Parents, staff push back on Mat-Central overhaul as district readies proposal

Parents, staff push back on Mat-Central overhaul as district readies proposal

What you need to know:

  • Mat-Su School District Superintendent Randy Trani and top district officials met with parents, teachers and students at Mat-Su Central this week to explain proposed program changes that could dramatically alter the school’s structure and costs to families.
  • The district faces a $22 million deficit and aims to increase local state education funding by changing how per-student payments are calculated for Mat-Su Central. The restructuring could generate about $3.3 million in additional funding in the first year. The proposal would administratively split Mat-Su Central into two schools, increase district correspondence school allotments, raise class fees and offer lower graduation requirements.
  • Parents and advisory members worry the changes will affect the school’s community-focused, family-oriented atmosphere. The proposal will be considered at a Feb. 5 school board meeting.

WASILLA — Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District officials sought to allay parents’ and teachers’ fears about major proposed changes to Mat-Su Central school’s operations and funding during a meeting this week, even as details about how those updates will fully affect families remained unclear.

Top district officials, including Superintendent Randy Trani, met with several dozen staff, families and students at Mat-Su Central’s Wasilla campus Tuesday afternoon for a nearly two-hour emergency meeting of the school’s Academic Advisory Council.

The meeting followed about a dozen days of rumors and uncertainty within the school about how the changes would affect enrolled families and existing staff, some of whom feared for their jobs as a result of the announcement, they told Trani during the meeting.

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A program restructuring proposed by Trani at a school board meeting this month would administratively split Mat-Su Central into two schools, reclassifying its in-person classes as a hybrid brick-and-mortar school with new staffing and administrative requirements under state rules. The plan would keep the day-to-day operations of the correspondence program largely unchanged while introducing a new payment structure for enrolled families.

School staff and families said they were not notified of the changes before the announcement. The proposal must be approved by both the school board and state education officials. The school board will consider the plan at its Feb. 5 meeting.

The proposal is key to a district effort to boost incoming education funding by updating how the state calculates per-pupil payments to Mat-Su Central while also attracting more homeschooled students to the program, district officials said.



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The district faces an estimated $22 million deficit for next year and will propose budget cuts, officials said at the school board meeting. If approved, the Mat-Su Central program change could generate about $3.3 million in additional funding within the first year, they said. Officials hope to have the changes in place by August.

Mat-Su Central, the district’s largest school with about 2,800 students, operates as a homeschool correspondence program with some face-to-face classes taught by district teachers or vendors. About 500 students enrolled in one or more of those classes this school year, according to district officials. A new 45,000-square-foot, $24 million Mat-Su Central school building, funded by the borough, will be completed this spring and will include nine classrooms.

Unlike the district’s brick-and-mortar schools, some of which receive $12,000 per student, Mat-Su Central is funded by the state as if it did not offer in-person classes, officials said. Instead, it receives the lower correspondence student rate of about $7,000 per student, about $3,000 of which is passed on to families as the state’s home education allotment.

If approved, the Mat-Su Central proposal would change that calculation, officials said. The restructuring would allow correspondence students to enroll in hybrid program classes on an as-needed basis, much as they do now, while the district would be reimbursed at the higher in-person rate. Students from other district schools could also take those classes, which could be offered at nontraditional times such as nights and weekends, officials said.

The hybrid program would also introduce a high school diploma option with requirements set below the district’s current 25.5-credit standard, a change that officials said would attract students who do not want the full district diploma and are currently enrolled in other programs elsewhere in the state.

“We’re facing a $22 million shortfall — things will need to be cut,” Trani said at the Tuesday meeting. “This is a way not to cut things.”

An estimated 3,000 Mat-Su students are enrolled in correspondence programs outside the district, according to state education data.

Parents, staff push back on Mat-Central overhaul as district readies proposal
Mat-Su Central parent Heather Lockwood speaks to Matanuska-Susitna School District Superintendent Randy Trani during a meeting at Mat-Su Central on Jan. 28, 2025. (Amy Bushatz/Mat-Su Sentinel)

The updates would also likely allow the district to pass along higher state education allotment payments to enrolled correspondence school families – about $4,000 instead of the current $3,000. At the same time, class fees would likely increase significantly to better reflect the cost of providing them, officials said.

Families currently pay $50 for most classes offered at Mat-Su Central and pay nothing to enroll in secondary classes at neighborhood schools, which are available on a case-by-case basis. Under the new structure, families will likely pay hundreds of dollars per class, and neighborhood school enrollment would no longer be free, officials said.

The district has not yet determined the final proposed allotment amount, the new class fees, or whether both programs will be overseen by Mat-Su Central’s current administrators, Trani told parents at the meeting. Fees will likely be set on a sliding scale based on grade level, subject and other factors, he said in an interview. Administrator decisions are in progress, he said.

Advisory committee members, administrators, teachers and parents at Tuesday’s meeting said that while they understand the need to raise class fees, they are concerned that the overall changes will fundamentally alter what they value about the school, including its current administrative team.

