What we did in 2015

The Library's State Office Building location will be open through the spring. We will move the collection after we get occupancy in A.P. Kashevaroff State Library, Archives, and Museum.

Despite unfounded rumors that the Alaska State Library is closed, 2015 has been a very busy year for us. Here's a look at our year in review.

We answered 34,000 requests for information. These requests came from near and far: legislators looking for information to shape their decisions, authors wanting historic photos for their books, and children needing Alaska facts for their school reports. We also provided 15,000 full-text journal articles to state employees, helped people from around the world find genealogical information about their Alaskan ancestors, and showed people how to use their smartphones.

We hosted 58 programs and events that encourage lifelong learning for Alaskans. These included webinars on using e-books, leading effective meetings, and copyright, First Friday art openings, French language practice groups, lunchtime lectures, and opportunities to explore resources like Ancestry and Listen Alaska+. Although we've suspended most programs to prepare for our impending move, we're cooking up ideas for fun events in the Andrew P. Kashevaroff State Library, Archives, and Museum.

We exhibited artwork from the children's book Mary's Wild Winter Feast by local author Hannah Lindoff and illustrators Clarissa Rizal and Nobu Koch in February and March.

Through our interlibrary loan program, we provided library patrons with nearly 1,000 articles, books, and other materials not held by our consortium from libraries in all 50 states, Canada, and Europe. We shared our unique materials with libraries around the world, fulfilling nearly 500 requests. We also bid farewell to a longtime friend, Becky Orford, who retired in April. She had been the queen of interlibrary loan for many years and was a master at fulfilling even the most obscure requests.

Interlibrary Loan maven Becky, shown with one of her favorite books, The Complete Works of Shakespeare, retired in April of this year.

We provided 5,500 internet sessions to Juneau patrons, tourists, and researchers, many of whom have no personal internet service and rely on the library to access government information, news, email, and social networks.

We celebrated milestones with our community partners, including the opening of the Walter Soboleff Center, the opening of the Mendenhall Valley Public Library, and the 25th birthday of the Egan Library at University of Alaska Southeast. We also cheered for Craig Public Library's National Medal win, as well as the many other honors received by Alaskan libraries this year.

The spectacular grand opening of the Walter Soboleff Center inspired and excited us about our own opening next spring.

We prepared to move to our new home. The building we've affectionately called SLAM received an official and apropos name, the Father Andrew P. Kashevaroff State Library, Archives, and Museum, and at the library, we've been weeding, measuring, and packing our collections to prepare for the move.

Governor Walker signs SB 63, which officially named our new building the Father Andrew P. Kashevaroff State Library, Archives, and Museum, with the Richard Foster Reading Room.

Library staff admire the progress on the Richard Foster Reading Room during a site tour in November.

Thanks to all of our patrons and friends for making this a great year! Happy New Year from all of us at the Alaska State Library.

How many people visited Alaska last year?

Tourism is a big industry in Alaska. How big, you ask? According to the Alaska Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development Division of Economic Development's report, Economic Impact of Alaska's Visitor Industry, 2013-14 Update, more than 1.93 million people visited Alaska between October 2013 and September 2014.

The United States Census estimate for Alaska's 2014 population is 736,732. More than 2.5 times that many people visited the state during the reporting period. That's a lot of tourists!

Cruise ship docked in Skagway. Photo by Jasperdo, some rights reserved.

How much was the PFD for the past seven years?

The 2014 PFD is the third largest in history, surpassed only by 2008 and 2000. Here are the amounts for the past seven years.

2014 $1,884.00
2013 $900.00
2012 $878.00
2011 $1,174.00
2010 $1,281.00
2009 $1,305.00
2008 $2,069.00

We previously posted the amounts for 2002-2007. The payment amounts since 1982 can be found at the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation website.

An Alaskan first?

Question: What was the first Alaskan community to ban plastic bags?

