Daily Sitka Sentinel from Sitka, Alaska • Page 3

Kenai Judge Says No to Subsistence Fisheries ANCHORAGE (AP) A superior court judge in Kenai has ruled that a series of subsistence openings planned in coming weeks in Cook Inlet will not be held. In the latest twist in Alaska's long battle over who get? to fish and hunt where, Judge Charles Cranston ruled Friday all Alaskans are not automatically subsistence users and therefore subsistence fisheries open to all Alaskans should be closed. The ruling falls in line with another court ruling earlier this summer by a Barrow judge. Both rulings contradict a state decision that opened up subsistence fishing and hunting to all Alaskans, not just residents of rural areas. State lawyers and fish and game authorities spent Monday reading the 19-page ruling and trying to figure out its ramifications.

One thing was immediately clear, they said: The subsistence fishing openings scheduled in upper and lower Cook Inlet for the rest of this summer, all for silver salmon, are now canceled. This includes dipnet fisheries on the Kenai and Kasilof rivers, and beach setnetting openings from Kachernak Bay to Knik Arm. Subsistence fisheries in districts near the Native villages of Tyonek, Port Graham and English Bay, which have existed for several years, are not affected and will continue, officials said. State officials are scheduled to meet in Juneau today to decide what, if anything, to do next. Among the possibilities are reviving last year's personal-use fisheries in the region.

That would, be a way to allow residents from all over the region to harvest large numbers of silvers with gill nets up to 25 fish ai day but on far fewer days than under the subsistence fisheries. "It's basically one more chapter in this very complicated said Jim Fall, the regional subsistence supervisor for the Alaska Department of Fish arid Game in "Anchorage. Alaskans have been arguing over who should be able to subsistence fish Artifacts Stolen From Church HOONAH (AP) Rare religious artifacts have been stolen from St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church, police said Monday. The theft occurred last week and was discovered Sunday when the church was opened for services.

A burglar smashed the padlock on the church door to get in, police Cpl Moses Smith said. The value of the stolen items is hard to estimate because several of them are considered priceless, Smith said. His pretirninary estimate was over $2,000. Missing are four large crosses, several robes and vestments, icons, and a bible. "These are irreplaceable items, it's impossible to try to attach a price tag to them," Father Michael of St.

Nicholas Church in Juneau said Monday. "This is very sad." Wins Derby JUNEAU (AP) A Juneau woman who says she has fished the Golden North Salmon Derby for decades with no luck won this year's event and with a 31-pound, 4-ourice king salmon. Linda Egan caught the fish Saturday in Slocum Inlel about 17 miles southeast of Juneau. "We have fished forever in the derby like about 20 years and never even placed in the top 100," Egan said Monday. "And to think that 31.4 was the biggest.

It just goes to show that anybody can win." Women and children dominated the top five spots in the 45th annual event Nobody caught any of the tagged fish worth large cash prizes. Anglers turned in 527 salmon for weighing, adding up to 7,469 pounds. That was more than double last year's total of 262 weight fish at 4,540 pounds. Topless Dancer's Body Found ANCHORAGE (AP) The Alaska State Troopers have identified the remains of a woman found May 12 in a shallow grave in woods off the Seward Highway. Elizabeth C.

Skowran, who was 31 when she died about two years ago, was identified through fingerprints, said troopers 1st Sgt. Dennis Casanovas. An autopsy showed she had been shot Skowran, a native of California, worked as a topless dancer at an Anchorage nightclub before she was killed, Casanovas said. Troopers are hoping someone will remember Skowran and can provide details that will Lead to her killer. Her mother reported her missing to Anchorage police on Aug.

2,1989. Anchorage police also are looking for another missing dancer, Lorie Papier, who was last seen June 17 when she was supposed to board a flight for Florida. and hunt for more than a decade, and the issue has become very complex in the two years since the slate Supreme Court threw out the old subsistence system that gave special rights to rural residents, forcing state officials to devise a new scheme. Last week's court ruling came in a lawsuit filed against the state by commercial and sport fishermen. They claimed that the state's new policy of making all Alaskans eligible for subsistence fishing threatened fish stocks and the future of commercial and sport fishing on the Kenai Peninsula.

The new all-Alaskans subsistence fisheries opened in the inlet July 23, and Fish and Game has estimated between 5,000 and 10,000 people participated. How many fish they harvested won't be known until figures are tallied this fall. In May, in a case involving subsistence bear hunting on the North Slope, Judge Michael Jeffrey of Barrow ruled that under the state constitution all Alaskans are not automatically subsistence users, as the joint boards of fish and game concluded last fall. Jeffrey ruled that all Alaskans' 'are eligible to be considered subsistence users." In his ruling, Cranston wrote that he agreed with Jeffrey that not all Alaskans should automatically be entitled to subsistence privileges, arid that the ruling should apply statewide. State lawyers haven't yet decided whether to appeal the Cook Inlet ruling, although they have already ajH pealed Jeffrey's ruling and expect the Supreme Court to consider the issue this winter, said Sarah E.

