Governor expected to call special session on subsistence

JUNEAU - Governor Tony Knowles told a Senate committee this month that he will call a special session of the Legislature in September with the hope of blocking an Oct. 1 federal takeover of Alaskas subsistence use of fish and wildlife.

Knowles will ask Alaskas lawmakers to consider a constitutional amendment setting a rural priority for subsistence harvesting of fish and wildlife. Such an amendment is necessary to bring the states constitution in line with the federal Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. Opponents of rural preference say another federal law, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA), wipes out rural preference by extinguishing Alaska Natives hunting and fishing rights.

Legislative approval of putting the proposed amendment before the voters in the November general election in 2000 would give Alaskans time to consider changes in the state law.

Bob King, Knowles spokesman, said Knowles intends to call the session after the Sept. 14 statewide permanent fund advisory vote and before Oct. 1, when the federal government will send in fish and wildlife managers. Knowles will have to announce the session early in September to observe the required 15-day notice, King said. The session will cost about $200,000 in daily expenses and travel costs for legislators. Money will be taken from budgets here and there, he said.

Money is certainly tight now, but it cannot be avoided. We are hoping the on-the-fence lawmakers will allow the public to solve the problem, to spare Alaskans the agony of a federal takeover and to end the painful divisiveness of the subsistence issue, King said. We are afraid the federal government will make decisions on subsistence with the meat ax approach using one set of criteria.

The federal government has given Alaska until Oct. 1 to amend the constitution to agree with ANILCA. Failure to solve the problem will result in federal management of subsistence harvesting.

Fishing for subsistence food gathering amounts to approximately 3 percent of fish taken annually in Alaska.

Knowless proposed amendment reads as follows:

The Legislature may, consistent with the sustained yield principle, provide a priority to and among rural residents for the taking of fish and wildlife and other renewable natural resources for subsistence.

Going back to Juneau on subsistence is useless, Rep. Scott Ogan, R-Palmer, said Friday.

It is a waste of my time and peoples money, he said. It is the same old burrito. Put it in the microwave and reheat it, but it is the same.

A standard-bearer for the opposition to a constitutional amendment on subsistence, Ogan said he has compromised as much as he can. He is willing to sit down and discuss constitutional protection for subsistence use, but not based on where people live.

I am willing to subscribe to priority highest uses in times of shortage, but only if it is subject to equal protection, he said. Rural preference will cause agony. Otherwise, rural priority will create different classes of people, Native and non-Native. It is wrong. It is ripe for litigation.

Several cases have kept the issue in courts over the past 10 years. Both King and Ogan have attorneys and legal scholars who say their positions on the issue will stand up in court.

Ogan said case law stemming from issues of discrimination among recipients of state bounty cases stemming from different levels of eligibility for the Longevity Bonus, Permanent Fund Dividends and residency in state Pioneer Homes tell him that discriminating between subsistence users by rural preference will not fly in court.

Ogan cited the outcome of a case concerning same-sex marriage as an indication rural preference will end up in a losing court battle if the vote in general election goes for a rural preference amendment to the constitution.

A constitutional amendment adding rural preference in subsistence, Ogan said, engages the state constitution on the issues of equal protection, due process, common use of resources, uniform application, and no exclusive right to fisheries.

The Knowles administration has legal sources, too.

On whether or not Congress has power to put rural preference on state subsistence management, lawyers say yes, King said. Arguments against ANILCAs requirement for rural preference will fail in court. There is no legal basis.

How does Ogan think Alaskans will vote if the Legislature puts a constitutional amendment providing rural preference on the ballot?

Oh, they will probably vote for it, he said. But that shouldnt happen.

There is a big incentive to solve the subsistence issue soon, such as when the next opportunity to hold a constitutional convention rolls around in 2002. There will be a well-funded push to have a convention, Ogan said. That means trouble.

If the constitution is opened up for revision, the whole document is open to all sorts of things. The subsistence issue is a very, very, tangled web, he said.

In a recent discussion of a report from a state commission to study rural and tribal governance, Bryan Mallott, member of the panel and director of Native Spirit Councils, said subsistence is one of the issues separating the state into two halves, rural and urban, Native and non-Native. Although he didnt agree with Ogan, Mallot said he commended him one of the legislators trying to understand the issue.

In all the craziness he speaks, he is doing it because of a powerful ideology. He wants very much to solve subsistence, Mallot said.

It goes both ways, he added.

There are separatists among Native people who say the only subsistence is Native subsistence. It will take the people in the middle to bring us together.