00HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 56                                                                                           
01 Relating to an exemption for federal lands in Alaska from the federal PACFISH                                           
02 management strategy.                                                                                                    
03 BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA:                                                               
04  WHEREAS Tongass National Forest timber resources accounted for about 2,500 of                                          
05 the annual average 3,600 private sector jobs directly generated by the forest products industry                         
06 in Southeast Alaska in 1992, the last year for which accurate figures are available; and                                
07  WHEREAS the forest products industry in Southeast Alaska accounted for 24 percent                                      
08 of basic industry employment (including government), and 34 percent of all private basic                                
09 industry employment, in 1992; and                                                                                       
10  WHEREAS workers in the forest products industry in Southeast Alaska, including                                         
11 loggers, road builders, stevedores, sawmill workers and pulp mill workers earned                                        
12 approximately $146,000,000 in wages and salaries during 1992; and                                                       
13  WHEREAS forest products industry employment in Southeast Alaska has declined                                           
14 sharply since 1990, marked by the loss of $18,000,000 in payroll and more than 600 jobs, due                            

01 to reduced timber harvests on the Tongass National Forest and the near-completion of the first                          
02 harvest on private land; and                                                                                            
03  WHEREAS a decline in the availability of timber to harvest in the Tongass National                                     
04 Forest will continue to cause the loss of jobs in the timber industry in Southeast Alaska and                           
05 will significantly impair the economic well-being of the area as many communities are totally                           
06 or otherwise very dependent on the timber industry as the sole or one of the largest employers                          
07 in the community; and                                                                                                   
08  WHEREAS the United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, and the                                           
09 United States Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management (BLM) have cooperatively                                
10 developed a comprehensive strategy referred to as PACFISH for managing Pacific anadromous                               
11 fish watersheds and habitats on land administered by the United States Forest Service or the                            
12 BLM in several western states that limits the development, including timber harvesting, of                              
13 those lands so as to preserve, replenish, or restore pacific anadromous fish stocks; and                                
14  WHEREAS the United States Congress has effectively exempted the Tongass National                                       
15 Forest from the PACFISH strategy by prohibiting the United States Department of Agriculture,                            
16 Forest Service, from expending funds to implement the strategy in Alaska until October 1994;                            
17 and                                                                                                                     
18  WHEREAS implementation of PACFISH requirements in the Tongass National Forest                                          
19 would effectively cripple the forest products industry in Southeast Alaska, causing large-scale                         
20 unemployment and severe economic distress, in direct conflict with the federal government's                             
21 policy for the past four decades of preserving jobs and maintaining community stability in the                          
22 region; and                                                                                                             
23  WHEREAS anadromous fish habitat in the Tongass National Forest is already                                              
24 effectively protected by a network of overlapping federal and state laws and regulations,                               
25 including the Tongass Land Management Plan, the Tongass Timber Reform Act adopted by                                    
26 the United States Congress in 1990 (with provisions mandating minimum 100-foot buffers on                               
27 all anadromous streams in the Tongass), the Alaska State Coastal Zone Management Program,                               
28 and the Alaska State Forest Practices Act; and                                                                          
29  WHEREAS Southeast Alaska benefits from healthy anadromous fish stocks,                                                 
30 historically high commercial salmon catches, and anadromous fish habitat in excellent                                   
31 condition at most streamsides; and                                                                                      

01  WHEREAS the State of Alaska maintains that the environmental goals of PACFISH,                                         
02 are already being achieved in Alaska by existing state and federal laws and regulations,                                
03 including specific provisions for effective management of riparian areas and establishment of                           
04 minimum and appropriate stream buffers on all lands;                                                                    
05  BE IT RESOLVED that the Alaska State Legislature respectfully requests the United                                      
06 States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, and the United States Department of the                               
07 Interior, Bureau of Land Management to recognize the inappropriateness of applying the                                  
08 PACFISH strategy to Alaska, and permanently exclude lands in Alaska managed by the Forest                               
09 Service or the Bureau of Land Management from the PACFISH requirements.                                                 
10  COPIES of this resolution shall be sent to the Honorable Michael Espy, Secretary of                                    
11 Agriculture; the Honorable Bruce Babbitt, Secretary of the Interior; to the Honorable Ted                               
12 Stevens and the Honorable Frank Murkowski, U.S. Senators, and the Honorable Don Young,                                  
13 U.S. Representative, members of the Alaska delegation in Congress; Mr. Jack Ward Thomas,                                
14 Chief of the U.S. Forest Service; and to Mr. James Baca, National Director of the Bureau of                             
15 Land Management.