SOUTHEAST SUBSISTENCE RAC MEETING 10/16/2018 SOUTHEAST RAC MEETING

SOUTHEAST ALASKA FEDERAL SUBSISTENCE REGIONAL ADVISORY COUNCIL MEETING

PUBLIC MEETING

VOLUME I

Sheet'ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi Sitka Tribal Community House Sitka, Alaska October 16, 2018 8:30 a.m.

COUNCIL MEMBERS PRESENT:

Donald Hernandez, Chair Michael Douville Albert Howard Harvey Kitka Cathy Needham Robert Schroeder Raymond Sensmeier Frank Wright John Yeager

Regional Council Coordinator, DeAnna Perry

Recorded and transcribed by:

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Page 2 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 3 (Sitka, Alaska - 10/16/2018) 4 5 (On record) 6 7 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Good morning 8 everybody. We'll be getting started real soon here, 9 just waiting for one more Council member. 10 11 (Pause) 12 13 MS. PERRY: Good morning everyone. My 14 name is DeAnna Perry. I'm the coordinator for the 15 Southeast Regional Advisory Council. And I want to 16 personally welcome everyone here to Sitka. We're in 17 the Sitka Tribal Sheet'ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi known as the 18 Community House. They've made us very welcome, so we 19 really appreciate that. 20 21 For those in the room, just want to 22 remind you that in the case of an evacuation you'll go 23 out the door that you came in. And before we call our 24 meeting officially to order we'd like to recognize Ray 25 Sensmeier, he is -- actually this is his last meeting 26 and if he would honor us with giving an invocation 27 before our meeting that would be great, Ray, thank you. 28 29 MR. SENSMEIER: Please rise. 30 31 (Invocation) 32 33 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you very 34 much, Ray, appreciate that. And as we get started here 35 this morning, after listening to Ray's very fine 36 invocation there, I'd just like to take a moment to say 37 that it's kind of a sad beginning to this meeting. 38 It's the first meeting we've had since our previous 39 Chairman, Mike Bangs, passed away suddenly, so I'd like 40 you all to think about the words that Ray just spoke 41 and remember Mike at the same time. 42 43 So thank you very much. 44 45 And with that I will call the meeting 46 to order and ask our Secretary, Harvey Kitka, to call 47 the role. 48 49 MR. KITKA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 50

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Page 3 1 Steve Reifenstuhl. 2 3 (No comments) 4 5 MR. KITKA: Frank Wright. 6 7 MR. WRIGHT: Here. 8 9 MR. KITKA: Patricia Phillips. 10 11 (No comments) 12 13 MR. KITKA: Mike Douville. 14 15 MR. DOUVILLE: Here. 16 17 MR. KITKA: Harvey Kitka's here. 18 19 Robert Schroeder. 20 21 MR. SCHROEDER: Here. 22 23 MR. KITKA: Albert Howard. 24 25 MR. HOWARD: Here. 26 27 MR. KITKA: Donald Hernandez. 28 29 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Here. 30 31 MR. KITKA: Raymond Sensmeier. 32 33 MR. SENSMEIER: Here. 34 35 MR. KITKA: John Yeager. 36 37 MR. YEAGER: Here. 38 39 MR. KITKA: Cathy Needham. 40 41 MS. NEEDHAM: Here. 42 43 MR. KITKA: Mr. Chair, we got a quorum. 44 We have nine present. 45 46 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yep, thank you, 47 Harvey. 48 49 We will begin the meeting with some 50

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Page 4 1 introductions and welcomes and first of all, Harvey, 2 would you like to introduce the Chairman of the Sitka 3 Tribe of Alaska. 4 5 MR. KITKA: Mr. Chair. Council. 6 Federal Subsistence Council. I'd like to introduce the 7 Chairman of the Sitka Tribe, Kathy Hope Erickson. 8 9 MS. ERICKSON: Thank you. Thank you, 10 Mr. Kitka. I've forgotten what it's like to be on this 11 side of the table. 12 13 (Laughter) 14 15 MS. ERICKSON: That's kind of nice in 16 this building. 17 18 And I also would like to welcome you to 19 our Sheet'ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi as representing the 20 government, tribal government for Sitka. I'm not able 21 to do the welcome of our traditional people. This is 22 Kiks.adi Land, and I do have the honor of being child 23 of Kiks.adi however. The young lady who was going to 24 come in and welcome you from the Kiks.adi had to go to 25 a department director meeting this morning so I guess 26 she's going to keep her job. 27 28 So I've been very, very impressed with 29 the breadth of your agenda and the wonderful things 30 that lay ahead of you, considering our eulachon, which 31 are almost gone, and our sockeye which are affected 32 greatly also by the things that affected the eulachon, 33 and taking in things such as the roadless rule. So I 34 wish you well in your stay and I wish you all the 35 wisdom that you bring with you will come forward with 36 you and you've come during a very busy time in Sitka, 37 you'll notice there are a lot of activities going on 38 this week. And most of them will welcome you with -- 39 well, all of them will welcome you and I particularly 40 like to point out there are a couple of things that you 41 may not see in the schedule in town. There's a fish 42 pie sale at St. Michael's on Alaska Day starting at 43 11:00, and you can't miss St. Michael's, it's down the 44 street, in the middle of the street. So we'd like to 45 welcome you there. And also the Kiks.adi are having a 46 ceremony at the base of Castle Hill on Thursday after 47 the parade and you're more than welcome to go to their 48 morning ceremony there, too. 49 50

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Page 5 1 I'd like to remind you that you have 2 some really young curious eyes and ears in your 3 presence this morning, the Mt. Edgecumbe High School. 4 This is an amazing name for a class, subsistence policy 5 class. And they're the future representatives on the 6 Regional Advisory Committees. Can you stand up kids. 7 And I think you deserve a hand for being here. 8 9 (Applause) 10 11 MS. ERICKSON: So I promised not to 12 take up too much time, but I did want to remind the 13 committee and the Chair that we need to examine extra- 14 territorial jurisdiction, you know, you know that we've 15 had a rough road so far as protecting our herring, and 16 that's one of the avenues that we need to look at and I 17 hope you will do so this week. 18 19 Thank you, and welcome. 20 21 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you very 22 much Kathy. I think I speak for the Council when I say 23 that most of us, this is our -- probably our favorite 24 venue to meet in, this house, it's just really, really 25 beautiful and a great place to hold meetings so thank 26 you for that. 27 28 MS. ERICKSON: And thank you for 29 choosing Sitka and the Sheet'ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi. 30 31 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Next, maybe we 32 could have introductions..... 33 34 MS. PERRY: Sorry, I don't know if you 35 seen, Harvey. 36 37 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Excuse me, Harvey 38 has somebody else to introduce. 39 40 Harvey. 41 42 MR. KITKA: Subsistence Chair and 43 Subsistence Council for Southeast I'd like to introduce 44 you to our new Mayor of Sitka, Gary Paxton. 45 46 MR. PAXTON: Mr. Kitka, Harvey, thank 47 you very much. It was good to hear from you and get 48 the offer to come and speak on behalf of Sitka. And 49 Chairman Erickson, God Bless You, ma'am. 50

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Page 6 1 This is my first opportunity as the new 2 Mayor of Sitka to welcome somebody to our incredible 3 town. And what an incredible place we are at, this 4 venue here, this building, that contributes so much to 5 our community. Before I talk about the subsistence 6 Board and your important mission, I would just like to 7 say to Chairman Erickson and to our STA, the important 8 work you do for your citizens, all Sitka citizens in 9 the region, you are just a force of goodness for our 10 town and our region. 11 12 Subsistence. I'm not a really great 13 subsistence person but I know from friends and 14 associates how important it is, not just to our Native 15 community, but to our entire community. And my 16 judgment is that the process of subsistence is just as 17 important as the food and the things that you bring 18 forth to eat. The ethos of that whole process is part 19 of who you are and part of who we are and highly 20 immense respect for that. I sometimes say I'm not a 21 real Alaskan because I don't have a boat, a truck or a 22 big dog, but I appreciate all those who do and when I 23 get to go out on the water with people who know how to 24 do that stuff, my wife and I always have great 25 enjoyment for participating in those endeavors. 26 27 Your mission's important. I wish you 28 well. God Bless. 29 30 Thanks. 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you very 33 much Mayor Paxton. 34 35 Next, I think I'd like to ask Wayne 36 Owen to come and welcome us from the Forest Service. 37 38 MR. OWEN: Does the transcriber want me 39 to speak into the mic or can I address you. 40 41 REPORTER: Yes she does. 42 43 MR. OWEN: Good morning, Council. My 44 name is Wayne Owen. I am the Alaska Region Director of 45 Wildlife, Fisheries and Subsistence Programs. And it 46 is my great honor and privilege to welcome you to 47 Sitka, to the Tongass National Forest, the Sitka Ranger 48 District. And, though, I had nothing to do with it, 49 this beautiful venue, we all are grateful to the Sitka 50

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Page 7 1 Tribe for making this available to us for this meeting. 2 As the Mayor said, there could not have been a more 3 appropriate place for this meeting. 4 5 So thank you for everyone that arranged 6 this. 7 8 And I'd also like to welcome people in 9 the audience, distinguished bureaucrats, distinguished 10 students, our colleagues from the State, at least one 11 or two of them back there. It's good to see the level 12 of engagement that we have here today. 13 14 I think you have an awful lot of great 15 stuff on your agenda this week besides -- well, 16 primarily, as you know, I don't have to tell you, you 17 know, fisheries is the primary business of this 18 meeting, although there are a lot of other things for 19 us to go over -- for you to go over, wolves, eulachon, 20 things from the past. There are also an awful lot of 21 things going on in the Forest Service these days, and 22 DeAnna has arranged some presentations for you, members 23 on the Council are certainly aware of the Prince of 24 Wales large landscape analysis that will be published, 25 the decision on that, the draft decision will be 26 published in a couple of weeks, so we know what that 27 looks like. You will be getting a presentation from 28 District Ranger Matt Anderson about that. The Central 29 Tongass large landscape analysis, which is the 30 Petersburg, Wrangell area, large analysis, that is on 31 its way, probably won't be signed until late in 2019. 32 And then what's probably on everybody's mind is the 33 roadless area rule. And the Forest Service will not be 34 sending a person here, as I understand, one of the 35 roadless team members -- or is Nicole coming? 36 37 MS. PERRY: She will. 38 39 MR. OWEN: Okay. So you'll have a 40 person here for awhile, that's tomorrow, I am here, 41 though anybody that has any questions before Nicole 42 arrives, I'm fully briefed on roadless and can talk to 43 anybody, or listen to anybody, you know, that has 44 comments or grief or glee about that. 45 46 So we have all those things to look 47 forward today -- look forward to today, and that's 48 great. But probably the best thing I have to do this 49 morning is to present length of service awards. And 50

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Page 8 1 first of all, Patricia Phillips, from Pelican, who is 2 not able to attend today for personal reasons, 3 nonetheless, she should be acknowledged here as 25 -- 4 25 years of service to the Subsistence Council and the 5 Subsistence Program, that's pretty darn amazing. 6 That's pretty much since day one. 7 8 And -- but we do have another old guy 9 in the room, who's going to get one of these, and I'm 10 going to ask Bob Schroeder to stand up, and I'm going 11 to stand up too and hopefully this catches me. 12 13 REPORTER: You're fine. 14 15 MR. OWEN: Okay. This seems a little 16 odd because I've been doing this -- this is a five year 17 award for Bob Schroeder, and I've been here longer than 18 five years and I'm hardly anything, what isn't part of 19 this is the decades of time that Bob stayed infested in 20 the Subsistence Program, long before he was a RAC 21 member. 22 23 So as I read that, just keep in mind. 24 25 So, Robert, Bob Schroeder, has been a 26 Council member since 2013, which was maybe the next 27 logical step for him as he served as a coordinator for 28 the Council for many years previously. Bob has hit his 29 five year mark of service for the RAC, however, his 30 work ensuring that ANILCA protections for subsistence 31 goes back, like I said, for decades. Bob spent much of 32 his career working with tribes and communities, whether 33 in the Forest Service or not, in Southeast Alaska and 34 elsewhere throughout the state performing studies on 35 subsistence harvest, the use of fish and wildlife and 36 has learned to love and treasure the environment of 37 Southeast Alaska that feeds his family and his soul and 38 he cherishes his adoption into the Raven's Nest House 39 in Hoonah. 40 41 We are grateful for Bob's years of 42 service, not only on the RAC, but to this cause, for 43 many years, and even though it's a small thing, it's my 44 pleasure to present Bob with this plaque of 45 appreciation for Robert Schroeder, in recognition of 46 years of service to the Federal Subsistence Management 47 Program as a member of the Southeast Alaska Subsistence 48 Regional Advisory Council for the years 2013 to 2018, 49 signed by Anthony Christianson, Chairman of the Federal 50

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Page 9 1 Subsistence Board. 2 3 Thank you, Bob. 4 5 (Applause) 6 7 MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you. 8 9 UNIDENTIFIED VOICE: Speech. 10 11 MR. SCHROEDER: Don't give me a 12 microphone. 13 14 (Laughter) 15 16 MR. OWEN: So with that, Council, I 17 wish you a fantastic and productive meeting. If there 18 are questions or needs, you know, that are -- of course 19 talk to your coordinator and she will assign those to 20 me, so thank you very much. 21 22 Gunalcheesh and have a great time. 23 24 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Wayne. 25 And we'll make sure we send along our appreciations to 26 Patty when we get a chance to see her. 27 28 Okay, next, before we go around the 29 room and kind of have every -- all the Staff and people 30 introduce themselves I'd like to recognize, as Kathy 31 Hope Erickson informed us, we have students from Mt. 32 Edgecumbe here and their instructor, Heather Bauscher. 33 Maybe Heather can tell us a little bit about what the 34 students are here for and the students introduce 35 themselves. 36 37 MS. BAUSCHER: Thanks so much. Really 38 nice to see everybody here today. Thanks for allowing 39 us this opportunity. I would like to introduce to you, 40 some of the students from the policy and procedures 41 practicum through UAS. My name is Heather Bauscher. I 42 am a community organizer with the Sitka Conservation 43 Society and we're working as a partnership between SCS 44 and UAS to continue to provide this opportunity for 45 dual enrollment credit to high school students. Today, 46 present with us, we have five students from Mt. 47 Edgecumbe, a home-school high school student and a 48 student from Pacific High. So I'm going to give you an 49 opportunity to meet them. 50

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Page 10 1 If you guys can just take turns 2 filtering and you need to use this mic. 3 4 MS. ITTA-TOMAS: My name is Laila and 5 I'm from Barrow, Alaska and I go to Mt. Edgecumbe High 6 School. 7 8 MR. KLISHKEN: My name's Gabriel, I'm 9 from Yakutat, and I go to Edgecumbe. 10 11 MR. MARTIN: My name's Andrew Martin 12 and I'm a local here in Sitka and I go to Mt. Edgecumbe 13 High School. 14 15 MS. ROME: My name is Gracie and I'm 16 from Hydaburg and I go to Mt. Edgecumbe High School. 17 18 MS. MARTINEZ: My name is Jaylynn 19 Martinez, I'm from Tuluksak and I go to Mt. Edgecumbe 20 High School. 21 22 MR. LAPERRIERE: My name's Blake 23 LaPerriere, I'm the home-schooler, and I'm from here in 24 Sitka, and that's it. 25 26 MS. YOUNG: My name is Angela Young and 27 I'm from Sitka and I go to Pacific High. 28 29 MS. BAUSCHER: I encourage all of you 30 if you have time on breaks, please take time to chat to 31 the students. They are learning network skills -- 32 networking skills. They get credit for the number of 33 people they talk to. 34 35 (Laughter) 36 37 MS. BAUSCHER: Hint. Hint. 38 39 (Laughter) 40 41 MS. BAUSCHER: So try to have 42 conversations and ask questions, but everybody here is 43 really excited to learn more about how these 44 regulations are made, and all of the students before 45 you are subsistence users. So when they learned of 46 this opportunity it was really fun getting to sit and 47 chat about the different animals that they harvest and 48 what's important to them, so I think this will be 49 really exciting and thanks for the opportunity. 50

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Page 11 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, 2 Heather. Thank you, Students. Heather didn't mention 3 it but I was at the Board meeting up in Anchorage in 4 April and Heather was there with four students, I 5 believe, at that time, and Anthony was one of those 6 students, nice to see you again Anthony, and I just 7 want to say that -- I mean that just seemed like a 8 very, very valuable experience there. The students 9 just got a tremendous amount of interaction with the 10 Board members and all the Council Chairs that were 11 there and I know that, you know, all the Council people 12 were really interested in talking to the students and 13 it seemed like the students were really interested in 14 talking to all the Staff and Council members present. 15 So I definitely encourage you to, you know, meet these 16 students and talk to them and answer their questions 17 and, yeah, it'll be great experience for everybody. So 18 glad you're here students. 19 20 Next, I think it's time to maybe talk 21 about a few of the housekeeping items that we have -- 22 oh, no, first, DeAnna, I think maybe I'll go around the 23 room..... 24 25 MS. PERRY: Okay. 26 27 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: .....for 28 introductions. Yeah, I think I'll do that first. 29 We'll go around the room and maybe ask the Staff people 30 that are here or any local residents that would like to 31 identify themselves, to just let us know who's here and 32 who is in the room. So we'll start, maybe we'll go 33 left to right, start over here where Wayne is sitting 34 and somebody else. 35 36 MR. OWEN: I did it already. 37 38 MS. PALOSAARI: I'm Naomi Palosaari and 39 I'm a Sitka Tribe of Alaska, tribal attorney. 40 41 MR. SUMMERS: Good morning. My name's 42 Clarence Summers. I work for the National Park Service 43 for Bert Frost. I serve on the InterAgency Staff 44 Committee for the National Park Service. Bert Frost, 45 by the way is the Regional Director and a Board member. 46 47 MR. CHEN: Aloha, Council members. My 48 name is Glenn Chen. I work for the Bureau of Indian 49 Affairs as the Subsistence Branch Chief. 50

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Page 12 1 MS. SILL: My name is Lauren Sill. I 2 work with the Department of Fish of Game's Division of 3 Subsistence in Juneau. 4 5 MR. SCOTT: Good morning, you guys, 6 good to see you again. I'm Ryan Scott, I work for the 7 Division of Wildlife Conservation for the Department of 8 Fish and Game. 9 10 MR. JOHNSON: Good morning, Mr. Chair. 11 Members of the Council. My name is Carl Johnson and I 12 work for the Office of Subsistence Management. And in 13 my nearly seven years as the supervisor of the Council 14 Coordination Division, this is my first opportunity to 15 attend one of your meetings in your region, so I want 16 to thank the Sitka Tribe for the honor and the 17 privilege of having a meeting in this space and also 18 it's just a real pleasure to be here and attend one of 19 your meetings. So thank you and good morning. 20 21 MR. SUMINSKI: Good morning everyone. 22 I'm Terry Suminski with the Forest Service. I manage 23 the Subsistence Program for the Tongass National Forest 24 and I live here in Sitka. 25 26 MR. WHITFORD: Good morning. My name 27 is Tom Whitford and I'm the Regional Subsistence 28 Program Leader for the Forest Service and I'm based out 29 of Anchorage, and I'm also a member of the InterAgency 30 Staff Committee. 31 32 MS. KENNER: Good morning. My name is 33 Pippa Kenner and I'm the acting lead for the 34 Anthropology Division at the Office of Subsistence 35 Management in Anchorage, and I live in Anchorage. 36 37 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you 38 all. 39 40 MR. KITKA: One more. 41 42 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Who do we have, 43 oh, sorry. 44 45 MS. RILEY: I'm Katie Riley. I work at 46 the Sitka Conservation Society and I'm here to help out 47 with the administration of the meeting and I'm really 48 happy for the experience. 49 50

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Page 13 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. Did we 2 miss anybody else, is there anybody behind any of the 3 posts. 4 5 (Laughter) 6 7 MR. JIMMY: Hi, I'm Leo Jimmy. I'm 8 the building attendant here. I work for the Tribe, and 9 I do a little bit of everything else in between. I 10 also work over at the Chamber, too. 11 12 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you. 13 And thank you all for being here. 14 15 And, now, maybe DeAnna can inform us of 16 a few items here. 17 18 MR. KITKA: The Council members. 19 20 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Good point, 21 Harvey, thank you very much. I might take this time to 22 go around and have the Council to introduce themselves 23 and say where they're from. We'll start with you, 24 Harvey. 25 26 MR. KITKA: Thank you, Mr. Chair. My 27 name's Harvey Kitka and from Sitka, also part of the 28 tribal council in Sitka. 29 30 MR. WRIGHT: Good morning, everybody. 31 My name is Frank Wright. I'm from Hoonah and I'm also 32 the tribal president for Hoonah Indian Association. 33 Good to be here. 34 35 Gunalcheesh. 36 37 MR. SCHROEDER: Bob Schroeder, Juneau 38 resident. 39 40 MR. HOWARD: Good morning. My name's 41 Albert Howard. I'm a former Mayor of Angoon, former 42 president of the Tribe. Just real quick, we started a 43 traditional foods council, so I'm taking on more of a 44 role in that area. 45 46 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 47 48 MR. YEAGER: Good morning. My name's 49 John Yeager, I'm from Wrangell. 50

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Page 14 1 MS. NEEDHAM: Good morning. My name is 2 Cathy Needham and I reside in Juneau. 3 4 MR. SENSMEIER: Good morning. I'm 5 Raymond Sensmeier from Yakutat. 6 7 MR. DOUVILLE: I'm Mike Douville from 8 Craig. I'm a Council member on the Craig Tribal 9 Association. I'm also a Craig City Councilman, hunter, 10 gatherer, full-time commercial fisherman, and also a 11 sport fisherman. 12 13 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And I'm Don 14 Hernandez. I live in Point Baker, and I devote most of 15 my time to working with this Council and not much else. 16 17 Thank you. 18 19 Also I might want to ask DeAnna Perry 20 to just introduce herself. 21 22 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 23 DeAnna Perry, Council Coordinator for the Southeast RAC 24 and I live in Juneau. 25 26 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And we're also 27 happy to have our favorite court reporter here, Tina, 28 so do you want to just say Hi, Tina. 29 30 REPORTER: My name's Tina and I'm the 31 court reporter. 32 33 (Laughter) 34 35 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. 36 DeAnna, housekeeping items here before we get into 37 anything else. 38 39 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chair. The 40 draft agenda for our meeting, along with meeting books 41 and supplemental materials for our meeting are on the 42 table just inside the front door. For those on the 43 phone, the meeting materials can be found on line at 44 the Federal Subsistence Program website and that's 45 www.doi.gov/subsistence and if you're interested in 46 following along you can go into the regions tab and 47 click on the Southeast. 48 49 One of the main purposes of our meeting 50

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Page 15 1 is to encourage and promote local participation in our 2 decisionmaking process affecting subsistence harvest. 3 If you would like to address the Council during the 4 meeting, please fill out a blue testifier form and 5 Katie, who had introduced herself earlier, will show 6 you where those are at, they're at the intake table and 7 that will help us keep track of everyone who would like 8 to speak regarding a specific agenda item. If you have 9 a time constraint, say, for instance you're here for 10 your lunch hour or something like that, let us know and 11 we'll make sure that we have an opportunity for you to 12 speak. 13 14 With that said, to accommodate the 15 schedules of many folks, as Wayne mentioned, that will 16 be participating throughout our meeting, we will be 17 doing possibly some agenda items a little bit out of 18 sequence, so we'll beg your indulgence for that. 19 20 And I'd like to remind folks that there 21 will be time for tribal and public comment on non- 22 agenda items and the Chair will announce that each 23 morning, that will be an opportunity for those present 24 as well as those participating on the phone to speak to 25 non-agenda items. 26 27 For those attending our meeting in 28 person we would ask that you sign in at the front 29 table, there's a sign in sheet and, again, Katie can 30 show you where that's at. That helps myself and the 31 court reporter greatly with spelling of names in our 32 minutes and in our public record. 33 34 I'd like to take a moment now to see 35 who we have participating by phone, so those folks that 36 have called in, could each of you state your name, your 37 agency or group that you represent or the community 38 that you live in. So if we could have someone kind of 39 start us off please. 40 41 MR. REEVES: Can you hear me DeAnna? 42 43 MS. PERRY: I can, go right ahead. 44 45 MR. REEVES: Hi. Good morning. Jeff 46 Reeves, Forest Service, Craig Alaska. 47 48 MR. DECKER: Luke Decker, Forest 49 Service, Craig Alaska. 50

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Page 16 1 MR. SHARP: Dan Sharp, BLM in 2 Anchorage. 3 4 MR. BURCH: Mark Burch..... 5 6 MS. OEHLERS: Good morning. This is 7 Susan Oehlers, Forest Service in Yakutat. 8 9 MR. BURCH: Good morning. This is Mark 10 Burch from the Department of Fish and Game. 11 12 MS. PERRY: And anyone else on the 13 phone. I have Jeff Reeves, Luke Decker, Dan Sharp, 14 Mark Burch and Susan Oehlers; is there anyone else we 15 haven't heard from. 16 17 (No comments) 18 19 MS. PERRY: Okay. Thank you very much 20 for calling in. 21 22 Mr. Chair, I believe we're ready to 23 move on. 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you, 26 DeAnna. Thank you people on the phone for being 27 available, even though you can't be here. 28 29 Just one other word about the public 30 testimony. In my view, listening is probably one of 31 the most important things this Council is here for and 32 we really appreciate people's testimony. We encourage 33 you to come and tell us your stories and as DeAnna 34 pointed out, we will have a time for public testimony 35 at the start of each meeting day. I'd also like to try 36 and have a time for public testimony as we begin each 37 session right after lunch, just so people kind of have 38 some time certain opportunities where they know they 39 can come and testify. If somebody wants to testify on 40 a specific agenda item, especially when it comes to 41 proposal time, if there's something you hear, you know, 42 in the course of our discussions that you want to 43 testify on, there's an opportunity then as well but, of 44 course, at that time you have to kind of follow our 45 agenda and know when to be here because, you know, that 46 is kind of fluid. So I just want people to know that. 47 And if anybody in the audience knows of anybody that 48 would like to come and testify before us, please 49 encourage them to do so. 50

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Page 17 1 So, with that said, we will review our 2 agenda for this meeting and adopt it with changes and 3 we'll probably, at that point, take note of when some 4 of the time specific items are, if you could inform us 5 of that DeAnna. 6 7 MS. PERRY: Okay. 8 9 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Harvey. 10 11 MR. KITKA: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 12 move that we adopt the agenda as a guide so that we can 13 accommodate all you said. 14 15 MS. NEEDHAM: Second. 16 17 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, moved and 18 seconded to adopt the agenda. Any discussions on the 19 agenda. 20 21 (No comments) 22 23 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Maybe at this 24 point, DeAnna, could you maybe inform us of when some 25 of our time specific items might be so everybody can be 26 aware of what we know has to happen at certain times. 27 28 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 29 can give you some blocks of time. 30 31 The roadless rule presentation, which 32 would normally fall under agency reports on the last 33 day, due to availability we will have that sometime 34 tomorrow between 11:00 and 3:00 p.m. 35 36 The Prince of Wales Landscape Level 37 Analysis presentation will be done Thursday morning, 38 first thing Thursday morning, and that will be followed 39 by the Central Tongass presentation. 40 41 And then the Water Contaminants 42 presentation will be on Thursday, sometime between 43 11:00 and 3:00 as well. 44 45 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 46 47 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. Thank you 48 very much. 49 50

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Page 18 1 If Council members don't have anything 2 they want to add to the agenda or change, we'll call 3 for the question. 4 5 MR. WRIGHT: Question. 6 7 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: All in favor of 8 the agenda as written signify by saying aye. 9 10 IN UNISON: Aye. 11 12 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, the agenda 13 is adopted. 14 15 So the next thing on the agenda is we 16 have to have a special election and maybe I'll ask our 17 coordinator to explain what's going to happen now. 18 19 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 20 We'll now hold a special election for the office of 21 Vice Chair of the Southeast Subsistence Regional 22 Advisory Council, that's to serve until the next 23 regular election in February. 24 25 Under Robert's Rules, in the event of 26 an unexpected vacancy in the position of Chair, the 27 Vice Chair automatically becomes the Chair and then the 28 Vice Chair position is vacant. So we'll have a special 29 election to fill the seat of that Vice Chair at this 30 time and are there any nominations for the Vice Chair 31 position. 32 33 MR. DOUVILLE: Mr. Chair. 34 35 MS. PERRY: Mr. Douville. 36 37 MR. DOUVILLE: I would like to nominate 38 Cathy Needham for the position of Vice Chair. 39 40 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Douville. 41 Ms. Needham has been nominated as Vice Chair. Any 42 other nominations. 43 44 (No comments) 45 46 MR. WRIGHT: Mr. Chair. 47 48 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes, Frank. 49 50

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Page 19 1 MR. WRIGHT: Move to close nominations. 2 3 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. It's 4 been moved to close the nominations. All in favor of 5 Cathy Needham being our new Vice Chair signify by 6 saying aye. 7 8 IN UNISON: aye. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Anybody opposed. 11 12 (No opposing votes) 13 14 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Oh, sorry, do we 15 have a second on Frank's motion to close the 16 nominations. 17 18 MR. DOUVILLE: Yes, I second. 19 20 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Mike. 21 So we'll go back and call for the question again. 22 23 MR. KITKA: Question. 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: All in favor of 26 Cathy for Vice Chair signify by saying aye. 27 28 IN UNISON: Aye. 29 30 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Anybody opposed. 31 32 (No opposing votes) 33 34 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Nobody opposed. 35 Congratulations Cathy, and thank you for accepting the 36 Vice Chair position. 37 38 (Laughter) 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Review and 41 approval of the previous minutes. I'll ask the Council 42 members to look over the minutes from the previous 43 meeting and see if they made any notes of any errors to 44 be pointed out, and we'll take just a couple minutes to 45 do that. 46 47 (Pause) 48 49 MS. NEEDHAM: Mr. Chair. 50

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Page 20 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes, Cathy. 2 3 MS. NEEDHAM: Mr. Chair. I move to 4 adopt the minutes. 5 6 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Is there a second. 7 8 MR. DOUVILLE: Second. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. It's been 11 moved and seconded to adopt the minutes from the 12 previous meeting. All in favor say aye. 13 14 IN UNISON: Aye. 15 16 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Anybody opposed 17 nay. 18 19 (No nay votes) 20 21 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. Minutes 22 from the previous meeting are adopted. Thank you very 23 much. 24 25 Next on the agenda is reports from the 26 Council members on local issues affecting their 27 communities. 28 29 I will begin those comments from Harvey 30 Kitka from Sitka. 31 32 MR. KITKA: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm 33 going to start back to our herring issue where it seems 34 like it has gotten considerably worse since last year. 35 This is probably one of the biggest issues here in 36 Sitka. We got -- of the herring that were out there, 37 this was probably the smallest spawn that we ever saw, 38 not only smallest but probably the worst we've ever had 39 for our people gathering herring eggs. We -- the eggs 40 that we collected on our trees were probably the 41 thinnest because these were the branches that we used 42 to cut off and throw away and put back in the water and 43 this is what we ended up with. There are very few 44 places that we even had the herring make it back to the 45 normal spawning grounds. 46 47 The commercial industry kind of blocked 48 the herring and kept them in one spot so they didn't 49 finish their pattern of how they spawn. 50

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Page 21 1 That's one of our major concerns. 2 3 The other one is the king salmon. 4 5 The king salmon were really small this 6 year. It is a big concern for our commercial fishermen 7 as well as not being very many fish out there and what 8 we could take home was not very much. Along with all 9 that we got the cost of fuel which is really high so it 10 caused a lot of people just to stay home. 11 12 The only good report we have is our 13 sockeye within the Redoubt that was really good. But 14 some of our other streams are really suffering for 15 sockeye. 16 17 So that's my report. 18 19 Thank you. 20 21 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Harvey. 22 Frank Wright from Hoonah. 23 24 MR. WRIGHT: Thank you, Mr. Chair. You 25 know this summer was a pretty unusual summer. You know 26 we've had some slugs and caterpillars that I've never 27 ever seen in my life in my hometown, long black slugs 28 and then you've got these little furry caterpillars 29 that are walking around that I've never, ever seen in 30 my life so something's going on in this world that I 31 don't like. 32 33 My sister Amy came down to my house one 34 time and she said look at this, and it was -- I said I 35 don't know what the heck that is but I told her to take 36 it to one of the people that were working with Hoonah 37 Indian Association and the guy said it's a giant wood 38 wasp, I said a what, giant wood wasp, I've never ever 39 seen a giant wood wasp or any kind of insect like that 40 before. Ever. It was about that big from head to end. 41 42 So this world is coming to, I hate to 43 say it, but a lot of things are continuing to happen. 44 45 The sunshine was -- the sun was just -- 46 it was so scary I was worried that Hoonah was going to 47 -- the Forest was going to burn down because the sun 48 was so bad. I mean it was about a month of continuous 49 sunshine and our rivers dried up, there was fish 50

