Alaska Peninsula / Aleutian Island / Chignik Finfish (2/25/2026)

Recording in progress.

Alright, let us get started this morning. The day is February 25th. The time is 9:03 AM. We're going to begin with deliberations on Group 3. Group 3 consists of South Alaska Peninsula salmon.

There are 20 proposals in this group, and so we will begin this morning with proposal number 127. 127, Please. Madam Chair, move we adopt proposal 127 with substitute language found in RC245. We're going to read it into the record first. Thank you.

Good morning, Madam Chair, members of the board. My name is Matt Keys, and just with up at the table with me, I have Jeff Spallinger, and for your research and genetic inquiries, I have Tyler Dan and Birch Foster as well. Proposal 127, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Island's June Salmon Management Plan. Move to adopt Proposal 127 with substitute language found in RC 245. Second and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board has before it proposal— or I'm sorry, the language in 245, RC 245, in lieu of the original proposal. Staff comments, please.

Proposal 127 with amended language from RC 245. This amended language would add Chinook salmon in the preamble of Part A of this management plan, and then it would adjust the set gillnet gear commercial fishing period to 64-hour fishing period beginning on June 6th. And then followed that with a 32-hour closure and then basically 64-hour fishing periods until we get to June 28th with the final fishing period being 40 hours. And then for persane and set gillnet gear, this would have 3— no more than 3 16-hour fishing periods within a 7-day period beginning June 10th. This would also And the final fishing period would be no later than June 28th.

And it would also eliminate the chum triggers from this management plan. We don't know the effects of this new fishing schedule on chum or in general salmon harvest, particularly with regard to the industry-led adaptive management and whether it would be possible to implement given the restrictive fishing periods. This would be prosecuted by EO, and there would be a lot of pressure on the department to pick particular days, especially with regard to weather and the unknown effects with regard to the implementation of the Chignik sockeye salmon action plan. This would reduce fishing periods for seine and drift gillnet gear to approximately 144 hours compared to the 310 hours that were in the current seine schedule and from 352 hours for this current drift gillnet schedule, and it would reduce the set gillnets to approximately 340 hours from their 410 hours.

In 2023, the board made numerous changes to the South Unimak and Chumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan to conserve Seawack chum salmon. These changes, when combined with fishing industry-led efforts to reduce Seawack chum salmon, intercept have been effective in reducing Seawack chum salmon harvest in the June fishery. The department believes the current management plan and industry-led conservation efforts are effective tools to conserve Seawack chum salmon while providing harvest opportunity on salmon stocks identified harvestable surplus. Prolonged or extensive closures that significantly reduce available fishing time can discourage the fleet from adopting proactive industry-led measures such as test fishing, to assess chum salmon abundance or implementing voluntary closures in high abundance chum salmon areas. The department is neutral on allocative aspects of this proposal.

Thank you. For discussion, Ms. Erwin, would you like to speak your substitute language? Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for the department for explaining a lot of those changes that are going to be happening from the current management structure to what this would be implemented as.

This substitute language comes in response to a slew of testimonies that we heard yesterday and in the days prior leading up to this deliberation. We heard individuals ask from everything from a full closure in Proposal 136 to status quo of the adaptive management plan. And I believe that this is a compromise on both ends because not only were, were a great majority of folks that are affected by the seawack take in this room asking for a full closure. They were asking for also 2-day and 10-day closures. And as the department indicated, having those long extended periods of closures is also not optimal for, for sockeye harvest.

And so the, the, this substitute language maintains an adaptive approach while still placing the responsibility of timing and openers in the hands of the department as the managers. Fishermen are still welcome and encouraged to participate in voluntary stand-downs when they see fit, communicate with each other and gather data, and engage in transparency with the public. This approach will allow for significant reductions in fishing time with nets out of the water while preserving the flexibility for management to open the fishery at the most strategic times. The public has expressed support for long closures. However, listening to the local fishermen indicates the extended closures during the peak sockeye periods could result in enormous loss of opportunity.

This will empower the department to determine that timing. Reducing commercial fishing time will increase the number of chum and king salmon reaching their natal streams, benefiting multiple Alaska systems where escapement goals are not being met and stocks of concern designation are in place. Maximizing escapement under these current conditions is essential to meeting the sustained yield principle, the mixed stock fisheries policy, and the sustainable salmon policy. In the last few years under the adaptive management strategy, we have not seen significant decline in the amount of seawack total harvest that has been taken in this fishery. In 2002, there was 95,474 seawack harvest taken.

In 2003, there were 58,923. And in 2024, there was 119,930 taken. I believe that this proposal speaks to the, the nature of the original proposer, ONC's proposal. They— I also will note that ONC has endorsed this proposal I spoke with the community and the tribe in developing this language, and we have multiple RCs before us that support it as well. So thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Other board discussion? Mr. Chamberlain.

Thank you, Madam Chair. After discussing this with other board members, it's become evident that in order to get this through— oh, we— oh, we did want— I wanted to move to Strike the provision on page 2 stating fishing periods may not be open for more than 16 hours a day. My intent is to allow for 3 24-hour fishing periods in a 7-day period.

Okay, so that's a motion to amend the substitute language. Yes. And where is that found specifically? Page 2. Page 2 in the open parentheses for A, right after the semicolon.

Okay, so in paragraph A or whatever? Yes.

Okay. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion on the amendment?

Miss Erwin? Yeah, Member Chamberlain, what would this do to the total hours, shifting the total hours from my proposed language 24 hours, what would that look like in the overall hours restricted? Well, thank you for the opportunity to do math at the— on the top of back of my hand. I believe it would increase the total fishing hours in the department. Who—.

Whoever in the room has a calculator can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it would increase the total hours for the June fishery to 210 hours.

Any other board discussion on the amendment? Mr. Swenson.

This is approved. How many hours would be lost in the month of June to the, uh, uh, same fleet from the current or from the substitute language from the current?

Madam Chair, was that a question to staff or—. Okay.

Sorry about that. We were trying to do some quick math. Madam Chair, Mr. Benson, I just pressure doing napkin math. I think the change would increase the hours to 216 hours total from the 144 hours I estimated from the original amendment. Does that make sense?

Yes, but what was the original if none of these amendments are allowed? I mean, don't they get 3 64-hour periods? And I just— I'm trying to figure out, you know, how much fishing time is lost due to this. Yeah, through the chair, Mr. Svenson. So currently, seine has a total of 310 hours and drift gillnet has a total of 352 hours.

In this current amendment, would only affect those— that schedule.

One of the amendments also increases the fishing time from 5 openings to 9 openings with these reduced hours.

Is that not correct? Through the Chair, Mr. Svenson, yes, it would be approximately 9 hours or 9 fishing periods total. Given its 3 fishing— 3 16-hour or 3 24-hour fishing periods within a 7-day period.

So the math is that they lose about 3.5 days over the month of June. Is that not correct?

Through the chair, yeah, it's about a loss of 100 and 36 hours— I'm sorry, yeah, 136 hours for drift gillnet and approximately 94 hours for seine gear.

Okay, thank you. Any other discussion on the amendment?

Someone want to call the question on the amendment? Question. Thank you. Mr. Nelson, please call the roll on the amendment. On the amendment.

Carpenter. Yes. Erwin. Yes. Godfrey.

Yes. Carlson-Vandort. Yes. Wood. No.

Stinson. Yes. Chamberlain. Yes. The amendment carries 6 in favor, 1 against, Madam Chair.

Okay, so back to more discussion on RC245 as amended. Mr. Godfrey. I'd like to offer an amendment to Item D on the first page. Where the— it says the commissioner may establish to change— change the term from may to the commissioner shall establish by emergency order commercial fishing periods as follows. So the amendment would change from may to shall.

Is there a second? Second. Would you like to speak to your amendment? Yes.

I want it to be compulsory as opposed to discretionary. Okay. Any other discussion? Mr. Carpenter? Yeah.

Well, I appreciate Mr. Godfrey's amendment. I think this, this takes all flexibility away from the department. And most circumstances around the state and being consistent, I like the commissioner and the department to have some flexibility. So I mean, for that reason, I can't support the amendment. Any other more discussion?

Mr. Chamberlain. I agree with Member Carpenter. One of the things we were looking at was to still work towards getting, getting the fish back by through the spawning grounds. And we trust the department to make necessary choices. They work well with the communities based on a lot of the public testimonies and interactions with the people of this region.

They seem to have a lot of faith in the local managers. I would hate to take away that discretion. And, and yet we're still looking to, to get the chum and the chinook through these, through to the spawning grounds. So yes, I'll also be opposing. Mr. One.

Yeah, thank you. Just question for my fellow board members. I guess I want to understand a little bit on how, why that's more prescriptive. I understand that may is, is less prescriptive and shall is more.

Prescriptive, but this is about opening commercial fishing periods. So I don't— I guess, where is the rationale that this is— it's less in the manager's hands and it's more prescriptive for the commissioner? Because it is about opening fishing periods. It's not prescriptive for closing fishing periods.

Mr. Godfrey.

Well, I think that the two previous board members just spoke to Essentially to that, it does in fact, if it's shall language, absent other emergency or dire matters unforeseen, everything that falls after D as far as the openers simply becomes mandatory by the Commissioner as opposed to discretionary. I don't know how to describe it any other way. It's so it does in fact take away the latitude or the discretion. So it essentially guarantees everything that follows that describes the openers will happen. Yeah, I'm going to be opposed to the amendment because I mean, I think this starts to fall into cookbook management where irrespective of what's happening on the grounds and with fish moving as they do unpredictably, I'm not interested in taking away any additional discretion that the department may have.

And if they were more prescriptive— I mean, more restrictive or not, I would assume that there was a biological justification as such. Any other additional discussion on the amendment?

Question. Question has been called on the amendment. Director Nelson, please call the roll.

On the amendment. Miss Vinson. No. Wood? No.

Chamberlain? No. Carpenter? No. Carlson-Vandorp?

No. Irwin? No. Godfrey? Yes.

The amendment fails, 1 in favor, 6 against, Madam Chair. Thank you. So again, board discussion, RC245 as amended by Amendment Number 1.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Bowers? Thank you, Madam Chair. So I just wanted to ask the board a couple of questions and try to get some guidance as we're working through this here. So with the changes that the board made to the June plan during the last Alaska Peninsula Chignik meeting, with the caps in place, you know, the I think the board built the record around the intent that the adaptive management would be in place to help inform management of those caps.

And so under RC 245, you know, it's clear that this RC is contemplating, you know, placing the full responsibility to reduce chum catch in the South Peninsula on the department through EO authority.

I'm wondering if the board has any guidance to the department on how to— it would like to see openings structured within these time periods. Thanks.

Well, I will just put my thoughts on it, and then we will go to Mr. Carpenter. I mean, I see that as what we just basically voted on in terms of the amendment. It is the responsibility of the department. It has been for many years the responsibility of the department.

The triggers, you know, were in existence for a relatively short period of time, and this isn't anything substantially different than how the department manages throughout the state. And, you know, the department will have to help determine when the appropriate You know, when they get concerned about whatever the chum catch is, as has been done previously, I guess. [Speaker:DR. BRYANT] Well, that's not quite what was done previously because the periods were more or less fixed. You know, we— under the previous June plan, you know, we could have essentially written all the EOs to operate that fishery today, you know, for a fishery that would occur in June. So this is fundamentally different than that.

And so that's why I asked the question. Okay. Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Forrest.

That was kind of what I was going to say to a certain degree. You know, the way it's currently managed, it's very prescriptive to the department. We did have caps in place, and they were able to manage the fishery based on the caps along with the adaptive management. And so the way this is written, and without a lack of in-season either aerial survey, we're genetic information, I, I just think that this is actually impossible. For the department to do this.

And that's assuming that the adaptive management plan will stay in place.

Member Erwin said that the commercial fish— fisher— fishing fleet in the South Peninsula is welcome to continue to use the adaptive management plan. Which is interesting because this entire meeting from several people on this board and a lot of people in the public talked about how unreliable and how they could not trust that process. And so I do not understand for one second, to Mr. Bowers' point, how this— the way this is written can be executed. I think it's not possible for the department to do it.

Mr. Irwin. Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to clarify for the record. I stated that fishermen are still welcome and encouraged to practice voluntary stand-downs when they see fit, communicate with one another, gather data to help managers make informed decisions, and engage in transparency with the public on fleet conservation efforts. So I was, I was stating that it is welcome for the fleet to continue to share information with the department and to, to continue to engage in that transparency and to help us understand what's going on on the fisheries ground.

It would— I would be behooved for our fishermen to no longer communicate with the department on what they're seeing on the grounds simply because they're outside of the adaptive management program. So I am not conflating the adaptive management plan with my substitute language, I am stating that the practices of the fleet, the good behavior of fishing practices that have been shown, is still highly encouraged.

Mr. Wood and then Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thank you. I'd like to ask Member Erwin what the incentive would be for them to continue adaptable management.

Well, they wouldn't be doing adaptive management. The incentive for them to be continuing to communicate with the department and share that they're gathering is for the betterment of the stock and the fisheries of all Alaska. We have a— we pride ourselves upon how sustainable our fisheries are, and my hope is that even if the fleet is not precluded from having any— not participating in the Adaptive Management Plan, my hope would be that these are— and I believe through public testimony, these are individuals who care about the resource and care about other areas, other areas that are in stock of concern designation and not meeting escapement goals. So So the incentive would be to rebuild the stocks that they're harvesting from in their intercept fishery.

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Wood, for that question.

I think we need to look at this in a practical sense also.

You know, when you look at the mixed stock policy, it talks about shared burden amongst users, and I think without question The people of the Yukon and the interior regions where Siwak fish reside have, have bared a lot of that burden. But when I look at the actions that the board has taken at this meeting in regards to gear restrictions or gear loss, and then I look— when I look at the components that are written into this substitute language as amended, There is a massive amount of loss there as well. And last meeting we also closed Sanak Island for the months of June, which was a big give, and there was a lot of chums that were taken, and the fleet decided that they were willing to give that up, and the board went along with that.

And I also think that you have to look at this adaptive management plan like there is no other place in the state that this, anything like this exists. And for the fishermen in the last couple years to do their best to stay under that cap so that more Siwak fish can get into the Siwak streams, I think was, it was a big deal.