Answer: The earliest plastic bag ban I was able to find in Alaska was Galena, which did indeed ban them in 1998. According to their municipal code, which you can access by choosing Municipal Code at the Galena city website., Title 13.04.045 (A), “Plastic bags, used for carry out, in retail business shall be prohibited”. This refers to Ordinance 99-01, from 1998, for its authority. It seems like this might be the earliest such ban in the world. Does your Alaskan community ban their use? Do you know of an earlier one in Alaska or elsewhere? Please share in the comments.

Alaskan historical census data

Question: How many WWI veterans lived in Anchorage in 1970?

Answer: 82, according to "Table 102, Social Characteristics for Places of 10,000 - 50,000: 1970" found on page 3-135 of the US Census "General Social and Economic Characteristics: Alaska" from the 1970 Census.

The Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development/Research and Analysis Division has scanned and posted PDFs of Alaska related census reports from 1880, 1910 and 1940 through 1990 at Alaska Census 1880-2010. For 1980, these reports include:

Number of Inhabitants
General Population Characteristics
Detailed Population Characteristics
General Social and Economic Characteristics

Alaska Census Data from 2000 and beyond can be located at Labor's Alaska Census Data and Information page.

Local Sales Taxes

Question: How many communities in Alaska do NOT have a sales tax?

Answer: Currently, 253. You can verify this for yourself by visiting the Alaska Community Database. Under Public Query System, go to Advanced Search Options, select all the communities in the left hand box and add them to the right hand box, then click Next. On the next screen, choose "sales tax" from the left hand box and add it to the right hand box, then click Next. Then run the report. Save the file and open it up in your favorite spreadsheet. When we checked, 253 was the number of communities that report "None".

Health Insurance Data

Question: Where can I find data on the cost for private sector employees to purchase health/medical insurance in Alaska?

Answer: The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services compiles data on private sector health insurance costs at the State level. You can access the data at Medical Expenditure Panel Survey. Here, you can find total premium costs by state per private sector employee, the average employee contribution, and many other data elements. Try clicking "Summary Data Tables" in the left navigation bar under "Data and Statistics," then scroll to the bottom of the page and choose "State and Metro Area Tables." You can limit the tables you’d like to retrieve by year, table “series,” table “subseries,” and keywords. Choosing the subseries "Premiums/Contributions/Enrollments" will retrieve tables identifying premium costs.

Earthquakes in Alaska

Question: I live in Alaska, and am worried about the ground exploding and things falling on my head. Where can I find information about fault lines and earthquakes in Alaska?

Answer: Not to worry! We have you covered.

The Alaska Earthquake Information Center has plenty of information about our earthquakes, including a list of notable earthquakes and a preparedness guide.

Inside the section titled “Earthquake Info” are maps showing the location Alaska’s fault lines, shown as red lines. http://www.aeic.alaska.edu/html_docs/maps.html
Fault lines are also shown in their FAQ page http://www.aeic.alaska.edu/html_docs/faq.html

If you’d like to see where the most recent earthquakes happened, they have an often updated map showing activity for the past few days. http://www.aeic.alaska.edu/recent/sub/index.html

For additional information about earthquakes, visit the U.S. Geological Survey’s earthquake page: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/

How Wealthy We Are

Update: URLs checked and updated. 8/1/11

Question: Where does Alaska rank nationally in terms of wealth?

Answer: Wealth can have a number of meanings. Two common measures used by the federal government for wealth are “Gross Domestic Product by State” and “Personal Income per Capita” by state.

According to the Statistical Abstract of the United States 2009, Alaska ranks 45th in Gross Domestic Product by state in current (2007) dollars. See table at http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2009/ranks/rank28.html.

In terms of Personal Income Per Capita, Alaska ranked 15th in 2007, the latest year available. Please see the table Personal Income Per Capita in Current and Constant (2000) Dollars by State at http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2009/tables/09s0659.pdf.

More wealth tables from the Statistical Abstract can be found at http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/income_expenditures_poverty_wealth.html.

Terrorism Statistics By Country

Question: I've heard that the US government publishes annual statistics on terrorism by country. Where can I find these statistics?

