Inside Alaska's Oldest Newspaper

FMC Fast Chat takes you inside the news so you can be in the know in 30 minutes. Hosted by Fair Media Council CEO and Executive Director Jaci Clement, Fast Chat features notables in news, media, and business.

Hi, this is Jaci Clement of the Fair Media Council. Thank you for joining us for this episode of FMC Fast Chat. This is part of a series we're doing that focuses on local news across America. And we're doing it by talking directly to the people who are working in local news. So today's episode, we take you to Alaska to talk with Deanna Hicker, who's the editor of the Nome Nugget, which is Alaska's oldest newspaper. Deanna, first, thank you so much for joining us.

You're welcome. Thank you for having me.

So I'm thinking for those of us like me who have never been to Alaska, if you can start out by giving us a little What is it like to live there? What do people do? How many people are in Nome?

We have a population of about 3,500 residents here in Nome. And when we talk about Alaska, Alaska is huge. So southeast is different from where we are. For example, we're closer to the Arctic. And right now, There's still sea ice in front of Nome, so there's, you know, we're still icebound, snow on the ground. We still have below freezing temperatures now here on May 4th, and it's a place where you can only get to by airplane. We're not on the road system, so we're a very rural region, even— Of in a rural state. So we have a, you know, constituency in our newspaper that includes villages around us, 15 communities that are then even further rural, and they also can only be reached by bush plane and snow machines sometimes. So the trails are kind of going down.

Mm-hmm.

These days because the snow is melting pretty fast. But we had huge amounts of snow. So we, you know, weather plays a huge part in our everyday life and how, you know, how we truck along doing business basically.

Yeah.

So it's a place where we have a diverse population here of Iñupiaq, Siberian Yup'ik and Central Yup'ik people in Nome. And further up north, it's more the Iñupiaq people on the island of St. Lawrence Island. That's the Siberian Yup'ik culture. And then further south of us, it's predominantly Yup'ik and Iñupiaq. So we have distinct cultures and distinct languages. And then, of course, other people who come here and have settled in Nome since 1900 when it first became a city.

Okay. All right. And when did the Nome Nugget start publishing?

That's a million-dollar question. Officially recognized by the, like, the Alaska State Library is about 1900.

Okay.

There are claims of 1897, but, you know, everybody kind of agrees on 1900. So we're 123 years old now.

Okay. Alright. Now, as you were describing Nome, I just wanna ask you 2 things that just popped into my mind. One, I'm wondering, you know, what happens in, in times of emergency, like, to get to a hospital, or if you need medical attention, what do you do? And 2, How do you just get grease? Is that difficult?

Sometimes. So we— there is a health corporation here that is established by the Indian Health Service, and that is owned by 20 tribes. So there's some healthcare service, but not— so basically, it's a trauma hospital if you get injured or hurt, and then From there on out, you'll be medevaced to, in an emergency, by bush, by a plane to Anchorage, which is about 600 miles, air miles away from us, about 1,000 land miles.

I see.

For other, like, you know, maintenance services, we have a dentist. We have 2 eye doctors in addition. And we have, you know, like I said, these are for non-emergencies. There's doctors in the hospital that will treat you. So it's, it's not that bad. But, um, like pregnant ladies, they are encouraged to go to Anchorage and have their baby because there's no one here who can, um, administer anesthesia. So—

Okay.

It's only, you know, you get patched up and then off you go on the medevac.

I see. Okay. And what about just general shopping, groceries, food?

Groceries. There are 2 stores in town here. You know, prices are— since everything has to be brought in here by airplane or barge.

Okay.

It's— transportation is very expensive, especially since the gas prices went up.

Okay.

So the stores, they're pretty well stocked. No complaints. But if we have weather events, or if the airport is— the runway is being fixed up and there's weather at the same time, um, if we have delays of planes coming in, uh, beyond 4 days, the shelves go bare.

I see.