And a lot of money was spent and a lot of hours were given up to try and do that because I think they were doing it for the reasons that we all want to put those fish into those natal streams. I will tell you right now, my prediction is this, having been a fisherman and understanding how these things work, there is very little incentive for the, for the, for the adaptive management plan to go on. And that is a real unfortunate thing because I think there was a lot of benefit to that. And I think having the caps in place was a way for the fleet to control their fishery based on the amount of chums and that cap number. And I know there's a lot of people in the audience and a lot of people sitting at this table that just, for whatever reason, have no trust in humanity anymore.

Well, I still do. And I think that it was proven the last several years that this can work. The potential to harvest more chums based on the way this proposal is written is substantially higher substantially higher because the adaptive management plan will most likely fall apart and there's no cap to manage it to.

Mr. Chamberlain—. Mr. Wood and then Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you.

Um, I don't support RC 245 for a lot of reasons. You go back and you look at the history of the management plans that have existed. You can look at it in RC2, tab 5, page 10 if you want to look at it. In the history of management in this area, there's only been 2 times it's had the least amount of chum harvest. That was back in the early 2000s and now.

And then you look at this RC and you say, what is this going to solve? Is this going to reduce chum harvest?

This, this plan has reduced chum harvest and it has incentivized chum— not harvesting chums.

No, apparently there's some backdoor deal between the state and the fishermen to do this, but evidently it seems to be working.

And people need more transparency, evidently, which I fully support. Ronald Reagan's old saying, trust but verify— I'm fully behind that.

Implement full integrity and honesty into this system. Everybody's begging you to do that, so just do it. They've already offered. When you go back and you look at the, at the, you know, 5AC 39.220 policy for management of mixed stocks under B, when it is necessary to restrict fisheries on stocks where there are known conservation problems, the burden of conservation conservation shall be shared among all fisheries in close proportion.

Now that word you got to figure out, figure out how that applies, but in close proportion to their respective harvests on the stocks of concern. The board recognized this, that precise sharing of conservation among fisheries is dependent on the amount of stock-specific, stock-specific information available. So in order— so you take that one level further and you go back to the court case of Village of Elam versus State, and it specifically asks that, especially for false pass, for this area.

Under subsistence law, the Board of Fish authority to manage a species extended beyond a geographical location. The area of identified subsistence use only so long as the board continued to believe that the species was manageable as a unit. Manageable as a unit.

All Siwak Chum, can you manage them as a unit?

Outside the geographic region, Area M. The management of Area M all the way through the Bering Sea from Ugashik to Kotzebue. Can we manage it as a unit? The board should ask, how can we do this? Is it manageable as a unit all the way through the area and fishery and beyond?

First of all, it was determined that there was a lack of certainty that the False Pass chum runs actually migrated all the way to Norton Sound, all of them. And second, the impossibility of managing chums as a unit in False Pass where the migratory is mixed in with strong primary migration of stocks with sockeye.

So what this has done is use the ability of the fishermen to see what's out there, local knowledge, the people that know how to kill fish and what fish they are, to use their experience, this local knowledge, this traditional knowledge, to manage, adaptively manage a fishery. Which, by the way, this term, this was implemented even before the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council, and they're starting to use the term adaptive management.

You look at the amount that is being harvested in this area, and I'm going to use— because everybody wants to argue the percentage, but I'm going to say 25% of the genetic work that was done by the state, Tyler Dance. 25%, Okay? So we're going to restrict a fishery that over time already has been managed, managed, managed, managed. Caps, caps, caps. Reduced time, reduced effort, da da da da, down to where we are right now, is that an equal burden of conservation?

Should they also get 100% because the Yukon is?

In my mind, no, but they should share the burden. They should share the burden of at least 25% and maybe higher. And I think they— that is integrated into this adaptive plan already.

If this plan goes away, there is no incentive to conserve. I'll leave it at that and see what the rest of my board members have to say. Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair. There are quite a few points I do want to address on this, but Since Member Wood started with Native Village of Elim, I'll— or finished with Native Village of Elim, I'll start with there.

Native Village of Elim was passed when it was a tagging study, and a couple salmon who had tags made it up to Norton Sound, were found there. At the time, there was not a lot of information on the migratory routes of the salmon and what percentage of the— at the time, what they called the False Pass fishery originated from Norton Sound. Since that time, we've had considerably more data. And you are— and we have a much stronger biological nexus for that. We've got the WASP— you've got the WASP data where it showed 57% from 2006 to 2009, which weren't necessarily high abundance years, were going to the AYK.

And then even after the crash, we're having it— in the midst of a historic crash on the Yukon and Kuskokwim Rivers where there was no subsistence opportunity, all commercial fisheries were closed, and there are serious issues with border treaty passage, you're still finding as much as 25% AYK or Siwak chum.

So as to manageability as a unit, I think one thing we really have to look at, or, or, well, I'll stick with the, the genetic nexus. Uh, there's a very clear nexus, as opposed to when Native Village of Elim was discussed, to, to show not only that, uh, that Siwak Chum are coming through the area and fishery, but when they're coming through, when they're coming through in higher abundance. Through the fishery. The WASP data gave us great data on abundance, and then the last 3 years have given us great run timing on when these fish are designed to go through. And when we get to manageable as a unit, the real question I'm going to point to is we have a June fishery management plan for a reason.

That's when these fish are known to target or to pulse.

Through this region. When we say it's not manageable as a unit, we are managing this group as a unit. There is a 3-week window in the June management plan where we, where we, where we've historically reduced harvest. We've managed and we've looked at other ways. The adaptive management plan that was passed 3 years ago was meant to target and let these fish by to go through.

Moreover, you know, we also have, you know, as Member Carpenter pointed out, we closed Sanak Island in the last cycle. Why? Because that was a hotspot. If there's anything this board has done is demonstrated that we can now manage this fishery as a unit. And so a lot of the work we do within the June Salmon Management Plan is designed to bring those to bring those fish home to the AYK, or to the Siuak area, to the Yukon, Kuskokwim, and those regions.

So a lot of the facts that Native Village of Elim is founded on are no longer applicable to this one. And so I do find that this is manageable as a unit, and I think the board has demonstrated that it is manageable as a unit. And I'm not just talking chums. Just this last year, the department initiated a few shutdowns when there was high Chinook abundance in, in some areas. So if anything, the ability of the department and the board to manage these fisheries as a unit has increased over time and grown substantially better.

So I also want to touch on chum caps since, since we had that. Sorry, there are a lot of topics to cover here. Chum caps. I've never liked them. One of the problems with them is They limit— they permit overharvest in times of low abundance.

When we've had substantial reductions in the productivity of a fishery, as we did in the Yukon, as we're experiencing in the Yukon with Chinook and with chum right now, a chum— a cap on, on those fisheries can allow, you know, I think that was based on historic harvest levels. Uh, getting to that level would still be devastating to that fishery. But when you hit high abundance years, what, what happens there is this fishery can hit that, or the, the Aleutian Peninsula area and fishery can hit that cap even faster. And what that does is that will shut down fishery in this fishery in high abundance years when there's no need to do so. So again, I'm all for adaptive management, but caps just leave too much room and they run contrary to the purpose.

They allow overharvest in low abundance years and underharvest in high abundance years. So with that, I, I do trust the department to do this far better than an arbitrary cap can do. Now with respect to what incentive do the local fishermen have to continue with the adaptive management policy, I would— a question I posed for the department before I go any further is, can you— can the department, between Chum, Chinook, and other species, how many, how many species that run through this are either in a a stock of management or yield concern or even looking at an ESA listing. I don't need a breakdown, but if there's an estimate in the number of stocks that run through this, I'd love to hear it. Mr. Bowers.

Thanks, Madam Chair. So, Mr. Chamberlain, you have— I don't have a comprehensive list of those stocks off the top of my head, but you have all that material in front of you in the various genetic studies that we presented. So that, you know, as, as we've discussed throughout this meeting, there's a number of stocks that migrate through this area in June. Some of them are stocks of concern. That's, that's well established.

You made a comment earlier that you felt the department could do a better job, you know, managing by EO. Than, say, the cap and adaptive management approach. And so, you know, I'm, I'm struggling. I'm contemplating how we would manage these openings by EO here as contemplated in RC 245. And, you know, normally when we open fisheries by emergency order, you know, we're basing that on, you know, real-time escapement data.

For local stocks. And, you know, in this case, you know, if I think, you know, based on your question about stocks of concern, you know, we're not going to know the escapement for stocks of concern that are migrating through this area in June until much later in the summer, well after the June fishery is concluded. So It would be difficult to base emergency orders for the June fishery around escapement performance of stocks of concern in areas well outside of the South Alaska Peninsula. That's just because of the timing of the migration. So then I'm thinking, well, what would be the other criteria we would use to, to justify an emergency order.

So, you know, we— you had the discussion about shall versus may, and so we— as I read this, the commissioner may establish these periods by emergency order. So it's completely discretionary. And is it— is it the board— I'd like to hear some intent from the board on—. Is it—. Is it the board's intent that all of these periods should occur at some point?

In the plan, or, you know, what are the criteria that the department should use when establishing these EEO periods? Thank you.

So to the department's question, those are wonderful questions, but I don't think there's anything new. You know, for the board to manage over 3 years for preponderant for the abundance of stock of concern fish within this. It's nearly impossible for the board to predict as hard as it is for the department to predict. And historic— this last year, you know, for instance, the department, I believe when they said it's hard to manage Chinook passage throughout this region, there were spot closures for Chinook when just this last year despite the assertion that it couldn't be done. And that was done on EO authority.

And I think one of the things the department has done very well is shown sound discretion in when to open and close this. And so to that extent, yes, I understand it's a very difficult question. It's hard to give guidance on that. But it's a very— but there are so many factors that affect these fish that there's no one answer, I believe, that can do that, that can answer this. We have to look at this as a, you know, at the totality of the circumstances for all intents and purposes to determine when and identify where a problem is, because not all problems are foreseeable and you may not know until, for instance, the 2020 fishery, you know, there was not a lot of data, but somehow we ran 1.1 million.

That— and I think the department agrees, we don't want that to happen again. And this goes to, to the local fishermen. And the point I was, I was getting at is there are stocks of management concern. There's— there are potentially treaty fish. There are other things that go through here that we really need to be careful of.

And so for the local fishermen, one of the things I I— one of the reasons I would strongly encourage continuation of the adaptive management program is that this is a mixed stock fishery, depends on the health of the runs, of the wild runs that run through this. As I've stated before, you know, in the WASP years, this was a very high abundance of wild salmon. Of late, the hatchery fish is particularly in and chums have begun to take over, and those are masking a lot of the disappearance of the wild stocks. But before I go too much further, I'm going to give other people a chance to talk because I've been going for a while. I have some thoughts on this, and then I'll get to Ms. Erwin.

So thus far in the discussion, we've heard a little bit of the mixed stock policy and The policy states that we should provide that all users of salmon resources should share in actions taken to conserve the resource in a manner which is ideally fair and proportional to respective harvest of the stock in question. I think this member would spoke to this a little bit and spoke to the idea of 25%. Well, 25% of zero is zero. 75% Of zero is is zero. And so for me, that skews the discussion a little bit because.

I don't know how fair and proportional if you're at zero. How is that fair and proportional? I'm struggling with that. Um, with respect to subsection B, again, um, in the findings, it states that the board addresses the burden of conservation. It is a subjective term, um, but that the conservation objectives, which I'm assuming here for me, is at least meeting escapement goals.

Let alone having any sort of harvest opportunity, will be shared fairly among users. And again, that goes back to nothing from nothing is nothing.

So we have a duty to make sure that these stocks are— we're doing our best to try and provide escapement for sustainability. And In the event that, you know, the mixed stock policy doesn't provide the guidance that we need, I refer back to the Sustainable Salmon Policy, and it states in Section 5 that in the face of uncertainty, salmon stocks, fisheries, etc., artificial propagation, essential habitat shall be managed conservatively, involving the prudent foresight that takes into account the uncertainties in salmon fisheries and habitat management. The biological, social, cultural, and economic risks and the need to take action with incomplete knowledge should be applied to the regulation and control of harvest and other human-induced sources of salmon mortality. And the— and using that precautionary approach requires the consideration of the needs of future generations and the avoidance of potentially irreversible changes. And that applies here.

To me, those, those words really resonate as I can contemplate what we're discussing here. I also heard Member Woods say that there is no incentive to conserve, and if that's the case, then I feel that much of what I heard throughout this entire meeting is meaningless.

If there is no incentive to conserve, then hours of public testimony is essentially meaningless. Matter of fact, I would say that the incentive exists to assist in informing future boards whether or not this is working, whether or not to relax or provide justification for adjustment of time and area going forward.

That for me would be significant incentive.

The other piece that I would just mention is that in terms of the department's question, I think you bring up some really good points. You know, perhaps it should be Shell. And maybe that's something we should revisit in this discussion, if that helps make your job a little bit easier. But I would also say that we are in the midst of this genetic study. You have mandatory— I think by EO you have mandatory retention on all of this.

I think the department has the ability through those mandatory retention and the harvest reports to see what's coming in, to be able to assess how many chum are coming in, and to adjust accordingly. So I don't have a problem going back to shall language necessarily if that provides you the certainty that you need in order— that you think you need to manage. But I think you have the tools as the language exists. That's my opinion. And I'll open it up.

Ms. Erwin, I think you were next. Yeah, Madam Chair, I just want to make sure nobody else had a response. A response for that. Thank you. Thank you for adding those points.

I, I will expand a little bit on your reading of the sustainable salmon policy and go a little bit further under Under C5A Section 4, where the impact of the resource use is uncertain but likely presents a measurable risk to sustained yield, priority should be given to conserving the productive capacity of the resource. And going back to Member Chamberlain's question to the department about stocks of concern, I don't have a full list, but I can speak to a few that run through this area. We have the Nushigagak kings who are in a stock of management concern since 2022. Nushagak chum failed to meet escapement in 2020 to 2023. Nushagak early-run sockeye is still a stock of concern.

Yukon River Chinook is a stock of management concern. Yukon River fall chum was advanced from no stock status to a stock of management concern this year. The Quinniak River chum only met escapement 1 out of the last 5 years. Escapement goals on the Snake, Nome, and Eldorado Rivers were not met in 2025. Kodiak in 2004, KMA chum run was almost half of its historical average, and in 2024, Chinook record was low at 432 for both river systems combined.