“I will not just leave Mat-Su Central; I will leave this school district if you do not retain them,” parent Heather Lockwood said of Mat-Su Central Principal Stacey McIntosh and Assistant Principal Nathan Chud. “And if you do not put them in full charge of this program, you will find other students that don’t attend the on-site classes will leave.”

Advisory committee members and school staff also said they resent Trani’s initial announcement and presentation of the program change this month because of how he discussed the school’s performance and his comments about the committee.

Mat-Su Central has the lowest graduation rate in the district at about 73%, in part because some students drop out to enroll in other correspondence schools with lower graduation requirements, according to district data. While Trani noted the dropout cause during his board presentation, parents and staff said he did not sufficiently emphasize the challenges it poses for the school.

During the same board meeting, Trani also described the nine-member advisory committee as a group that is no longer needed.

Parents, staff push back on Mat-Central overhaul as district readies proposal
Matanuska-Susitna School District officials met with several dozen staff, families and students at Mat-Su Central’s Wasilla campus on Jan. 28, 2025. (Amy Bushatz/Mat-Su Sentinel)

Established by school board policy, the committee includes parents, staff and district representatives and is charged with making recommendations on school policy and budget. It was created to allow the school to operate as a district-run program with some of the freedoms of a charter school, Trani said.

“I call them the blue extension cord — the extension cord that used to run something very important, but now just this blue extension cord would keep walking across the top of it. We wonder why it’s there,” he told the school board.

Parents and advisory members objected to that characterization.

“This group of people here … They were publicly referred to as the blue extension cord you keep stepping over,” said Andrew Lockwood, a parent who also teaches classes at the school and at Mat-Su College. “But that’s not how we see them. We listen. We chose them, and we listen to their advice.”

Siyen Emmert, an advisory committee member who also served on a group that guided plans for the school’s new facility and who has been involved with the school for more than a decade, said she worries the new program will hurt the school’s family-oriented atmosphere.

“I’m not sure that that’s totally recognized by the district, that this is a very community-based, family-based program,” she said in an interview after the meeting. “We really focused on how to make this a family-oriented space. So it was not designed for what he’s talking about as a hybrid model. It wasn’t designed for kids to come for four classes at a certain time of day.”

— Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com

Grocery shoppers willing to pay more for Alaska Grown produce, study finds

Grocery shoppers willing to pay more for Alaska Grown produce, study finds

By Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon

How much are Alaskans willing to pay for produce that is homegrown? A newly published study has some answers: a significant premium, especially when they have information about the benefits of locally grown food.

Alaska grocery shoppers on average were willing to pay $1.90 extra for a head of lettuce if it was labeled as “Alaska Grown,” the study found. When given information about locally grown products’ benefits to health, the environment and the state economy provided by products with the “Alaska Grown” label, that premium jumped to $3.31 on average, the study found.

The study is based on surveys and interviews of shoppers at Anchorage grocery stores and farmers markets. The surveys and interviews were conducted by University of Alaska Anchorage students; the study was led by Qiujie Zheng, an associate professor of business analytics at the University of Maine. Zheng was previously at UAA.

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While the surveys and interviews were conducted several years ago, in 2018, Zheng said she believes the results still stand.

The COVID-19 pandemic that came later may have changed food consumption patterns worldwide, she said by email. “However, due to Alaska’s unique geographical location, I believe that the state’s agricultural supply and consumers’ fresh produce options have remained relatively stable over the past few years,” she said.

There has been no interruption in the Alaska Division of Agriculture’s annual Alaska Grown $5 Challenge program, a summer and fall campaign that encourages residents to spend at least $5 a week on locally grown food, she noted. The information the researchers used from the state has been consistent, she added.



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It was important to study consumer preferences for Alaska Grown products because the subject has gotten much less attention than consumer attitudes about local foods elsewhere, Zheng said.

And Alaska has reasons to bolster its local sources of food, she said.

“Alaska’s unique geographical location significantly influences its food supply. Since the majority of Alaska’s food is imported, Alaska’s food supply is vulnerable to supply chain disruptions and natural disasters,” she said by email. “A stronger local food system could improve the resilience of the state’s food supply. Understanding consumers’ preferences for local foods and identifying potential marketing and communication strategies are critical before promoting local food in Alaska. This helps strengthen the local food network, and, in the long run, enhances the resilience of Alaska’s food supply.”

The study also analyzed consumer preferences about lettuce labeled as organic and lettuce grown through the hydroponic method, which uses a water-based nutrient solution as a substitute for soil.

Taken in isolation, the Alaska Grown premium that consumers were willing to pay was higher than that for organic food and for hydroponic-grown lettuce. Without being given extra information about benefits, consumers were willing to spend $1.74 more for organic lettuce and 73 cents more for hydroponic-grown lettuce.

Consumer preferences were more complicated when the Alaska Grown, organic and hydroponic labels were combined and when additional information was provided, the study found.

Alaska Beacon is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Alaska Beacon maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Andrew Kitchenman for questions: info@alaskabeacon.com. Follow Alaska Beacon on Facebook and X.

