
10 years ago, April 24, 2014
Aesthetics, cost hurt downtown’s appeal
By Karen Garcia
Commercial business owners in Haines say high prices and unattractive, substandard buildings on Main Street have led them to invest elsewhere in town, including at Dalton City and Fort Seward.
High asking prices for vacant lots is also keeping owners of existing businesses from relocating downtown, including Haines Brewing Company, which has been looking to expand from its Dalton City location for at least 10 years.
Haines Brewing owners Paul Wheeler and Jeanne Kitayama moved into their Dalton City location in 1999.
The brewery sells all the beer it produces, so expanding production is a goal, Kitayama said. “We have the demand, but don’t have the capacity to supply that demand,” she said.
The couple is also looking to expand their tasting area following a change in state law that allows them to sell a few pints to customers on site. Patrons now must squeeze into a 50-square foot corral, which puts four or five people a little too close for comfort.
Wheeler and Kitayama have been looking downtown, both at vacant lots and existing buildings. Lot owners have been reluctant to let go of their land, though, and available buildings would need complete overhauls.
25 years ago, April 1999
Orca shares troller’s catch
A Haines troller recently spent a few minutes playing cat-and-mouse with a killer whale.
Don Nash was fishing in Cross Sound off the north end of Yakobi Island last week when a female orca, one of a group swimming nearby, took interest in the string of kings Nash was bringing on board.
“I had five on the line so we decided to give the fifth to her.”
Nash said the 25-foot whale surfaced near the stern of his troller Becca Dawn to check out the potential meal, then followed the fish around as Nash played the king in and out of the whale’s range.
“I could pull the king in and out and she would follow it around…It was pretty exciting.”
Nash said he finally let his leader out enough for the whale to take the fish in its mouth and yank it off the hook. He said the whale was alongside the Becca Dawn for 3-4 minutes.
Nash, who’s fished the Gulf of Alaska since 1974, said killer whales often pick longlines, but don’t usually hang around the sterns of trollers.
“I’ve never heard of it happening to anybody.”
50 years ago, April 4, 1974
Withhold funds – or pay up?
By Ray Menaker, Editor and Borough Assemblyman
The Haines Borough Assembly, Linn Forrest Architects, and Burgess Construction Co. will come to grips with mechanical, structural and drainage problems in the new Haines Learning Center (high school building) next Tuesday, April 9, when they try to determine just how much the final payments to contractor and architect should be.
The assembly has withheld 10% of the contract price until a determination has been made about where responsibility lies for defects. The contractor has requested final payment, and has suggested credits of $1,025 be withheld from final payment to cover items considered unfinished. The architect has submitted the contractor’s request, implying all but the $1,025 should be paid.
The 10% retainage amounts to more than $200,000, and the assembly has met twice this week to determine its course of action.
Central to the delay in payment is the water in the pipe tunnels beneath the gym floor – tunnels which are supposed to be dry. As much as 23 inches of water have been in the tunnels, and the water has been kept to a lower level by constant pumping with pumps which were not in the original plans. As a result of the water in the tunnels, insulation on some hot pipes has been damaged causing the water to be heated and high humidity in the gym. Unless the humidity is controlled, there is the distinct possibility that the hardwood gym floor will be permanently damaged.