Thank your legislators for fish funds

As another summer fishing season approaches, the Cook Inlet fish wars have started to heat up once again. This time, though, there appears to be a slightly different slant to the rancorous finger-pointing battles historically occurring between users as the salmon runs into Cook Inlet begin.

Don’t misunderstand, there is still a lot of dissention and the cutthroat politics of fisheries in Alaska is still very much alive and well. A good example of this is the recent unseating of a sitting Board of Fisheries (BOF) member whom the governor had re-nominated to the board. Right or wrong, these sorts of things will continue into the future. However, some groups have started making an effort to open discussions to determine where users, both sport and commercial, can work together to improve the health of our Cook Inlet salmon resources.

This just-completed legislative session saw our Valley legislators work many long and hard hours to secure funding needed to determine why our Northern District salmon stocks have had such dismal returns over the past several years. Included in these several funding appropriations are millions of dollars specifically for Northern District research and management projects to help return the health and productivity of our salmon stocks to their historic levels.

There are three specific capital budget appropriations of which I am aware. The first is a $2.5 million appropriation directly to the Mat-Su Borough for various salmon projects in the Northern District. The Mat-Su Borough Fish and Wildlife Commission (MSBFWC) will be meeting in the next week or so with the borough assembly and mayor to flesh out how these funds are to be used. As a side note, it is rather unusual for funding of this nature to be appropriated to a local government rather than to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G). This may be a one-time appropriation so we need to carefully use this funding for the greatest possible good of the salmon resources affected.

The second appropriation of $2.5 million was made to ADF&G specifically for research, restoration and enhancement initiatives for the Susitna River drainage system. This money was originally a part of the $10 million the governor asked to be appropriated for king salmon research across the state to develop programs to bring king salmon populations back from their current lows. Rep. Bill Stoltze secured this piece of the $10 million and was able to earmark it to the Susitna River drainages and broaden the use to include all five species of salmon. The department is currently fine-tuning the multi-year projects they plan to implement with this funding.

The third appropriation of $2 million went to ADF&G for king salmon enhancement in Northern Cook Inlet. This money is also probably a one-time appropriation, but being capital money, the plan is to expend it over a five-year timeframe. The MSBFWC has met and done some preliminary brainstorming on recommendations we would make to the department about how that money could be spent. However, we can only recommend; the money will be the department’s to spend, but we’re hoping ADF&G will listen and act on our recommendations.

Another huge pot of gold is attached to the Susitna-Watana dam project. Something like $95 million dollars was allocated for further studies of the potential ecological effects of the dam construction, as well as archeological and other impacts. I suspect that group is gearing up to begin fieldwork, too.

A major coordination effort must begin within the next few weeks between all the various groups or government agencies doing fisheries research in the Northern District, including the state, borough and federal folks (the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service currently has several fisheries research projects ongoing in the Valley) to minimize replication of effort, to maximize research, project benefits toward improving the status of our Northern District salmon stocks and allow projects scheduled to begin this season to start moving forward.

All of this doesn’t include operating budget funding ADF&G has for research and management programs currently ongoing in the Northern District. One notable increase includes the addition of several new weirs around the Valley’s drainages to improve knowledge of actual escapement returns and, with funding from other capital programs, possible smolt outmigration counts.

The knowledge base for the Northern District’s salmon populations is about to expand like never before in the 100-plus-year history of fishing in the area. That is because of your legislators’ efforts. Call and thank them for making this possible.

Howard Delo is a retired fisheries biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. You can leave him a message by emailing sports@frontiersman.com.