And so it's quite obvious to me, while this— again, while this fishery may not be the sole purpose for these stocks not meeting escapement goals, it is the only thing within this board's hands today that we can deal with. I cannot make any decisions about warming water temperatures, ichthyophonous, global market prices, the demand for fish on a domestic and global scale. We cannot control habitat, but today what we can make a decision on is whether or not we are going to protect and preserve these stocks that are in abysmal numbers. Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um, I keep going back to the practical part of this proposal. And the ability for the department to manage this.

I'm not sure how the department would ever write an EO for this fishery the way this is written.

You have no in-season weir or aerial surveys.

You can have all the numbers you want on fish tickets, but how do you base a proportion off those fish tickets to be able to say this is how many sea whack fish are there, this is why I'm going to make the announcement.

For the department to do that and then pick days based on something that's not quantifiable, quite frankly, I, I just don't understand how that, that's possible. And they go back to the point I made a little while ago, it's The department, when they had the cap, that was something that they had as a target, and they could have used that to actually make EO decisions. And that was a tool or a target for the fleet to stay below. That was something that was valuable, and I just— I think the board passing regulation that does not allow the department to, to manage the fishery the way people think they can, I, I just think we're putting the department in a very, very uncomfortable and very impossible situation. And I think, once again, I think that I just— without the cap and without the adaptive management plan, I just I know what's going to happen.

So anyway.

Mr. Godfrey, then Mr. Wood, Mr. Chamberlain, did you have your hand up? Okay. Not having an opportunity to visit with stakeholders at our area before seeing this RC, it is my opinion that, as has been mentioned by multiple board members, the adaptive management plan, if this is adopted by the board, goes away. And the net effect is far more chum get caught. And it was also my impression during this week, the last 7 days or whatever, the department was very impressed with the adaptive management plan.

As Board Member Carpenter had mentioned in his earlier comments on this, I think that's problematic to adopt something that essentially makes that plan obsolete.

I would like to ask the department if— does the department believe they can manage Yukon chum as a stock of concern in Area M given the intermingling of all the other stocks in there?

Through the chair, Mr. Godfrey. So that, that's a A good question that kind of gets to the heart of the matter here. So, you know, in our staff comments, we made a statement that the existing plan with the chum triggers coupled with the adaptive management plan had been effective at reducing the harvest of Siwak chum. So the data that allowed us to make that statement is the 3 years of WASP data and then the 3 years of post-WASP chum genetics that, that show a declining proportion of Siwak chum in the harvest in recent years. So, but in season we don't have that information.

So we have information on total chum catch in season. So, so the information that we would have to inform these emergency orders would just be total catch by species. Thank you for that, Mr. Bowers. So, you know, one of my problems, you know, with this proposal fundamentally is addressing an area where fish are transiting through and attempting to get a higher number of Siwak and Yukon chum through this area that are then going to go on to be captured in large.

In large amounts in Bristol Bay, and we didn't address that in Bristol Bay. So we're picking and targeting an area here that's much farther away from the nexus, the source of origin of these salmon, than Bristol Bay, which is far closer.

I can see us increasing chum going through here by taking, you know, adopting radical proposals that that are very aggressive and austere in nature towards Area M, what percentage of those chums that don't get caught then move on to Bristol Bay and get caught? And it's— it just strikes me as very odd when you look at a map of Alaska that we aren't addressing this closer to the source rivers, which is Bristol Bay. And that may be a nut that's just too hard to crack, and so no one's tried, given the volume of fish taken out of Bristol Bay and how you would go about doing that. Because in a ratio in Bristol Bay, it's a small percentage of chum, but in the aggregate it's an enormous amount of chum take that was heading north. Down on the peninsula, it may be a higher percentage of chum of their take that has been viewed as problematic, um, to the systems up north, but in the aggregate, it's far less than what's going up through Bristol Bay.

So, you know, we're talking about sharing the burden of conservation here, but we haven't addressed that in Bristol Bay. And we didn't— we didn't address it in the last meeting on that matter. I, above all, am concerned with the adoption of this, that the net effect is the opposite of what's intended. And adaptive management plan goes away and the department is left without that tool. I think we did talk about chum harvest in Bristol Bay.

What was the total chum harvest in Bristol Bay last year? I recall it was around a couple hundred thousand. Madam Chair, off the top of my head, I think it was 500,000 or 600,000. And what was— and what was— okay, so some of those are Bristol Bay bound as far as we know, and some of them could have been headed north because we don't have the genetics to parse them out, correct? Correct.

Okay, Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. Just on the triggers or caps, the incentive was to not hit those. They were set at 300 and 450, and if they hit 300, then they stopped fishing. Now with those gone, there is no incentive to not hit them.

It was actually my hope that we could add the drifters and the seiners together and actually use that as a combined, combined total rather than just seiners. If the adaptive management plan lived. But without triggers, I think it's kind of, it's ignorant to think of that with the harvest capacity that exists out there could go and kill a lot of fish, even in a 2-hour opener. And if there's nothing saying you just caught too many chum, what keeps them from just catching chum? I mean, like you said, afterwards you don't know until how much was caught until, you know, all these openers have happened with the harvest tickets.

But I, I would like to move on to one other point in the policy for the management of sustainable salmon. Number 1, under 5AC 39.222: While in the aggregate, Alaska's salmon fisheries are healthy and sustainable largely because of abundant pristine habitat and the application of sound precautionary conservation management practices. Two, in formulating fishery management plans designed to achieve maximum or optimum salmon production, the board and department must consider factors including environmental change, habitat loss and degradation, data uncertainty, limited funding for research and management programs, existing harvesting patterns in new fisheries or expanding fisheries.

I'm not going to drive the point home that the Yukon's water is polluted, that mines have dribbled acid into the water, or dams have stopped fish from moving. But I do want to acknowledge that for a river that travels 3,200 kilometers, or 2,500-some miles. There have been some significant problems recently that have been acknowledged in very credible reports done by people like Fedoren and all that talked about how changing climates have affected the Yukon, the Kuskokwim, 20 other— 20 rivers right here just in the Bering Sea itself. Their ability to reproduce, their size, to have food, The predation as they enter the waters. The largest amount of predation on kings is the first year going out to sea.

This one right here, Alvon Finster from Canada writes about just Canada. So Chinook and fall chum. Says the same thing. Death by a thousand cuts. We've got upwellings that no longer even get to where the fish can swim up them because the ground has rebounded for fall chum and the klawane.

We got the Porcupine River that is reaching temperatures of 78°F. Fish are dying in the river. I'm not blaming this, but I mean, there's just some places that fish just can't go anymore, and we can't control that. And they're not able to get back and reproduce or make it out and do what they need to do to an ocean that is increasingly more inhospitable. In 2019 alone, these ocean blobs have crashed stocks.

Totally crashed. I mean, these fish, like fat fish like Chinook and chum, they need fat food. They can't go out there and just eat ramen. Those fish aren't there. They need a food source, man.

In 2019, the mures, the birds flying upriver and just ending up in the open leads because they can't fly, they couldn't get down to bait fish to eat. I mean, you go like, you look at that and you're like, man, this world is collapsing. I'm sure everybody on the Yukon understands what it means to see the world collapsing. But just in terms of a global perspective, one of the world's largest chum hatchery programs is in Hokkaido, Japan. They release over 1 billion fry annually to sustain a major commercial fishery.

They have figured out that the reason rising sea temperatures and poor marine survival have led to declines in adult returns that used to peak from 88 million returning in 1996 to 19 million in 2021. 18 Million— 88 million to 19 million.

They have tried to figure out ways to start managing this. They recognize that our ocean environment isn't producing fish the way it used to. And we need to bring that into consideration without a doubt, that unfortunately the Yukon in particular has gotten hit excessively hard over the Kuskokwim or some of these other rivers because of the length of it. And anyhow, I'll just leave it at that. I think it's interesting you bring up 1 billion hatchery fry since Alaska does around the same number, Mr. Wood.

Uh, Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Members Godfrey and Wood brought up who's sharing the burden of conservation. I want to touch on what's happening in the Yukon and Kuskokwim. And I want to start with the question to the department. There was recent, you know, in this last cycle, there was a 7-year moratorium on Chinook harvest in the Yukon River. Can the department explain for the public what brought that about?

Through the chair, Mr. Chamberlain, I wish the commissioner was here to speak to that because he was integrally involved in the development of that agreement. But, you know, essentially, the Yukon River Chinook have been in a long period of low productivity. The agreement was between the United States and Canada to make dramatic efforts to rebuild that stock.

And that was in part based on the Pacific Salmon Treaty, was it? Or— Through the chair, Mr. Chamberlain. Yes, so the— because the Yukon is a transboundary river that flows out of Canada into Alaska, It's managed under an international treaty between the two countries. Thanks. So I want to next direct my question to the Department of Law on this.

The— we've heard before that with regard to regulations, the board's under no obligation to follow their own regulations, which is why the sustainable salmon policy, the mixed stock policy, and precautionary principles often get disregarded in some instances. However, Alaska does have a statutory subsistence policy, which, you know, directs subsistence uses must be provided for first before other uses of harvestable surplus for a fish— of a fish and game population. And we also have the treaty, which also.

Address marine waters. So I would like the Department of Law to explain where those two lie, especially where it comes to treaty obligations as respect— as they compare to state law and even state constitution, and whether the board is free to disregard those.

Through the chair, Member Chamberlain, no, the board's not allowed to disregard Alaska statute nor treaty obligations on behalf of the state and the country. Thank you. So this comes back to subsistence. One thing I want to make crystal clear on this record is we as a board right now are regulating hunger. I want to reference the board's Subsistence presentation in the AYK where they showed villages like Alakanuk in the lower Yukon had a 40% food insecurity.

In my region, we've had, you know, in the middle Kuskokwim, there's been about 30% outmigration in the last 10 years, and you've got about 30% poverty. We've heard a lot of these people, they used to use commercial fishing to buy their boats so they could go and do subsistence. They're not able to do that, and they're doing subsistence the best they could, best they can. And recent regulations have further limited that. We heard from, from a testifier how people are going out in a lund boat out 50 miles into the Bering Sea to try to catch fish, where we're, we're hearing fishermen complaining that in their 50-foot boat, they're this water just gets too rough.

And we've got people in the western Alaska going out 50 miles in the Bering Sea to catch halibut and cod.

We either have a subsistence priority or we don't. And we either prioritize subsistence throughout the— through this policy and throughout the migratory range. The Pacific Salmon Treaty specifically speaks to marine waters. And when we're looking at what can we conserve next to, to reduce harvest of Yukon and Kuskokwim, Chum, and all these other, these other rivers, the Kenai River, Ayukuluk, Karluk, all of those run through here. But when we're looking, can we do more in river?

We went in, in AYK where every one of the tribes and villages said, we all agree that we need to do this. And we as a board said, no, we need you to do more. We cut on top of that. We went into Bristol Bay where everyone said, we all agree that this is a good amount of cutting to do to conserve kings and get into that. We as a board said, no, we need you to do more.

And so this burden is not being isolated and thrust upon the Aleutian Peninsula. We have gone into every district, every region that is being touched by these fisheries and said, no, we need you to do more. And to the point where we're curbing subsistence in the Yukon and Kuskokwim. So when we come in, we were putting this time in. We acknowledge it's a mixed stock fishery because if it wasn't a mixed stock fishery, it would be closed entirely by statute.

So we're taking reasonable opportunities and we're— and what our intention is that this will actually lead to the Kuskokwim meeting its ANS for the first time in a long time for the Yukon to rebound faster and to get that. And the sooner we get all of these fisheries healthy, the sooner all of these people can go back to fishing and we can return to our normal lives. I was starved out of my fishery when I was 18. When I was 18 years old, I was talking to someone and they said, you've got— you've— you're so much better for it. And the answer to that is no.

I was running a law firm. My family was extremely proud of me. I went home in 2017 and my brother was working up at the Donlin Mine. Every 2 weeks he was out going out subsistence fishing. I would have traded spots with him any day.

That's what we're starving out of ourselves. It's not something we can ignore. Thank you. Miss Irwin. Yeah, thank you, Ms. Carlson-Vandort.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chamberlain, for your comments. I would like to first start off by addressing some comments made by Member Wood in terms of the health of this river. I recognize that there have been many studies that have been put forward, and there's a lot of uncertainty on what the, the, those reports indicate about the health of the river in terms of its capacity to produce. We don't know based on that habitat reports what the effects are on the spawning grounds. However, we heard public testimony that people in Galena drink the Yukon River water.

I then had conversations with other Yukon users— Beaver, Stevens Village, multiple communities throughout the Yukon River drink this water. On top of that, we also heard testimony yesterday from someone who sighted the Yukon River panel escapement of Chinook, Canadian-bound Chinook across Eagle. The estimate at Pilot Station was 24,000 Canadian-bound Chinook. The number that passed through Eagle, 200— excuse me, 23,806. In an over 1,000-mile migration journey in a river that you're saying is too unhealthy for productivity, only 190 94 fish were unaccounted for.

And if those fish went back into the river systems and they died before they were able to spawn, they are advancing and adding to that ecosystem. It's a total ecosystem collapse that we are facing when fish don't get back to the river. And I believe that this specifically proves that if we've put fish back in our river, they are going to be able to produce and produce healthy fish. Next, I would like to go through and discuss— we've gone through many policies. Another one that's very important for us to discuss here is the allocative criteria, which I'm going to go through now.

Number 1 in the allocative criteria is the history of personal use, sport, guided, and commercial use. In Area M, there's a long history of harvesting salmon and other species for economic gain in addition to subsistence, but subsistence isn't listed on the first criteria. I just want to note that, that I recognize subsistence is an important resource for both of these The Yukon River has a, has a long history of commercial fishing as well. However, there's no more commercial fishing happening on the Yukon River. The historical catch records and genetic stock composition studies indicate that a significant portion of Area M harvests intercepts Seawalk-bound chum and Chinook.

