson worked alongside one other technician in the lab, and they got along well. But the lab director, Dr. Richard McGrath, did not put her at ease. She had only been working in the lab for a few weeks when she said McGrath started to cross the line into her physical space.

“Immediately I could tell where he placed his body was unprofessional,” Johnson says. “The personal bubble wasn’t there.”

“It was a fairly small lab, and so, you know, I’m sure someone could justify, like, ‘There just wasn’t enough room. That’s why my pelvis just slid across you, right? Or, like, ‘I’m just grabbing for the gauze. That’s why I grazed your breast.'”

She recalls a moment when he called her into his office and pulled her chair closer to him so their knees were touching. When she tried to scoot her chair backwards, he pulled her close to him again. She recalls several other instances of inappropriate touching, including on her thigh, neck, and hair. She says he invited her to his home on Prince of Wales Island, which she declined. And then there was a slap. 

He came in, and that was the morning that he like full on, slapped my butt, and there’s  no mistaking that,” Johnson says. “It was underhand, slapping, cupping booty jiggle, all of it. And I was stunned, and I remember looking at him, and I was resolved, and I just said, ‘Never touch me like that again.’”

She reported McGrath to the tribe’s human resources department the same day, March 19, 2012. Three days later, she sent additional documentation, listing other instances of inappropriate touching and conversation. She met with the tribe’s human resources director, who said they would investigate. 

KCAW reached out to Ketchikan Indian Community CEO Emily Edenshaw, who declined to comment.

(Editor’s Note: After this story was published, Edenshaw sent KCAW a statement. We’ve included the link at the bottom of this story)

Johnson says they weren’t taking the allegations seriously. 

“I do recall being told, I don’t know if it was before or after the letter, HR saying, ‘Okay, well, clearly there’s an issue, so we’ll just have it so you guys interact very little. And I’m like, ‘Well, not really sure how that’s supposed to happen, because he’s the director. And that’s when it became very clear that, ‘Oh, I’m I’m the disposable one. They’re going to want to preserve a director, I guess.'”

A month later, on April 17, she received a response from KIC’s General Manager at the time, Debra Patton. The letter rejected Johnson’s sexual harassment claim, calling the incidents “non-intentional communication and physical contact.” It said McGrath’s actions may have been misinterpreted by Johnson due to his  “casualness” in the office, and the physical touching of her hands and shoulders was intended, “to refresh your knowledge of blood withdrawing procedure.” It said invitations to McGrath’s home were standard for all employees. Furthermore, the letter said McGrath’s butt slap was accidental, and was intended for her back. It said they found “no witnesses to support the allegation [that] he touched [her] on the neck, thigh and hair,” but if she felt intimidated in the future, she should speak with human resources or a management staff member immediately.    

The letter, which she says was delivered to her by the tribe’s former health administrator Brent Simcosky, said she could file a grievance in response to the investigation. Johnson says she filed a grievance right away. Within days, HR staff called her into a meeting, and told her she was fired. Johnson remembers crying as they immediately escorted her off the premises.

“Treating me as if I was some high threat or a criminal was that much more traumatizing,” Johnson recalls. “And then I’m just being dumped out on the sidewalk with no plan, no severance, no apology, no justice.”

KCAW has independently confirmed that McGrath worked for the Ketchikan Indian Community through at least 2013. A few years later, he was hired at Sitka Community Hospital. He was under contract there until he was placed on administrative leave in December 2018 after several sexual assault allegations were raised against him by three different women. He was charged in 2019 with 13 counts of felony sexual assault. Following a mistrial in 2022, on the first day of what was expected to be a lengthy trial in 2023, McGrath took a last-minute deal with the state. He pleaded guilty to third degree sexual assault, and was sentenced to two years in prison. KCAW reached out to McGrath’s legal representation for comment, but they did not respond. 

Johnson believes that if McGrath’s actions had been addressed by Ketchikan Indian Community years ago, it could have prevented him from harming patients and medical staff in the future.

Last year, she happened across news coverage of McGrath’s Sitka arrest. She felt it was time to ensure that her story was heard. 

