Village News:
Village News
Maserculiq Inc.
News
Maserculiq Inc. was founded in 1974.
According to Willie Fitka Jr., its Vice Chairman, the only
difference in the village corporation today is that
information is easier to get from the State and Federal
governments. Today Mas. Inc.'s Chairman is Tim Andrew.
Besides Willie Fitka Jr., the other members of the Board of
Directors are Delores Hunter, George Owletuck and Secretary,
Roberta Fitka. Their meetings are held once a month at the
call of the Chairman. They are open to the public. Some of
the subjects discussed are financial issues, investments,
land, fisheries and new ventures. The Corporation
shareholders receive a yearly dividend based on the 7i funds
from the shared profits of other Regional
corporations.
Willie says Mas. Inc. is hoping to
improve their store, Marshall Enterprises, and that they are
in the process of planning a new building on a new site. The
gas station will remain in the same location, but only
petroleum products will be sold in the building. The new gas
pump will also be upgraded to a self-service
pump.
Mas. Inc. is the only corporation in the
area that still has a fish plant operating and making a
profit. It is presently in the process of getting a fish
smoker on-line as another way of processing fish.
In terms of land issues, the corporation
still has 14 C3 land to be conveyed by the BLM. C1and C2
land has already been conveyed, and all that needs to be
done now is for the city to ask for the land from the
BLM.
Willie adds, "Our corporation is stable
and profitable." Roberta Fitka agreed, and said she enjoys
working to make it that way.
By: Rose Lynn
Fitka
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Keeping People
Alive
Is there anything wrong with the people
in our community? Roberta Fitka is trying to figure this
out. She works as Family Services director with ICWA (Indian
Child Welfare Association) which is a part of the Marshall
Traditional Council. She helps provide services in the
community. One of her duties is to assist in counseling
families and individuals at risk. She's the contact person
for reporting DFYS cases, and she also visits the school to
find out if students have problems that she could help them
with. Her "dream" is to see the people alive--alive
spiritually. And not necessarily in a religious way,
but in terms of self-esteem and pride.
She spends a lot of time looking for
grants to bring more projects into the community. Lately,
Roberta has been trying to find funding to send a
representative from Marshall to the Rural Providers
Conference which will be held in Fairbanks this summer. She
has also been trying to setup the Youth-Elder Conference in
Marshall, as well as a basketball camp for the youth. The
Youth-Elder Conference is scheduled for sometime in April,
and the basketball camp will be sometime next
year.
Roberta adds, "Services are available
through ICWA. If you have any questions, I can be reached at
the T.C. Office."
By: Rose Lynn
Fitka
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Marshall Fish
News
During the 1999 summer
fishing
season, good king salmon subsistence
catches were reported from the mouth of the Yukon River
upriver to Eagle. However, the king salmon harvest was 31%
below the recent ten-year average harvest of 100,695 kings.
Commercial sales in the round were only 69,196 kings. The
chum harvest was 94% below
the recent ten-year average
of 532,815 fish, with only 29,389 chums harvested from the
Alaskan portion of the Yukon River drainage.
Roe sales by species totaled 1,096 pounds
for kings and 24 pounds for chum. The total estimated
commercial harvest, including the harvest of roe sold, was
69,483 kings and 29,412 chum.
The 1999 Yukon River king and chum runs
continued to show the decline in productivity observed in
recent years. Summer chum abundance has been below average
to poor since 1997, although parent escapement was very good
from 1994-1996. Changing climate and ocean conditions have
probably impacted salmon survival.
Yukon River fishermen in Alaska received
an estimated five million dollars for their king and chum
harvest in 1999, approximately 21% below the recent 10-year
average of 6.4 million dollars.
Lower Yukon fishermen received an
estimated average price per pound of $3.80 for kings and
$0.10 for chum. The price paid for kings was well above the
10-year average of $2.72 per pound. Prices for chums have
continued to low since 1995. The average in the Lower Yukon
area fishery was $7,869.
Maurice Turet
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New Post Office for
Marshall
According to post mistress, Theresa Elia,
the new Post Office building is going to be built sometime
this coming summer. The reason is because we simply need a
bigger one, she says. They are going to tear down the trees
on the land between Daisy Coffee's house and the old
community hall site and construct the new building there.
After the new post office is built, the Postal Service is
going to provide it with a computerized weighing machine to
weigh the boxes. Then Marshall will be a part of the modern
age.
Jolene
Soolook
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City of
Marshall
In a recent interview with Ray Alstrom,
he said that currently the city is hooking up Fred Fitka's
new house to water and sewer.
The city is also doing weekly garbage
pick-ups. On Monday and Thursday, trash is picked up from
the school on down, and on Tuesday and Friday it is
collected from the school on up, including the new housing
area. The first Wednesday of every month is white trash
pick-up, that is, things like TV's, refrigerators,
etc.
Later on this summer, Ray said, the city
will have fire hydrants set up--one by the clinic and one in
the vicinity of the city office. The two hydrants that were
supposed to be set up around the housing area were cut
because of budget problems. "We had to cut those two," he
said, "because the water and sewer budget is mainly to
install water and sewer in homes." He added that, "We also
are going to hook up water and sewer in the fish
plant."
Ray complained that municipal assistance
and state revenue sharing money is being cut again, so that
is going to hurt our daily operations.
Our grant for the community center is
still pending.
Finally, he said, "The deal on the dump
is that we can't do anything about the smoke. The
incinerator is set up to burn trash and will be there for a
good number of years."
Kim Fitka
|
New Water and Sewer in
Marshall
Water and Sewer, foreman, David Fitka
reported that all they've been doing over the past few
months is hooking up houses that don't have water and sewer.
They finished seven houses last fall, he said, plus worked
on three others we didn't quite complete, but which should
be done by this summer. Larry Webb will be working with them
on the sewer systems this summer and will repair
manholes.
David said they have also been putting in
water hydrants around town, one near the school, one near
Theresa Boot's place, and two in the HUD (Housing and Urban
Development) subdivision.
They plan to hook up the fish plant to
water and sewer sometime in the future, but they are still
in the design stage on it.
They are scheduled to be done with
everything by the end of September, David said.
By: Kimberly
Fitka
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