Historical patterns support limiting Area M harvest during key migration periods. Allocative criteria number 2: the number of residents and non-residents who have participated in the fishery in the past, and the number of residents and non-residents who can reasonably be expected to participate in the future. Area M has several hundred permit holders that participate annually in the multiple commercial fisheries, and a good majority of them are also non-resident, as we've heard numbers from the drift fleet. In the Siwak area and the Yukon area, hun— hundreds of permit holders have been disenfranchised from their commercial fishery and now solely rely on subsistence However, they are unable to rely on subsistence because subsistence needs have not been met in the last 6 years. There has been no reasonable opportunity for subsistence.

Number 3, the importance of each fishery providing residents the opportunity to obtain fish for personal or family consumption. In Area M, subsistence is very important to the users, as it is in the Yukon River as well. And it's important to the diets of both communities. Limiting Area M harvest is necessary to ensure Siwak Chum reach their communities, and doing this limitation will not put the subsistence needs of Area M at risk. The availability of other alternative resources for commercial operations— Area M has the opportunity, and through subsistence, to harvest sockeye, pinks, chum, coho, Dungeness crab, red king crab, Tanner crab, Pacific cod, halibut, herring, octopus.

We also heard— this is specific under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, obviously, and this is not for commercial sale— but there are also the availability of the stellar sea lion, harbor seal, spotted seal, and walrus for those who meet the minimum requirements for blood quantum under the MMA. They also have access to other fisheries such as the North Peninsula, Chignik, Bristol Bay, and Kodiak fisheries. Fisheries within the Yukon River have whitefish and pike as alternative resources. There are marine mammals. Those, those numbers are declining.

We heard Yukon River users speak to that. In fact, in the— in many of the federal lands within the Yukon River, there have been complete closures and shutdowns of all use.

Of those resources due to low numbers. Number 5, the importance of each fishery to the economy of the state. Area M contributes to the state economy via salmon harvest and processing and fish tax— landing taxes. But as we heard yesterday, without a processing plant in these small communities, those fish taxes are not going to the local communities. And the Yukon River permit values are low, if not zero, and there once was a strong economy that helped participate, uh, helped the local and state economy, but it's no longer viable.

Number 6 is the importance of each fishery to the economy of the region and local area. I kind of went through that, but obviously there's an importance of the economy to Area M and the local communities. Similar on the Yukon, there were canneries, there were smokehouses, there were commercial fish wheel permits. People were selling to global markets in the '80s, and that is no longer happening because of diminished returns. And finally, number 7, the importance of each fishery in providing recreational opportunities.

Both have opportunities for providing recreational opportunities for resident and non-resident. I would be happy for any of my fellow board members to add to the allocative criteria for anything that I missed. Thank you. Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you.

I would like to understand, like, address the, the whole idea of the kings between your numbers between Pilot Station versus Eagle. Member Irwin, the reason I traveled to Rampart or Rapids a few years ago was it was the tail end of the study done by the feds that member Zarey had been working on for many, many years. And the reason that study was so important was because of the significant dropout between Pilot Station and Eagle. So I'm not 100% sure how we can have 24,000 at Pilot and 23,806 in Eagle Because the ichthyophonous was taking a major whack at them was what they were theorizing. And that's why this program was in play.

Secondly, I'd like to talk a little bit about— address the subsistence issue and especially subsistence in the Area M versus other parts of the state. One thing we learned in Fairbanks this year was we heard a lot about how the 30 percent harvests, the 30-70 rule, 30% harvest for 70. It's a harvest and share.

What we hear about in these remote communities along the Aleutians is there's not a ton of boats. And you look at the Commercial Fishing Entry Commission numbers, I mean, there's 40-some boats maybe fishing that are local boats, and they might be big, But the cost of operation and the size of the ocean out there is pretty huge. They employ locals for their crew, and as we heard through subsistence, they're also providing their subsistence needs on commercial boats. This too is their life. They were blessed to also be in a place that had a resource that wasn't just a one-trick pony.

You can't, you can't like ding somebody for that, especially for having to live out there in that area. I imagine it's pretty darn windy. I'd also like to just point out that everybody now from Nushagak, from Bristol Bay, all the way around to Chignik relies on having a place where they can move their fish. And the importance of that for all these rural communities is extreme, especially when we hear about the different areas that have lost their ability to have people there to transport their fish and the processors to deal with them. That's a major hit for more than just, you know, Area M. Anyhow, I'll listen to more of what others have to say.

Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you. I'll try to be quick. Yeah.

I want to address the commercial subsistence. It was that way for me too when my commercial fishery stopped and I had to leave. I— that's— it's heartbreaking. I know how hard that is.

But my family— I left for economic opportunity, not for subsistence. We still could catch fish at the time.

There are still means to harvest salmon. There are still means to harvest fish, even with the beach seining or doing other things. You can— they're not as efficient. But you don't need to harvest 10,000 fish. That's the upside of subsistence.

The demands of it for one family are not as strong as those for commercial, I think. And so it's important to conflate. You know, there's commercial opportunity to feed yourself and supplement subsistence, and then there's subsistence. When we're telling people they can't catch fish to eat, that's different than we're not letting you run a commercial fishery so you can buy a boat to fish. That this is a reasonable opportunity for subsistence and that, that does it.

That is available. With that, I'll leave that at that. We're— I think we're running long. Any other discussion? Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Before I read costs, I will just say one last time This is not going to conserve chums. It's going to do the opposite of what everyone in this room wants to have happen. And it's basically going to tell the department to throw darts at a wall and how to manage this. And so for that reason, approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery.

And approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional cost to the department. I'd call the question. Thank you, Member Carpenter. I would just note before recognizing the question that ONC was the original author of the original proposal proposer, and in RC 255, they expressed support for the substitute language. The question has been called.

Mr. Swenson, what do we— we're voting on the substitute language as amended to the 24 hours for 127. 24 Hours. Yes, the— it's the substitute language found in RC— what is it? No, substitute language in 245 as amended from 16 to 24 hours. That's correct.

Not the amendment, the whole proposal. We already voted on that amendment, Madam Chair. The question— you haven't recognized the question yet, but I— this is a very big decision by the board, and if there is any confusion by board members whatsoever, and they need to take 2 or 3 minutes to read it, I would hope— I would hope that by this point that is very clear, but I don't want this to become an issue. So it's up to you to decide what you want to do, but I want people to be clear on what they're voting on. All right, so to be clear, what we are voting on is the substitute language in RC 245 that is— was substituted in lieu of the original language found in Proposal 127.

The board amended the language in RC 245 already, and the amendment that was made and, and approved was to change in June 10th, the EO could be open for more than 3 days in a 7-day fishing period. 7-Day period fishing periods may not be open for more than the— it said 16 hours originally. The amendment that passed changed that to 24 hours. Okay. Do you have any additional questions?

No. Okay. Question has been called. Are there any errors and omissions? Mr. Nelson, please call the roll.

Final action on Proposal 127 as amended.

Wood? No. Godfrey? No. Carlson-Vandork.

Yes. Erwin? Yes. Chamberlain? Yes.

Carpenter? No. Svenson? Yes. Motion carries, 4 in favor, 3 against.

Madam Chair? Yep, let's go ahead and take a quick break and then we'll come back.

If folks need to check out from their hotels, now is a good time to do it. We'll come back on the record and be— complete deliberations.

Okay, welcome back. We are back on the record. The time is 11:05. We're going to continue with Group 3. We just deliberated 127.

Next up is Proposal 133.

Proposal 133, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, I move the board take no action on Proposal 133 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 133. Proposal 131. Proposal 131, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Island's June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 131 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 131. Proposal 132. Proposal 132, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shimmigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 132 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 132. Proposal 136. Proposal 136, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumagin Island June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 136 based on its action on RC245. I second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 136. Proposal 129. Proposal 129, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak, Shumigan Island, June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 129 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 128. Proposal 130— oh, I'm sorry, that was 129. My apologies. Proposal 128.

Proposal 128, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 128 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. Proposal number 130. Proposal 130, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan.

Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 130 based on its action on RC245. Second that. Now screen unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 130. Proposal 134.

Proposal 134, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumagin Islands Dune Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 134 based on its action on RC245. Second that. Now screen unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 134.

Proposal 137. Proposal 137, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, I move the board take no action on Proposal 137 based on its action on RC245. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 137.

Proposal 135. Proposal 135, 5AAC09.365, South Unimak and Shumigan Islands June Salmon Management Plan. Madam Chair, move to adopt Proposal 135 with substitute language found in RC 149. Second that. Now screen unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board has before it the language in RC 149 in lieu of the original proposal. Staff comments, please.

So, um, retention of king salmon taken in commercial fishery notwithstanding 5AC09.365, from June 1st through October 31st, all king salmon 28 inches or greater in length caught by SO1 and CFEC permit holder may not be retained and must be immediately returned to the water unharmed. And all king salmon that are returned to the water must be recorded on a form provided by the department and shall be submitted to to the buyer at the time of delivery with ADF&G fish ticket.

And not— and except that if a delivery to a licensed buyer is defined— I'm sorry, except that if a delivery to a licensed buyer as defined in Alaska Statute 43.75.290 does not occur, the CFC permit holder shall submit the form along with the ADF&G fish ticket to the department.

And notwithstanding (a), the section, a permit holder must retain all visibly injured or dead king salmon and must be recorded on fish ticket. And for the purpose of this subsection, caught means brought on board the vessel.

This could provide the department with an additional management tool to curtail commercial harvest of king salmon when it is determined that king salmon conservation is needed. It is difficult to quantify how many king salmon could be conserved if this proposal is adopted, since it is likely that some king salmon released from commercial gear die after release. The department likely opposed this proposal as adopted because it would reduce information on total king salmon mortality. While some additional king salmon may be conserved by allowing them to be released from purse seine gear, there will be a concurrent loss of information on total king salmon catch and mortality. This proposal could also complicate enforcement of retention requirements for other salmon species during the June fishery.

And if adopted, the department would benefit from additional guidance from the board on how to implement this regulation as the South Alaska Peninsula differs from other areas that manage local king salmon stocks.

Does the department have a a position on this proposal as the substitute language? Mr. Bowers. [Speaker:MR_BOWERS] Thanks, Madam Chair. So that statement about the guidance, I mean, I think that applies to the original proposal, which would have gave the department discretionary EO authority to implement non-retention.

This, the substitute language is not discretionary the way I read it. So, so we're clear on what the substitute language does. But, but some of our other comments do apply because, you know, as Mr. Keyes mentioned, we have mandatory retention of all salmon in the June fishery. So You know, we believe that this would complicate enforcement. It would— and it would reduce the amount of information we have on total salmon mortality.

It would also, you know, in the short term complicate our efforts to collect information on stock of origin of king salmon in the area. So just to be clear, this removes the department's authority. That's kind of how I read it. But I just want to make sure. Yes, so that's correct, Madam Chair.

The way I read RC 149 is that these provisions are not implemented by emergency order. So they're in regulation. All the time. And, and so this would essentially supersede those existing provisions for king salmon only that require mandatory retention of all species in June. Thanks.

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you. I don't know who wants to answer this, Department of Public Safety or the Department of Fish and Game. I'm thinking of other areas where there's non-retention of kings. We'll just use Kodiak for an example.

I'm trying to figure out why this would make it complicated for enforcement in Area M but not in Kodiak.

Well, hopefully, uh, Mr. DeGraaff will correct me if I, if I misstate anything here, but so in Kodiak, um, individuals can, could discard any species of salmon they catch at any time. In the, in the South Alaska Peninsula June fishery, the board has adopted a regulation that requires permit holders to retain all salmon that they catch. So this would be an exception to that for king salmon. And, you know, there have been concerns raised in this fishery. In the past about discarding chum salmon, for example.

It might make it, you know, hard to distinguish, you know, from a distance, the troopers on the grounds, it could be difficult for them to tell whether it's a chum salmon or king salmon being discarded. And then just a quick follow-up on that. But considering what the board just did, what would be the reason that anyone would ever throw chum back? That's a good question, Mr. Carpenter. With, you know, the— under the previous cap or trigger structure, there might be some incentive, but that's certainly reduced now.

Thank you. Mr. Swenson. Well, just speak a little bit to my proposal. I don't want to get— you know, a lot of this has been talked about. But we talked about the mortality issue.

I mean, it's raised— it's everything from any fish caught is a dead fish to 95%. I think that the mortality rate fairly would be somewhere between— or I mean, the fish that would make it will be somewhere between 50% and 70%. And we've heard talk about the— the sainters who really want to let these fish go. And in the way this reads, you know, in terms of genetics for the department, they still have all the fish under 28 inches and all the dead ones that would be over 28 inches to use for genetics. So I just know we have king problems all over the state.

I just think every fish, you know, every fish counts. So that's my reasoning behind, behind this proposal. Thank you.

Mr. Wood. Yeah, thanks. I support this because as we heard from so many people out there, Well, if you don't allow them to return it, you're basically just going to turn them into outlaws because they're going to return them anyhow because they have a conscience. And so I'm fully opposed to full retention. And as Mr. Carpenter just said, there's no reason to throw a chum back anymore.

So the only thing going overboard now will be the kings that people really want to make sure live to get into the river system. So Maybe the department could provide some guidance on.

On fish tickets, like how they might be able to record those. But I'm fully supportive of returning kings back.

Mr. Bowers. Thanks, Madam Chair. So Mr. Wood brings up a good point about how this reporting of, um, of fish would occur. So, um, Of course, as we've talked about earlier in the meeting, all salmon that are retained must be recorded on an ADF&G fish ticket. And so this specifies that all, you know, visibly injured or dead king salmon must be recorded on a fish ticket.

But in addition, the king salmon that are released would have to be recorded on a form provided by the department. So, you know, that's getting into the area of reporting requirements that lie under the commissioner's authority, and it's, you know, an additional, you know, it's an administrative reporting function that's squarely in the commissioner's authority. So, you know, if this were to be adopted, I mean, the board can certainly adopt this, but The department would have to consider, you know, how we would implement it given that conflicting authority and, you know, our ability to implement a new reporting program. So this would provide additional cost to the department, which we don't have any authorities over? Madam Chair, it would be a small cost, but yeah, there would be a cost associated with it.

Okay.

Mr. Lee. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to echo Mr. Bowers' comments. I did catch that when this RC language was originally presented to me. I didn't have the opportunity to kind of brief the board on that aspect of it, but at this time it would require buy-in from the department in order to implement that section of the RC language.

