Alaska News

Close that loophole

State Superior Court Judge Craig Stowers confirmed the obvious Friday. He ruled that e-mails sent or received through Gov. Sarah Palin's personal e-mail accounts are public records if they concern official state business.

That's a victory for Andree McLeod, a Republican activist and former state employee who pressed the freedom of information case. Gov. Palin contends McLeod is disgruntled because she didn't get a job in the Palin administration.

Her potential self-interest aside, Ms. McLeod won a victory for all Alaskans with her case. The state's public records law would be almost meaningless if officials could circumvent it by using their personal e-mail accounts.

Gov. Palin made heavy use of personal e-mail for state business, until a hacker broke into one of them. Because those personal e-mails fall outside the state's official archiving and retrieval system, some of them may be lost forever.

That would be unacceptable. State e-mail business has to be conducted in a way that preserves all official state e-mails and makes them available for public disclosure as the law provides.

Judge Stowers declined to ban the use of personal e-mail accounts for official state business. That call may be acceptable -- as long as the state can ensure the e-mails are properly saved and made accessible.

Judge Stowers should keep a close eye on what e-mails the state is able to retrieve for Ms. McLeod's case. If there are any gaps, the judge should require the state to arrange a system that ensures official state business e-mails are fully preserved.

ADVERTISEMENT

BOTTOM LINE: State officials can't avoid the public records law by doing state business on personal e-mail accounts.

Arnold Brower Sr.

Alaska mourns a Barrow elder

Rescue workers found the body of Arnold Brower Sr. near his cabin about 60 miles southeast of Barrow last week. He died an Alaska death; reports said his snowmachine went through ice and although he was able to get himself out of the water, he couldn't make the walk back to his cabin.

He was 86.

He was at the cabin doing what he'd done through so many Arctic autumns. Hunt and fish for subsistence.

He lived an Alaskan life, an Alaska Native life. Whaling captain, reindeer herder, decorated World War II veteran, elder, father, grandfather, great-grandfather. His knowledge of the land, sea and ice was wide, deep and intimate. As a boy his father, Yankee whaler Charles Brower, told him he had to choose between becoming a reindeer herder and going away to school in San Francisco.

He chose the reindeer, and began a profound education that reached beyond far beyond himself, to scientists, journalists, Native corporations and fellow Alaskans; to American Public Media's "Marketplace" and into the company of astrobiologists studying Europa, one of Jupiter's moons.

And he could find his way through a storm.

According to Janelle Everett of KBRW in Barrow, Brower and his late wife, Emily, had 17 children, 80 grandchildren and more than 50 great-grandchildren.

The North Slope Borough has lost a great elder. Alaska has lost one of its great men.

Alaska Notebook

Wayward goose

In the dark of 4 a.m., the goose sounded lost. Judging by its plaintive, urgent honks, it was flying low, doing rough circles over our Eagle River neighborhood, like a worried mother calling for her child, or a bird for its mate.

From much higher above came the music of the flock in serious flight. It was too dark to see the "V," but the chorus distilled autumn as purely as did the birch leaves on the deck. Song of departure, going long under stars and sun, thousands of miles south.

But what about the solo flier? Its voice was more magpie than haunting symphony in the heavens. It did another loop, and sounded so low over the roof that I half-expected to see it land, or least see its silhouette against cold clouds.

But I didn't. Just heard the goose close by, then heard its honks fade away up the street.

ADVERTISEMENT

Had this one lost its flock? Was it calling to them as they passed? Trying to join them?

I don't know. Hope the goose found its way before dawn, and wingmates for the journey.

-- Frank Gerjevic

ADVERTISEMENT