“Being able to talk about this now means that my experience isn’t just invisible and it wasn’t erased. It means something, and there are so many survivors out there that don’t get their stories told,” Johnson says.

“Every time that we can tell these stories, it shines more light. You know, they say to drive out the dark with light,” she continues. “But it also, I think, hopefully inspires other people to be better. Even if somebody reads this and they decide, ‘Maybe I should go to therapy,’ [or] ‘Maybe I should tell my best friend this thing happened to me. Maybe somebody just needs that push to just try one more time.”

Johnson says she filed a grievance with the Indian Health Service earlier this year, but she’s skeptical of the state’s court system as a means for victims seeking justice. She says its “deference to state agencies supersedes its citizens in a way that feels inhumane.” Still, she’s optimistic that, if people act with integrity, those systems can be changed.

“We don’t need a system to have integrity, I try to teach people that. Every day I teach my daughter that you don’t need a law to tell you to be a decent human being,” Johnson says.

“The systems could be crummy, but if you have integrity, if we collectively have integrity we can fix the system, we can change the system, or we can work around the things that are not functioning as they should, or that are harming people.”

A civil case filed by one of McGrath’s victims in Sitka is being appealed before the Alaska Supreme Court. 

Editor’s Note: After this story was published on March 31, KIC CEO Emily Edenshaw released a statement. In her letter, Edenshaw said that as a matter of policy, KIC does not comment on past or current employee matters. “At the same time, we recognize that conversations like these can be difficult and may surface painful experiences for survivors,” she wrote. “Anyone impacted by sexual abuse or violence deserves support, care, and access to resources.” The letter included links to resources for survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. “KIC remains committed to maintaining a safe, respectful, and accountable workplace and community,” the letter continued. “We take all concerns seriously and continue to uphold the highest standards of integrity in how we serve our people.”

Read the full statement here.

“So we obviously don’t want to come in here and say, here’s a $900,000 deficit. Figure it out,” Leach said. “We’ve got some options that have been put together, and I just want to throw these out there to stir some discussion, and I know there will need to be some tough decisions made.”

Leach suggested two possible cuts– he first suggested tackling the “resource proposal” list. These are requests for new positions or equipment city department heads submit during the budget process. The other option Leach suggested was reconsidering part of the city’s contribution to the Sitka School District, by reverting to the traditional 50/50 split of the Secure Rural Schools Funding to trim the deficit.

The assembly leaned into the resource proposals first. After much discussion, the group cut several items from the list, including the purchase of two patrol cars for the police department, and $250,000 for athletic field sand. Overall, the group trimmed the deficit from the draft general fund budget by more than half, and directed the municipal administrator to identify other cuts that could bridge the remaining budget gap. 

Setting aside the question of Secure Rural Schools funding, and even with city funding schools to the cap, or maximum allowed by state law, the Sitka School District’s budget is in a tight spot. At a School Board work session earlier in the week, the board considered three possible scenarios for trimming its own projected budget deficit for next school year. School Board President Phil Burdick told the assembly all of those scenarios included staff cuts.  

“So you know it’s it’s dire, and it’s not your fault. Let’s just put it that way. We’re looking at 11-and-a-half staff reductions, even in the best case scenario, that’s just teachers. We’re also looking at one-and-a-half administrators. Not rehiring positions, that’s included in that. The one full time counselor position that we’ll fund with grant funds, reduction of classified staff,” Burdick said. “Basically, we’re cutting in every area no matter, no matter which scenario we look at.”

The Sitka School Board will hold a public budget hearing on April 1 beginning at 5 p.m. in the Sitka High School library, before its regular meeting. The Sitka Assembly will hold several more special budget meetings next month before it finalizes the budget in May. 

“The historic preservation plan has been created by the Historic Preservation Commission as required by Sitka general code. It allows for the maintenance of Sitka CLG or certified local government status, which is a nationwide program,” Will said. “The plan before you has been underway since 2009 and is meant to act as a guiding document for the Historic Preservation Commission. The meat of the plan is within its goals.” 