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Page 22 1 swimming at the mouths of our rivers, trying to get up 2 the river but there was no water in the river. When 3 the tide came up, the salmon were there, but then when 4 the tide went down they just followed the water down 5 but there -- my nephew went up and he saw one salmon 6 trying to get up into the river, get up, and it was 7 literally on its side going up, trying to get up in the 8 little water that was left in the river. You know a 9 Forest fire in Hoonah would have been pretty tough to 10 -- because of the mountainous area and all the dry 11 trees, you know, and one time it rained, it rained 12 pretty good, but I knew what was going to happen to 13 that rain, that rain was not going to reach the river 14 because the plants would have sucked it up right then 15 and there. 16 17 This summer we had a ceremony in 18 Glacier Bay, it was a peace ceremony, it was a peace 19 ceremony between the National Park Service and Hoonah 20 Indian Association where we had all the tribal members 21 from Hoonah going over and Park Service and we were -- 22 there was a time when we couldn't hardly deal with the 23 Park Service, but this peace ceremony was for -- 24 because of the Park Service willing to work with Hoonah 25 tribal -- the Tribe, that we were able to get some 26 things done over there to establish the existence of 27 our tribes in the bay. The only way that it happened 28 was because we had gotten some Park Service people, 29 superintendents in the Park that really believed, 30 believed that the Hoonah people were originally from 31 Glacier Bay, so it worked out real well so that we 32 could now -- now we have our ceremony house there and 33 it was amazing to see the number of people that 34 attended this thing. 35 36 You know, I've been working on this 37 project for many years, I've been with the Hoonah 38 Indian Association Tribe since '86, and in '95 is when 39 we started getting people that believed in us and I 40 think that when two governments work together, things 41 can happen, and the only way that happened was because 42 we talked we didn't yell. We talked with each other 43 and decided that well this is the way we should do it 44 and there were some people that wanted things to happen 45 instantly and that doesn't work that way, you know, so 46 as long as we talked things worked out real well. So 47 now the Park Service and Hoonah Tribe is wanting to 48 talk as much as we can so we can get things done. 49 50

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Page 23 1 I've been fishing for more than 55 2 years. I started fishing when I was 11 years old. 3 This season on purse seining was the worst I've ever 4 seen. The worst. You know, I had a hard time because 5 I was wondering about my crew, I was worried about my 6 crew, what are they going to do, you know, and it just 7 so happened I lucked out that my crew kind of lucked 8 out, that I had IFQ, where they can get a little kick 9 in the pants for, you know, a couple bucks for the 10 season, you know, so this season has to be a disaster 11 season. There were so many boats that were wondering 12 about what they were going to do because -- how are 13 they going to make boat payments, I mean there was no 14 fish anywhere. We didn't even fish Lisianski this year 15 and I don't think they did very well down towards 16 Ketchikan except for a short spurt. 17 18 There's another thing that's happening 19 in Hoonah, there's the tour industry, which I'm -- 20 Hoonah object to, is that they're planning to put 21 another dock in Hoonah. I mean next year they plan -- 22 this year they had 107 ships and next year they plan on 23 that and 20 more and then the year after that another 24 20 more. And putting another ship in an area that I 25 fish is not going to be -- I'm not going to be too 26 happy about that because when you got a ship there and 27 you know that stuff is going overboard, from where I'm 28 at, it's going to affect the way I fish. Out by Points 29 of Fire, they're going to move the other dock down the 30 ways and then probably going to make a big difference 31 on how I do things. 32 33 You know, one of the things I like 34 about the industry, the tourist industry that's there, 35 is that, young kids can work. When you turn 15, or 16 36 years old you can work. You know a lot of the kids 37 that are in the school work. The problem that Hoonah 38 is having is with the number of ships that are coming 39 in, we don't have enough workers. We have workers from 40 Angoon, we have workers from Kake, we got workers from 41 Juneau, we got workers from Seattle coming up to work 42 and that's -- you know, I see some of my friends from 43 Angoon or Kake and I see them on the ferry or 44 something, and I say, apply in Hoonah, they're looking 45 for workers. At the start of the season this year they 46 were 35 people short. 35 people short to work, young 47 people, they need young people that want to work. 48 They're producing some housing so I think if young 49 people came to Hoonah to work they would -- I mean next 50

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Page 24 1 year 127 ships. I was talking to a guy that does a 2 tour ship -- I mean whale watching, he says, I'm going 3 to be working five months, every day there's going to 4 be out looking for whales. Every day. He said I'm 5 king of bummed out because I can't do my subsistence, I 6 won't be able to go get my sockeyes, go pick my 7 berries, can't do anything because I'll be working the 8 whole time. 9 10 So this year there was a lot of 11 dungeness commercial fishermen in Hoonah, I mean big 12 piles of pots came in. I was talking to one of the 13 guys, he said, well, a lot of the sea otters are 14 starting to show up and where they're getting dungeness 15 it's only about 15 to 20 fathoms, which is nothing 16 compared to if it was -- a deep fishery, but I think 17 the sea otters are going to do what they did to 18 Cordova, you know, Cordova used to have a big fishing 19 industry, dungi fishing industry, now they don't 20 because of the sea otter. You know we got to figure 21 out what we're going to do about that because, you know 22 -- this is kind of a funny story, I was talking to a 23 guy, he was purse seining and he caught a sea otter 24 that was on deck and there was a sea otter and I told 25 him, did you kill it, and he said, no, I can't because 26 I'm White, and I says, you should have just killed it 27 anyways and he says no. And he said the sea otter had 28 its paws on the rail and it was standing on the deck at 29 the rail and the sea otter was so fat that he was just 30 looking at the guy, so the guy just grabbed the hind 31 legs and threw it overboard. I mean that's kind of 32 funny, you know, the sea otter looking at you, come on, 33 help me off because I know you can't do anything to me. 34 35 (Laughter) 36 37 MR. WRIGHT: This year the herring 38 eggs, we had a guy, Vern Hill, that used to come over 39 every year, he came back home and there was hardly 40 enough to go around. I mean he was here for a long 41 time. And he said this was going to be his last year 42 because he wanted to get out of fishing and his boat, 43 he won't be able to use his boat to come over so does 44 that mean that I have to come over with my boat, which 45 is a lot bigger and I don't know. 46 47 The berries, nil. My wife used to go 48 out and get five, 10 gallons at a time. This year come 49 back with a gallon bucket that's not even -- a gallon 50

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Page 25 1 can that's not even half full. The sun was so bad they 2 were all dried up, looked like raisins already, so the 3 sun just dried them up. We didn't find any salmon 4 berries. 5 6 And I was looking forward to going king 7 salmon trolling this last spring so I could catch 8 something to go eat, they shut it down and we couldn't 9 go out. 10 11 So there's so much going on with the 12 world environment that these young people that are 13 sitting here, I'm hoping that they're looking into the 14 subsistence world and looking at what is happening to 15 our world and I'm hoping that they're the leaders that 16 make a difference in what's happening. I'm sure 17 they're looking at the people with high authority and 18 saying, come on, look what's going on, look at what 19 happened down in Florida, 155 miles an hour, that's 20 faster than a plane, I mean my goodness, if we flew 21 into a storm like that you're going back 30 miles an 22 hour. So if we don't look at this world and start to 23 take care of it, the way we should, which is our 24 responsibility as subsistence leaders in this world, 25 it's not going to be long before our young people are 26 going to be struggling through to try to get a fish to 27 eat. 28 29 Gunalcheesh. 30 31 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Frank. 32 Bob Schroeder from Juneau. 33 34 MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you, Frank. I 35 really second so much of what Frank had to say although 36 I wish I had gone first because then I would have had 37 something to say. 38 39 But just looking closely at Juneau. 40 Juneau's hurting for a number of harvests. There are 41 no berries around in Juneau this year. 42 43 Shrimp, king crab and King salmon have 44 been effectively closed. We did get some terminal king 45 salmon real late in the game because they didn't count 46 against the closure. And our coho harvesting was 47 pretty lousy. 48 49 But listening to Frank it got me to 50

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Page 26 1 thinking about when ANILCA was passed in 1981, fully 37 2 years ago and ANILCA is what authorizes us and empowers 3 us to act on all things related to subsistence, nobody 4 was really thinking about climate change. The idea was 5 basically what we needed to do was work on allocation 6 and deal with, essentially what we call now user 7 conflicts to make sure that subsistence harvest would 8 be able to continue. Nobody was thinking that maybe 9 the stuff just wouldn't be around anymore. Well, I 10 think we're at that point at this moment. 11 12 Just about a week ago the United 13 Nations passed its latest version of climate change 14 report. And we had the occasion, in Juneau, the person 15 who was the editor of the previous version came to town 16 and gave a talk on climate change and what was going on 17 and that gave me a feeling for this group and it's 18 really a conservative group. You know if you can 19 imagine getting dozens and dozens of countries to agree 20 and perhaps, I think, it's like 100 academics about are 21 involved reviewing 6,000 scientific papers, well, to 22 get an international agreement on something, it tends 23 to be pretty moderate and watered down. These aren't 24 storm the barricades radicals who are writing this sort 25 of report. But the latest version basically is really 26 dire. It says that we have 12 years to get our act 27 together as a planet, 12 years. And then the 28 consequences are really dire. Frank was talking about, 29 and it's hard to avoid, seeing examples in the news of 30 storms that have never occurred before, ecological 31 conditions that are supposed to be one in 100 years, or 32 one in 500 years, and now they happen twice a year. 33 Well something's going on here. Kind of really close 34 to us and what it does to resources, you know, we've 35 heard -- Frank was mentioning how streams are drying up 36 and obviously salmon are really sensitive to 37 temperature in addition to water flow. 38 39 I was talking with Cathy earlier, 40 yesterday, on some of her survey work and I couldn't 41 help thinking that really the side bars have changed on 42 how you do fisheries research because the fish aren't 43 doing the stuff that they were doing for the last 50 44 years, they're doing things differently. 45 46 I also, just, when I was waiting in the 47 airport in Juneau, I talked to a former Forest Service 48 colleague who does plants and she was talking about 49 fire danger. And, you know, so I asked her, and, you 50

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Page 27 1 know, as probably all you guys know, fire has never 2 been a feature of the Tongass. It is -- fire is a 3 modifying feature of many forests around the world, but 4 you can't find fire in the Tongass, you know, even if 5 you do historical studies or you really are trying to 6 figure out what's going on for the past thousand years, 7 two thousand years in the Tongass, you don't find fire, 8 you find blow down, you find other extreme events, but 9 you don't find any fire. What happens if our Forest 10 dries out and what she was talking about was the fuel 11 ladder in the Forest, and I think what she meant was, 12 well, we got the stuff that's above the ground, we got 13 the stuff that fell over, and then we've got a huge 14 amount of organic material in muskeg future peat, which 15 if it ever got started it'd probably burn forever. 16 17 So where am I going with this. 18 19 I think even though our charter and why 20 the Regional Council exists, no one was thinking about 21 climate change at that time. They didn't say we need a 22 Council to really look after climate change and its 23 affect on subsistence, however, we are empowered to 24 look at all things that affect subsistence uses in our 25 region and so I got an idea and maybe we can talk about 26 this at some other time. I really would like there to 27 be a small working group of this Council to look at 28 climate change effects, and I'd really like support 29 from Forest Service and OSM to do some planning for 30 what climate change may occur in the future, I think 31 that's part of our responsibility. And that this 32 group, along with the OSM and Forest Service's 33 technical assistance, would report back to this Council 34 at our next meeting on what we may expect. 35 36 Back on the IPCC report, it presents a 37 really dire picture of what's in store for us world- 38 wide, and it's been criticized because it doesn't -- it 39 didn't have any way of evaluating what they call 40 tipping point events or feedback loops, or things like 41 that, which could make things go way quicker, both in 42 terms of the overall global warming, but specifically 43 for things that we're concerned about on this Council. 44 We know that we have really lousy ocean survival of 45 many salmon species and hopefully that's just a fluke, 46 hopefully that's gone next year, and that Frank will 47 say he has the best year ever seining, but what if it's 48 not just a one year occurrence, what if you're just 49 basically facing a downward trend and, you know, we 50

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Page 28 1 don't even have any salmon anymore. That our resource 2 base just radically changes because that's what we 3 appear to be facing world-wide. 4 5 So just to close up, that's what's on 6 my mind more than most other things. And I would 7 really like to see if there are other Council members 8 who would like to form a working group and we can get 9 assistance on this from Forest Service and OSM because 10 I think this is more than an issue, it's a living 11 situation that will affect all of us whether or not we 12 want it to. 13 14 Thank you. 15 16 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Bob. 17 Albert Howard from Angoon. 18 19 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 20 I was sitting here listening to Bob and the difference 21 between Angoon and Juneau is Bob can go to Costco when 22 all these issues -- or when you're having resource 23 issues, we can't do that in Angoon. We have -- this 24 year the biggest concern there was we were all ready to 25 go fishing for king salmon in the spring. Now, you look 26 at the laws, and I'd like to encourage the young people 27 here to look at the laws and the intent of them. I've 28 learned to do that because sometimes you have to remind 29 people, there's laws in place and there's reasons for 30 it. They shut down king salmon without asking Angoon 31 what's the impact that this is going to have on Angoon. 32 When you leave -- hunting closes for us in January, 80 33 percent unemployment in Angoon, and Mr. Wright, 34 correct, a lot of our young kids are now going to 35 Hoonah to find work so they can have the money to carry 36 you through the winter, well when king salmon closes 37 when you're all ready to go fish for it, that doesn't 38 leave anything. You have to wait until the rest of the 39 salmon show up. The halibut were non-existent. We 40 have the right, as rural residents, to set 30 hooks, 41 you can't do that in Juneau, and I'm sitting here -- I 42 remember the conversation I had with the gentleman from 43 Juneau at our last meeting, subsistence has become a 44 word that they like to use on TV, whether or not you 45 qualify as a subsistence user. These are real issues 46 that feed our people in our communities. This is our 47 food. This isn't a catch phrase that somebody likes to 48 use on TV, subsistence. That's why I mentioned the 49 local tribe has created a traditional foods council 50

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Page 29 1 because we don't agree with the word subsistence. You 2 look at the definition of subsistence, it's to get by 3 at a minimum. 4 5 I'm fortunate. This summer I had two 6 young men in my home that filled our freezer so full 7 with halibut and salmon with their allowable catch 8 because we have a gentlemen sitting up here listening, 9 that they love to fish, and they processed the fish and 10 put it in the freezers. To us, that's like a full bank 11 account in a community. 12 13 You can sit here -- everyone around 14 this table and even in this room, when you have money 15 in the bank that's security. When we have food in our 16 freezers, that's food security. 17 18 I'm concerned that we have the same 19 thing, there's no rain. Everyone in this room knows 20 salmon need to get up the streams and if there's no 21 water in the streams, they're not going to. What does 22 that do to the parent year of this year's fish. Years 23 down the line when these fish are supposed to come back 24 so Mr. Wright can salmon seine, or as a guide I can go 25 out and catch them, they're not going to be existent 26 because there was no water. And when it wasn't 27 regulated properly. I think there should have been 28 someone saying, we need to do something now that 29 there's no water in the streams for the fish to get up, 30 but, no, we left the fishery open. There used to be a 31 10 day closure for trollers, that doesn't exist. 32 Something has to be done different. Traditional 33 knowledge has to be acknowledged because a lot of what 34 I'm learning from listening. Chairman Hernandez says 35 we listen. We have to listen to our elders and what 36 they have, it's amazing when you start connecting the 37 dots, that, well, the water's important for the salmon 38 to make it, the salmon's important because they have to 39 come back in the future. I may not be here when these 40 salmon return. It's just -- it's -- life. Life's that 41 way sometimes, you know. You get up one morning and -- 42 and we have a new Chairman, that -- that still sits 43 with me everyday and that should be something we think 44 about. Our elders taught us none of this belongs to 45 us, it belongs to our children and our grandchildren 46 and we have to take care of it and resource management 47 isn't our responsibility. Resource management, when 48 you heard the extra territorial jurisdiction petition, 49 sometimes that has to happen. Angoon has done that 50

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Page 30 1 before and there was repercussions for it. Political. 2 But at the end of the day we want to save the resource 3 that takes care of all of us. 4 5 We had bear hunter guides come through 6 Chatham. Imagine -- I sit in a charter and imagine how 7 mad my elders would be if they saw what I saw. A bear 8 floating with no head, no fur, no feet, nothing, 9 floating out in the middle of Chatham. Who does that. 10 There should be guidelines in place to keep that from 11 happening. We talk about a pristine Alaska. Imagine 12 the tourist coming through and seeing that, they're 13 like what in the world is this. 14 15 They're having an impact on Angoon. 16 17 I had a crab pot, he was talking about 18 crab, I had a crab pot in one of the bays and I go to 19 check it and I see somebody pulling it for me. I was 20 like, did you get anything, yeah, it was full, I was, 21 like, yeah, that was my crab pot, so he starts 22 explaining himself, he's friends with so and so and so 23 and so and I was like, you know, in communities not 24 everybody likes everybody and the friends you 25 mentioned, I don't like them, and then I don't like you 26 because you're pulling my pot that would feed elders in 27 my community that cannot come out here and get crab of 28 their own. So when people make decisions on, yeah, 29 we'll allow you to go bear hunting in this bay, there's 30 consequences to that. This is one of them. 31 32 The other consequence now is we've got 33 people that never knew about the deer population in 34 Chatham coming in to Chatham to hunt. That's another 35 unintended consequence. 36 37 So more so than -- I understand climate 38 change is important but we also have to address the 39 rest of this, the resource. 40 41 The impact certain things have on our 42 communities. And he mentioned we -- at the tribal 43 council we tried to ask the State to shut down certain 44 use areas for our community, three days, for crab and 45 other resources and the proposal wasn't thrown out -- 46 or it was thrown out. The other proposal that was less 47 likely to succeed moved forward to the Board, which was 48 close down Chatham altogether. Well, they moved that 49 one forward because they knew that wasn't going to 50

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Page 31 1 pass, but the reality of not putting the three bays 2 that we wanted to close to commercial crabbing ended up 3 with no crab the next year. A boat came and dumped 4 every possible pot they could in the bay, took all the 5 males that were legal size and left everything that 6 wasn't legal. Now, imagine I put my pot in there and 7 I'm like I got to eat, and I only use myself as an 8 example because this is the reality of the people in 9 Angoon, they have to eat. Sometimes the crab is the 10 last thing they can get so they pull it and it's 11 undersized crab, they're going to get a ticket. You go 12 fishing to catch a king salmon, you usually catch it in 13 the spring, you're going to get a ticket. 14 15 So there has to be a balance. 16 17 That's part of the intent of sitting 18 here, I mean, and the reality of Angoon. We can't go 19 to the store and buy this stuff. And sometimes to 20 bring yourself back to center in life and everything 21 else, you go trolling and try to catch a king, it gets 22 your mind right, gets everything right. And you took 23 it away without asking. That's the biggest problem we 24 have down -- and to sit there as a leader in the 25 community, what are you going to do about it. 26 27 I'd like for us to find a way to 28 address that the next time you want to close king 29 salmon, address it as a subsistence food, where you 30 give it priority, where you come out and ask Angoon, do 31 you guys really need it. Come and look in our 32 freezers, some of our people are, you know, it's hard 33 to explain unless you're the person it's happening to. 34 35 I don't sit here for myself, I could be 36 home hunting or taking care of my mother. I'm 37 fortunate enough to have family that they come and take 38 care of her while I'm here. But this is important. 39 This is the reality of Angoon. 40 41 Decisions that are being made outside 42 of Angoon are having an impact. And it isn't how the 43 laws are written. You're supposed to come and consult, 44 government to government in some instances. But until 45 you don't -- when you start listening and start 46 protecting -- I've heard them say, well, people have 47 boat payments to make, I've been a commercial fisherman 48 and just so you guys know I'm going back that way, I 49 sold out of my charter, I'm still going to work for the 50

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Page 32 1 company but I'm buying under commercial because my boys 2 are old enough, I don't have to take care of them 3 anymore so I don't have to stay home. Until you 4 realize this system isn't working we have in place. 5 Alaska has a history of decimating the resource and 6 then, oh, geez, I wish we would have listened to 7 somebody, and part of that history started with the 8 fish traps. The fish traps almost decimated the salmon 9 industry. And now you have 58 foot -- I've said this 10 before, you have 58 foot seiners, they put a limit on 11 them, size limit, 58, what's happening, you can go down 12 to the docks down here, yeah, they're 58 feet, but 13 they're almost 58 feet wide, which means you can pack 14 three or 400,000 pounds. When they went limited entry, 15 those boats probably backed 60,000 pounds which means 16 you have to quit fishing and go unload. These boats 17 don't have to quit fishing, they can keep fishing. So 18 what's going to happen is we're going to go back to the 19 old days of the fish traps, where you have so many 20 multiplier effects on these salmon, water, commercial 21 fishermen, you have charter boats, I'm going to blame 22 everybody for this, I'm going to blame myself because 23 I'm not speaking up. 24 25 I heard these young people speaking and 26 believe it or not I used to be as shy as you guys were 27 but when it comes to our resource people need to hear 28 you. 29 30 A lot of you have grown up on the 31 resources. It's our traditional foods, it's something 32 our elders have always done. Everything's affected. 33 That's why I want to have this kind of meeting in 34 Angoon. Come and look in our freezers, some of them 35 are empty. 36 37 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 38 39 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Albert. 40 John Yeager from Wrangell. 41 42 MR. YEAGER: Thank you, Mr. Chair. A 43 lot of the things that I've took notes on have already 44 been mentioned by my fellow Council members and so I'll 45 try not to touch on those. But I think that will be 46 kind of the status for most of our reports because a 47 lot of the effects are region-wide, if not state-wide, 48 unfortunately. 49 50

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Page 33 1 In Wrangell, specifically over the 2 course of the summer I think the exceptional weather 3 was just the talk of the town. There was just so much 4 nice weather that everyone seemed fairly upbeat about 5 it but along with that came the effects of the nice 6 weather, the impact on fishing, the impact on the 7 salmon, salmon streams, the lack of rain during the 8 summer. So all of this is -- was basically a big 9 recipe for a lot of questions and worry. There's a 10 substantial amount of worry in the town amongst the 11 people. Commercial fishermen for one. I don't need to 12 reiterate that the salmon season was down, extremely 13 low, compared to other years. Sportfishing was down 14 again. A lot of questions about the management of the 15 king salmon and the practice with such a -- the drastic 16 restrictions. People were talking about, why did we 17 all of a sudden get to this, you know, drastic measure 18 for management. Could this have been -- should this 19 have been seen for earlier on and maybe a more 20 progressive management practice was a very talked about 21 issue amongst the fishermen. 22 23 There was a great understanding, I 24 think, about the king salmon and the reasons why we 25 couldn't fish where we normally do at certain times and 26 I think from -- personally from my experience with my 27 charter clients, that they understood why we weren't 28 fishing for king salmon. They understood that catch 29 and release is just as damaging on the king salmon and 30 something that we weren't going to do. And so I feel 31 fortunate that I didn't have to fight that battle, but 32 it did mean losing business, especially from people 33 that wanted king salmon, they went elsewhere or didn't 34 come to Alaska at all. 35 36 When I was asked why we were having 37 these issues, there's so many speculations and reasons 38 out there that there was no one clear answer for it and 39 you mentioned -- our Chairman mentioned about listening 40 and I did a lot of listening and you couldn't actually 41 give a straight answer in my opinion because there was 42 just so many potential effects that were causing our 43 salmon to be in the situation that they are now. 44 45 So that was actually a lot of the 46 discussions and a lot of the problems that we were 47 facing in Wrangell. 48 49 The community would like to continue to 50

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Page 34 1 have the Transboundary Mining issue in the forefront 2 and would like our Council to continue requesting some 3 updates and monitoring on that and they feel that that 4 should be something that is very important for us to 5 maintain our eyes on. 6 7 Predation on salmon, in particular. 8 The community members are noticing more than ever 9 larger amounts of seals and sea lions and whales that 10 are more -- you talk to elders and some of the 11 fishermen that have been in Wrangell for years and 12 years and years and they'll tell you that they never 13 saw sea lions around the flats of the Stikine River, 14 and now we have them by the hundreds, and we have them 15 traveling further up the river. Seals by the hundreds 16 up there. You go by a sandbar and one individual 17 counted almost 300 seals on a sandbar up on the Stikine 18 River. I personally, out on fishing trips, have seen 19 sea lions eating salmon right behind my boat. And it 20 has to have an impact and it has to be noticed and it 21 has to be recorded and it has to be, you know, watched, 22 because there are a lot of salmon eaten by predators. 23 24 Another thing that we noticed is that a 25 lot of commercial fishing boats for sale. We have some 26 boats up on the hard right now, and I walked through 27 the yard there there were 15 gillnet boats out of the 28 water right now and five of them have for sale signs on 29 them. That's a pretty high number, I think, of people 30 that are unfortunately either are failing in that area 31 or business or just decide to give it up because they 32 are seeing possibly the future impacts of fishing to 33 them, and that's sad to see that because that affects 34 the community, it affects the family, and that's 35 unfortunate. 36 37 The moose hunting, and hunting in 38 general in the Wrangell area, very difficult. Good 39 weather, sunshine, dry conditions and a lot of animals 40 are moving at night. They're not typically where they 41 were in previous years, and I think not having the 42 official numbers, but I think the moose, particularly 43 on the Stikine River are probably less than 15 animals 44 taken on the river this hunting season. But I don't 45 have those numbers in front of me for sure but just 46 from what I've seen and by talking to other people. 47 48 I think that is about all that I have. 49 But I do mirror a lot of the comments from other 50

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Page 35 1 Council members and I feel that there's huge impacts 2 coming from what's happening to salmon and to our 3 climate and I think we need to be prepared. 4 5 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 6 7 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, John. 8 Cathy Needham from Juneau. 9 10 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 11 have a few comments that I want to make. But one of 12 them is kind of a housekeeping comment that I'd like to 13 start off with. 14 15 It's been this Council's observation in 16 the past and something that we've brought up in our 17 annual report about, you know, we always talk about the 18 budget constraints that we're under and how much that 19 is making it more and more difficult for us to do our 20 job effectively and in our annual report from this last 21 year, you know, we brought to light some comments that 22 we have brought up ourselves about the number of 23 Federal Staff support biologists that are available to 24 us. And we're working on this meeting, in our 25 fisheries cycle, and we're going to be making decisions 26 about potential fisheries regulations and I kind of 27 look around the room and I'm thinking, most of the 28 faces that we've seen in the past that have helped us 29 with these kinds of decisions are not here. I know a 30 couple of them are on the phone and I appreciate their 31 ability to attend by phone. And I want to bring that 32 point up because, as you know, I wasn't able to make 33 the last Council meeting and so I participated by 34 phone, and that's not something that I ever really want 35 to do again. It is the most difficult way to 36 understand what's really going on in the room. It's 37 difficult to ask questions. It's difficult to even get 38 acknowledged. And I appreciate the fact that the phone 39 is available to people who can't attend, but as a 40 Council member it is not an effective way to conduct 41 business. I did not feel like I, personally, could 42 even participate in the meeting. I could listen but I 43 really couldn't participate. And that's not any of the 44 -- the fault of how we do business, it's just the phone 45 system, in and of itself is not conducive for having 46 the one on one interactions that we become accustomed 47 to. In our comments in our annual letter to the 48 Federal Subsistence Board, we brought this -- not 49 necessarily the phone issue, but the issue of having 50

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Page 36 1 support Staff here to work with us and to be able to 2 ask questions and have them be able to come up before 3 us and give us information that we need to make 4 decisions. And I want to read to you what the Board's 5 response was to our annual letter in respect to that. 6 It says, the Board agrees with the Council, that this 7 is important to have appropriate Federal Staff at the 8 Council meetings to work with the Council. While there 9 have been reductions in Federal travel budgets, the 10 Council can expect continuing biological support at our 11 meetings. And I could only hope that my observation 12 around the room this morning is a product of the fact 13 that we're just beginning our deliberations and we have 14 not started working on our fisheries proposals. But I 15 really hope that we will be able to have some support 16 biologists available to us this meeting so that we can 17 move forward with that. 18 19 I want to make sure that this issue 20 stays to light because I think that I've been on the 21 Council for nine, almost 10 years now, if I'm 22 reappointed, of course, and I've noticed this change. 23 When I first started on the Council we had a lot of 24 Staff here, available and that's how I learned about 25 things, the things that you don't do just succinctly in 26 being able to talk into a microphone and put it on the 27 record. I have always appreciated the fact that I can 28 go to our Federal Staff, both the Forest Service Staff 29 employees and the Office of Subsistence Management 30 Staff people, as well as the Fish and Game Staff 31 people, to ask questions, so that I can get into an 32 intellectual space to be able to make a decision when 33 we actually deliberate. 34 35 So I just wanted to bring that up. I 36 know it's kind of not the most positive comment to make 37 but I think it's important. 38 39 To switch gears a little bit, I had the 40 opportunity to spend the last six months on Prince of 41 Wales Island. Most of my work took me there this year 42 and so since our last meeting I haven't lived in 43 Juneau. It's hard to know what's going in the 44 community necessarily when it comes to subsistence- 45 based issues, but I did get to spend time on Prince of 46 Wales and it was an interesting summer. You know the 47 weather was amazing, it's hard to complain when you 48 have sunshine every day and you're out there working on 49 the land and doing things, and I really appreciated 50

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Page 37 1 that. I'd say for the first half of the summer I was 2 quite confused about whether or not a lot of fishing 3 and gathering opportunities that I thought would be 4 available were actually going to happen. A lot of 5 observations about the warm weather affecting the fish 6 coming back into the creeks. The warm weather 7 affecting berry crops because of berries being dried 8 out. And then it seems like later than normal, in late 9 August all those things really started clicking and 10 started to happen. So it didn't necessarily happen on 11 a timeframe that I was used to or expected, but, you 12 know, we were fortunate in the lower portion of Prince 13 of Wales Island to have a lot of sockeye come back that 14 we weren't expecting and up until about a week and a 15 half ago, I was still actively picking berries, and 16 having a great berry crop. So I'm not sure that that 17 was region-wide, but on the southern part of Southeast 18 Alaska those changes in weather patterns definitely are 19 having an effect in terms of shifts, and how resources 20 are available. But I think a lot of needs were being 21 met. 22 23 Having spent time on Prince of Wales 24 Island, I also had numerous conversations about the 25 wolf situation and what I was hearing on the ground is 26 that people still continue to feel like the number of 27 wolves on the island is too high, and the new 28 population estimate has just been released this last 29 week of having 231 and I know we're going to have a 30 presentation by the State about the new wolf management 31 plan and I just want to convey the message that I've 32 been hearing, is that, the number 231 is too many 33 wolves for Prince of Wales. And so I'm interested to 34 hear, like I know we're trying to narrow -- the wolf 35 management plan is trying to narrow in on a specific 36 target range of wolves and I'm interested to hear what 37 that's going to be but I also want to put forward the 38 message that a lot of subsistence users are saying that 39 231 is too high for the whole of Unit 2. 40 41 Another observation I made that was 42 interesting and it goes along with Mr. Schroeder's 43 comments about climate change. I think it would be 44 interesting to go through a lot of our transcripts, 45 maybe this is a student project, or somebody's PhD 46 actually, and looking at how we've talked about, over 47 time, the traditional knowledge that has come from this 48 body and how we've talked about shifts and changes and 49 harvest patterns and stuff and concerns that we've had 50

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Page 38 1 that actually can be tied back into these changes in 2 climate change. And just by making the observations 3 that we do on the record, that's actually a data 4 project waiting to happen in terms of finding 5 information. And with that being said, one observation 6 that I made on Prince of Wales was later in the season, 7 a lot of the red cedar were drying -- the needles, if 8 you will, were drying up and turning brown and so when 9 you're driving down the corridor on Prince of Wales 10 Island between Klawock and Hydaburg, it's almost like 11 looking at trees in the fall when they change color, 12 the red cedar was changing -- the leaves were changing 13 from green, from the evergreen state and drying up and 14 turning brown, sort of an orangish-brown and stuff. 15 And I think that -- I think what we were seeing is 16 actually a pretty large -- I don't want to say all of 17 the red cedar are going to die off but definitely a 18 large impact to red cedar. And I think it's because -- 19 possibly because the season -- we had such a warm, dry 20 summer, that our water table on Prince of Wales Island 21 just went below enough that the red cedar weren't 22 getting the water that they needed. So just having 23 those kinds of observations and having them on the 24 record, somebody can look at, the traditional knowledge 25 that's being shared amongst the Council members about 26 what's happening in their communities, would be a 27 project or something, or a way to look at information 28 and how climate change has been impacting, at least 29 subsistence resources over time. 30 31 My final comment, and I have a lot of 32 questions regarding the roadless rule, and so I do want 33 to say that I'm looking forward to hearing the 34 presentation that is coming up today and saving my 35 comments and questions regarding that to that 36 discussion. But I think most communities have now been 37 visited and are getting that information and I hope 38 that we can have a very productive discussion about 39 what's coming down the pike with that. 40 41 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 42 43 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Cathy. 44 45 Raymond Sensmeier from Yakutat. 46 47 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 48 I would like to say that, you know, we had a long hot 49 summer as well, over six weeks and I remember a long 50

