00Enrolled HJR 4                                                                                                          
01 Requesting the Federal Subsistence Board to rescind its decisions regarding the subsistence                             
02 fishery priority given to Ninilchik, Happy Valley, Hope, and Cooper Landing residents.                                  
03                                        _______________                                                                  
04 BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA:                                                             
05      WHEREAS the communities of Ninilchik and Happy Valley have not exhibited a                                     
06 long-term and traditional fishing history in the Upper Kenai or Kasilof drainage waters on                              
07 federal land; and                                                                                                       
08      WHEREAS, in making the customary and traditional use determination for the                                     
09 communities of Hope and Cooper Landing, the Federal Subsistence Board failed to follow its                              
10 own regulatory criteria for making that decision; and                                                                   
11      WHEREAS a survey by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game did not support                                       
12 these communities' receiving a subsistence priority; and                                                                
13      WHEREAS the residents of these communities fall short of meeting the eight factors                             
14 the Federal Subsistence Board considers when determining if an area has a subsistence                                   
15 priority; and                                                                                                           

01      WHEREAS the United States Congress determined that, unlike purposes of other                                   
02 federal refuges established or expanded by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation                              
03 Act, the rural subsistence priority was not an appropriate purpose of the Kenai National                                
04 Wildlife Refuge, and, therefore, purposefully omitted "continued subsistence uses by local                              
05 rural residents" from the list of purposes of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge; and                                   
06      WHEREAS, unlike its determination of purposes for other federal refuges, the United                            
07 States Congress chose to make fish- and wildlife-oriented recreational opportunities a purpose                          
08 of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge;                                                                                  
09      BE IT RESOLVED by the Alaska State Legislature that the Federal Subsistence                                      
10 Board is requested to rescind its decisions granting Ninilchik, Happy Valley, Hope, and                                 
11 Cooper Landing residents a subsistence fishery priority.                                                                
12      COPIES of this resolution shall be sent by electronic transmission and by mail to the                            
13 Honorable Dirk Kempthorne, United States Secretary of the Interior; the Honorable Mike                                  
14 Johanns, United States Secretary of Agriculture; the members of the Federal Subsistence                                 
15 Board; the Office of Subsistence Management, United States Department of the Interior; and                              
16 the Honorable Ted Stevens and the Honorable Lisa Murkowski, U.S. Senators, and the                                      
17 Honorable Don Young, U.S. Representative, members of the Alaska delegation in Congress.