The new plan highlights five commission goals, including developing partnerships and raising awareness of historic resources for under-represented communities, especially Tlingit history, as well as preserving the historic and cultural resources of the city, educating the public, and promoting heritage tourism, and improving city’s process of consider historic preservation in planning. That goal contained an item that was a sticking point for some assembly members— the review process for construction projects on historic buildings.

That’s why Mayor Steven Eisenbeisz recused himself from reviewing the plan. Eisenbeisz owns a business in the city’s downtown historic district, and he said he’s working to replace rotten studs on a remodeled section of the building. Addressing the assembly as a member of the public, he said a permit for the project would require a review from the Historic Preservation Commission, which would slow things down.

“You could see within just a few minutes that what I am doing to the building is not in a historical nature at all. It would take someone just a minute or two to come down, ask a few questions, and indicate that we are not changing any of the historical structure,” Eisenbeisz said. “This process adds at least two months to my permitting process.”

Eisenbeisz asked for the assembly to consider amending the document to include an faster “administrative review” of projects that don’t impact the historic qualities of buildings.

Assembly member Thor Christian agreed, and suggested postponing the plan’s approval to reconsider that section.

“Not that we don’t value our history and Sitka, that’s Sitka’s claim to fame,” Christianson said, and added that the process could be costly and, “make a project that’s benign and trivial almost take months, and add a real burden to a property owner.”

Planning and Community Development Director Amy Ainslie said the commission’s permit review process outlined in the new plan is actually “status quo” and approving the plan would not change how that process works– it would only put things in writing. Ainslie said one of the goals within the plan itself is to improve and add clarity to that process.

“And if that were to happen, that would come back in front of the assembly as a plan amendment, because, again, I want to avoid in future these processes that were implemented, but maybe not as formally documented, and to have that memorialized as a part of the plan, which is why that would come back to you,” Ainslie said. “So it’s recognized in the plan that this process is not as well defined as it should be. But that’s that’s one of the goals in finalizing this plan, is to then move on to that next project of improving the process.”

Assembly member Katie Riley suggested approving the Historic Preservation Plan with the contingency that the permit review section sunsets after a year and is replaced.

“I don’t think we actually solve any issues if we don’t pass this tonight, because then the status quo continues and we continue to elongate building times,” Riley said. “We have to tell them through the actions that they’ve identified that we do want to see them take that, and if we deny this plan, I don’t necessarily know that that happens.”

But Deputy Mayor Tim Pike felt it was worth postponing the item to give staff and the commission time to address the concerns.

“I certainly was impressed with all the work that had been done, and I would expect to see all the same things come back,” Pike said. “We’re not sending it back and saying the plan has failed. We’re sending it back and saying there’s a portion of it that this point is making the community a bit uncomfortable, and I think we need to make sure we have some clarity on it, and that’s where I’m standing.”

Ultimately the assembly voted 4-1 to postpone adopting the plan with member Riley opposed. It will come before the assembly again at its first meeting in May.

Snow plow funding approved

The Sitka Assembly is greenlighting an additional quarter of a million dollars for snow removal. When the group met last night/on Tuesday (3-24-26), it approved $225,000 to pay private contractors to plow snow, and $25,000 to cover unanticipated snow-related overtime across several city departments.

Observers at Sitka’s wastewater treatment plant have recorded nearly 60 inches of snow in Sitka since December. More than half of that fell in the last month, making this March the second snowiest on record, according to data from the National Weather Service. City staff say keeping up with the downfall has been challenging.

Earlier this week (3-24-26), Municipal Administrator John Leach and several city staffers formed an incident comment group earlier to address the issue, and put the funding proposal on the assembly’s docket with a quick turnaround.

“I just wanted to get everybody refocused on making this a priority. The crews have been working around the clock. I mean, the three o’clock in the morning wake ups are getting pretty old. The equipment’s tired, the folks are tired, and we needed that help,” Leach said, and added, “You know, right when I say that, it turns sunny outside, but yes, it’s a good opportunity.”

Leach said the city has secured three short-notice agreements with private contractors, and while snowfall had slowed, clearing streets, moving large snow berms, and clearing drains, remains critical. Mayor Steven Eisenbeisz thanked staff for their work throughout the weeks of persistent snow.

