Legislature(2017 - 2018)Anch LIO Lg Conf Rm
09/10/2018 02:00 PM Senate RESOURCES
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| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| Overview: Coastal Resiliency Management | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
JOINT MEETING
SENATE RESOURCES STANDING COMMITTEE
HOUSE RESOURCES STANDING COMMITTEE
September 10, 2018
2:00 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
SENATE RESOURCES
Senator Cathy Giessel, Chair
Senator John Coghill, Vice Chair
Senator Bert Stedman
Senator Kevin Meyer
HOUSE RESOURCES
Representative Andy Josephson, Co-Chair
Representative Geran Tarr, Co-Chair
Representative John Lincoln, online
Representative Harriet Drummond
Representative Justin Parish, online
Representative Chris Birch
Representative George Rauscher, online
MEMBERS ABSENT
SENATE RESOURCES
Senator Natasha von Imhof
Senator Bill Wielechowski
Senator Click Bishop
HOUSE RESOURCES
Representative DeLena Johnson
Representative David Talerico
Representative Mike Chenault
Representative Chris Tuck
OTHER LEGISLATORS PRESENT
Former Representative Kurt Olson
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
OVERVIEW: COASTAL RESILIENCY MANAGEMENT
- HEARD
PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION
No previous action to record
WITNESS REGISTER
KEN PAPP, Deputy Director
Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys (DGGS)
Department of Natural Resources (DNR)
Anchorage, Alaska
POSITION STATEMENT: Provided an overview of coastal resiliency
management.
JACQUELYN OVERBECK, Manager
Coastal Hazards Program
Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys
Department of Natural Resources (DNR)
Anchorage, Alaska
POSITION STATEMENT: Provided an overview of DGGS' coastal
flooding and erosion program.
ACTION NARRATIVE
2:00:50 PM
CHAIR CATHY GIESSEL called the joint meeting of the Senate and
House Resources Standing Committees to order at 2:00 p.m. and
said this is a subject of particular interest to Representative
Tarr who chairs the House Resources Committee, so she would turn
the gavel over to her for this meeting.
CHAIR GIESSEL said Senators Coghill and Stedman were also
present at the call to order.
CO-CHAIR TARR announced that Representatives Birch, Drummond,
Co-Chair Josephson, and herself, Co-Chair Tarr were present and
online were Representatives Parish, Rauscher, and Lincoln.
Former Representative Kurt Olson was in the audience.
^Overview: Coastal Resiliency Management
Overview: Coastal Resiliency Management
2:02:26 PM
CO-CHAIR TARR said today the committees would listen to an
overview of the Coastal Resiliency Management Program from a
number of departments.
CHAIR GIESSEL welcomed Senator Meyer to the committee.
2:03:27 PM
KEN PAPP, Deputy Director, Division of Geological and
Geophysical Surveys (DGGS), Department of Natural Resources
(DNR), Anchorage, Alaska, said before getting started with the
coastal hazards portion of the presentation he would provide an
overview of some of the other hazards work they department
performs starting with volcanic hazards. In 2017, the [Ted
Stevens Anchorage] International Airport that is ranked as the
second busiest cargo airport in the U.S., and currently deals
mostly with flights to and from Asia and the airspace above it
is potentially threatened by over 54 active volcanoes, about
half of which are not monitored at this time. This is the main
reason why the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO) was formed back
in 1988.
Four DGGS staff are involved in the larger group effort between
the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the University of Alaska
Fairbanks Geophysical Institute. The four DGGS staff are
dedicated to geologic mapping and research on the active
volcanoes; they also perform helicopter and fuel procurement and
logistics tasks. They also work very hard to communicate
information about active volcanoes to the public and other
agencies. Some of the recent volcano geologic maps are displayed
on the slide.
2:05:42 PM
The procurement and logistics portion of what their group does
is support for the entire observatory; all of their field
programs are done from June through September. The AVO website
is the main vehicle through which information about active
volcanoes is provided to the public.
MR. PAPP said in FY18, the website received over 60 million-page
views, almost 10 million more than the previous year. One of the
recent AVO achievements is creation of the Alaska Tetra
database, tetra being basically busted up rocks that have flown
out of the volcano. This is important because it basically
allows scientists to understand the potential and capability of
some of the active volcanoes, basically the extent over which
ash might fall.
