Katherine Rose

1 week ago | kcaw.org | Katherine Rose

The Sitka Assembly is happy with the work the city administrator and attorney have done over the last year. When it met in a special session last night/on Tuesday (4-15-25), the assembly gave “exemplary” performance reviews to the only two city employees who report directly to the assembly. It first went behind closed doors for over two hours to give feedback to Municipal Attorney Rachel Jones.

2 weeks ago | kcaw.org | Katherine Rose

The city’s budget is divided into chunks– the biggest is the general fund budget– around $48 million in revenue and expenses that includes some of the city’s biggest line items, like school funding. This year the assembly is funding schools to the cap, or the maximum allowed by state law, in addition to school building maintenance and funding the Blatchley Middle School swimming pool.  The general fund budget, as it stands, is at a surplus of over $200,000 but that could change.

3 weeks ago | kcaw.org | Katherine Rose

Pictured: 10-month-old Matilda Cunningham investigates a maraca at the “Instrument Petting Zoo” in Sitka on April 4. It’s quiet in the library, when I sit down to interview Rick Trostel, a trumpet player in the Juneau Symphony. He’s also a longtime music teacher at Juneau Montessori School. He’s getting ready to raise the volume with a hands-on music class of sorts – an “Instrument Petting Zoo.” On the counter behind him is a stack of several 36 inch PVC pipes. “Those are my didgeridoos.

3 weeks ago | kcaw.org | Katherine Rose

Photo/Berett WilberThe harvest allocation for king salmon in Southeast Alaska is lower than the region’s commercial trollers expected. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced Tuesday (4-1-25) that 130,800 treaty Chinook salmon will be available this year for all Southeast fisheries, down almost 40% from last year’s allocation. From that total, trollers are allowed to catch 92,700 king salmon. The balance of treaty salmon goes primarily to sport anglers.

3 weeks ago | kcaw.org | Katherine Rose

It’s a little after 10 in the morning, and Brownie Thomsen is sitting in her kitchen, her feet propped up in a chair as her little dog runs back and forth beneath her. Her fridge is covered in photographs and cards – one hand drawn watercolor wishes her a happy 100th birthday. Thomsen smiles, as she looks out toward Sitka Sound. She first saw those waters from the window of an amphibious World War II era plane over 75 years ago. “1949. June 9, yeah,” she says.