A Mat-Su borough plan to borrow city health powers could unlock millions in opioid help

A Mat-Su borough plan to borrow city health powers could unlock millions in opioid help

What you need to know:

  • Mat-Su officials want to leverage health powers held by the area’s cities to better distribute more than $2 million in opioid settlement funds for addiction treatment and prevention services. The Mat-Su Borough does not have health powers under Alaska state law and can currently use the funding only for training and education services.
  • Under the proposal, the borough would use the cities’ health powers to significantly expand the types of organizations eligible to access funding for opioid-related treatment, prevention, recovery and harm-reduction services.
  • About 360 Alaskans died from drug overdoses in 2023, a nearly 45% increase from 2022, according to state health data. An average of 21 drug overdoses occurred in the borough annually between 2018 and 2022, according to borough data.

PALMER – Millions in funding could soon be available for Mat-Su-based opioid treatment services under a proposed grant partnership between the borough and the region’s cities.

The plan would allow officials to distribute more than $2.3 million in opioid settlement funds to a wide range of local addiction treatment and prevention services by co-opting the health powers granted to the region’s cities under Alaska law, Matanuska-Susitna Borough Manager Mike Brown said.

Brown said that without such a workaround, the borough can spend the money only on training and education because it has no health powers of its own.

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The borough will receive the $2.3 million over 18 years, with about $300,000 of the disbursements received so far. Only four organizations applied for grants last year under the borough’s current narrow distribution rules, leaving more than $230,000 unspent and limiting options for using the remaining money, he said.

About 360 Alaskans died from drug overdoses in 2023, a nearly 45% increase from 2022, according to state health data. About 80% of those deaths were caused by opioids, the data show. From 2018 to 2022, the Mat-Su region averaged 21 drug overdose deaths per year, according to a borough fact sheet.

That deepening crisis means the borough needs to find a way to legally distribute the money to services that need it most, Brown said. While the borough could also get the health authority it needs through a ballot measure or from state lawmakers, working with the cities offers the easiest path, he said.



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“We should do our best to get this deployed into the community because that was its intended use — not for the borough to just sit on it,” he said.

Expanding the scope of eligible addiction services could significantly impact the region’s programs, said Michael Carson, former chair of the Mat-Su Opioid Task Force and vice president of MyHouse, a Wasilla-based nonprofit youth shelter. The organization received $23,000 of the borough’s settlement funds for training and education but would apply for additional funding under an expanded program, he said.

“We’re going to have to get the word out, like, ‘Yo, guess what? Now you can access money for direct services.’ I would think that would put a lot of smiles on a lot of people’s faces.”

Although the borough needs to strike an agreement with only one of the cities to go forward with the plan, officials hope to reach agreements with all three, Brown said.

If approved by the city councils and the Assembly, the borough’s new health power would be limited to opioid settlement-related activities and would expire when the money is exhausted, Brown said. The arrangement would allow funds to be distributed to organizations throughout the borough, not just those operating in Houston, Palmer or Wasilla.

Funds distributed under the plan would follow a set of guidelines approved by the Mat-Su Assembly last year, Brown said. The rules require the borough to use 30% of the funds for treatment, 30% for prevention, 10% for recovery, 10% for harm reduction, and, for the first five years only, 20% for media about the effort.

The plan would allow Wasilla, which is receiving its own payout from the settlement estimated at about $80,000 annually, to continue to distribute its funds according to its guidelines, Brown said. Palmer and Houston were not eligible for settlement funds because of their smaller populations.

Brown first approached the cities about the proposal in September and held an informational meeting with officials from each city just before Christmas.

Palmer Mayor Steve Carrington and Houston Mayor Carter Cole said they plan to brief their city councils on the plan this month and work to introduce legislation in February. Both said they support the plan but want to ensure the cities have a role in selecting grant recipients under the agreement.

“Our area has been hard hit with those afflictions, and I just want to be sure that whatever we’re going to do is going to make an impact,” Cole said.

In Wasilla, the proposal is “currently a work in progress,” Mayor Glenda Ledford said in a statement.

Brown said he hopes to have an approved health powers agreement in place in the next few months.

— Contact Amy Bushatz at abushatz@matsusentinel.com

A newly proposed state trooper post would bolster patrols near Willow and Talkeetna

A newly proposed state trooper post would bolster patrols near Willow and Talkeetna

What you need to know:

  • An Alaska State Trooper post proposed for the Talkeetna area aims to improve public safety and reduce response times. The post would serve areas along a roughly 60-mile stretch of the Parks Highway, from Willow to just north of Trapper Creek.
  • The post would include six full-time positions. It was proposed as part of Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s fiscal year 2026 budget and would cost $2.4 million to fund in its first year.
  • The post was proposed in response to local concerns about an inadequate trooper presence in the area, highlighted by community feedback following a 2023 kidnapping and double homicide linked to drug trafficking.

WASILLA – An Alaska State Trooper post proposed for the Talkeetna area would add dedicated law enforcement officers to the upper Matanuska-Susitna Valley as part of an effort to improve public safety response times, officials said Thursday.