But, but, but, but we have, um, a culture here that's basically a mixed cash and subsistence economy.

Okay.

Where people go out and hunt moose. Of course, it's all regulated, but there's a very thriving subsistence culture going on of people harvesting fish in the summertime, salmon, and then marine mammals. That's traditional foods here because in the villages, the stores are really horrendously expensive, the items they sell there, and they're not very wholesome foods, you know. So it's, it's a common thing where people go out and hunt whatever is in season and supplement their diet with, you know, good wholesome wild foods.

So how did you end up there? Because you're not originally from the area.

No. I came here from Hawaii, and I met my husband here who was a dog musher. And, you know, sled dogs don't do so great in Hawaii. We have a kennel. My husband, he's actually working in the advertising department. He's running the business side of the Gnome Nugget. And I am the editorial department head here with the edit— as the editor and Just, you know, running the newsroom.

Okay. All right. So let's talk about the newspaper. Are you the only newspaper for the area that you serve?

Yes.

And have you always been the only one?

Uh, no. The Nome Nugget went through several iterations since 1900, from the Nome Chronicle to the semiweekly to the triweekly to the daily. To back, they were triweekly to the no nugget then to the daily back. And so there were several iterations, but it was always a consistent like ownership basically. There were other newspapers that came and went, but we're the last one standing. You know, went from a daily to a triweekly to a semiweekly and now back to a weekly. And we there was a a competitor in the early '90s, and that was not very long around the Bering Strait record. And so ever since then, we are the only newspaper in an area that is huge— the entire Seward Peninsula plus part of Norton Sound, or Norton Sound down to the Yukon Delta.

Okay.

So it's an area of almost, you know, I think it's bigger than Delaware. It's huge.

Yeah.

And, um, so we're serving them as best as we can with— we report the news on what is happening in our ecosystem, which is undergoing just a dramatic, uh, change by climate, through climate change. And then of course we're— we are Alaska's neighbor to Russia, and we are the closest to Russia, the Bering Strait region. We report on whatever's going on, you know, in terms of relationships, in terms of people running away from Russia and ending up in our area here. So a lot of things to report on.

Okay. So in addition to weather and climate change, what are the other big issues for the people living there?

Of course, the government. That's all, like, we doggedly go to pretty much every meeting, um, that the city government controls, like, um, council meetings, planning commission, port commission, school boards, utilities meetings, and so on. So that is like, we just do that because it needs to be done.

Yeah.

We try to have a reporter in each one of those. Of course, we're doing crimes and court Mm-hmm. Education reporting. A big one is the sports, of course, high school sports. And they are quite interesting because in addition to, you know, the regular basketball and volleyball, and we have skiing, and we also have Native Youth Olympics. It's called NYO Games. Those are games that are very Arctic-specific. From, you know, the native population mimicking some games that were— that relate to hunting out on the sea ice.

And— Oh, I see.

Just, they're very super athletic and it's— they're awesome to watch. So we have very, very unique— and of course we have dog mushing. So known as the end of the Iditarod Trail, it's that dog race. That's a 1,000-mile dog race from Willow to Nome. We're at the endpoint of it. So that's always very exciting when the dogs come in and—

Yeah. Now, when is Iditarod season for you?

March.

March, right. And I imagine you're extremely busy then, news-wise, covering that.

Yep. Yep. And that's, you know, that's the fun part. That's like, of course, that makes it even more fun because we're Being dark marshers ourselves, we see things with different eyes than just a regular reporter who doesn't really know what they're looking at. And, you know, we have like a more expert set of eyes on things.

I see. Can you give me an idea how climate change has changed the Iditarod from what you see there?

We see that breakup is happening earlier, and, you know, marshers have to contend with more crazy storms at the end of the race.

Oh, okay.

And also, um, and more precipitation, and just it makes it warmer for dogs to run. So the mushers time it so that they rest their dogs in the heat of the day, and they prefer to run early morning, early evening, and then at night.