He said DGGS staff also study active faulting, earthquakes,
tsunamic inundation mapping; they also do landslide mapping and
response. They study snow and ice hazards such as avalanches and
glacial outburst floods and perform studies on permafrost and
groundwater and also take part in coastal erosion and flooding
research.
2:08:07 PM
Obviously, as geologists they care about the rocks, but it is
really difficult to see them underneath dense forest and thick
vegetation. So, one tool they typically use to better see the
geology is light detection and ranging (LiDAR), a remote sensor
that detects light and range that can be mounted an aircraft or
put on an ATV or someone's back. It sends pulses of laser light
through a target that gets returned to the sensor and recorded.
It has the capability of producing some extremely high-
resolution digital elevation models for events like the
landslides on Wishbone Hill and Girdwood.
Often times, they perform these LiDAR surveys when there is
"leaf-off" and no snow to better see the rocks underneath the
vegetation. Some other applications include permafrost, lava
flows, erosion studies, flooding, and faults.
2:09:03 PM
SENATOR STEDMAN editorialized that the landslide photos on slide
3 were taken in Sitka and that one slide was where a house once
stood and a building inspector getting away from the slide. He
said that area was mapped as a slide zone years ago and was
deleted out of the subdivision as not suitable for building. The
planning commission a few decades ago allowed several "green
belts" along that route. Time passed, and personnel changed and
some of those parcels, particularly this one - a known slide
zone - were subdivided and subsequently built on. This shouldn't
have happened.
He also stated that constituents around coastal Alaska are being
subject to escalating regulations, building restrictions and
fees to subsidize a $20-30 billion Federal Emergency Management
Agency (FEMA) deficit from Houston, Louisiana, Florida, and a
couple other places. Sitka has not reported floods from the
ocean and people have lived there for 10,000 years. Rebounding
has been going on that has changed some elevations, but the fees
just seem to be filling a deficit and spreading the customer
base to Alaska to do that. If this was a real flood issue, the
communities would have dealt with it a long time ago.
Furthermore, no cannery was ever built in Southeast that has
since gone under water, and according to these flood zone maps,
a lot of them would be under water along with the boat houses
that were built above high-high tide.
CO-CHAIR TARR recapped the topics Senator Stedman mentioned and
asked for comments.
MR. PAPP responded that the next slide on Alaska's coastline was
of recent progress in the geologic hazard areas. They had worked
very hard with the Department of Transportation and Public
Facilities (DOTPF) in the Yukon River Dalton Highway area to
better understand the surface geology, the permafrost, and the
local hydrology. This is in support of infrastructure planning,
both current and into the future. They hope to do additional
field work in 2019. In response to Senator Stedman, he said they
are analyzing new LiDAR data acquired in the Sitka area to
create a hazards map for landslides there.
2:16:28 PM
SENATOR STEDMAN commented that the impact of the coming study
will target areas that are less stable than others and that will
encourage insurance companies to ring fence up to a mile and a
half around the slide zones. That makes it very difficult to
insure a mortgage; it will devastate property values and put the
community in a precarious position: being shoved up against the
mountains on one side and ocean on the other. The flood zone map
is out your front door and the slide zone map out your back
door, and there won't be a whole lot of property left.
He asked Alaska Housing Financing Corporation (AHFC) to look at
this issue to see if they could underwrite individually some of
the mortgages and risk adjust if need be, they are going to shut
down the mortgage market for existing homes as well as new
construction.
2:19:32 PM
REPRESENTATIVE PARISH said one of his Juneau constituents was
subject to a flood zone designation but lived in a protected
harbor. The explanation that makes the most sense is that
Alaskan properties are being unfairly targeted to make up for a
shortfall in FEMA's budget.
MR. PAPP answered that in 2018 made two publications regarding
tsunamis inundation maps (slide 4): one is for Haines; others
have been published for Kodiak, Juneau, Skagway. They also
produced permanent flooding maps for Valdez, Chenega, Chignik,
and Chignik Lagoon. In FY15 they produced 32 new reports and
peer review publications on geologic hazards and that is double
from the previous year. So, they are working hard to get the
information out to those who need it.