Mr. Irwin.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not sure what that means for our abilities to vote on this, but I guess I'll just continue the conversation with deliberation. So, um, I want to thank Member Svenson for bringing forward this proposal. I've had a lot of conversations on the side with him, and I truly believe that he believes this is the best way to, to conserve kings and give them a chance to get back to their natal streams. Um, I have a hard time with the uncertainty of knowing the mortality rate.

You know, we heard different numbers, and there's really no way for us to know exactly what that what that number looks like. And so knowing that this would reduce the amount of data that we have, and it's a loss of information, it would also be, um, complicated for enforcement and for the— for to, to manage. Um, I am not seeing the, the net benefit in terms of, uh, knowing what is actually out there and having that data and information. And also when it comes to the mortality, as I said before, there's no way for us to really know these numbers, but I'll cite the, um, Southwest Alaska Fish Sport Fishing Regulations, where the majority of, of catch and release regulations within this state require that the fish not even be removed from the water for a photo to be taken. And we've had discussions about the mortality rate of barbed versus barbless hooks.

And so, um, it's— to me, it's— if we're going to have such strict regulations on our sport fishermen who are using single hooks, they're not allowed to remove them from the water for the purposes of mortality or potentially injuring them, it seems really difficult for me to grasp the mortality rate being any higher within these gear systems that we are talking about in this region.

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you. I guess maybe a question to Director Bowers.

Section B of Chapter 9 of this amended language and Chapter B of excuse me, Chapter 15, Section B, if those two pieces, bodies were removed with that, would that, I guess removing that, would that satisfy the idea that we're not directing the board through administrative purposes and costs to implement the reporting form? [Speaker] Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter, yes, it would. Then we'd just be under normal fish ticket reporting requirements. Thank you. Madam Chair, I move to amend RC 149 to strike under Chapter 9, Section B, and under Chapter 15, Section B.

Second. And ask for unanimous consent. I object to the unanimous consent. Okay. Discussion on the amendment?

I will speak to my objection. That effectively makes this— what does this do at this point? If it is the normal reporting, all this does is just speak to the retention aspect. Is that what we are doing?

I mean, it seems to be what we are trying to get at is what is the injured— well, that is a whole different discussion, but like if you are removing the reporting for injured Dead Kings is just regular reporting, right? Irrespective of size.

Madam Chair, so if you were to strike Section B from both of these pieces of draft regulation, you would be left with regulations that allow king salmon, or that require permit holders to release all king salmon 28 inches or greater in length. And this is just for purse seine gear. So, so all king salmon caught that are greater than 28 inches in length, 28 inches or greater in length, may not be retained and returned to the water. So that's, that's what this does. And it specifies that— continues to specify that all visibly injured or dead king salmon must be recorded on a fish ticket.

And then it defines what caught means. Okay, thank you. So we have an amendment. We have an objection. Any other Discussion, Ms. Erwin.

Yeah, I guess my question is maybe for the department or for Member Carlson-Vandort for the objection is just if we don't strike this language, then are we able to pass—. If—. Are we able to pass this within the board's authority?

I suspect that we do. I mean, there's no additional cost to the department. Mr. Lee.

Madam Chair, I think, well, I think Mr. Bowers' statement was that there would be additional costs. And so however minimal that might be, that would be an administrative regulation. Even with the amendment? Well, if it was struck, then that administrative portion would be gone. So yeah, you could pass it.

It's still within the board's, yeah. To answer her question, yes. All right, I remove my objection. Is there any other objections? I'm going to go— you want to ask for unanimous consent again, Mr. Wood?

And I ask for—. I second that and ask for unanimous consent. Okay, hearing no objection, we have it, um, the substitute language in 149 as amended. Um, any other additional board discussion? Mr. Godfrey.

[Speaker:CHAIRMAN BRYANT] I'll probably just be echoing what's already been said on the record. We've certainly heard it during Committee of the Whole and public testimony. And the benefit of data certainly is a legitimate pursuit when it comes to retaining all kings. But to do that in order to better manage the stock for future flourishment of the stock at the expense of some of these salmon making it upstream and propagating their progeny. It seems like cognitive dissonance here that we would focus on data, even if it's 50%, even if it's 70%, or whatever percent make it, some of them are going to go back upstream and they will produce other salmon.

And that, that's— to do that now to help the salmon stock, I find more practical, even if it's not 100% of them that are thrown back in that make it back up there, than 100% mortality to pursue data to better manage the stock and have it flourish in the future. So I'll be supporting this. Mr. Payton, what is the— I'm looking at the proper catch and release methods for the sport fishery for kings, and there's a whole bunch of stuff that you put that is in here. You know, only remove the fish from the water if it's necessary for hooking, measuring, or ID. Don't gaff, never fight the fish to exhaustion.

Don't release a fish without reviving it by supporting it in the water until it's able to swim away. And this is typically when it's either in river, approaching river, and slightly more hardy. What is the mortality rate on kings that are removed from the wild.

Do you know in the sport fishery? So, by our— thank you, Madam Chair, for— and those you're referring to are on page 29, and they're best practices, especially the one where you're, you know, if you just— if you fight a fish to exhaustion or it's exhausted and you just toss it back in, you know, a lot of times they'll sink to the bottom or tumble down, and they're in shock, obviously, when it goes through a traumatic experience. So it's best practice to hold them in the river, let them, you know, revive them, rub their belly, and then let them swim off on their own. That greatly increases their odds of survival. So on our most recent tagging studies on the Nushagak, the mark recapture mortality study, we, most of those were all removed from the water, fought to exhaustion, removed from the water, put a telemetry tag in them, and then put back in the water.

And that study off the top of my head, was about a 7% mortality rate. And that was with and without bait, with and without treble hooks, and, you know, mimicking kind of a typical sport fishing technique, excluding putting a telemetry tag in their— down their throat, you know. But 7%. Thank you. But based on, you know, the staff would always revive the king and make sure and note whether it swam off or what it looked like, and you know, if there was damage.

So that was full, like, best practice utilization with those Kings at that time? Okay. I guess this, this, this seems counter to what we're trying to do. Like, this is removing the department's EO authority to require mandatory retention of Kings to inform its study even in the next couple years, which I think is crazy because we have this opportunity. Furthermore, this board wrote a letter to the legislature in support of the funding for that study.

So it seems very counterproductive in my opinion to say You know, please give us the $5 million or whatever it was to complete the study, and then we turn around and remove the ability for the department to inform it with the data that it needs in order to get the information that this board supposedly has been begging for for years. I don't see how this is at all enforceable. And furthermore, I think it's the— certainly the 5AAC Chapter 15 section is direct conflict to what the board action already at this meeting was with respect to the King Salmon Action Plan in the Chignik— for the Chignik King Salmon stock of concern. Nothing about this makes any sense to me. I don't know why we would remove the department's authority, which it has already stated on record it's utilizing to help inform the study for the next 2 years.

Again, the board supported that study, so to take action to remove the ability for us to garner information makes zero sense to me whatsoever. Mr. Bowers. Thanks, Madam Chair. And, you know, I just wanted to add one additional piece that I failed to mention earlier. You know, we did take the unprecedented step of establishing king salmon harvest caps in this area because we're concerned about conserving king salmon throughout the Gulf of Alaska and in western Alaska.

And so this regulation would certainly impact the ability our perception of what catch is in relation to those caps and our ability to enforce those caps. The other thing that I would ask about this is who determines what injured is. It seems like it's super subjective. For a king salmon, is that, you know, the loss of 10% of its scales, 20% of its scales? I can tell you, unless you're rolling a king over the cork as you're slowing down the purse entirely to drop the corks down to do so, I see a ton of scales in the water and, you know, it's affected by the gravity and the pressure of thousands of pounds of fish on top of it.

Typically in a, in a same net, I've seen those roll up along the purse and then back down into the money bag and they go down and they're covered by fish. So I think that the, the injury rate would be super high. And if that's the case, and I mean, I guess the question is who's determining what injured means? It's pretty obvious to see what a dead fish is, but Whether a fish is dead the instant it hits the deck, no. But is it going to be dead in 3 minutes?

Possibly. 10 Minutes? Probably. So this is super subjective. It's totally unenforceable.

And again, compromises the department's management significantly as far as I'm concerned and in relation to the study that this board supported. Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, so I want to start with some of the studies. You know, uh, PC15 was out, I believe, uh, where the Candy study was, was shown, and that was at a max 32 hours.

Um, there were other studies that I looked through, and I think the max we found was about 5 to 10 days where they were looking at, uh, at mortality of salmon over, and, and it increased significantly after 3 to 5 days. I didn't find anything that— any peer-reviewed study that had a salmon go, uh, go over 10 days. I know there are technological limitations on that. We did have anecdotal evidence of one fish making it about 300 miles, but when we're looking at fish having to go over 2,000 miles up the Yukon after going several hundred miles just to get to the Yukon, I don't see any evidence or anything scientific with any indicie of reliability that these fish are going to make it. Given the nature of handling, when you're bringing a fish up over onto a deck of a boat and throwing it over, you're going to have a lot of problems with that.

And to expect that fish to make it a long way, you're going to have problems. The other thing in the question I want to— I'd like to address to the department is Yukon Chinook are statistically significantly larger than Kuskokwim and other species of salmon. They have a higher oil content, and they're probably going to be bigger. That was just my experience growing up on the Kuskokwim, because you knew when you ate it. Ate a Yukon King because those of us used to the Kuskokwim Kings had digestive problems afterwards.

Um, given that size disparity of Yukon King compared to a lot of other kings and the fact that a lot of the kings in the June fishery are migrating, and I think we established that the June fishery kings are a lot larger than the other years, are we running the risk of skewing the statistics of any of the studies we're looking at to inadvertently or lower the abundance of those migrating kings into those terminal rivers as opposed to the ones that are milling about in, in the July fishery?

Through the chair, Mr. Chamberlain. So If all king salmon are retained and delivered to a processor, and I'm speaking in relation to the genetic study we've been doing, then that's— we have access to all the fish that are caught in the fishery, right? So if a portion of the fish are discarded at sea and not available, available for us to sample, then that introduces bias.

I'm not prepared at this time to speak to what that bias would be, you know, but it does introduce bias into our sampling. Mr. Swenson.

I've talked to a bunch of the Saners. They say that those Kings are on the top when they bring that purse up.

Also, in regards to injury, I don't know, I've looked at a lot of kings, I've released a lot of kings, probably over 1,000, not on us commercial. But if you've looked at a lot of fish that are injured, whether you're on a commercial boat or whether you're fishing sport, you can look at them and tell those fish that are going to make it or not make it. To a, not 100%, but But certainly, a lot, you know, you got a good idea which ones are gonna make it and not make it.

And that's, and in two, talking about the size of the fish, well, the studies have shown that the fish over 28 inches have a much larger chance of survival. So in terms of what one of the members spoke about, about the size, I think that the bigger the fish, the better chance it has of survival. And I come back to the one point is every fish counts. So I'm a little not understanding why that doesn't apply to the YUK also, but I guess not. Thank you.

Well, I don't need to talk to a bunch of seiners to know what my direct experience on a seine boat is and what the behavior of king salmon are. And if they're bigger, they also have a larger effect of gravity. I know in other areas of the state, that's why we don't take them out of the water is because of the effect of gravity on their internal organs and all things, particularly.

Particularly the larger, I would see that having a greater effect. But the bottom line is, with respect to the King caps that the department has as well, this is essentially sanctioning, and not only sanctioning, but almost encouraging King chucking.

Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. Looking at this, um, RC 149 and 15, It says that 28 inches in length caught may not be retained and must be immediately returned. Then it says in C— sorry, that was under A— in C, notwithstanding this section, permit holder must retain all visibly injured or dead king salmon and must, and must be recorded on a fish ticket. So if that 28-inch fish is dead, it Is that saying it still needs to be returned even dead?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood. So the language says that fish that are over 28 inches may not be retained and must be immediately returned to the water unharmed. Okay.

Okay. Thank you. I'll just— I'll just refer to comments I made previously.

About the reason, you know, there's so many contradictions here. And I think I have one undisputable percentage. It's undeniable that it is a 100% mortality in a fish hold. And if there's a chance that they can live, then I support throwing them over still. Does this board support the department removing department's authority to get information and to complete their study that this board supported?

Mr. Swenson? Yes. Every fish counts.

Mr. Carpenter? Yeah, thank you. Um, this might be a question for Director Payton. And we're talking about a marine environment here, obviously, when we're talking about releasing fish from a commercial boat. But is there anything that precludes a sport fisherman in a marine environment, not freshwater, from fishing 24 hours a day and releasing every king that they catch?

Through the Chair, Member Carpenter. Yeah, I'm trying to remember all the state regulations across the state, and I— we have some areas that are shut down to king fishing. Uh, I don't know of any time, like, less than 24-hour rules in the saltwater. We have some 6 to 11 in freshwater, but I, at this time, I don't, I don't know if they apply to salt. But to answer your question directly, nothing would prevent someone from being out in the marine environment and fishing for anything, and if they catch a king, to let it Go.

Thank you, Mr. Wind. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I brought this point up earlier a couple days ago, but the— if the board passes this regulation, it's going to be directly inconsistent with our prior actions taken in the Nushagak River during Bristol Bay, in which there was a terminal harvest fishery where the kings only had to go 12 miles, as I understand it, to get to their spawning grounds. And yet we voted 7-0 to retain all of those kings and not allow them to be kept for home pack in order to get data and in order to, in the name of conservation, to better understand where these kings are. And so now that we are looking at this, we're looking at not retaining kings that are thousands of miles away from their natal streams, because as I understand it, there's only one local Chinook stock in this management area, and so they have thousands of miles to go.

So I'm, I'm just interested in the in the justification of board members from our prior meeting to this one on what changed, especially when that first vote was on a terminal harvest fishery? Mr. Swenson, I'm glad you asked that question because I forgot to speak to this. It was 7-0 because we were voted to retain those fish up there because they are gill— gill hooked or gill caught in a net. These fish we're talking about are pursained, and they are not caught by their gills. So that's the reason why we voted 7-0 to require retention in the Nushagak.

There are mesh gills. Get caught in mesh.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct costs for a private person to participate. And approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct costs to the Department. I call the question. Thank you.