Funding for the post is included in Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s proposed $16.8 billion budget for fiscal year 2026, which begins in July. The budget proposes $2.4 million to establish the post with six new positions: a sergeant, three full-time troopers, a wildlife trooper and a criminal justice technician, public safety officials said. The post would be part of B Detachment, which patrols an area the size of West Virginia, stretching hundreds of miles from Glennallen to Cantwell.

If approved, it would not be the first time a trooper post has operated in the Talkeetna area. A facility on Talkeetna Spur Road was closed in 2016 due to state budget cuts, and its six employees were transferred to the Meadow Lakes post.

A newly proposed state trooper post would bolster patrols near Willow and Talkeetna

Rather than field its own police force, which borough officials estimate would cost at least $14 million annually, the Matanuska-Susitna Borough relies on troopers to provide law enforcement for much of the region. About six troopers patrol the vast area at any given time, public safety officials said earlier this year. Incident response times vary widely, with some calls to locations outside the core area taking hours, borough officials said.

Reopening a post near Talkeetna would help address that problem, said Austin McDaniel, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety. Troopers assigned to the new post would cover a roughly 60-mile stretch of Parks Highway from Willow to north of Trapper Creek, he said. They would not be regularly called to core area patrols or incidents, he said.

McDaniel said the funding request for the post stems in part from feedback gathered at a community meeting following a kidnapping and double homicide near Trapper Creek in 2023 that was linked to drug trafficking.



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“They were very clear that they felt that the responsiveness from the Alaska State Troopers wasn’t up to what it should be,” he said.

Both a Mat-Su Assembly resolution passed unanimously in January urging residents to arm themselves and a free gun safety and live-fire training program approved by the Assembly in May were created in direct response to the lack of trooper presence in the Trapper Creek area, said Assembly member Ron Bernier, who represents the area and sponsored the measures.

Troopers receive about 2,500 calls annually to the region between Willow and north of Trapper Creek, McDaniel said, or about 15% of calls received area-wide each year, according to trooper incident data. Since 2021, troopers have logged 262 welfare checks and 421 vehicle collisions in the area north of Willow, he said. Since 2020, they have recorded 785 reports of illegal drug use, he said.

If funding is approved, the exact location of the proposed Talkeetna post would be determined through a state leasing process, McDaniel said.

A newly proposed state trooper post would bolster patrols near Willow and Talkeetna

Mat-Su Borough officials said they are eager to support the proposal and could share land or space in an existing facility.

“This is a huge deal for us and something that I think we all want to dive into and lend our support wherever we can through this legislative session to retain what the governor has done,” Mat-Su Borough Manager Mike Brown told the Mat-Su Assembly during a meeting Tuesday.

While the reopened post would add new trooper positions if approved, filling those spots is a separate challenge, public safety officials said.

Fourteen of B Detachment’s 72 trooper and wildlife trooper positions were vacant as of Oct. 1, according to public safety data. A dozen recent academy graduates – nine troopers and three wildlife officers – are expected to fill some of those positions, McDaniel said. The department is also working to solve its staffing challenges in part by refocusing its recruitment and retention efforts in the state, he said.

“They have doubled down on in-state recruiting, which is an area that we have frankly overlooked for a few years as we focused on out-of-state applicants,” he said.

Dunleavy’s 2026 budget proposal marks the first recent effort to reopen a trooper post in the Talkeetna area with new staffing.

In June, the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District considered a proposal to convert portable buildings at Su Valley Junior-Senior High School for use as temporary office space for troopers passing through the area. The school board rejected the proposal in a 4-3 vote, citing the lack of permanently assigned troopers.

— Contact Amy Bushatz at abushatz@matsusentinel.com

Mat-Su voters back major road and school funding while incumbents keep their seats, preliminary results show

Mat-Su voters back major road and school funding while incumbents keep their seats, preliminary results show

What you need to know:

  • Preliminary Mat-Su voting results show both a $36.4 million bond for 10 major road projects and a $58 million proposal to fund three new charter school buildings won voter approval. A fire service area change for Caswell and Willow also appeared to pass.
  • All incumbents appeared to retain their seats in the Mat-Su Mayor, Assembly, and School Board races, according to preliminary results. Newcomer Andrew Shane ran unopposed for the School Board District 4 seat. 
  • Unofficial preliminary results include only votes cast on Election Day and early votes cast by Friday. All other votes, including about 7,000 absentee and questioned ballots, have yet to be counted.

A pair of major Matanuska-Susitna Borough funding packages appeared to win voter approval Tuesday, while incumbents appeared to keep their seats in every borough race, according to preliminary results available early Wednesday.

The bond packages provide $36.4 million for 10 major road projects across the borough and $58 million to fund the construction of three public charter school buildings. Combined, they would increase Mat-Su property taxes by up to $51 per $100,000 in assessed value, according to borough estimates. 

Road funding appeared to win approval by a wide margin, with a vote of 18,283 to 7,639, according to unofficial results that did not include all ballots. Funding for charter school construction also appeared to pass, with a vote of 13,325 to 12,682.

