For non-Native Alaskans who had their hearts set on a sea otter pelt to hang next to other trophies, their hopes may be running out.
A recent resolution introduced by Rep. Peggy Wilson, R-Wrangell, attempts to better manage the population of sea otters in Southeast Alaska through a more aggressive cull.
The House Resources Committee passed a revised version of the non-binding House Joint Resolution 26, which urges the federal government to update regulations on sea otter use by Alaska Natives.
Wilson revised the original resolution to remove the recommendation to allow Alaska Natives to sell raw sea otter pelts to non-Natives. The change came a week after some Native groups voiced strong opposition.
At today's House Resource Committee meeting, the Petersburg Vessel Owners Association’s Executive Director, Julianne Curry, pushed back against this change, saying it came under pressure from the Alaska Native arts community and a number of harvesters want the option to sell to non-Natives, they just haven't spoken out yet.
Wilson urged interested harvesters to contact her office.
To give Alaska Natives broader freedom in the styles of handicrafts that they create, the resolution recommends the Federal government, through the Marine Mammal Protection Act, redefine allowed art from “Authentic and Traditional” to “Alaska Native Articles of Handicraft.” Arthur Martin, a legislative intern for Wilson said in testimony.
Though the resolution passed unanimously, committee members took time during their comments to express dislike for the resolution’s strong rhetoric. The bill assumes Southeast ecosystems are out of balance due to sea otter growth and the subsequent need to cull. However, Martin said the bill is written to create a discussion, not give direction.
Rep. Scott Kawasaki, D-Fairbanks, said a previous McDowell Group study gave reasons other than sea otters for the decline of geoduck, cucumber and urchin harvests.
Kawasaki later called into question the resolution’s assumption of the sea otter’s negative impact on fisheries.
Rep. Cathy Muñoz, R-Juneau, asked for the editorializing language be toned down as it will “build up the hysteria around the issue.”
Tina Brown, president of the Alaska Wildlife Alliance said the strong rhetoric in the resolution was divisive.
“This issue is escalating and you haven’t even passed the resolution yet,” Brown said.
She asked legislators to be patient before advocating population reduction. The research is underway to find out sea otters’ effect on Southeast ecology, but more time is needed, she said.
Brown said the Legislature shouldn’t pick winners and losers in the ecological marketplace.
“Are we going to choose sea cucumbers over sea otters?” Brown asked.
The resolution is good if it attempts to give Alaska Native artists more protection and more freedom, Brown said. She would oppose it, she said, “if the resolution is an attempt to use Native Alaskans as a tool for sea otter predator control.”
Greg Brown, a Juneau resident who owns Weather Permitting charters with his wife Tina, testified he believed sea otters could improve the ecosystem and are worth their tourism dollars. Greg gave an example of an annual sea-otter-themed bike tour held on the southern Pacific coast.
Greg advised working with the sea otters.
“Embrace nature and not fight it, we can all become rich,” Brown said.
Committee member Rep. Paul Seaton, R-Homer, said he appreciated the changes made to HJR 26. He said the resolution urges the expansion of the use of sea otters by Native Alaskans while not letting the harvest get out of control.
The Committee Substitute for House Joint Resolution 26 passed the House Resources Committee unanimously on Monday.
• Contact reporter Russell Stigall at 523-2276 or at russell.stigall@juneauempire.com.
Comments (33)
Add commentThe truth isn't
I'm wearing beaver!
I still don't understand something...
Why is it important WHO gets to purchase sea otter pelts?
I haven't understood why this is an issue that Natives can buy them and non-Natives can't and why Native groups are opposed to non-Natives buying them. It would seem to me that Natives selling pelts would want a larger audience to sell to instead of a smaller one.
Can someone explain why this is so important?
What it is!
It's a dead animal skin, nothing more. A dead cow's skin benefits a lot of people, a dead furry skin could benefit the Alaska native population a whole lot! IF allowed to do so! Dead is dead, get over it!
Leave it to Peggy
To stir up hysteria.