Question has been called. Any errors or omissions? Mr. Lee. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to note, because the discussion didn't necessarily focus on the fact this proposal covers both Area M and Area L. And I just wanted the board to be aware of that, that, you know, contemplate— or it frustrates the conversation that has happened.

Thank you. I think we did. I did make mention of it, that it is directly in conflict with the action plan that this board passed earlier for King Conservation and the Chicknick Management Area. And just one follow-up. I just want to be clear where we are procedurally.

Was the amendment voted on yet? Okay. Sorry. Thank you. Yep.

All right. Question has been called. Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 135 as amended. Svendsen?

Yes. Wood? Yes. Chamberlain? No.

Carpenter? Yes. Carlson-Vandort? No. Erwin?

No. Godfrey? Yes. Motion carries, 4 in favor, 3 against, Madam Chair. All right.

Moving on. Proposal 138.

Proposal 138, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Will do that. Second. Staff comments, please.

This would increase commercial salmon fishing time during scheduled fishing periods in July for set gillnet gear only. For each scheduled fishing period during July, there would be a 24-hour extension for set gillnet gear past the current time each commercial fishing period closes. No change would be made to the scheduled commercial fishing periods for other gear types. This would increase the total fishing time during July from 249 hours to 417 hours for set gillnet gear only. The proposal, proposal specifically mentions increasing fishing time for set gillnet gear and keeping existing fishing time for the same gear.

The department is opposed to this proposal because of the proposed increase in fishing time during the later two-thirds of July. In accordance with the Policy for Management of Sustainable Salmon Fisheries, the department shall distribute harvest throughout the course of particular salmon stocks' runs— run timing— to help maintain the integrity of that stock and decrease the likelihood of temporal shifting in future returns of that stock. The Department would continue to use EO authority to manage for sustainable escapement levels. The Department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal.

And to meet the Board's statutory responsibility to the subsistence law, would consider whether subsistence regulations can continue to provide a reasonable opportunity for subsistence uses if the proposal is adopted. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] For discussion, Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. Um, we're going into this originally, I wasn't that inclined to increase anything in terms of fishing time and stuff, but, you know, since some of these setnetters got lost some area to be in, I'm inclined to think that maybe having the opportunity to go wherever you can and spend a little bit more time there might be helpful.

And although I do respect the fact that it does, with the comments of the department, that this does kind of mess with the allocation. So I'd be interested on hearing what the rest of my other board members have to say.

Other board discussion? Mr. Carpenter. Thank you. Maybe a question for the department. I mean, you have your authority here, but are you managing these fisheries based on aerial surveys or weir counts?

Through the chair to Mr. Carpenter. Beginning probably around mid to late July, we are beginning our aerial surveys. We do have one weir project, but that's in the Southeastern District mainland. Majority of our systems are managed and monitored from aerial surveys. And then I guess just to follow up, I know it might be— it might be quite different on the Peninsula.

I'm not sure on how often you can actually go do these aerial surveys, obviously based on weather, plane availability, etc. Do you have enough capacity, or have you had, in regards to that, to provide you enough information to manage this through EO?

Through the Chair to Mr. Carpenter, I would say our biggest limiting factor has been weather. We do attempt to try to survey the area at a minimum once a week. Granted, that gets shifted quite frequently due to weather and often trying to make up some time and also trying to focus some of our attention occasionally on those systems that we know that are returning earlier. And so, yeah, sometimes we don't get as frequent of surveys as we'd like, but we do, I would say, 2 to 3 at a minimum surveys when, when all things are available. One, one other question, please.

So if the board were to pass this, and you, you talk about it in your, in your department comments, the management of sustainable fisheries to distribute harvest throughout a course of a particular salmon stock, if you retain EOA authority and you have aerial surveys, even if the board were to pass this, wouldn't you have the ability still to monitor and control the fishery through EO?

Through the chair to Mr. Carpenter, I would say we could probably reduce these fishing periods down based on escapement information if we have it available. Yeah, and just to add to that, Mr. Carpenter, so that, you know, if you voted in the affirmative on this proposal, that would be adding additional time into the management plan, so we'd be EEOing outside of the plan. But yeah, we maintain that EEO authority though. Okay, that's clear. Thank you.

Other board discussion?

So I, um, I, I, [Speaker:COMMISSIONER_MILLER] I'm compelled by what Member Wood said in terms of providing additional opportunity, but I'm not quite sure that this is the proposal that I'd do it in. Because it is increasing the fishing time from 249 hours to 417 hours. That's a pretty significant jump. And as the department notes, that increase in fishing time on the early portion of the local pink and chum salmon stocks could be detrimental in years with low returns. Even though we just had the discussion around that in terms of what the aerial survey capacity is or capability is in poor weather environments, that the early run could be overfished and run timing of stocks could be altered.

And for that reason, I will not be supportive. Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair. I— yeah, I certainly understand the plight of the setnetters in here. That's a whole lot of work for not a lot of return.

But I think we should— we do— we as a board have to pay attention to the precautionary principle. I think there's a significant risk for overharvest given the increase in, in this fishery and the timing of the increase. I just don't know that it gives the department enough time to, to sustainably manage that and prevent potential overharvest. So I will also be opposing. Madam Chair, I move to amend Proposal 138 to strike 24-hour and replace it with 12-hour.

Where? Second. I asked where first. It's in the— I guess in the first part of the proposal where it talks about 24-hour extension for set gillnet gear past current time for each commercial fishing period.

Yeah, Madam Chair, I'm sorry, I was looking at the staff comments and it was written a little differently than the proposal, so I'll withdraw that amendment at this time. Mr. Swenson.

How many setnetters are we talking about?

Uh, through the chair, Mr. Svenson, uh, just one second please. We'll get to that information specifically so we can accurately provide you that.

Through the Chair, Mr. Benson, I think I couldn't get the exact number, but I think it is somewhere around 40 total throughout the whole area. Mr. Swenson, one follow-up question. What are they catching during that time out there? Are this— is this mostly pinks, or are there kings and chums and everything? A lot—.

Is there a lot of kings and those other fish out there at that time?

Through the chair, Mr. Swenson, I would say majority of the harvest for set gillnet gear is going to be pinks, chums, sockeye. And once we get later into the season, occasionally coho.

And this goes through August, correct? Madam Chair, this is for July or August 1st. Madam Chair, this particular proposal would only affect the July management schedule. Once we get into August, it's Openings are all EO based on escapement information. And how many SEPNET permits are in Area M?

Since they can— are mobile and can go move around, and if there's an additional time in one area, that might compel people to move there.

The only number I have right off top for is for the South— what has fished in the South Alaska Peninsula, and last year it was 40. Um, I— that's in addition to the handful of setnetters that are fishing on the North Pen and like Nelson Lagoon. But I would say majority of the, of the setnet fleet doesn't really migrate to the northern part of the peninsula. South Pen is kind of what I was getting at. Thank you.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Wood. Yeah, for the department, do you have any other way to know whether this, these, this area could be overfished, as we had heard, is other than just Recording the harvest on a fish ticket?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood. Well, it would— if it was overharvested, then we wouldn't be meeting our escapement objectives for each, depending on— for pink salmon, it's an area-wide goal, and for chum salmon, it's district goals. So if we're not meeting those escapement levels, which we typically do recently for both those species every year, now, um, or very close to it. I would say over— not meeting escapement goals would be an indication of overharvest. Thank you.

Mr.

Irwin. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not sure if this is the appropriate time to mention it, but I will say to the department, when the genetic stock composition data for June and July was put together, 2022 to 2024, the difficulty that I have is that it just separates SANE and GILNET. So it doesn't separate out SETT. And so I'm not sure if this is just a point of direction that I would like to see the department be able to figure out a way to divvy those out if possible, or if there's a reason for that, or if I'm just reading the July data incorrectly.

Through the chair to Ms. Irwin, for first of all, the combined drift and set gillnet is only going to be for the southwestern and south Unimak area and set gillnet. There are no drift fleet in the south, in the southeastern district area or the south central district. So there is some separation, but as far as the exact combination.

Combination of those out in the other areas is likely due to strata. Actually, I would let these— maybe one of these gentlemen to address that combination if you are more curious about that. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] Mr. Bowers. Thanks, Madam Chair.

While, uh, gentlemen at the front table are, are conferring there, so there was a question earlier about the number of permits. So there's— there are 111 CFEC permits issued for SO4M, so that's Alaska Alaska Peninsula set gillnet, and I believe there were 40 that were active in 2025.

Thank you, Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thank you, Matt. So when I look at the proposal the way it's written, Specifically to seine gear, this proposal doesn't change the amount of time for the seine gear component, correct? Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter, that is correct. It does not change the scheduled fishing periods for purse seine or drift gillnet, just set gillnet as written.

And so the amendment that I made earlier, I referenced 24 hours, but When you look at number 1 in the proposal, it talks about 57 hours for the same— for the setneck year. That's, that's what the proposal is asking for. And that's what translates to me to the 24 hours. Am I correct?

Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter. Yes. So the first fishing period is only 33 hours. So by adding 24 additional hours, you get 57, and then the remaining fishing periods are then currently 36 hours. So by adding 24, we'll get you 60 hours for those remaining fishing periods.

Yeah. Do you want to do some substitute language? I mean, I'd really like to provide a little bit more opportunity to the senators, but I mean, this is— this language is so convoluted. I just don't know that I can make an amendment on the fly. And so I guess for that reason, unless we want to break for lunch now and I could work on something.

Yeah, I guess I won't make an amendment at this time.

[FOREIGN LANGUAGE] I will just add that I tend to agree with Member Carpenter. I think I'm not opposed to adding a little bit more additional time here, but the language in this particular proposal makes it difficult. Difficult to do that easily. So I'm not going to be in support of this particular proposal, but hopefully we can identify one where it might be a little bit cleaner, possibly. Mr.

Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, I'll go ahead and reference my subsistence review for the Alaska Peninsula areas that we've discussed earlier in the meeting. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is is not expected to result in the additional direct cost to the department. I'd call the question.

Question's been called. Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 138. Wood?

No. Godfrey? No. Carlson-Vandort? No.

Erwin? No. Chamberlain? No. Carpenter?

No. Svenson? No. Motion fails 0-7. Madam Chair?

Thank you. I think we'll pause here for lunch, come back on the record at 1:30, and resume Group deliberations with proposal number 146. See at 1:30.

All right. Welcome back. Time is 1:43. We are continuing on with Committee of the Whole Group 3 deliberations. Why do I keep saying Committee of the Whole?

It's just Group 3. We are on Proposal 146.

Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. For the record, my name is Matt Keys. Proposal 146, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Madam Chair, move the board adopt Proposal 146 with substitute language found in RC 268. I second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, we have the language in 268 in lieu of the original proposal's language. Staff comments, please.

This, this proposal would separate purse seine and drift gillnet gears fishing schedule and keep that remain the same as it currently is in regulation and separate out set gillnet gear from that, that current schedule to a new schedule that would increase each fishing period by 12 hours. So starting on July 6th, Fishing periods would run for 45 hours, it would close for 51 hours, and then the next fishing period would begin at 6 AM and close at 6 AM for 48 hours. There'd be a 48-hour closure, and that would continue on until the end of the— until the end of the month.

This would increase the fishing periods, total fishing periods, by 80 hours, which goes from 249 hours to 323 hours. Like I said earlier, there's one 45-hour fishing period and six 48-hour fishing periods. And the department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal. To meet the board's statutory responsibility to the subsistence law, it should consider whether subsistence regulations can continue to provide a reasonable opportunity for subsistence use if the proposal is adopted.

Thank you. More discussion? Mr. Carpenter? Yeah, I think I'll speak to the substitute language. I mean, Matt just laid it out pretty clearly.

No change to drift gillnet and seine, a little bit more opportunity in the month of July for the setnetters. And if anybody has any questions, but it's as simple as that. Other board discussion? Mr. Wood? I support more opportunity for the setnetters.

So I, I'm supportive of this proposal. So I originally was interested in providing more time until I started looking at the AMR, at the Area Management Report for the South Peninsula. And I'm looking at the 2025 report and I'm looking at Appendix D-13 and I At most, I think you'd see around, I think we heard around 40 or so permits there. And in 2015, that area, those just the setnetters caught almost 800,000 sockeye in 2015. If we go down in 2016, it was 533,000.

In 2017, this is the department's numbers, 436,260. And then it drops down in 2018, which is a disaster year, to 151,000. I might note that This is when Chignik was closed entirely. 2019, 323,000. This is sockeye only.

And then in 2020, another disaster, 197,225, 131. Anyway, goes on down, but the average for that 10-year is over 307,928 sockeye salmon for that 10-year average. And in 2025 alone, they caught 280,652 sockeye with 24 permits fishing. So if we are concerned about moving fish through, originally I thought that, okay, well, I didn't think that there would be that big of an impact. But when I started digging into the numbers, I think that there is a significant impact, especially if, you know, 40-some-odd or maybe a little bit more permits can catch almost 800,000 sockeye and then that are passing through.

In July. So originally I was supportive of that, but in looking at the numbers from the department's annual management report from 2025, I don't know that I can support it. I think that that is counterproductive to some of the actions taken lately. Um, Miss Irwin. Yeah, thank you.

Just question for the department, so I'm making sure I'm clear. The, um, the Chignik late-run sockeye Are they running through this area at this time?

Is that a hard question?

Uh, through the chair, Miss Irwin, we're looking at what some of our genetics information says about that specifically for post-June. She asked whether or not they are, not how many there were.

There are some, yes. Okay, thank you.

Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair. And kind of digging through the AMRs, I think one of the things I should note is in 2020, the set gillnet fleet in South Peninsula post-June fishery caught more sockeye than the entire Chignik second run. On that year, Chignik didn't even make its late-run escapement. And so, yeah, as I stated before on the previous proposal, you know, the precautionary principle controls here.

And so out of the abundance of caution, I certainly don't want to hamper the setnetters any more than I have to, but But given how powerful this fishery is and how vulnerable some of the local runs are, I'm leaning no on this one. And so I'll leave it at that.

What are the king harvests in this— in the set drift? I'm sorry, in the set gillnet fishery in this area? Madam Chair, in 2025, there was 34. In 2024, there was, um, 18. And 2023, there's 206.

