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INSIDE

The Daily News-Miner wishes all of you a safe and happy Thanksgiving Day.TO OUR READERS

Two dollars newsminer.comTHURSDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2017

T H E V O I C E O F I N T E R I O R A L A S K A

Aurora forecast.

Auroral activity will be

active. Weather permit-

ting, active auroral dis-

plays will be visible over-

head from Utqiagvik to

Anchorage and Juneau.

This information is provided

by aurora forecasters at the

Geophysical Institute at the

University of Alaska Fair-

banks. For more information

about the aurora, visit http://

www.gi.alaska.edu/Aurora-

Forecast

GOOD MORNING

SOURDOUGH JACK:

“I’ve got dibs on

the drumsticks.”

The weather.

Partly cloudy. Light

winds. Tonight: Mostly

cloudy with a chance of

snow.

High today ................4

Low tonight ...........-10

They’re going to be a part of itInterior Alaska cheerleaders hit the Big Apple

for Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

By Amanda BohmanABOHMAN

@NEWSMINER.COM

What do Gwen Stefani, the Goo Goo Dolls, Hello Kitty, Miss America and Fairbanks’ North Star All Stars cheerleaders have in common?

They are scheduled to be part of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. The parade is televised start-ing at 9 a.m. today on KTVF Channel 11.

“We are the first cheer team ever to come from Alaska,” said Angela Fos-ter, team coach and owner of the North Star All Stars gym on the Old Richard-son Highway.

Foster is accompany-

ing 18 girls and one boy, ages 12 to 18, from Fair-banks and North Pole who along with about 500 cheerleaders from across the nation con-verging on New York City this week. They are all part of the Spirit of America performers, who were selected from among the best cheer

squads in the country to strut their stuff in one of the country’s best-known parades. The cheerleaders had to raise money — $2,325 per person plus air fare — to participate.

The teenagers are see-ing sights, including the Statue of Liberty, 9/11 Memorial Plaza and the Empire State Building as well as practicing the routine they will perform as they walk about 2.5 miles from Central Park West to 34th Street, join-ing such American icons as The Radio City Rock-ettes along with about 8,000 other parade par-ticipants.

WEATHER » A5

Classified » B7-8 | Comics » B6 | Dear Abby » Latitude 65 | Markets » B5 | Opinion » A6

No appetite for politics

WASHINGTON — Pass the turkey — but may-be hold the politics. The already fraught topic now includes allegations of sexual misconduct against politicians of var-ious political stripes.

From GOP President Donald Trump to Dem-ocratic Sen. Al Franken, politicians past, pres-ent and aspiring stand accused of sexual mis-conduct and that could keep tensions high at the holiday table. More than a third of Americans dread the prospect of politics coming up over Thanksgiving, a new poll shows.

G l e n n R o g e r s , a Republican from Los Angeles, said he asks people around the table to talk about things to celebrate from the past year. Not everyone, he knows, will be toasting the Trump presidency.

“For the most part, we get to the point where we know that we’re not going to agree with each other and it gets dropped,” said the 67-year-old manufactur-ing consultant, who said he voted less for Trump than against Democrat Hillary Clinton.

With a cascade of sex-ual misconduct scandals now echoing similar alle-

gations against Trump during the campaign, tempers on the subject of Trump may not have cooled, Rogers said. “When you start talking about it now, there’s still some, I think, real ani-mosity when you start talking about character.”

Rogers is among more than a third of Ameri-cans who say they dread the prospect of politics coming up over Thanks-giving, compared with just 2 in 10 who say they’re eager to talk pol-itics, according to a new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Four in 10 don’t feel strongly either way.

Democrats are slightly more likely than Repub-licans to say they’re uneasy about political discussions at the table, 39 percent to 33 percent. And women are more likely than men to say

they dread the thought of talking politics, 41 per-cent to 31 percent.

Those who do think there’s at least some pos-sibility of politics coming up are somewhat more likely to feel optimistic about it than Americans as a whole. Among this group, 30 percent say they’d be eager to talk politics and 34 percent would dread it.

T h e d e b a t e o v e r whether to talk politics at Thanksgiving is about as American as the tra-ditional feast itself. By Christmas 2016, 39 per-cent of U.S. adults said their families avoided conversations about poli-tics, according to the Pew Research Center.

But Americans still are trying to figure out how to talk about the sub-ject in the age of Trump and amid the sexual

By Laurie Kellman and Emily SwansonASSOCIATED PRESS

SOURCE: AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research AP

Poll: please no politics at Thanksgiving More Americans would rather steer clear of politics this Thanksgiving, according to a new AP-NORC Center poll.