I see.

The dogs don't overheat, uh, it's just easier for, for the animals to Mm-hmm. Not that hot. Other topics for the Nome Nugget are we have an Arctic port that is about to be built here.

Okay.

And we have mining issues and mining proposals that we cover, big-time mines that are proposed to be put in here next, you know, next to Nome. We have the ecological disaster kind of hitting us through climate change with harmful algal blooms, different fish distributions, and also the avian flu. There's a lot of big issues that are complex.

Mm-hmm.

And not easy to write about, like more sciency stuff, which Which is really hard to convey because sometimes we have huge stories that break, like, about things that we didn't even know are a thing. Like, for example, there was, um, a few years ago, um, scientists came back from a science cruise and they said they couldn't find the cold pool. And we're like, what the heck is the cold pool? You know, never heard of it. So it's, uh, a very complex thing where Cold water changes the salinity and kind of brings down a curtain so that certain fish, they're like, oh, that's too cold for me, I'm not going there.

Oh, okay.

Turn away. So when the scientists couldn't find that cold pool anymore, there was a bigger fish distribution of fish that we usually didn't see here. There was a whole shift in what's going on in the ocean. We keep track of that here. These really earth-shaking news items that are very complex to write about and thus don't really make big waves, unlike other stories that are more simple and they go viral. And I'm constantly wondering why, you know, we're breaking news that are really significant And people just, you know, like other news outlets don't really understand what we're talking about and don't pick up on it. And like, come on, you got to follow up on that at least.

Now, would you say that's always been an issue? We talk about, you know, there being less journalists working and just cutbacks in news overall across the board. I mean, we focus a lot on the, on the cuts to hyperlocal, but the reality is national news has let People go, you know, we see lots of holes happening on different levels everywhere. So from your perspective, have you seen those holes growing or you've always had this issue because of where you are?

We just came back from Alaska Press Club week. We— every end of April, the Alaska Press Club organizes a conference and they give out their awards. And guess what? We just won Best Weekly.

Congratulations.

This year, last year too. But, um, so I think Alaska is doing okay on journalists.

Okay.

Well, we're so used to— we're so used to making do with a bare minimum, you know. If there's a live body sitting into a— in a radio station, that's awesome, you know. We're like, oh, he Yeah. Good for you. But, um, newspapers, there's far in between, that's for sure. So I think, um, when I talk about the larger news outlets not paying attention to, like, these big issues, is I have no idea because they do have resources that we don't have. I can only explain that with the fact that those are really complex Okay. And they don't really impact those people in the lower 48 or in urban Alaska as much as they impact our subsistence cultures here, right here, who go hungry, you know, if the sea ice doesn't come with the walrus. So usually it's like a conveyor belt where in the springtime the ice melting or the ice moving north from the Russian side is like a conveyor belt bringing the walrus with them as they migrate up north. And if that doesn't happen, there are certain communities who, who are specializing in walrus hunting, and they go hungry if they cannot find— get their catch in for the year.

Okay.

So yeah, they do care. And yeah, we explain why this is happening and what's going on. We have a, you know, like a sea ice outlook. We have a column in our paper every week that keeps an eye on climate, on the weather, summarizes weather events. That's really, really important for us.

Yeah.

Storms. Last year we had in September, 100-year storm that kinda made national news, Mürbach, who that just basically devastated several communities here and just washed away. Yeah. That was quite horrible.

Wow.

Yep. Yep.

Okay. Now tell me a little bit about, you know, talking, talking to people across the country. There's always 1 or 2 issues that seem to be an issue everywhere, no matter where I speak to people. One of which is— and, and tell me if it's an issue for you or not, or how this factors in— affordable housing and taxes.

Yeah, taxes. Okay, so first, the taxes. We— I just last night came out of the Board of Equalization meeting here in Nome. The assessment letters went out, assessments went up for a good reason. Um, everyone is up in arms, but this will all be solved because the council probably is not going to mill rate as they have now. So anyway, taxes. Yeah, well, we're— this area is a very economically deprived area, so we're high poverty rate.