Sea otters
The one native complaint about selling to non natives was that they were afraid the pelts would end up overseas where they would be made into "native" crafts, made in Taiwan, and shipped back to Alaska to be sold to the tourists. Just limit
how many pelts an individual can buy/possess, I would suggest 2 to 3 tops. I have been trying, legally to obtain a couple for my own use, but it seems if I want to continue with my personal project I may have to resort to beaver pelts.
Thanks!
BigD--Finally some clarification.
@ Jo MacNamara
Right on. I don't get it either.
Jo - me too
You got me as well. When I first heard the story, I thought, "well, if Natives only are allowed to take them, they will be for allowing the sale to non-natives, because it's a bigger market". Plus, if we need to cull the sea otter population, then it's a win-win.
Jo - me too
You got me as well. When I first heard the story, I thought, "well, if only Natives are allowed to take them, they will certainly be for allowing the sale to non-natives, because it's a bigger market". Plus, if we need to cull the sea otter population, then it's a win-win.
Discrimination!
It ain't like sea otters are subsistence food. I support a draw permit hunt. And NO SALES. That is illegal. If Natives want pelts, let them draw a permit and catch their own. If the state culls them, set up a free lottery drawing. NO SALES.
Huh?
skirkz, just why the hell not? What is the sell of a dead animal gonna hurt?
Law
Sell one game species, then you may as well be able to sell all game species. If you go the extra mile and classify sea otters as fur bearers, thereby available to trappers, then legalize the sale of their pelts. The Native distinction should not come into play. It's Alaska's game. If it isn't, then Alaska has no business managing it. Any management by the state is paid for largely by user license fees. Any depredation hunts should provide equal access, or at least, equal chance of access by draw permits.
clam killers
who cares? little rascals just decimate the ecosystem of all clams, crabs, cockles, ect. they move in rafts, completely wiping out all food in an area and move on...i wish they all could be on everyones wall...sea otters are good for nothing...but eating all day...on the issue of non-native folk hunting for pelts...just buy one if you want one so bad...let native americans do what they do, enough has been lost already...
skirkz
I would go for that, manage them as any other animal. Equil treatment for everyone.
History lesson
Sea otters were almost extinct in some parts of Alaska around 1900. Around 1900 is when the first prohibition against harvesting sea otters went into existence. The Marine Mammal Protection Act did not get passed until 1972. These are federal regulations not state.
Why...
...then is the state legislation doing anything? Sea otters aren't whales or seals that have a subsistence roof value like the fish they are eating. Sounds like federal pets having preeminence over state fisheries. I'm sure they are happy to have that designation. The folks pushing back against this legislation sure are.
Agree with skirkz
Limiting harvest of anything that is publicly owned is racism not matter what race is favored and what race gets screwed. Allow everyone an equal opportunity to harvest whatever number the sea otter population allows. End of story.
discrimination
I am starting to believe that the prohibition of selling to non-Natives is discriminatory.
To deny non-Natives the right to purchase these simply because they MIGHT fall into Taiwanese hands and MIGHT come back as fake Native artwork is speculative, iffy and ludicrous.
It's also racist.
End the discrimination.
pelts
I'm not only a Tlingit artist but also a deckhand on a power troller and I don't see enough sea otters a summer to classify them as destroying the ecosystem. And as an artist, most Native artist I know would love to sell them to anybody, I don't know who they talked to - must be the 1%.
Question for Shaayi
Would you support allowing all Alaskans an equal opportunity to harvest sea otters?
@Jo MacNamera
I'm sorry but it's not racist. Racism is institutionally subjugating a population based on racial identity or religion. Keeping a population down by force of intimidation by the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government and by the majority of the population. Jim Crow laws are racist, Japanese internment camps were racist, prohibiting two people of different races to marry is racist, beating children for speaking the language is racist, and indiscriminately killing a population based on race is racist. Racism was alive and well in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nazi Germany, and the beginning of US history.
Sorry but wanting a sea otter pelt to hang on your wall and it not being allowed isn't racism, it's just stupid.