Lastly, in collaboration with the Alaska Seismic Hazards Safety
Commission, Mr. Papp said, they have published on the DGGS
website a very important report that outlines all they know
about active faults and potential seismic hazards in Alaska.
2:22:15 PM
CO-CHAIR TARR asked how their work is affecting housing
insurance and what kind of coordination is taking place with
FEMA.
MR. PAPP replied that they coordinate efforts with FEMA and
other federal agencies so that efforts aren't duplicated. Also,
particularly for coastal hazards and erosion issues, a critical
part of what they do is work very closely with community leaders
to help them understand the information they produce.
CO-CHAIR TARR asked if they interact with insurance underwriters
and who advocates on behalf of the homeowners in those
geographic locations.
MR. PAPP replied that DGGS doesn't interact with insurance
underwriters. Community leaders would deal with those issues;
DGGS basically just provides scientific information that can be
used by anyone.
SENATOR STEDMAN said for FEMA you opt in, and the hook is if you
don't opt in, you're not going to have access to federally-
backed mortgages. That is why he has started having discussions
with AHFC. Sitka is a very good example of the not-so-subtle
kind of game they are playing. Premiums are high as a couple
thousand dollars a month and have a minimum escalation clause.
2:26:36 PM
REPRESENTATIVE PARISH asked what manner of formal action from
the legislature would be most helpful in resolving this.
MR. PAPP said he would get back to them on that.
2:28:04 PM
JACQUELYN OVERBECK, Manager, Coastal Hazards Program, Division
of Geological and Geophysical Surveys (DGGS), Department of
Natural Resources (DNR), Anchorage, Alaska, said their primary
focus is on coastal flooding and erosion. Alaska's coastline is
40,000 miles long; that is more than 1.5 times around the
equator. It makes up about 40 percent of the U.S. coastline
including the Great Lakes region and has 159 coastal
communities.
2:28:54 PM
The coastline has permafrost (ground with a temperature that
remains below 32 degrees, which is the freezing point of water,
for two or more consecutive years). Permafrost is vulnerable to
rising air and sea temperatures for ice-rich soils. Much of
Alaska's coastal infrastructure and the coastline are subject to
steep increasing temperatures. Alaska's northern and western
coastlines have sea ice forming along it in the winter months.
In recent years during the regular fall and winter storm seasons
the extent and thickness of it has been at record lows. Storms
that occur this time of year gain energy in the ocean and
transfer that energy to the coastal communities if the sea ice
isn't present, which results in flooding and erosion in low-
lying areas. November 2017 is the lowest extent of sea ice on
record. Even into February the Bering Straits had open ice and
storm waves were able to impact the community and small island
of Diomede.
2:30:44 PM
MS. OVERBECK said that Alaska has to account for relative sea
level changes because the entire coastline is, such as in
Southeast Alaska where land is actually rising up out of the
water, outpacing global sea level rise resulting in a cumulative
sea level decline. That's also the region of Alaska that has the
most monitoring equipment and the longest records in order to
determine what those rates are. In northern and western Alaska,
few studies are available showing relative sea level rise in
comparison to that.
CHAIR GIESSEL asked her to comment on a common question that as
the sea ice melts the sea level will rise.
MS. OVERBECK answered that relative sea levels are expected to
rise and are documented to have been rising, but there are many
contributing factors including melting of ice on land as well as
in the sea and other contributing factors that she would get
back to her on.
CHAIR GIESSEL observed that if sea ice melting raised the level
of the ocean, then glasses with ice water in them would over
flow as the ice melted, but that is not what happens. Water
while it is frozen will displace the same amount of water
consistently. She could see how land-based glacier ice melting
could contribute, to a minor degree, to the ocean level, but sea
ice melting does not raise the level of the ocean, as a physical
principle.
MS. OVERBECK said she will get back to her.
2:33:45 PM
CO-CHAIR JOSEPHSON said he wanted Ms. Overbeck to feel
comfortable in responding to Senator Giessel's question. He said
legislators look at myriad legislation and try to be experts in
every field, whereas Ms. Overbeck spends her time on this issue.
He asked if she agrees based on her reading and research with
the Senator's statement.
