The North Pacific Fishery Management Council voted over the weekend to relax economic data reporting requirements for the Bering Sea-Aleutian Islands crab fisheries.  Mark Fina, the Council’s senior economic advisor, testified that many of the current requirements are duplicated elsewhere or are not reliable enough for use by analysts.

Fina presented a report outlining three alternatives for updating the program - one alternative being the status quo.  The Council opted for the least stringent reporting requirements, eliminating many areas of data collection.

Equipment to monitor magnetic storms will be installed on Adak Island in the Aleutians this summer.  The 40-antenna radar array will help scientists understand the interaction between the Earth’s upper atmosphere and space. Here’s University of Alaska Fairbanks electrical engineering professor Bill Bristow.

“The weather radars you’re used to seeing look at the troposphere, the lower portion of the atmosphere, and map out the large scale patterns, like when you see a hurricane it has that large vortex pattern you see on the screen.  We’re looking at similar patterns in the upper atmosphere, although they’re due to a very different source.”

The Aleutians must stay together.  That was the conclusion of Alaska Superior Court Judge Michael McConahy in his ruling on the 2011 state redistricting plan. 

The plan divided House District 37 at Unimak Pass.  Aleutian communities to the west ended up paired with the Yukon-Kuskokwin Delta region while communities in the Aleutians East Borough stayed connected to the Bristol Bay region.  A lawsuit brought by two Fairbanks area residents contended that the configuration violated the state constitutional requirement that voting districts be contiguous and compact. 

A 12-year-old case of mistaken identities is in the process of being resolved.

Last week, the Unalaska Department of Public Safety received a call from a Colorado man saying that his identity had been stolen by an Unalaska resident. When police ran a records check, they discovered that an undocumented immigrant had been arrested under his name for stealing a vehicle and driving while intoxicated in Unalaska in 2000.

Icy conditions on Friday contributed to three motor vehicle accidents and thousands of dollars worth of damage.

The first accident took place on Friday afternoon at the intersection of Airport Beach Road and Safety Way, in sight of the Department of Public Safety building. According to Deputy Chief Mike Holman, a vehicle was traveling at around 25 miles per hour down an icy slope when the driver lost control. It then hit another car, which had been stopped and waiting to turn. While the crash only resulted in minor injuries, it caused about $4000 worth of damage to the two vehicles. The driver was cited for driving to fast for the road conditions.

For the past couple of weeks, the Unalaska Department of Public Works has had to deal with snow, wind, ice, and rain. Now, they’re battling avalanches.

According to City Manager Chris Hladick, snow began sliding into the landfill in the early afternoon. At about 1pm, the crew was struggling with the accumulation.

“They couldn’t keep up with cleaning them up, so they decided to shut it down,” says Hladick.

The Alaska Department of Labor has released their jobs data for December, and the unemployment rate for the state remains at 7.3 percent.

But in Southwest Alaska, the number of people without jobs has gone up. While the Aleutians West Census area usually has one of the lower employment rates in the state, it shot up from 12.4 percent to nearly 20 percent. That jump can partially be explained by the seasonal slowdown in fishing. The region’s big groundfish fisheries closed up during the fall, and fishing for crab wrapped up early, leaving little product for area plants to process.

Today, AC Value Centers are ubiquitous in rural parts of the state, selling everything from groceries to sporting gear to bedding. But a hundred years ago, the Alaska Commercial Company was a force that played a major role in the early development of Alaska. There are plenty of detailed records about their early operations in Kodiak and Cook Inlet, but information about their Aleutian outposts has been scarce, up until now.

The U.S. Attorney’s office is recommending a reduced sentence for Arne Fuglvog.

The former fisheries aide to Sen. Lisa Murkowski pleaded guilty in August to falsifying records for his sablefish catch in 2005.

That year, illegal fishing earned Fuglvog an estimated $100,000. Court documents estimate the total value of Fuglvog’s illegal harvests between 2001 and 2006 at $1 million.