“I wish that, like, I don’t wish that the overtime budget was bigger, right? I understand that our staff has done all that they possibly can at this point. Seven days a week at 3 a.m. is not an appropriate work schedule for anybody,” Eisenbeisz said, and said that the added cost “doesn’t display my true appreciation for them.” 

Eisenbeisz and others noted that as winter wanes, “pothole” season is next. Leach  said city staff are preparing for those repairs once the streets are clear. 

The assembly approved the additional funding unanimously on first reading.  

As of Wednesday morning, city staff said contractors were working to clear Edgecumbe Drive through the Cascade Creek area and removing a large accumulation of snow at Sitka High School before progressing to Peterson Avenue. 

In the mid-90s, there was a campaign to amend the Oregon constitution that sought to restrict gay rights. Thomas Lauderdale, a young political activist and pianist, was fighting against it. And music was the means.

Lauderdale connected with the midcentury-era trio the Del Rubio Triplets, after seeing them on the star-studded Pee Wee’s Playhouse Christmas special.

“They lived in a triple white mobile home in San Pedro, California. They wore matching mini skirts, matching booties, and they had huge hair,” Lauderdale says. “They played guitar, and they sang covers of ‘Walk Like an Egyptian’ and ‘Whip It.'”

Lauderdale brought them to Portland, Oregon to do a series of concerts campaigning against the ballot measure in nursing homes, hospitals, even rotary meetings.

“And at the end of [each show] they would very sweetly say, ‘Please vote no on Proposition 13,'” Lauderdale says.

At the end of the triplet’s week on tour, Lauderdale had planned a community-wide concert, but he needed an opening act. He says he threw on a Betsy Johnson cocktail dress, hopped on stage, and Pink Martini was born. Growing to over a dozen musicians, they became the house band for political fundraising in Portland, and soon an internationally renowned, genre defying group. 

And now, Pink Martini will travel to Sitka and Juneau in April for two benefit concerts for Katlian Collective, a nonprofit working to revitalize Tlingit clan houses in Southeast, starting with the Point House in Sitka. Clan houses are cultural centers for Tlingit people – places of ritual, community and tradition. 

It’s a project that Pink Martini is happy to support. The band, known as the “little orchestra” performs in numerous styles, from jazz to classical to pop, and in over 30 different languages. 

“We’re sort of musical diplomats and ambassadors, and sort of believe in the power of bringing people together through music,” says Lauderdale. “We have a 31-year history of doing this, and we’re so delighted to be coming to Alaska, to be part of be continuing in that tradition.”

Storm Large is one of the band’s lead singers, and this will be her second time touring in Alaska with them. She says often a band’s lead singer is the “mouthpiece” that carries its identity, but Pink Martini is different.

“It is one of the most relaxing front gigs, because I’ll sing a bunch of songs solo, and then I will shimmy back to the back…[and] Jimmie Herod will step forward, Edna Vazquez will step forward, or it’ll be a band solo, a piano with Thomas and his partner, Hunter Noack, on piano doing Rhapsody in Blue [and] the most hilarious physical comedy you’ve ever seen in your life,” Large says.

“It’s like Laugh In, kind of,” she continues. “It’s a big variety show, and everybody has an important role in unison. But I see Pink Martini as as a collective of wonderful, amazing, brilliant stars in their own right.” 

Kiks.ádi clan member Lduteen Jerrick Hope-Lang says the work to rebuild Point House started out of a conversation with the late Bertha Karras.

“We walked by this chunk of property on our way to her house, and she said to me, just casually, ‘That’s your people’s property, and you need to get it back,'” Hope-Lang says. “At the time, I really had no idea, or no concept as to what tied me to that land, and what her impression was that I had any business being a part of it. So kind of led me down a rabbit hole to understanding what had been there prior.”

What came next was over a decade of work toward repatriating the land where the Point House stood. Hope-Lang now stewards the land on behalf of the Kiks.ádi. They hope to break ground on a 21st Century clan house sometime in the next year, and continue to address the broader issue of clan houses.

“I said, we need to rebuild, not just structurally, because this is a brick and mortar project, but we need to rebuild spiritually. And there’s ideas that tie to that property, that I just felt like…the time was ripe,” Hope-Lang said.