Mat-Su voters back major road and school funding while incumbents keep their seats, preliminary results show

In the Mat-Su Assembly race, all incumbents appeared to retain their seats. In District 7, which includes Talkeetna, Ron Bernier led challenger Sheena Fort, 2,145 to 1,675, according to preliminary results. In District 3, which includes parts of Palmer and Wasilla, incumbent Dee McKee led challenger Luke Hyce, 2,559 to 924. In District 6, incumbent Dmitri Fonov ran unopposed.

Unofficial preliminary results include only votes cast on Election Day and early votes cast by Friday. All other votes, including about 7,000 absentee and questioned ballots, have yet to be counted. The Assembly is scheduled to certify the election on Nov. 19.

Tuesday’s election saw a 28.5% voter turnout among Mat-Su residents, according to preliminary results. That compares with a turnout of about 33% in 2020, the last year with a presidential race also on the ballot. In 2016, another presidential election year, turnout was about 28%.



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Borough Mayor Edna DeVries appeared to secure a second consecutive term, winning 22,426 to 1,374 against write-in candidates. Those included Hillary Palmer, who ran as a write-in candidate after her name was removed from borough ballots following confusion over a missed financial filing deadline.

In school board races, incumbent Tom Bergey led challenger Ben Kolendo 3,059 to 1,437 in the District 1 race. Kolendo previously served on the board as a nonvoting student representative. District 1 includes Butte and Sutton.

Andrew Shane, a former member of the school district’s now-disbanded Library Citizens’ Advisory Committee, ran unopposed for the District 4 school board seat, which includes the city of Wasilla. That seat is currently held by Jubilee Underwood, who appeared to beat incumbent David Eastman for the District 27 state House seat with just over 51% of the vote, according to preliminary state results. Find all other state House results here and state Senate results here.

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Incumbent school board member Brooks Pitcher ran unopposed for District 5, which includes Big Lake.

A ballot question before voters in Caswell and Willow to officially combine the fire service areas for those regions appeared to pass in both areas, with 481 to 411 votes in Willow and 181 to 113 in Caswell.

This week’s election ushered in two subtle but significant changes to local ballots approved by the Assembly early this year.

Candidates newly elected to full terms as mayor or to the borough assembly will serve four years, up from three. Candidates for mayor, assembly, and school board also appeared on the ballot with a political party affiliation, a first for local governments in the state.

— Contact Amy Bushatz at abushatz@matsusentinel.com

All Mat-Su schools to stock anti-overdose medications under new state rule

All Mat-Su schools to stock anti-overdose medications under new state rule

What you need to know:

  • Mat-Su district schools will soon have at least two doses of opioid overdose reversal drugs on hand under a new state law aimed at reducing drug-related deaths.
  • Some Mat-Su schools already stock the medication, and school staff administered at least several doses last year, district officials said. The new rule will boost those schools’ supply and provide the medication to others for the first time, they said. State officials will provide schools with a training video on administering the medication.
  • Alaska has seen a 47% increase in overdose deaths in the last year, with most cases involving opioids like fentanyl, according to federal data. The state’s per capita rate of fentanyl poisoning is among the highest in the nation.

PALMER — All Mat-Su schools will soon have at least two doses of an opioid overdose reversal drug on hand under a new state law aimed at reducing drug-related deaths.

The legislation requiring schools to have opioid overdose reversal drugs was signed into law Friday by Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy during a ceremony at the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District administration building in Palmer.

The law requires all public schools statewide to have at least two doses of the medication in their main building and at least one dose available during school-sponsored events on campus. Rep. DeLena Johnson, a Republican from Palmer, sponsored the legislation.

“Should the unthinkable occur and someone fall unresponsive because of an opioid overdose, the right device for a person trained to use it is going to be within reach to save a life,” Alaska Chief Medical Officer Dr. Robert Lawrence said during the bill-signing ceremony.

Many Mat-Su schools already have one such dose on hand, Deputy Superintendent Katie Gardner said in an interview Friday. The new law will increase supplies to three doses in some locations and the required two doses in others, she said.

The medications were used at least several times in Mat-Su schools during the 2023-24 school year, Gardner said. More details about those incidents are not available because of student privacy rules, she said. No doses have been used so far this school year, she said.



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Overdose-related deaths in Alaska increased 47% between 2022 and 2023, according to data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Between August 2021 and August 2022, there were 264 overdose deaths in the state; over the past year, there were 388, federal data show. Most of those deaths were related to opioids, including fentanyl, according to state data. The rate is among the highest in the nation.

Life-saving overdose reversal drugs, typically administered as a nasal spray, can reverse the effects of an opioid overdose within minutes. Of the 75 nonfatal overdoses recorded by state health officials in January, 62 involved the use of such drugs, according to state health data.

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“Alaska suffers from an opiate crisis,” Dunleavy said during remarks at the bill signing. “We know that Alaska has one of the highest, if not the highest, per capita rates of fentanyl poisoning here this past year. It’s not something that any of us are proud of.”

The new opioid overdose kits, which come in black zippered pouches, will be distributed across the state over the next several weeks, state health officials said. The kits include two doses of the nasal spray drug, safety gloves, a CPR face shield and strips that can test drugs for fentanyl. They said training on how to administer the medication will be provided through a short online video.

