![]() By Dave Atcheson I would first like to thank Sen. Peter Micciche for scheduling hearings in Soldotna and Homer, Dec. 9 and 10, on the controversial House Bill 77, especially after the Department of Natural Resources canceled its own hearings, in what many see as a deliberate attempt to keep the public in the dark and at bay. This bill, a bill that the governor is pushing and that is currently lingering in the Alaska Legislature, is expected to be taken up during the next legislative session. It is a bill that a large number of people have proclaimed to be an outright assault on our fisheries. Many even characterize it as an assault on our very rights as citizens. While that language may sound strong, when one delves into this long and unwieldy piece of legislation, it is a characterization that is difficult to dispute. Probably the most alarming aspect of House Bill 77 is the massive concentration of power it bestows upon just one person. The commissioner of the Department of Natural Resources, if this contentious piece of legislation passes, would have unprecedented powers to issue general permits for just about any activity on state land. Under current law, Alaskans are given notice and have an opportunity to comment on impacts to water, fish and human health. This bill would make preliminary notice and a comment period no longer mandatory in many cases, basically silencing the citizenry and taking away our say on many issues, issues that could easily have an affect on our daily lives. Another very concerning aspect of this bill is that it attempts to significantly curtail citizens’ ability to apply for water reservations. Until now any citizen or group could apply for water reservations, which simply means maintaining enough water in a particular stream or river to protect traditional use of our natural resources. In many cases these are fisheries that have been used over long periods of time by sport and subsistence fishers. The proponents of this bill say it streamlines permitting. However, if it passes Alaskan citizens could only apply for water reservations through a public entity, such as a borough or municipality. What this does is create an additional layer of bureaucracy for ordinary Alaska citizens, while large outside corporations need only ask the commissioner of DNR for the rights to use our water and land, and in many cases without notice to us or without allowing us to comment. Much of Alaska’s reputation has been built upon our world-class fisheries and the sustainability of our natural resources. Our commercial and sport fisheries employ 63,000 Alaskans and last year generated more than $2 billion in income. Our U.S. senators and governor regularly travel out of state and even overseas touting the health of our fisheries and our supposedly rigorous permitting process that maintains them, but with this bill we are on the verge of heading down the same road to ruin so many other states have traveled, where our fisheries and our voices take a back seat to lobbyists, large corporations, and special interests. Most Alaskans would agree that clear and concise permitting is a good thing, but this bill would leave Alaskans out in the cold, without a voice, and unable to weigh in when it came to protecting our own property and access to our resources. It is government overreach at its worst, putting state and Outside interests ahead of local communities. Gov. Parnell says his House Bill 77 will streamline permitting, but what this fish-killing bill does in actuality is streamline every Alaskan out of the process, and it needs to be stopped. All Alaskans should contact their state senators and urge them to do everything in their power to halt this piece of misguided legislation before our fisheries and our reputation suffers the same ill fate that so many around the world have suffered. The time to act is now to protect our fisheries and our rights. Dave Atcheson is a freelance writer and author of the guidebook “Fishing Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula.” He works with Trout Unlimited Alaska, protecting our state’s coldwater fisheries ![]() Trout Unlimited (TU) Alaska Program is at Fish Expo this week in Seattle, reaching out to fishermen and others about TU’s Tongass 77 and Transboundary campaigns. Formally known as Pacific Marine Expo, the three-day conference that ends tomorrow is the largest commercial marine trade show on the West Coast. It’s great place to spread the word about the threats facing Southeast Alaska wild salmon and the opportunities to conserve, protect and restore the top salmon-producing watersheds in the Tongass National Forest. TU’s Heather Hardcastle and Melanie Brown (middle and right in photo) are collecting signatures and sharing information at Fish Expo with fishermen, boat builders, gear and equipment suppliers, fabricators, seafood processors and others whose livelihoods revolve around the ocean and the marine industries. Helping Heather and Melanie to staff the TU booth is photojournalist Amy Gulick, author of “Salmon in the Trees,” a book that tells the story of the remarkable connection among salmon, people, trees and wildlife of the Tongass rain forest. Thanks, Amy! ![]() Trout Unlimited’s Heather Hardcastle and her husband, Kirk, took the story of Tongass wild salmon to the campus of Stanford University in California this fall. The Hardcastles, who are co-owners of the Juneau-based sustainable seafood company, Taku River Reds, were guest speakers