Fishermen said that fishery managers mismanaged struggling salmon stocks on the Yukon River at the expense of rural Alaskans. John White, former chair of the state Board of Fisheries, said their decisions showed “antagonistic disregard for the people of Western Alaska.”
Myron Naneng, head of the Association of Village Council Presidents in the Bethel region, said that villages should no longer honor state fishery plans unless they help create them. He said that at present the Lower Yukon villages are experiencing economic genocide. A small group of state fisheries managers sat in the audience, taking the heat.
It is pointed out that fishery managers created this summer’s “unprecedented” fishing limits because the state had to meet the obligations of that treaty, something it hadn’t done the previous two years. John Hilsinger, head of the state’s commercial fishery division told that about half the king run originates in Canada, so getting fish to those spawning grounds is critical to future returns.
Next year, the state hopes to get a more accurate in-season count. That might mean putting sonar counters in new locations, including on a floating barge and along the banks. Jack Schultheis, plant manager for one of the two remaining seafood processing companies on the lower Yukon, said fishing in the area was once a profitable activity that provided jobs, paid bills and generated tax revenues for cities.
In Bethel, the speakers raised familiar arguments, including that the state hasn’t done enough to stop the powerful pollock fleet that has caught and tossed away hundreds of thousands of king salmon this decade.
