KMXT 100.1 FM Public Radio in Kodiak, Alaska

Rosemarie Alexander/KTOO U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral Thomas Ostebo and his Russian counterpart Lieutenant General Rafael Daerbaev Wednesday signed an agreement calling for continued cooperation on law enforcement in the Arctic, Bering Sea and North Pacific. Daerbaev is chief of the Northeast Border Guard of the Russian Federal Security Service. He and other Russian Coast Guardsmen have been in Juneau …

Coming up this week: As the pollock A season wraps up, villagers call for a crackdown on the trawl fleet because it’s intercepting too many of their salmon, Obama’s National Oceans Policy is criticized at a panel in Anchorage and fishermen want more information on ocean ccidification. We had help from KUCB’s Alexandra Gutierrez in Unalaska, APRN’s Steve Heimel and …

Jay Barrett/KMXT Preliminary figures from the Rasmuson Foundation show over $33,000 from 456 donations have been pledged to Kodiak non-profits through the Pick Click Give program. Pick Click Give allows Alaskans to donate all or part of their Permanent Fund Dividend to one or more charities. According to an announcement Tuesday, the program has raised $2.2 million statewide this year, …

Jay Barrett/KMXT As the clock ticks down to the end of the Alaska Legislature’s regular session, lawmakers in both the House and Senate are trying to wrap up some major issues and avoid a special session. However Kodiak Representative Alan Austerman, the House Majority Leader, thinks extra time in Juneau might be inevitable.

Jennifer Canfield/KMXT Concern about ocean acidification seems to be increasing in Alaska. In 2010 the University of Alaska Fairbanks established the Ocean Acidification Research Center. Last fall 18 U.S. Senators- including Mark Begich and Lisa Murkowski from Alaska- founded the Senate Oceans Caucus. Their first presenter at their first meeting was Dr. Jeremy Mathis, the director of the research center. …

Photo courtesy of Spirit of Youth Jennifer Canfield/KMXT Kodiak High School junior Wendi Castellon has been named a 2012 Spirit of Youth award winner in the science and environment category. Last summer Castellon got involved with the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge’s Youth Conservation Corps. Shelly Lawson is an education coordinator at the refuge. She says it was an easy decision …

Jay Barrett/KMXT With less than two weeks left in the 2012 legislative session, the pace in the state capital has picked up. The full Senate will likely vote on the $9.5-billion state operating budget this week, which will then go to a House-Senate conference committee where legislators will try to hammer our their differences. The state capital budget, which funds …

Jay Barrett/KMXT The Alaska Redistricting Board met all last week to craft a new voting district map after the Alaska Supreme Court shot down the original plan as unconstitutional. The courts, in response to a lawsuit brought in Fairbanks, agreed that some districts were too spread out to meet state requirements. Kodiak’s Bob Brodie, who serves on the board, said …