It’s Veterans Day, but Salcha’s American Legion post won’t be conducting its own service – at least, not this year. That’s because it’s Alaska’s newest Legion post, established just over a year ago.

Atcharee Buntow said she’s happy to be back, but she’s afraid of what will happen next.

A Fairbanks woman is grateful to be home with her family for the holidays, after spending a month in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center. // Alaska’s newest American Legion post in Salcha will observe Veterans Day along with other local military service organizations. // The state of Alaska is reducing its payments to SNAP recipients by about a third this week, in response to federal guidance. // Kodiak-based Alaska Aerospace Corporation is partnering with the UAF Geophysical Institute to expand their statewide capabilities and space missions. // Nine puppies found abandoned in a crate at the Fox transfer site last week were all adopted by new families in a single day.

One food bank CEO said that, between benefits lapsing and high winter demand, she expects “a lot of silent hunger behind closed doors.”

The Army Corps of Engineers is preparing to remove radioactive materials from an old nuclear power plant on Fort Greely, and a global organization is bringing traditional foods to villages impacted by ex-Typhoon Halong.

Cuts in federal SNAP benefits program have made it harder for Alaskans who already are struggling with high food prices. // Six mushers signed-up Saturday for the 2026 Yukon Quest Alaska sled dog race, which begins and ends in Fairbanks in February. // The Alaska Supreme Court has ordered disgraced former U.S. District Court Judge Joshua Kindred to be disbarred for inappropriate relationships he had with two federal prosecutors. // The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation may soon regulate the state's hazardous wastes if the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency authorizes it.

Lightning caused most of the fires that swept across the Interior this summer, burning thousands of acres and dozens of structures.

A jury found a 23-year-old Fairbanks man guilty Tuesday of murdering two people in August 2022. A group of researchers at the University of Alaska Fairbanks is working to use machine learning to improve lightning forecasts. Unofficial results are in from Tuesday’s election in the Denali Borough, and as expected, voters reelected all unopposed incumbents. Alaska-based organizations are presenting a film and discussion in Fairbanks this evening about PFAS contamination in Alaska. Donlin Gold mine in Southwest Alaska is the latest Alaska project to gain the support of a federal agency seeking to streamline permitting. Akiak has restored municipal electricity for its residents, 43 days after a mechanical failure cut off power.

The Fairbanks City Council got to review new Mayor Mindy O’Neall’s first proposed budget earlier this week. Another committee is backing a proposed charter school in the Fairbanks North Star Borough – this time, in Two Rivers. State health officials released new data last month about a program that tests incarcerated Alaskans for syphilis. A controversial higher education compact from the Trump administration has sparked a petition from several University of Alaska unions. A closer look at what the canceled EPA grant would have done for the storm-devastated village of Kipnuk.

EPA officials said last week that Alaska’s revised plan to improve Fairbanks and North Pole air quality is good to go. // People who rely on food assistance from SNAP could have their electronic benefits cards refilled as soon as this week. // Alaska’s economic development and finance corporation is committing another $50 million to the controversial Ambler Road Project. // Four soldiers were injured Monday when the vehicles they were in slid off the road on a slippery stretch of the Richardson Highway near Birch Lake. // A new album from the Wasilla-based band Portugal. The Man is on the way. And the project has elements of Alaska culture throughout.