All Mat-Su schools to stock anti-overdose medications under new state rule
The contents of an opioid overdose kit displayed at the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District administration building on Aug. 30, 2024 (Amy Bushatz/Mat-Su Sentinel)

State officials recommend that school administrators store the kits in a central location with the school’s heart defibrillator, which they also are required to keep on hand. School staff will regularly monitor the kits to ensure the drugs have not reached their expiration dates, officials said.

Mat-Su addiction recovery activist and former teacher Michael Carson said he hopes to someday see the anti-overdose medication requirement extended to school buses, where students can spend hours each day with little supervision. Such a provision was originally included in the legislation but was removed before passage. Without a state mandate, the decision to carry the drug on buses in Mat-Su would be up to bus contractor Durham, school district officials said.

The law requiring anti-overdose medication in schools, signed Friday, also includes a separate, unrelated measure ensuring that correspondence schools can continue to operate following an Alaska Supreme Court decision in May that found some public funding of the program violated the state constitution.

Dunleavy also signed a series of unrelated health care bills during a ceremony at a Capstone medical clinic in Wasilla earlier Friday, including legislation allowing medical clinics in the state to offer care through a subscription service known as “direct health.”

All Mat-Su schools to stock anti-overdose medications under new state rule
Dr. Wade Erickson speaks during a bill signing at a Capstone clinic in Wasilla on Friday, Aug. 30, 2024. (Courtesy of the Office of the Governor)

Capstone co-owner Dr. Wade Erickson, who has spent nearly a decade advocating for the change, said the new law simplifies the cost of health care by allowing clinics to sell it in a membership package instead of through complicated health insurance plans. Such programs could lower employee healthcare costs for small businesses while reducing the burden of processing health insurance claims for clinics like his, he said.

Capstone clinics will offer direct care options under the new rule and continue to accept a variety of insurance plans, he said.

— Amy Bushatz can be contacted at abushatz@matsusentinel.com.

A long-term Mat-Su Borough road strategy relies on voters to regularly OK new tax rates

A long-term Mat-Su Borough road strategy relies on voters to regularly OK new tax rates

What you need to know:

  • Mat-Su Borough officials want to fund road projects by asking taxpayers to regularly approve new bond measures, a plan they say will keep tax rates steady rather than letting them fall as old debt is repaid.
  • A new road projects bond measure that could be headed to voters in November is part of that strategy. The measure would fund seven projects across the region, including an extension of Engstrom Road and fixes to Settlers Bay Road. The measure will go before the Assembly on Aug. 6.
  • The same proposal would also ask the Assembly to approve new bond sales that could cover shortfalls in funding for a series of three previously approved projects.
  • Mat-Su’s growing population has increased road usage and maintenance costs, outpacing available funds. Over the last 15 years, the borough has increasingly relied on voter-approved bonds due to increased repair needs paired with decreased outside funding.

PALMER – A proposed Mat-Su bond measure that would fund seven new road projects across the region is part of a long-term borough plan to ask voters to approve a steady stream of new debt over the coming years, all of which would be repaid through property taxes.

Bond debt-related property taxes traditionally grow or shrink based on factors that include interest rates and how much voter-approved debt the borough holds.

Rather than letting borough debt and related taxes fall as bonds are repaid, the plan would keep the tax rate steady by consistently adding new debt to the old, Borough Manager Mike Brown said.

The plan requires borough voters to periodically approve new projects funded at least in part by bond sales. Borough officials hope to put a new bond package on the ballot every three to five years, he said.

“We have to find a rhythm that financially makes sense,” he said. “That’s what we’re working on.”

Keeping the borough’s transportation-related bond debt even by cycling in new voter-approved projects gives the borough both the construction authority and a way to pay for the constant parade of needed road repairs and extensions across the region, Brown said. Federal and state funding could also pay for portions of the approved projects, he said.

The bond measure currently under consideration asks Matanuska-Susitna Borough voters to approve $33.3 million in bonds for seven area road projects. It is scheduled for a vote by the borough assembly on Aug. 6. If approved, it would go before voters in November. It is sponsored by Assembly Member Dmitri Fonov, whose district includes parts of Wasilla.

Mat-Su’s steady population growth has put unsustainable pressure on roads originally designed to handle limited neighborhood traffic, Brown said, while also accelerating wear and tear on major traffic collectors.

As Mat-Su grows, the cost of those repairs has outpaced the money available through Road Service Areas, a system through which residents pay road maintenance levies that vary by region.

Mat-Su is the only area of the state projected to grow in population over the next several decades, according to state demographers.



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Even as Mat-Su’s population and corresponding road use have grown, available state funding has decreased, Brown said, and officials have increasingly turned to voter-approved bond sales to help fund the projects.

Only one such bond measure was approved by voters before 2011, he said. If approved, the current bond proposal would be the fifth such measure approved to fund road construction packages in 15 years and the third since 2020.

That total includes a list of 2021 projects that have not yet required bond sales to fund, Brown said, and a ballot measure passed by voters last year that approved 17 projects as long as half the construction costs were funded through a federal or state grant. Money for those projects was not included in the 2025 state budget signed by Gov. Mike Dunleavy earlier this month; the projects remain unfunded.