MS. OVERBECK said she was not prepared to answer the chair's
comment, at this time, from the perspective of her office that
considers any published research and takes on-the-ground
measurements. She wouldn't know the contributing factors to sea
level rise in a particular region off the top of her head, but
she would really like to get back to them on it.
CO-CHAIR JOSEPHSON responded that before the comment was made,
Ms. Overbeck said that, in fact, relative sea level rise (RSLR)
was attributable in part to mankind.
MS. OVERBECK responded that it was not her intention to
attribute sea level changes to anything at this time but wanted
to speak to the observations that are made on the ground.
2:35:35 PM
REPRESENTATIVE DRUMMOND said there looks to be significant sea
level fall in Kodiak, Cook Inlet, just north of Prince William
Sound near the Yakutat area (referring to slide 8).
MS. OVERBECK said that is correct.
REPRESENTATIVE DRUMMOND asked if she had some idea why that is
happening in those particular places.
MS. OVERBECK replied that is occurring in those regions because
of the relative motion of the land there, which is very
tectonically active, actually lifting up out of the water faster
than global sea levels change.
CO-CHAIR TARR commented that arrows are sized differently to
show the relative impacts.
2:36:59 PM
MS. OVERBECK agreed and summarized that the map shows measured
land-based GPS data and modeled water levels for the entire
region of Alaska. The positive arrows show the relative sea
level rise as compared to vertical land motion and the downward
arrows show the relative sea level decline. The magnitude of the
arrows is also associated with that.
2:37:25 PM
SENATOR STEDMAN said the University of Alaska did an analysis on
sea level movement in Southeast and attributed it to the melting
of the ice, especially around Mount Fairweather and the glaciers
where land is rebounding. The Forest Service has also done a lot
of work with the melting of the ice. Apparently, there used to
be land masses in front of Sitka, Prince of Wales, and other
areas. Some of that land has gone down, which is now in the
ocean, and some has gone up. Village sites are being found up to
300 feet that is being attributed to the melting of the ice.
CHAIR GIESSEL said that Norway has multiple evidence of village
sites that actually became more distant from the coast as the
ice cap melted and that the downward movement in Prince William
Sound and "Earthquake Park" in Anchorage were due to a sizable
seismic event. She was just trying to look at the sea level
issue from a standpoint of what they know about movement of land
having nothing to do with the political comments about climate
change.
CO-CHAIR TARR asked Ms. Overbeck if her office is collecting all
of the data for their modeling or is it coordinating with other
divisions.
MS. OVERBECK replied her office doesn't collect any data that is
shown in this map. It is all published information and she
offered to provide the references. She added that in 2009 lots
of government reports came out discussing Alaska's vulnerability
to coastal flooding and erosion. These were the only reports
that were available that actually pointed to specific
communities that might be at risk. This included government
reporting from the Government Accountability Office, the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers, and the state's immediate action
working group. This map doesn't tell them the relative
vulnerability to these hazards and their magnitude. Since those
reports are almost 10 years old, there could be some
discrepancies between what is known today from what this map
shows.
CO-CHAIR TARR asked her to differentiate the coastal types.
MS. OVERBECK answered there are three different types of coastal
settings: those exposed to wave activities (communities set on
the open ocean without any land mass fronting them), sheltered
coastlines (with land mass in front of an ocean community), and
river communities that are tidally influenced (near the
coastline that might experience local storm surge and high
tides).
2:42:30 PM
Slides 9 and 10 illustrate what some communities around the
state are dealing with and some of the infrastructure that is
impacted by coastal flooding and erosion. She visited Quinhagak
in June and took photos showing the erosion that is occurring in
front of the sewage lagoon. The community of Dillingham has a
sewage lagoon that is also near an eroding coastline. Coastal
storms have been documented to erode as much 10-20 feet during
an individual storm.
Many dump sites in western Alaska are also located near coastal
rivers and coastlines. The community of Kotlik dumps materials
that were actually floating in the river at a high tide during
their site visit. The community that operates this dump site is
able to get heavy equipment into it when the river is frozen.
However, if the river doesn't freeze, they can't do that. So,
they end up having issues with dump materials flooding into the
river.
MS. OVERBECK said the Nunapitchuk primary dump site is fenced
around the lake area, but it is hydrologically connected to a
lake on the right, which is also connected to the entire river
system and dump materials move back and forth between them.
