Split decision handed down in Native corporation free speech case
Posted by Jacob Resneck, CoastAlaska | May 18, 2021
The cover design of Goldbelt Inc.’s 2016 annual report was inspired by the late Clarissa Rizal, a Goldbelt shareholder and weaver. (Photo by Jeremy Hsieh/KTOO)
“I speak up for what I think is right,” Austin told CoastAlaska.
But the judge did find him guilty for not filling out the required paperwork before making his comments in a public forum: free speech is not a defense in these types of cases, she ruled.
“Mr. Austin’s constitutional rights were not violated by the requirement he provide the [regulators] concurrent copies of his Facebook postings, including his own re-submitted candidate posts,” administrative law judge Carmen Clark wrote in her 31-page decision.
Sealaska shareholders consider election reforms
Posted by Jacob Resneck, CoastAlaska | May 13, 2021
A Sealaska corporate logo adorns the roof of the Southeast Alaska Native corporation’s headquarters in Juneau on May 2, 2018. (Photo by Jeremy Hsieh/KTOO)
At Sealaska’s upcoming annual meeting, five seats are in play on the corporation’s 13-member board, and candidates are seeking support from the more than 22,000 people holding shares. But one of the biggest contests will be how elections will be carried out in the future.
Former Sealaska board member Ed Thomas says about a fifth of shareholders don’t have a particular candidate in mind, “but they still want to be supportive of Sealaska; there’s an opportunity to give their votes to the proxy holders to vote as they wish.”
Independent doctors and nurses in Ketchikan say state’s vaccine distribution plan left them out at first
Posted by Eric Stone | Jan 14, 2021
Syringes and vials lay atop a table at a pop-up clinic for COVID-19 vaccinations at the downtown fire station in Juneau on Dec. 17, 2020. (Photo by Jeremy Hsieh/KTOO)
Vaccine clinics run by the state’s Division of Public Health kicked off this week in Ketchikan. They’re open to people over 65 along with doctors and nurses who aren’t affiliated with the local hospital.
Those doctors and nurses only started receiving the COVID-19 vaccine earlier this month, weeks