Legislature(2013 - 2014)CAPITOL 120
04/16/2014 01:00 PM House JUDICIARY
| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| SJR23 | |
| SCR2 | |
| SB170 | |
| SB173 | |
| HB45 | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
| + | SCR 2 | TELECONFERENCED | |
| += | SB 173 | TELECONFERENCED | |
| += | SB 170 | TELECONFERENCED | |
| + | SJR 23 | TELECONFERENCED | |
| + | HB 45 | TELECONFERENCED | |
| + | TELECONFERENCED | ||
| + | TELECONFERENCED |
SCR 2-ACQUIRE TONGASS NATIONAL FOREST LAND
1:17:39 PM
CHAIR KELLER announced that the next order of business would be
CS FOR SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. 2(JUD), Urging the
governor to acquire land in the Tongass National Forest from the
United States government by purchase or negotiation or by
seeking amendment to the Alaska Statehood Act.
1:19:25 PM
SENATOR BERT STEDMAN, Alaska State Legislature, said the
resolution deals with the Tongass National Forest and indicated
that the Tongass National Forest was created in 1907. At the
end of WWII, Japan needed a timber supply and looked to
Southeast Alaska for that, and that helped create pulp mills in
Sitka and Ketchikan. Both had sawmills as well, he said. Based
on the economics at that time, the desire was to create year-
round jobs in Southeast Alaska on federal forest lands. He said
that the political climate has changed since, and the 50-year
logging contracts were shortened to account for that. Today,
the pulp mills are being closed and removed and both sawmills
are gone, he explained. He noted a medium-sized sawmill on
Prince of Wales Island, and said the timber industry is unlike
it was 30 years ago. If Anchorage lost its airport, it would be
of similar impact to the economy, he stated.
1:21:33 PM
SENATOR STEDMAN said what he is trying to do now is to stabilize
the economy in Southeast Alaska; the population "has been
paralyzed for quite some time while the growth is in Anchorage
and Mat-Su." A few years ago it was forecasted that the region
would lose up to 20 to 30 percent of its population, and that
has not happened because of the hard work of many. "But we
could do better," he said. In trying to ensure timber for the
remaining saw mill and the other operators and to have more
local and state control, Alaska needs to select some lands out
of the Tongass National Forest, he opined. If Alaska cannot get
the land through the Statehood Act, SCR 2 encourages the
governor to discuss purchasing the land, out right, from the
federal government. He said, "Do whatever we can to get more
land into the State of Alaska's hands...and other private
individual's hands," including Alaska Native corporations. The
less federal land there is in Alaska, the better off the state
is, because Alaska is a resource extraction state and is
different from the East Coast, he explained. He said it is
difficult to keep year-round jobs when the economic strings are
pulled out of Washington D.C. instead of locally. He added that
it is important to support the governor in his endeavors to push
back against the federal government and to try to get some
private land and state land out of the Tongass.
1:24:02 PM
CHAIR KELLER said he is on a citizen's advisory commission that
had a summit last summer on federal overreach. The testimony
was that the U.S. Forest Service has gone from a philosophy of
"working forests" to preservation.
DICK COOSE, Ketchikan, said he is retired from the Forest
Service but is speaking for himself. He worked as a land
manager on the Tongass National Forest for 14 years, he noted.
He said he supports SCR 2, because the federal government no
longer has the desire or the capability to manage federal lands
for the health of the lands and the benefit of the local people.
He said he sees little hope that the federal government will
change its attitude, but the state has a proven record of good
forest management, and the Statehood Act's limit of 400,000
acres was OK when there were two pulp mills, but today that
limitation is not necessary. The mills were driven out by "the
feds," he opined, and the state would be the best manager.
Alaska needs to take ownership of the entire national forest or
it should select 5 million acres, he added.
