v Alaska Historical Library
, .v- % Box 2051
Your rCommunity Newspaper Juneau
•i narch 31, 1955 __10 Cents Per Copy
fol. 5, No* 42
"pud audit
Roland Rettig of ,*the firm Ret tig,
Scott and Company, Certified Public Ac
countant s, Anchorage, turned over his
report of the audit of PUD books Monday
night to the directors.1 The meeting
ms closed to the publid^t the ‘request
of Mr* Rettig, according;to PUD Presi
dent Gen© Browning* The audit, which
took 16 days to perform, is reported
to have cost the PUD $170Q*
An inspection of the report indi
cates that a total of $53,025.40 was
taken in as revenue by. the district and
$43,839.48 was listed as expenditures
leaving a balance of $9185.92 as excess
The revenue received from the dock
represented the larger share of the to
tal figure# The dock „ revenue was
$34,192.06 and the general fund revenue
me $18,833.34* .r • 1
Dock expenditures totaled $26,731*27 ••
leaving an exoess of $7,460*79 and the
general fund expenditures were listed
at $17,108.2! leaving an excess ©f
$1,725.13.
Two comments made in "the report by
the auditor should, be noted. The first
deals with the delinquent tax sale fund
and reads as follows: "The purpose of
this fund is to account for the exoess
proceeds collected from,delinquent tax
sales. The accounting for such funds,
was incomplete dr non existent insofar
a® the regular books of account were
e once me d. The excess, proceeds'from
tax sales were deposited to a restrict
ed savings account, howe'ver, more ade
quate accounting for such monies has
been suggested and‘explained in detail
to the manager." Mr. Rettig was asked
by a News reporter . if this meant that
the manager had kept no records of the
delinquent tax sale monies. He stated
that such was not the case. The monies
were accurately accounted for, but that
a separate set of books had not been
set up to take care of the monies, he
stated*
In a section entitled "General Com
ments" the auditor said, "In the prep
aration of the accompanying statements
It ms necessary to develop the requir
ed information largely from the origin
al sources. The formal books of ac
count were so incomplete 'and inaccurate
that we found it impractical to rely on
(Cont. on Page 2, C61if 3)
PETITIONS FILED
The board or directors accepted^iwo
more petitions of candidates for the
A^ril 12 PUD election at thdijr* Monday
evening meeting* The petitions were
for Margaret Anderson and Henning John
son* This brings the total to ibur
petitions accepted thus far by the di
rectors* Harry Gregoire filed his pe
tition after the meeting Monday" night
and it is assumed that it will be ac
cepted before April 12* The deadline
for filing the petitions is today
{Thursday) at 3 p*m* Ora Jones and Ben
Bellamy had filed their petitions sev
eral weeks ago* It has been stated
that Robert No nnan’s name had been
placed on a petition and presented to
the directors, but as of Wednesday af
ternoon the petition had not appeared
in the PUD office* *N
STORY-WRONG
■Bert Ejisen, steward for the labor
ers, loiigshoremen and'teamsters unions,
stated this week that the story which
appeared in la'st week’s Homer Herald
concerning the hiring of local help on
tho hospital building was not "based on
fact.
Hansen said that it is tho policy of •
the unions to hire qualified local help
first on all construction Jobs'whether
one or a hundred men are needed. This
policy is carried out all over Alaska,
he said-.
Further, he said that he will be
notified before any local construction
is begun and that every endeavor will
be made to distribute the jobs fairly.
CHAMBER NOTES
President Nelsbn Moyer was elected
Monday to represent the Homer Chamber
of Commerce at the All-Alaska Chamber
meeting in Juneau in mid-April. The
membership is being asked to make vol
untary contributions of 36 to send
their representative - to the capital
city. It has been estimated that about
$300 is needed to send him. *
In other Chamber business the presi
* dent appointed Homer Thompson and Don
Smith to assist the directors- in pre
paring copy for the Ate sta Visitor’s
Association bfoeb^r©*
It was announced that the Anchorage
Chamber had gone on record supporting
the local group in seeking more roads
fer the Kenai Peninsula.