2022, There's 14. Um, average is the 5-year— or yeah, the 5-year, 10-year average is 104. Kings? Yes, ma'am. Okay, thank you.

Mr. Swenson? Thank you. How about the chum? How many chum have they caught?

Through the chair, Mr. Svenson. Last year was 42,376. 2024, 7,664. '23 Was 35,748 with an average, a 10-year average of 55,404.

Thank you. Mr. Carpenter, then Mr. Wood. Thank you. Um, in this area that we're generally talking about, there's a lot of wild stock chum production in these areas, am I not? Am I correct?

Through the chair, Mr. Chamberlain, you are correct. And just to clarify, these numbers that we have been looking at is July 1st through October 31st, is not just July, right? [Speaker:COMMISSIONER HART] Appreciate the clarification there. And I guess the only other question I have is in your department comments, for the way the proposal was submitted, you were opposed because the likelihood of achieving your sustainable escapement levels could be overexploited. Do you feel that reducing this time from 24 hours to 12 hours, you would have similar concerns, or would you be less concerned?

Through the chair, Mr. Chairman, I think overall, and I think as we discussed earlier too, if we do have concerns, we could potentially use authority to reduce fishing periods. But I think overall, I think our concerns would be less with fewer, with a fraction of what's going on. Thank you. What is the coordination between managers in season from various area managers? So are you coordinating and talking about like restricting outside of the management plan for EO?

Closures with, you know, adjacent to what may or may not be happening in another area? How often does that happen?

Madam Chair, I'm in communication with CHIK'nik fairly frequently. We, we do communicate, especially what's going on for sockeye salmon specifically when we're looking, especially when we're looking in June for restrictions. And I need to make sure I understand what's going on there. And a lot of information is available either through our advisory announcements as well. So we also coordinate with our coordinator, who's— I guess they're based in Kodiak, but they're— those are areas where we do communicate with each other to make decisions that are sometimes outside the bounds of these management plans for conservation purposes.

[Speaker:COMMISSIONER_MCCARTHY] Has that authority been exercised for reduction of time in this area? In this fishery related to Chignik sockeye in recent years? No, ma'am.

Mr. Swenson. It's hard for me to keep all this straight, but so when they come around the south side, do they then pass through the north side?

I mean, after— yeah. Through the chair, Mr. Spencer, I'm not sure what you mean by they. Are you talking about the—. I'm talking about the sockeye. The sockeye.

I mean, do they— where are they bound to?

I mean, there are some local sockeye streams in the South Alaska Peninsula. There could be bound east just as easily as they could be bound west. But I wouldn't— I'm not— I don't— majority of them are probably not like Bristol Bay. It's mostly the Gulf of Alaska. And we do have local systems that produce sockeye salmon on the Alaska Peninsula as well.

Thank you. What are the size of those local systems? For example, I think Orzinsky Lake is the only one that's really assessed. Is that correct? Madam Chair, that's the only one that's assessed by weir.

We do assess systems with aerial surveys. Orzinsky Weir has an escapement goal range of 14,000 to 28,000. Um, off the top of my head, I can't— the average has been probably around 15,000-16,000. Uh, we have Thin Point Lake, or that system there, that we've seen anywhere— we've seen around 25,000 to 30,000 fish there. We also have— most of them, yes, are fairly small systems.

They're not doing hundreds of thousands of fish like Chicknake, but there are systems there. Yeah, so I guess what I'm just getting comparatively, if I'm looking at the sockeye catch, you're talking hundreds of thousands of fish.

So it's— I think it's reasonable to assume that not all of those are local stocks, especially with the Rodzinski being only 24,000 or 14,000 escapement.

Madam Chair, I mean, that was the escapement. The total run is still not going to be hundreds of thousands of fish. But I know 2023, I think we had— or 2022, total run was more like 40,000. But yes, you're correct. They're not as big as Chignik.

Thank you. I think what I'm getting at here is that Like I said, the fleet, as small as it is, seems to do pretty darn well in catching sockeye with the area that it has provided and the time in which it has provided. Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. To the department again, I mean, for a later run like this, July 6th all the way, you said, into October, where is the later run— where's the escapement at for Chignik at this time for the later run?

Do you have any idea? Like, If they're still trickling in, are we worried about that at this point?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood. So, yeah, I mean, Chignik sockeye continue entering the Chignik River into the fall. You know, we— I think the weir is usually in until, you late August, but there are Chignik sockeye that are continuing to enter the river, you know, at least into September. Thanks.

Thanks. Okay.

What year was the crash of the— when the second— the late-run Chignik didn't meet his escapement goal?

Madam Chair, so for Chicknick late run, we did not meet the escapement goal in 2020. Escapement was 151,000 that year, and the lower bound of the goal was, well, the OEG now, but it was 240,000. Okay, and I will note that according to the AMR in 2020, it looks like the setnetters caught 197,189 sockeye. All right, anything else?

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you. I would go ahead and reference my subsistence review from prior proposals. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional cost to the Department. I call the question.

Question has been called. Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, please call the roll.

Final action on Proposal 146 as amended. Carlson VanDork. No. Carpenter. Yes.

Wood. Yes. Godfrey. Yes. Svensson.

No. Chamberlain. No. Erwin. No.

Motion fails. 3 In favor, 4 against. Madam Chair. Proposal 139. Proposal 139, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula.

Moved to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please.

This would allow the commissioner to establish commercial fishing periods by emergency order from August 1st to August 31st in the Southeastern District for set gillnet gear. There would be 6 61-hour fishing periods interspersed by 59-hour closures beginning August 1st. Each fishing period would open at 8 a.m. and close at 9 p.m. The fishing periods would be based on the lower bound of the South Alaska Peninsula. Pink salmon sustainable escapement goal, which is 1,750,000 pink salmon.

There would be specific escapement goal percentage checkpoints that would indicate whether subsequent scheduled fishing periods would open. From September 1st to October 31st, fishing periods would be based on the abundance of coho salmon stocks, and the department could consider the abundance of late pink and chum salmon stocks. This would shift management from opening fishing periods based on the strength of local sockeye Coho, pink, and chum salmon runs to a scheduled August fishery based primarily on pink salmon escapement. Although the proposed fishing period schedule set forth would be based on pink salmon escapement, there remains the potential for deleterious effects that the proposed fishing periods could have on local salmon stocks, particularly on local sockeye, coho, and chum salmon runs. If management is no longer based on the abundance of these species, this would eliminate the need to manage all salmon stocks through EEO authority to ensure sustainable escapement levels.

The first scheduled commercial fishing period would open at— open on August 1st for set gillnet gear if 20% of the lower bound of the sustainable escapement goal for pink salmon was met. The established fishing periods could continue to open if at the end of the second fishing period 40% of the lower bound sockeye escapement goal for pink salmon was met. The established fishing periods would further continue to open at the end of the fourth fishing period. If 80% of the lower bound escapement goal is met for pink salmon. For pink salmon, and based on this pattern, it is possible the proponent meant to further include the established commercial fishing periods would continue to open if after the third fishing period, 60% of the lower bound escapement goal of pink salmon was met.

The department is opposed to this proposal. This proposal would depend on the department's ability to conduct regular stream surveys with frequency to determine escapement, which would inform the proposed schedule. Although the Department attempts to conduct frequent stream surveys during August, survey occurrences can be variable and unpredictable. For example, depending on weather conditions and aircraft availability. The inability of the Department to conduct stream surveys on a scheduled basis due to the aforementioned factors to assess escapement could be a further complication for the implementation of this proposal.

It may not be possible to conduct stream surveys in accordance with this proposal. Which could lead to scheduled fishing periods not opening. To meet the board's statutory responsibility for the subsistence law, it should consider whether subsistence regulations continue to provide a reasonable opportunity for subsistence uses if the proposal is adopted. For discussion, Mr. Carpenter. Thanks, Matt.

I'm kind of looking at Section B of this where it talks about opening at 20%, 40%, um, and then 80%. I mean, how practical— how practically reasonable is that considering the weather and water conditions and everything for the department to even try and assess a percentage like that?

Through the chair to Mr. Carpenter, from a practical standpoint, I mean, we're— we are calculating how much or estimating how much fish are, you know, being seen in the escapement. However, applying it, it's one of the issues, especially on even years, it's a much more conservative approach because we've had some pretty detrimental pink salmon escapements during even years. So I think there's a lot of variability around the escapement during these times. And so opening on August 1st, that hasn't happened in a while. And so, and I think even people, some folks spoke to this last year, I think probably was one of the earliest years we've opened in a while, which was August 3rd.

Pink salmon escapement was clearly on its way to meeting the lower end.

Thank you.

Mr. Wood, how consistent is that, the pink salmon escapement? Do you have any concern for the stocks out there?

Through the chair to Mr. Wood, like I said, even years, we certainly have a much more precautionary approach. It's been a while since we have not met the lower end of the escapement goal. Even years are— I'm sorry, odd years are very much stronger escapement levels. In the last several 3 to 5 years, we've actually exceeded the upper end of the escapement level for pink salmon. But in the last 3 or 4 years, we've also— we have met the— met or exceeded or around the midpoint in even years.

But this is— that's more of a common occurrence. 2010, We started seeing a collapse in the pink fishery, and it just took a while to get it to come back. Okay, thank you. Any other discussion? Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll reference my subsistence review for prior proposal for the Alaska Peninsula areas. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct cost for a private person to participate, and approval of this proposal would result in additional cost to the department. And I would call the question. Question's been called.

Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 139. Erwin? No.

Chamberlain? No. Godfrey? No. Svenson?

No. Wood? No. Carlson-Vandort? No.

Carpenter? No. Motion fails 0-7, Madam Chair. Proposal 142. Proposal 142, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula.

Moved to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please. This would allow the commissioner to open by emergency order commercial fishing periods for specific or multiple gear types from August 1st to August 31st. These commercial fishing periods could be concurrent or non-concurrent.

This would allow the department to open non-concurrent fishing periods by emergency order in August. Thus, there could be commercial fishing periods established for specific gear types and fishing periods for different gear types would not need to occur at the same time throughout the southeastern, south-central, southwestern Unimak districts. This would likely increase harvest opportunity and harvest of salmon. The department opposes this proposal because the department does not have the emergency order authority to make in-season allocated decisions without very specific direction from the board on how to implement these actions. If the proposal were adopted, the department could be in a place— could be placed in a position of making in-season decisions that would limit one gear over another.

The department is neutral on allocative aspects of this proposal. To meet the board's statutory responsibility to subsistence law, it should consider whether subsistence regulations continue to provide a reasonable opportunity for subsistence uses if the proposal is adopted. For discussion, Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. Is there Anything wrong with the 5AC09.366 versus 5AC09.365?

Does that jive?

Through the chair to Mr. Wood, no, 365 is the June Salmon Management Plan and 366 is the post-June Salmon Management Plan. And because this occurs in August, I think when we wrote this, we assumed the proposer meant 366. Okay. Thanks.

Any other discussion? Mr. Carpenter? Yeah, I mean, I agree with the department's comments on this. I mean, the department and the commissioner do not— it's the board's responsibility to deal with allocation, and I think, you know, like proposals that we dealt with earlier, now the commissioner and the department are in the position to make allocate— allocative decisions. So for those reasons, I won't support it.

Any other board discussion?

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Reference my subsistence review for the Alaska Peninsula areas. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct costs for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional cost to the department. I call the question.

Question's been called.

Questions and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 142. Chamberlain. No.

Carlson-Vandort. No. Erwin. No. Svenson.

No. Godfrey. No. Carpenter. No.

Wood. No. Motion fails 0-7. Madam Chair.

Okay. Proposal number 144. Proposal 144, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Madam Chair, I move the board take no action on Proposal 144 based on its action on Proposal 142. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 144. Proposal 145. Proposal 145, 09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Madam Chair, I move the board take no action on Proposal 145 in light of its action taken on Proposal 142. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 145. Proposal 140. Proposal 145, AAC 09.200, Description of Districts and Sections. And 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Move to adopt.

Second. Staff comments, please. This would split several sections in the South Central and Southwestern Districts into inner and outer sections, and only the intersections would be considered terminal harvest areas. The areas that would change include the Belkowski Bay, the Mino Creek/Little Coal Bay, the Volcano Bay, and the East and West Pavlof Bay sections. Terminal harvest areas would be reduced in size because terminal harvest areas— because terminal harvest areas would be reduced in size in the Belcoski Bay, Mino Creek, Little Coal Bay, and the east and west Pavlov Bay sections, it is possible that harvest in these areas would decrease and that fewer non-local salmon would be intercepted during these years when it is warranted to open these terminal areas outside the post-June regulatory schedule.

There has not been any harvest in these areas outside the post-June regulatory schedule since 2006.

The department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal.

Board discussion. Ms. Erwin. Yeah, I have a question. I guess this is showing my limited time so far. I guess I haven't seen a proposal come before us that asks the board to determine something to be a terminal harvest area or not.

I guess I would assume that would be more biological and based on genetics if we, we had that availability. Um, to the department, is this a common proposal to be brought before the board?

Uh, through the chair, Ms. Irwin, I haven't really seen anything in particular for this. Um, as far as other areas, I'm not familiar. Um, but these terminal harvest areas are defined in regulation for the post-June management plan. Okay, thank you. Mr. Wood.

Yeah, I'm wondering what the need is for this. Do you have—. Are you concerned about these stocks in here?

Through the Chair to Mr. Wood, not in particular. And the— I think, like I said in my earlier comments, the way that it's prescribed in the management plan is providing additional opportunity outside the regulatory schedule in these specific areas only. We haven't done that. Our escapement levels— our escapements have shifted quite a bit later in the season that we're not providing additional opportunity outside the regulatory schedule based on escapement in these specific areas.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Carpenter? Yeah, I mean, I guess I just got one question when I'm looking at the the map on Figure 140-1.

You know, these terminal harvest areas seem to be kind of broke out with very similar areas on both sides of them to a certain degree. And I'm just— I'm trying to wrap my head around why some of them— like why the Belicosky Bay section is— is put in there. It's like, in my— from my experience, terminal harvest areas are very different than what is trying— what is tried to be done here.