To address the broader issue, the group has received federal grant funding for their work and succeeded in getting the National Trust for Historic Preservation to recognize Sitka’s Indian Village as an endangered historic place. They’re also remodeling a 19th Century Kiks.ádi clan house four doors down from the Point House.

Hope-Lang says fundraising is key to keep the work going. Last year, Katlian Collective brought several big-name bands, including Portugal the Man, to Southeast and the concerts were a resounding success. So he reached out to his longtime friend, Lauderdale, with Pink Martini, who jumped on board. 

“Last year was rock and roll and folk and singer songwriter, and this year, bringing Pink Martini into the fold, it really creates this open dialog of like, ‘We are inviting you. The purchasing of a ticket is an invitation to be a guest in our process,” Hope-Lang says. “You could be part of this restoration, this regeneration, this restorative practice.”

Hope-Lang says Pink Martini’s music encompasses the name of the show which is “Hit Wóoshdei Yadukícht, Dancing our House Together.”

Learn more about the work of Katlian Collective, Inc. here. Tickets to see Pink Martini at the Sitka Performing Arts Center on April 15 are available at www.fineartscamp.org

Sitka was hit with snow again over the weekend, punctuating a month of persistent snowfall. City staff say exhausted road crews and damaged equipment have slowed the snow removal process. 

In an update to local news outlets Monday (3-23-26) morning, Municipal Administrator John Leach said as the snow has continued to fall, crews are running out of places to put snow berms, and are fatigued by long hours. Some of the city’s snow removal equipment has been damaged and taken out of commission. While the city is not declaring an emergency, Leach has formed an Emergency Operations Center (EOC) team made up of city staff to coordinate and respond to snow removal needs.

Leach has proposed dedicating up to an additional $250,000 to pay contractors to plow and remove snow. The appropriation will be added to the Sitka Assembly’s agenda for consideration at its regular meeting on Tuesday (3-24-26).

Leach said one contractor is already working to support the city’s snow plowing efforts, and more are expected to onboard soon. The city currently contracts with K&E Alaska to plow Green and Blue Lake Roads. A local volunteer ATV group also helps plow city streets and sidewalks.

Leach asked for patience and understanding from the public as crews continue to clear Sitka’s streets. As the snow melts, plowing will remain essential to ensure drains are open to prevent flooding. 

Spring break for the Sitka School District was extended by a day when school was canceled on Monday– the third cancellation this year. In an email to KCAW, Superintendent Deidre Jenson said the district plans to add additional days to the end of the school year for the first two snow days, but will be asking the state for an emergency waiver for March 23. She said the district will send out more information as soon as plans are finalized.

Snow also impacted Sitka’s energy grid over the weekend with an outage early Saturday morning, and a second outage Monday morning. Both times, Sitka’s electricity was cut off shortly after 4 a.m. when trees fell on the Green Lake transmission line. On Saturday, power was fully restored shortly after 7 a.m. Monday morning, power was fully restored shortly after 6 a.m.

In an email forwarded to KCAW, Electric Utility Director Ron Vinson said the city has been working with local tree removal contractors to remove risk prone trees along the Green Lake corridor 13 times in the last month, as recently as last Friday, but accumulating snow has caused instability with trees in the area. Vinson said the electric department will continue to work to prevent outages as weather conditions persist.

According to National Weather Service data, this month has been the second snowiest March on record, with just over 31 inches of snowfall recorded at Sitka’s water treatment plant as of March 23.

The Sitka School District budget will be in the red next year without substantial cuts. The Sitka School Board is looking for ways to trim a deficit of at least $1 million and is asking for community input on its process.

When the board met in a work session on March 10, Superintendent Deidre Jenson said if they build next year’s budget status quo, they’ll end up with a $1.2 million deficit. Cutting roughly 10 teaching positions would bring them close to a balanced budget.

That’s not accounting for inflation or if the school district’s health insurance costs increase. Jenson said a 10 percent jump in insurance would nearly double how much the district would be in the hole. Jenson said they expect to have preliminary insurance numbers at the end of March.