Answer: The State Department publishes an annual report called Country Reports on Terrorism which is available at http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/index.htm. As of this writing, the latest version is 2013. The country reports consist of a narrative about the environment for terrorist groups in each country. There are worldwide and Iraq/Afghanistan statistics contained in each year's Annex of Statistical Information. The Annex for 2013 can be found at http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/2013/index.htm.

Another source of terrorism statistics is the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) at http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/. The GTD is a project of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism and is located at the University of Maryland. According to the GTD website, this database is: "an open-source database including information on terrorist events around the world from 1970 through 2007 (with annual updates planned for the future). Unlike many other event databases, the GTD includes systematic data on domestic as well as transnational and international terrorist incidents that have occurred during this time period and now includes more than 80,000 cases. For each GTD incident, information is available on the date and location of the incident, the weapons used and nature of the target, the number of casualties, and—when identifiable—the group or individual responsible."

Updated 4/10/15

Alaska Pipeline Oil Spill Data

Question: Where can I find oil spill data for Alaska online?

Answer: The best place online for this information is the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, Division of Spill Response at http://dec.alaska.gov/spar/index.htm. This agency is required by federal law to log spills and responses. The following are several links to their data:

1. Spills Database Online Query at http://dec.alaska.gov/Applications/SPAR/PublicMVC/PERP/SpillSearch.
Complete information back to 1995. Prior to that the data may be incomplete and/or inaccurate. Direct contact information for the agency is listed on the page in case you need older data. If you choose to search the database, the “Spill Specific Search” will allow you to limit by location, type of incident, type of substance and more. In addition, you can use two other buttons search by facility or affiliate (company) if you have the information.

2. Oil and Hazardous Substance Spill Data Summaries at http://dec.alaska.gov/spar/perp/data.htm.
These reports are general, but the larger reports will indicate major pipeline spills. You can then take that information and go back to the online database’s “Spill Specific Search” for details.
3. Response Updates back to FY04 (July 2003 – June 2004) http://dec.alaska.gov/spar/perp/response/sr_active.htm.
This is a browse portal without searching capabilities. You can find basic information on the active responses and read detailed situation reports.

Alaskans With Library Cards

Question: How many Alaskans have library cards?

Answer: According to information compiled by our Library Development section, 379,206 Alaska residents had library cards in 2007. This number is subject to a few cautions according to Patience Frederiksen, our public library statistician. She notes:

One odd thing about this data is that many of the libraries do not have an online catalog and some do not give out library cards at all, so I gave those libraries their entire population as library card holders.

Another odd thing is that many of the libraries give out temporary seasonal cards to tourism, cruise ship, and fish canning and processing employees, so sometimes they give out more cards than they have residents living in their local service area.

People interested in other statistics about Alaska's libraries should check out the Alaska Public Library Statistics page at http://library.alaska.gov/dev/plstats/plstats.html. The statistics web page is under revision and the FY2006 and FY2007 statistics should appear in January.

Repeat Criminals in Alaska

Question: Where I can find information on repeat offenders in Alaska?

Answer: Here are a couple of recent reports from the Alaska Judicial Council that cover repeat offenders in the State of Alaska:

Criminal Recidivism in Alaska (January 2007)
http://library.alaska.gov/asp/edocs/2007/03/ocm83977386.pdf

Recidivism in Alaska's Felony Therapeutic Courts (February 2007)
http://library.alaska.gov/asp/edocs/2007/03/ocm85815309.pdf

Questions to ask yourself that might lead to additional resources include:

1) Whom do you consider a repeat offender? Are you looking for a certain kind of offender?
2) Is there a particular type of crime that you are interested in?

How much was the PFD for the past 5 years?

Question: How much was the PFD for the past 5 years?

Answer: The Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation has a page listing the dividend amounts all the way back to 1982 at http://www.apfc.org/home/Content/dividend/dividend.cfm. Amounts for the last five years were:

2007 $1654.00
2006 $1106.96
2005 $845.76
2004 $919.84
2003 $1107.56
2002 $1540.76

The Permanent Fund Dividend (PFD) is a payment to Alaska residents from investment income generated by Alaska's Permanent Fund.