Results based on interviews with 1,070 U.S. adults conducted Nov.15-19. Margin of error is 4.2 percentage points.

19%

36

40

Which of the following best describes the way you feel?

How likely is it that politics will come up as a topic at your

Thanksgiving dinner?

Extremely/

very likely Not tooSomewhat Not at all

19% 24 22 26 4

Not eating

Thanksgiving

dinner

I would be eager to talk about

politics at this year’s

Thanksgiving dinner

I dread the thought of having

to talk about politics at

Thanksgiving dinner

I don’t feel strongly

one way or another

PARADE » A3

POLITICS » A3

Americans want to avoid the topic today

Panel to look at problems with testing of Alaska potASSOCIATED PRESS

ANCHORAGE — A com-mittee will look at prob-lems about the testing of cannabis products amid inconsistency in poten-cy results from different labs, Alaska’s top mari-juana regulator said.

Erika McConnel l , director of the Alcohol and Marijuana Control Office, told Anchorage television station KTVA she didn’t know how long that process would take.

McConnell, at a recent Marijuana Control Board

meeting, recommended a review of testing reg-ulations, citing, among other reasons, evidence of “significant deviation” in potency-testing results of the same product by different labs.

POT » A5

Members of the North Star All Stars competitive cheer squad tour Broadway in New York City before a performance in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. COURTESY OF THE NORTH STAR ALL STARS

Look for the

North Star All

Stars at about

10:30 a.m.

following the

Pikachu

balloon.

Borough contacting residents suspected of flouting burn banBy Amanda BohmanABOHMAN

@NEWSMINER.COM

Staff from the Fairbanks North Star Borough and the Alaska Department of Environmental Conserva-tion were watching chim-ney pipes during the burn

ban in North Pole earlier this week, an air quality official said.

The manager of the borough Air Quality Divi-sion, Nick Czarnecki, said suspected violators will be getting letters.

“FNSB and ADEC staff conducted field observa-

tions (Tuesday), which resulted in 25 violations of the stage 1 burn restric-tion, and warning letters have been sent out for each violation,” Czarnecki said in an email Wednes-day.

BAN » A5

A5Thursday, November 23, 2017 Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

Under a Stage 1 air alert, wood and coal burning are prohibited without a waiv-er under the borough code of ordinances.

The letter warns of a potential $500 fine for another violation and encourages the residents to call the borough to dis-cuss options.

“We look forward to assisting you in whatever way we can to help lower your emissions, keep your home warm, and improve the air quality,” according to a sample letter provided by Czarnecki.

Tougher new rules are in place this winter to deal with high levels of PM2.5 pollution in parts of Fair-

banks and North Pole. PM2.5 is a byproduct of wood smoke and has been scientifically linked to heart and lung diseases.

The Borough Assem-bly tightened the rules on wood burning under pressure from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which has said the air here is out of com-pliance with the federal Clean Air Act at times, typ-ically during winter when the air gets stagnant.

The Stage 1 air alert ear-lier this week was the first for winter 2017.

The burn ban in North Pole was in effect from Monday afternoon until 5 p.m. Tuesday.

Burn bans are nothing new in North Pole area. Last winter, the area had 20 burn bans, according to

data provided by Czarnec-ki.

A burn ban has not been called in Fairbanks.

Wednesday’s air in Fair-banks and North Pole was “good,” under the air qual-ity index. Czarnecki said the air quality forecast is good to moderate despite temperatures that are expected to dip down into the teens and below zero.

“FNSB staff will moni-tor the data daily during the holiday and update the website as conditions change,” he said.

For more information about air quality and burn restrictions, call 459-1234 or visit www.aqfairbanks.com.Contact staff writer Amanda

Bohman at 459-7587. Follow

her on Twitter:

@FDNMborough.

Wants to thank the following for being a part of our Final Friday

Silent Auction held on September 29 at River’s Edge Resort

Thanks to all the businesses who donated to our Silent Auction!