2:45:00 PM
Other pictures from 2013 showed the Gambell dump site that had a
breach in the fence where dump materials had been released from
the dump during storm events. Slide 11 had some examples of
residential homes in Kwigillingok, a very low-lying community on
the Kuskokwim Delta, which experienced a storm in January last
year, showing flooded boardwalks that connect the community.
2:45:46 PM
The community of Golovin is set on a low-lying sand spit,
primarily where much of the residential facilities are as well
as some other infrastructure. They experience regular flooding,
as well. Ms. Overbeck showed a photo from 2011 during the last
major Bering Sea storm that occurred in western Alaska, which
impacted many communities along the coastline.
REPRESENTATIVE BIRCH said he had been in and out of Point Hope a
number of times and it has a well-earned reputation of being one
of the longest continuously-inhabited communities in North
America. He asked Ms. Overbeck if she has data on how long
communities have been established to get a sense of how
transitional some of these locations are.
MS. OVERBECK answered that the length of time for which a place
has been occupied is not part of their analysis. However, they
are collecting historical aerial imagery that goes back to the
1950s.
CO-CHAIR TARR asked if traditional cultural knowledge is used in
their analysis.
2:50:02 PM
MS. OVERBECK replied their program takes traditional knowledge
and stories into account and corroborates them with ground
surveys and other data. More examples of public and private
infrastructure being impacted in Utqiaqvik (formerly Barrow) and
Newton were pictured on slide 13.
MS. OVERBECK said she just visited Kotzebue Sound and the
Community of Deering (slide 14) that experienced storms last
year resulting erosion up to the power lines that connect the
western part of the community, which would be the airport
facilities, the tank farm, the sewage location, and health
clinic, as well as some residential facilities.
2:50:59 PM
A site visit to Kotzebue in July 2018 revealed a small storm
event that flooded part of a road. The local city planner said
those events are anticipated in fall and winter, but it happened
in July, which was abnormal.
The program visited Shishmaref in 2012 and 2017, and the photos
on slide 15 show the 100 feet of erosion on the beach relative
to the snow fence in those five years. Then, after their visit,
in November a storm event resulted in erosion of the road that
provides access to the local dump site.
Port Heiden on the Alaska Peninsula relocated in the 1980s due
to erosion; the road south is the only infrastructure that is
left. This area has no permafrost; it's all made of volcanic
materials, a very light pumice, and waves erode the pumice very
easily and quickly. The monitoring station there has been up for
about three years.
2:53:10 PM
MS. OVERBECK said she provided a lot of examples of the changes
happening around the state to give the committee a better of
idea of what is going on. Now she would talk more specifically
about what DGGS does in working with these hazards. A wide
variety of state and federal agencies do engineering work in the
coastal zone; they do community planning, disaster preparation
and mitigation. Those groups rely on DGGS data to fill in gaps
in their information.
2:55:46 PM
They collect orthoimagery, aerial imagery that is collected from
a fixed-wing aircraft, a drone, or satellite that is corrected
to the earth's surface so that measurements can be made from the
photograph. Using a LiDAR system, they collect topography, which
is elevation data, and bathymetric data, land elevations below
the water surface. This is primarily needed for any sort of
modeling of the near shore coastal zone for both flood and
erosion issues. Water level data is collected using a sensor
that is set out in a community setting that documents not only
the highs and lows of the tides but also the very highest water
level events and storm surges. Sea ice and wave data are also
collected since they are connected to storm surge. This data
helps them understand how storms are going to impact the coast
line. The Continually Operating Reference System (CORS) is a
system that is placed in the ground and collects data
continuously to measure the relative land motion. Their aerial
and ground surveys need the corrections from these stations in
order to accurately see what is happening.
CO-CHAIR TARR provided a time check and asked how using drones
improves the ability to get data.
MS. OVERBECK answered that using drones allows them to
continuously collect an entire area of elevation data. They are
also able to get an image of that area, as compared to going out
with one survey rod and collecting those data sets individually.
Local individuals are interested in using drones as part of
potential community-based monitoring programs that collect the
data for the department.
CO-CHAIR TARR commented that the legislature is interested in
maximizing the use of those technologies, because they know the
data is needed, but the cost of sending people out to these
remote locations is prohibitive and sometimes even prevents it.
