Musher Hugh Neff, flanked by treat-loving Iditarod lead male dog Marcellus (left) and Yukon Quest lead female Nova, poses on Broadway in front of his “Winter Rules” truck last week. See Andrew Cremata's Musher Profile of Skagway's first entry in this legendary event in features below. Jeff Brady
Big hearing Feb. 24th
Juneau Access SDEIS at a glance
By JEFF BRADY
The Juneau Access Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement arrived in the mail on four CDs early this week, and many in town are beginning to pour over its 490 pages, 21 appendices and numerous illustrations. A hard copy is available at the library.
Public meetings on the SDEIS are scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 24 at the Skagway City School. There will be an open house from 4-6 p.m. followed by a public hearing from 6-9 p.m.
An examination of key elements of the report that previously have been identified by Skagway residents – cost of travel, socioeconomic effects, avalanche concerns, and Dewey Lakes area impacts – will be covered in the March 11 issue with coverage of the Feb. 24 hearings.
In the meantime, here are some highlights from the summaries:
• Preferred Alternative 2 (East Lynn Canal Highway with Katzehin Terminal) would construct a 68.5-mile-long, two-lane highway from Echo Cove to Skagway, with the small ferry Aurora used to shuttle passengers from Katzehin to Haines’ ferry terminal. Existing mainline and fast ferry service in Lynn Canal would be discontinued. This alternative was favored over nine other alternatives, including: the existing fast and mainline ferry service; partial E. Lynn Canal road and shuttle ferry combinations, a W. Lynn Canal route; and having more frequent fast ferry service from either Auke Bay or Echo Cove.
• Initial capital cost of the preferred alternative is $281 million, compared to zero cost for existing service, and $98 million to $137 million for the enhanced fast ferry alternatives.
• Annual maintenance cost for the preferred alternative is $4.4 million, compared to $10.2 million for existing service and $11.3 million to $16.7 million for the enhanced fast ferry service alternatives. Alternative 2 had the highest value cost, $115 million, compared to negative values for the enhanced fast ferry alternatives.
• Summer travel time on the road between Juneau and Skagway would be 2.1 hours, compared with 3.5 to 7.1 hours on various ferries, depending on the vessel. With the Katzehin ferry shuttle running up to 20 times a day under Alternative 2, travel time to Haines from Juneau would be 2.5 hours.
• User cost for the preferred road alternative for a family of four traveling from Juneau to Skagway would be $10-41, compared to the existing cost of $237. The enhanced fast ferry alternative costs for a family of four ranged from $149 to $261.
• A greater influx of independent visitors to Lynn Canal and their increased spending would be the largest economic benefit of the preferred alternative, outweighing the effects on local businesses from enhanced spending by Skagway and Haines residents in Juneau, according to the report.
• Alternative 2 crosses 61 avalanche paths and subpaths. With appropriate hazard reduction, including raised embankment and catchment areas and blowing down slides with explosives during temporary closures, it would “be reduced to the generally accepted standard in North America for safe operation of a highway in avalanche-prone areas.” There would be an average of 16.5 closures a winter.
• The report recognizes divisions in the region over the preferred alternative, citing a Juneau vote slightly favoring improved ferry service, and a 1999 Skagway survey showing 49 percent opposing the road and 44 percent favoring it. The summary did not mention its own more recent 2003 survey which showed a wider gap, nor did it mention the results of the October 2004 Skagway advisory vote that had 62 percent supporting better ferries compared to 38 percent for a road to Juneau. It did mention the 4-1 Skagway City Council vote in favor of improved ferry service.
• Unresolved issues include the federal 4(f) status of the Dewey Lakes Recreation Area (the state and Federal Highways Administration contend 4(F) only applies to the trails being crossed) but the state pledges to work with the city on mitigation issues. The National Park Service has not concurred with FHWA’s conclusions about visual and auditory impacts on the Skagway and White Pass Historic Landmarks.
This is just a look at a few aspects of the report. Take the time to read and study the SDEIS before the Feb. 24 public hearing and submitting comments, which are due March 21.
The report and its appendices can be downloaded from the project website: http://juneauaccess.alaska.gov
When it comes to childbirth, Canada can no longer deliver for Skagway
By ANDREW CREMATA
One of the most difficult aspects of living in Skagway is its isolation. If it were not for the Klondike Highway connecting our town with Whitehorse, many needs and services could be obtained only by a flight or long ferry ride to Juneau.
But for pregnant women seeking pre-natal care and delivery needs, it is as if the road suddenly doesn’t exist.