Alaska Railroad, Alaska RawFur, Alaska SalmonBake&PalaceTheatre, Ann’s Greenhouses,

Ayana@Elements Salon, Beaver Sports, Blue Ribbon Sewn’ Vac, ChenaHot Springs Resort,

Cold Spot Feeds, Cookie Jar, Co-opMarket, Country Kitchen, Dr. Yamamoto,

Fairbanks Concert Association, FairbanksDailyNews-Miner, FairbanksDrama,

FairbanksMemorial Hospital Gift Shop, FairbanksNissan, Fairbanks Symphony,

Gavora’s FineWines, GreatHarvest Bread, GreatNorthwest, Ivory Jack’s, Leslie’s Salon,

Mochalicious, North Pole Coffee, North Star Ballet, NorthernThreads, Pagoda Restaurant,

Party Palace, PumpHouse, Risse Greenhouse, RiverboatDiscovery&GoldDredge #8,

Santa ClausHouse, Spruce Roots FamilyDentistry, Stepping Stones Builders, Turtle Club,

UrsaMajorDistilling, Venue,Warbelow’s Air,Wayne’s Air Supply,WildAlaska Chaga

Jeanne Armstrong, Karen Austen, Kate Lamal, Karen Malone,Ann Wood O’Brien, Jackie Pananen, John Pananen, Iris Sutton

Thanks to all the individuals who donated to our Silent Auction!

Thanks to our First Friday Artists!

Happy Holidays to our members and supporters!

Thanks to our corporate sponsors throughout the year!

Thank you to everyone who put cash or a check in our Donation Box!

Thanks to everyone at River’s Edge for hosting this event!

Thank you to the NewsMiner, KUAC and fairbanksalaska.com for helping usget the word out about our event!

Thank you to all our volunteers and helpers!

Thank you to all anonymous people and anyone wemissed!

THANKS TO ALLWHO STOPPED BY AND SUPPORTEDOUR EVENT!

Airport Road West Fred Meyer Employees Association, Ear Nose &Throat Clinic,

Elks Lodge #1551, Fairbanks Community Mental Health Services,

Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, Family Centered Services, Foundation Health Partners,

IBEW Union #1547, Julie Scott Wealth Management, Kinross Fort Knox,

Kroger-Fred Meyer Community Rewards, Mount McKinley Bank, River’s Edge Resort,

Usibelli Foundation

Thanks to all the individuals who donated throughout the year!

F18525541

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2017 • CARLSON CENTER

34th Annual

Gingerbread House

Contest

Come vote foryour favorites!

9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. (907) 456-6661 • newsminer.com

NEWS

Brian Coyle, CEO of Steep Hill Alaska, one of two testing labs in the state, said THC results from customers who got samples tested at both labs were higher in all 16 samples tested by the other lab, Canntest LLC — in some cases, signifi-cantly so.

THC is what gets con-sumers high.

“High THC is what the customers are seeking. The retailers want it, the cultivators want it, so

they can sell their prod-uct for a premium, and that’s what brought us to this situation,” Coyle said.

Steep Hill also retested products it bought from retail stores and said it found variations.

The inconsistencies are greater than one would expect between two dif-ferent labs, Coyle said.

Jonathan Rupp, Can-ntest’s scientific direc-tor, said he has ques-tions about how Steep Hill conducted its tests but also wants to fig-ure out why the results are so different. His lab

would never inflate THC results for financial gain, he said.

Canntest, in a state-ment it posted online, cited a number of poten-tial factors that might contribute to the report-ed discrepancies but said that “without direct cooperation between labs any differences are difficult to determine.”

Steep Hill has sug-gested, among other things, using equipment at the state crime lab as a third-party check of test results coming from licensed marijuana test-ing labs.

POTContinued from A1

BANContinued from A1

Moore thanks Trump in new fundraising email

WASHINGTON — Republican Roy Moore is touting President Donald Trump’s near-endorsement of him in a new fundraising email to support-ers.

The Republican Senate candidate from Alabama sent out a fundrais-ing appeal Wednesday night touting Trump’s criticisms of Democrat Doug Jones.

Trump referenced Jones on Tuesday when he told reporters, “We don’t need a liberal person in there.”

While Trump has not officially sided with Moore, he noted that Moore has denied the accusations of sexual mis-conduct against teens.

Trump said, “Roy Moore denies it, that’s all I can say.”

Moore tells supporters in his fund-raising appeal, “I appreciate Donald Trump for defending my honor and my character.”

In terror-wary NYC, security tight for parade

NEW YORK — Sand-filled sanitation trucks and police sharpshooters will mix with glittering floats and giant balloons at a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade that comes in a year of terrible mass shootings and not even a month after a deadly truck attack in lower Manhattan.

New York City’s mayor and police brass have repeatedly stressed that layers of security, along with hundreds of officers, will be in place for one of the nation’s biggest outdoor holiday gatherings, and that visitors should not be deterred.

“We had a couple of tough months as a nation,” Police Commissioner James O’Neill said. “We won’t ever accept such acts of hate and cowardice as inevitable in our society.”