Okay.

The taxes are like— one, Alaska doesn't have an income tax, so it's not really a Big deal here, the taxes. We have a sales tax, the city has, and the property tax.

Okay.

But people living in the villages, there's no sales tax, I don't think, in the municipalities. So what drives a lot of Alaskan politics talk is the so-called PFD. That's the Permanent Fund Dividend because oil Oil riches were put into a fund.

Okay.

Permanent fund, which is then reinvested, and the investments are— that was the idea, to save something for a rainy day. And every year, Alaskans get a share of that, the earnings of that fund.

Okay.

So though things were great When, you know, the oil was flowing and we could tax the, you know, get a lot of taxes from oil to pay for state services. But since the oil kind of the price decreased, now the state finds itself hurting for money to pay for services.

Okay.

And so they're kind of every year the debate since 2010, 2009 is like, Do we dip into the permanent fund and take money from that to pay for state services? So that's always like a huge discussion because everyone wants their permanent fund, right? So, or the dividend, I should say. So that's a big deal. And then housing is a very, very big deal. And that's like everywhere. You can just cannot find good housing. You have to— In a That drives up the assessment rates for houses that do sell. And that, in my opinion, just exacerbates the whole housing situation because the higher the value, the less people can afford it. And, you know, those who can, they will— there will always be those people who can buy a house that's maybe just worth $150,000. They put down $300,000.

Mm-hmm.

Because there's just such a demand for very scarce housing. So we have solved that in a way for us because we have a hard time recruiting reporters from our community, unfortunately. So I have to bring in reporters below 48.

Okay.

And, um, and we have to build our own housing.

I see.

So we have 2 houses for reporters, which, of course, that's quite an investment. Yeah. So what am I gonna do?

No, it's, it's actually very innovative for you to be doing that. But now tell me a little bit about your staff. How many people do you have working to cover these kinds of issues?

Yeah. So we have a Advertising manager who's married to me, so I give him housing. Then, then we have a full-time super reporter here. She's right next door. We actually bought a cabin, had it moved from out of town to here, totally refurbished, remodeled, put in everything new. So that's where she and her husband live in now. And then I'm currently looking for a second reporter. Who we have housing for.

Okay.

And then we have a distribution crew who, they, they live here, so they're doing this part-time just on a Wednesday when the paper comes off the plane. And, uh, then we have a, our typesetter, or she used to be typesetter, that now it's, uh, you know, recording, um, court information, uh, Trooper Beat. So she's collecting material for us and typing stuff still for us. And she's been with us for 30 years now. I'm really lucky to have her still around. And then we have a freelancer who, you know, reports on the fun, like the drama club play at the school, you know, the things that are, you know, we don't get around to do, but that are still important for this community. And she does some sport reporting too, yeah.

And what about the business side? How are you managing to pay the bills? Is it mostly, are you relying on subscriptions or advertising or some folks are doing special events? We're seeing all sorts of things happening.

Yeah. Um, it's mostly advertising. We have not raised our subscription rates or, or, you know, it's still, the paper goes for 50 cents. We distribute it to all village stores here and have outlets in Anchorage as well. Knock on wood, but we, I mean, we always have this uphill fight of, you know, public notices. Like, you know, people are starting to advertise their events or their positions or their requests for proposals on social media, or we have a listserv here called Gnome Announce that is not passing the legal test of what is a public notice. So we're constantly, you know, knocking on doors saying like, no, you cannot do that. You cannot just put it on an obscure government website and hope people find it. That's not public notice. You're not serving the public doing that. You might be checking a box, but you're not serving the public. And I'm, you know, we're all about service. I mean, that's at least that's what I tell my people here is like, We're servicing this community here. We're not— it's okay. It's nice when we get awards, but we're not writing for awards. We serve these people, our community.

