Hope Happenings

Photo courtesy Ron Thorne Longtime Hope residents, Richard and Averill Gay, celebrate 65 years of mar-riage Christmas day. They were married in 1943 in Cornwall, PA, by Averill’s father, Washington Sands Fox, who was the minister of the Cornwall’s Methodist Church. The Gay family moved to Anchorage September 1960. Richard retired from Alaska Methodist University as the Vice President and moved to their retire-ment home in Hope in the late 1980s. Their Anchorage family hosted a celebra-tion on December 20th and their Bellingham Washington family honored them on Christmas day. As they say, “for being age 88 they both are doing just great.”

By Fayrene Sherritt
Turnagain Times Hope Correspondent

Hope’s 2008 in Review

New Post office built for Hope

Mid-summer construction of Hope’s new Post Office began after some delays on site selection by residents. Working faster than normal “Hope-time”, Nov. 1, Doug Nielson of Nielson Construction, Inc. handed over the keys for the new Hope Post Office all finished and ready for the old post office to move to its new location off Palmer Creek Road and Logman. The new location opened Nov. 22 with a grand opening held Dec. 9.

Change in staff at Hope School

Because of declining enrollment at Hope School, the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District offered Lennie, our teacher of many years, a great job in Soldotna. It is a career opportunity that she felt she couldn’t pass up and is excited about the challenge.

Hope School receives grant from Rasmuson Foundation

The Hope School received a $600 cultural excursion grant from the Rasmuson Foundation, which is administered by the Alaska State Council on the Arts. This grant covers the cost of transportation and admission fees for students to attend arts and cultural events or visit arts and cultural venues. 

Volunteers of Hope create memories for many

In 2008 there were many activities held in Hope that, without the help of the a large number of volunteers, could not have happened. To all those who worked to make it all happen, a heartfelt thank you goes out to you. The major events include the annual Hope Christmas Potluck, the annual Library’s Christmas Bazaar; the biggest fundraiser of the year is the school’s annual “Auction Night. Volunteers provide bake goods for multiple bake sales as fundraisers for the Hope Students. 5-K Run Record runners for Wagon Trail 5-K run, Hope resident, Lee Hall, wins race out of 250 runners. The race, raffle and weekend events took many Hope volunteers to make it a successful fundraiser. $10,425 was raised each group received $1,488.

Hope Inc. purchases lot for new restrooms

For a number of years, Hope Inc. presidents Jim Skogstad and Shawn Butler have worked to purchase, for the Hope community, the small lot across from the Hope Social Hall. The sale was finalized in August. The vaults for the new toilets were put in place before the ground froze ready for completion in the spring of 2009.

Chugach Electric is busy in Hope and along the highway

Crews have been at work cutting trees in what Chugach defines as Section 4 of the Hope line (milepost 10 to the town of Hope). This work is being accomplished with in FEMA-originated grant funds administered by the state Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. Chugach successfully obtained $312,000 in grant funds to cut danger trees and clear the right of way to its permitted width in this area of the line. As of Oct. 18, Chugach had spent about half the funds and taken down 980 trees. Chugach expects to complete construction and energization of this new section of the line by the end of the year.  The efforts of Rep. Mike Hawker, Hope Inc. and others, helped to secure a $200,000 grant in the State capital budget to help with this approximately $500,000 to 700,000 project. The old section of line will be wrecked out next year.

Two new subdivisions begin development

Marcus Mueller, Land Management Officer for Kenai Peninsula Borough, reported that the engineering for the two new subdivisions in Hope, has been completed. The construction bid will go out in February for road, electric and phone utilities. It is hopeful that the State will pass title of the land to the Kenai Borough the winter of 2008/2009. How land disposal will be handled to be announced at a later date.

Road Work on Resurrection Creek Road links two roads

Residents are now using the new road linking the Palmer Creek to Resurrection Creek Roads. The project moved part of the road from the Chugach National Forest over onto Borough land. This is the first major road change since the Hope Highway was paved in 1982. This change has been done as the Kenai Borough prepares for a land disposal that will take place in a few months

Hope represented in the 50-year Statehood Quilt

A large quilt representing communities from all over Alaska to celebrate 50 years of statehood will be unveiled January 3 in Anchorage. Hope submitted to the Statehood quilt a panel to be added to this State project. Quilters Linda Graham and Fayrene Sherritt created “A Window to Hope” using silk fabric printed with photos of Hope. A copy was made for Hope and it will be displayed at the Hope Library.

Hope’s local tye-dye T-shirt business a huge hit

Dave and Lana Scanlan, owners of Glacier Dyeworks and Hope residents, who took a couple of years off to build their home, returned to making their ever-popular tye-dye T-shirts this summer. They made over 1,500 shirts to take to the Alaska State Fair and they also made the tye-dye shirts the staff at Anchorage’s Moose’s Tooth.

New “No Gas” sign goes up

A new smaller road sign replaced the large handmade sign that was along the Hope Highway, just passed the entrance into the DOT Silver Tip garage area. It is attached to the new sign that gives the number of miles into Hope. Hopefully motorists making the drive into Hope looking for gas will not miss the DOT sign..

Local artist completes “1 percent for-art-grant”

Local Hope artist, Erica Miller, finished a “1 percent for Art Grant.” The large art project (each are 11 feet by fourteen feet) took over three months to complete. The artwork, located in the Houston High School Gymnasium and is titled “Houston Hawks, Spirit of HHS”, was finished March 13. Houston High School is located in Houston near Big Lake.

Resurrection Creek Restoration Project II underway

Project planning for the Phase II project was initiated in 2008. Implementation of the three to five-year project is expected to begin as early as 2010. The project will be analyzed under an Environmental Impact Statement, which was scheduled to be completed by the fall of 2008. Interpretive displays will be created along the restored creek to show various aspects of the restoration, fisheries, wildlife, and historic mining. Chugach National Forest’s goal is “Through successful implementation of Phase II of the Resurrection Creek Stream and Riparian Restoration Project, the Forest Service and its partners will rehabilitate the majority of the remaining impacted portions of Resurrection Creek.

Free breakfast each Wednesday at Hope Christian Church

The doors open at 8 a.m. each Wednesday morning and breakfast is served until 10. All are welcome to come. Following breakfast, the Hope Christian Church Food Bank is open Wednesdays 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. Any folks needing to take advantage of the food pantry, outside the regular hours, please contact Burgins at 782-1002.