View Jenson’s presentation here

While the state legislature approved a funding increase last year, school leaders say it wasn’t enough, and the district still needed to spend down its fund balance last year to keep from eliminating staff. Jenson said she’d grown weary of cutting, and cutting.

“Bottom line is, the state has not funded schools the way they should have, and I’m getting a little frustrated with it,” Jenson said. “They want us to make changes, and they want us to make improvements in the state. And then they talk about like, ‘Can we not talk about what we’re going to cut for half-a-year and instead talk about educational improvements?’ I’m pretty frustrated.” 

For around two hours, the board discussed its plans for how to right the ship. Could Secure Rural Schools be a buffer? The federal funding program, which supports schools surrounded by federal lands which don’t contribute to the local tax base, was reauthorized this year, including two years of retroactive pay. It’s still not clear exactly how much money the city will receive or when it will receive it, but the assembly has signaled plans to direct the whole amount from the retroactive years to the school district, which could be up to $600,000 a year. Board member Tom Williams suggested putting the funds in reserves. 

“My household money, my car breaks down, and I don’t have anything in savings. You know, I’m walking,” Williams said. “I think a responsible budget has reserves so that when the unexpected happens, which it seems to always do, you have money to be able to cover these costs.”

Several board members including Paul Rioux said given the uncertainty of the amount and timing of the federal funding disbursal, they would prefer to use the money for one-time expenses, like curriculum or tech. 

“I do not feel comfortable building a budget around SRS funds that we may or may not be getting. I mean, I know that makes the front end a lot more difficult, probably, for staff, but I would rather build it to the worst case scenario and then add things back in as we get the good news that it’s showing up,” Rioux said. “Rather than build it in a better case scenario and be like, ‘Oh, the check’s not coming in the mail this year,’ and then we have to go back and panic cut, and I don’t want to be in that position.”

Jenson also reviewed the potential effect that merging schools could have on the budget. Sitka’s school enrollment has been steadily declining over the past two decades [by around 400 students], which has reduced revenue from the state. Closing a school would also decrease the district’s revenue, at least at first. Still, board member Courtney Amundson said the long range savings should be noted.

“It’s not going to save us next year, but over the over the long term, we need a plan, right? Because we have fewer students, we have a lot of buildings, and they could be put into a smaller space,” Amundson said. “So it may be additional costs in two or three years, but in 10-20 years you’ll see those cost savings.”

Jenson said if enrollment continues to fall, they would have to consider that down the line. But she said right now there are too many students enrolled in Sitka’s two elementary schools to fit into just one of the buildings.

The board also discussed how to get feedback from staff, parents and stakeholders. Rioux suggested a survey that doesn’t ask parents what to cut, but to instead rank their top 5 programs as a way for the board to gather more information to inform the budgeting process. President Phil Burdick liked the idea, and said they should also ask folks what they’d put an influx of one-time funding toward.

“Considering where we are and what we’re looking at, and what we have already done in the last 15 years because of flat funding,” Burdick said and continued, “there isn’t a lot more for us to do in terms of cutting saving. It’s important to know what the community values. It’s important to know what the priorities of this community are, and the reality may be that we might not be able to fund them.”

The board will host hearings for staff and stakeholders later this month to share budget scenarios and get community feedback on how to move forward.

Last fall, a group of alumni and a handful of former and current staff raised concerns about conditions at Mt. Edgecumbe High School. They said a high number of students were being treated for suicidal ideation, and staffing and budget cuts meant less access to mental health services. They said enrollment was dropping precipitously.

A group of lawmakers visited the school in February, and found the facilities warranted additional scrutiny, with leaks, exposed wires, and a rat living in the gymnasium that students named Tiptoes.

Superintendent David Langford told the Alaska Board of Education and Early Development on March 10 that 104 students have left the school as of March. That’s about 25% percent higher than normal. While he said there are a lot of reasons students leave, he attributed the deteriorating facilities and longtime funding cuts. 

“This is a problem decades in the making of funding not coming through, projects not being managed, maintenance not being up kept, and funding being cut. I think six, seven years ago, we had seven maintenance people, and today we have one-and-a-half,” Langford said. “And keeping up with a campus that size, with one and a half people, they do an amazing job, but they just can’t do everything that needs to be done. So it is a funding issue for Mt. Edgecumbe.”