A posting last year in an English- language magazine of the Islamic State group, which took credit for the Oct. 31 truck attack that killed eight people, mentioned the Thanksgiving parade as “an excellent target.” Authorities say there is no confirmation of a credible threat.From wire reports

IN BRIEF

A3Thursday, November 23, 2017 Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

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FNSB Division of Animal Control, 459-1451www.petharbor.com • Tues.–Sat., 11 a.m.–6 p.m.

Lolliepop (also called Lilly) is a beautifulolder gal who is looking for a loving homethis holiday season! As November is Adopta Senior Pet Month, it is only fitting that wespotlight one of our cherished older pets.Lolliepop found herself at the shelterbecause her owner passed away. She ishousebroken, knows basic commands, andgets along with other dogs! Lolliepop ishoping to find a sweet family that will giveher daily walks and a cozy bed. She is verycheerful and shows her enthusiasm withoutover-exerting her voice. Meet this lovely ladyat 2408 Davis Rd or www.petharbor.com!

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NOVEMBER

G AME

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Today’s Lucky Number

INTERIOR

Co-op helps customers pay it forwardA

few cents here and there can make a big difference. Just look at

results of the Co-Op Market Grocery and Deli’s Lend A Hand and Shop & Share pro-grams.

The Lend A Hand pro-gram began in October 2013 and has donated $52,094 to area charitable organiza-tions. Almost all that money was collected less than one dollar at a time.

“As our grocery manager put it, that’s more than 5.2 million pennies,” said Kristin Sum-merlin, marketing and owner services manager. “And in spite of our economic woes, our donations are up a whopping 60 percent over last year.”

Here’s how it works: Every month, customers have the opportunity to round up their shopping bills to the nearest dollar and donate the differ-ence, 100 percent of which goes to a charitable organization.

The organizations are cho-sen by Co-Op Market owners.

The applications for 2018 are due Dec. 1. Find the applica-tion at http://bit.ly/2B2Epy0.

Those donations are extremely beneficial to chari-table organizations.

“One of the stories from Lend A Hand that stuck with me this year was from Ronnie Rosenberg, director of the Fairbanks Animal Shelter Fund,” Summerlin said. “In March, we raised $2,341 for them — the largest sum for any organization to date.

“Ronnie said that the money would be used for veterinary care at the shelter and told me that they’d recently had a pup-py brought in after it was hit by a car. It needed X-rays and extensive medical treatment.

“Donations like this help the shelter keep animals alive and healthy, so that they can be

adopted by loving people,” she said.

In 2017, the other organiza-tions receiving donations from Lend A Hand include the Inte-rior Alaska Center for Non-Vi-olent LIving, Breadline/Stone Soup Cafe, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Fairbanks Youth Advocates, Literacy Council of Alaska, Calypso Farm & Ecology Cen-ter, Friends of Creamer’s Field, Fairbanks Children’s Museum, Georgeson Botanical Garden Society, Boys & Girls Club of Fairbanks and Green Star of Interior Alaska.

Apply now to get on the list for 2018.

Shop & ShareThe Co-Op Market Grocery

also helps the community through its Shop & Share program, an innovative way to pay it forward and promote healthy eating for families. The program began about one year ago.

To make it happen, the mar-ket partners with the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation. Shoppers can purchase seven specific items when they check out at the cashier, paying for their own groceries. The items are basic building blocks for a nutritious diet and include one dozen organic eggs, 1 pound ground turkey, a 24-ounce container of plain organic yogurt, bags of organic broc-coli or blueberries, or a serving of healthy soup from the deli.

Shoppers must select the items and the price is added to their bills. Vouchers are creat-ed for each item and handed over to the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation. That organization selects families who can cash in the vouch-ers at the Co-Op Market and enjoy the benefits of healthy food.

Families are selected through the AHFC’s Jump-Start Program. These are pri-marily families in the rental assistance program who are

moving toward self sufficien-cy. The Co-Op does not select voucher recipients. And the donor remains anonymous.

Too often, Summerlin said, families are having to choose between paying for food or paying utilities, such as elec-tricity, at the end of of every month.

Here are the results after one year: “We learned that we’d provided 340 vouch-ers to 64 families, totaling more than $1.370,” Summer-lin said. “Most of those fam-ilies are headed by a single adult. One family included 10 people, but the average fami-ly size is four.

“Also of note is that we’ve seen about a 20 percent increase in shoppers using SNAP benefits at the Co-Op,” she added. “We are happy to be able to provide good, nutri-tious food to our community.”Reach columnist/community editor

Kris Capps at kcapps@newsminer.

com. Call her at the office 459-7546. Follow her on Twitter: @FDNMKris.

