00                  SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. 11                                                                   
01 Designating August 18, 2011, as Walter J. Hickel Day of the Arctic.                                                     
02 BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA:                                                               
03       WHEREAS Walter J. Hickel worked in service to the state and the peoples of the                                  
04 Arctic in the interest of the public good; and                                                                          
05       WHEREAS he served as the Governor of Alaska twice, from 1966 - 1969 and 1990 -                                  
06 1994, and as United States Secretary of the Interior under President Nixon from 1969 - 1970;                            
07 and                                                                                                                     
08       WHEREAS, during the fight for Statehood, he played a major role in winning the                                  
09 battle for a resource base for the state that included 103,000,000 acres of land; and                                   
10       WHEREAS, as the state's second governor, he successfully pushed to open Prudhoe                                 
11 Bay to oil development; and                                                                                             
12       WHEREAS, as United States Secretary of the Interior, Hickel oversaw the permitting                              
13 process for the Trans Alaska Pipeline and helped gain the votes in the United States Congress                           
14 to authorize its construction, played a key role in the settlement of Alaska Native land claims,                        
15 advocated nationally for the 200-mile limit to protect Alaska's fisheries, and placed all eight                         
16 species of great whales on the endangered species list; and                                                             

01       WHEREAS, in his second term as governor, he was the architect of a $1,000,000,000                               
02 universal legal settlement of the damages caused by the Exxon Valdez disaster, assisted in                              
03 establishing the Alaska SeaLife Center in Seward, pushed for community development                                      
04 quotas, and took the problem of wasteful bycatch fishing practices to the United Nations                                
05 Conference on Environment and Development, also known as the Earth Summit, in 1992 in                                   
06 Rio de Janiero, where he was the only United States governor asked to speak; and                                        
07       WHEREAS, in his later years, Hickel co-founded Commonwealth North with                                        
08 Governor William A. Egan, co-founded the Northern Forum, and founded the Institute of the                               
09 North, and those organizations continue to promote Alaska public policy issues, highlight the                           
10 state's role as an Arctic state, and connect the state to others on the national and international                      
11 stages; and                                                                                                             
12       WHEREAS, in 1973, Readers Digest published his article, "The Day of the Arctic has                              
13 Come," and he spent the rest of his life advocating for "the reality, the richness, and the                             
14 responsibility of the North"; and                                                                                       
15       WHEREAS, in 1988, he participated in the first Friendship Flight between Alaska                                 
16 and the Russian Far East; and                                                                                           
17       WHEREAS he was the first non-Russian appointed to the board of the Non-                                         
18 commercial Partnership of the Coordination of the Northern Sea Route Usages, and he was                                 
19 the first non-Russian to speak to Vladimir Putin's People's Chamber, which was established to                           
20 address some of Russia's most challenging problems; and                                                                 
21       WHEREAS, throughout his life, he advocated for local control and local                                          
22 responsibility for the land and natural resources of the state; and                                                     
23       WHEREAS his concept of Alaska as an Owner State has shaped the thinking of, and                                 
24 inspired, peoples around the world who live on rich and environmentally sensitive land; and                             
25       WHEREAS he died May 7, 2010, at 90 years of age and, at his request, was buried                                 
26 standing up so he could, if necessary, "come out fighting" for Alaska, as he had always done;                           
27 and                                                                                                                     
28       WHEREAS August 18 is the day of his birth;                                                                      
29       BE IT RESOLVED that the Alaska State Legislature recognizes and honors Walter J.                                
30 Hickel by designating August 18, 2011, as Walter J. Hickel Day of the Arctic, to recognize                              
31 his service to his country, to Alaska, to the peoples of the North, and to the world.