Road bond measure proposed for 2024 ballots

The new proposal does not require state or federal funding. Three of the projects approved by voters last year are also in the new measure because completing them is a priority, and approving them without a match requirement would move them forward, Brown said. An additional four projects included in the proposal are newly selected for work, according to the proposal.



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The previously approved projects are:

  • Grading, paving and related reconstruction of Green Forest Drive, which connects Palmer-Wasilla Highway to Bogard Road. Estimated cost: $6.2 million. Project completion year: 2027.
  • Traffic and safety improvements around Shaw Elementary School on Wasilla-Fishhook Road include adding access to the school from East Foxtrot Avenue. Estimated cost: $12 million. Project completion year: 2027.
  • Grading, paving, drainage, and related reconstruction of King Arthur Drive between No Name Hill Drive and George Parks Highway. Estimated cost: $2.1 million. Project completion year: 2026.

The newly selected projects are:

  • A nearly 1-mile northern extension of Engstrom Road to Tex Al Drive. Estimated cost: $6.1 million. Project completion year: 2027.
  • Improvements to nearly 2 miles of Johnsons Road, which runs from Hollywood Road to George Parks Highway, including grading, drainage, paving and shoulder widening. Estimated cost: $3.3 million. Project completion year: 2026.
  • Paving, resurfacing and related improvements on about 1.5 miles of Settlers Bay Drive between Turner Drive and Knik-Goose Bay Road. Estimated cost: $2.7 million. Project completion year: 2026.
  • Paving, resurfacing and related improvements on about 1 mile of Lakeview Road between Wasilla-Fishhook Road and Seldon Road. Estimated cost: $920,000. Project completion year: 2026.

The proposal could be amended by the assembly next month before it is approved for the November ballot, with projects added or removed.

A second bond measure, also scheduled for consideration Aug. 6, would seek voter approval for $58 million in funding for building expansions or new construction at three borough school district charter schools. Combined, the two measures would authorize about $100 million in bond debt.

The area-wide mill rate for 2024 paid by all borough property owners is 8.748 mills, or $874.80 per $100,000 of assessed property value. This rate includes levies for a variety of previously approved bond packages while also covering most borough and Mat-Su Borough School operating costs not paid for by federal or state grants or allocations. Of that 0.521 mills, or $52.10 per $100,000 of assessed property value, covers borough-wide nonschool debt.

Residents who live outside Palmer, Houston or Wasilla city limits also pay a non-area-wide rate of 0.38 mills, or $38 per $100,000 of assessed value.

If approved, the proposed road measure would add as much as $18.30 per $100,000 to tax bills, effective once the bonds are sold.

The ordinance that would place the road projects bond measure on the ballot also asks the assembly to approve a funding increase for four projects approved by voters for bond funding in 2021.

Brown said those projects need an additional $18.5 million because of inflation-related cost increases. Because bond sales must be authorized by the assembly even after they are approved by voters, a vote by the assembly is needed to move forward with the additional funding.

The projects that require additional funding are:

  • Extension of Hemmer Road to connect Valley Pathways School on France Road to Palmer-Wasilla Highway. Estimated cost: $6.5 million. Project completion year: 2027.
  • Upgrades, reconstruction and a bicycle lane for Fern Street between Fairview Loop Road and Knik-Goose Bay Road. Estimated cost: $4 million. Completion date: 2026.
  • Reconstruction, a turn lane to Tanaina Elementary School and upgrades to a bike lane on Lucille Street from Spruce Street to Seldon Road. Estimated cost: $4 million. Completion date: 2027.
  • Extension of Tex Al Drive from its existing terminus west of Palmer-Fishhook Drive to Engstrom Road to create a major collector for three miles from Wasilla-Fishhook Drive to Palmer-Fishhook Drive; improvements to the existing section of Tex Al Drive. Estimated cost: $4 million. Completion date: 2028.



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Borough residents can give public comment on the bond measures or any other issue during the Aug. 6 assembly meeting, scheduled for 6 p.m. in the assembly chambers at the Borough Administration Building in Palmer.

— Amy Bushatz can be contacted at abushatz@matsusentinel.com.

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First review set for new borough library panel tasked with examining challenged books

First review set for new borough library panel tasked with examining challenged books

What you need to know:

  • A new Mat-Su Borough citizens’ library advisory committee will examine its first book at a public meeting set for Aug. 12. The panel will first consider “Identical” by Ellen Hopkins, one of three books currently slated for review, according to a borough website.
  • Both books were previously recommended for removal from school library shelves by a separate yet similar school district panel. The titles were ultimately cleared for return to school shelves by district administrators.
  • The borough committee will use a 17-question Library Material Review Score Card to evaluate material challenged by borough residents and selected by the committee for review. Questions on the scorecard consider factors ranging from frequency of use to potential criminal obscenity. The committee will then vote on whether to recommend removing, relocating, or retaining the material. A final decision on the book will be made by the borough’s community development director.