McCracken, an assistant attorney general. Rob Bosworth, acting subsistence director for the Fish and Game Department, said the agency was trying to figure out a way to open fisheries in the upper Inlet that would allow dents to take large, subsistence-like catches. It's possible that with the new subsistence seasons thrown out, state policy in the region would revert to last year's personal use fisheries, he said. Sawmill Back In Operation WRANGELL (AP) Th5 sawmill resumed nearly fiil production Monday after a five-day shutdown because of a small fire. Mill spokesman.

Roy Martin said only a few minor repairs remained to get the mill back to full production, but that all employees had returned. The fiie, blamed on a welder's spark that ignited wood waste, was quickly extinguished the night of Aug. 6. But it burned long enough to damage hydraulic and electrical equipment in the mill's main production area. The Alaska Pulp Corp.

mill employs 175 people. It is the largest employer in Wrangell. Coast Guard The search that began Sunday night after a distress flare was sighted in Thomas Bay hear Petersburg has been suspended, the Coast Guard said. The source of the flare was not discovered, but no sign of any vessel or individual in distress was found in a thorough search of the area. Coast Guard Air Station SUka received a call from the Alaska District Coast Guard office in Juneau at midnight Sunday and sent a helicopter out Monday at first light The aircraft was on the scene by 5:55 a.m.

and stopped searching at 8:17 The search was suspended at 9:01 a.m., said Coast Guard spokeswoman Miriam Thomas. Four people in a boat sighted the bright red flare at 9:40 run. Sunday and reported it to the Coast Guard. Seas and weather were calm. The boaters who saw the flare went to the area from which it came, but could not locate the source, Thomas said, Emergency Calls At 12:03 p.m.

Monday an ambulance was sent to 1701 Halibut Point Road and a patient was taken to Sitka Community Hospital. At 1:56 p.m. Monday an ambulance was sent to Sitka Community Hospital and a patient was taken to the Sitka Airport At 7:26 p.m. Monday a fire truck was dispatched to Verslovia Elementary School to put out a fire in a large black trash can. Fire Chief Doug Karpstein said the barrel was destroyed and the pavement beneath it was marred.

The fire department has no leads as to who set the fire, he said. At 7:42 p.m. Monday a fire truck was dispatched to the old hospital building at 207 Moller St. The alarm proved to be false. At 11:01 p.m.

Monday an ambulance was sent to Totem Square and a patient was taken to Mt. Edgecumbe Hospital. At 12:13 a.m. today an ambulance was sent to the Crescent Harbor tour dock and a cruise ship passenger was taken to Sitka Community Hospital. At 8:03 mis morning an ambulance was sent to the Crescent Harbor tour dock and a passenger from the Pacific Princess was taken to Sitka Community Hospital.

More Atlantic Salmon Making Way to Alaska By BRIAN S.AKRE Associated Press Writer JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) More Atlantic salmon have shown up off Southeast Alaska, but a federal fisheries official said Monday that the immigrants probably pose little threat to Alaska's prized stocks of Pacific salmon. The Atlantic salmon likely escaped from pens in commercial "salmon farms" in British Columbia, said Bruce Wing, director of the National Marine Fisheries Service laboratory in Juneau. Commercial fishermen last week turned in three Atlantic salmon caught southwest of Ketchikan, said Steve HeinI, a commercial fisheries biologist for the state Department of Fish andGame. The fish were sent to the Juneau lab, where Wing confirmed Monday that they were Atlantic salmon. A fourth commercially caught fish presumed to be an Atlantic salmon was turned over to state officials in Ketchikan on Sunday, HeinI said.

It also was being sent to the lab for identification. "A sport fisherman, meanwhile, reported catching one of the distinctive fish near Prince of Wales Island, but said he released it, HeinI said. The three confirmed fish are the latest documented catches of Atlantic Salmon in Alaska waters since the first in July 1990. That was caught near Cross Sound, 75 miles Daily Sitka Sentinel, Sitka, Alaska, Tuesday, August 13,1991, Page 3 Sen. Bettye Fahrenkamp Dead of Cancer at 67 Police Blotter The following calls were made to Sitka police before 8 Aug.

