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Friends of Glacier Bay held its annual meeting on September 19th, 2009. We heard from Cherry Payne, superintendent of the park, on various aspects of park business. We also listened to a great presentation from Jim Macoviak about the early history of industrial logging in the Tongass National Forest. Minutes from the meeting are below.
Saturday, September 19th, 2009
Friends of Glacier Bay Annual Meeting
Gustavus School, Gustavus, Alaska
FOGB board president opened the meeting and introduced Cherry Payne, superintendent of Glacier Bay National Park.
Cherry Payne talked about park topics and took questions.
Ken Burns film, America’s Best Idea. The 6-part, 12 hour series is expected to be shown on PBS starting September 27. There will one-hour preview on September 26. It features Gustavus residents!
New park brochure result of many hours effort.
Staffing changes – Sheri Barry will be returning as Administrative Officer. Chief of Maintenance position is vacant, have narrowed down to 6 applicants from 30. Will be hiring a cultural resources manager. Also hiring a budget technician. Losing Whitney Rapp, Invasive Species Coordinator, to Katmai. Protection ranger Duane Grego has also accepted a job down south.
Alaska Native Land Entitlement Act – Sealaska has still not received all the land promised in ANCSA. 2007 bill to resolve this included removal of some land from Glacier Bay National Park. That bill died. Natives are concerned about access to the park and preservation and management of sacred and cultural sites. Commercial fishing is also an issue but otherwise they have not been able to articulate shortcomings in NPS management of Glacier Bay. Bill has been reintroduced. Most recent version no longer calls for removal of land from the park but does call for cooperative management. Not clear if this is just about certain areas versus entire park, not clear who the cooperators would be. NPS has a working government-to-government relationship with the Hoonah Indian Association, a federally recognized tribe, and is concerned about the cooperative management provision of the bill. Makes it difficult to make decisions. Legal analysis from SEACC suggests the bill changes the purposes of the park, also makes native corporation lands tribal lands, removes the state historic preservation officer from the loop.
Planning
Gull Egg Harvest LEIS draft out last winter, accepted comments for 78 days. Group has been analyzing comments, working now on final draft. Mary Beth Moss is the lead author.
• Dry Bay road/trails EA – there were some errors in the original plan – closures that should not have been made, access problems. This winter there will be another EA to make corrections. Some approved trails will be closed and others will be allowed. There will be little to no net increase in trail mileage.
• Rescue 21 (Allison Banks) – Coast Guard has funding and mandate to improve communications so they can hear radio distress calls from everywhere. First project in Glacier Bay will be at a non-wilderness site in Deception Hills. The equipment is sensitive enough to hear signal from 1W transmitter on beach. There is currently a gap in coverage on the outer coast of Glacier Bay National Park and also the inside waters of Glacier Bay. Coast Guard will be applying for easement to install facility in Deception Hills, outside wilderness. 50-60’ tower, generator, solar panels. Will be EA this winter. That will cover Fairweather fishing grounds. Another site for inside waters would have to be in designated wilderness. One option is to co-locate/replace NPS Beartrack repeater site. Another option is Willoughby Island which is a pristine site. USCG will hire contractor to write EA. USCG is hoping to begin construction on Deception Hills site next spring. Cherry: ANILCA allows rights of way, even in wilderness for navigational aids and interior solicitor has determined this project qualifies as a navaid. NPS seeking to mitigate by co-locating with NPS facilities; there is an NPS radio repeater at Deception Hills as well as Beartrack. Bill Brown: Wilderness mystique includes luxury of getting lost and not being able to call for help.
