Minimum wage initiative meets signature requirements: It appears a ballot measure which would allow Alaskans to increase the state's minimum wage has met its signature requirements, according to the Alaska Division of Elections. According to Tuesday's totals, 31,295 signatures were counted, with just under 6,000 rejected. It shows the initiative had enough required signatures in 31 of 40 House districts, above the minimum of 30 needed. Before officially appearing on the August primary ballot, the initiative must now be signed off by the lieutenant governor's office. The measure, if passed, would increase Alaska's minimum wage from $7.75 to $8.75 in 2015 and $9.75 in 2016.
Stepovich memorial service planned: Former Alaska territorial Gov. Mike Stepovich, who lobbied hard for statehood, will be put to rest next week in Fairbanks, according to the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. There will be a Rosary and viewing at Immaculate Conception Church in Fairbanks at 6 p.m. on Feb. 27. The following day a Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 11 a.m. at Sacred Heart Cathedral. Stepovich died last week after suffering a serious head injury in a fall while visiting one of his 13 children in San Diego. Stepovich was appointed the state's territorial governor in 1957 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, but ended his term in 1958 to run for Senate.
Iron Dog leaders hit Unalakleet: Six teams at the front of the Iron Dog were resting in the village of Unalakleet on the Bering Sea Tuesday morning as the world's longest, toughest snowmachine race closed on Nome. Barely 24 hours after leaving Big Lake, about 50 miles north of Anchorage, the six pairs -- all within half an hour of each other -- were led in by 42-year-old former champ Chris Olds, a construction project manager from Eagle River, and partner Mike Morgan, 28, a welder and pipefitter from Nome. Riding a pair of new Polaris Switchback snowmachines, they were trying to break what has become something of a Ski-Doo stranglehold on the Iron Dog in recent years. The pair hit Unalakleet with a lead of less than a minute on defending champs Marc McKenna from Anchorage and Dusty VanMeter from Kasilof, who ride the well-known Canadian brand. About seven minutes back were Tyler Aklestad from Palmer and Tyson Johnson from Eagle River on another pair of Ski-Doos. More than a dozen teams are expected to arrive in Nome Tuesday. Racers take a long break there, celebrate with a halfway banquet on Wednesday, and then turn back toward Fairbanks to race for a Saturday finish.
Study fleshes out herring's abundant past: Archaeological finds along the Pacific coast stretching from Alaska though British Columbia to Washington state suggest herring were existed in abundance for a period stretching for thousands of years, longer than previous studies had been able to confirm, according to a new study led by researchers from Simon Fraser University in British Columbia (and republished by Alaska Native News). The study looked at fish bones found at 171 archeological sites -- some as old as 10,000 years -- and found that herring composed the largest portion indigenous fisheries -- even more than salmon. The collection of data both confirms traditional Alaska Native and Canadian First Nation accounts, and provides a "kind of ecological baseline extends into the past well beyond the era of industrial fisheries," said Ken Lertzman, one of the study's co-authors.
Mythbusting Alaska's gender ratio: After CNN's John Sutter published several stories on rape and sexual assault in Alaska, the correspondent heard from a number of readers who pointed to Alaska's highest-in-the-nation ratio of men to women. The numbers -- 10 men for every woman (in the 1980s, according to the writer), 12 men for every woman -- and the catchphrases -- "Odds are good but the goods are odd!" -- are as familiar as they are wrong. Sutter cites Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development figures to point out that there are about 107 men for each 100 women in the state, still the highest ratio, but a far cry for the orders of magnitude which sometimes circulate. And not nearly high enough to explain the state's rates of sexual violence, which run at three times the national average.
China seeks role in future Greenland mining industry: "We are not a mining nation today," said Greenland's Deputy Foreign Minister Kai Holst Andersen Monday, "But we are definitely a mining nation of the future." And if the vision of Andersen and others plays out, it may be Chinese mining companies who lead the transformation of the Arctic territory (an autonomous region of Denmark) into a mining state, according to a report in The BRICS Post. While not an Arctic nation, China has increasingly sought to extend its growing influence to include the region, receiving observer status on the Arctic Council and launching a polar icebreaker. Since 2010, Greenland has had control over its mineral resources and last fall, its parliament voted narrowly to overturn a ban on mining uranium there.