12 About 7:40 officers led a horse running at large on Charteris Street back inside its fence. At 9:55 a.m. a resident reported her 30-year-old brother had left the house the night before and hadn't come back. She called back at 11:21 a.m. to say he'd returned; A man reported he'd found a white 12-speed bike on Halibut Point Road near New Archangel.

Police couldn't identify the bike by the serial number, but took it for safekeeping. At 1:06 pan. a resident reported two vehicles were blocking the road between American and Barracks streets, but the owners had moved the vehicles before police arrived. A woman complained another vehicle was parked against her bumper on Lincoln Street. She said she didn't think the other driver -should have parked so close to her car.

A resident dropped off three kittens at the animal shelter. Police picked up a cat surrendered for adoption by a Lake Street resident. At 2:30 p.m. a resident gave the harbor patrol a 6-foot skiff he had found floating near Long Island. The owner of a Harbor Drive restaurant said she thought a former employee was putting plastic flies in the food.

Police are investigating the case. At 5:15 p.m. police were unable to locate a man reported to be driving while intoxicated in the 900 block of Halibut Point Road. At 6:31 p.m. a resident said he wanted to file charges against someone he had been in a fight with the previous night at a Sawmill Creek Road night club.

A resident surrendered two Siamese female cats to the animal shelter. At 7:44 p.m. the alarm was set off at Sitka Community Hospital by accident. At 11:02 p.m. a man said he needed an ambulance after he hurt his leg, but no police assistance was needed.

At 11:15 p.m. a resident reported he had run his vehicle into a bridge railing when he pressed the accelerator on his vehicle instead of the brake. A woman reported someone had called her and tried to get her credit card number. Aug. 13 At 12:40 ajn.

an employee at a Lincoln Street bar asked police to help him remove a man from the bar. Officers told the man, who was standing outside when they arrived, that he would be arrested if he didn't leave. Don Muller, 44, and John Gleason, 24, were arrested for criminal trespass in the second degree. The two had chained themselves to the dock at Alaska Pulp Corp. (See Sentinel story, page 1) Norman Paul, 15, was cited for driving without a license.

In Court Alpheus S. George, 24, was sentenced to 3 years in prison, with 2 years suspended, for criminal mischief in the third degree, a class felony. He was sentenced to 20 days in jail and fined $500 for driving while intoxicated. He pleaded no contest to the charge that he had driven a car that was reported to be stolen March 21 and was found guilty by the court. He also was sentenced to serve one year of his suspended jail sentence, to be served consecutively to the other sentences, for violating the conditions of his probation.

west of Juneau. "I'm surprised that we haven't seen more of them to date," Wing said. Salmon farming has become a significant part of the seafood industry in British Columbia, and there are fish farms in Washington and Oregon as well. But in Alaska, commercial salmon farming is prohibited by law. Commercial fishing interests lobbied for the ban, arguing that fish reared in pens are more susceptible to diseases that could spread to the state's wild stocks.

Wing said that is less of a concern today because salmon farmers take more precautions against disease and are more strictly regulated than in the past. There also are fears the farmed fish could affect wild stocks by mating with Pacific species, but Wing said researchers' attempts to crossbreed the species have been unsuccessful. "It's not a genetic worry," he said. "For the most part it looks like the Atlantic salmon is a strange one in that it does not cross with any Pacific salmon." HeinI said all four fish caught last week had marks on their fins indicating that they were reared in pens. The first three fish were from 23 to 25 inches long and 4-5 pounds each.

One was caught in a gillnet and the others were netted by seiners. HeinI said they were caught at Kendrick Bay and Cordova Bay on Prince of Wales Island, and at Tree Point near Dixon Entrance. "They looked healthy," Wing said. "This trio looked like they had been feeding for the summer. The one last year looked like it had been hungry." Atlantic salmon are distinguished by a dark, narrow tail, unlike the silver tail of a king salmon.

They also have large, black spots on their heads. Troll Fishery Closure Thursday The state Department of Fish and Game reminds trailers that the Southeast Alaska and Yakutat commercial troll fishery will close 12:01 a.m. Thursday and reopen 12:01 a.m. Aug. Catch data updated through Aug.

11 still indicates that the closure is necessary to achieve guidelines established by the A'laska Board of Fisheries to move coho salmon to the inside areas. By BRIAN S. AKRE Associated Press Writer JUNEAU (AP) Sen. Bettye Fahrenkamp, who represented Fairbanks and the Interior in the Alaska Legislature for 12 years, died Monday night at her Fairbanks home after a yearlong battle with bone cancer. She was 67.