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Page 39 1 time ago when we had extended periods of sunshine you 2 would hear the elders talk about it as earthquake 3 weather and that was in my mind a lot because it was 4 hot. 5 6 And as Frank and Harvey testified the 7 streams were drying up. You had a lot of fish at the 8 mouths of the river that wouldn't come in. My wife 9 always puts up a lot of dry fish and smoke strips and 10 this year she put up one king salmon and a couple of 11 sockeyes, that was it. They didn't even open the 12 commercial season at all and they also closed it for 13 subsistence. The stopped the sporties from catching, 14 told them they couldn't catch sockeye but they allowed 15 them to continue and catch Dolly Varden. Well, I don't 16 know how you catch Dolly Varden without catching 17 sockeye. 18 19 And as far as the herring eggs, Harvey 20 mentioned when Sitka feels the pinch on herring eggs, 21 we feel it in Yakutat. Because traditionally we always 22 trade eulachon for herring eggs and there's very, very 23 little herring eggs that came, so we're concerned about 24 that. 25 26 Someone mentioned, Frank mentioned the 27 cruise ships, we have had a problem with them for a 28 long time, not only do they dump massive amounts of 29 pollutants into the water, they come into 30 Disenchantment Bay, where we've traditionally hunted 31 seals, they come in around the 15th of May and that's 32 when the mother's are giving birth to the pups and the 33 pups when they're first born don't know how to swim and 34 they don't have a lot of fat and so they depend upon 35 the mothers for milk and they have to lay on the ice 36 pans to do that and the cruise ships are so big that 37 they can just come in and plow through the ice and it 38 washes the babies off into the cold water and we have a 39 high mortality rate as a result, and a lot lower 40 population of seals than there used to be. 41 42 Egg Island is in the middle of 43 Disenchantment Bay and now you can see five, six, seven 44 sea lions sitting on the rocks there and they never 45 used to go in there. That's a concern as well. 46 47 And I heard several people mention the 48 bear problem. We had a lot of bears coming into town, 49 right up around the houses and several had to be killed 50

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Page 40 1 for that reason so, you know, there's no fish going up, 2 we're starving for fish, they're starving for fish and 3 it's become a real problem that needs to be looked at, 4 if we can do anything. 5 6 Fortunately the quota on moose was 7 taken and a lot of the people that are going to have a 8 hard time this winter as a result of no fish managed to 9 get a moose, so that was a little bit of relief. But 10 even that was dangerous because -- like a friend of 11 mine, Tom (Indiscernible) lives in Haines now, he was a 12 teacher for 20 years in Yakutat, came in and two of his 13 friends, and they went across the bay to Mambi side, 14 and hunted, and they were successful and they packed 15 one load of meat on packboards down to the boat and 16 when they got back to the kill site there was a big 17 brown bear so they left, they didn't want to tangle 18 with the brown bear. 19 20 As DeAnna stated, this is my last 21 meeting. I had hoped that I could remain on the 22 Wrangell-St. Elias Board, I've been on that Board for 23 over 25 years, and I used to represent Yak -- I used to 24 represent Yakutat on the Wrangells, and now SERAC as 25 well. That's something that I would like to talk to 26 someone about. 27 28 So at this time that will conclude my 29 comments. 30 31 Thank you. 32 33 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Ray. 34 35 Michael Douville from Craig. 36 37 MR. DOUVILLE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 38 Just a word to our students up here, you know, I'm 39 happy to see them here and, you know, we sit here and 40 we look pretty serious but we do take our job very 41 seriously but really we're nice people. 42 43 (Laughter) 44 45 MR. DOUVILLE: And if you have 46 questions for us, we'd be happy to talk to you so don't 47 be intimidated at all. 48 49 There's a couple of things on my mind 50

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Page 41 1 here, one Cathy mentioned, is that, you know, we need 2 to have the proper support here. When a biologist 3 submits his work here and then is restricted to being 4 on the phone is not the same, that never happened 5 before. And I think Title VIII says that we will be 6 provided the proper support services and I don't think 7 we are, and it's a token effort, and I disagree with it 8 and I think it needs to change. 9 10 The most worrisome thing that we have 11 right now on Prince of Wales is this roadless rule that 12 is being looked at and the State wants to go through 13 the back door and overturn it, if you will. And it's 14 really troubling. I think we will get into that 15 discussion later, I had hoped to, but it's really 16 important for us to have a voice. And I think the 17 timing of our meeting here is not -- is a day off from 18 the closure of the scoping, which I think is important 19 and the next thing we'll be dealing with is the 20 alternatives and I totally disagree with that, we 21 should be able to make comment. 22 23 Anyway, the habitat is affecting the 24 deer and affecting the wolf and it's affecting 25 subsistence users, which we will get to at some point 26 in this meeting. 27 28 So that's all I have for now, thank 29 you. 30 31 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Mike. 32 Lastly, I guess, is my report, and I'll give a report 33 on what happened up at the Subsistence Board meeting in 34 April on wildlife issues and then I also have some, you 35 know, local concerns. 36 37 So I was very privileged to represent 38 the Council at the Board meeting in Anchorage on 39 wildlife issues. I thought that the meeting went very 40 well for the Southeast issues. The Board maybe had 41 four proposals before them, they adopted three of our 42 proposals, which was good, and the wolf proposal did 43 not get adopted but as we are finding out, that issue 44 continues to evolve and we will be addressing it again 45 in the near future. 46 47 I do have to say that, you know, the 48 work that this Council does is really exceptional. You 49 know before the Board to present our arguments for 50

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Page 42 1 proposals is just made so easy by the fact that we do 2 such a thorough job here and I know that's really 3 appreciated by the Board, and certainly anybody that's 4 fortunate enough to be a Chairman to go and present 5 your work is much appreciated. 6 7 As far as local issues go, of course, 8 you know, I would echo just about everything everybody 9 said here earlier about all the fisheries issues and 10 worries about the changing climate conditions. We, of 11 course, saw those effects as well as a community that's 12 very dependent on commercial fishing and subsistence 13 activities. 14 15 On a different note, I'd like to thank 16 the Forest Service for making two visits to our remote 17 community this summer. They sent Staff out to take 18 subsistence testimony regarding the Prince of Wales 19 Landscape Analysis. That was a good opportunity for 20 local people to voice a lot of concerns they have about 21 subsistence issues in general and in relation to the 22 planning efforts going on for the next 15 years on 23 Prince of Wales. And then we also had a meeting in 24 September, they sent Staff out to inform us about the 25 new roadless rule, which Mike mentioned, and take 26 comments from our community and we were pleased to have 27 people come all the way from Washington D.C., to our 28 community of 27 residents to hear our concerns and it 29 was a very, very good meeting. There was a lot of 30 discussion on all topics. And of course in the 31 roadless, just about all of our discussion centered 32 around subsistence activities. That was our main 33 concern and we made that very clear to the Forest 34 Service Staff people. 35 36 I look forward to having interaction 37 with the rest of the Council on that issue at this 38 meeting as well. 39 40 As far as other things happening in the 41 area, I think it was mentioned briefly, by Frank, about 42 the caterpillars, I want to start with caterpillars and 43 go from there. It's something that I know in my 45 44 years here living in the Forest I'd never seen before, 45 this infestation of caterpillars that were eating the 46 spruce needles and killing off the spruce needles and 47 the ground, at least in -- I don't know if it was 48 region-wide, but in my particular little corner of the 49 Forest there in the north end of Prince of Wales 50

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Page 43 1 Island, the ground was just littered with -- the first 2 thing we saw was caterpillar feces being deposited on 3 the ground and building up in quite large quantities 4 and nobody quite knew what that was at the time, and 5 then we started seeing the needles falling from the 6 trees and it was just building up in incredible amounts 7 on the Forest floor and you started noticing the trees, 8 the Hemlock trees just looking very bare, kind of 9 worrisome, especially in such dry conditions, you know, 10 we talked about the concern about fires but I mean the 11 entire Forest just looked different. And then come to 12 find out that, you know, these caterpillars were always 13 present. They're usually kept in check by a fungus. 14 The fungus normally kills off the larvae, I guess, of 15 the caterpillars when they lay their eggs and the dry 16 conditions, this fungus was not present to keep the 17 caterpillars in check. So the reason I mention this is 18 just the fact that the factors involved in the eco- 19 system that goes on in this Forest, there's some things 20 that we just don't realize. And subtle little things 21 like that can -- could have potential, you know, large 22 scale impacts and in our discussions on the climate 23 change and how it's affecting the Forest. 24 25 think the people in my community are 26 particularly attuned to it because we, I don't know, we 27 live so close to the Forest, all our activities are so 28 tied to what happens with the Forest, that this Forest, 29 this temprent rain Forest that we live in is the only 30 hope that we have in mitigating some of the effects 31 that we're going to see from climate change, through 32 our fisheries, our wildlife, the health of our Forest 33 with the trees, you know, that Cathy mentioned, the red 34 cedars, I hadn't noticed that, but now that she 35 mentioned it, I did, a lot of red cedars turning brown. 36 I mean it's got -- there's a lot of impacts. And, 37 yeah, just to be able to just take a look at the whole 38 scope of things and how important it is for the future 39 to just protect this Forest that surrounds us, I think 40 is just becoming crucial. And, you know, it just 41 really disturbs me to, you know, think that there are 42 still these fairly powerful forces out there that still 43 want to, you know, develop this Forest and to change it 44 into something that it is not now and never has been, 45 you know, with more timber harvest and going into, you 46 know, areas that were set aside as roadless that, you 47 know, protect subsistence values and large scale areas 48 of old growth Forest, it's just really -- really 49 concerning to me and my neighbors. 50

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Page 44 1 So that's the end of my report. 2 3 And we're going to take a break and 4 when we come back we will ask for any public testimony, 5 tribal testimony and then after that hopefully if we 6 have time before lunch we'll ask Alaska Department of 7 Fish and Game Wildlife Staff, Ryan Scott, to inform us 8 about what's happening with the wolf management. 9 10 So a 10 minute break, maybe 15 minute 11 break. 12 13 Thank you. 14 15 (Off record) 16 17 (On record) 18 19 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. Council 20 members, if you're in the room we'll get started here 21 with public testimony very shortly. 22 23 (Pause) 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. First up I 26 have one blue card from Mr. John Duncan, we'll call him 27 up first and I'll remind anybody in the audience, if 28 they would like to testify at this time, please let us 29 know, either with a blue card or just raise your hand 30 and let me know if you'd like to testify, that would be 31 great. 32 33 So, as I said, we'll start with Mr. 34 John Duncan. 35 36 MR. DUNCAN: Good morning. 37 38 My name is John Duncan. 39 40 (In Tlingit) 41 42 First of all, I'm Kiks.adi. I'm a 43 speaker of the Clay House, which (In Tlingit) the Chief 44 came from. And as most of you -- you know the history 45 that this is our land. And I wanted to welcome you 46 folks here to talk on very important issues for our 47 people, Tlingit. 48 49 I'm mostly concerned about the way our 50

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Page 45 1 subsistence was promised, by law, years ago, but let me 2 get into my introduction of myself first of all. 3 4 I was born in a camp in Excursion 5 Inlet, actually a military hospital in Excursion in 6 1943. I was raised up with my mother, from Sitka, 7 Kiks.adi, my dad was from Klukwan, and he was a 8 Northwest Mounted Police in Canada. They got married 9 and they settled in Excursion Inlet. And we were 10 raised on every seafood that was near Excursion. We 11 were raised on seal meat, bear meat, deer meat, 12 porcupine, all these things that were like all the 13 land. Then I was walking on the dock a couple years 14 ago with some people and then he said, well, what 15 happened, I said then the White man came. I'm not 16 discriminating -- I don't discriminate against people, 17 any kind, or religion. But the thing that was promised 18 to us years ago, where did it go. When I go after 19 crab, all those places closed. But we learned two 20 months later that it was open to commercial fishing. 21 22 I got a lot of things to talk about, 23 our subsistence, mainly is what happened to subsistence 24 first. Right now it's last place. 25 26 I learned this last over here in Sitka 27 when I got stopped by a State Trooper, he said the area 28 was closed for commercial fishing, emergency closure 29 they call it, but yet it was open for sportfishing, the 30 salmon derby. I was very angry when I was driving away 31 from there. Very angry. Because I said to myself, 32 what happened to subsistence, our people can't catch 33 king salmon but here it's open to sportfishing. What 34 happened to the picture. Is it someplace in these 35 papers that I overlook. Subsistence, I believe, is 36 still first. 37 38 I was really upset years ago when I was 39 reading that they took those seines away from those 40 poor -- our brothers -- we're all brothers, Native 41 brothers across the state, that's the way I look at it, 42 we all have to stand together. When they took their 43 seines away, threw them in jail, big fines and 44 everything, and I might be wrong, but they opened the 45 mouth of that place for commercial fishing. There's 46 something wrong with that picture. I always said that 47 our Native people are being discriminated in this state 48 and I tell you, who can prove me that I'm wrong, when 49 you go look at the highways and you see all kinds of 50

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Page 46 1 people working there, but no Native people on those 2 jobs. 3 4 So those are -- I didn't know -- am I 5 on time. 6 7 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes, continue. 8 9 MR. DUNCAN: I'm a senior citizen, and 10 I'm speaking on this very important issue that is going 11 over for years and years, and it's very important that 12 I come here and I have to say that, but besides saying 13 that, you folks are welcome on this land. 14 15 But I'm hoping that the Federal 16 government could help look at the State, what they're 17 doing to our people, and why all of a sudden that 18 subsistence belongs to everybody. Our Native people 19 were the ones here years ago, they were the ones that 20 were promised. But from what I understand the State 21 said well everybody's got to be, everybody. So when it 22 comes to fighting for stuff like this and talking for 23 this kind of stuff, we're the ones that have to do it, 24 we have to give up the time, we have to put the money 25 up, nobody else, that's getting the subsistence in this 26 whole state come stand with us. 27 28 I wanted to talk about the herring 29 issue because that's a very big thing. 30 31 I spoke with the State many times 32 letting them know that we're the ones that know what's 33 happening with the herring because we fish it from the 34 time it starts until the time it ends. Over 90 percent 35 of our subsistence areas are gone. The rest of the 10 36 percent, we're lucky to get 10 percent herring eggs on 37 our branches anymore. And last year the only place -- 38 the only place that our Native people was going to be 39 able to get herring eggs from, the Fish and Game opened 40 that area in front of there, no more than half a mile 41 away and took all that herring that was probably going 42 to spawn in that area, so they came out with nothing. 43 What's wrong with our Native people. 44 45 I said one time, we're not the ones 46 that bombed Pearl Harbor, yet, the State is so excited 47 about getting all the food from the Native people so 48 that the people that bombed Pearl Harbor could have it. 49 Like I said, I'm not prejudiced to nobody. 50

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Page 47 1 I told you folks that I lived off 2 subsistence, that's all we had, we didn't have a choice 3 then. My dad had only a thumb and a pointed finger on 4 one hand, and on the other hand he only had a thumb, 5 and he had to provide for us. 6 7 So I really urge whatever you folks can 8 do, to check on the State and see what they're doing to 9 us. I don't think -- I know -- I know it's not right. 10 I know we're being discriminated against. Everything 11 that our Native people can make money off of there's a 12 law against it, but, yet, boxes and boxes of fish are 13 going out of here on Alaska Airlines. Our people are 14 hurting up north, our brothers and sisters are hurting 15 up north, do you think we can put a box of humpies or 16 dog salmon on the plane and send it to them. We got so 17 much whales here in town that are eating up our 18 herring, they're having a hard time trying to get a 19 whale up there, why can't we share. But most of all, 20 please look at our people and what they deserve, what 21 they fought for and what they took care of. 22 23 I talked about Proposition 1 when I 24 went over to a meeting that we're having at the 25 Centennial Building. That Proposition 1, it's good, I 26 like to protect the fish, but I said, what about our 27 people. When I went there I heard everybody talking 28 about commercial, what about our people, our people, 29 ancestors took care of the fish, took care of that for 30 years and years, don't take too much, don't kill that, 31 we were taught as kids not to kill something that we 32 weren't going to eat. So we really protected the fish. 33 That's why today they're fighting over it. 34 35 But I'm a construction worker all my 36 life, I got a different language than most people do. 37 I'm not on those computers because I'm an old-timer. 38 39 Look after our people. That's the last 40 word I'm going to say with you. 41 42 The herring, we need to look at -- they 43 call us liars and everything, they told us we're lazy, 44 we didn't know how to do it, if anybody knew how to do 45 the herring it was -- I knew, I paid attention from 46 high school, 1959 when I went to Mt. Edgecumbe High 47 School I started paying attention to the herring that 48 was going through the channel. Everybody used to say, 49 you'll hear the story over and over, we could have 50

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Page 48 1 walked over it and we hung on, for over 20 years we've 2 been hanging on to try and slow it down, not to stop 3 the commercial fishermen, but so that there would be 4 fishing today. Now, they can't fish today. All the 5 people that were telling me there's so much herring out 6 there you could walk over it, they can't even step on 7 one now. 8 9 So I'm very glad that you folks are 10 here to meet on the land. I'm glad to see some of our 11 people on the Board. And I always told my people, if 12 you're not going to vote in favor of our Native people 13 then you need to get out of here because we're the 14 reasons why they're here. I'm not necessarily talking 15 about all you folks, but most of our organizations that 16 are here, got to stick up for our Native people. And 17 I'm only here. 18 19 (In Tlingit) 20 21 I'm not talking here for my life 22 anymore, I'm talking for our grandkids that will have 23 that right, subsistence first. There's a lot of other 24 stuff that are not subsistence first anymore. You talk 25 about the shrimp. Now, they're getting into our 26 seaweeds. Oh, there's restrictions that the Native 27 people can't do it, but commercial people can. 28 29 I'm here for our people, I'm not 30 speaking for an organization, I'm here for the Native 31 people. 32 33 I said awhile ago my life is short, I 34 know, maybe three years, not matter to me any more, 35 yeah it does, for our grandkids, for our people, just 36 like our language, we're going to try to teach what we 37 can so that when we go away we're not taking everything 38 with us. 39 40 Gunalcheesh. 41 42 (In Tlingit) 43 44 Thank you for giving me the time and 45 listening to me. 46 47 Thank you, very much. 48 49 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Mr. 50

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Page 49 1 Duncan. And I don't want to have any misunderstandings 2 here, you asked a brief question about time, we don't 3 have any time limits on testimony here, you know, 4 unlike the Board of Fish process, people can speak for 5 as long as they wish. So with that, if you want to 6 stay there and take any questions or comments from the 7 Council you may do so. 8 9 Council members, any questions, 10 comments for Mr. Duncan. 11 12 Harvey. 13 14 MR. KITKA: Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's 15 good to see you here Mr. Duncan. 16 17 I just -- being at the Board of Fish 18 meetings with you and over the times, would you explain 19 to the people and just basically the way they put it to 20 us on not having the effort put into it, are you 21 putting in more effort into getting your herring eggs 22 now than when you used to 10 years ago? 23 24 MR. DUNCAN: Thank you, Mr. Kitka. 25 I'll be glad to. When I first started putting herring 26 eggs out, branches, I was able to tell where the 27 herring started spawning or where they were going to 28 spawn next by years of watching and paying attention. 29 We were told that we're lazy now, we're not doing it 30 right but yet the boats that are hired to get the eggs 31 for people, they are paid by commercial fishermen to 32 get the eggs, and I went with one of those boats this 33 last couple years and I been helping them, showing them 34 where to set and those boats are having a hard time 35 trying to meet what commercial fishermen are asking 36 them to do. And this last year one of the boats asked 37 them to -- one of the seine boats that they were going 38 to show us how, they got a bunch of trees, went out and 39 dropped them out there and those trees are still there. 40 Show me. If they're not going to stay and spawn on 41 your trees you can show us how you're going to drop the 42 trees in but they didn't bring any eggs in. That big 43 seine boat, all those trees were there, the seine boat 44 left, those trees are still there and now we have to go 45 and clean them out because if you don't clean them out 46 they'll be all mixed up with your new branches. 47 48 Very hard. 49 50

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Page 50 1 I used to have to -- and I send eggs to 2 a lot of people across the state, some of them I think 3 the State should have been paying for at least their 4 shipment. And talking about Homer, where they had that 5 oil spill. And Juneau. Juneau had a lot of eggs over 6 there, they had so much eggs there, and so much 7 herring, that place you could have walked on the 8 herring, it was thick on the beach when the tide went 9 out too fast, they were dying. But it wasn't that, 10 they fished it out, and I keep asking the State, what 11 are they going to do for Juneau. Now Berners Bay is 12 starting to get a little bit of eggs and they're 13 already talking about fishing that. But I sent word 14 over to Juneau that you guys need to stop, it's 15 Juneau's deal, they need to stop that because they need 16 to get their herring eggs first, they have to pay a lot 17 of money to come over here and get eggs. 18 19 I had to -- I have to work a lot harder 20 because, like I said, a lot of the places don't get 21 them anymore and then right now it does -- the places 22 that used to spawn for seven days are lucky to spawn 23 for seven hours, one tide. And we have to tow that 24 tree someplace else where they'll spawn good or we have 25 to set a lot more trees and hoping that one or two of 26 the trees will turn out okay. I'm talking about 100 27 trees. I have to drop a 100 trees in the water to 28 maybe get two trees or three trees out of it and that's 29 not even enough to -- for anybody. And they're very 30 thin. They used to be real -- I have pictures, they 31 were very thick eggs, now they're really thin. And 32 people get mad when you send it to them, oh, they're 33 really thin, okay, you need to go to a Fish and Game 34 meeting then. 35 36 So the reason why I keep asking about 37 the time is because when we go to a Fish Board meeting 38 they tell you, all your life that you've been living 39 off the subsistence you got two minutes to talk, you're 40 cut off, you can't talk no more, and seniors like us, 41 Harvey's dad was one of the very knowledgeable guys, 42 yet, by the time he got up to the chair and sat down 43 and introduced himself his time was almost up, but they 44 cut him off. Our Native people, that's how we're 45 getting treated. 46 47 So it's so much different, like I know 48 what Harvey asked me, and it is really, really 49 frustrating to go and you have to spend probably six 50

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Page 51 1 times more gas to go back and forth, set those branches 2 and because -- because it's so hard to get now -- if 3 you have a good tree out there it's going to be gone 4 over night, and you can't blame them, because they're 5 not getting any eggs, they'll take that one. And the 6 people that they were paying to go out and get eggs to 7 give away because they're getting paid for it, they 8 were picking up eggs, so it's really hard to leave your 9 tree in there and let it get any thick, if it was going 10 to, and if it got thick you got to watch out because 11 it's already gone, somebody else enjoying it over in 12 Juneau or Anchorage or someplace else. Here we work so 13 hard. I was so upset because I see women doing it, and 14 they were taking it from the women that worked so hard 15 to get it out there. And they were stealing from 16 handicapped people that had a hard time like myself. 17 Nobody really knows that I'm 75 years old and 18 handicapped, my bones hurt, it's really -- I used to 19 listen to uncles, it's hard to get old. 20 21 Anyway, thank you very much and I hope 22 that I answered your question, Harvey, because it is 23 like one -- one year we had one island, they talk about 24 all the miles, everybody got their eggs off one island 25 and people are buying up land around that island and 26 you know what's going to happen, that beach will be 27 contaminated from sewer and stuff. So that's what 28 we're up against. 29 30 I asked for two bays to be closed off 31 last year, and I hold that against those Fish and Game 32 Board for turning down those two bay to be closed, when 33 they don't even fish there, but I'm just saying maybe 34 three herring will go up the bay and they'll spawn and 35 people will leave them alone and then it'll get big 36 again. But point number 1, I'm here because 37 subsistence people are getting pushed away, being 38 pushed under, and herring is the biggest thing right 39 now that I'm concerned about. 40 41 Thank you very much. If you have any 42 more questions I'm glad to -- I'll answer it really 43 short this time. 44 45 (Laughter) 46 47 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Frank. 48 49 MR. WRIGHT: Thanks for coming and 50

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Page 52 1 testifying John. 2 3 You know, the use of herring eggs is 4 changing a lot because there's so little of it. I 5 remember when mom and them used to hang some branches 6 outside to be sun-dried, we don't do that anymore 7 because there's not enough. And I remember taking it 8 off the -- taking the herring eggs off the branch and 9 dip it in the seal oil and eat it like that, you know, 10 so because of the way things are going, our culture is 11 changing a lot because of restrictions that we have 12 being put on us as a people. 13 14 Gunalcheesh for testifying. 15 16 MR. DUNCAN: Yeah, thank you, Mr. 17 Wright. And I'd like to say, you know, I was in Hoonah 18 -- I used to be on the other hand where you received 19 herring eggs years ago when I was a boy, going to 20 school in Hoonah, what a delicacy. Now, we can't even 21 send a branch to Hoonah, there's nothing. There's 22 nothing. It's not that we don't want to it's just not 23 there anymore. 24 25 My biggest request, biggest reason why 26 I'm here is please, please, please watch the State. 27 What I understood was that when the Federal government 28 turned the fishery over to the State, they said you 29 have to take care of that. Right now we're not -- 30 right now they aren't. So we're hoping that you folks 31 or anybody can look at the State and say you have to 32 pay attention to what they're supposed to do for our 33 Native people. 34 35 Thank you, very much. You folks have a 36 good stay and a good visit here. And if the Lord would 37 be over your head and our Native people welcome you 38 here. 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. 41 Albert, you have a question or a comment. 42 43 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 44 Thank you, Mr. Duncan for coming before us. 45 46 I bring a group from Angoon every year, 47 we didn't come last year. A bunch of my guys went off 48 to college to try to become smart so they can push this 49 rock up the hill we've been pushing up for years. 50

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Page 53 1 My question to you would be, if you 2 were allowed to change the way resource was being 3 managed concerning herring eggs, what would you do 4 different with your traditional knowledge and the 5 traditional knowledge of everyone here in Sitka that's 6 been here before it became commercialized. I had an 7 uncle, Al McKinley, my favorite -- his comment was when 8 he was in Glacier Bay collecting seagull eggs, the 9 mosquitoes were terrible, he said somebody call the 10 Fish and Game so they can manage the mosquitoes so 11 they'll disappear like everything else that's being 12 managed. 13 14 (Laughter) 15 16 MR. HOWARD: So if you had the 17 opportunity to fix this important matter, it's 18 important to Angoon, it's important to all Southeast, 19 and if you don't get that you have to look at the 20 beginning of the food chain. Our elders in Angoon, one 21 of them being Reggie Nelson, who used to live in Sitka, 22 he said go check here and see if there's herring 23 spawning, you go back, Reggie there's nothing there, 24 well, go check here, I'm not going to say where because 25 somehow that's going to become commercialized, so in my 26 mind every year he sends me somewhere to see, places 27 there used to be herring spawn like Sitka, these guys 28 have a real problem and it's not being addressed, it's 29 going to end up like the salmon problem, this is the 30 beginning of Southeast Alaska's food chain, herring. 31 They may come here to spawn but they leave here and go 32 to different areas of Southeast Alaska. So if you had 33 the answer to change in the way it's being managed, 34 what would you do and how would you like to see that 35 change. 36 37 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 38 39 MR. DUNCAN: I'll tell you, the only 40 way that we could have saved it was if the commercial 41 fishermen slowed down. If the Fish and Game took care 42 of things right, not just looking at the money. I 43 would have slowed it down so that everybody would 44 benefit, including the fishermen. And we keep 45 reminding them, that we're not here to close them down, 46 we're here so that we could save it and their permits 47 would be worth money. 48 49 I mentioned two days ago at Fish and 50

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Page 54 1 Game, that maybe we should say go ahead and fish it out 2 and your permit's won't be worth a dime. Well, right 3 now that's where it's at. So I would have worked hard 4 with the Fish and Game, to let them know that they have 5 to take care of this and slow it down so that everybody 6 can benefit off of it. And let me remind you that my 7 brother was Robert Duncan from Angoon, and my cousin 8 was Alfred McKinley from Hoonah, and a story about 9 that, is they were talking about mosquitoes and he said 10 that I wish that the Fish and Game can take care of the 11 mosquitoes because everything they take care of, it 12 depletes. That was exactly what he said. 13 14 So our cousin, he's gone now. But I 15 keep that in my mind, too, that -- I can't say it too 16 often because my nephew is with NOAA, so my brother get 17 a little upset if I mention that comment. 18 19 (Laughter) 20 21 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. Bob. 22 23 MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you, Mr. 24 Chairman. I'd like to thank you. I think you helped 25 out quite a bit, oh, it's many, many years ago on the 26 first documentation of herring egg harvest in Sitka 27 that took place, I think it's like 25 years ago, with 28 Matt Kookesh. At that time there was a move on the 29 part of certain interests in Fish and Game to put a -- 30 like a bag limit on herring roe harvest, and if I'm 31 remembering right you very graciously took Matt and I 32 around and shared your knowledge with us and that ended 33 up in a report, Gunalcheesh, which, at least got rid of 34 that threat because it turned out that, no, if you put 35 a bag limit on herring roe you basically shut the 36 subsistence users out because it's people like Mr. 37 Duncan who are community harvesters and who supply 38 dozens if not hundreds of people in Sitka and around 39 Southeast. 40 41 So I really appreciate your 42 steadfastness on this issue and your good work for so 43 many years. 44 45 Gunalcheesh. 46 47 MR. DUNCAN: Yeah, I remember that very 48 well and I was very open because this, again, was for 49 our subsistence people, and I do work very hard to get 50

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Page 55 1 it to most of our people because like I said awhile 2 ago, that I was on the other end. I know what it 3 tastes like. I know how happy they are to get it. And 4 I tell you those people are just -- it's something 5 else, a lot of our poor elders haven't had it for years 6 because all these, either regulations, or the ground 7 we've been losing to where we can't take care of 8 everybody. I really feel bad that a lot of people, our 9 people can't -- you have to imagine if they took your 10 steaks away, if they took your buttered popcorn away. 11 You know, you have to imagine that, how would you feel 12 man, it just really -- I mean for years, I talked about 13 I lived off subsistence food. When we had hot dogs, 14 man it was a holiday, you had to go from Excursion to 15 Hoonah, that's 20 miles on a five horse, they didn't 16 have big motors then, five horse, and you had to make 17 sure the weather was going to be good because it takes 18 you awhile on the five horse to get that -- and it was 19 like 25 miles or something like that, and you had to 20 come back on the small skiff that's maybe a freeboard, 21 it's about 16 by 18 inches, you know, so we had to go 22 to Hoonah to get our food and all the way back, so they 23 had to get -- like I say, my dad was crippled and he 24 didn't have a whole lot of choice and money to go and 25 get stuff from the store, so we lived off subsistence 26 and our people that -- right now, like I said I was a 27 construction worker, I got money coming in all the 28 time, I'm not going to brag about it, I'm just going to 29 show you a point, that no matter how much money I have, 30 I don't want to eat in a restaurant, I want to go home 31 and have my bowl of fish or seaweed or smoked fish, 32 seaweed, man, I'd rather have that than go down and eat 33 a steak downtown. Not because I don't have money, but 34 that's what I'm used to living off of. 35 36 And another thing that's hurting us 37 really bad is the gas prices has gone up so high, big 38 high gas prices, our dad taught us, when you go on a 39 boat, you go after fish at home shore, you kill a bear, 40 you kill a seal, you kill deer, take anything that's 41 coming when you're coming back because you pay a lot of 42 gas. And then my dad, to save a bullet, he would set a 43 snare on a bear trail so that he can get a bear without 44 using a bullet. So that's how we grew up, if anybody 45 grew up on a subsistence lifestyle, I did, and I loved 46 it. 47 48 And now I just wanted to say, yeah, I 49 sent one box of herring eggs over -- there's so many 50