Langford gave similar remarks in February to the House and Senate Education committees alongside Education Commissioner Deena Bishop. They highlighted the improvements they’ve made, like replacing dorm room furniture and upgrading bathrooms, and maintenance needs they’re working to address, including replacing the roof and ventilation system for the boys dorm in May. 

“Those photographs were pretty deplorable and saddening to see, because that isn’t the Edgecumbe that I remember, so I’m glad that a lot of those are being addressed,” said board member Pamela Dupras, a Mt. Edgecumbe alumni.

Langford was hired as superintendent last year after already accepting a job overseeing the Chatham School District. The state board approved his appointment and Chatham agreed to him taking on the second job. Then, last month, Mt. Edgecumbe’s alumni advisory board voted 4-3 to recommend the state reopen the hiring process, this time with input from the board and other stakeholders.

Dupras said that the board had received feedback about reopening the position, but also had received positive input on the progress officials made addressing issues at the school.

“Because we have been receiving emails, and the emails ask for recall, for the superintendent, and the second part of that was the [ad hoc] committee” she said. “What I’m hearing is we are getting a lot of input from the community, [and] a lot of things are being addressed. So what are the continued issues, if these things are being addressed, that you are facing?”

Commissioner Bishop said much of the recent feedback about the school has been positive, and a lot of the issues that remain are “adult issues.”

As concerns come in we go and address them,” Bishop said. “Anyone who works in a school, I don’t want to offend them, but myself included, a lot of school issues are adult issues, and not children issues. And I would say a lot of these concerns were more about adults than they were students, and what they were were receiving. So I do believe that, you know, that we’re moving forward with sorting out the adult issues and moving forward in the right direction for kids.”

She said while some advisory board members were interested in reopening the superintendent hire and being involved in the hiring process, she believed it would be a “critical error.” She said Langford was the right fit given his background in business and history with the school, and said she didn’t include the advisory board in the process because the hire had to happen quickly. 

“There was a reason why David was selected to be able to bring Mt. Edgecumbe, pairing what had been done on the cultural side, bringing that strength back, to the management side and other leadership, is a need there,” Bishop said. “I did exercise what I can. Folks that know me know when there’s time to hire, we do engage a larger group. But this was critical. School needed to be opened.” 

While the state’s board of education did not signal any plans to reopen hiring for the school’s top position, it did move forward with one of the advisory committee’s recommendations– the formation of an ad hoc committee for the school. The temporary committee will be comprised of students, staff, alumni, and other stakeholders who will spend the spring and summer gathering information on the school, and will return to the Board of Education next fall with its findings and recommendations. The board approved the formation of the committee unanimously. 

Sitka School District officials say the school budget is in better shape than previously thought, but its fund balance is now down by over half-a-million dollars. 

Late last month, Superintendent Phil Burdick told the Sitka Assembly that an audit in mid-February found several issues that would put the district in a deficit going into the next budget cycle, though at the time Burdick said a final tally was not yet available. 

At a school board meeting Wednesday night, Superintendent Deidre Jenson said they’d initially planned to spend the district’s fund balance down to $750,000 by the end of this fiscal year to cover staffing costs. After revising this school year’s budget, Jenson said they now expect to spend the fund balance down to $223,000, which means they’ll be ending the school year with less leftover money than they initially planned. 

“At our last board work session, we said that we were going to be funding at the end of the year, we were going to be ending at zero. So that is a positive thing, that we’re actually going to end up, plus we have put a spending freeze on, so that will help us as well,” Jenson said. “It’s not the $750,000 that we were anticipating having at the end of the year, but it’s also not zero.” 

Business Manager Kathrynn Hollis-Buchanan said the difference could be attributed to a few things, including overestimating the district’s enrollment, and the mistaken addition of $650,000 to the district’s revenue for FY26. She said that was due to an overestimate of the amount of available leftover funds from the previous year. 

The Sitka school board unanimously approved the budget updates to account for some state funding increases, and the removal of the leftover funds.