Peek at the Past

Here’s what made the news 19 years ago, from the Dec. 16, 1992, edition of the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman:

Wal-Mart deal confirmed

Wal-Mart is coming to town. Harold Newcomb, who owns a strip of land off the Parks Highway at Seward Meridian Parkway, confirms he has signed a deal with the company to use his land as a site for a Wal-Mart store. The majority of the land will be used for parking, Newcomb said, and the store will be at least 100,000 square feet. He said he did not think the store would sell groceries. “I think that Wal-Mart will be a real asset to the community here. They’ll employ a lot of people and they’ll have a good, quality product that the price is right.”

Dealing gets tough on DOT road funds

Department of Transportation and Public Facilities has handed the Mat-Su Borough an ultimatum: if you want $4.89 million in federal highway funds, you have to take over capital responsibilities of certain state roads. The Mat-Su Borough Assembly doesn’t like the condition. Under the proposal, DOT would require the Mat-Su to take over capital responsibilities — road construction and upgrades — for the Old Glenn Highway, the Fishhook system, the Palmer-Wasilla Highway, Trunk Road and Clark-Wolverine Road. Borough Manager Don Moore said it would be borough’s responsibility to dole out funds to borough cities and let them decide how to spend the cash.

Borough wants check on northern landfills

The Mat-Su Borough has begun advertising for a consultant to develop a risk assessment and install additional monitoring wells at two more landfills sites at Sunshine and Talkeetna. The two sites will have four additional monitoring wells drilled in the first aquifer at each site as part of the borough’s response to a growing landfill contamination problem. The Talkeetna landfill is 17 acres and the Sunshine landfill is 14 acres.

It cost what?

According to advertisements, in 1992 you could:

• Rent a two-bedroom apartment in Wasilla for $525 a month.

• Watch “A Few Good Men” at Mat-Su Cinema for $6.

• Fly roundtrip to Chicago for $229.