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Page 56 1 laws against our people I said, I sent a box of herring 2 eggs over to my auntie in Juneau and one of these guys, 3 I don't know -- that was going over to Juneau that took 4 the box of herring eggs over to my auntie in Juneau on 5 a plane, and when she got them, she saw that it was a 6 White man bringing her that eggs she almost fell over 7 because all the laws and restrictions against our 8 Native people, but I appreciate that time we met. Al 9 Duncan was my brother, he was the other one that was 10 working with Kookesh. 11 12 Thank you very much for giving me the 13 time, and, again, thank you very much. Look after our 14 people, please. 15 16 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Mr. 17 Duncan for sharing your knowledge and answering our 18 questions. My one comment there on your testimony 19 would be that it may be the impression out there that, 20 you know, that Sitka is -- or that the herring roe 21 harvest is not in our jurisdiction because it takes 22 place in State waters, but, you know, that's not 23 necessarily so here in Sitka because there are Federal 24 waters as well, it's kind of a unique situation, Sitka 25 Sound, and, you know, the Sitka Tribe or anybody in 26 Sitka does have options, you know, with the Federal 27 government, you know, to do something to aide you in 28 your efforts to protect your harvest here. So I'd just 29 like to remind you of that, yeah, there are ways that 30 the Federal management could help in the situation and 31 I'm sure the Council would be involved in anything you 32 might ask in that effort. 33 34 So, thank you. 35 36 MR. DUNCAN: Yeah, thank you. And I 37 guess what I was asking is that if you folks had any 38 way to talk with the State, that we need that help. 39 40 Thank you. 41 42 Gunalcheesh. 43 44 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Mr. 45 Duncan. 46 47 We also have Larry Edwards from Sitka 48 who would like to testify. 49 50

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Page 57 1 MR. EDWARDS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman 2 and Board members. I took to heart and glad to hear 3 the conversation about climate change. I just wanted 4 to give some observations of my own about that. 5 6 You probably all know about the 7 committee that the Governor appointed to report back to 8 him and make recommendations in preparing comments to 9 send to them. I was looking at the greenhouse gas 10 inventory for Alaska and I was amazed to find that 22 11 percent of the state's carbon dioxide emissions come 12 from aviation and it's not (indiscernible), 13 particularly, that's kind of a drop in the bucket, it's 14 just all the jet travel within state. Alaskans going 15 out, tourists coming in. But this is something that I 16 think we should all be thinking about as Alaskans and 17 talking among ourselves and with our friends and 18 relatives that live down South, and suggesting that we 19 need to be flying a heck of a lot less and that applies 20 more to some people than others, of course, and there 21 have been sociological studies globally that about 70 22 percent of the aviation emissions come from about 15 23 percent of the fliers, only 10 percent of the global 24 populations have ever been on an airplane and so a lot 25 of this has to do with affluence and the impacts from 26 it hurt subsistence, they hurt commercial fishing and 27 to the extent that we fly a lot ourselves we're just 28 hurting ourselves. So not trying to make anybody feel 29 bad or point a finger at anybody but I just think we 30 all need to be thinking a lot about this, and, you 31 know, things are changing real fast and I think we're 32 going to be amazed just how fast things are really 33 going to change. We haven't really seen it yet. 34 35 So just my thoughts. 36 37 Thank you. 38 39 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you, 40 Mr. Edwards. 41 42 Is there anybody else in the room that 43 wanted to testify that we haven't heard from. 44 45 46 (No comments) 47 48 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Apparently not. 49 So at this point we'll move into our old business on 50

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Page 58 1 the agenda. And the first item of old business will be 2 a report from Ryan Scott, Alaska Department of Fish and 3 Game on what is happening with wolf management in Unit 4 2. 5 6 (Pause) 7 8 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, go ahead, 9 Ryan. 10 11 MR. SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and 12 members of the Council. Like I said earlier it's great 13 to see everybody again and to be back. 14 15 You thought we were going to talk about 16 wolves but actually we're going to talk about red back 17 voles today and maybe porcupines. 18 19 That was just a try at humor, it didn't 20 work out. 21 22 (Laughter) 23 24 MR. SCOTT: So I have a couple quick 25 presentations to go through. 26 27 One, some headway on wolf management in 28 Unit 2. Another question that we've discussed at 29 length, during Council meetings and some other venues, 30 especially on Prince of Wales, is the current deer 31 harvest, harvest numbers. We've consistently said 32 we're working on it, we're going to get them, we're 33 going to get them, well, we got them. And so we're 34 here to talk about that a little bit too. And then I 35 have a few, just kind of general, Southeast wildlife 36 comments that I'll try to keep short because I think 37 this is the wolves and deer on Prince of Wales is our 38 primary topic right now. 39 40 Yeah, next slide, great. 41 42 For the fall 2017 population estimate. 43 That was finalized just a few weeks ago. It's just 44 been released in a survey memo and you guys have copies 45 of that. I brought them. There's a ton of stuff in 46 there that I don't get either, you know, once we get 47 the number of samples in and the information goes into 48 the lab and then it comes out, people who know a lot 49 more about mathematics than I do sit down and run 50

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Page 59 1 through the numbers. The take home message is the 2 population estimate essentially came out exactly the 3 same as the previous year. So in the fall of 2016 we 4 estimated a mid-point of 231 wolves, this year we came 5 in at 225 wolves. So what does that mean in kind of 6 current management framework and how, you know, we'll 7 go forward at least for the near term. We're still 8 operating under the quota by regulation, both, on the 9 State side and the Federal side. That equates to 45 10 wolves are available for harvest for the season that's 11 currently running for Federal hunters and Federal 12 trappers will be able to start in the next -- gosh, I 13 guess in about the next month, next three weeks or so. 14 And then the State season will open up December 1 and 15 run through March 31st. 16 17 Another, I think, important point, when 18 we think about the population estimate is that we see 19 that as a -- I don't know if I want to call it a 20 turning point as far as the number of wolves coming up 21 on the island, but if you recall several years ago we 22 estimated, you know, a low number of wolves, 89 wolves, 23 so we see it as, at least, a consistent number from 24 last year indicating that, you know, we don't think 25 we're dipping down all that low at this point, that 26 we've recovered from that. 27 28 Next slide, please. 29 30 Much of this will be very similar and 31 we'll just cruise right through it and get down to the 32 meat of taking the next step. 33 34 In 2017 we had a total harvest of 60 35 wolves, if you recall we were shooting for, no pun 36 intended, we were attempting to take 46 wolves, so we 37 did exceed that. That's a common thing. Exceeding 38 that quota or guideline harvest level. Interestingly 39 enough this past season, 40 of the wolves harvested 40 came from smack dab in the middle of our study area, 41 which is fine. The whole area is open. But it 42 presented us a little bit of a challenge on the number 43 of animals taken out of places that we were trying to 44 collect hair data for, that was pretty high. So we 45 really didn't know -- it was a new challenge for us, 46 how do we incorporate that into the next -- this coming 47 year's estimate, or for the fall '17 estimate that we 48 use for managing this year. However, we got through 49 that. In addition to that, we were able to detect, you 50

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Page 60 1 know, 13 of those, a small number of them prior to 2 harvest. 3 4 Next, please. 5 6 So that just talks about what I just 7 put out to you, came in at about 225 wolves. In the 8 middle -- that's the mid-point we're using, operating 9 under the 20 percent still so 45 wolves are available 10 for harvest under that. 11 12 Next. 13 14 Again, it just demonstrates it's a 15 different graphic kind of way to present the harvest 16 data but a couple things to -- or the estimate data, 17 excuse me, to note there is on the far left, you can 18 see, they call this a violin graph, and you can see on 19 the left-hand side, that's a huge violin, it's more 20 like a cello, and it indicates that our precision 21 around the estimate wasn't very high. It was pretty 22 early on in the process. We started trying to collect 23 hair data in 2012, it didn't work out for us. We 24 didn't get enough samples to come up with an estimate. 25 And then in -- from 2013 on we had enough DNA to 26 provide the estimate. And you can see, you know, as we 27 get through like 2014, '15, '16 and now '17, we have a 28 pretty high confidence -- in statistical confidence in 29 the estimates that we have at this point. And if -- I 30 believe there's a slide coming up that'll actually show 31 you that, what range. We use the mid-point to manage 32 on, but there is a range of numbers. So if we're using 33 225, as the mid-point right now, you know, the range is 34 198 up to 250, 260 animals, somewhere in there. 35 36 Next slide. 37 38 And the next one. 39 40 So right now, as you're aware, we have 41 two Board of Game proposals upcoming that address Unit 42 2 wolves. One came from this Council, the Regional 43 Council, to increase that harvest rate, if you will, 44 from 20 percent up to 30 percent, and just as a look 45 back in time, that's what it was for a long time. We 46 went I think from 25 percent to 20 percent to 30 47 percent, and, you know, there have also been plenty of 48 times when we didn't have a percentage that we were 49 shooting for. 50

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Page 61 1 The second proposal, Proposal 43, is 2 the one submitted by the Department, one that we've 3 talked with you folks quite a bit about and we've 4 actually had some really great discussions, and I want 5 to highlight that, I hope today we'll continue that 6 discussion. I came with numbers, believe it or not, you 7 know, and that's kind of gutsy, you know, to put them 8 up there, but it's a starting point for us to have 9 those discussions and see where the folks here are 10 comfortable as far as the ranges that we're going to be 11 hopefully shooting for as far as managing the animals. 12 13 The RACs sequence of hearing the 14 proposals, I think is pretty important. 15 16 The Southeast -- or the RAC proposal 17 will go first before the Board of Game. It'll -- and 18 then we'll come second with the No. 43. The 19 information we're going to provide to the Board is 20 exactly the same, you know, we're really not going to 21 -- the presentations are going to look the same, I'm 22 going to guess many of the questions are going to be 23 the same. With that said, I think the Board of Game, 24 just like I anticipate today with the Regional Advisory 25 Council, there's going to be some hard questions for us 26 because we're kind of going out on a limb a little bit. 27 We're trying to change things and do things different. 28 29 It is really, really, really important 30 that somebody from this Council be at that Board of 31 Game meeting. It always is. But it's going to be -- I 32 think it's crucial, to be honest with you, that 33 somebody be there to testify on this proposal and other 34 things that are going to come up. We also, and you 35 guys are aware, the Craig AC submitted a deer proposal 36 as well and that's another real critical one. So I 37 encourage you to be thinking about that as we move 38 forward, and I'll cover a little bit more about the 39 Board towards the tail end. 40 41 Next one, please. 42 43 Okay. 44 45 So why even do something different? 46 47 We continue to chase this percentage, 48 whether it be 20 percent, 30 percent, you know, if it's 49 30 percent, yes, we're going to be able to harvest 50

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Page 62 1 additional wolves, but we've -- we've helped 2 demonstrate and we've been taught that we can't chase 3 it. We just can't keep up with it. And we beat our 4 head's up against the wall a long time and it really is 5 -- it's almost a change in the way of thinking about 6 it. As a wildlife biologist who manages, you know, 7 many hunts across the region, you know, I think about, 8 gosh, I want to take X number of animals, that's what I 9 believe can be harvested sustainably so that's the 10 focus and that's how we've proceeded. And, you know, 11 at times, and we won't go through all the history of 12 the wolf harvest on Prince of Wales in Unit 2, but we 13 all recognize and we've talked about it several times, 14 the number of wolves taken and the number of wolves 15 that we thought were on the ground was getting pretty 16 low, you know, and there were some real concerns there. 17 So with this Council and members of the public on 18 Prince of Wales, the Board of Game and other folks we 19 set some of those percentages very low and we took some 20 additional steps by trying to address other perceived 21 issues as far as unreported harvest and things like 22 that. 23 24 We still came up over the quota almost 25 every time. I mean I don't know that we ever actually 26 -- I don't -- I can't remember a time when we got it so 27 we're going to try something different. 28 29 Currently we also have a 14 day sealing 30 requirement. That, again, was in the vein of trying to 31 keep up with what was happening. Having a sealing 32 requirement like that with trappers is -- it's very 33 difficult. People travel quite a ways to put sets out, 34 some places have very long trap lines and it just -- 35 just the logistics of keeping up with that 14 day 36 sealing requirement is a challenge. You know it's been 37 pretty unpredictable at times. We keep plugging along 38 and we may get one or two wolves reported and, you 39 know, maybe a batch comes in and then we start thinking 40 about and scratching our heads, well, gosh, maybe we 41 should get it closed up pretty soon and then low and 42 behold 28 of them come through the door and it's 43 unpredictable for the trappers and it's unpredictable 44 for the Department, as well as the Forest Service; one 45 more reason that it's been a challenge. We've seen 46 some pretty short seasons. We've tried to -- if you 47 recall, one season we had a quota of seven -- seven or 48 nine, I mean it was single digit wolves, you know, it 49 was very important that we have a season and provide 50

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Page 63 1 the opportunity for people to go out and harvest 2 wolves, but I mean single digits. That just like -- it 3 takes the whole -- chasing the harvest guideline level 4 and the 14 day sealing requirement and that just 5 compounds it, you know, when you're shooting for a -- 6 you know, essentially it's like opening -- you should 7 have just opened the season for a day or something like 8 that, you know. And I don't recall the total number of 9 wolves we took, I think it was 16 before we got it 10 closed. But that's a challenge. And then we've used 11 emergency orders and special action requests through 12 OSM and the Department and the Board of Game to close 13 it every year. 14 15 The focus has been on the percentage of 16 wolves to harvest, not the number of wolves that we all 17 want to see on the ground. And when I say, all, I mean 18 collectively, not just me, not just the Department, not 19 just this Council, but the people who live on Prince of 20 Wales, the people who have a vested interest in 21 wildlife diversity, wolves on the ground, the number of 22 deer running around and it really is -- it's a big 23 undertaking. Not unlike the other topics that you have 24 to discuss and make recommendations on. 25 26 So we want to shift to that population, 27 that level, and how to manage and we've talked ad 28 nauseam about that, we've never had a number of wolves 29 we want to keep on the ground. And, really, that just 30 makes good sense. And I mentioned a little while ago, 31 just a few minutes, that it's almost a change in how 32 you think about things. It's really not -- and I don't 33 know when I came to this conclusion, you know, or when 34 it finally landed on me like a rock or something like 35 that, you know, we get so focused on that percentage 36 and so focused on how many wolves can we have 37 harvested, that we're really losing sight of the bigger 38 question, or the bigger statement, I think, which 39 drives the whole -- which is silly, for my part because 40 it drives the whole thing. But it's how many wolves we 41 want to have left on the ground. That, and we want to 42 provide that opportunity, subsistence uses. If there's 43 recreational use, that people want to harvest wolves, 44 great. And we also, I mean we can never lose sight of 45 the fact that when we talk about wolves, especially on 46 Prince of Wales in Unit 2, but other places in 47 Southeast Alaska, we're going to talk about deer as 48 well. We may talk about other species, moose, goats, 49 things like that, but in Southeast Alaska the -- you 50

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Page 64 1 know the driving big game animal is Sitka black-tailed 2 deer. 3 4 Next slide, please. 5 6 Okay, so here it comes. 7 8 Managing for a population objective. 9 And we're going to -- like I said, I did come with 10 number and we're going to talk about those. 11 12 The intent is to have seasons run 13 without a fixed harvest quota. That means the 20, 30 14 percent, 45 percent, whatever percent it is, that won't 15 be in regulation anymore. We anticipate seeing a full 16 length season for most seasons. We're going to -- that 17 is the catch here. How do we manage for various ranges 18 of animals on the ground. A population that remains on 19 the ground, and we're going to use season length. But 20 we've identified a level, a threshold, if you will, 21 that if as long as we can keep wolves kind of in that 22 sweet spot we're going to let people have it. 23 24 Sealing within 30 days -- within 30 25 days of the end of the season. That's the standard 26 across Southeast Alaska and Alaska, you know, the whole 27 state. So we have a proposal in to eliminate that 28 requirement. 29 30 We're not going to give up on the DNA 31 based population estimates, but we're not going to do 32 them as frequently. This has met with some -- I would 33 say a lot of criticism, because it's the tool that we 34 have now and it's working, you know, it's the best tool 35 that we have. Is it perfect, we've had lots of 36 discussions about that. We know it's not perfect but 37 we feel like it does give us the information we need to 38 move forward. 39 40 We're also going to monitor population 41 trends in other years by doing things like den checks, 42 we're going to be really watching the age of the 43 harvested animals. If you recall, and for the 44 beginning, so lots of ideas about that. In the 45 beginning we talked about requiring having leg bones 46 turned in again so we could at least tell pups versus 47 adults. We're going to ask people to do that 48 voluntarily to help us keep track of, you know, how 49 many animals, and it gives us some idea of what the 50

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Page 65 1 recruitment was like coming out of the pupping season 2 as well. 3 4 The other thing we looked at was trying 5 to purchase wolf skulls. There is a market for them, 6 that's great, and we were going to try to meet that 7 market value and purchase the skulls and we can remove 8 the canine teeth and we can get exact age from them. 9 That's still in the works. You know at times that's a 10 challenge to, frankly, to get permission, if you will, 11 to purchase those things from trappers and that's fair 12 enough. I mean they can sell the skulls and make a 13 little bit of extra money beyond the pelt and that's 14 good. 15 16 Sightings and expert opinions to gauge 17 abundance and distribution. And then the focus is 18 going to be keeping wolves in that desired range. 19 20 So I really want to -- I want to 21 highlight that monitor population trend in other years 22 using: The other thing that we have talked about a lot 23 here and it's a challenge, for us, is TEK, traditional 24 ecological knowledge. And that's something that I have 25 been asked -- maybe I'll restate that, I have been told 26 that we need to do more of, and this is something -- 27 and this is where that really comes in. So there's 28 another large component of kind of walking out and 29 taking this step, getting away from percentages. We 30 are about to put a whole lot of responsibility on the 31 trappers on Prince of Wales Island, and we are going to 32 ask for that traditional ecological knowledge in ways 33 of -- for instance: You know what do you see, you 34 know, not only with wolves, are you seeing a bunch of 35 wolves, where are you seeing them, what else is going 36 on out there that you're telling us about, what are you 37 seeing for deer, you know, deer are going to be an 38 indicator for us. You know we've all been around, you 39 know, long enough to know that if we get a slug of snow 40 in the wintertime, that's going to put the hurt on just 41 about every deer population in the region. Here, deer 42 are one of the driving forces for wolf management, but 43 it also can be an indicator that we can look at and 44 that we can go forward with. So we're -- in my mind, 45 we're going to put some of that responsibility on the 46 trappers. They're going to have to think about what 47 they're doing and they're going to have to self- 48 regulate some. If they start digging into it too much 49 they need to recognize that and they're going to have 50

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Page 66 1 to back off. If there's ample wolves and we're up in 2 that sweet spot, go forth and do it. But just to keep 3 everybody -- I don't know, keep everybody happy or 4 comfortable, we're going to have to continue that 5 interchange of information, not only what we're seeing 6 at dens, not only the age structure of the harvest that 7 we see checked in, we need to know what's going on on 8 the ground. How that's all going to relate, that's 9 kind of a -- that's still, I think, a little bit 10 unknown, you know, I think that we're going to have to 11 go through a few seasons to see how things are 12 progressing and how comfortable both the Department, 13 OSM, the users, the Council, the ACs, everybody who's 14 involved is with that. And it's probably going to have 15 to go on long enough that we can get back on the ground 16 in a year or two and actually count wolves and see if 17 we're able to stay in that sweet spot. 18 19 Next one, please. 20 21 Advantages, population objective. You 22 know it gives, not just managers, it gives all of us a 23 target, and I think I've said to this Council, at least 24 once, those population objectives don't necessarily 25 have to be simply biological acceptable or even 26 biologically defensible, if you will. They are in the 27 in process. But there's a lot of social input into 28 that. We had comments from Council members, when they 29 gave Council member reports, of hearing that there's 30 too many wolves still. That's fair. You know, that's 31 part of -- and that's a good -- that's good to hear but 32 we also need to hear, okay, what's enough wolves. You 33 know, what really is too many wolves and what number is 34 enough wolves. 35 36 We'll get there in just a second. 37 38 And that talks about, it goes through 39 that, we want to, again, get into that spot, that 40 management regime, if you will, that all the users and 41 all the interested parties are comfortable with and 42 also make sure that the wolves are protected. You know 43 none of us, and I've heard it here lots and lots and 44 I've heard it all over the place, none of us are 45 interested in seeing wolves either being driven to, you 46 know, to such a low level that there's a real viability 47 concern there or, you know, going the next step and not 48 having any wolves, that's not what we're here for. 49 We're here to try to address the needs of subsistence 50

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Page 67 1 users, trying to address the needs of hunters that hunt 2 under State regulations, but we can never lose sight 3 that we're here to address the needs of the wolves as 4 well, and they're part of the ecosystem, they have a 5 job to do, they've been there a long time and that's 6 part of our mandate. And we've been through two ESA 7 petitions recently, and part of that was because wolf 8 numbers dipped too low. That's something we got to be 9 careful of. And this is going to be -- this approach 10 is going to be -- you know that's going to be a 11 challenge there. But it's a process. It's a process 12 of this discussion. It's a process of the discussions 13 and consultations, if you will, on Prince of Wales and 14 sitting down and talking about what those numbers look 15 like and how can we make sure that we don't take wolf 16 numbers down to a point that, A, we're uncomfortable or 17 we put them in trouble. 18 19 Next please. 20 21 We need some public guidance and 22 Council guidance on numbers for a population objective. 23 We've gotten some of that. We've had a series of get 24 togethers on Prince of Wales. I'm trying to think of 25 how many, two in Craig, two in Thorne Bay and we 26 actually had another discussion that centered a lot on 27 wolves and deer in Ketchikan, as well. 28 29 User groups, traditionally, expressed 30 their desires, you know, through the Board of Game, 31 that's, you know, from our perspective, it's really -- 32 I think that in this venue we need to think about that, 33 more expansive, that you guys need to hear from your 34 constituents and the resource users from Unit 2 and 35 other places in Alaska, you know, that there's going to 36 be other opinions and desires there. And establishing 37 that population objective, that's going to give us a 38 goal to manage for. And in a lot of places we have 39 population objectives for a lot of different species. 40 Some of them are really scientifically rigorously 41 determined. Others aren't. Deer populations in 42 Southeast Alaska is a great example where we don't know 43 how to count them. You know, we got all kinds of 44 different methods that we use to essentially index 45 where deer populations are and trends and things like 46 that, and we can count them in small water sheds, but 47 that doesn't expand out to, you know, big chunks of 48 real estate, like we can go in and do two or three 49 different water sheds and we can give you a pretty good 50

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Page 68 1 number of deer are living in that water shed, using DNA 2 again, but we really are uncomfortable taking that 3 information and saying well this is how many deer live 4 in Unit 2. But having this objective and because we 5 can count wolves in places, we can manage for that 6 objective. 7 8 Next slide, please. 9 10 Okay, so here's just kind of the run of 11 the mill thought process and I want to point out that 12 Tom Schumacher and Ross Dorendorf, Tom in Douglas and 13 Ross' is in Ketchikan have worked, you know, pretty 14 hard on a lot of this and I think for me it was great. 15 You know, red is bad, yellow we got to be careful and 16 green we're good to go. That's kind of the gist of 17 where we're headed. You know we're going to -- those 18 question marks represent numbers that we got to plug in 19 there. If we get down low, we need to shut the season 20 off or restrict, go back to really restricting the 21 harvest, and we're going to do that by time at this 22 point. We're not talking about going back to a quota, 23 we'll do season length and at least that will be 24 somewhat predictable for a trapper. It may be, you 25 know, if things are going great, they may get four 26 months on the State side of the season or part of the 27 Federal season. If we're down to a place where we are 28 starting to have concerns we'll reduce that season 29 length to actually manage the harvest. Ultimately 30 we'll know what the harvest is, you know, in the end, 31 but that's our intent, to use time to manage the 32 harvest, rather than an EO or quota or things like 33 that. 34 35 Okay, so let's see, let's go to the, 36 yeah, to the next one, I think the next one. 37 38 Things to consider before we get to the 39 population objective. 40 41 We talked about we got to sustainably 42 manage wolves and I think we're all on the same sheet 43 of music there. We've had that agreement since we 44 began this. 45 46 Next. 47 48 We can't forget that there is a time 49 lag and, you know, there's a lot going on here. But 50

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Page 69 1 it's just to demonstrate that the crews get on the 2 ground, they're actually on the ground now starting for 3 this year's estimate, both Department crews as well as 4 Hydaburg is participating again, the Nature Conservancy 5 as well, the Forest Service, so the folks who have 6 played a role before, they've started and starting to 7 collect hair. We have a trapping season that occurs 8 through that. I think we've figured out now how to 9 deal with how many -- when animals are taken out of the 10 population that we're trying to estimate. The lab DNA 11 analysis, that's been a little bit variable as far as 12 time goes. Last year and I believe it was right at 13 1,200 hair samples went into the lab and Cathy can 14 correct me if I'm wrong but I think that's like twice 15 as much as we sent the year before and we overwhelmed 16 them a little bit. So they ended up taking some time 17 and there was an additional time lag before we got the 18 -- essentially the number of wolves identified, back 19 from the lab and then we can crank out the population 20 estimate. And then once we get the information from 21 the lab, our folks in the Department, our statisticians 22 and Gretchin, our wolf biologist, they're pretty well 23 set up to plug those numbers in and to run the 24 simulations and to produce the estimate, but it takes 25 some time. You know it's usually -- we shoot, we 26 really want to have the number out by July, but, you 27 know, August and September has been a little bit more 28 of the norm lately and that's going to continue, even 29 as we move away from doing annual DNA estimates, when 30 we do do it again, I don't anticipate that getting any 31 quicker really, maybe here and there but, you know, in 32 the big scheme of things, still going to take some 33 time. 34 35 Next one, please. 36 37 So what would the population objective 38 look like. Back to the color coding. That green area 39 is de facto where we anticipate that range of animals 40 would be where we land, where we want to keep the 41 number of wolves that are on the ground, based on the 42 estimates and based on other information that we get 43 from the folks, the users and other folks who are 44 involved in wolves and other wildlife resources on the 45 island. We want to stay in that green. 46 47 Next one. 48 49 Okay, so here are some numbers. 50

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Page 70 1 Probably the first time we've ever actually put numbers 2 to this whole idea. 3 4 And this is where I hope, you know, if 5 we want to finish -- we're almost done with my part of 6 this, at least the presentation part, but I hope this 7 is actually the slide that we really focus on so that, 8 you know, either we walk away with we've got some -- 9 we're comfortable with what we have to take forward, or 10 we've got new information or at least something to 11 think about, and we can continue those discussions. 12 13 If we think about back in 2014, I 14 believe, we went down to 89 wolves. That was pretty 15 low, you know, estimated 89 wolves and that set off 16 some alarms and some sirens from, you know, we had the 17 20 percent and we reduced that by 50 percent and we -- 18 that was the year we took the single -- or attempted to 19 take single digit animals. You know, we kept the 20 harvest down but we still went over it. So we put 100 21 at that threshold to -- we don't want to go below 100 22 estimated wolves on the ground. We know, we've 23 demonstrated that we can rebound from -- we rebounded 24 from a low of 89, you know, based on our estimate so we 25 used 100 as that, we don't want to push that envelope 26 again. 100 to 150, we put in a conservative range, 27 and, again it was based on a lot of our estimates as 28 well as management actions, you know, during those 29 years in the survey memo on Page 6, it gives you a list 30 of the point estimates as well as the ranges for the 31 year that we've successfully gotten a population 32 estimate. So for 2014/2015 we were hovering right 33 around that 100 animal estimate and using very 34 conservative measures to control the harvest, using 35 that percentage though again. And then coming up 36 2016/2017, the wolf population, which I think we're 37 familiar with at this point, that wolf populations can 38 rebound very quickly if you can control the harvest and 39 there's adequate prey species, things like that and 40 it's demonstrated that. So using that 100 to 150 as 41 the zone that we'd really be -- we'd be cautious, it 42 doesn't mean we'd shut it down, doesn't mean that there 43 would not be opportunity there, but it would mean a 44 shortened season. And we put two -- you know two time 45 periods in there to give you an idea of what we would 46 intend as far as providing that opportunity but using 47 time to manage for the harvest. You know if you're 48 sitting right at 100, you're like pretty darn close, 49 right, to be in -- if we're just using 100 as the 50

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Page 71 1 gauge, if you estimate 100 animals, we know we will 2 have gone through a pupping season but we also would 3 have gone through a harvest season so that's a pretty 4 uncomfortable place to be. If you're between 100 and 5 150, you know, there's a difference between, especially 6 in this realm where -- and the estimates that we've 7 looked at, you know 50 animals actually represents a 8 significant proportion of even the estimates that we've 9 provided. So we want to -- we use that 100 to 150 10 animals as keeping an eye on what's going on. We use 11 time to manage the harvest. Be shorter if we're closer 12 to 100, it'll be a little bit longer if we're closer to 13 150. 14 15 Between 150 and 200 animals, again, 16 using that 50 wolf increment, because it does represent 17 a significant proportion of the estimates that we've 18 had, again, we use time, but we'll expand that time, 19 you know, it might be a couple months that we provide 20 for harvest. Again it'll be predictable for trappers, 21 it's predictable for us. The ultimate harvest is going 22 to -- that's going to be an unknown until we get all 23 the information back and we get all the sealings back. 24 And then we recommend that if we come up with a 25 population estimate that's above 200 wolves, which is, 26 you know, pushing -- getting pretty close to the top 27 end of our estimates over the last few years, we open 28 up the season and it runs as it's written in the book. 29 30 So -- but I think -- so that's great, 31 right, you know, if we can get to 200 wolves, 220, 230, 32 whatever it is, we feel comfortable that that number of 33 animals is -- provides the opportunity to have a full 34 length season. Hopefully it addresses some of the 35 concerns that we've already heard here this morning, 36 that there's -- that people feel like there's too many 37 wolves, so there's still opportunity to get out there 38 and harvest. It's really that section, you know, below 39 200, you know, that's the uncomfortable spot. That's 40 the place where part of this is going to be -- there's 41 going to be a learning process here for sure. Keeping 42 up with us getting back on the ground, counting wolves, 43 getting a hard estimate, tracking, taking a look at 44 dens in the spring to see what kind of production we're 45 getting. Looking at the age structure of the harvest. 46 Getting information back from people who are on the 47 ground and who, you know, are participating in the 48 season or wolf viewing or whatever they might be. It's 49 also the place that the trappers got to pony up, that's 50

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Page 72 1 where it's going to be on them, and that's what we've 2 been asked to do. We've been asked to give it back and 3 we're going to do that. We're trying to do that. 4 5 Now, this could all be -- you know, 6 this is a great discussion, we're going to have good 7 information, I think, when it's all over, this is all 8 going to go to the Board of Game and ultimately, you 9 know, they're going to -- I don't know that they will 10 take this approach and put it in regulation, such as 11 they did with the 20 percent, I doubt it. But we'll be 12 looking for an endorsement there. And they will likely 13 set that population objective, you know, that we are 14 going to try to keep the wolves -- the wolf numbers in. 15 16 So that's kind of it. 17 18 That's it in a nutshell. And I mean I 19 got to tell you, it's a little uncomfortable, you know, 20 because even though it doesn't work to chase that 20 21 percent, doesn't work necessarily to chase that 30 22 percent, it gives you a hard and fast threshold and -- 23 but it doesn't work and, you know, we've heard from the 24 users, we've heard from this Council, we've heard from 25 the ACs on the Island, we've talked to other folks and 26 I think it's worth trying, you know, and, gosh, if we 27 get into a situation where we get -- our concerns go 28 way up well then, you know, I'll start making phone 29 calls. I'll call Mike, I'll call Don, and I'll call 30 others and say, this is not playing out the way we saw 31 and we can make the decision on how to address that. 32 33 But, yeah, so that's it. 34 35 That's it for now, I'm ready. 36 37 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, thank you, 38 Ryan. That was a lot of information to digest here and 39 then you say you still have some deer information to 40 pass on. We are kind of getting into the lunch hour, I 41 guess I have a question, are you available for a length 42 of time after lunch. 43 44 MR. SCOTT: Mr. Chairman, I am. I'm 45 here all day and if need be I'll stay because this is 46 important. I need you guys to give me feedback. And I 47 think the other thing we need to talk about or at least 48 hopefully have some agreement on, is when we, the 49 Department and the Council shows up at the Board of 50

