Fish board to hold Valley hearing

WASILLA — The Alaska Board of Fish has announced it will hold two special hearings in advance of next February’s Anchorage meeting of the Board of Fish on Upper Cook Inlet issues. The meetings, one in Soldotna and one in Wasilla, will enable local residents to speak their mind without having to travel to the actual board meeting.

“We want to give people a chance who might not be able to get an opportunity to come to Anchorage,” Wright said.

The upcoming board meeting will examine proposals for changing fisheries regulations that impact the entire Cook Inlet drainage, ranging from Susitna Valley streams in the north to Kenai Peninsula streams to the south, as well as the inlet itself. As the board meets to discuss the area only once every three years, the board meeting is expected to draw a large number of interested parties from all user groups, including sports, commercial and personal use fishermen.

The board is given broad authority to draft or alter fisheries regulations, and essentially has the final say on fisheries management policy statewide.

Both hearings will be held Jan. 30, with the Wasilla hearing tentatively scheduled to begin at 3 p.m. at the Best Western Lake Lucille Inn.

Board member Howard Delo of Big Lake said he and two other members of the board — Bonnie Williams of Fairbanks and Vince Webster of King Salmon — will attend to listen to anyone who wants to be heard. The board members will hear public testimony and then report back to the full board in advance of the regular meeting, which begins Feb. 1 and runs through Feb. 12.

Because fish politics in Cook Inlet are often highly divisive and controversial, Delo said the board wanted to make its meeting as accessible as possible to community members who want to have a say in the process.

“Upper Cook Inlet meetings are always, well, I could be politically correct and say ‘interesting,’ but contentious is probably a better word,” Delo said.

More than 300 proposals have been submitted to be taken up during the two-week board meeting, and some major issues are expected to again dominate.

Major Cook Inlet issues include ongoing fisheries allocation battles between commercial and sport fishermen, as well as the contentious debate over the interception by Cook Inlet drift fishermen of stocks bound for Mat-Su streams.

That issue, in particular, likely will be a hot button for Valley residents, who have been affected by seasonal sport fishing closures in recent years due to poor sockeye and coho salmon returns.

Contact Matt Tunseth at 352-2265 or matt.tunseth@

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