PALMER – A new citizens’ advisory committee tasked with examining challenged books in Matanuska-Susitna Borough public libraries selected its first title for consideration during a meeting Monday and scheduled the review date for early next month.

The committee is the first government-ordered citizens’ advisory group empaneled to review books in the region’s public libraries. A similar committee was created by the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District last year to review questioned books only in school district libraries.

The panelists voted during Monday’s meeting to consider “Identical” by Ellen Hopkins at their first review session, scheduled for Aug. 12. It is one of three books listed on a borough website as awaiting review.

The second pending title, “Red Hood” by Elana K. Arnold, will be scheduled for review at a later date, committee members said during Monday’s meeting.

A third book, “Damsel,” also by Elana K. Arnold, was listed on the citizens’ committee agenda Monday. At the time of the meeting it was incorrectly included in the library reconsideration portal as awaiting review, borough Community Development Director Jillian Morrisey said this month.

That title was first flagged by a borough resident last year, then later withdrawn from the review process, Morrisey said. The title has since been changed on the borough website to indicate it is awaiting panel review.

The new panel replaces the borough’s previous book reconsideration board, which consisted of librarians and library advisory board members. That board was disbanded by district officials earlier this year after a meeting ended in chaos.

The new committee was ordered by the Assembly early this year to give community members control over whether children have access to books that some members of the public consider obscene, borough assembly members said in April. It is the latest change sparked by an ongoing series of debates over materials on library shelves across Mat-Su.

Alaska state law prohibits the distribution of “indecent material” to children younger than 16. A letter sent last year by Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor to school and public library officials warned against distributing such material to minors.

The new borough committee is charged with reviewing books based on a 17-question borough-issued Library Material Review Score Card and voting to recommend whether a title should be removed from circulation, moved to another section, or left as is.

The assigned scoring questions are wide-ranging, with several addressing whether the material has been used frequently by patrons or is a priority for the library collection, according to the scorecard, which was distributed at Monday’s meeting.

A series of four other questions examine whether the material is criminally obscene, borough officials said. For example, one such scoring question asks, “Does the material depict the following actual or simulated conduct?” and then lists six types of sexual contact that are also listed in the state statute.



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The upcoming borough committee review is not the first time “Red Hood” and “Identical” have been considered for removal from libraries in the region. Both titles were among 16 books pulled from school district shelves and ultimately returned to school collections by district administrators following an internal review ordered by the school board. Both titles had been recommended for permanent removal by the district’s citizens’ committee, which was tasked with making recommendations on 56 challenged books.

Of the books examined by the district committee, the school board has so far voted to permanently remove seven from school library shelves, while 30 have been returned to the collection either by a school board vote or after district review. Fifteen of the original 56 titles were ultimately not reviewed by the committee because they are no longer available on district shelves; four reviewed titles are still awaiting school board consideration.

The school district citizens’ committee disbanded last month. An ongoing lawsuit filed by two civil rights organizations on behalf of eight Mat-Su students contends the district violated their constitutional rights by removing questioned books from school library shelves.

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Unlike the school citizens’ committee, which was given its list of books to review by the school board, all books selected for review by the borough panel should follow a multistep process that begins with a meeting between the patron requesting the review and the librarian at the branch where the material is shelved, borough officials said Monday.

If the patron isn’t satisfied with the outcome of that meeting, they can submit the book to the borough panel through an online portal, a borough library policy states. Those requests will be received by borough staff, paired with notes from the librarian who held the initial meeting, and forwarded to the citizens’ committee, borough officials said at Monday’s meeting. The committee can then choose whether to accept the material for review and a recommendation vote, according to the policy.

The final decision on whether material is retained, reshelved, or removed following committee review is up to the borough’s community development director, the policy states.

Books can be questioned only by borough residents who have a library card, according to the policy.

While members of the citizen advisory board may individually submit their own material reconsideration requests, they must recuse themselves from any committee process that reviews that title, said Borough Attorney Nicholas Spiropoulos. The panel cannot vote to add books to their review list, he said.

Panelists are provided copies of the book under consideration and are required to “perform a review” of the material based on the scorecard, according to the ordinance. The ordinance does not explicitly require panelists to read the material selected for review.

The scorecard must be completed during the public meeting, the ordinance states. All scorecards and panel votes are public record.

Members selected for the committee are required to have “expertise and knowledge of the community,” according to the ordinance. The ordinance does not require them to have any other expertise. Current members were nominated by Borough Mayor Edna DeVries earlier this year and confirmed by a vote of the assembly in May.

The borough board’s first book review meeting is scheduled for Aug.12 at 5 p.m. and will be held in the Borough Assembly chambers at the borough administration building in Palmer.

Public comment is permitted during the borough book reconsideration meetings and is limited to two minutes per person.

Meetings will be held on the second Monday of each month as long as there is material to review, board chairman Chad Scott said Monday.

— Amy Bushatz can be contacted at abushatz@matsusentinel.com

This story was updated July 11 to reflect a change in the review status of the book “Damsel” by Elana K. Arnold. A change to the book listing in the borough review portal made after the panel’s meeting notes that it is currently pending review.

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