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Page 73 1 Game, it's going to be really important that we're in 2 pretty close lock-step if we can be. 3 4 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. That's good 5 to know. I might ask the Council, do you feel you need 6 to continue on with questions right now while it's 7 fresh in your mind, would you like to take a lunch 8 break and no pun intended, but, digest some of this 9 information, and come back after lunch. 10 11 (Laughter) 12 13 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: What's the wish of 14 the Council. 15 16 MR. DOUVILLE: Lunch break. 17 18 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, I'm seeing 19 that lunch break might be in order, so let's do that 20 and we can think about what Ryan just presented, get 21 back into the deer numbers. Never want to talk about 22 deer on an empty stomach. 23 24 (Laughter) 25 26 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: So we'll do that 27 and take -- let's see let's try a little over an hour 28 lunch break, we'll come back at 1:30 and see how long 29 it takes folks to forage the streets of Sitka for 30 things to eat and see if we can accomplish that by 1:30 31 and get into it. 32 33 Thank you. 34 35 (Off record) 36 37 (On record) 38 39 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: We'll begin in 40 five minutes and hopefully we'll have everybody here by 41 that time. 42 43 (Pause) 44 45 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, everybody, I 46 think we have a full Council here, I think everybody's 47 in the room. So we'll get started again and bring Ryan 48 back up to the desk, and reconvene. 49 50

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Page 74 1 (Pause) 2 3 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: So I'd just like 4 to point out that while we were at lunch, Ryan's 5 PowerPoint was kind of printed off and distributed to 6 everybody, you'll see it there in front of you and I 7 think there was one additional slide that might not 8 have been in our original bit of information and that 9 is that last one where we have the graph, I guess call 10 it a graph of the population objective and what it 11 would have looked like in actual numbers, the actual 12 numbers Ryan was referring to. 13 14 Okay, so Ryan do you want to pick up 15 where you left off and then we'll probably have a lot 16 of questions for you. 17 18 And, before we do get started, I just 19 want to ask, are people back on the telephone. I know 20 we might want to have some questions for Jeff Reeves 21 and Luke Decker in Craig, possibly, are they there. 22 23 MR. REEVES: Yeah, hey, Don, Mr. 24 Chairman. Jeff Reeves is here. 25 26 MR. DECKER: Mr. Chairman, Luke Decker 27 is here. 28 29 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Very good. Okay. 30 Ryan Scott, let's pick up where we left off and we'll 31 probably be getting into questions here pretty quickly. 32 33 MR. SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 34 For the record my name is Ryan Scott, I work for the 35 Division of Wildlife Conservation, Department of Fish 36 and Game. 37 38 This is actually -- this is the end of 39 the wolf information. I don't know if you want to go 40 right in and whip through the deer harvest information 41 that I brought as well and get all the presentation 42 stuff out of the way or should we just dive right into 43 questions, discussion on the wolf. 44 45 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Let's hear the 46 deer presentation numbers, okay. 47 48 MR. SCOTT: Yes, sir. DeAnna was 49 gracious enough to take it from me earlier and it'll be 50

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Page 75 1 up here on the screen. And, again, several of these 2 items, all of us are going to be somewhat familiar with 3 as far as methodology and things like that and so I'll 4 go through those very quickly but if there's questions, 5 obviously we can go back and cover those, and I think 6 the harvest data is probably the most pertinent and 7 what people are going to be primarily interested in. 8 9 Okay, next slide please. 10 11 Three methods to monitor deer 12 populations. Pellet group surveys, we've been doing 13 them since about the mid-1980s. There's lots of things 14 you have to take into consideration when you do them. 15 There's validity to them in that they're a long-term 16 index, but they will not pick up a substantial short 17 period change in the deer population, and generally we 18 don't think it'll detect anything unless there's like 19 30 percent change, which is going to be pretty drastic. 20 We're going to hear about it a long time before we ever 21 detect that in our pellet surveys. 22 23 Aerial alpine surveys. That's 24 something that we've just recently reinvested in, if 25 you will. It was something that's been experimented 26 with before but we, again, are looking for 27 opportunities to index deer and, you know, at least 28 with the alpine surveys we're going to get a minimum 29 number of deer. So we fly -- I have a chart, we fly 30 several areas, at times when we can, we try to list 31 bucks versus does, fawns, if we can, but I got to tell 32 you, some places there's so many deer that you just 33 count deer. So the metric that we've arrived on 34 because we -- it gets a little bit inconsistent on 35 where we're flying is deer per hour, is the one that 36 we're using right now, is to kind of assess what kind 37 of numbers we're seeing and to compare it to other 38 areas in Southeast Alaska. This is -- the other big 39 question that comes with aerial alpine surveys is, what 40 proportion of the deer population are we actually 41 seeing up in the alpine. Based on previous work, we 42 know some deer stay low all year round, some deer move 43 up and down all the time and, you know, may settle into 44 a kind of a mid-elevation area and then we have a 45 proportion that will move to the alpine that we can 46 actually see. We haven't -- we don't have an answer 47 for that yet. We're in the process of designing 48 research projects primarily in Unit 3, that's where 49 we're likely to go first to try to get at some of those 50

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Page 76 1 questions. And it's going to involve marking deer, 2 radio-collaring deer, and then also likely DNA sampling 3 from the beach up the mountain to the alpine, to 4 determine a ratio of the animals that we've got marked, 5 the ones we can identify via DNA and then correcting 6 for the animals that we count in the alpine. It's 7 going to be a lot more complicated than that, but 8 that's the gist of it. 9 10 And then hunter effort and harvest 11 data. As you all know we've got hunter report cards. 12 We all get harvest tickets. And we get those back at 13 the end of the year. 14 15 Next slide, please. 16 17 Pellet group surveys. We talked about 18 it has to be a pretty significant change for us to 19 detect it. We say fixed transects but in some places 20 they are a transect, doesn't mean you have to be on the 21 same bering every year so you can -- you know, as 22 you're going up and if you come to a giant root wad or 23 you've got a hateful clear-cut to go through or 24 something, we can move those around. As long as we're 25 in the same water shed. And the other parameters are 26 that we go, we do 125 pulls, that's what we strive for, 27 or we get to 1,500 feet, or we run into snow where the 28 place that we've stopped is more than 50 percent 29 covered by snow. And I think it's by -- within three 30 pulls. So if you get to snow, it doesn't mean you 31 actually have to stop, you can go another couple of 32 times before it's like, well, you know, we're at snow, 33 we're not going to go any further. It's only a subset 34 of transects are monitored each spring. The program 35 that we use now is different than we did in the '80s 36 and the '90s. It used to be a very coordinated event 37 with the Fish and Game and the Forest Service and just, 38 you know, based on personnel and money and logistics, 39 now it's done less frequently in each water shed, but 40 we do try to move around all of Southeast Alaska as we 41 do it so last spring we did Prince of Wales as one of 42 them, Admiralty Island is another one that we do just 43 about every other year. There's some that get done 44 every year, the Juneau road system's real easy for us 45 to go out the door and do those as well. And then we 46 pull a cable up the hill, 60 meter cable -- excuse me, 47 a 20 meter cable and we count deer poop essentially 48 within half a meter, or about one and a half feet on 49 either side of that, and if we can we do 125 of those. 50

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Page 77 1 And then we calculate pellets per pull, and that's the 2 index that we use and we track over time. 3 4 So the good news is, is we have about 5 almost 40 years of data for some places. And, again, 6 it tracks that long-term trend. 7 8 Another challenge that is has, deer can 9 be distributed differently, every single year. If 10 there's a ton of snow often times they're going to be 11 lower and the pellets will be concentrated so the 12 pellet counts are going to go up, because that's what 13 we see. As we've had the last few years where we've 14 had pretty mild winters, there's poop all up and down 15 the mountain and it doesn't give us the density every 16 time we pulled the chain, so that's the variability we 17 see. 18 19 Next slide, please. 20 21 These are some of the counts that -- 22 the Unit 2 count anyway that we got done down in -- 23 yeah, on Prince of Wales, this last season. You can 24 see what we got for 2018 and then you can see the year 25 that it was previously surveyed and then the percent 26 changed, both positive and negative. You don't want to 27 hang your hat on positive changes. It's good to see. 28 But, again, we have to think about the variables that 29 we see year to year and it takes, you know, a few years 30 to actually see a trend or a change in that. There was 31 one area, the Twelvemile that we saw a pretty 32 significant decrease. 33 34 Next slide, please. 35 36 Alpine surveys. We start late July 37 finish up in early August. We try to make sure that 38 we're up there doing that stuff before the vegetation 39 starts to die off and animals start to move off the 40 tops. If we can, we try to repeat each survey two to 41 four times. And we start just before -- a couple of 42 hours before sunset and all the airplanes that we use, 43 we got to be on the ground or back on the water, if 44 we're using a float plane, by dark. Count all the deer 45 we see. And we're not sure how that relates to the 46 total deer population, but we're working on that. 47 48 Next one. 49 50

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Page 78 1 And these are just examples of the 2 survey sites. Some of them are very quick. They can 3 be done in about 40 minutes. I think Kuiu Island maybe 4 took, you know, 40, 45, 50 minutes, something like 5 that. Prince of Wales takes a little bit longer. 6 Areas right around Petersburg, there's not a lot of 7 Alpine there so they can be done very quick as well. 8 But it is -- it's logistically challenging, in that, 9 when the weather's good we want to be in all these 10 places all at once and so over the last couple of years 11 we've actually brought in contract pilots. And, you 12 know, on a good evening, that it looks like it's going 13 to flyable, we'll have two Cubs, generally working kind 14 of the Unit 3 area, maybe one down at Prince of Wales, 15 or one working Southern Admiralty, or Northeast 16 Chichagof as comparison areas. 17 18 Next one, please. 19 20 This is in the central portion of 21 Prince of Wales. You can see we're just sticking with 22 the alpine. 23 24 Next one. 25 26 So these are all the surveys that we've 27 done for the last couple years. And you can see the 28 mean deer per hour, which is the metric that we're 29 using, POW has been done the last couple of years. 30 Douglas we started last year. I don't know if you've 31 seen the Board of Game proposal book, but we have a 32 reduction in deer bag limit for Douglas Island there 33 and we started to start to get a little bit better 34 handle on deer numbers as well. Northeast Chich was a 35 recent addition, as well. It says we only -- it says 36 we did South Admiralty in 2017, but we've actually done 37 that multiple times, I'm not sure why those numbers 38 didn't show up. I'm here to tell you if you can get to 39 South Admiralty and get to the Alpine you're going to 40 really enjoy it. So that's a good place to go. Some 41 of the areas around the mainland, Unit 1B, across from 42 Petersburg and Wrangell and in some of those other 43 areas in Unit 3. 44 45 Part of this started because of the 46 intensive management program in Unit 3 for deer and 47 wolf relationships. 48 49 Next one, please. 50

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Page 79 1 These focus squarely on the Prince of 2 Wales surveys and, you know, the northern section of 3 POW definitely has come down based on what we saw 4 starting in '14, and, you know, it's not as low -- or 5 I'm sorry, it came down since 2016, it's not quite as 6 low as 2014, but it's on the lower end, and the central 7 area, though, increased. Which, you know, there's not 8 a whole lot of difference when we're talking about 9 alpine surveys and the mean deer per hour numbers that 10 we have there 112, 138, but it's a good -- it's nice to 11 see a positive trend there when we've had a lot of 12 trapping effort, if you will, in those areas. So we'll 13 see -- the intent is to keep doing those. They're not 14 cheap, they run at about $51,000 a year to get them 15 done but we think there's some validity to them and I 16 anticipate that they'll continue on. 17 18 Next slide, please. 19 20 Hunter effort and harvest. We've all 21 heard this, people -- the primary thing here, the 22 challenge sometimes is just making sure we get those 23 report cards back, it's definitely improved over the 24 years and we take some additional steps, we send out 25 reminders that reporting is coming. And then if we 26 don't get something we send another reminder out and 27 even a second reminder in a lot of cases. Then we get 28 that information back, we know we don't have every 29 single report card from every person who got a harvest 30 ticket and we take the data that we have and we expand 31 it out for, you know, by community, by GMU, we can do 32 it by island, all those things, and come up with a 33 total harvest. 34 35 Next, please. 36 37 And this is the one that I think people 38 have been primarily curious about recently. So this is 39 the total deer harvest for Prince of Wales Game 40 Management Unit 2. You can see that there has been a 41 decline in both Federally-qualified and non-Federally- 42 qualified hunters and from a peak of -- and I believe 43 it was 2015 where the total unit harvest was a little 44 over 4,000 deer and that was, you know, the highest on 45 record that we had had, but it is declining as we can 46 see there down to about 1,500 for qualified hunters and 47 I think it was like 888 for non-Federally-qualified 48 hunters. 49 50

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Page 80 1 Next slide. 2 3 And this graphic is the number of 4 actual hunters from both those demographics that we 5 have the data for. And you can see there's actually 6 been a decline in the number of hunters for both sub- 7 groups and I think that's important, that we're seeing 8 the number of hunters, you know, declining for both. 9 And I don't know why, you know, but it may be a figment 10 -- I'm not sure that's the right word, a factor of the 11 reporting, you know, it could be something in there. 12 But I mean that's enough of a decline for both 13 demographic groups that I think we're seeing less 14 hunters as well. Does that account for all the decline 15 in the overall harvest, ehhh, I mean one's a lot 16 shallower than -- or a lot smaller than the other, the 17 number of hunters, it declined less than the total 18 harvest but, you know, there may be something to that 19 as well. 20 21 Next one, please. 22 23 But this one is -- I think this is 24 something that tells us a lot. And this is one of the 25 measurements, the metrics that we use pretty regularly 26 and something that we pay a lot of attention to. This 27 is the deer hunter effort. The total number of days. 28 You can see that non-qualified hunters, Federally- 29 qualified hunters, have dropped off a lot, but the 30 number of days hunting has increased by Federally- 31 qualified hunters. This doesn't reflect success. This 32 graphic has nothing to do with success, it's just the 33 total number of days that have been reported hunted -- 34 hunters hunting for those two demographics. 35 36 Next one, please. 37 38 This one is another one, though, that 39 we watch pretty closely and one of the primary deer 40 metrics that we use. And this is the number of days 41 per deer harvested. So how many days did it take 42 before you killed a deer essentially. And that has 43 risen for both, a little bit more shallow for the non- 44 Federally-qualified hunters, but there's fewer hunters 45 and fewer days hunted. But I think the one that really 46 catches my eye is the Federally-qualified hunters, and 47 how many days were needed to successfully harvest a 48 deer. So I think that this is one that, yeah, I mean I 49 think it speaks to exactly what we've heard, even here 50

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Page 81 1 this morning before, you know, we got started too deep 2 into this discussion, and certainly something that, you 3 know, we're paying attention to as well. It's 4 increased from a low of -- I think it was in 2014, you 5 know, just a little under three days all the way up to 6 -- you know, it's pushing, probably four and three- 7 quarters of a day or something like that. 8 9 Next one, please. 10 11 As you know, this Council submitted a 12 proposal to the Federal Subsistence Board to reduce the 13 State bag limit. That was passed and adopted and is 14 now in place. Originally it went into place with a 15 special action and now, I believe, it's probably firmly 16 in place. I think the Federal regulations have been 17 published in the Federal Register now. The State has 18 asked for that to be reconsidered, to be brought back 19 to the Board for reconsideration, not only the State 20 but I believe there were two other parties, and they're 21 in the process of reviewing that request now. So it 22 may very well be that we're before the Federal 23 Subsistence Board again discussing this -- that issue. 24 25 And that's what I have for deer, I 26 believe. 27 28 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you. 29 So time for questions. I guess we probably have 30 questions on both the wolf proposal, management plan 31 and people may also have questions on the deer numbers 32 you just presented, and actually some new information 33 to the Council, I don't think we've heard before, that 34 there's been a request for reconsideration on the 35 decision there on the Unit 2 deer. So that's, as far 36 as I'm aware, I don't know if anybody has heard that 37 before. 38 39 So I'll open it up to questions from 40 the Council. 41 42 (Pause) 43 44 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I know we probably 45 all don't know where to begin but I might get started 46 here. 47 48 A couple things I was wondering about. 49 Going back to your wolf presentation there and what's 50

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Page 82 1 happening with the wolves. 2 3 In the past, in our management 4 decisions there seemed to be quite a bit of concern 5 about the unreported harvest of wolves and I didn't 6 hear any mention of that in your latest management 7 plan. You know, are you still concerned about that, 8 keeping track -- trying to keep track of it, because in 9 the past it reduced the allowable harvest by a 10 significant amount with that as a concern, so where are 11 you on that right now? 12 13 MR. SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I 14 guess to answer the question, are we still concerned. 15 Absolutely. That's never going to go away. You know 16 that's something that we've heard about and, you know, 17 we've seen some of it but it's something that -- and 18 it's something we're going to have to deal with. And 19 where we've -- kind of where we've left it before, is 20 that, you know, if we can document that it was actually 21 illegal or, you know, unreported, human-caused, then 22 we'll count it, you know, against. But in this case, 23 you know, there's not a quota to worry about. So 24 really what we're going to -- in that regard, you know, 25 this will be -- there always were enforcement issues 26 and they will squarely remain enforcement issues, and 27 if it becomes a bigger issue in the future, you know, 28 that's something we'll have to -- gosh, I sure hope we 29 don't get there again. Those were long difficult 30 conversations. 31 32 But if we do keep finding out about 33 them, you know, that's part of the mortality for them, 34 and if it becomes a significant issue then, you know, 35 yeah, we'll have to revisit that. It's not 36 specifically addressed in this because we're not 37 chasing a quota and trying to figure out how to -- if 38 we should or shouldn't apply those to a quota. 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Cathy. 41 42 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 43 So, Ryan, the Department has spent a lot of time on 44 Prince of Wales doing public meetings and you and your 45 Staff have spent a lot of time talking to users on the 46 ground, independent to public meetings and presenting 47 this idea of a shift in how wolves are managed, and I 48 was wondering if you could speak a little bit towards 49 what you feel like you guys are hearing from users and 50

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Page 83 1 their potential support of the ideas behind this 2 management plan that you presented to us today. 3 4 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 5 Needham. I think it's all over the map. 6 7 I think that there's some folks that 8 are very skeptical, that, you know, this is going to 9 work and how -- especially how managing the harvest or 10 managing for harvest using time and season length, you 11 know, there's some unknowns there and some learning 12 that's going to have to occur as we go through that. 13 But I would say that that's in the minority for the 14 most part. The majority, I believe, are pretty 15 supportive. Even if, you know, there's not -- and 16 there's parts of this, right, I just said there's going 17 to be some learning, you know, even if it's not 18 completely clear how this is going to play out on the 19 ground, I think folks are pretty happy to hear that 20 they can see some predictability in the season length. 21 I think people are supportive of, you know, we're not 22 trying to drive wolf numbers down really low. We're 23 not trying to get rid of wolves, things like that. And 24 I think the other thing that people are really 25 supportive of is, we're going to rely on the people on 26 the ground. You know, we're going to have to have that 27 communication, we're going to have to have, not only 28 communication, but cooperation. You know, it's, again, 29 as I mentioned in my presentation, it's going to be 30 giving some of this back, you know, to really -- it's 31 got to be a cooperative thing. 32 33 So I think, overall, people are 34 supportive, even if there's questions about how it's 35 actually going to play out on the ground. 36 37 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, go ahead, 38 Cathy, with a followup. 39 40 MS. NEEDHAM: Thanks, Mr. Chair. Just 41 as a followup to that. Do you see a difference in how 42 the trapping community versus the hunters, their 43 attitude towards the wolf management plan or how wolves 44 are managed on the Island, do you see that difference 45 and do you feel that they're coming closer to agreement 46 with the potential -- for changing out of a guideline 47 harvest level and on to a, by going the new direction? 48 49 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 50

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Page 84 1 Needham. Just so I make sure I understand the question 2 right. Do I see -- or how would I categorize people 3 who hunt and trap wolves versus people who don't and 4 how they see the plan? 5 6 MS. NEEDHAM: No. The difference 7 between trappers and then those that are actually 8 hunting wolves. 9 10 MR. SCOTT: Member Needham, thanks for 11 the clarification. 12 13 Yeah, I don't believe there's been a 14 lot of testimony on that specific point. As you know, 15 and we've talked about here, the lion's share of wolves 16 taken in Unit 2 are taken by trappers. Typically the 17 number of wolves harvested by hunters is very low, I 18 believe the only time that that really didn't hold was 19 last year we had a significant number of animals early 20 in the season taken by hunters. So I don't -- I don't 21 think there's any conflict there, I don't really 22 perceive any conflict between the two different method 23 groups, if you will. 24 25 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you. 26 27 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mr. Schroeder. 28 29 MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you. Thanks for 30 a really good presentation and also for coming before 31 the Council numerous times on the wolf issue, and I 32 anticipate you'll be coming before the Council numerous 33 times in the future as well. I've got a couple of 34 directions here. 35 36 One is methodologically. So 37 mythological things. And I just wanted to put these on 38 the record. I mentioned these to Ryan at our break. 39 40 One is that it's a little bit unclear 41 -- some of this stuff is a little bit difficult to 42 understand, particularly because wolves are being 43 sampled through the hair samples in a place where 44 they're also harvested and that kind of makes 45 statistics kind of complicated and I was suggesting to 46 Scott that there be some explanation of that because 47 I'm probably not the only one who is going to have some 48 questions on that. 49 50

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Page 85 1 Along with that is the expansion of the 2 area. And from the presentation it's not exactly clear 3 how that took place because the -- if we're expanding 4 the area under analysis by 20 percent, well maybe we 5 just get 20 percent more wolves. I don't need you to 6 answer these right now because they're more things to 7 address down the line. 8 9 The second methodological question, 10 which came up, would be, I think you need a discussion 11 of refugia because the sampling and the harvesting 12 seems to overlap quite a bit. And someone could say, 13 well, so what, if you take a lot of wolves from this 14 area, other wolves will just move in, or someone could 15 say, there really aren't any wolves in these areas that 16 you aren't sampling. 17 18 So those are just things to address and 19 I don't need a response on that. 20 21 But I would like some discussion, 22 though, on kind of how you figure out how many -- let's 23 see, this is based on some estimate of how many wolves 24 are there, I understand if it's a year when there was 25 research done, that you do have an estimate that's 26 backed up by the DNA stuff for what happened the 27 previous year. So we're always one year behind in that 28 respect. What I'd like would be that the information 29 from local harvesters, trappers and hunters, as well as 30 whether that's all TEK knowledge, I'm not sure what's 31 under the TEK umbrella, but that the TEK and the local 32 knowledge would be a really important factor in 33 figuring out how many wolves are around. That was in 34 our comments when we developed our wolf proposal at our 35 last meeting. What we were hearing was a lot of 36 information from people saying that, oh, my gosh, there 37 are a whole lot more wolves than now than you're 38 accounting for. And some of that would be that it's a 39 year later, and perhaps a wolf population could double 40 in a year, perhaps it could half in a year. So I guess 41 I'd like a little bit more confidence in how you'd 42 arrive at an off year -- well, it's not even an off 43 year, an estimation of how many wolves are there. So, 44 you know, for example, right now, our DNA stuff says 45 that there are, I think is it 245 wolves, at some 46 sample point in 2017, well, what do we know about how 47 many wolves are there now from these sources. And 48 perhaps that also gets into the technical zone. 49 Because if you were able to say something about that 50

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Page 86 1 when you present to the Board of Game that might be 2 kind of convincing. 3 4 But I guess that's a little bit 5 rambling. It's a bit, not how they incorporate how 6 they -- the local knowledge and TEK knowledge is 7 incorporated but it's almost like how is it weighted. 8 9 And let's see, I'm getting kind of long 10 here. 11 12 But I also sort of mentioned at the 13 break that this is kind of getting back to the 14 stewardship model of wildlife management, where you had 15 someone out there who really knew what was going on in 16 the environment and who interacted very closely with 17 hunters and trappers. And he or she amalgamated the 18 information they had and said this is what we should 19 do. 20 21 So I guess it's not a very direct 22 question but there are a few things you could comment 23 on there. 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Ryan, do you have 26 some response. 27 28 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 29 Schroeder, I'll try. 30 31 (Laughter) 32 33 MR. SCOTT: You know, I think you hit 34 actually -- you hit the nail on the head where this 35 gets uncomfortable. 36 37 Again, we can go out and we can count 38 wolves and we can have disagreements about the 39 estimating -- how it works and is it, you know, 40 capturing everything and the assumptions we make when 41 we overlay it over the whole unit, but we have a number 42 and we can manage -- or we could try to manage for that 43 harvest guideline level. And it is, that's the place 44 where, especially, those -- for lack of a better term, 45 the off year, the year that we're not operating on the 46 ground, because that compounds the actual timeframe 47 that we're going to -- we already experience a year 48 lag, so then we're going to just increase that lag by 49 another year, year and a half, maybe two years even 50

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Page 87 1 before we get another point estimate. And it is, you 2 know, the place where the TEK or user knowledge, you 3 know, whatever we want to call it really is going to 4 have to come into place. I am not -- I'm not clear how 5 that's going to be translated to us at this point, 6 other than in the, gosh, I don't know, you know, how 7 many years have I been coming to this and talking about 8 wolves, you know, but, you know, but those 9 conversations have started. You know, we've had -- you 10 know, I haven't talked to Mike a lot in the last few 11 months but over the last few years it's, you know, it's 12 right up there. And I know how to get a hold of 13 Chairman Hernandez. We talk to the sealers who are on 14 the ground as well. We're in pretty constant contact 15 with other trappers as well. So I don't know that we 16 can formalize that process and I'm not sure we should, 17 but maybe we need to make it a little bit tighter to at 18 least have that information flow, but it is happening 19 already. 20 21 And you asked the question, how is it 22 weighted. 23 24 I think it's going to -- my intent is 25 that it receives equal weight to everything else that 26 we can get. We're going to have the point estimate at 27 some given time and space, the other things that we 28 talked about doing would be going out and doing den 29 checks and seeing -- you know, to ensure that we're 30 getting reproduction, that doesn't mean recruitment, it 31 just means we're getting pups out in the process, the 32 harvest data, we're going to augment that with looking 33 at age structure of the harvest as well, which is going 34 to help us understand a little bit about recruitment at 35 that point. And then part of -- the primary reason to 36 provide not only the deer harvest numbers that folks 37 have been interested in, and we finally have the data, 38 but also to demonstrate how we're going to continue to 39 look at deer numbers, which will, in a sense, become a 40 proxy for wolf numbers as well. Maybe not right now, I 41 think it's going to -- you know, there's a lag, there's 42 some spacial issues there as well, temporal issues I 43 should say, but those are all things that we're going 44 to have to put in. And I don't see how local knowledge 45 would necessarily be any different than some of these 46 more, you know, less succinct factors that we're going 47 to take into consideration when it's a year we're not 48 on the ground counting wolves. 49 50

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Page 88 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Followup, Bob. 2 3 MR. SCHROEDER: Just as a followup, 4 Scott [sic], I know you're aware of these things, but, 5 you know, sometimes the Department is invested really 6 heavily in this sort of thing, like with the Northwest 7 Arctic Caribou Herd, it's probably a 20 year effort to 8 involve people, and there are -- there are kind of a 9 couple of directions that are possible and I'm not 10 suggesting one or the other, well a few directions. 11 12 One is kind of what you've implied, 13 which is, it's a bit informal contact with hunters and 14 trappers, of actually being on the ground on Prince of 15 Wales, and I think that's great. But a second 16 possibility is that there is an advisory committee of 17 sorts formed, where people are not only representing 18 themselves but they're representing the communities of 19 interest and that some committee of sorts then does 20 weigh in on these things. And I expect those would be 21 lively discussions. 22 23 And then in a different avenue would be 24 a research effort, which would probably be better done 25 by the Division of Subsistence, or in cooperation with 26 the Division of Subsistence, where you actually have a 27 methodology where some number of people are interviewed 28 and asked a particular set of questions and then that 29 comes up with numbers and scholastics that you can then 30 go and report to the Board of Game or to us on. 31 32 So those are just some suggestions, but 33 I kind of think that needs to get tightened up a bit 34 for this to succeed. 35 36 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Any response. 37 38 MR. SCHROEDER: That's a comment. 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Any response Ryan. 41 42 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 43 Schroeder. I appreciate all of those things and I 44 would agree that it does need to get tightened up. And 45 I guess I was sitting here thinking about, you know, 46 the different opportunities for us to do that and, you 47 know, one thing I do want to stress that I don't think 48 I actually stressed in anything I said, we're not 49 walking away from the DNA work. You know that will be 50

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Page 89 1 -- that's kind of our point that we can measure all 2 these other things up against. We are talking about 3 doing it at different intervals but, you know, gosh, I 4 just -- I don't see when we're ever going to get away 5 from it. 6 7 Yeah. 8 9 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: John you had your 10 hand up earlier, you still have a question. 11 12 MR. YEAGER: Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. 13 Ryan, you may have already answered this but I would 14 like to ask this question again. 15 16 What are your -- is this management 17 strategy designed for a full season effort, or is it -- 18 are there triggers that you will have that could be 19 pulled to this, that would shorten it, it would not 20 meet your satisfaction, or this would not be workable 21 and you would be back at square one again? 22 23 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 24 Yeager. The intent, the gold standard, if you will, is 25 a full season, to let it run. 26 27 I'm sure that we could probably go -- 28 you know we could probably brainstorm things that, you 29 know, might cause us to rethink that, we find a pile of 30 dead wolves somewhere that we didn't know about, you 31 know, for instance. We had a comment or a question 32 about unreported human caused mortality a little bit 33 earlier, you know, some significant thing there, I 34 think, would be, you know, probably give us reason to 35 at least think about what's going on in that given 36 year. You know we're not going to give up our 37 emergency order authority and, you know, I believe that 38 the Forest Service and OSM wouldn't -- you know, 39 they're going to maintain their special action 40 authority as well. But the intent is to really build 41 in that predictable season length. And even if we get 42 down below a place where, you know, it's down below the 43 200 wolves or whatever that number ultimately becomes, 44 it's still going to be somewhat predictable. You know 45 we're -- unlike this, now, we're not going to be really 46 counting every single wolf by day that comes in getting 47 ready to close the season, so it may not be four 48 months, if we're down below an optimum objective, it 49 might be two months, it might be six weeks, but, still 50

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Page 90 1 we want to provide that opportunity and we want to 2 provide the predictability for people. 3 4 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Cathy. 5 6 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 7 Kind of along those same lines then, if there is sort 8 of in-season triggers that make you -- like you're 9 getting to a point where it's becoming uncomfortable, 10 is the State managing that, is the Federal side 11 managing that or how does that jointly go because right 12 now our regulations are aligned and you're talking 13 about a potential change in this regulation from an 14 entire management system happening in January and so 15 I'm just thinking about the season after that, how that 16 would work, or if it moves in this direction are we 17 looking at trying to do an out of cycle adjustment to 18 bring it together? 19 20 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 21 Needham. That's a great question. I may have been 22 just blissfully hoping that we were moving forward. I 23 anticipate that it'll be very similar to what we see 24 right now, a joint movement in management of wolves, 25 and not just OSM, not just Fish and Game, this Council, 26 the AC's and others. I do know that Mr. Suminski is 27 here and I don't know if he has anything to add to 28 that, but, yeah, I believe that -- I'm hoping that 29 we're going down the same road, if not, we just spent a 30 couple of hours..... 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mike Douville. 33 34 MR. DOUVILLE: Well, just a comment. I 35 don't think they're guessing at season lengths and 36 stuff like this because they have years of estimated 37 population as well as trapping seasons to look at for 38 data and they're not -- the numbers aren't much 39 different than we're seeing today with your estimate, 40 is the numbers they were going off of in the later '90s 41 and 2000s and you know what the season length was and 42 what the catch rate was for all of those years so it's 43 not like they're going into it blind, they do have some 44 sort of baseline guesstimate to work off of. 45 46 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Albert, go ahead. 47 48 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 49 The one thing I'd ask you guys to caution is the 50

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Page 91 1 percent out of this was taken out and I talked to Mr. 2 Douville about it, and he supports that. 3 4 The reason I'd like to caution you is 5 because there's a saying, history forgotten is history 6 repeated. And I say that because Angoon lowered the 7 bag limit on sockeye working with the Department in the 8 past because the sockeye weren't returning to Kanalku 9 and we saw a need to lower the bag limit or totally not 10 even go to Kanalku anymore. Well, after the sockeye 11 returned and made a come back the numbers never went 12 back up, it's still 15. So just something to think 13 about. 14 15 The other thing is you talk about 16 traditional ecological knowledge. There's nothing here 17 in black and white that says anything, we reference it 18 but there's nothing that has the State saying, yes, we 19 acknowledge there is traditional knowledge out there. 20 A way to bridge that gap is, is you and I have a 21 conversation and you take my information for what it's 22 worth but at some point you're going to be like, hey, 23 there's a correlation here. Like last year I assumed 24 there was going to be a high death rate of deer because 25 it was so cold but now I see otherwise. So if you and 26 I had a conversation and I took what I thought was 27 right and true and you took what you have as science- 28 based and we figure out where the common ground is, I 29 don't need to be the guy that has to be right, I need 30 to be the guy that helps protect the resource. If that 31 makes any sense. 32 33 But I'd like to see that put in black 34 and white. 35 36 Mr. Douville, he said he supports this 37 and would take our proposal and remove it. I respect 38 your thoughts because this is your backyard, so this is 39 another suggestion of maybe taking this, if we all 40 agree with what's in it and mirroring it as our 41 proposal, so we always have a seat at the table. If 42 that makes any sense. Because if we take ours away we 43 don't know if he's going to have the support to push 44 his through and our proposal will still be on the books 45 supporting his. 46 47 If I may, Mr. Chairman, what I 48 appreciate about this piece of work, we could apply 49 this to all resource management in Southeast Alaska and 50