Soon to be mother Jaime Bricker, manager of Skagway’s Wells Fargo branch, scheduled her first visit with a doctor in Whitehorse in early April.
“Two weeks before the appointment I called to confirm,” she said. “Not only did they say they did not have it, but the lady said they were no longer delivering U.S. babies.”
For her first child, Skagway resident Lauri Magee utilized the services of Branigan Clinic in Whitehorse. Now pregnant with her second child, she recently discovered that she would need to seek care elsewhere.
Why the sudden change?
“We’ve had conflicting messages from the Canadian Medical Protection Association,” says Dr. Wayne McNicols, an Obstetrician, Gynecologist, and the President of the Yukon Medical Association. “Family Practitioners can reasonably assume care for those patients. ObGyns do not have primary care practices (in Canada); they give advice to Family Practitioners. If the patient has reasonable access to that care (in the U.S.,) then (ObGyns) in Canada do not provide that care.”
This means there is a gray area for health care providers in Canada when assuming care for American patients. A family practitioner can still be used by Skagway residents, but when it comes to pregnancies the CMPA, which insures 98 percent of Canadians, will not cover the liability from U.S.-based lawsuits.
American patients used to sign a waiver, which would protect Canadian doctors from malpractice suits. Now the CMPA will not cover a doctor’s defense on litigation, or doctors who solicit for pre-natal care.
“We cannot solicit U.S. patients for anything,” said McNicols. “We can’t put ads in Skagway.”
McNicols would like more clarification from the CMPA, and an understanding from them of the unique set of circumstances that face residents of Haines and Skagway. “This is upsetting to a lot of the family physicians here who have provided family care to many Skagway residents over the years,” said McNicols.
He added, “We want Skagway residents to know that in an urgent or emergency situation, health care will not be refused on any basis.”
Until the situation is resolved, assuming it will be, the future moms of Skagway will have some new obstacles to overcome. What used to be a two-hour drive to the doctor will now be a 3-6 hour ferry ride or a sometimes-distressing flight to Juneau. This is more than just an inconvenience to expectant mothers.
“I have to go to Juneau now once every three to four weeks,” said Magee whose baby is due in August. “It is going to cost so much money to go to Juneau and it will be interesting with an 18-month-old child.... We are paying for this out-of-pocket. The insurance won’t cover it.”
Insurance issues are a major concern when considering this new policy. Says Magee, “There are no private providers offering pre-natal coverage. Even companies cannot afford it.”
The added financial burden combined with the physical hardships and unreliability of travel in Skagway has left expectant mothers with few options. Some are looking to the Skagway clinic for answers.
Is there any chance that future improvements to Skagway’s Dahl Memorial Clinic will provide pre-natal care for local residents?
“We are working on an ObGyn Packet of information to set up an OB clinic here,” says Clinic Administrator Kathie Dawson. “We would love to get a midwife and maybe an RN, people who could deliver a baby in Skagway.”
Even if Skagway were to secure a grant for a midwife or RN, there is no guarantee that one would be willing to come here. “Essentially, they put a name on a board and someone has to respond if they want to come here,” said Dawson.
Dawson stresses that in an emergency situation Clinic Chief of Staff Cynthia Farrell could deliver a baby, but as for now, women seeking pre-natal care and delivery needs will have to make the journey to Juneau.
Eric Coufal and Jessie Rapin wait in their Fulda car to clear Canada Customs before moving on to the Carcross Desert event. Jeff Brady
Skagway Team USA pulls out of Fulda Challenge
Day 2 events end with highway accident, confrontations
By JEFF BRADY
The Skagway-based team in the Fulda Challenge withdrew from the event at the conclusion of the second day of competition, but not for lack of trying. They cited safety concerns with the event following a highway accident involving another team.
Eric Coufal of Skagway and Jessie Rapin of Eagle River were tied for seventh place among the 10 teams after the snow machine, mountain bike (see photo sidebar, p. 8), and downhill kayak events. Coufal said the team was in the next to last group of kayakers on the snow-covered dunes of the Carcross desert, but most of the teams had already left when they finished.
As they were driving back to catch up with a convoy that should have waited for them, Coufal said, they were passed by a Fulda media car going over the speed limit on the snowy road. Then, about six miles from the Alaska Highway, traffic halted. There had been an accident involving the British team of Emily Gribble and Richard Jackson. Their race vehicle had drifted into the oncoming lane and had been side-swiped by a van, according to Yukon news reports. The Skagway team got out of their car and ran to assist.
“The scene was total chaos,” Coufal said a few days later after returning to Skagway. Jackson was walking around, being assisted by a Fulda medical team, but Gribble was trapped in the driver’s seat with serious injuries.