Shoulder season charter vessel use – hoped to have a planning newsletter out by now with several alternatives – no action, extend summer quotas and requirements to shoulder season, etc. Intend to initiate EA regarding vessel use and management for September and May use or September through May use. Timeline: scoping began with May meeting. Develop alternatives and February-May public document open for comment. September FONSI or begin EIS. Any action would require rule making which could be done concurrently with the EA or as a separate later process. Related issue is vessel transit permit, which sunsets in 2011. Without action that permit will go away so may consider extension as part of this process. Meanwhile NPS is monitoring the charter fleet. State ran out of funding for survey so NPS hired Bruce Kruger on emergency hire to conduct the survey at the Bartlett Cove dock. Hope to have decision completed by December, 2010. At public meeting last may, there was a comment that someone had understood NPS was expecting FOGB to do research regarding impacts of charter fishing. Cherry clarified that there is no expectation on the part of NPS for FOGB to conduct any research. She also noted that this is a very complex issue and NPS could spend a lot of effort doing studies with nothing conclusive. Dan Lesh: There was a fizzled effort to do some research with [?]. Effects of charter fishing on this complex marine system need to be figured out and Glacier Bay does not have the staff to do it. Cherry: Park had halibut study going on under Jim Taggart. Work has not completed peer review. “We don’t have the data” to determine cause and effect relationships between harvest, climate variations, species interactions. Bill Brown: This is a matter of law, not science. Cherry: Using science is problematic; failed in Drake’s Bay. Dan Lesh: would like to follow up on marine science research to find out what is being done. Judy: Not sure why science is needed to limit sport fishing; it wasn’t used to remove commercial fishing. Cherry: There was a national effort to remove commercial fishing from the park, no such effort to remove or limit sport fishing. Judy: Seems to be a bias in favor of sport fishing. Agrees very hard to show scientifically that there is an effect but still don’t see why that is necessary.
Glacier Bay Lodge - There is a rumor the lodge will not be operating next summer – that is untrue as far as NPS knows. There is about half the business there was 12 years ago. Contract expires end of 2013. NPS will contract for a market study to inform what happens in 2014 and beyond. Day boat is the highest priority and that will continue regardless of what happens with the lodge. Concessions Reform Act says there has to be a viable business opportunity. Dan: any chance sport fishing could be added back to the concession contract? Cherry: Can’t say now because analysis has not been done. Dan: if new resource extraction is added to the contract
Library – Lynne Jensen volunteered as librarian this summer. Assigned a seasonal ranger to work one day/week in library. Developing pilot project to convert to electronic library. Adding research papers to bibliography. Posting many papers on park web site, though cannot post copyrighted materials without permission. This summer chief archivist from NPS visited GLBA for a week. National guideline that all field reports and other original materials should be accessioned into museum collection. Began pilot program with whale data. Working on protecting archival material. Funding for archivist planned for 2012-2013. Rusty working on other funding sooner. New Cultural Resources Manager will oversee this effort and find funding for it.
Alsek Use – No plans to change one trip/day use limit that has been in effect for some time. Allison: did some scoping regarding updating the Alsek River Management Plan. Overwhelming input that plan is working well as is.
Outer coast – have plans but no resources.
• Inventory and monitoring networks – we are part of Southeast Alaska network with Sitka, Klondike. Was never adequately funded. Partnered Sitka, Klondike plus Wrangell to get additional base funding to inventory the outer coast resources (controls and assessments).
• We no longer have Nunatak or pilot/plane. Working to re-instate some of those. Agreement with USCG to put rangers on their boats when they patrol outer coast. Also partnered with other on operation PULSE with troopers, NOAA law enforcement and USCG, under which everyone on the water was stopped and got a safety inspection and creel survey.
• Ranger patrol happened on outer coast. Another multi-disciplinary visit to Lituya Bay documenting commercial fishing use, cultural sites, helicopter use, fixed wing aircraft, firearms discharge.
Climate change
• Climate-friendly parks workshop in 2005 resulted in selection criteria for cruise ships relative to ship environmental practices and emissions. Criteria were used to evaluate proposals for the new 10-year contracts. The park has replaced diesel generators at Bartlett Cove with greener system. Working on intertie to Falls Creek hydro project, on track for 2014.
• Dan Lawson working on climate studies, seeking funding to add laser monitoring of glacier thickness. Working on funding for monitoring ocean acidification in Glacier Bay. Region is finishing up a climate change strategy.
Break for Pizza
Jim Macoviak presented some electronic slides on early industrial logging in Southeast Alaska.
Business Meeting:
Sean Nielson announced his intention to resign from the board and nominated Dan Lesh as the new Board President. Kim Heacox seconded and all present voted yea.
Kim Heacox offered to join the board and was voted in.
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