Kris Capps

COMMUNITY EDITOR

kcapps@newsminer.com

misconduct allegations that have ignited a new debate over standards for conduct between men and women. The conversation, some ana-lysts and respondents say, touches on identi-ty among people who group themselves by oth-er factors, such as family, friendship or geography.

Ten months into Trump’s presidency, he remains a historically unpopular president and a deeply polarizing force in the United States. His drives to crack down on immigration in the name of national secu-rity and the economy cut right to the question of who is an American. And his defense on Tues-day of Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore, the former Ala-bama judge accused by six women of pursuing romantic relationships with them when they were teenagers and he was in his 30s, comes amid a deluge of sexual misconduct scandals.

For any mention of Moore, who denies the accusations against him, there’s Franken of Minnesota, who has apologized or said he feels bad about the alle-gations against him. For every mention of

the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump could be heard bragging about touching women without their consent, there are allegations that Democratic President Bill Clinton assaulted women. Both men deny the accusations.

Trump won the 2016 election, even though more than a dozen wom-en accused him of sexual misconduct, and rough-ly half of all voters said they were bothered by his treatment of women, according to exit polls. Trump called the alle-gations false and said he would sue the wom-en, but that hasn’t hap-pened.

In the past, the Emi-ly Post Institute Inc. received Thanksgiving etiquette questions that were typically about how to handle difficult rela-

tives, author Daniel Post Senning said.

“Now, I am hear-ing questions like, ‘I don’t want to go,’ or ‘I can’t imagine sitting at a table with some-one who has this per-spective and staying through the meal,’” he said. “My impression is that it’s still out there. ... The shock of that elec-tion is a little further in the rearview mirror, but I think people still have strong feelings about it.”

The AP-NORC poll of 1,070 adults was conducted Nov. 15-19 using a sample drawn from NORC’s Ameri-Speak panel, which is designed to be repre-sentative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

POLITICSContinued from A1

Millions of spectators and tens of millions of television viewers are expected to watch the parade, which is in its 91st year.

Foster said the North Star All Stars, who will have green pompoms, earned a place at the front of the Spirit of America cheerleaders. She said they will be on TV at about 10:30 a.m., follow-ing the Pikachu balloon.

“They had to work their way up to the spot that they got,” Foster said.

The All Stars have plen-ty of parade experience — albeit on a much smaller scale — performing in the Golden Days Grande Parade in Fairbanks. Last summer, they won Best Youth Organization for their float.

“We had the big gold star, and the kids were stunning on the float,” Foster said.

The squad has been practicing the 1-minute routine for the Macy’s p a r a d e s i n c e e a r l y November. Part of the routine will be televised, Foster said.

“They usually cut in from the commercial,” she said via text message from New York City.

The squad arrived in New York on Saturday and went straight from the airport to practice for four hours, Foster said. On their off time, they have been touring the city, including riding the subway and seeing a Broadway show, “Charlie and the Chocolate Facto-ry.”

Foster said they were invited to perform in the parade by Spirit of Ameri-ca Productions.

“Because they place so

well at competitions, they got the invitation to come to the Macy’s parade,” she said.

The All Stars have won national titles, Foster said. They have competed in Las Vegas, Kansas City, Indianapolis, Anaheim, California, and Washing-ton, D.C. Next month, the squad will compete in Portland, Oregon. Foster said they have been prac-ticing six hours per week, perfecting their rou-tine for the competition, which is the first weekend in December. They add-ed two hours of practice a week for the Macy’s parade.

They also worked hard on fundraising for the New York City trip with the help of the Fairbanks Choice Lions of which Foster is a member. Bob Larango is the club trea-surer.

“I’m really proud of that whole bunch,” he said.

The Lions sponsored a 50/50 raffle for the All Stars.

“We had the girls at the (Tanana Valley State) Fair,” Larango said. “The girls sold most of the tickets. They raised most of the money them-selves.”

T he pot e xceeded $25,000, and the cheer-leaders took half.

Foster said the team must be ready for the parade at 5:30 a.m. It is the culmination of months of hard work and dedication, she said.

“They busted their butts,” Foster said.

They are scheduled to return Fairbanks from New York City at 4:44 p.m. Friday. Contact staff writer Amanda

Bohman at 459-7587. Follow her

on Twitter: @FDNMborough.

PARADEContinued from A1

President Donald Trump pardons Drumstick during the National Thanksgiving Turkey Pardoning Ceremony on Tuesday in the Rose Garden of the White House. AP PHOTO/EVAN

VUCCI

Members of the North Star All Stars cheer squad tour New York City. COURTESY OF THE NORTH STAR

ALL STARS