“No one was tending to her,” Coufal said, but someone had put an IV into her arm.
Coufal, who is a trained ETT and wilderness responder, and Rapin, a former EMT, went to Gribble’s aid. Rapin ran vitals and found a faint pulse, Coufal gathered blankets to cover the woman from the -25 cold, and they directed another person to stabilize her head, he said. But then members of the crew started to pry the door off, shaking the car.
“I yelled for them to ‘stop, stop, do not move this car,’ and then one of them tried to grab her, and I said ‘back the ---- off, do not move this woman,’”
It had taken a long time for organizers and others at the scene to contact the RCMP via satellite or cell phones, but as they were shouting at each other, they heard sirens. Once rescue personnel arrived, order was restored, he said, and Gribble was taken to the hospital where she could be for up to two weeks with a punctured lung, fractured pelvis, and broken arm.
That evening at race headquarters, the High Country Inn, the two Skagway team members were publicly thanked three times by organizers, Coufal said, but they were having concerns. Rapin called Yukon coordinator Susan Huff at the hospital with their concerns, and they made the decision to withdraw. Huff then apparently called event director Holger Bergold, who asked for a private meeting with the team “not two minutes later.”
During that meeting, Bergold and other officials “proceeded to read us the riot act and accused us of interfering at the accident,” Coufal said. The organizers questioned whether the two Skagway members would have acted in the same manner if American doctors had been on the scene, Coufal explained, and then Bergold allegedly said that if he had been there, he would have pulled Coufal out of the car himself.
“At that point, we said the meeting was over, and good-bye,” Coufal said.
A CBC reporter was in the hotel at the time, and news of the team’s withdrawal spread. In a Yukon News interview on Jan. 2, Bergold said Coufal “overestimated himself very much” at the scene. He added that the car behind the British team contained a “trained rescue physician and (Coufal) was actually obstructing our rescue physician.”
The Skagway News attempted to contact Bergold and Huff to ask why the Skagway team was first thanked, and then criticized after they withdrew from the event. There also has been a concern in town that the incident may sour Fulda on having an event in Skagway next year. E-mails were not returned by deadline. “The reason that Jessie and I withdrew was that based on what we had to do, and what we saw from their rescue personnel, we did not feel adequately safe in their hands,” Coufal said. “We had to ask ourselves, if it had been us, would we have been safe?”
He added that he thinks organizers want to keep people safe. During the pre-race meeting in Skagway, drivers were cautioned by a race official to slow down, as there had been complaints about speeding.
“They treated these roads as if they were the Autobahn,” Coufal said, adding there should be training for driving on northern roads, and they should stick to the rules of having a caravan behind a pace car.
“I do think that when they hold this event next year, they need to coordinate with local emergency crews, have satellite phone training, know the cell phone areas, and respect the traffic laws,” Coufal said.
Rapin is now back in Eagle River and Coufal is back in Skagway with bitter tastes in their mouths for the event, but they stand by their decision despite being labeled as “poor sports” by some of their competition. Both usually finish what they start.
“I’m still not happy about having to quit,” Coufal said. “I don’t like quitting. I wish things had gone differently.”
ALSO SEE: Riding with the Wind - Skagway to Fraser Mountain Bike Race
PHOTO OF THE WEEK
Sharon Bolton (right) was presented a certificate by Jan Tronrud of the Skagway Chamber of Commerce for her 15-plus years of service to the organization at an Open House at the new chamber offices on Jan. 28. Tronrud called Bolton the “glue and motivation” that kept the chamber together and helped it grow. A lot of her ideas like the PO box list, weekly calendar, relocation guide, and “Shop in Skagway” program are staples of the organization today. Even though Bolton is “retired,” she still helps when asked. “No one can come close to realize how much time she had devoted to the chamber and the community,” said Lynette Roseberg, who took over some of Bolton’s duties for a while. The Chamber has a new administrator, Jeanine Masciola, who is settling into the new office in the American Legion building. – JB
OTHER ONLINE STORIES:
• "DREAM QUEST": Skagway musher takes on big races
• SPORTS ROUNDUP: Travel travails for hoop teams
• RIDING WITH THE WIND: Fulda mountain bike event
• OBITUARIES: Gordon Beitinger
To read all the stories in the News, including complete city and school digests, letters and commentary, police and court reports, and view our many advertisers for Skagway products and services, you must subscribe to the real thing. Out of town subscriptions cost $35 per year for second class mail, $45 for first class mail. Send a check to Skagway News, Box 498, Skagway, AK 99840 or call us at 907-983-2354 with a credit card number.