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Page 92 1 we would have so much salmon and so much herring, we 2 probably wouldn't know what to do with it. Oh, I'm sure 3 somebody would think of it, but in a way, you know, 4 it's easy to sit here and criticize everything, but 5 when you find a solution, I'll be the first guy to say 6 thank you. 7 8 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, any response 11 Ryan. 12 13 MR. SCOTT: Through the Chair. Member 14 Howard. I appreciate your comments about putting 15 traditional ecological knowledge, the statement in the 16 document, and before it goes to the Board of Game I'll 17 make sure that happens. 18 19 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. Cathy. 20 21 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 22 I'd like to go back to my question now that Terry is 23 here. Essentially what I'm getting at is I think that 24 this Council has been very active in trying to help 25 solve a problem in terms of the way wolves in Unit 2 26 are managed, and we've done so by putting our own 27 proposals forward for both the Federal and the State 28 system and we have this upcoming State Board of Game 29 meeting where we put in a proposal where the Department 30 has -- is proposing a management plan and managing in a 31 different way and so I think our body is going to be 32 making a decision about whether or not we want our 33 proposal to continue forward at that process or if we 34 want to maybe potentially ask that that be pulled and 35 support this new process now that the Department has 36 had time to develop it. And I'm not saying at this 37 point in time that we're agreeing to everything, but in 38 my mind I'd like to know how that process moves forward 39 and how this management plan would be implemented under 40 -- like what the Federal side is going to need to do if 41 we go in the direction of not managing with a quota, 42 but managing more on a population objective. So 43 hopefully Terry can help me just understand where this 44 might need to go if we make that change. 45 46 MR. SUMINSKI: Mr. Chairman this is 47 Terry Suminski with the Forest Service. 48 49 I think we have enough flexibility 50

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Page 93 1 within the regulations and also enough flexibility that 2 was recently approved by the Federal Subsistence Board 3 in a letter of delegation to the two managers on Prince 4 of Wales, and that even if, you know, our regulations 5 don't match what the State may move forward with the 6 Board of Game proposal, I think there's enough 7 flexibility that we could continue to work with the 8 State until the next regulatory -- you know, Federal 9 regulatory cycle where we could put in -- you know 10 somebody could put in a proposal to clean our 11 regulations up to work better with what the State is 12 proposing and, you know, that would be completely up to 13 you whether that's the direction you want to take. 14 15 Does that kind of answer your question? 16 17 MS. NEEDHAM: So are you saying then if 18 the Board of Game moves towards managing on a 19 population objective, that the Federal subsistence 20 regulations would then fall under delegated authority 21 with the Ranger on Prince of Wales? 22 23 MR. SUMINSKI: Through the Chair. Ms. 24 Needham. I'm just saying I think there's enough 25 flexibility with the way the regulations and the 26 delegation are written that we could continue to work 27 closely with the State to move in the direction if 28 that's, you know, what the Council wishes. And then in 29 the next Federal regulatory cycle if there needs to be 30 some little bit of cleanup we could work on that. 31 32 Thank you. 33 34 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, I just want 35 to comment there, Terry. That's -- I mean as of right 36 now under Federal regulations, we're at that 20 percent 37 harvest guideline, as of now, because the Federal Board 38 did not approve our efforts to increase that. I mean 39 we're at a pretty restrictive management regulation 40 right now. Do you really think that there is enough 41 flexibility given that constraint we have in the 42 regulation now? 43 44 MR. SUMINSKI: Mr. Chairman. If you 45 look at the regulations, our regulations don't talk 46 about percentages at all, it only talks about working 47 with the State to manage within a joint quota. So if 48 this -- you know the Board of Game chooses to eliminate 49 quotas and go with the management system that Mr. Scott 50

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Page 94 1 is describing, you know, our regulations only reference 2 a joint State/Federal quota, it doesn't mention 20 3 percent or 30 percent or anything. So that's why I'm 4 thinking there's enough flexibility there because we 5 could come up with a joint Federal quota just to get us 6 through that first year until we get our regulations 7 better aligned. I think the new delegation of 8 authority letter gives the in-season managers much more 9 flexibility than they had in the previous letter. And, 10 you know, there may be some legal people might disagree 11 with me on that but I do think there's enough 12 flexibility to move forward, at least through '19. 13 14 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, that's an 15 interesting explanation, I have to say I hadn't caught 16 that distinction there myself, that does open up some 17 possibilities. So, yeah, Ryan, you have a comment. 18 19 MR. SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 20 Just to point out that I do recall at previous 21 discussions with the Council, you know, timing was a 22 question. We knew that the Board of Game meeting was 23 coming in January and your next wildlife cycle is next 24 year so I mean there's going to be one, I think there's 25 -- right, one season, that we're going to be a little 26 bit off kilter if we can't figure out how to legally 27 bring those back into -- and that seemed a lot better 28 than like three years, you know, that potentially with 29 the Board of Game cycle, the way it is. 30 31 That's another thing, too, that I'll 32 just mention, that while the Board of Game is on a 33 three year cycle, you know, if things don't work out 34 like we collectively all think they're going to, we can 35 go to the Board of Game out of cycle, you know, and 36 demonstrate, hey, this didn't work the way we thought 37 it was going to work, or it created a real mess over 38 here, or, you know, a biological emergency or something 39 like that so we'll have some -- you know, it's 40 sometimes hard to meet those bars, to get it in, but it 41 is potentially an option if we need to make changes in 42 the interim. 43 44 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Terry. 45 46 MR. SUMINSKI: Yes, Mr. Chairman. We 47 also have the -- you know if I'm off on my 48 interpretation of how much flexibility is written, we 49 also have the special action request process. Anybody 50

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Page 95 1 can submit a special action request to parallel what 2 the State is doing and that would be reviewed by the -- 3 potentially the in-season manager or the Board, and so 4 there is another possible process to align with the 5 State if you so choose. 6 7 Thanks. 8 9 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mr. Douville. 10 11 MR. DOUVILLE: Our proposal to the 12 State -- thank you, Mr. Chair -- would only be 13 affecting State and private lands, it's the one we 14 submitted to the Federal Board, it failed, so I just 15 want everybody to keep that in mind. 16 17 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mr. Schroeder. 18 19 MR. SCHROEDER: The deer data, at our 20 Craig meeting we heard quite a bit about how it was 21 getting harder to get deer on Prince of Wales and that 22 the effort was going up and that deer harvest was going 23 down, and low and behold when you presented the data 24 and you highlighted that, that the quantitative data, 25 based on harvest tickets confirmed the information that 26 we got at our Council meeting. So thinking about the 27 wolf situation and I'm kind of coming off of what I 28 think Albert was saying a few moments ago, we have 29 really kind of an interesting thing here because every 30 once in a while, every two to four years, you're 31 proposing to do DNA sampling, which would give us that 32 kind of a hard number, if we get a little formal about 33 how the hunter, trapper and TEK information is included 34 in the off years, we have a way of seeing if it's 35 correct. And so this has potential beyond just wolves 36 because, you know, frankly there's kind of something of 37 the notion on the one hand that TEK is absolutely and 38 always correct and never fails and that if you hear 39 someone say something from a community that that is the 40 Gospel truth, and then people who don't appreciate 41 those data always suspect that anyone who is wearing 42 that hat is just kind of blowing smoke, that on Prince 43 of Wales that no, it really isn't that way, it's just 44 this person is motivated by other considerations, and I 45 think we've got this really neat opportunity here to 46 see how these things go together. 47 48 In other words, if the hunter and 49 trapper and TEK people said, gosh, wolves are way up, 50

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Page 96 1 and then you get around to doing DNA sampling and the 2 DNA sampling comes out and says, gosh, wolves were real 3 up for that period that people were talking about, 4 we've got real confirmation there, and I think that 5 would be really useful. And since I -- my bias is I 6 completely weight the local knowledge and the reports 7 of trappers and hunters, so you might be able to get 8 away with -- if you did this for a few years, you could 9 even forget about doing DNA sampling and rely on people 10 who hunt and trap and who live in the communities. 11 12 But that aside, I think we got a really 13 neat opportunity here to see how something works. But 14 it needs some sort of -- a little bit more formality on 15 how we tap into the hunter, trapper, local knowledge, 16 TEK. 17 18 Thank you. 19 20 I don't know if you need to comment or 21 not. 22 23 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: We'll let Mr. 24 Howard ask a question or comment. 25 26 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 27 I like the option of paralleling the State's take on 28 the wolves. That sends the message to the Board that 29 we support your work, and by doing that the only way we 30 could say is, as a RAC, we support what he's doing is 31 by paralleling his work. And some more knowledge, a 32 deer ran by my house this morning while I was sitting 33 here so that's what I was sharing with them. So 34 there's some knowledge on the deer population in 35 Angoon. They figure that they're safe in town while 36 I'm out looking for them. 37 38 (Laughter) 39 40 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 41 42 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I'm not seeing 43 other questions at the moment. Let's just take five 44 minutes here and kind of hash over what we've just 45 heard and then I think we may have to take some action 46 in regards to our proposal or possibly do nothing, but 47 we need to decide, I guess. So let's just take a short 48 break and then come back and do that. 49 50

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Page 97 1 (Off record) 2 3 (On record) 4 5 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, do we have 6 everybody in the room. Could the Council members take 7 your seats please. 8 9 (Pause) 10 11 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. I think 12 we've all had enough time to kind of think over the 13 issues before us on what the Council might need to do 14 in regards to the new information we've had here at 15 this meeting. 16 17 Ryan is still available in case anybody 18 had any other questions they thought of while we were 19 on break so I'll leave it open for that. But otherwise 20 I will entertain any ideas from the Council as to how 21 to proceed with our wolf proposals presently before the 22 Board of Game. 23 24 Mr. Douville. 25 26 MR. DOUVILLE: Mr. Chair. I would like 27 to make a motion that we withdraw our support from the 28 Board of Game process for Proposal No. 42. 29 30 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And do we have a 31 second. 32 33 MS. NEEDHAM: Second. 34 35 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Second by Cathy 36 Needham. 37 38 Any discussion. 39 40 Mike, go ahead. 41 42 MR. DOUVILLE: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 43 44 My decision is made on the fact that I 45 like the State Proposal No. 43, 42, on the other hand 46 would only affect State and Federal land, and the 47 Federal Board did not support a similar proposal. I do 48 believe that 43 has a good opportunity to succeed. 49 50

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Page 98 1 That's all. 2 3 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Anybody else. 4 5 Ms. Needham. 6 7 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 8 would agree with Mr. Douville and I would also like to 9 add that I think, I know it might be construed as 10 putting a lot of faith in one proposal to go forward 11 that is about a management strategy without specific 12 numbers -- well, I guess there's numbers but not, you 13 know, it's not a regulation at this point in time 14 across the body -- for this body to consider, but I 15 feel like this relationship between the Staff of the 16 Department and this Council has been building trust for 17 a number of years now and I think that if we, 18 quote/unquote, play our cards right, we need to make 19 sure that we help the Department see their proposal 20 through, and that Proposal No. 42 is no longer 21 necessary, and so while we're considering withdrawing 22 that proposal, and then I'm assuming our next 23 discussion will be whether or not we're going to 24 support the other proposal and how we do that, I think 25 that we can come up with a good plan that the future -- 26 the next few years of management of Unit 2 wolves is 27 being done together cohesive -- between both the 28 Federal and the State system and doing -- trying 29 something that will help alleviate the issues that 30 we've been seeing by managing Unit 2 wolves on a quota 31 system. 32 33 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you, 34 Cathy. And I might have to look back at the motion 35 again, was part of that motion to support Proposal -- 36 the State proposal as well, or is that a separate issue 37 -- that's a separate issue? 38 39 MR. DOUVILLE: That's a separate issue. 40 41 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you for the 42 clarification. 43 44 Anybody else with discussion on the 45 motion. 46 47 48 (No comments) 49 50

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Page 99 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Seeing none, I 2 will call for the question. 3 4 MR. KITKA: Question. 5 6 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: But first DeAnna 7 would you just -- could you repeat the motion for 8 everybody. 9 10 MS. PERRY: Yes, Mr. Chair. Mr. 11 Douville's motion is to withdraw the Council support 12 for Board of Game Proposal No. 42, which is the 13 proposal -- the companion proposal this Council offered 14 to parallel the Federal proposal. 15 16 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. So the 17 motion is to withdraw the proposal, Mike, you have one 18 more thing to say. 19 20 MR. DOUVILLE: I guess withdraw support 21 or withdraw the proposal, you know, I guess maybe 22 they're one in the same, but it's clear that I wanted 23 to withdraw the proposal. 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Could we have that 26 clarification that with the agreement of the second, 27 that the motion is to withdraw the proposal. 28 29 MS. NEEDHAM: Yes. 30 31 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. If 32 everybody is clear on that, the motion to withdraw our 33 proposal then I'll call for the question. 34 35 All in favor of the motion signify by 36 saying aye. 37 38 IN UNISON: Aye. 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: All opposed, nay. 41 42 (No opposing votes) 43 44 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. It sounds 45 like we're going to withdraw that proposal before the 46 Board of Game. Is there any other action we may want 47 to take at this time in regard to that. 48 49 Mike. 50

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Page 100 1 MR. DOUVILLE: I'd like to make another 2 motion, I don't know how to properly word it but I'll 3 give it a try. 4 5 I would like to support Proposal No. 43 6 and a letter of support from the Council be submitted 7 to the Board of Game. 8 9 MR. HOWARD: Second. 10 11 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. A motion 12 from Mr. Douville and a second from Mr. Howard for a 13 second action to write a letter in support of the 14 State's proposal for the Board of Game. 15 16 Any discussion on that. 17 18 Mr. Douville. 19 20 MR. DOUVILLE: I support Proposal No. 21 43. It appears that it moves in a little different 22 direction that is not based solely on quotas and it 23 appears to be a favorable direction. 24 25 Along with a letter of support I would 26 think that the RAC would want to have somebody present 27 at that meeting to put forth the letter and could 28 answer any questions, you know, to support it. 29 30 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Cathy. 31 32 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 33 think as we're deliberating if we're going to support 34 No. 42 [sic], a question in my mind is..... 35 36 MR. DOUVILLE: 43. 37 38 MS. NEEDHAM: 43, sorry. Thank you. 39 One question in my mind the proposed numbers that we're 40 seeing today and if we support those numbers and would 41 like to see -- because, I mean I know and learning to 42 trust Ryan a lot, and great deal, and I know that he's 43 going to take the Department's message back to the 44 Board of Game but we all know the way the Board of Game 45 system works sometimes is that sometimes they make up 46 their own mind and don't necessarily even go with the 47 Department and so if we're going to write a letter in 48 support of 43, I think we should address whether or not 49 we feel these numbers, specifically, that we're seeing 50

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Page 101 1 today, if we agree with them and would like to see 2 those being put into the plan or not, or if we want to 3 see something different. I mean I kind of don't have a 4 complete feel for what we all think is appropriate in 5 terms of numbers but I want to make sure that there's 6 enough safeguard in that letter of support that we 7 don't just leave it up to the Board of Game body 8 themselves to figure out what the thresholds are. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: So if I understand 11 you correctly, you want some clarification maybe in the 12 letter of support that we support the specific proposal 13 as worded with the numbers presented to us and not 14 necessarily support any action that the Board may end 15 up taking if it diverts from this -- what we've seen 16 here today, would that be a good summation of what you 17 want to see in the letter? 18 19 MS. NEEDHAM: Yeah. I think our letter 20 should be -- have substance to it because we've worked 21 together through this process for a number of years and 22 we have a lot of record that we can pull from for 23 putting into a letter of why we would support this idea 24 and how we feel it's benefiting subsistence users on 25 the ground, but I also don't want to leave it so wide 26 open that our general support gets misconstrued for 27 supporting something that we don't quite know is going 28 to happen at that Board of Game level yet. And so if 29 we could decide if these numbers are fair, I'd like to 30 actually include the numbers in the letter as well. We 31 haven't really talked -- as a Council we haven't really 32 talked about this range. We're kind of saying, yeah, 33 we generally agree with the concept of managing for a 34 population objective, do we feel that the Department 35 has come up with the right objective range for a 36 population on Prince of Wales. 37 38 So it's kind of a question that I think 39 we should have that discussion so that it's in the 40 record so that we can determine if that's what we're 41 going to put in our letter. 42 43 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. I guess the 44 question will be when to have that discussion. I don't 45 know if we need to have that right now, before we vote 46 on this, is that what you had in mind? 47 48 MS. NEEDHAM: Well, before we close our 49 meeting because the Board of Game is going to meet 50

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Page 102 1 before we meet again so it definitely needs to be a 2 discussion that we have. And I guess I would throw it 3 out there, that the first thing I noticed about the 4 numbers on the board are numbers that I've heard from 5 this body before. And so maybe not necessarily in that 6 order but I think Mr. Douville has shared with us that 7 he -- on the record before that he thinks a good target 8 population is -- for Prince of Wales is between 100 and 9 150, so those numbers are on there, are they in the 10 right place, do we want to support that, do we want to 11 stick to 100 and 150, that 200 level. And maybe it's 12 something that we need to form a working group on to 13 decide if it's not something we want to hash out at 14 this exact moment in time, but, again, my concern is, 15 is that if we just write a letter of support and it 16 doesn't have any substantiation to it, it's going to be 17 hard for us to interact with the Board of Game on 18 whether or not this meets our intentions and I want to 19 make sure this process after the Board of Game 20 continues on smoothly for the Federal side of things. 21 22 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, so depending 23 on how we vote on this motion we will be generating a 24 letter and we do have to take some time to decide what 25 points we want to put in that letter so we can, you 26 know, have some discussions here before the end of this 27 meeting and come up with the wording on that letter, 28 that would be your suggestion it sounds like. 29 30 MS. NEEDHAM: Yes. 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And, Mike, you 33 have something to add. 34 35 MR. DOUVILLE: No. I guess we'll 36 discuss it or something, but I would support a target 37 population of 150. 38 39 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. We have 40 that on the record. And we also have our resident 41 parliamentarian came to the table, did he have 42 something to add. Mr. Johnson. 43 44 MR. JOHNSON: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 45 For the record, Carl Johnson, Office of Subsistence 46 Management. I do not come in my parliamentarian role, 47 but I wanted to endorse Member Needham's suggestion 48 about perhaps a working group during this meeting form 49 and come up with specific things. Because think of 50

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Page 103 1 this very much like if you were making a recommendation 2 to the Federal Subsistence Board, you like to develop 3 very specific justifications for when you're making a 4 recommendation. And here you, in a combination of two 5 motions, chose to withdraw one of your own proposals 6 and then instead support this one, so I think one of 7 the things you might want to address is how you feel 8 specifically Proposal 43 goes more towards 9 accomplishing some of your Unit 2 wolf management goals 10 compared to your own proposal. And then some of the 11 specific things that Member Needham suggested, you 12 know, coming up with particular numbers, particular 13 reasons why you support Proposal 43 and why you think 14 it'd be good for subsistence uses in the Southeast 15 region. And then coming up with those and then having 16 those on the record at some point in time before the 17 end of this meeting would be an excellent idea. 18 19 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you for 20 that. And while you're there I have a procedural 21 question. We just took a vote to withdraw a proposal 22 that we had before the State. You know normally in our 23 process when we vote on a proposal, you know, we have 24 to give our justifications given on the four factors of 25 conservation concerns, impacts to subsistence users, 26 those four things, if you're -- we just voted to 27 withdraw a proposal, do we necessarily have to justify 28 it in the same way that we would before the Subsistence 29 Board? 30 31 MR. JOHNSON: Well, that's a very good 32 question, Mr. Chair. And, no, you do not. Those 33 factors are derived from specific provisions of ANILCA, 34 Section .805, particularly, Section .805(c) when it 35 comes to recommendations to the Board on either 36 supporting or opposing a general proposal, so really 37 when it comes to providing a rationale on the record 38 for why you withdrew Proposal 42, that's not necessary. 39 You just need to, I would say, focus on developing your 40 record for what you want to have in your letter in 41 supporting Proposal 43. 42 43 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Very good, thank 44 you for that. 45 46 Are we ready to vote on Mr. Douville's 47 motion. 48 49 Albert. 50

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Page 104 1 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chair. If 2 you read the State's Constitution, this is consistent 3 with the State Constitution in managing for abundance. 4 So you look at 100 to 150, that's managing for 5 abundance, which I agree with. I've always wanted this 6 for the fisheries, manage our fisheries for abundance 7 like this is being done. The State Constitution gives 8 him clear direction, this is managing for abundance so 9 you don't have a conservation concern in the future. 10 And I used to be able to recite the Constitution based 11 on the numbers but I've let that kind of slide a little 12 bit. I think the last number could be 20 because in 13 our last conversation about wolves we know that they've 14 made it to a population of 15 and still made a come 15 back to now, over 200. So your baseline in the red 16 could be 20. So this, in itself, is consistent with 17 the State Constitution and by us supporting it, this is 18 setting a precedence that they're going to look at this 19 organization and all of us around the table, that we've 20 managed to do something with Mr. Scott that no one else 21 in the state has ever done. There's no -- you can't 22 find an example of this anywhere where the State and 23 the Federals have sat down and found a solution to a 24 common problem. This is a solution to a problem 25 concerning wolves. 26 27 So I think, Mr. Chairman, if we're 28 going to do this, we should do a roll call vote and I 29 have some ideas for your letter. So thank you, Mr. 30 Chair. 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Albert. 33 34 Mr. Douville. 35 36 MR. DOUVILLE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 37 I guess I have a question, like we're voting on the 38 letter of support but the total contents of that letter 39 is not complete, which will be done by a working group, 40 would it need any further action besides this vote to 41 complete? 42 43 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I'm unsure. Any 44 opinions from the Council. 45 46 Mr. Schroeder. 47 48 MR. SCHROEDER: Mr. Chair. I think 49 we've done this numerous times in the past where the 50

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Page 105 1 Council wants to express its views and has a number of 2 points to make and we've often had a committee sit down 3 and then come back to the Council with a letter before 4 we close and then the Council says either yea or nay or 5 modifies it in some way or makes additions. So that 6 might be an efficient way of proceeding here. 7 8 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Bob. I 9 think we do -- we have had enough discussion on what we 10 want to see in that letter, some specific numbers that 11 we want to nail down as what we support, so I think we 12 can do that easily before the end of the meeting, 13 generate wording for a letter. 14 15 So any other discussion. 16 17 (No comments) 18 19 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Should we have the 20 call for the question then. 21 22 MR. YEAGER: Question. 23 24 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, Albert 25 requested a roll call vote, that might be a good idea. 26 Mr. Kitka, you want to call the roll. 27 28 MR. KITKA: Frank Wright. 29 30 MR. WRIGHT: Yes. 31 32 MR. KITKA: Yea or nay. 33 34 MR. WRIGHT: Yea. 35 36 MR. KITKA: Mike Douville. 37 38 MR. DOUVILLE: Yes. 39 40 MR. KITKA: Harvey Kitka is yes. 41 42 Robert Schroeder. 43 44 MR. SCHROEDER: Aye. 45 46 MR. KITKA: Albert Howard. 47 48 MR. HOWARD: Yes. 49 50

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Page 106 1 MR. KITKA: Ray Sensmeier. 2 3 MR. SENSMEIER: Yes. 4 5 MR. KITKA: John Yeager. 6 7 MR. YEAGER: Yes. 8 9 MR. KITKA: Cathy Needham. 10 11 MS. NEEDHAM: Yes. 12 13 MR. KITKA: Donald Hernandez. 14 15 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes. Motion 16 passes unanimously so we will need to take some time to 17 maybe have a little discussion about who might want to 18 come up with some wording for that letter and get that 19 done before the end of the meeting. 20 21 So thank you all very much. Thank you, 22 Ryan, you've been very helpful, and we will move on. 23 24 Cathy. Comment. 25 26 MS. NEEDHAM: Mr. Chair. At this time 27 are we going to potentially talk about making sure that 28 somebody from the Regional Advisory Council can attend 29 the Board of Game meeting to be present as Mr. Scott 30 had requested at the beginning of his testimony on 31 wolves. 32 33 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes. We know that 34 is going to be important. I think there might have 35 been some place on the agenda, at least with the Staff 36 questions, where we wanted to make sure that happened. 37 I think there will be an opportunity here during the 38 course of the meeting to stress that point, that we do 39 need support to go to the Board of Fish, Board of Game 40 meetings. So if that topic -- if we get the right 41 people in front of us on that discussion, please, 42 remind us all that that's an important thing we have to 43 bring up. 44 45 So, thank you, Cathy. 46 47 John. 48 49 MR. YEAGER: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I 50

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Page 107 1 believe Mr. Scott had a few comments there after our 2 vote on this. 3 4 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, go ahead, 5 Ryan. 6 7 MR. SCOTT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 8 Mr. Yeager. First off, thank you, good job. I mean, 9 gosh, what a road we've been on so far and I know we've 10 got farther to go but, you know, it's pretty neat 11 actually to be able to be a part of this and to sit 12 here and to work with that. 13 14 As far as the letter of support goes, I 15 think that's a -- I encourage you to do that. I don't 16 know when, whatever group is going to get together, is 17 going to get together, but if you'd like me to be 18 involved in that or to be available, I will try to be 19 here through tomorrow and then I could be available by 20 phone after that if -- so I'm going to work on that, 21 just staying through the night and then I'll catch 22 tomorrow's flight out and I'll be available for other 23 things, you know, especially if we're going to talk 24 about numbers, you might want some help with the 25 history and the background of some of that. 26 27 Okay. I said I only wanted five 28 minutes on some fun stuff, like other wildlife stuff, 29 can I do that? 30 31 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Sure. 32 33 MR. SCOTT: Okay, perfect. 34 35 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Go ahead, let's 36 just have some fun stuff. 37 38 (Laughter) 39 40 MR. SCOTT: All right. First off, just 41 a quick thing, quick notes about some hunts and some 42 population stuff in Southeast Alaska. 43 44 Everybody talked about the weather and 45 how that has impacted some hunting opportunities and 46 success rates. That was across the region. It could 47 have been for deer, for moose, even bears, you know, to 48 some extent moving around a lot. They're not 49 concentrated on streams. About the only species that 50

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Page 108 1 really, we saw an increase in the harvest early in the 2 season and through now is Mountain Goats, and that's 3 because everybody could look out the window and it was 4 nice weather and they said, ah, there's a goat, I'm 5 going to go up and hunt them. 6 7 Most of the moose hunts caught up 8 towards the end. The Unit 1B and Unit 3, one's going 9 to be down a little bit. Moose continue to push west. 10 Kuiu Island represented a fairly high number of moose 11 harvested this year. It won't be long and you're going 12 to be seeing them, you know, on Prince of Wales. And 13 we recently had a moose show up in Hoonah, so, who 14 knows maybe we'll have them show up there, too. 15 16 And was that a bull or a cow that..... 17 18 MR. WRIGHT: I don't know. 19 20 MR. SCOTT: Yeah, I can't remember. I 21 thought maybe it was a young bull, hopefully he'll find 22 a mate soon. 23 24 Deer numbers, aside from places we've 25 talked about that are having some challenges appear to 26 be doing very, very well with the mild winters and 27 people are reporting really good success rates and we 28 have a count of one, anyway, in Angoon. And I don't 29 know, was it a doe or a buck? 30 31 MR. HOWARD: It looked like a little 32 buck. 33 34 MR. SCOTT: Nice. Well, hopefully he 35 makes it through, you know, the next few weeks, gets 36 his job done and we'll have more. 37 38 The Southeast Wildlife office has 39 experienced a lot of change, and I just want to make 40 you aware of that, and some new names that you're going 41 to be hearing. Boyd Porter retired a couple of weeks 42 ago out of Ketchikan. That position is vacant right 43 now. It'll be recruited for fairly soon. About eight 44 months ago we put a young man named Ross Dorendorf in 45 as the assistant there and he'll pick up the reins and 46 fill Boyd's position, at least, in an acting status. 47 We have a biologist there, someone to work with for the 48 State for Ketchikan and Prince of Wales area. Rich 49 Lowell recently retired as well out of Petersburg. And 50

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Page 109 1 that was, I believe, the tail end of August or 2 September 15th, I guess. We've recruited for that, 3 going through the hiring process and we hope to have 4 somebody stationed down there. We were fortunate 5 enough to fill another position in Petersburg with a 6 very capable program technician named Hillary Wood and 7 she's doing a great job. She's basically running 8 Rich's moose hunt and that's going pretty well. Tom 9 Schumacher, last Friday, was officially named the new 10 regional supervisor for Southeast Alaska and he 11 couldn't be here, he's working on a brown bear guiding 12 issue for Unit 4 right now and they're meeting with the 13 Forest Service, the guide industry and Fish and Game 14 are meeting this afternoon on that. 15 16 A couple of other things. Highlight 17 some research stuff because I think it has direct 18 application to the things we've talked about. We 19 brought a new guy up from the Lower 48, he's a deer 20 person, and he's going to be working on our deer 21 research. As we speak he is processing trail camera 22 data and actually thinks he's got some real insight 23 into how we can use trail cameras to enumerate deer or 24 at least get population trends, and that's something 25 new for us. We have umpteenthousand pictures of deer 26 from Prince of Wales and other places, frankly we don't 27 know how to use it all. It's such a voluminous thing 28 and how do you know you're not seeing the same deer 12 29 times and, you know, things like that. And I had hoped 30 I could actually provide some preliminary information 31 on that today but his computer stuff crashed last night 32 and he sent me a note and apologized but we'll have 33 something for that in the future. The other thing, 34 he'll be looking at how to relate alpine deer surveys 35 to deer in the woods. Is going to be looking at Unit 3 36 to see how deer and moose are interacting. Deer drive 37 intensive management in Southeast Alaska and people are 38 killing a whole lot of moose in Unit 3. So that's a 39 good thing. 40 41 I'm not sure if you've heard of, or 42 followed the announcement that a new disease has shown 43 up in Alaska and a short terminology is emovi, it's a 44 bacterium that occurs in the lungs and causes pneumonia 45 essentially. It was first detected in a caribou calf 46 and now, subsequently, it's been detected in adult 47 caribou as well as moose, sheep and mountain goats in 48 different places. It doesn't mean it's going to kill 49 the animal and if it's a healthy animal, you know, 50

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Page 110 1 there's a chance it's going to be able to overcome it 2 and defeat it. But it is something that -- and, you 3 know, the world's changing. We've talked about that. 4 And so that's something that we have stepped up our 5 surveillance on and so if you bring in a goat head or a 6 moose head or a deer head and we have someone 7 available, you might see us swab the nose and we send 8 those off to be tested and we're doing that for a 9 variety of species across the state of Alaska. 10 11 And I guess the last thing that I want 12 to just mention real briefly, last week I was fortunate 13 enough to spend three days on the ground with the 14 Forest Service in Yakutat working on their subsistence 15 moose hunt. That's been a management challenge for 16 many years with some changes in State or land 17 management, things like that. The hunt was going super 18 fast, we were having a hard time controlling it and, 19 you know, we do manage on a quota and hitting that 20 quota, last week, it opened last Monday and it closed 21 at midnight on Friday so it went, you know, it's a 22 token, but it went a half a day longer, you know. But 23 really I wanted to point out that the Forest Service 24 Staff in Yakutat, Susan Oehlers, Lee Vincent, those 25 folks, Roy Churchwell, out of Juneau with our shop, 26 they did an outstanding job. They made some changes to 27 reporting requirements. It's a little bit of a 28 challenge but we went to a 24 hour reporting 29 requirement and that seems to have worked pretty well 30 for the moose that were harvested. I don't know that 31 we're going to land right on the quota but we're going 32 to be doggone close. And that -- it really has -- it 33 really played out well this year and I think that they 34 deserve some credit for really riding herd on that. 35 36 More credit goes to you guys as well 37 for moving the season dates on the other side of the 38 Yakutat Forelands where we wanted to distribute some of 39 that hunting effort and, again, it's a token, you know, 40 improvement, but we do have additional moose harvested 41 from the east side. So while it didn't -- it's not 42 going gangbusters and we haven't solved all the world's 43 problems, we've moved a little bit farther in that 44 direction. 45 46 And, yeah, I guess that's it. 47 48 Thank you for your time. 49 50

