“I fear the worst is yet to come,” - Steve Colt, research professor at the University of Alaska’s Center for Energy and Power, on rising fuel prices in rural Alaska driven by the U.S. war on Iran.
Waves roll in on a Cook Inlet beach north of Anchor Point on Oct. 23, 2025. The Trump administration is planning a March oil and gas lease sale in federal waters beyond the shoreline. (Photo by Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon)
By Yereth Rosen
The Trump administration on Friday announced that it will hold an offshore lease sale in federal waters of Cook Inlet next March, about a year after a similar federal lease sale offering the same acreage drew no bids.
Petty Officer 3rd Class Brandon Dawson, a U.S. Coast Guard Marine Safety Task Force member, chats with a community representative at a fuel facility in St. Michael in the Bering Strait region during an inspection conducted on July 28, 2022. (Photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Nate Littlejohn/U.S. Coast Guard)
By James Brooks
The average price of a gallon of heating fuel — No. 1 diesel — in rural Alaska reached a record $7.97 per gallon in August, according to the latest biannual survey conducted by the Alaska Division of Community and Regional Affairs.
The rural average, based on a survey of 100 communities taken between July 15 and Aug. 24, was up 23% from January and the highest nominal price on record since the survey began in 2005.
Alaska gubernatorial candidates Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins (left), and Republicans Bernadette Wilson (center) and Dave Bronson (right) attend a forum hosted by the Juneau Chamber of Commerce in Juneau on October 7, 2026. (Photo by Corinne Smith/Alaska Beacon)
By James Brooks
If elected, Republican governor candidates Dave Bronson and Bernadette Wilson said they would seek to roll back Alaska’s mandatory sick leave law and eliminate a minimum wage increase approved by voters in 2024.
The two spoke at a forum hosted Wednesday in Juneau by the Juneau Chamber of Commerce, which is in favor of rolling back the sick leave law.
The Egan Library at the University of Southeast Alaska in Juneau is seen on May 7, 2026. (Photo by Corinne Smith/Alaska Beacon)
COMMENTARY
By Kathy Kysar, Sarah Birdsall and Lynn Lovegreen
October is a time of witches, goblins, ghosts, and ghouls — and also a time for us to contemplate the ramifications of book banning as we recognize Banned Books Week this week.
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