@glacierdogs
idk, because when things are open for hunting/fishing in this country (here and down south) many times they're wiped out. ex: whales, buffalo, eagles, wolves, salmon, bears (both brown and black), moose (down south) many deer populations, beavers, pollock, atlantic cod, etc.
From the beginning days of the New England colony the puritans in Boston, our mindset has been we own nature and can do what ever we want with it because it doesn't matter. I'd like to think that we, as Americans, can sensibly hunt/fish a species responsibly but it hasn't happened yet. That's why lower 48er's come up here to hunt and fish (sport and commercial), their stocks have been depleted for a long time. So to answer your question, I don't know.
This is good news to me.
This is good news to me.
@ Shaayi
I respectfully disagree one point...
A law which permits one race (native Americans) the right to sell certain items only to certain groups based on race is indeed racist.
But I will concede that there are different levels of racism and that selling a sea otter pelt is insignificant compared to the Japanese internment camps.
I will also concede that the term "racist/racism" is thrown around way too much. Some racism, such as what you mentioned, is extremely harmful to society, whereas other areas of racism (take hip hop music for example) is not.
But in this case, it is indeed relevant, and I don't understand the Native community's opposition to this.
@jo MacNamara
"A law which permits one race (Native Americans) the right to sell certain items only to certain groups based on race is indeed racist."
-understood. I would argue that it's discriminatory more than racist. I guess racist has a more negative feel to it. Racism seems like something more from my father's generation when it was more blatant and accepted in society. When Pres. Barak Obama was born in Hawaii it would have been illegal for his parents to be married in the south. That to me seems racist.
Gangster Rap can be bigoted. Not racist because it doesn't physically hurt or keep one race down. Bigots and racists get all mixed up with each other. Most people nowadays are bigots (idiots) and not as many racists (white supremists/neo naxis). I know we have lots and lots of bigots in Alaska, I hear them all the time.
It's nice to discuss these kind of issues without anger and defensive posturing.
Interesting point.
If racism is one race with more privilage than another,and therefore subjugating a race? Just who is subjugating whom? Who is the racist in this instance?
@ AankadaxTseen
Why is it good news? It's just one more thing the government is telling us we can't do and one more way our people aren't able to sell something to make a living in the villages.
Overharvesting
This was and is not the practice of any single race or group of people; we should probably not point fingers at one another.
I like the idea of classifying the critters as fur bearers and make them available for trapping.
Suggest a trip to Portlock Harbor,and areas on either side of it if you have not seen sea otter populations in great numbers.
Federal regulators are out of touch. Anyone remember the Feds asking for public input when they decided to re-introduce the sea otters into Southeast? I was here and don't recall any discussion before the decision was put into action.
@alaskabloc
I don't believe it's racist at all. It's discriminatory, but that's not always bad. I don't believe anybody is being subjugated except the sea otter.
I'd like to know who the artists are who were displeased with the bill set forth by Rep. Peggy Wilson because the harvesters I know would love to sell the pelts and make money. Now they don't make gas money not to mention the cost to having it processed.
I believe in Yeik'.
@ Shaayi
I appreciate your respectful tone. Thank you.
By your words, the action of Natives selling only to other Natives is discriminatory, but not racist.
That begs two questions; 1) If this is indeed discriminatory, what class is being discriminated against? and 2) what defines the class of people being discriminated against?
The answers are: 1) The class(es) being discriminated against are non-Natives. 2) Race defines who is Native and who is not.
Therefore, if only Natives can sell things only to Natives for whatever reason, it is discriminatory, and that discrimination is based on race.
That makes this practice racist.
It's a subtle distinction, but it is there. It's not heinous or atrocious, but the distinction is there.
As such, Native leaders who are in opposition to selling these to non-Natives would do well to rethink their position.
That is my entire point. I'm not blowing the racist whistle.
I never intend on buying one, so I really don't care personally. Just pointing out how certain Native leaders speaking for all Natives sometimes damage Native credibility without realizing it. Since I have many Native friends, I hate seeing this happen and hope it is corrected.