Kinross tells court it will change Fairbanks route for its trucks. But chief state bridge engineer warns against using Steese bridge for 'heavy ore loads'

In an attempt to escape an obvious legal snafu, Kinross and its trucking contractor now reveal in court documents that they will have their trucks run on the Steese Expressway instead of the route identified by the state.

But the court documents don’t say that would mean crossing the Chena River on a 46-year-old Steese Highway bridge that the chief state bridge engineer said in July should not be used by “heavy ore loads.” The state has long banned the heaviest trucks from the Steese bridge because of safety concerns.

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Attorney General invents 'trade secret' cover story to keep from revealing how much state pays statehood defense contractors

The office of Attorney General Tregarrick Taylor is waiting to hear from the Holland & Hart law firm about whether the company wants to help hide public information about how much the state paid per hour for legal services from former Gov. Sean Parnell and others.

This is rich. The information is not a trade secret. And having the attorney general invite private contractors to define public information as a trade secret is going to fail.

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State erases UA Geophysical Institute director from membership on Alaska aerospace corporation board

Alaska law says the director of the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska or a designee has a place on the board of the state-owned Alaska Aerospace Corporation.

The corporation board is meeting today in Anchorage, but Robert McCoy, the director of the GI and a longtime board member, is no longer listed as a board member or as chairman of the board.

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Dan Sullivan stays silent on his secret judge selection committee

Sen. Dan Sullivan’s office won’t say how many people have applied to the new secret Sullivan federal judge selection committee, chaired by his friend and former employer, Sean Parnell.

Judge applications to the secret committee were due by November 20, but Sullivan spokeswoman Amanda Coyne has declined to respond to several requests about how many people have applied and when their names will be released. Perhaps they will never be released.

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Dunleavy creates jobs Outside with millions for lawyers in burgeoning statehood defense industry

The Dunleavy administration continues to create new jobs in the statehood defense industry, most of them with lawyers Outside earning several hundred dollars an hour by promoting the political opinions of Gov. Mike Dunleavy and Attorney General Tregarrick Taylor.

There is no evidence that before signing contracts to create statehood defense jobs—spending hundreds of thousands of dollars or even millions in the process—that anyone in state government investigates the chances of success or whether the money might be better spent elsewhere.

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