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Page 111 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, thank you 2 for that kind of recap. A lot of good news there, glad 3 to hear it. Glad to hear a little improvement in the 4 Yakutat situation because that has been a problem so we 5 may have to continue working on it, but, yeah, thank 6 you. 7 8 Any other comments from the Council. 9 10 Cathy. 11 12 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 13 One thing that Ryan brought up in his earlier 14 presentation regarding deer reminded me that I wanted 15 to ask a question and I'm not sure that -- maybe he's 16 the right person to ask this but it might be somebody 17 from the Federal side. 18 19 The proposal, the wildlife proposal 20 that we submitted reducing the bag limit in Unit 2 that 21 had a request for reconsideration, an RFR, and I was 22 wondering if somebody could walk me through how that 23 process goes because I don't believe that RFRs happen 24 very often with us and I'm just not sure -- I'd like to 25 just hear a quick summary of what happens now that that 26 RFR was put in and when a decision on that gets made or 27 how it gets made first of all. 28 29 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you, Cathy. 30 I did make a request that the Staff kind of brief us on 31 that process. It looks like maybe we're going to have 32 that briefing now. 33 34 MR. JOHNSON: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 35 Again, Carl Johnson, OSM. 36 37 So RFRs can be submitted up to 60 days 38 after a publication in the Federal Register. So the 39 RFRs that were submitted after the Board action were 40 not yet ripe for consideration because the Federal 41 Register notice for the wildlife regulations only just 42 published recently. So there's still up to 60 days 43 after that before the deadline for submitting RFRs. 44 And then after that the regulations don't provide a 45 timeline for when the initial threshold analysis has to 46 be completed. But that's the next step. A threshold 47 analysis will be completed to determine whether or not 48 the RFR, as submitted, meets the threshold requirements 49 to be a valid request for reconsideration. If it is 50

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Page 112 1 determined that the RFR does meet the threshold 2 requirements then a full analysis will be completed. 3 But, again, there's no timeline as to when that 4 analysis has to be completed. And in the meantime, 5 until the RFR process is completed, the regulation that 6 is being challenged, that is being requested to be 7 reconsidered, goes into effect and remains in effect 8 until reconsidered by the Board. 9 10 That's a quick overview. 11 12 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you for 13 that. Any questions. 14 15 Cathy. 16 17 MS. NEEDHAM: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 18 Does it ever come back to the Regional Advisory 19 Council? I'm only curious because it was a proposal 20 that we put in so I'm wondering -- you said an analysis 21 happens, I'm assuming maybe the InterAgency Staff 22 Committee or some body like that actually does that 23 analysis, but does it come back through this body at 24 all or is the decision made outside of anything -- any 25 input that we might have back into it. 26 27 MR. JOHNSON: Through the Chair. Yes, 28 the issue of the RFR will come back to the Council at 29 some point. The Staff are the ones who write the 30 initial threshold analysis. And in the case of 31 Southeast proposals, we do have some Forest Service 32 Staff who are working on the threshold analysis. I do 33 not recall, off the top of my head, at which point the 34 issue does come back to the Regional Advisory Council, 35 but the Council is invited to provide input at some 36 point. 37 38 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mr. Schroeder, you 39 still have a question. 40 41 MR. SCHROEDER: (Shakes head 42 negatively) 43 44 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: No, okay. Anybody 45 else. 46 47 (No comments) 48 49 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, I think that 50

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Page 113 1 wraps up wolves and deer in Unit 2, although it's never 2 truly wrapped up, but, for now. 3 4 MR. SCOTT: It's a good fish meeting. 5 6 (Laughter) 7 8 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. Right. 9 Until next time. 10 11 (Laughter) 12 13 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Take a quick look 14 at the agenda here. We have one more item of old 15 business. Okay. The eulachon monitoring update and I 16 believe Jeff Reeves was going to give that; is that 17 correct? 18 19 MS. PERRY: Yes. 20 21 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And, hopefully, we 22 still have Jeff on the telephone. 23 24 MR. REEVES: Yes, Mr. Chairman I'm 25 here. 26 27 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Is that you Jeff? 28 29 MR. REEVES: Yes, it is. Can you hear 30 me? 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. And I do 33 want to mention that Mr. Sensmeier informed me that he 34 has to leave the meeting after today. He's got another 35 obligation and he did have one other -- one brief 36 presentation he wanted to make before he leaves, so 37 we'll do the eulachon monitoring report and then Mr. 38 Sensmeier will address the Council. 39 40 Okay. 41 42 So, Jeff, you're up. 43 44 MR. REEVES: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 45 Council members. My name's Jeff Reeves, I'm with the 46 US Forest Service. 47 48 Now, I had -- what I had for this 49 presentation was actually a PowerPoint and so I'm 50

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Page 114 1 hoping that it's being put up on your screen. 2 3 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Just a second. 4 5 (Pause) 6 7 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, Jeff, yeah, 8 we have the PowerPoint up on the screen and we have a 9 request that maybe you could speak a little more 10 directly and forcefully into the microphone, we're 11 having a little bit of trouble hearing you. 12 13 MR. REEVES: Oh, okay, can you hear me, 14 is this any better? Can you hear me? 15 16 (Telephone interference) 17 18 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Tina's kind of 19 working on it here. 20 21 (Telephone interference) 22 23 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you, 24 Tina. Yeah, go ahead Jeff. 25 26 MR. REEVES: Okay, Don -- Mr. Chairman, 27 is this better? 28 29 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Go ahead. 30 31 MR. REEVES: So what I'm going to do 32 here is I figured the best way to go over this topic 33 because this has been a pretty hot topic the past few 34 years, is I have a PowerPoint here and so what we're 35 going to try to do is we're going to not only look at 36 like the biology of eulachon but we're also going to 37 then look at a little bit of the monitoring that we did 38 this year. 39 40 So my title slide should have -- you 41 should be seeing two eulachon there. 42 43 Next slide, please. 44 45 I'll be kind of going over each -- some 46 kind of description of each slide and make sure that 47 you have the right one. You're looking at a white 48 background slide. And first of all what I tried to do 49 was -- I went back through the transcripts and tried to 50

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Page 115 1 see what were some topics that had been identified, 2 specific questions that were asked. One that stood out 3 was -- what kept getting mentioned was the term, black 4 with eulachon, so hopefully in this presentation we 5 kind of come up with the idea, well, what is black with 6 eulachon mean. Some other comments, Mr. Yeager, during 7 the fall 2017 meeting, he was very interested to know 8 the biology, what's it going to take to open a fishery 9 back up. And in the past, some of the ratings that we 10 used fair, moderate, good return, and he was kind of 11 wanting to know, well, what does that mean. There was 12 some other testimony during the fall 2017 meeting that 13 was specific to the aerial surveys that the Forest 14 Service was doing. The individual making the statement 15 is I -- I believe thought the aerial surveys weren't -- 16 weren't a valid method. Their quote that they said's 17 right -- is right there below in the middle of the 18 slide. And then another one that popped up that kind 19 of added this in there is the fact that a big -- big 20 importance of the harvest of this fish is for grease. 21 And so one of the big questions that keeps popping up 22 is how much is needed for grease. And when I was 23 putting this together at the very end I -- it took me 24 awhile to find something that would be considered -- or 25 scientifically peer-reviewed and citable, and you see 26 there that I have a note that Swan in 1880 basically 27 reported that a ton of fish is required to make 28 anywhere from 24 to 30 gallons of grease. 29 30 So go ahead and move to the next slide 31 please. 32 33 So this slide should be kind of a 34 greenish-blue background. 35 36 It gives you a rough idea of a 37 typically spawning biology of eulachon. So typically 38 the adults will live three to four years in marine 39 water and migrate up into the river to spawn. During 40 spawning, roughly about each female releases about 41 25,000 eggs but they're broadcast -- for -- spawner, 42 excuse me -- and so when the eggs are fertilized they 43 pretty much are at the winds of the current, they sink 44 and then they're sticky and adhesive so they're going 45 to try to attach to the gravel or sand on the river 46 bottom. After they've attached, as long as they have a 47 good oxygen and water flow, the bottom center of the 48 picture there you see a picture of a actual eulachon 49 larvae and after about one to two months of incubation, 50

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Page 116 1 depending on especially water temperature, those are 2 going to hatch, they're just going to float up into the 3 current and then if the winds with the river current, 4 basically, to get themselves out to saltwater and then 5 from that point, again, until they get big enough to 6 grow fins and swim in their own they're at the whims of 7 the marine water current. 8 9 Next slide, please. 10 11 So hopefully here you're looking at the 12 -- a close up of the pelvic fins of two individual 13 eulachon. And other than looking for actually 14 (indiscernible) or roe, this is kind of how a lot of 15 managers now will determine the gender of eulachon. 16 And so you see on the left there that the females tend 17 to have a shorter pair of pelvic fins than a male does. 18 So obviously this one -- I found this after this year's 19 monitoring so ideally next year we're going to 20 hopefully be able to look for this, or this -- or in 21 2019 if we're on the ground, and hopefully we can kind 22 of be able to sample a large number of fish, too, to 23 kind of be able to identify sex ratios that are 24 returning back. 25 26 Next slide, please. 27 28 Now, hopefully this slide you're 29 seeing, you're going to see some substrate and you 30 should see a measuring tape drawn across the bottom and 31 in this picture, it was at Carol Creek back in 2011 and 32 what you're looking for here is if you look straight 33 above the number 40, up above -- there's a rock in the 34 bottom there, there's going to be a lot of white 35 modeling in this section of the picture and what that 36 is is that actually -- that's eulachon eggs. What you 37 can see here is they can be really hard to see, 38 especially if they're not attached to rocks and they 39 wind up in a really fine substrate like this. This is 40 a rather large patch but we don't know if this was 41 successful because when the tide was low, this gravel 42 bar -- or sand bar, whatever you want to call it, was 43 actually exposed. So we don't know if these eggs, or 44 whatever, fully matured or if they're able to withstand 45 being able to exposed during tide cycle. 46 47 Next slide, please. 48 49 So -- now, here what we're trying to 50

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Page 117 1 look at is -- I did a literature review of Alaskan 2 areas and if they've done any studies on especially 3 weight -- because we're looking at trying to figure out 4 how many fish are in a pound and we're knowing that 5 based on what I had just told you earlier that it takes 6 about a ton of these fish to make up to 24 to 30 7 gallons of oil, we need to know how many possibly it's 8 going to take. Now, what we find here, the Twentymile 9 River drains up into Cook Inlet, so it's up in the 10 Anchorage area, and during the project years up there 11 they found that the males tend to vary to about 65 to 12 69 grams per fish, and the females were a little bit 13 smaller, ranging from 60 to 65 grams. So when you 14 compare this -- what it comes down to is the majority 15 of the fish being five year olds, you're going to see 16 about six to seven fish per pound. 17 18 Next slide, please. 19 20 And so the next river that -- as you 21 come down the South Coast line where they've listed 22 some weights is the Copper River and then a number of 23 like channels and tributaries draining in. And so in 24 the top corner there you see places like Flagg Point 25 (ph) and Thirtyeight Mile, and Thirtyseven, Thirtynine 26 Mile channels, these were just locations where they -- 27 where they sampled fish. So you see there's kind of a 28 variation in those areas of what the average weight per 29 fish was. Kind of you have a range of 57 to 63 grams 30 per fish. This suggests about seven to eight fish per 31 pound. And, again, just like the Twentymile fish were, 32 this -- these study fish tend to be dominated by five 33 year olds. 34 35 So our next slide is specific to the 36 early years when there was some sampling done at the 37 Unuk River before the collapse of the run. And they -- 38 from 2001 to 2003 you can see that there was almost 39 1,600 fish were sampled. These fish, though, they only 40 average about 38 grams per fish, which is quite smaller 41 than those fish to the north. But you're seeing about 42 twice as many fish per pound, 12 fish per pound. And 43 the dominating age class in these fish was three year 44 olds. So why they're younger to the south, that, I do 45 not know. But -- so we're looking with the Unuk 46 though, obviously you can tell 12 fish per pound is 47 kind of this magic number. 48 49 Next slide, please. 50

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Page 118 1 So here, hopefully, this can kind of 2 give us an idea of maybe what we can use to refer to 3 the term black. 4 5 The bottom left picture, where it's 6 just a dense -- well, actually that's not a location 7 here in Alaska, I had to pull that one off the 8 internet, but the two pictures to the right are 9 locations in Southeast Alaska. The bottom one is Akwe 10 River, that was probably about five, 10 years ago when 11 that picture was sent to me. So you can just see that 12 in that water, I mean you're just looking at it's dense 13 and black. That top right picture, that was about two 14 years during an aerial survey, that's in the Upper Unuk 15 River. And when we flew over that you could see that 16 black shape change. I wish I had a video of the 17 picture so you could see how it would work. But the 18 blackness of these pictures and knowing that in both 19 cases this is relatively deep water, it gives me strong 20 confidence that the density of the schools that we're 21 seeing there is probably similar to that picture on the 22 left. 23 24 But one of the things we're gong to 25 have to be careful with, though, is in the next slide, 26 and what you'll see here is that shallow water schools 27 can actually appear denser than they are. And so the 28 picture on the right was also a couple of years ago, 29 that's in the Eulachon River, which is a tributary to 30 the Unuk. And you can see the black against the 31 corresponding, you know, against the substrate in the 32 picture but if you were to actually get down there in 33 your waders and walk along it, what you're going to see 34 is real similar to the picture in the left. You'll see 35 that there's fish there but there's nothing as dense as 36 that previous picture where it's just like if you fell 37 out of your boat and landed on it, you probably 38 wouldn't get wet. 39 40 The next slide. 41 42 This is District 1. So this is, of 43 course, the area that the Unuk River flows into. It's 44 a rather large district. It includes the US waters of 45 Portland Canal, so from Hyder straight down. It's the 46 open waters there just south of Duke Island which is 47 right below the word Ketchikan. The line on the left 48 angles up through the mid-point of Lower Clarence 49 Strait, and then also included in the district you can 50

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Page 119 1 see is West and East Beam Canals with Ravella Island 2 and then there's three inlets, George Inlet, Carol 3 Inlet, and then Thorne Arm which are inlets on Ravella 4 Island right there in the middle. 5 6 Next slide, please. 7 8 So when you look in this district what 9 we have is obviously the Unuk is the most important 10 river. Draining into it is Eulachon River and then at 11 the head -- or the top of the tide flat where it meets 12 freshwater is also the Klahini River, if you come south 13 you'll see that there's Carol Creek and Chikamin River, 14 the location of them -- or the -- these locations have 15 -- fish have been seen in these in the past. Now, the 16 Willard and Fillmore Inlets and Halibut Bay, at the end 17 of our monitoring this year, we had an older gentleman 18 that has pretty much lived on a boat most of his life, 19 he came into the Ketchikan office and informed us that 20 in his lifetime he's also seen eulachon in these 21 locations, but what he believes why he was seeing them 22 there is, if you notice in the bottom right corner, you 23 see the Nass River, and what he believes it that the 24 fish that showed up in those locations were just excess 25 fish off of the Nass return. Because he believed that, 26 it was usually in the big -- that he saw them there 27 when the Nass had really big returns. 28 29 So the next slide is we're starting 30 into our monitoring efforts. 31 32 And so what you need to understand, we 33 did try to -- four weeks on the ground to pretty much 34 cover the duration of eulachon presence. Some of the 35 folks that were involved are listed there, we have 36 Aubrey Saunders, that's the young lady that's standing 37 on the dock in the top right picture, she pretty much 38 spent four weeks out there. Ton Gallegos with the 39 Ketchikan Indian Community, he's in the bottom right 40 picture. He came out and he joined us during the first 41 week. I have Justin Koller listed there. Justin did, 42 I believe about a week at the very end of it when I had 43 to take off for a family emergency. Jon Hyde is our 44 local Ketchikan Forest Service biologist, he 45 participated in the Federal aerial surveys that we did. 46 And we also had Steve Huffine, who's a local cabin 47 owner on the Unuk involved. And he had been basically 48 on the Unuk for about two weeks prior to us showing up. 49 He was very instrumental in letting us know when he saw 50

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Page 120 1 indication that fish were starting to go and then when 2 the ice moved and he was pretty much out there the 3 duration of the time we were there and also was the 4 individual that made a cabin available so on short 5 notice we could get out there. Now, with our 6 monitoring efforts being such short notice we weren't 7 able to get a fisheries resource permit so we were 8 really limited in that we couldn't sample any fish. So 9 that explains why we just -- we took no biological data 10 and we just strictly stayed with visual surveys and 11 aerial surveys trying to see if we could, you know, was 12 one seeing more than the other and then we did look at 13 mortalities that we found. But since we couldn't 14 gather enough of those for really any valid 15 information, we just looked more just to see did those 16 -- did those mortalities have parasites. And a few 17 pictures you might see it looks like a worm kind of 18 coming out of the gills, not every eulachon has those 19 but we do see those. And so 2018 was purely more 20 observation and hopefully in 2019 that we're actually 21 able to come up with some plan to sit there and step it 22 up from more of observations and try to get into 23 something that's more, you know, besides the 24 observations also trying to look at how's that -- 25 what's the sex ratio -- you know has the weight 26 changed, just stuff like that and trying to figure out, 27 you know, number of fish per volume, that type of 28 thing. 29 30 So, next slide, please. 31 32 So this picture -- I wish it would be a 33 little bit more (indiscernible) this is obviously from 34 an aircraft and to the side -- the left side of the 35 people where the tide flat enters into Burrows Bay. 36 The bottom left corner you have the main -- actually 37 the main channel of the Unuk itself coming in. Bottom 38 center is where it dumps in and then on the right side 39 of the picture you have where -- what they call Lower 40 Landing Slough kind of dumps in, this is just the 41 bottom end of the river. 42 43 Next slide, please. 44 45 This -- this gives you a perspective 46 that if you were coming from the bay and you were 47 looking -- or you're headed up into the river, this is 48 the tide flat. Now, at a rising tide -- one thing you 49 need to understand with this picture, though, is that 50

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Page 121 1 in the far distance there when you start to see the 2 alder line, that alder line was about the same area 3 that the previous picture was taken from from the air 4 and you're looking at about -- that's about two and a 5 half miles away in this picture. So it's -- the tide 6 flat is a rather extensive tide flat. And that's part 7 of -- besides the remoteness of this area, what makes 8 it really tough getting into this area. 9 10 Next slide, please. 11 12 So from the previous picture, when 13 you've made it to where those alders were and you come 14 in, we hit the junction point and if you look to your 15 right, this is the main -- where the main Unuk River 16 kind of comes in and meets the top of the tide flat 17 here. When this picture was taken the tide, you can 18 see, was high. We were running in and judging by those 19 seagulls that are swirling there's some activity going 20 on. So you kind of see that it's -- it's so wide, to 21 try to be able to really get a good idea as to what's 22 going on here from this point, is quite difficult. 23 24 Next slide, please. 25 26 Now, hopefully here you're looking at 27 two pictures. This should be Lower Landing Slough, but 28 the picture in the top left corner, you saw that one 29 just prior. We can tell there that's a high tide 30 condition. And the one with the skiff here, that's -- 31 that's at a low tide. So this area of the river has a 32 definite, a really large tidal fluctuation, which is 33 obviously why it's a landing slough where aircraft can 34 land. Planes can only get in and out of here at high 35 tide. And from this point down at a low tide, if you 36 have a motor like you see on this skiff here, you get 37 really limited and then it requires more of a jet drive 38 to get anywhere else, like over to the main river or 39 up. 40 41 Next slide, please. 42 43 Now, this picture's up on the Eulachon 44 River. It's a tributary into the Unuk. It comes in on 45 a bend and the top end of Lower Landing Slough. This 46 piece, it's very -- it can be very -- tidal influence 47 as well and the tide can move in here very fast. This 48 section is really unique, in that, in all of the river 49 this area is just nothing but a pure fine sandy 50

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Page 122 1 substrate. And it's always changing. It does tend to 2 get a lot of fish but when we see the fish from this 3 area more often than not it's like in that one aerial 4 shot where you could see that there was a lot of space 5 in between the fish, the fish would be more scattered 6 even though that from above it looked like they were 7 fairly dense. 8 9 So once we got on the ground -- next 10 slide. 11 12 We tried to do some different types of 13 survey methods. Obviously one method was boat surveys, 14 which were more conducive for high tide conditions. 15 The picture on the left, that's actually -- I'm headed 16 up -- we got up into the upper part of Eulachon River 17 there and it took a really high tide to get up in 18 there. But the draw back to the real high tide 19 conditions is that you see in the picture on the right, 20 which that's in Matni (ph) Slough, the visibility can 21 be a little bit cloudier. Matni Slough, it has a mud 22 bottom and so when the tide rushes it tends to stir the 23 water up in there. 24 25 The next slide is lower tide 26 conditions. So we obviously -- obviously we tried to 27 do walking surveys as much as we could when they were 28 safely allowed. The picture on the left, that's in the 29 Upper Landing Slough area, we're near the cabin and 30 we're fording across pretty much to get to the gravel 31 bar that you can see in the background to head down to 32 the Eulachon River. Judging what I'm looking at, I'm 33 guessing there must be some fish right there, but, 34 again, at low tide when we're looking at fish, often 35 what we're seeing is what you see in the picture on the 36 right there, you'll see a lot more scattered fish. 37 38 Next slide, please. 39 40 So one of the other things we tried to 41 do -- or at least I tried to do since I have the 42 certification to snorkel, was to try to get in some of 43 these areas and just to see maybe in some of the deeper 44 water sections, were we missing a lot of fish. And 45 this was nice -- or it worked okay, but it was really 46 hard to assess actual densities because what it dawned 47 on me after the fact was I think that if I floated down 48 stream trying to really see -- I see the scatter fish 49 before I could get on top of them and I think what it 50

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Page 123 1 is is that they were confusing me for what you see on 2 the right, which in this picture I am actually in the 3 same section of the river that these sea lions are in 4 at high tide here. 5 6 So, next slide, please. 7 8 Now, I tossed this one in here because 9 -- this is the really interesting part of being up on 10 the grounds and I never thought I'd find Pacific 11 herring in a river, granted we only found about a half 12 dozen, but we'd find these mortality in the scatter 13 where there was actually big groups of eulachon so I 14 think what was happening here in this case was that the 15 herring were just following the eulachon and wound up 16 in the river but they just could not handle the 17 freshwater and before they could get turned around to 18 get back out to marine water they were dying. 19 20 Next slide, please. 21 22 So earlier we talked about aerial 23 surveys. And over the years we've actually had -- 24 we've had really good success with the aerial surveys 25 despite the fact that there is belief that they don't. 26 And the reason I make that statement is because you can 27 see in -- not only this picture, which is this year, 28 where you can see -- the two circles are basically two 29 big masses of fish, and then each of those masses you 30 could see broken into several schools, but the other 31 key is if you look at the little picture on the top 32 center, that was from last year and you can see at the 33 bottom of that one -- you can see where the eagles are, 34 but you can see all the individual specs in there, 35 which those are actually eulachon. So in a lot of 36 cases if we -- we can see fish, or at least we pick up 37 the predator presence, and the one that I wish that I 38 had a picture of this year was, was that when we flew 39 out about mid-point this year, we also hit a stretch of 40 the river that even though we didn't see like the large 41 schools of fish but when you see like large groups of 42 seals that are in excess of 100 plus animals you know 43 that there's something going on there. 44 45 So next slide, please. 46 47 So this slide is a white one with some 48 -- with a bucket and some coolers. What we're hoping 49 here -- well trying to figure out, well, how do we sit 50

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Page 124 1 here and try to come up with some way to estimate what 2 we're seeing. And I -- so what came to my mind was 3 that, all right, let's just use as a volume, 4 potentially, what is somebody who's going to go up 5 there to fish going to possibly use. So we tried to 6 come up with -- we came up with a bucket, which is 7 about five gallons, so when we saw a group of fish in a 8 section of the river and we looked at it, we were like 9 -- would that -- if we harvested every single one of 10 those fish, would it fill a bucket, would it fill the 11 white cooler, which is like 120 quart cooler, so about 12 30 gallons, or would it fill a tote, a fish tote, like 13 you see in the bottom left corner there, kind of tossed 14 in some rough measurements on what I found on line for 15 what one of those would be and it kind of comes up to 16 about 200 gallons, or is that -- a lot of fish even 17 bigger than this. 18 19 So, next slide. 20 21 So what we did is each week, we tried 22 to -- based on the observations, the daily 23 observations, tried to kind of summarize where we saw 24 fish by putting them on this aerial overlay and then 25 tried to use the -- the symbols here -- the cross is 26 like for about an amount of fish that would fill a five 27 gallon bucket, a star, five point star is the cooler, 28 the six pointed star would be a fish tote, and then the 29 seven pointed star would be -- that's definitely an 30 amount that's probably greater than the fish tote. And 31 then the color coding, as you can see is red means it 32 was a heavy school density, so I'm -- that -- my 33 assumption is that's black. A 50/50 spacing on fish 34 where you'd look at the school and you'd probably have 35 just as much light or substrate showing through the 36 school if you were seeing fish, is an orange colored 37 mark, and then yellow is where there's like a really 38 large spacing between the -- the fish and more typical 39 of like some of the pictures that you saw where we had 40 the shallow water areas. So -- now one thing that's 41 interesting to note here is that the fishery was closed 42 preseason so there was no impact in this area, but what 43 you can see is that from March 19th to March 27th is 44 that on the main side of the river where the two really 45 large seven pointed red stars are the only difference 46 that you see is that the biomass of those fish moved 47 farther down the river. Now, when you look at the 48 Eulachon River on the -- to the left where a lot of the 49 orange and yellow stars and the crosses are and then 50

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Page 125 1 from Upper Landing Slough up to the other channel in 2 the river there, you notice all of a sudden that from 3 the 19th of March to the 27th, that, you know, the fish 4 that were in there changed. I -- I really kind of 5 scratched my head on this going, well, why did that 6 change so fast because we never found any real heavy 7 indication of a lot of them going in there and die and 8 the other thing was that during the same period of time 9 the -- the water level kept getting lower and lower. 10 So unless there was a big massive, just exodus of these 11 fish because of the water level, and -- which -- is 12 real similar to what probably happened in the Eulachon 13 River is it gets shallower and shallower, you know, 14 those fish were moved down into the Upper Landing 15 Slough but why was there such a dramatic change because 16 -- because the -- the fish that were over on the main 17 side of the river, if it was a thing where they were 18 just following out with the tide then they should have 19 disappeared as well. So I -- I really don't have an 20 explanation for that. But then you can see that 21 between March 27th and March 30th, that all of a sudden 22 at that point, the abundance had just completely 23 dropped off. By the last week that -- when Justin and 24 Aubrey went back up on the river in early April, the 25 fish were gone, there was no fish seen. 26 27 Next slide, please. 28 29 So now, you're looking at this and 30 probably wondering well why am I showing you some 31 graphs of African anchovies and pilchards and 32 (indiscernible) anchovies and -- and the same thing. 33 What I'm trying to get at here is these -- while 34 they're not eulachon, these fish -- well a pilchard is 35 a sardine, if you don't know, these are a forage fish 36 and these are cases in history where when fishing 37 occurred on them, they got -- where you can see that 38 they were overexploited, especially like the graph on 39 the left, look at the really dark line that's 40 representing pilchard and you can see that harvest from 41 the '50s all the way up until 1970 were pretty intense 42 and then you had this rapid drop off, and then you see 43 from '70s to almost mid-'70s the harvest picked up a 44 little bit again but it wasn't the same and then it 45 just resulted in a major crash and then there's a huge 46 flat line. 47 48 And the graph on the right, when you 49 look at the anchovy graph, you see the same thing, that 50

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Page 126 1 from the '50s to the '70s major exploitation, rapid 2 drop off, all of a sudden it looked like, hey, there's 3 a resumption in the fishery and then it just -- it 4 collapsed again. 5 6 And so this is kind of a driving factor 7 of, you know, forage fish really have a -- it seems 8 like when you see this they have a hard time rebuilding 9 themselves. And so this is kind of the model that we 10 want to use -- is it really worth diving back in and, 11 you know, to fishing right away. This is stuff that I 12 learned when I was -- you know, back in the late '80s 13 when I was in school and it was really emphasized so 14 this is kind of why, for me, as a manager, I am really 15 reticent about just recommending diving back in, into a 16 full-fledged fishery that has collapsed just because 17 you see fish again. 18 19 So, next slide, please. 20 21 So this -- this is showing -- this kind 22 of gives you an idea that of a lot of eulachon systems 23 across the Pacific Coast. And what you see in here is 24 that when you go about center in there you're going to 25 see the Nass and Skeena listed and if you draw a line 26 between the Skeena and the Kitamat (ph) there -- any 27 system below that right now is what -- between the 28 Canadian system of threatened and endangered -- or the 29 US system of threatened and endangered, all those 30 stocks are pretty much considered threatened or 31 endangered. The Nass and Skeena, when the Canadians 32 did their initial determination, they called those two 33 stocks threatened but they did a re-review of them and 34 changed that -- their determination from threatened to 35 -- they consider the Nass and Skeena stocks of 36 concerns. Now, it's really interesting though, that 37 when you look, right up above the Nass, what's the next 38 system that you see, it's the Unuk, so -- and then 39 above that from the Stikine all the way up to 40 Twentymile. We know that those stocks -- they seem to 41 be -- the returns seem to be doing okay there, you 42 know, as -- as to how they are compared to past 43 returns, I don't know, but we just know that the 44 Stikine, Alsek, they're all get fishing back, but one 45 thing that we need to consider here is that in some of 46 these pictures that I showed you of the Unuk, is that 47 the Unuk is not comparable to the Nass or Skeena. And 48 these rivers that are north of the Unuk, a lot more of 49 them can be probably comparable to the Nass or the 50

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Page 127 1 Skeena. 2 3 So, you know, we're not looking at it 4 as huge -- huge rivers with -- with a lot of -- a lot 5 of volume, a lot of (indiscernible), you know, the Unuk 6 is more comparable to a lot of these more southern and 7 mid-range BC systems that, unfortunately now are all 8 under a threatened or endangered ruling. 9 10 So, next slide, please. 11 12 So what I wanted to show you here with 13 the next series is that the Bella Coola River, I mean 14 here's some pictures of it and you can -- you can see 15 that it does seem to be a system that is comparable to 16 the Unuk. And the Bella Coola is one that -- it -- it 17 had an interesting history and we're going to go over 18 those in the next few slides here, so if you want to go 19 ahead and jump to the next slide, these -- so this -- 20 the Bella Coola supported -- historically supported a 21 traditional fishery for a group of people that reside 22 there. We're looking at this system it's mid-coast BC, 23 and the graph could -- need a little more work -- but 24 it's pulled out of a Master's thesis by a young lady 25 that did her Master's thesis that grew up here, but she 26 -- she looked at the system, she put together all the 27 past harvest data and the estimated harvest -- or the 28 area that's in grey in the bottom of the graph that you 29 see in the picture, and then they had an estimated 30 catch in tons, which is kind of what -- is on the right 31 there, for what's on the legend, and these are points 32 that she brought up through her studies, which a lot of 33 this stuff comes from interviews of local folks. So 34 some points that she came up with was that the seine 35 net was introduced in the '70s, and when you look at 36 the graph that's when all of a sudden you see that all 37 of a sudden these harvests, they spike, you see that 38 they're about twice as much as what they had been, so 39 no longer were small trap nets being used, they were 40 just doing like in the previous slide where you saw 41 that there was actually -- those were guys that were 42 seining eulachon in the Bella Coola there. So at that 43 point she said, with the exception of a small trap net 44 by the '80s pretty much the majority of the folks 45 fishing down there had all switched their gear over to 46 seine nets. And the bottom comment here was that in 47 the late '70s that a lot of the participants were 48 reporting that there were large returns of eulachon at 49 rivers (indiscernible - trails off). 50

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Page 128 1 Next slide, please. 2 3 But by the 1980s what these same folks 4 were saying is that all of a sudden that the returns 5 started -- they were becoming lower, and the most 6 notable decline that you see there happened the last 7 two years before the collapse of this return and that 8 in '96 was that what they have described is the last 9 big return of eulachon into that river. And so in bold 10 -- this is actually pulled, this is from an elder 11 interview, that it was described as being so thick that 12 -- you know they were coming on the beach and folks 13 were just able to go down with buckets and bring the 14 fish home. 15 16 Next slide, please. 17 18 Now, a year later, after this great big 19 return it's -- in '97 they had a really hard time 20 catching fish. But the quote from an interview says 21 they had a really hard time that year, a really hard 22 time, they couldn't get anything for the longest time 23 and then finally one day we got about three tons, which 24 is pretty much all that the community had to make 25 grease with. 26 27 '98 the description says is that there 28 was still enough eulachon to make grease, but some 29 interview participants said they described the run as 30 average and then in 1999 the run collapsed. No more 31 fish showed up there. 32 33 So next slide, please. 34 35 So now if you're wondering about the 36 Bella Coola now, in 2012, which this actually kind of 37 corresponds around the same time that the Unuk started 38 seeing returns again, they started getting some returns 39 back into the Bella Coola. This year is one of the 40 best returns that they've noted since the collapse but 41 it gets really important here and you'll see on the 42 next slide is that it's nowhere near what it had been. 43 This is -- this is quotes -- and in the blue, hopefully 44 if you have the paper copy of the whole thing it gives 45 you the web location where these articles, that these 46 quotes were pulled from, come from, so you can see. 47 48 This quote in red here, this is Megan 49 Moody, the same gal who did the Master's thesis, she's 50