MS. OVERBECK said DGGS collects data by using remote sensing
methods and either contracts it out or collects it themselves.
Any drone survey requires some level of ground control in order
to have an accurate product, but ground control can cover
multiple surveys. DGGS does equipment installations and puts
efforts into a community-based monitoring program (originally
funded by Alaska Sea Grants in collaboration with the Bristol
Bay Native Association) as well as working with individual
tribes in Bristol Bay. They train community members on how to
continue the monitoring and to catalogue the data for long-term
storage. She provides technical assistance as well as an
understanding of Alaska's coastal data to other agencies that
are investing in topo mapping Alaska.
MS. OVERBECK said DGGS houses all the elevation data that is
available in the state in one location regardless of who
collects it and provides it to the public in a format they can
use, primarily through their elevation data portal. She has set
up individual pages for communities to access data that they are
helping to collect or that is being collected around their
communities.
She said DGGS helps with both disaster preparation and
mitigation. In the three to five days before a storm actually
hits the coastline, the National Weather Service is looking for
forecasts for that region and then provides a forecast for the
communities. They are moving from a method of regional forecast
to more localized forecasts, which provides more detailed
information to individual communities. DGGS assists with that by
using their color index map, which is a conversion of the
elevation data collected in that area, infrastructure
information provided by the Division of Community and Regional
Affairs on their community profile map, and a conversion between
what the storm surge model is actually computing and the land
elevation. So, instead of saying there is going to be 4-6 feet
of storm surge for the Norton Sound area, a forecaster can say
specifically that flooding is expected on Front Street.
Seventeen communities in western Alaska have these maps, which
are created wherever they have baseline data in order to do it.
She offered to provide that information to interested parties.
She said that disaster declarations have been rejected by FEMA
because there was no proof that the event actually happened. So,
they want to be able to give those communities the capacity to
document those disastrous events by providing survey benchmarks
on elevation models that give an idea of what parts of a
community were affected.
MS. OVERBECK said her department just completed a community
planning effort to help update the State Hazard Mitigation Plan,
as many local Hazard Mitigation Plans look to the State Plan in
order to be written. Slide 21 mapped the communities from which
they had data that could actually be processed in conjunction
with data from the National Park Service on the North Slope and
the U.S. Geological Survey. All the data from western Alaska was
compiled into a map showing erosion rates around communities.
The community of Newtok, for instance, erodes 63 feet per year.
This data allows them to project shorelines into the future
based on their historical rates of erosion to give an idea of
what parts of the coastline are more vulnerable.
3:06:13 PM
CO-CHAIR TARR asked if DGGS is planning to create a community
profile for every coastal community they can, but right now
there are gaps. So, eventually that number of 17 communities
will go higher.
MS. OVERBECK answered that they want to create these maps for
about 63 more communities on the western coastline. Some are
more at-risk for flooding than others, so they have a priority
scale for mapping them. Different layers of data sets are
available for each of those communities, and if Co-chair Tarr
was interested in knowing why an individual community didn't
have one of those maps, she could point out which data sets they
are missing.
3:07:36 PM
CO-CHAIR TARR asked, once these maps are done, if the
responsibility for community planning gets transferred as a
local responsibility or is the state still involved.
MS. OVERBECK replied that some state partners like the Division
of Community and Regional Affairs work on community plans, but
DGGS does not do any of the local planning. They work with the
individuals who are doing the planning, though, in trying to
determine the best format for the data and how it can be most
easily ingested.
She said many engineering firms operate in western Alaska and
they are able to use DGGS data for any sort of engineering
analysis. One example is the Newtok Planning Group to which they
provided elevation data that was used for planning their new
community site. For any coastal modeling efforts, they have the
statewide model that models tide and surge and other baseline
data.
3:10:53 PM
MS. OVERBECK concluded that the Coastal Hazards Program is
dedicated to fostering partnerships among many stakeholder
groups, for example, the Alaska Water Level Watch by the Alaska
Ocean Observing System whose primary goal is to improve the
technology and capabilities for collecting water level data
throughout the entire state for more purposes than just flooding
and erosion, like navigation to get in and out of communities.