at Stanford’s Sustainable Seafood Week. The weeklong series of events at Stanford includes Alaska wild salmon in the dining halls, film screenings, panel discussions, and cooking classes focusing on sustainable seafood. “It was a great opportunity for us to spread the word far and wide about how amazing the Tongass National Forest is in terms of salmon production and to get the students and the faculty at Stanford really excited about the fish and about what they can do to help sustain the forest habitat that makes it all possible,” said Heather. The Hardcastles’ company sells about 25,000 pounds of wild-caught salmon to Stanford each year. The university serves the fish in each of its 11 dining halls throughtout the year. During Sustainable Seafood Week, the Hardcastles offered cooking demonstrations and talks about efforts to conserve wild salmon habitat in Southeast Alaska’s Tongass rain forest. “Everyone was really receptive to hearing about the Tongass 77 campaign and wanted to know how they could get involved. It was super-encouraging for us,” said Kirk. Dara Olmsted Silverstein, Stanford’s Sustainable Food Program Manager, invited the Hardcastles to meet with students and give presentations throughout the week. She hopes to do more with them in the coming year. “The students were very engaged in learning about the Tongass. Their response was really overwhelmingly positive. Stanford is really proud to sources its wild salmon from Taku River Reds, a company that’s all about sustainably harvesting fish and protecting the watersheds that the salmon depend upon,” said Dara. Here are some other images from the week: ![]() One of Trout Unlimited’s partners in the Tongass National Forest, Sitka Conservation Society, has been doing some innovative outreach to school children around salmon education. It’s a program called “Fish to Schools.” The goals are to connect students to local foods like salmon, to learn traditions, and to understand the impact of food choices on the body, economy, and environment. During a recent visit with some third-graders in Sitka, Tracy Gagnon zeroed in on the importance of salmon-related jobs in Sitka and elsewhere in Southeast Alaska. Gagnon is SCS’s community sustainability organizer. Read Tracy’s blog post about the creative methods she used to teach children about how salmon underpin life in Southeast Alaska, including many jobs and sources of income. ![]() It’s hard not to be frustrated with the Forest Service. If this bloated federal bureaucracy isn’t wasting taxpayer dollars on money-losing timber sales in Southeast Alaska, its officials are whining about how costly public-use cabins are to maintain in the Tongass National Forest. Or, as the case may be, planning to shut them down. Last week the federal agency issued a press release from its Ketchikan office saying because some of the 152 public cabins on the Tongass sit in remote locations and don’t experience heavy use, they “have been allowed to deteriorate.” And the Forest Service’s plan is to close a yet-to-be-determined number. The cabin program lost $600,000 last year so in the interest of being “strategic,” the best way to reverse the budget shortfall, the Forest Service argues, is to shutter cabins. The agency blames the situation, in part, on reduced federal funding for recreation in the Tongass, saying it’s dropped by 50 percent over the last decade or so. Let’s get this straight. The Tongass is one of Alaska’s most stunningly beautiful places. It’s a world-class destination for tourists, hunters, anglers and others, a place that supports a $1 billion annual visitor industry. More than one million tourists descend upon the Southeast Alaska rain forest every year. They drop more than $2 billion annually on airfares, souvenirs, T-shirts, and local excursions like fly fishing, kayaking and flight seeing. But somehow the Forest Service can’t figure out a way to entice more of these people to use public facilities in the Tongass? They can’t somehow sell the story of these rustic, scenic cabins located in some of the country’s most gorgeous natural settings? This is either a case of really bad marketing or an agency that knows nothing about dollars and sense. Case in point: while the Forest Service is planning to shutter public cabins popular with locals and visitors alike, it’s continuing to waste more than $20 million a year putting together timber sales that lose big piles of money and create huge public controversy. The Tongass timber industry accounts for less than one percent of jobs in Southeast Alaska and yet it gets the lion’s share of the Forest Service budget in Southeast. Salmon and trout fisheries account for more than 10 percent of regional jobs. Visitor services provide about 20 percent of overall Southeast Alaska employment. And yet somehow funding for these industries always takes a back seat to the Forest Service’s logging program. It makes zero economic sense. If you disagree with the Forest Service’s plan to close Tongass cabins, do something about it. The Forest Service contact is listed as Hans von Rekowski, staff officer for recreation, heritage, and wilderness in the Tongass. Tell him this misguided decision needs to be halted and more of the taxpayer funds dedicated to old-growth logging should be directed to recreation, fisheries and visitor services – the Tongass’ real money makers. His phone number is 907-747-4217 and his email is [email protected]. |
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