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Page 129 1 saying that she believes the difference in this year 2 was due to the -- or between the Nass and the Skeena, 3 which are doing good, she's saying that she believes 4 the difference is the size of the river. And that's 5 where she -- and she goes on to say that the Bella 6 Coola and this other river, which I'm not even going to 7 try to pronounce, they could only support small runs 8 because they're just not as big and don't support the 9 huge returns like the Fraser the Nass and the Skeena 10 do. The third point on this slide is that she believes 11 that that's also why the Bella Coola has been taking so 12 long to recover, due to size and a smaller stock is 13 naturally going to take longer to replenish so she 14 holds positivity that the potential for recovery is 15 there. 16 17 And, next slide, please. 18 19 This is so more quotes from -- from 20 this article that's also cited here. They couldn't 21 find them in 2001 but said -- you know, since 2012 the 22 return -- or the run has been slowly coming up Moody 23 says. Historical runs used to be approximately 150 24 tons, but after the collapse they thought they were 25 only seeing 50 to 100 kilograms a year. Right now she 26 says it seems like a lot, but in red, this is what 27 she's saying about this years, that what she saw this 28 year, even though it's been the best return that 29 they've seen, she's estimating it's only about one 30 percent of the historical run. 31 32 And then -- then her next point here in 33 red is that the return is exciting but remain cautious 34 because it's going to require more years of nurturing. 35 36 Now, they believe that this year's 37 colder spring, which has been more in line with 38 traditional weather might be what's showing why the 39 return is healthier and in the past it shows -- 40 eulachon would spawn in April or May, but recently what 41 they've noticed is that for some reason there's been 42 this change for February and March. 43 44 So, next slide, please. 45 46 So this is another BC river, the 47 Klinaklini River. Unfortunately I couldn't find any up 48 close personal pictures of the river but what you can 49 kind of see in this satellite image is that the way it 50

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Page 130 1 lays out, it's real similar to what you saw earlier 2 where I had the pictures of the Unuk in District 1 3 there. 4 5 Next slide. 6 7 So this one also -- if you see anything 8 in bold, it's to highlight the point of what was being 9 identified with this return. And so that they said by 10 the mid-90s they noticed this river's returns were in 11 decline. The '96 study that the estimated biomass was 12 thought to be 15 percent less than historic runs, or 13 only about 15 percent of the historic return. By 2000, 14 if you look at that, that's around the time we started 15 seeing the declines in the Unuk, the Klinaklini was 16 reported to be very low. Bottom part of what you're 17 seeing here that's listed is you'll see that this is 18 coming from a member of the First Nation Tribes in -- 19 and someone who has very good knowledge of this return, 20 that they witnessed low returns in 204 and 2005, but 21 then here what I highlighted is that they said, okay, 22 in '07 it looked like things improved to be a very good 23 return, but just like what they saw on the Bella Coola, 24 just because it looks good the next year, the following 25 year, actually all of a sudden was very weak. 26 27 So next slide, please. 28 29 Now, this is showing some quotes of 30 elders that were interviewed regarding both the Bella 31 Coola and the Klinaklini, and it -- they're asked -- 32 these are regarding when they were asked, well, why did 33 they think that the fisheries collapsed here and so -- 34 and in highlight here it says several First Nations 35 have witnessed major declines in the eulachon returns 36 and their concern is, is that it was regarding newer 37 technologies for fishing. And then when you look 38 through the rest of it here, you'll see like it says 39 participants expressed concerns about that seine net, 40 that they started using in the '70s. There's a bolded 41 quote here about the seine net replacing the 42 (indiscernible) nets, but what -- what the key is here 43 and this is one that could be, you know, maybe hitting 44 the nail on the head that not only were they catching 45 more but right there in the middle you'll see what's 46 highlighted is that some of those fishermen believed 47 that the lead line of the seine itself was doing the 48 extra damage and killing any deposited eggs that may 49 have been in the area as they were dragging the net 50

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Page 131 1 across the bottom. 2 3 And then one of the other concerns was 4 that -- it's bolded there towards the very bottom -- is 5 that, the -- these fishermen stopped following the 6 traditional rules. And so instead of letting like the 7 first wave to pass, which tended to be females, they 8 were -- they started fishing them, and so they're 9 wondering if that's part of the problem. 10 11 So next slide, please. 12 13 Now, here -- and you've probably seen 14 this one before, this is the historic harvest that's 15 been reported from the Unuk River. And obviously from 16 2005 the fishery has been closed yearly and these 17 harvests are nowhere near what we were seeing, or, you 18 know, like what was historically seen in the Bella 19 Coola or the Klinaklini, but what you see here is that 20 obviously from the commercial harvest, which is in 21 blue, to all of a sudden where we had those first 22 couple of years of Federal harvest, is that, if you 23 were to throw a trend line in there you're going to see 24 just a deep diving trend line that's showing a major 25 downward trend. And so, again, when we look back to 26 what happened in those, you know, pilchard and anchovy 27 fisheries, and what's happened in these other two 28 comparable BC systems, you know, as managers we have to 29 be very careful in diving back in, into the Unuk River 30 here. 31 32 Next slide, please. 33 34 This slide, hopefully you're -- 35 unfortunately you're seeing a bunch of dead eulachon, 36 this is on the Stikine River, this picture was sent to 37 me -- I believe it was probably just tidal wash up. 38 But what we got from here is that other areas that we 39 could find some information on in 2018, the Columbia 40 River had some of its lowest returns, since they 41 started seeing an incline, and they closed it down 42 because the test fishing boats that were used to sit 43 there and try to assess the volume as to whether they 44 were going to open up any more commercial fisheries or 45 even sportfishing, they had a collective total of less 46 than 130 pounds harvested after eight days of fishing. 47 We talked about the Bella Coola just a little while 48 ago, yeah, it had its largest documented return since 49 '99 but it's only estimated to be one percent of the 50

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Page 132 1 historic levels. But the Skeena River, fish arrived in 2 mid-March, about the same time they were noted on the 3 Unuk and as described as (indiscernible) this year with 4 fish, the river had -- the river still had ice coming 5 down the river early in the return and so it really 6 hampered the fishing efforts by folks on the Skeena, 7 but later on they're saying that the population in the 8 (indiscernible) River had provided some of the best 9 grease for the area but even that section and that 10 tributary to the river has been in a state of decline 11 over the past (indiscernible) years. The Nass, fish 12 also arrived in March, and indication's are good 13 harvest occurred and there was one article that I did 14 -- folks in Bella Coola were able to get fish to make 15 grease with but the only reason they got them was that 16 they had a grant that allowed them to go up -- to send 17 a commercial truck up to the Nass to participate in 18 part of that harvest and then to bring those fish all 19 the way back down to their coastal communities. And 20 then the general feeling from my communications that 21 the Stikene had a good return from mid-March through 22 the end of April, and like I said earlier, that picture 23 to the side there kind of gives you an indication that 24 there was a good pulse of fish but that you had 25 eulachon get trapped up on the beach during an outgoing 26 tide. 27 28 And that brings me to my last slide, if 29 you have -- and this is just one little shot that was 30 some eulachon in a shallow water section this year and 31 at this point I'll answer any questions that you have. 32 33 Thank you. 34 35 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yeah, and thank 36 you Jeff, yeah, I know the Council has been very 37 concerned with the eulachon runs on the Unuk for a 38 number of years now and we wanted to get more 39 information on what was happening up there. And, yeah, 40 you were able to put in some pretty extensive efforts 41 this year, and that was some pretty good information. 42 43 So are there any questions from Council 44 members. 45 46 (No comments) 47 48 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I have one 49 question. Was the work that you did up there this 50

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Page 133 1 year, was that funded by some of our Fisheries Resource 2 Monitoring Project money or did that -- or were your 3 efforts funded some other way? 4 5 MR. REEVES: Mr. Chairman. Yeah, no, 6 the FRMP project had expired and this was actually -- 7 like I said, it was a combination of donation of cabin 8 use by that local cabin owner and this was just 9 strictly internal Forest Service funds that we had. My 10 -- I have been in some really good communication after 11 this with Mr. Gallegos from Ketchikan Indian Community 12 and at this point when the call for proposals comes 13 forth, I -- he and I -- I'm going to -- he and I are 14 going to try to get a new proposal in to try to get 15 some new Fisheries Resource Monitoring Program money 16 and I'm hoping that what it will be is that it would be 17 a proposal primarily from, you know, from that tribe, 18 the Ketchikan Indian Community since it -- you know, 19 being out of Ketchikan it's easier to get there and we 20 can get up -- and he had that time on the river with us 21 and the Forest Service would provide the support 22 through it but we'll just see when the time comes, you 23 know, because we can't -- just because we're talking 24 about it now doesn't necessarily mean that their 25 Council would approve it or not and same thing, 26 hopefully Mr. Gallegos and I, too, can have 27 communications with, like Metlakatla, too, to see 28 possibly if it's something they're interested in. 29 30 But we definitely -- now that we've had 31 some time on the ground, you know, want to try to get 32 something further developed, if possible. 33 34 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Right. Also, 35 something that was pointed out there is the Council had 36 also kind of stressed the point that we -- after a lot 37 of public testimony on this issue that we really hope 38 to see some cooperation between Forest Service and 39 local people and monitoring the Unuk, and it appeared 40 from your presentation that you were able to make some 41 good connections and get some good support there. 42 43 So that all sounds -- I mean the run 44 still has some problems but it certainly sounds like 45 maybe we're getting a better handle on what the 46 situation is there. 47 48 So, yeah, if anybody else has anything. 49 50

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Page 134 1 (No comments) 2 3 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I don't see any. 4 Thank you very much, Jeff, very good report. 5 6 MR. REEVES: Thank you. 7 8 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And, now, 9 hopefully we have time here for the remainder of the 10 afternoon, if Ray Sensmeier, you have something you 11 wanted to present to the Council. 12 13 MR. SENSMEIER: Okay. 14 15 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Yes, please, go 16 ahead. 17 18 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 19 20 Bob, you've heard this talk twice so 21 you might want to excuse yourself if you don't want to 22 hear it again. 23 24 (Laughter) 25 26 MR. SCHROEDER: Maybe the third time. 27 28 MR. SENSMEIER: Okay. Bob and I both 29 serve on SEACC and I gave this talk over at SEACC and 30 on the TransTribal Boundary Working Commission. 31 32 (In Tlingit) 33 34 I'm from Yakutat. My Indian name is 35 (In Tlingit) I come from the Raven Moiety. I am 36 Teikweidi. Grandchild of the Brown Bear. And I come 37 from the house of the HalfMoon people. 38 39 I've given this talk several places in 40 Alaska and the Lower 48 and places like Denmark, Japan 41 and Iceland. 42 43 Respected elders, brothers and sisters. 44 It is an honor and privilege to be in this ancient and 45 sacred land. I apologize beforehand if I offend anyone 46 by my words or actions, it is not intentional. I hope 47 my words may be of some service in solving the myriad 48 of problems facing our Mother Earth. 49 50

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Page 135 1 Before I begin my talk I would like to 2 share some words of a respected elder, Walter Soboleff, 3 who gave the keynote address at a function I attended. 4 He opened his talk with the following words: When the 5 Europeans landed on our shores over 300 years ago, 6 little did we know that they came from a land of great 7 cathedrals, great cities, great sailing trips, 8 libraries, a written language, a people who were well 9 on their way to this thing called progress. And little 10 did they know that our Native culture was quite an 11 advanced culture as well. We didn't write. We had no 12 books or libraries. But we had a very good memory. 13 The world of nature was our school. We watched the 14 clouds. We watched the sea. We watched when the birds 15 left and when they returned. We watched the bears. We 16 watched the fish in the sea and we watched the plants 17 as they grew. We watched the movements and actions of 18 all life. And after a millennia of watching we 19 developed quite a complex library of the mind. 20 Whatever we saw we remembered and we used. And so the 21 old people would talk to the young people, watch the 22 sea very closely, listen to what's going on. Whatever 23 they saw was stored in the very first computer, the 24 human brain. But much more than that, the Native 25 family life was a highly organized one, full of 26 protocol and respect. The parents, were, of course, 27 the very first teachers. They were the models. The 28 mothers took care of the girls, and, the boys, when old 29 enough, were taught by their maternal uncles, but 30 always, always it was believed that our children would 31 grow up to be useful. They did not want them to grow 32 up to be nobody. And for that reason they taught them 33 their family history, their family lineage, clan 34 relationships. They knew they had good mothers and 35 fathers, good aunts and good uncles, and good 36 grandparents. It was not a perfect picture, but it was 37 very close. 38 39 Not all that long ago we had a complex 40 oral tradition full of protocol and respect. It was 41 like going to a college or a university. Now days, you 42 hear the question, who are you, and in the Native 43 culture you always knew that you were somebody and so 44 it was that we lived and celebrated the splendor of our 45 lives. It has been our experience in the past that 46 when a government agency wishes to enter into a co- 47 management agreement, it meant that we cooperate and 48 they managed. 49 50

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Page 136 1 Traditional knowledge was, and most 2 time, still is regarded as purely anecdotal and is 3 given only customary recognition and quickly dismissed 4 or considered out of date and not applicable in today's 5 world. 6 7 I once asked a respected elder, Rolling 8 Thunder, an InterTribal Medicine Man from Nevada as to 9 why our people were overwhelmed with such brut force, 10 terrible weapons of destruction, the raping and taking 11 of our land, our women, our children, he replied, they 12 don't know it yet but they came to learn from us. At 13 first I didn't know what he meant, but as the years 14 passed I hear this more and more, and in my heart I 15 know this to be true, he was referring to the proper 16 treatment of this Mother Earth. 17 18 For too long Western Science has 19 claimed that they have all the answers, that only their 20 technology can fix things. They say that they, alone, 21 can save mankind and solve these problems that grow in 22 number and complexity, even as we speak. There is an 23 ancient story in my culture which alludes to such 24 attitudes and the disastrous consequences that can 25 occur as a result of this kind of thinking. The elder 26 who told me this story, if alive today, would be around 27 130 years old. He told it as it was told to him by his 28 uncles, as is the custom among my people. In the 29 Tlingit culture it was the mother's brother who taught 30 the nephews. It was believed that the father had so 31 much love for his son that he would not discipline him 32 to the degree that is necessary to become a good 33 hunter, provider and possibly a leader and respected 34 elder among the people. We are a matrilineal society 35 and take the clan of our mothers, which is also the 36 clan of our uncles, our mother's brothers. He trained 37 his nephew diligently for he was the teacher and was 38 responsible for any transgressions committed by his 39 nephew, even into adulthood. The conduct and moral 40 value of his nephew reflected his own upbringing and 41 sense of honor. If a law was broken, the uncle could 42 be held responsible which was the weight of the law 43 that was given to us by the Creator and was respected 44 and strictly adhered to by the nephew and uncle and all 45 clan members as well. 46 47 I tell this story for the good of all, 48 but especially I tell it for those of the Western 49 culture and the scientists, in particular. 50

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Page 137 1 (In Tlingit) in my language means black 2 skin, and there's a story about it. 3 4 We do not have stories, they are often 5 referred to as stories but they are teachings. 6 7 In the mornings the uncles would wake 8 the nephews up and take them down and put them in the 9 cold water and they would sit there and after a long 10 period of time the uncle would bring them out and whip 11 them with willow branches to get their blood 12 circulating. Then he would take them back to the 13 community house and put a warm bear skin robe around 14 them and sit by the fire. This was done to prepare 15 them for the long canoe journeys south as far as 16 Southern California and to the Aleutian Islands. The 17 uncle had three nephews that he was training and one of 18 the nephews did not care for him or for his two 19 brothers so he would not go down with the nephew and 20 the uncle early in the morning, he would make himself 21 rise before they did and he would go down and sit in 22 the water and then whip himself with willow branches 23 when he came out. There were three saplings growing on 24 the riverbank and when they were able to pull those 25 saplings out of the ground, then they would be ready to 26 go on to the next test. So one morning, DuckTooth (ph) 27 got out of the water and he was able to pull them out 28 of the ground so he pulled all three out and poured 29 water in so they froze and when his two brothers and 30 uncle came down and they were able to pull them out, 31 the uncle said, uh-huh, it's time, it's ready. So they 32 went out to Sea Lion rock to wrestle the sea lions and 33 at the last minute DuckTooth came running down and he 34 said, I want to go too and at first the uncle said no, 35 and he said I can bale the canoe so they let him go. 36 His two brothers that weren't ready were killed 37 immediately. DuckTooth went to the top of the rock and 38 wrestled the bull sea lion and tore him in half and he 39 came back to the village and he bragged about what he 40 did, he said he didn't need anybody, nobody helped him, 41 he could do it all by himself, and he kept this up 42 until another man came to the village who looked like 43 the identical twin of DuckTooth and they started 44 fighting, the wrestled for four days and four nights 45 and they killed each other. And the morale, the 46 teaching in this story is that you never brag or boast 47 about what you do, always someone who helps you, no 48 matter what station you aspire to, if you do not do 49 this then you will defeat yourself as DuckTooth 50

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Page 138 1 defeated himself. 2 3 We know from this particular story, 4 that no matter what we achieve in life, no matter what 5 station we aspire to, we didn't do it by ourself. 6 7 We must work together and think as a 8 people and not individually, we must work for the good 9 of our communities, not ourselves. We must always bear 10 in mind the responsibility to the next generation. 11 This is the way it seems to me concerning those of the 12 Western culture who are known as scientists, people 13 with PhDs. They claim to be experts in their field of 14 study when in reality they're knowledgeable in one 15 small slice of the circle, the circle of life, and, in 16 fact, know little of the rest of the circle, which is 17 the most important part, the spiritual aspect. And so 18 in doing they upset the balance the harmony that have 19 existed for millennia. 20 21 When Mother Earth becomes unbalanced 22 Man becomes unbalanced. Disharmony prevails, confusion 23 reigns and we suffer. If attitudes are not changed, 24 then the suffering will increase and the cries of 25 despair of our children, and their children shall be 26 even greater than our generation and the generation 27 that preceded us. When people exercise free will and 28 do not include the spiritual power that surrounds us, 29 the conditions and situations created are such that 30 people do not do what is best for themselves, for their 31 children, or for this Mother Earth. Only humans have 32 the power to unbalance the Earth and when they do we 33 all suffer the consequences. But if someone like the 34 boomerang, that the aborigines of Australia use, when 35 you throw it, it comes back on you. We cannot use up 36 the gifts of Mother Earth or waste and destroy them 37 without paying a terrible price, but people are doing 38 it, and like the boomerang it is coming back on us, we 39 see it all around. The one aspect that is missing or 40 overlooked and which we consider to be the most 41 important part in maintaining balance is spirituality. 42 This is not something that can be quantified, measured 43 or weighed or cataloged. It seems that people do not 44 believe in anything they can't see or somehow quantify. 45 Western culture has a saying, seeing is believing, we, 46 on the other hand, have always been taught that 47 believing is seeing. If you believe that God created 48 this Mother Earth and all that is upon her and treat 49 them with respect, then seeing is not limited to 50

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Page 139 1 eyesight alone, but becomes a matter of faith. I 2 cannot explain in words what it means for words are 3 inadequate to describe something that is scared. It 4 requires an understanding that transcends words. It is 5 something that we, as indigenous people, have never 6 questioned. That belief, along with the appropriate 7 ceremonies for different occasions has allowed us to 8 maintain balance and live in harmony with the Mother 9 Earth for tens of thousands of years. The elders have 10 taught us that everything has life and we must not 11 abuse them or misuse them. 12 13 It is one thing to step on or injure 14 something if you believe it does not have life, it is 15 quite another matter if you do this knowing otherwise. 16 17 Non-Natives tend to look at things as 18 objects and compartmentalize and disconnect things. To 19 us, everything is connected and everything was put 20 there to be used in a good way. The Mother Earth is 21 being polluted at an alarming rate and the elders tell 22 us that she is on the verge of collapse. The Earth is 23 now trying to cleanse herself. We are already in the 24 stages that have been foretold by the elders by many 25 generations; floods, droughts, fires, earthquakes, 26 weather changes, climate changes, tidal changes, 27 powerful storms and celestial events all bear witness 28 to this cleansing. And the elders say it will get 29 much, much worse before it gets better. Attitudes must 30 change and they must change quickly, not only on a 31 local level but on a region-wide level, but also on a 32 global scale. We cannot go on taking without thinking 33 of the consequences for those yet unborn, our 34 children's children. 35 36 When I say attitudes must change, I 37 mean the way Man perceives things must change. It is 38 not enough to reduce automobile emissions, it is not 39 enough to leave wider buffer strips when clear-cut 40 logging, it is not enough to say we will only use (mic 41 cuts out) in a clean and safe manner, it is not enough 42 to put scrubbers in factory smokestacks. This is only 43 a cosmetic approach and does nothing to solve the 44 problems. The same attitudes that create the problems 45 are trying to solve them. 46 47 Without a holistic approach these 48 solutions become self-serving and make it unwholesome 49 for it always involves money. The more money involved 50

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Page 140 1 the more self-serving it becomes. As indigenous people 2 we know this to be true, yet, we have been forced, as 3 our parents before us, and their parents before them, 4 to attend far away schools. We were taught that in 5 order to be successful we must make money. The more 6 money we make, the more successful we are. Making 7 money becomes the predominate reason for living, or, 8 perhaps I should say existing. To succeed we must 9 compete. It has evolved from an us generation to a me 10 generation. We know in our hearts that dichotomy 11 exists and so we despair. So in the process we destroy 12 that which we can be, in fact, that which we used to 13 be. Is it any wonder that (indiscernible) Indians have 14 the highest alcoholism rates, the highest suicide 15 rates, the highest unemployment rates, and the growing 16 number of murders, that only a short time ago would 17 have been unthinkable are becoming every day 18 occurrences. We were taught that only through giving 19 are we able to receive, now we are taught otherwise. 20 This attitude of taking is destroying the balance and 21 harmony of life. Everyone and everything suffers. 22 23 If this does not change, the world as 24 we know it will cease to exist. This has been 25 prophesied. 26 27 I listen to a keynote speaker from the 28 Northwest Territories in Canada who shared the words of 29 her grandfather. 30 31 The killing of fish and game for sport 32 must stop, the catching and releasing of salmon must 33 stop. God put them on this Mother Earth for us to use 34 with respect, not to play with. These are barbaric and 35 shameful acts, which must cease. How can Man do such 36 things and call himself civilized. 37 38 I often hunt with my sons. Before I 39 kill anything I pray to its spirit and thank the 40 Creator for this gift. I tell him that we need it for 41 food and will not waste it and that we will treat it 42 with respect. I have learned that when you hunt with 43 this feeling in your heart you don't have to chase the 44 animal around, you wait and he will come and give 45 himself to you because that is why the Creator put him 46 there to be used in a good and proper manner. When a 47 man hunts for sport, he does it quickly, he does it 48 without thought and he always takes the biggest and he 49 always takes the strongest. When killing takes place 50

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Page 141 1 in such a manner the animal has no idea of what has 2 happened to it. The elders have always told us that if 3 we take things in such a manner, they will begin to 4 disappear, and, indeed, isn't that what is happening 5 today, it is. You know it is. I know it is. And most 6 certainly the elders know it is. The belief that an 7 animal gives itself to you is made even more evident 8 when I watch a documentary on whale hunting. To make a 9 long story short, I had always thought that Eskimos 10 jumped up and down on a walrus skin so they could spot 11 the whales, an elder explained otherwise, no, he said, 12 we jump up and down on the walrus skin so the whales 13 can see us, this is how we believed for thousands of 14 years and it has served us well. Only now do we 15 struggle for our food. We must strive to regain what 16 is lost before it is lost forever. Indigenous peoples 17 will continue to be victims of greed as long as we have 18 lands and territories that have natural resources. It 19 has become a race for profits now and the survival of 20 our children. There is a race between common sense and 21 the global market. The race is in progress and this 22 generation and the next will determine the outcome and 23 so I ask the same question that (Indiscernible) 24 Spiritual Leader Oren Lyons asked in the past, he is 25 also a professor at Harvard. 26 27 What is the message I bring you today 28 is that our common future, it seems we are living in a 29 time of prophecies, a time of definitions, a time of 30 decisions. We are the ones with the responsibility and 31 the options to choose the path of life with a future 32 for the next generations, or the path that defies the 33 laws of regeneration. Even though you and I are in 34 different boats, you, in your boat, and, we, in our 35 canoe, we share the same river of life, what befalls us 36 befalls you and downstream in this river of life our 37 children will pay the price. They shall pay the price 38 for our selfishness, for our greed, for our lack of 39 vision and for our arrogance. 40 41 In closing, I would like to reiterate 42 that time is of the essence, the challenges are upon 43 us. My attitude used to be one of pessimism, that, 44 however, is changing to one of guarded optimism. As I 45 stated earlier my attitude has changed from one of 46 helplessness to one of cautious hopefulness. I see men 47 and women in many cultures and the caretakers of 48 traditional knowledge seated at universities and places 49 such as this, and I often think of that old man who 50

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Page 142 1 said, they don't know it yet, but they came to learn 2 from us. I see a fragile bridge being built between 3 two cultures and that is good, it is a bridge that 4 requires a great deal of faith, and faith being a 5 matter of the heart inherently makes the approach 6 holistic and spiritual as it should be, indeed, as it 7 must be. I have heard and seen things in this meeting 8 of many peoples that has given me hope and confidence 9 that working together we can close the gap and complete 10 the sacred circle, the circle of life. The continued 11 existence of this Mother Earth is dependent upon it. 12 Sitting Bull, a respected elder and Lakota Sioux Chief 13 who lived over 150 years ago was chased up and down the 14 country by the United States Army until he finally went 15 up to Canada where he was welcomed by the First Nations 16 Indians. He lived there for a few years, but like all 17 Indians he missed his home. The US Army promised him 18 that if he came back they would give him his land. 19 They did not. And when he saw that his people were 20 going to be exterminated and that their way of life, 21 which they had known for thousands of years was in 22 danger of disappearing, he gathered his people and met 23 with the representatives of the United States 24 government, and the generals of the Army as well as the 25 black robes, with their bibles. 26 27 In closing, I would like to share that 28 he uttered simply and eloquently, let all of us 29 gathered here today put our minds together and see what 30 life we can make for our children. 31 32 Gunalcheesh. 33 34 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you very 35 much for that, Ray. Those were some very wise words 36 eloquently put together. 37 38 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you. 39 40 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I'm really glad 41 that we had some young people here in the audience this 42 afternoon to hear that, that's very much appreciated. 43 44 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you. 45 46 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Any other Council 47 members care to have any comments. 48 49 (No comments) 50

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Page 143 1 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Ray, am I correct, 2 that you are leaving after this afternoon and won't be 3 with us tomorrow. 4 5 MR. SENSMEIER: I'm going to Ketchikan 6 tomorrow for the Alaska Native Brotherhood Convention. 7 I serve on the landless committee and the roadless 8 issue. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, well, I 11 think your words you just spoke were an excellent 12 summation for the business and some of the issues and 13 things we talked about today. 14 15 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you. 16 17 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: And the Council 18 appreciates your service for these last, I can't 19 remember how many years you've been on, but it's been 20 much appreciated and your advice to the Council has 21 been very valuable to us. 22 23 MR. SENSMEIER: Thank you. 24 25 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: So, thank you for 26 your service here. 27 28 And we will recess -- oh, okay, Bob, 29 you had something to say. 30 31 MR. SCHROEDER: Well, since this may be 32 my last chance to be on the Council with Ray, I just 33 wanted to thank him for his good words and also, you 34 know, we get into the nitty-gritty of trying to 35 determine the gender of eulachon on the Unuk River and 36 exactly what's going on with wolves, but I think it's 37 really wonderful to step back and look at the big 38 picture and I think that's what you provide to the 39 Council in your comments, so, Gunalcheesh, Ray. 40 41 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Anybody else. 42 43 (No comments) 44 45 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. Before we 46 do recess for the afternoon, just so we can kind of 47 keep things moving along that concludes our old 48 business. 49 50

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Page 144 1 Tomorrow we start new business, which 2 is proposals. 3 4 DeAnna, I might ask you to remind us, 5 are there any time specific items for tomorrow, I can't 6 -- I believe there is one. 7 8 MS. PERRY: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, 9 we do have Nicole Grewe from the Forest Service coming 10 to speak to us on the roadless rule. She'll do a 11 presentation sometime between 11:00 and I think 4:00 or 12 5:00, so whenever we can fit her in there, and that's 13 all we have for tomorrow. 14 15 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay, thank you 16 very much. So we will start with proposals as the 17 first order of business following any public testimony 18 that people want to give first thing in the morning. 19 But before we do leave, I might ask that -- so we can 20 kind of get things accomplished that we need to 21 accomplish here, maybe before we leave we can have some 22 volunteers on that working group to draft a letter to 23 accompany our recommendation to the Board of Game on 24 the wolf proposal, so that possibly they can start 25 working on that this evening, if they have time to get 26 together. 27 28 So volunteers. 29 30 (Pause) 31 32 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Bob, you're 33 volunteering. 34 35 MR. SCHROEDER: I volunteer to be a 36 typist. If the people who really know about this issue 37 are there to tell me what to type. 38 39 (Laughter) 40 41 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Thank you. 42 Anybody want to volunteer for the substance. 43 44 Mike. 45 46 Cathy. 47 48 (Laughter) 49 50

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Page 145 1 MS. NEEDHAM: I'll help Bob. I'd be 2 happy to help Bob and I think it would be appropriate 3 if Mike could at least weigh -- if not being on the 4 work group, at least help weigh in on the letter stuff. 5 6 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Mike, can you help 7 out with that. 8 9 MR. DOUVILLE: Yes. 10 11 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Very good. 12 13 Anybody else. 14 15 (No comments) 16 17 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I will probably 18 help out with that as well. So I think that's 19 sufficient. 20 21 Cathy. 22 23 MS. NEEDHAM: Yeah, Mr. Chair, I'd also 24 like to request that if Ryan Scott is going to be 25 around, if he'll also -- if we can also have Staff 26 input, have him available to help with anything that we 27 do with drafting the letter. 28 29 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Okay. 30 31 Bob. 32 33 MR. SCHROEDER: I'd like to put this 34 off as long as possible, but it's probably more 35 efficient if we were to go over to the Westmark and sit 36 down and just do it, if the other people are available. 37 38 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: I think we can do 39 that. Okay. 40 41 Okay, it sounds like we're set for 42 tomorrow. 43 44 MR. HOWARD: Mr. Chairman. 45 46 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Albert. 47 48 MR. HOWARD: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 49 Maybe in the letter reference to the fact that we did a 50

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Page 146 1 roll call vote and it was unanimous, and also make 2 reference to the fact that we supported this proposal 3 based on the fact that there was -- all the user groups 4 were a part of that process to come to that conclusion 5 to put that proposal together as a good reason for us 6 to support it. 7 8 Thank you, Mr. Chair. 9 10 CHAIRMAN HERNANDEZ: Good point, 11 Albert. We'll keep that in mind. 12 13 Okay, I think we can recess until 8:30 14 tomorrow morning. 15 16 (Off record) 17 18 (PROCEEDINGS TO BE CONTINUED) 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

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1 C E R T I F I C A T E 2 3 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ) 4 )ss. 5 STATE OF ALASKA ) 6 7 I, Salena A. Hile, Notary Public in and for the 8 state of Alaska and reporter for Computer Matrix Court 9 Reporters, LLC, do hereby certify: 10 11 THAT the foregoing pages numbered through 12 contain a full, true and correct Transcript of the 13 SOUTHEAST FEDERAL SUBSISTENCE REGIONAL ADVISORY COUNCIL 14 MEETING, VOLUME I taken electronically on the 15th day 15 of October in Sitka, Alaska; 16 17 THAT the transcript is a true and 18 correct transcript requested to be transcribed and 19 thereafter transcribed by under my direction and 20 reduced to print to the best of our knowledge and 21 ability; 22 23 THAT I am not an employee, attorney, or 24 party interested in any way in this action. 25 26 DATED at Anchorage, Alaska, this 7th 27 day of November 2018. 28 29 30 31 Salena A. Hile 32 Notary Public, State of Alaska 33 My Commission Expires: 09/16/22 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

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