Unalaska, AK – The local Marine Advisory Program office is scheduled to run out of funding in August unless the state legislature provides money in the upcoming budget. The Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program first opened an office in Unalaska six years ago at the request of community members. Many people felt that as the largest port in the nation, Unalaska should have a person to go to with marine science questions and for community support.

Unalaska, AK – The water in Iliuliuk Lake will soon be getting cleaner. The city just accepted a $45,000 grant to install three more storm water collection sediment separators.

"They're large concrete vaults that the runoff water will go into," explained Public Works Director Nancy Peterson. "It provides time for the sediment to fall out of the water. So the water will go into the vault and then the water that comes out of the vault will be minus a good majority of the sediment that was in that water.

Unalaska, AK – City council is still debating the future of the Ports Department offices. They are deciding between two options. The first is keeping the offices at their current location near the city dock and only building restrooms, showers, and a workshop down at the new small boat harbor. The second is to build new offices as well and move the center of ports operations down to Little South America. One of the major concerns is costs. It would cost about $97,000 per year to run the new office and new facilities. It only costs $40,000 per year to run the old office, but that number does not include the costs to operate and maintain the new restrooms, showers, and shop.

Unalaska, AK – The Department of Transportation is planning to build an airport for Akutan and open it by the fall of 2012. The $75 million facility will be built on neighboring Akun Island and passengers will travel to and from the airport on a hovercraft. Akutan Mayor Joe Bereskin explained that there was no good way to build the airport on Akutan itself.

"Akutan Island is pretty mountainous. That's one of our problems and there are only two sites that were recognized early on for possibility of an airport. The problem we ran into was trying to build a road access to it."

Unalaska, AK – Mayor Shirley Marquardt spent three days in Juneau earlier this month to attend the Alaska Municipal League meeting and to lobby the state government for more money to come to Unalaska. Marquardt said the purpose of the meeting was to determine the league's statewide priorities, such as providing consistent revenue sharing funds to small communities and forward funding schools for two years so they can more easily retain teachers and plan into the future.

Unalaska, AK – The Unalaska Raiders won their first tournament this weekend. The boys' team came in first of four teams by winning all three of their games at the Kotzebue Klassic. On Thursday, the boys team faced the Dillingham Wolverines. They led the game by double digits from start to finish and won by 10 points, 58 to 48. Their Friday night match up against Kotzebue presented more of a challenge but in the end they were once again ahead, this time just by four points. They beat the home team 47 to 43.

Unalaska, AK – Two new records were set during the Polar Bear Run this year. Ben Bolock took first in the men's race with a time of 15:03. That beats the old record by 2 minutes and 40 seconds. The women's record was smashed as well, this time by Crystal Hudak from the US Coast Guard. Her time of 20:13 was 1:02 faster than the old record. In second place for the men's run was USCG officer Sanchez at 19:47 - almost 5 minutes after Bolock. Third place Dmitri Dela Cruz ran it in 21:01. For the women, USGC officer Tourot finished at 24:23 and nine seconds later Danielle Williams cruised in for 3rd place.

Unalaska, AK – A new emergency order by the National Marine Fisheries Service might bring more crab to Unalaska's processing plants this year. About 600,000 pounds of golden king crab are required to be harvested and processed in the western Aleutians. In this case, Adak. The problem is there are no operational processing plants in Adak.

Adak Fisheries stopped processing last April then filed for bankruptcy in September. They were purchased by Adak Seafoods, a company basically run by the same person, Kjetil Solberg. Aleut Enterprise, the owner of the processing plant property, says that the old company's lease for the property expired and they will not extend the lease for the new company. Additionally, Adak Petroleum, which is also owned by the Aleut Corporation, will not sell Adak Seafoods any fuel. All three entities are currently tied up in legal battles and NMFS does not foresee any processing taking place on the island in the near future.

Unalaska, AK – The Unalaska Raiders boys and girls teams played their first matches in the Kotzebue Klassic Thursday afternoon. The girls had a rough game against the Dillingham Wolverines, who are pulling ahead as one of the best girls teams in the region. They lost 15 to 31. The boys however are showing off their improving defensive skills and their soaring offense. They led the game by double digits pretty much from start to finish. It's their fourth straight varsity win and their first win in their conference. They boys beat Dillingham 58 to 48.