1:26:18 PM
DAVID BEEBE, representing the City of Kupreanof, said SCR 2 is
at odds with Article VIII, Section 4, of the Alaska
Constitution, which mandates managing fish, forests, and
wildlife under sustained yield principles. He said sustained
yield requires that ecosystems function without significant
impairment, and the state has long known that impairing forests
in Southeast Alaska precludes the sustainable yield of Sitka
black-tailed deer. He told the committee that a major symposium
in Juneau in 1978 documented the concern for future deer
populations from clearcut logging, and in 1993 the Alaska Board
of Game passed a resolution unanimously recommending the
protection of high-volume old growth forests because the Alaska
Constitution mandates wildlife resources to be managed on a
sustained-yield basis for all of the people of Alaska.
Emergency closures and significant restrictions on deer hunting
presently exist in a 20-mile radius around the City of
Kupreanof, he stated, and it is not a new problem.
1:27:54 PM
MR. BEEBE said Mitkof Island first suffered severe restrictions
to its deer populations in the early 1970s, and the deer numbers
are not recovering 40 years later. He explained that the
structure and function of the habitat, according to the best
available science, will not be restored for two centuries or
more. If SCR 2 passes and its ultimate ends are achieved,
Alaska can expect a much larger rural subsistence predicament to
occur across more of Southeast Alaska. He noted that Gordon
Harrison, the author of the Alaska Constitution Citizen's Guide,
said that Alaska's delegate to Congress, Bob Bartlett, wanted to
defend against "freewheeling disposals of public resources and
colonial style exploitation," and that is precisely the central
premise of SCR 2. The constitution establishes the obligation
of the government, including the legislature, to assure
sustained yield management, and he urged the committee to uphold
the oath the members took to defend the constitution by voting
no on SCR 2.
1:29:28 PM
JAMES SULLIVAN, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council (SEACC),
said that SEACC also opposes SCR 2. The resolution proposes a
return to a "timber-first" forest policy on the Tongass National
Forest, and it attacks the Forest Service's attempt to create an
integrated forest plan that takes into account the numerous
aspects and uses of the forest, he stated. The resolution
ignores the needs and desires of the local communities in order
to cater to a single industry. Federal law requires multi-use
and sustained yield of all renewable forest resources, he
stated, but state forests are managed primarily for timber,
which is in direct conflict with the Alaska Constitution.
1:30:47 PM
MR. SULLIVAN said that Southeast Alaska has adapted to a new
Tongass. He noted that the sponsor of SCR 2 spoke of decisions
made after WWII, but that is a step back in time and in the
wrong direction, he opined. Communities have transitioned to a
new economy and are improving wages and the quality of life. He
said the Southeast Conference Annual Report states:
It is a good time to live and work in Southeast
Alaska. The economy of Southeast Alaska is in an
expansion phase and has been since 2008. Between 2010
and 2012, the economic growth of the region has
intensified. Nearly every single economic indicator
for the region is up and continues to rise.
MR. SULLIVAN said the report also states that the region has
more workers than ever, along with the highest total payroll,
even when adjusted for inflation. He added that Southeast
Alaska has gone through a difficult transition with the loss of
the two pulp mills, but the region is diversifying and turning
into a more vibrant economy. He asked that the committee let
the Tongass National Forest transition the way it is.
1:32:49 PM
MR. SULLIVAN said the sponsor of SCR 2 has previously stated
that the resolution is designed to open up a discussion about
the Tongass, but any discussion about land use should
acknowledge it as a "salmon forest" and incorporate tourism,
fishing, subsistence use, and energy along with timber. All are
important to Southeast Alaskans, he said, and all are being
ignored in the resolution. He said he does not want to kill the
timber industry, but he wants an industry that will not destroy
all the other industries. He also encouraged the governor and
legislators to establish mechanisms for developing government-
to-government processes with the tribes in Southeast Alaska
regarding resource use.
REPRESENTATIVE LYNN asked how many jobs have been lost due to
the "basic shut down of the forestry industry" and how much
revenue has been lost due to restrictions on logging.
1:34:24 PM
MR. SULLIVAN said there were over 500 jobs lost [when the pulp
mills shut down] in the early 1990s. Currently, Southeast
Alaska has the most job growth ever, he added. Timber is a much
smaller part of that industry in the region, he said, and even
though the large pulp mills are gone and there is a diminished
number of logs being exported, there are well over a dozen small
working mills within the communities. "We would encourage this
legislature to find ways of enhancing and finding ways to help
those small mills that live in the community and are creating
jobs in the community and putting food on the plates of their
families." For the most part, the small mills have access to
enough timber, but, he suggested, the legislature could help
them diversify.