Fahrenkamp died at 10:10 p.m., legislative aide Eldon Mulder said. "She passed away very quietly," Mulder said. "She had been in a lot of pain recently, but the doctors were keeping her resting quite comfortably." Alaska's eldest legislator missed most of this year's legislative session for treatment of bone cancer in her back. She returned to Juneau in April but had to be hospitalized soon afterward for a related blood infection. Fahrenkamp went back to the Legislature a few weeks later, but broke her hip in late April, forcing her to return to a Portland, hospital.

She never returned to the Legislature. House Speaker Ben Grussendorf, D-Sitka, described Fahrenkamp as "one of the old-school type of politicians." "She was hard-nosed and her word was her bond," Grussendorf said today. "She's going to be missed." Fahrenkamp was born in Wilder, and moved to Alaska in 1956! After a career as a teacher, the Democrat was elected to her first Senate term in 1978, and was re-elected three times. Sen. Steve Frank, R-Fairbanks, said Fahrenkamp was "a no-nonsense advocate for Fairbanks." "She took her job very seriously," Frank said.

"She had a great deal of respect for the process. She had high ideals. "It's a sad thing for Fairbanks. She was certainly a trouper. She hung in there as long as she could, I'm sure." Fahrenkamp was looked up to as the elder stateswoman of the Fairbanks delegation, Frank said.

"The whole delegation had a great deal of respect for Bettye." Her office also served as a training ground for those who wanted to pursue political careers. Democratic Reps. Mark Boyer and Tom Moyer of Fairbanks Sen. Pat Pourchot of Anchorage are former Fahrenkamp aides. Boyer, who worked for Fahrenkamp for six years, described Fahrenkamp as his mentor and "the most incredibly giving person I ever "She and 1 were neighbors for six or seven years, just down the street," Boyer said.

"Many, many nights were spent on her porch sipping a Scotch and discussing politics. That kind of mentoring I'm going to miss. "The greatest loss is that there were still lessons to Fahrenkamp was an avid golfer and card player. She frequently could be seen in the Capitol's legislative lounge playing cribbage. "She loved to play games almost any type of game," Boyer recalled.

"But the two she loved most were golfing and cards any type of card game." In the Legislature Fahrenkamp was active in natural resource, mental health and education issues. She was chairwoman of the Senate Resources Committee in 1989-90. In the mid-80s she won legislative approval of money to build an treatment center for troubled children and adolescents in Fairbanks. Before that, children often were sent out of state for treatment, Boyer said. "She cared an awful lot about kids.

She never had any natural children, but she loved kids and working with them." Fahrenkamp served for years on the Legislative Council, the panel that conducts the Legislature's internal business. "She was concerned about preserving the integrity of the legislative branch and its role in serving the public," Grussendorf said. She served as a Democratic national committeewoman from 1972 to 1979 and worked as a special assistant to U.S. Sen. Mike Gravel from 1975 to 1978.

It will be up to Gov. Walter J. Hickel to appoint a Democrat to fill Fahrenkamp's Senate seat. Fairbanks Democrats will submit three names from which to choose. Mulder said last week that Fahrenkamp had written Hickel asking him to appoint her best friend, Shirley Craft.

Some Fahrenkamp friends and supporters said Fairbanks attorney and Hickel supporter Ed Merdes was interested in the appointment Merdes said he had been recruited for the job by the governor's office and was on a short list of names being considered. But Hickel spokesman Eric Rehmann said no such list existed. Fahrenkamp is survived by three stepchildren and some family in Tennessee, Mulder said. Her second husband, G.Hi "Gib" Fahrenkamp, 1 died in 1974'. Funeral plans had not been" set by this morning.

WE HAVE SOUTHEAST ALASKA'S LARGEST SELECTION OF Band Instruments at very competitive prices! Top Quality Brands BACH SELMER YAMAHA LEBLANC GEMEINHARDT HOLTON TAMA LUDWIG PEARL CB 700 Piccolos Flutes Clarinets Bass Clarinets Saxophones Trumpets Trombones Tubas Concert Percussion Snare Drum Kits Drum Sets A11 Accessories Method Books Printed Music Ask us about our Rent-To-Own program. Top Quality Brands Low monthly rate No interest charges rental payments made go toward the purchase of the instrument. "Rental credit given for trade-up purchase option. Call TOLL FREE 1-800-478-3650 Ask for Roy McPherson or Tina McPherson or Bernie Hendricks SALES RENTALS REPAIRS IN THE MUSIC EDUCATION FIELD FAST, FRIENDLY SERVICE McPherson Music P.O. Box 9261 2400 Tongass Ketchikan, Alaska 99901 (EXPERTISE VISA FINANCING AVAILABLE OA.C..