Also, the Alaska Geo-spacial Council has a coastal strategist
that is jointly funded by National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration's (NOAA) Office For Coastal Management, the
Alaska Ocean Observing System, and the Department of Natural
Resources (DNR) that are developing a strategy for coastal
mapping for Alaska which is doing the same thing: identifying
who the stakeholders are, what the gaps in data are, and in
doing that, two major meetings have happened with over 100
participants both last year and this year at the Coastal Mapping
Summit.
MS. OVERBECK said she couldn't list all of the collaborators,
but most of their technical assistance comes from NOAA, the
National Geodesic Survey, and the National Weather Service.
She displayed the final slide of contact information.
3:12:55 PM
CO-CHAIR JOSEPHSON asked if the Governor's Climate Action
leadership team had consulted her office.
MS. OVERBECK answered yes, and she presented to their group this
last year. A number of the members are active collaborators with
the DGGS.
CO-CHAIR JOSEPHSON observed that Unalaska must have been
situated roughly where it is, because we know about the Russian
experience there in the late 1700s. It's also commonly
understood that villages used to move more but stopped doing
that partly because the U.S. encouraged them to be more fixed
and sedentary. Ms. Overbeck mentioned Port Heiden's issue back
in the 1980s, and he wanted to know if her historical knowledge
allowed her to say with confidence that erosion is worse now
than historical knowledge suggests it was even with villages
being more transient then and that this wasn't happening to this
extent 100 years ago.
3:15:17 PM
MS. OVERBECK replied that their data goes back only to the 1950s
and that data would be different for each location and require a
detailed analysis.
3:16:14 PM
REPRESENTATIVE BIRCH thanked her for a great briefing and asked
who owns all the data and where it resides.
MS. OVERBECK replied the data collected by the state is owned
and housed by the state.
MR. PAPP added that the data they use in their analysis are
publicly available for anyone for no cost. The department wants
to promote that knowledge.
3:18:37 PM
SENATOR MEYER asked if he had analyzed what would happen to
coastal erosion with the sewage lagoons and dump sites if Ballot
1 passes.
MS. OVERBECK replied she was not familiar with what Ballot 1
would do, but she would get back to him on that.
REPRESENTATIVE LINCOLN asked if they are doing any projections
in terms of future inundation if sea levels rise.
MS. OVERBECK answered that they are not making projections on
sea level changes with surge level modeling at this time. The
data has to be collected first and the next step would be making
models and projections.
REPRESENTATIVE LINCOLN asked if that next step is in the
abstract or if it is the actual next step she is planning to
take.
MS. OVERBECK said that would be a long-term plan for the
program, which doesn't have the capacity to do it at this time.
MR. PAPP added that they work with a lot of other partners to
make this information possible and as their data goes back only
so far, useful projections need additional data collected in
collaboration with other state and federal agencies and the
communities themselves.
REPRESENTATIVE LINCOLN asked if they need direction or funding
from the legislature and if they have a timeline.
MR. PAPP replied they don't have a timeline at this point.
REPRESENATATIVE LINCOLN thanked them both for the work they are
doing saying it is a major issue for the state and his district,
especially. Some iconic Alaskan communities are under
existential threats from sea level change and storms, and having
that information is a huge first step in addressing it. But at
some point, soon they will need to apply some resources and
interventions to help these places out.
3:24:06 PM
SENATOR COGHILL commented that the only things missing from this
really good information are the places where mitigation has been
tried and either succeeded or failed. That kind of information
would be helpful.
3:25:43 PM
CO-CHAIR TARR summarized the requests for follow up were: what
is going on in Southeast Alaska, how the Proposition 1 will
affect sewage lagoons in coastal communities, and some examples
of successful or failed mitigation efforts. She thanked the
presenters again and recessed the joint meeting of the Senate
and House Resources Committees at 3:25 p.m. She subsequently
adjourned this meeting prior to the start of the 3:00 p.m. joint
meeting.
| Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| SRES- Hearing Agenda - 9 - 10 - 2018 - 1400pm.pdf |
SRES 9/10/2018 2:00:00 PM |
|
| HRES - SRES - DGGS Presentation - 9 - 10 - 2018.pdf |
SRES 9/10/2018 2:00:00 PM |