1:35:30 PM
REPRESENTATIVE LYNN asked how much revenue has been lost to
Alaska from what some would call a shutdown of logging.
MR. SULLIVAN said there is no shutdown; over 150 million board
feet of timber was taken out of Southeast Alaska last year.
CHAIR KELLER noted that the Department of Fish and Game has
primary management of wildlife. He asked if the state will be
incapable [of management]. He then said that DNR (Alaska
Department of Natural Resources) is fully capable of handling
management under the state.
MR. SULLIVAN said the danger is not who is managing Alaska's
wildlife. The danger is what decision are made for Alaska's
habitat, he clarified. He said wildlife managers will be forced
to make decisions that they do not want to make, and the
Endangered Species Act may come into play that could actually
affect the small communities.
1:37:04 PM
REPRESENTATIVE GRUENBERG said he has not intimately lived with
this issue, but there seems to be a mixing of two topics, and
the mixing is having an effect on the tenor of this discussion.
The first issue is whether Alaska is entitled to get the
remainder of its promised acreage and whether it should come
from the Tongass National Forest, and a different issue, he
said, is what the state would use the land for. It may not be
the time to discuss that until the state takes ownership.
1:38:39 PM
CHAIR KELLER said he is absolutely right, and he would rather
not make that a dialogue between "you and the testifier,"
because there is a lot of talk about the revised TLMP [Tongass
Land Management Plan].
REPRESENTATIVE GRUENBERG asked if this is the time to discuss if
Alaska should be entitled to proceed with its selections.
CHAIR KELLER surmised that the question posed by the bill is to
support the governor's attempt to negotiate for land settlement
that includes the Tongass National Forest in order to increase
logging in Southeast Alaska.
1:39:59 PM
MR. SULLIVAN said regardless of who is actually managing the
land, it would be SEACC's hope that the acres are managed for
the multiple uses of the forest.
SENATOR STEDMAN said the intent of a land selection in the
Tongass would be to increase the timber supply, but there is a
lot of recreational needs. He said there are state forests in
the Tongass, and the intent is not to get land from the federal
government and clearcut it all, but to get it into the control
of the state so it can control its own destiny. The state has
been a very good steward of game: "Where I live in Sitka, I can
shoot six deer; my wife can shoot six; my daughter can shoot
six." He said his only limit is on how much he can eat.
1:41:36 PM
CHAIR KELLER asked about the Alexander Archipelago wolf, which
is having a status review. It would be speculation on the
impact on whether it is federal or state land, he said.
SENATOR STEDMAN said there is the wolf, the spotted owl, and a
multitude of issues with land and aquatic animals that a person
could point to as an excuse to maintain federal control. There
are no wolves on Baranof Island, he stated, but there are brown
bears, so he is not as familiar with [the wolf]. "If it wasn't
for the wolf, it would be just another creature," he explained,
and the basic argument is over development.
CHAIR KELLER closed public discussion.
1:42:57 PM
REPRESENTATIVE LYNN moved to report CSSCR 2(JUD) out of
committee with individual recommendations and the accompanying
fiscal notes.
CHAIR KELLER objected.
REPRESENTATIVE GRUENBERG said he would like to see what can be
done, with good management, to help the economy here. We are
all Alaskans, he said, and it is time that the legislature did
something to help this part of the state-and other parts.
CHAIR KELLER removed his objection. Seeing no others, CSSCR
2(JUD) moved out of the House Judiciary Standing Committee.
| Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| HB 45 Leg. Legal Opinion.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
HB 45 |
| SJR 23 ACPE Resolution of Support.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
SJR 23 |
| SJR 23 Support Letter~University of Alaska.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
SJR 23 |
| SJR 23 Witness List HJUD.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
SJR 23 |
| HCCSSB 173 ver. Y Draft.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
SB 173 |
| HCSCSSB 173 ver. Y Leg. Legal Memo.pdf |
HJUD 4/16/2014 1:00:00 PM |
SB 173 |