Yeah.

And so, yeah, so it's a mix of subscriptions, advertising, and paper sales. Okay.

All right. And as far as delivery, is it only to the stores or do you— is it home delivery or via mail or anything like that?

It's a, it's a mix. So we have no home delivery. So the— our cycle is we, you know, Monday, Tuesdays are deadline days. We put the paper together here in Nome, then we put it on the cloud and the printer in Anchorage, again, 1,000 miles south, is printing it. And on Wednesday mornings, and then puts most of the papers on the plane to Nome.

Okay.

And every Wednesday, you hope it— the planes are flying and the weather is good and no volcanoes are breaking, you know, like spewing ash in the air. And, you know, like, there's a lot of millions of parts that move to get the papers here. And then the papers get here and our distribution who pick them up from the airport, take them to a different terminal, some of them to the village store. So Gamble gets 50, Savoonga gets 50, you know, Elim gets 30. So they wrap them up and put them on a bush plane, and the rest goes to the Nome stores and here to the Nome Nugget for sale. Another part is not leaving Anchorage, is going directly from the printer to a mailing service, and they imprint the subscribers on the paper and send them out from there.

Okay.

So that they don't have to come here to know just to be flown back to down south.

Alright. Got it. So given how complicated all of that is, how important is your website to people? Or do they not really log on? I don't know what internet access is like there.

It improved. We have— we're now connected to a fiber optic cable that runs actually from London down to Tokyo, and they built a spur to Nome, and I think with Kjavik, and I want to say one more community, but I'm not sure. So we got into that. Broadband action, which improved it. But again, the communities around us, they have fickle communication services.

I would think so.

Yeah. On end, or weeks on end, we go without even being able to call Little Diomede, which is right smack in the middle of the Bering Strait.

Okay.

And, uh, 2 miles away from Big Diomede. Which is Russian. So, um, they're in the most extreme spot on Earth, I think. So there's, um, very little communication going on. And then now there's, you know, Starlink, where they can actually set up, uh, those little satellites or, you know, antennas, and that seems to be working quite well. So, okay. But it's not like in the lower 48 where you have like your You know, you're glued to— well, people are already glued to their phones, but it's, um, you know, people still like paper.

Got it.

Where's my paper? Yeah, it's still, you know, people still clip photos of their kids out and put them on the refrigerator. And so I do think that a lot of people outside of Gnome, we have a lot of those subscribers who, uh, read the Nugget online.

Okay.

Our readers in the region, I think, still rely heavily on the paper.

I see.

Yeah.

It's very interesting.

Yeah. So we only have one airline, like, that has jet service to Nome. It's Alaska Airlines.

Okay.

And, you know, we're pretty much at the mercy of if they load up the paper on their flights or not. And There's one— we have one champion at Alaska Airlines in the cargo office, and if she's not there, I'm, you know, calling and, where are they? Oh, they will be there on Saturday. I'm like, no, it's Wednesday. They gotta be here, you know, put them on the plane. That's— it's newspapers. On Saturday, it's not news anymore.

But, um, you know, I think you gave us really a great overview of what's happening there. Um, I have one final question for you, which is, I mean, given all of this, just how convoluted everything is and how hard it is to attract journalists there and the weather and the lifestyle and all of that and the stress of putting out a weekly newspaper, you know, because that's not easy. Why do you do it?

Well, I've been a reporter all my life. I think that's— I'm supposed to do that. And I came to Nome in 2002, just as 2 reporters were leaving here. The owner then, she was like, like this, and she was like, okay, can you start like right now? I'm like, sure, okay. So, I grew really fond of the Nome Nugget and what we all do here, you know, what we all achieve and what this whole nugget is all about in terms of serving a readership that otherwise maybe wouldn't have the context that we provide to news. Because we don't— so we don't have any national news or any, you know, people can pick that up elsewhere. We're really reporting on news that are affecting people's lives right here.

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