00                            HOUSE BILL NO. 198                                                                          
01 "An Act relating to access to fishing waterways."                                                                       
02 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA:                                                                
03    * Section 1. AS 38.50 is amended by adding a new section to read:                                                
04            Sec. 38.50.015. Access along fishing waterways. (a) The commissioner and                                   
05       the commissioner of fish and game jointly shall prepare and maintain a list that                                  
06       identifies land to or along fishing waterways where public access is or may in the                                
07       future be impeded by private land ownership. The list must include at least two and                               
08       not more than five meander miles along fishing waterways, and may identify land to                                
09       be used for public access for fishing, hunting, or other recreational purposes. The list                          
10       shall be prepared before December 1 of each year, except that the commissioner and                                
11       the commissioner of fish and game are not required to prepare a new list if the existing                          
12       list contains at least two meander miles of private land along fishing waterways.                                 
13            (b)  Before February 1 of each odd-numbered year, the commissioner, with the                                 
14       concurrence of the commissioner of fish and game, shall submit to the legislature a                               
15       plan to acquire by easement, fee, or other interest, public access to or along fishing                            

01       waterways through trade with or purchase from a willing landowner or landowners.                                  
02            (c)  An agreement for an easement that provides public access to a fishing                                   
03       waterway under this section may allow the owner of the land granting the easement to                              
04       develop the land subject to the rights granted by the easement.                                                   
05            (d)  The commissioner may close or restrict public access acquired under this                                
06       section if necessary to protect habitat along a fishing waterway.                                                 
07            (e)  The commissioner and the commissioner of fish and game shall consider                                   
08       land providing public access along Montana Creek upstream of the Parks Highway,                                   
09       and along Anchor River and Deep Creek on the Kenai Peninsula for inclusion in the                                 
10       plan under (b) of this section.                                                                                   
11            (f)  The commissioner may not obtain a property interest in land under this                                  
12       section unless the commissioner has made not less than an equivalent acreage of state                             
13       land available for disposal for private use under AS 38.05.050 in the same calendar                               
14       year.                                                                                                             
15            (g)  In this section,                                                                                        
16                 (1)  "fishing waterway" means a waterway that contains wild sport fish                                  
17       or fish of a species, physical size, and abundance that may support a sport,                                      
18       commercial, personal use, or subsistence fishery;                                                                 
19                 (2)  "meander mile" means a distance of one mile measured following                                     
20       the course of a waterway.