The Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly approved $26.3 million worth of capital spending on Thursday, postponed an ordinance to enact ranked choice voting and agreed to provide a minimum of $49 million to public schools.
An ordinance adopting ranked choice voting, along with a substitute measure that would put it to a vote of the people, will come back before the assembly at 5:30 p.m. Thursday.
Seven public works projects were approved for construction, while three projects will go to design, according to a spreadsheet outlining the boroughâs Capital Improvement Program.
The construction projects are part of a 10-year, $218 million plan established last year. The vote to continue momentum on the plan was unanimous.
The North Pole Police Department responded to an active shooter near the 500 block of West Fifth Avenue about 11 a.m. on Thursday.
According to Lt. Jeromey Lindhag, North Pole police received several reports of shots being fired outside of an apartment complex in the area. When officers, along with Alaska State Troopers and the North Pole Fire Department, responded to the scene, they found that a juvenile male had fired three to four shots. No one was injured in the incident.
Lindhag said that the individual had apparently been going in and out of an apartment in the complex. He was inside the building when law enforcement arrived. Lindhag said when they knocked on the door, the suspect eventually cooperated with orders and surrendered himself. Lindhag said there is not yet a clear motive, but the individual is currently being interviewed.
Fairbanks is listed as the No. 1 dirtiest city for short-term particulate pollution out of 216 metropolitan areas, including Seattle, Los Angeles and San Francisco, in the American Lung Associationâs annual ranking of the countryâs âmost-polluted cities.â
The ranking was announced this week in the Lung Associationâs 2021 State of the Air report. It is based on an analysis of pollution data from 2017-2019 and includes pollution caused by wildfire smoke.
The Lung Association assigned Fairbanks a failing grade for air quality and concluded that the number of high pollution days each year is on the rise.
The association critiques air quality based on the levels of PM2.5, or particulate pollution, and ozone. PM2.5 is a minuscule substance found in exhaust from chimneys and tailpipes that has been studied for decades and is linked to disease and death.
Trust Grants $930,000 to Improve Psychiatric Crisis Response in Fairbanks
The Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority recently awarded three grants, totaling $937,500, to Fairbanks organizations to support improvements to the community’s response to individuals experiencing a behavioral health crisis.
These grants represent a significant step in efforts led by the Trust, in partnership with the Alaska Department of Health and Human Services (DHSS) and community partners, to improve our systems that respond to Alaskans in crisis.
As a part of this effort, the Trust and partners are working to implement the nationally recognized
Crisis Now model, consisting of a continuum of services that are working in many communities to improve mental health crisis response, prevent suicide, and reduce reliance on law enforcement, emergency rooms, and jails when responding to crises.