Don Saiith -suggested that a program
be put in force to tally the number of
tourist dollars spent in Homer. He
suggested;ttat containers be placed by
local cdsh registers and a penny be
placed in the can for every dollar tak
en in from the tourists. He said that
he had contacted several merchants and
received a favorable reaction to the
plan. Chuck Abbott stated that he
would donate small can banks for the
purpose and Smith offered to distribute
the cans.
It ms announced that R. E. Wade,
REA auditor, donated $26 to the school
workshop project,
J Merrill Hatcher reported briefly on
the visit of the Anchorage high school
ski team. He said that the visitors
seemed to enjoy their visit and that
they were given a tour of the area af
ter the races.
Sam Pratt stated tiat there should
have been more Homer people at the tow
to enjoy the races and show the Anchor
age youngsters a good time. He expres
sed the opinion that the community mis
sed a good advertising opportunity.
A letter from Harry Hegdahl was read
to the Chamber. In the letter Harry
gave his views about public service. .,.
WEATHER
High Low
Mrrch 24 40 31
March 25 40 33
March 26 36 27
' • March 27 41 ;27
March 28 " 44 :25
\ March 29 41 28
Msirfch 30 40 22
A ship-board fire in Seldovia harbor
early Tuesday morning took the life of
a Port Grchf^m native, according to re
ports from that community. Leon Me gar.
aek, about 23 years of age, was believ
ed to have been the victim of the fire*
however, the body found in the exten
• aively demnged boat was badly burned
and positive identification was not
immediately possible* - i:
It is understood that the fire
aboard the boat "Parka 23w was discov
ered about 1:30 a#m. as it lay tied up
at the storage dock* An endeavor was
mad© to get the# boat in close enough to
use the cityifire hos© but it proved an
impossible task. .The boat was then cut
loose from its mooring to protect other
boats in storage and then it. was sunk
in shallow water to put out the flames.
At low tide the gutted boat was in
spected and tbB body found* It is un
derstood th©t the victim had been drin
king end had apparently wapdered aboard
the ship and in some unknown manner set
it afire*
•PUD MEETING U
In a letter to the HJD this‘week,
Irving Roed, territorial highway engin
eer, stated tifit if the* legislature
-appropriates the money his office will
tassist Homrr ;sin the construction of si
boat basin* He stated that he was im
pressed with the efforts of locelvfish
ermen to start a basin on their own*
The appropriation is contained, he
said., in House Bill 41 which had not
passed the Senate when he wrote his
letter*
The Reed letter was a part of the ,
correspondence read at the meeting of
the directors of the PUD Monday evening
A letter from Senator Magnuson of
Washington informed the directors that
seat rain hearings would be held in the
Territory after the present session of
Congress is concluded*
Lowell Puckett of the Bureau of Land
Management wrote to say that the office
of the territorial engineer wculd he
the one to contact in regard to erosion
on the Homer Spit*
Amos Alter, territorial sanitation
engineer, wrote that his office had ap
proved the plans on the hospital sewage
disposal system last November* It was
expected that when the approval was re
ceived the bids would be let on this
portion of the project, but the matter
was tabled until the next meeting*
The matter of the operation of the
old fork lift at the dock was discussed
at some length after a letter from Ho
mer High, business agent of the long
shoremen’s union, was read* High no
ted that he should have been contacted
concerning the trouble and,he question
ed the purchase of the equipment,
pointing out that it had never been
too satisfactory* ' He stated that tbs
longshorenten would take the matter up
at a later meeting* The board decided
that the dock manager could fire any
employee on the dock for reasons stated
in the union-PUD contract, and recom
mended that an endeavor be made by the
.longshoremen to train more'' fbrk lift
operators*
Lonnie Scroggs suggested to the
board that the PUD acquire title to
,* (Cont* on Page 2, Col* 4)