WASHINGTON,
D.C. – U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, today released the following
comments in favor of legislation that would allow Southeast Alaska’s Sealaska
Native Regional Corp. to complete the land selection promised to its
shareholders nearly 40 years ago under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act
(ANCSA):
“This
legislation is important not only to keep the legal promise the federal
government made in ANCSA, but also to ensure the survival of the remaining
timber operations in Southeast Alaska,” Murkowski said. “Without access to
private timber, the remaining mills will disappear and an important part of the
region’s economy will be forever lost.”
The
Sealaska bill (S.730) was one of six lands bills the Senate Energy and Natural
Resources Committee heard testimony on Wednesday.
The
Sealaska bill would complete the aboriginal land selections by Southeast Alaska
Natives, while also protecting the rights of other Alaskans who depend on
Southeast lands for their livelihoods.
Under
the bill, Sealaska would select from among 80,000 acres on Prince of Wales and
Koscuisko islands to complete its land entitlement. While a large portion of
Sealaska’s land selections will be designated for timber harvesting, some 4,000
acres will be set aside for tourism and other non-timber economic development.
Another 3,600 acres of Sealaska’s selection will be preserved as sacred,
cultural, historic and educational sites.
“I know
some will argue that Sealaska should accept the lands they effectively were
forced to originally take. The problem is if they did, they likely would be
barred from utilizing many of those lands on environmental grounds,” Murkowski
said. “Notably, they likely wouldn’t be allowed to develop lands along the
Situk River – the nation’s foremost steelhead fishery – and in the municipal
watershed at Craig, the two most valuable pieces of land inside their selection
areas. This bill simply seeks to pick other places for Sealaska to take their
remaining lands than what was required under the 1971 act.”
The
intent of the bill is to steer Sealaska into timber harvests in areas with
roads and existing timber infrastructure, and into areas containing second-growth
timber so they can reduce their reliance on old-growth. That is clearly
everyone’s current concept for a restructured timber industry in Southeast.
The
bill, originally introduced in 2007 and again in 2009, has undergone major
revisions over the past year to reflect hundreds of public comments.
“We took
great care to fulfill the promises made to Sealaska shareholders, while at the
same time protecting the concerns of all Southeast residents who utilize the
Tongass for everything from subsistence to fisheries to recreation,” Murkowski
said.
Background
Congress
approved ANCSA nearly four decades ago to settle the aboriginal land claims of
Alaska Natives. Under a complicated land conveyance formula, Sealaska was
entitled to roughly 375,000 acres of the 16.9-million acre Tongass National
Forest to help improve the livelihoods of their 20,000 shareholders. That
promise has never been fulfilled.
In
contrast to every other Alaska Native corporation, Sealaska’s original
selection areas were limited because much of Southeast Alaska was under
contract to the pulp mills and unavailable when ANCSA passed. While there are
327,000 acres in those original areas still available for selection, 44 percent
of that are water and much of the rest is in village watersheds.
Of the
112,000 acres of old-growth timber still available within those areas, 61,000
of those acres are in old-growth reserve areas – areas considered unacceptable
for development on environmental grounds – and much of the land is located in
the 277,000 acres currently designated as “roadless” areas by the U.S. Forest
Service.
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