Barrow

[stiffnecked]

I gotta come visit again. It sounds like things have changed a lot. I think the last time I was there was in 1997. How about Cape Smythe Whaling and Trading Company and Matties Cafe, are they still there?

It's hard to imagine all that housing. People used to be on a year long waiting list to get into the 1st-29 and 2nd-29. And they weren't anything special. Utilities weren't too bad then. Our natural gas bill in the winter ran about $40 and electricity was about $50. The killer was the water bill. 18 cents a gallon. I think our bill the first month was around $300. Nobody told us they charged by the gallon. We hung a sign over the toliet that said,

"If it's yellow let it mellow, if it's brown flush it down".

We got real creative about saving water.

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by stiffnecked

I gotta come visit again. It sounds like things have changed a lot. I think the last time I was there was in 1997. How about Cape Smythe Whaling and Trading Company and Matties Cafe, are they still there?

The store they had no longer exists. The buildings are all still there, but they are being used for other businesses. The property has been inherited by younger people in the family. The Cafe is now "Brower's Cafe", and the business has changed owners almost every 18 months for several years. For the past several iterations it has been run by Koreans (Pepe's is the only restaurant not owned by Koreans now). Whatever, I had dinner tonight at Brower's Cafe and have a really pleasant relationship with the mother and daughter who are running it. They are both significantly younger than I and my friends are, and we've spent a lot of time trying to help them understand the community so they can have an easier time with the business.

Originally Posted by stiffnecked

It's hard to imagine all that housing. People used to be on a year long waiting list to get into the 1st-29 and 2nd-29. And they weren't anything special.

Man, finding a place to live here back then was a real adventure. It was all word of mouth, and somebody's friend always got it before anyone else ever so much as heard that it was available! Today, there are always 3-4 places being advertized on the cable TV's advertizing channel.

Maybe 6-7 years ago they totally remodeled the 2nd-29, and it is now an office building for the borough! The 1st-29 is low income housing, and may actually still have a waiting list, though it certainly wouldn't be long. (For others, those are two large buildings that once were both appartment complexes, with 29 apartments per building.)

The change is indeed dramatic, and it came about almost over night and took many by surprise. I moved here in 1997, and it was just like you saw. By the end of 1999 you couldn't sell a house in Barrow, mostly because it was worth 3/4 of whatever it had cost to build, and the remaining loan was higher than the value. The bank had a terrible time because half the people who left ended up dumping a mortgage on the bank.

Originally Posted by stiffnecked

Utilities weren't too bad then. Our natural gas bill in the winter ran about $40 and electricity was about $50. The killer was the water bill. 18 cents a gallon. I think our bill the first month was around $300. Nobody told us they charged by the gallon.

That is all still about the same. Water is a little different now. First, almost everyone is on the utilidor system now. Also they no longer have to desalinate the water, and now use only a filtration system. We do have excellent water, which (as you well know) comes from the Middle Lagoon that was damned off from the ocean quite some years ago and has finally leeched all the salt out.

Barrow Utilities and Electric Cooperative Inc (BUECI) decided to go to a flat rate for residential users. So we get 3000 gallons a month for $55, which is less than 2 cents a gallon. (My rent includes utilities, so I may be off a bit as I haven't directly paid any of these for 3-4 years now.) The last I knew the per gallon rate was down to 10 cents a gallon, but it might be different now.

As to the $300 a month water bill... I know of two horror stories on that. In one building (hah, the Bingo Parlor) owned by the City of Barrow the facility in the men's restroom was faulty and wouldn't shut the water off. The maintenance people didn't catch the significance soon enough, and it went from Friday night until sometime the next week with the water running continuously. I heard (from the then mayor, so it's probably true) that BUECI hit them with a $1500 bill for water. But the worst one I know of is a guy who's house sprang a leak while he was on vacation. $8000! He is pays them extra every month...

[Trapper_john]

Is it possible to get a place and then a crappy job in that order. Are there rooms that are cheap? Say 400 a month or so. What about Narl? Is that for non-scientists and students?