So I don't know if you have any— if you can enlighten me on, you know, do you consider from a managerial point of view— I mean, the sections that big— do you consider those terminal harvest areas? Through the Chair to Mr. Carpenter, I mean, outside the bay, probably not so much. But this is a relic regulatory, and I'm not quite sure the complete history on when and why that was set in the regulation. Okay, thanks. So I hearken back to other actions that have been taken while I've been on this board, and typically when you're trying to target localized stock, you try to get as close to, obviously, the terminus as possible.

Typically along the Alaska Peninsula, whether north or south Alaska Peninsula, that means bays, often in between cape points, that have been identified and the board has taken action on to try and make sure that the terminal— that those fish are actually headed for those particular streams and systems. This is an interesting sort of scenario because this also has EEZ application, correct? Because it's beyond the 3-mile?

Madam Chair, no, there is— these are 3-mile state water markers because of landmass that are— it's hard to see on these maps. They're not big land, but these are 3-mile state water markers. All the way out into the general— all the way out, I mean, to the general section. Yeah, there's a lot of land. There's a lot of small islands, whatnot out in these areas.

And so these aren't— these aren't EEZ. These are state waters. Okay. So what was the reason I'm asking is because my notes here from Committee of the Whole mentioned that this extends out 15 miles.

Madam Chair, there is one area around the Unimak District which is not within these terminal harvest areas that is in federal waters, and there was a management plan put into place around 2011. I don't know if, Forrest, you want to speak more to that.

Yeah, Madam Chair, so the area of the South Peninsula that's considered EEZ waters is— I'm trying to relate it to Figure 140-1. It's basically southeast of that— what's identified on the map as the Thin Point section.

It's—. It may—. It's a little hard to tell. I'm looking at two different maps here, but I think it may include part of the Thin Point section if I'm interpreting the map correctly, but most of it lies to the west, south of Unimak Island. And so south of Unimak, the EEZ boundary line is about 15 miles from Unimak Island, but as Mr. Keyes pointed out earlier, if you look at Figure 140-1, particularly like in the southwestern district, the Belkovski Bay section, there's a number of small islands there.

And so those, even though they're quite far off of the mainland of the Alaska Peninsula, those— there's a 3-mile line drawn around all of those.

Okay, thank you. I guess I'm just looking at sort of— I'm laying Figure 140-1 and 140-2 kind of next to each other, and I just don't see the problem with identifying terminal harvest areas more appropriately. It seems like it's made sense. There's a lot of precedent for it, and this board throughout the state of Alaska. Um, and it seems to me that it could allow for better precision and management if you are getting, um, into high mixed stock areas, um, farther out and farther away from the terminal harvest areas.

Um, it seems like this would provide the department more of a scalpel than an axe in terms of how it could open and close sections based on surveys and stock, terminal stock assessment. I guess those are my thoughts.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Irwin? Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. To the department, I'm looking at Figure 140-1, and it's showing that those hatched areas are where additional fishing time may be allowed. And so if we were to make those terminal fishery areas.

Closer to the actual terminus, would we then be, say, providing more opportunity for like setnetters in those areas than maybe drifter seine that are usually harvest those terminus areas out further? I'm trying to understand the allocative nature of this proposal before us.

Madam Chair, Miss Irwin, it wouldn't be gear-specific.

Okay, I understand that. I guess my, I guess my question was, when the department chooses to allow additional fishing time, it— this wouldn't, um, I guess I'm trying to think of my question. Um, when the department is considering adding additional fishing time, then the gear types wouldn't be affected by these terminus harvest areas being made smaller?

Madam Chair, Miss Irwin, I don't think so. I mean, it's hard to say exactly if there would be any gear conflict with that, but probably not. Okay, thank you. Madam Chair, if I could just add a little bit to that. So I think Mr. Owen's question was about our comment, you know, that we're neutral on the allocative aspects of the proposal.

And so, you know, this, this proposal contemplates reducing fishing area. And so that might have an allocative impact. That's the simple answer to that. Okay. Thank you very much.

Mr. Carpenter, thank you. I guess my question is to you, Matt. This is post-June. I mean, what happens to the drift fleet specifically in post-June? Do they typically stay on this side or are most of them transitioning to the northern side?

Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter, for the most part, they transition to the north side unless fishing is poor there, then some might stick around south side as well. But I would say the majority are going to transition to the north side. Okay. I guess my last comment will be I've just never seen terminal areas like this. I know this is a very different part of the state and is managed very differently, but this is not what I consider terminal areas.

And so, I mean, for those reasons, I just don't see any— I just don't have support for this at the time. Mr. Godfrey, then Mr. Wood.

Yeah, listening to the discussion here between the staff and board members and trying to wrap my head around this, at the end of the day, to me, this looks like a solution in search of a problem, and I'll be opposed to it. Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. Um, yeah, I think that given the fact that's later in the season, it's more local stocks, it's, uh another hit to loss of area potentially. And there was some testimony too, just about how, you know, to us this is hard to know, like how this is terminal.

But for people that fish in this area and know it, it sounds like there is— between run timing and wind and tide, they do know, they do have a better sense of where the fish are and when and where they're going already. So I'm inclined to just leave it the way it is. I'm no on this.

Yeah, I think I just want to add that, you know, I again, I think that defining terminal harvest areas is a good thing. It helps to allow some different management tools, especially in the mixed stock fishery. And in this time of year, there are especially that far out transiting stock stocks, particularly heading to Cook Inlet and points east, east of Wasup. So, um, at least for the sockeye, particularly there are local pink and chum stocks, so that I will acknowledge. But again, those are, those are what they're targeting.

Those are headed into the terminal areas in the bays, and that's precisely what this is attempting to define. And I will reference my allocative comments with respect to approval of Proposal 126. Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct cost for a private person to participate.

And approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional cost to the Department. I call the question. Question has been called. Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please.

Final action on Proposal 140. Wood? No. Godfrey? No.

Carlson-Vandork? Yes.

Yes. Chamberlain. Yes. Carpenter. No.

Svensson. No. Motion fails. 3 In favor, 4 against. Madam Chair.

Proposal 141. Proposal 141, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Move to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please.

This would create 2 king salmon harvest triggers that could come into effect in a statistical area in the South Alaska Peninsula management area beginning July 1. If the commercial harvest of king salmon is greater than 1,000 fish during a regulatory fishing period, the statistical area or areas primarily responsible for this harvest of king salmon would remain closed during the subsequent regulatory commercial fishing period. If harvest of king salmon surpassed 5,000 fish, the statistical areas primarily responsible for this harvest of king salmon would close to commercial fishing immediately and remain closed through August 10th.

This would direct the department to close commercial fishing periods in statistical areas with high king salmon harvest for all commercial gear types based on two— based on two king salmon harvest triggers. If proposed regulations had been in place as written by the proponent in the past, the closure would have been triggered until August 10th every year since 2015 except 2017 and 2023.

The department supports king salmon conservation measures, particularly in areas where stocks of concern are present, and has taken action throughout the Chignik, Kodiak, and Alaska Peninsula management areas to conserve king salmon. The department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal.

Mr. Carpenter, thank you.

So this— these triggers, and we've, we've kind of dealt with something closing down statistical areas when we dealt with Chignik. Does this proposal speak to all of the South Peninsula, or is it a prescribed area?

Through the chair to Mr. Carpenter, this would be any statistical area that has this level of harvest. So the whole South Peninsula, as far as I can tell, I assume it's just the South Alaska Peninsula. Yes, South Alaska Peninsula. So any statistical area within the South Alaska South Peninsula would—. So it's not a cumulative number.

It's actually the trigger number is— So a statistical area where this threshold is met would only close down that statistical area. It's not an area-wide or a more broad, I guess, section of the South Peninsula.

Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter, that is my understanding interpretation of this proposal, is that it speaks specifically to any statistical area or areas that meet this trigger criteria of 1,000 fish would close down the next commercial fishing period for that particular statistical area, but for all gear groups. Okay, thanks.

I'd like to draw members' attention to RC 190. And again, we took action already during the first group to shut down and restrict time and area in the Metrofania Island area, which I think on average, you know, only harvested a couple thousand kings a year.

And I would Just again, draw, draw folks' attention to RC 190 and particularly 282-11. And that's the percentage of king harvest. And it harvests more kings in that particular statistical area than the rest of the South Peninsula combined. And certainly way more than the Metrofania Island area where this board took action for king conservation. There are no, aside from the Chignik, system on the South Pen, King systems in this area.

There are several as you head east and you get into Karlik, Iakuluk, Cook Inlet, southeast and, and outside of Alaska. I don't know where these fish are coming and going from. I think it's reasonable to assume that, you know, a good chunk of them could be headed for Chignik, which has a stock of of concern. And this is not shutting down the area entirely, but it allows a fishing period to close if you're seeing high percentages of kings caught. And I think that is more than reasonable since all of those systems that I named, with the exception of some in Southeast, and I don't know about outside of Alaska, have stock of concern designations.

I think the Karlik River had less than 100 kings escape last year. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't even think they made triple digits. So I think that this is not only reasonable but responsible to shut down these areas. Now, the interesting thing that we did.

Though, is, you know, by requiring non-retention, it's going to be very difficult to ever hit this cap or even assess it. But I think that this is an acknowledgment that these areas are harvesting kings and they're not theirs.

Miss Irwin. Yeah. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for bringing up the actions that this board has taken earlier and the difficulty that it's going to be to actually implement this, but I'm not a huge fan of triggers solely because I don't like the incentivization of not keeping and retaining your kings or throwing them overboard. But looking at this 28211, it is an enormous amount of take.

As Member Carlson-Vandord read into the record from RC 190, there was It's greater than all of the other areas combined. And in the years where Chignik has not been meeting its escapement, 2021, 28211 caught 6,667 kings, 8,000 in 2022, 7,000 in 2023, almost 5,000 in 2024, and 6,700 in 2025. And I, The depressed king stocks throughout the state, and I've built record on my comments towards in that regard. So I think that this would— while I don't love the idea of there being a trigger, I do think that some of these statistical areas do need to be addressed. I guess my one question for the department would be, would this displace effort into other areas just near 28211 that might increase the king take in those statistical areas?

Just kind of displacing the effort? Through the Chair, Ms. Irwin, yes, it would certainly move fleet around to different areas. Whether or not it would change how much King harvest is taken in those other areas, it's much more variable in other areas around Area M. Okay, thank you. Mr. Wood. Yeah, to the department, is the higher King average in this area due to the fact that there's a large congregation of Kings typically there, or is this something that is due to the proximity of a port and the amount of use?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood, this, this stat area gets a lot of fish, not just kings, but all of the harvests, pink salmon and chum salmon, sockeye salmon. This area, the best way I can describe it is almost like a highway for lots of animals coming through the Alaska Peninsula. And it's a function of the orientation of the islands and the current of the Gulf of Alaska current. It's in the fleet knows this is a good place to go catch fish. So there's a large portion of the fleet that fishes there because there's a lot of fish there.

Mr. Chamberlain, then Mr. Swenson. Thank you, Madam Chair.

I, I know there's a lot of effort concentrated here, but there's also a lot of kings that are concentrated here.

I don't like the idea of decreasing efficiency for the sake of decreasing efficiency or to even slow this down, but I think one of the things this would do is make the fleet more cognizant of when they are catching kings. I'd be interested in seeing what the statistical variances between this year and— or next year and this are. But yeah, I think if we find that we're on a hotspot with kings, I think it's incumbent upon us to do the responsible things because I don't know a king stock in this state where they're doing fantastic. And I think this board over the last, in my tenure, has put a large priority on, or priority on restoring kings. And if we've got a statistical anomaly such as this, I think it's incumbent upon us to at least look at actions.

And I have a feeling the fleet will identify where, you know, where the low abundance areas are that can still get that. You know, the market always finds a way to accommodate. And I think this is one where it's necessary. So with that, yeah, I'll be supporting.

Other board comments? Mr. Swenson and then Mr. Godfrey.

I'm in support of this because everybody knows my stance on Kings. But if the fleet goes to other areas, are you able to close those areas or know what they catch in those other areas by EO authority?

Through the chair, Mr. Svenson, we, we will know what the harvest is because we have daily harvest reporting requirements from the processors. But, and then if we had an instance where another stat area became the new hotspot, then we would follow the same actions for that area for the next fishing period. Okay, thank you. Mr. Godfrey. For staff here, so if this had been, um, if this had been adopted in the past, there's a reference here in staff comments that a closure would have been triggered until August 10th every year since 2015 except 2017 and '23.

Do you have by chance the date of those two exceptions, 2017 and '23? And what that date was, if you have it.

As far as when we would have— sorry, through the chair, Mr. Godfrey, as far as what, what date we would have closed down the fishery? Correct. So the two exceptions were 2017 and '23. So I'm wondering what date, if you have it, it would have been, since it wouldn't be August 10th. I don't, I don't have it directly in my hands here.

Mr. Owen. Yeah, thank you. So I just want to be really clear so that I understand the action that we took on 135 versus this action. So this is commercial harvest. So this would just be the, the count towards the trigger would only be kings that were retained, not kings that were thrown back, correct?

Okay, thank you. I just wanted to make sure I'm clear on the board's actions. Thank you.

Yeah, and again, I think that this is, this is reasonable. I mean, it is both. I've heard the word blessing of the Area M in terms of the abundance of salmon in the area, but it's also with respect to kings, a little bit of the curse, because we have to be really mindful of, you know, all those fish that are passing through and the impacts that they are having on king salmon. And it is for one fishing period. And so the fleet can move around a little bit.

If it gets high in another place, then you can restrict that area. But it's not like they couldn't go back to Stat Area 282.11 unless they just nailed, nailed Kings. And that's through August 10th. There's a lot of pink and chum, which I believe is assuming that is primarily what folks are going for in terms of localized stock in that area that could still be harvested. But we're trying to keep them off the kings again that aren't bound for local systems.

And that, I think it's reasonable.

Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you to the department. These are late season kings, right? So do you suspect, is there a weight on those? So are they feeders or are they traveling?

Are they in the migratory route at this point in time of the season? And then my other question is, is how you keep track of these of these caps? Through the chair, Mr. Wood, I would say on average they're, they're probably more of the feeder kings. They're smaller, they're smaller king salmon that are migrating through. Average weight varies from area to area, but I think our average weight was around 6 or 6.5.

Pounds. Um, sorry, I missed the— I forgot the second part of your question. How will you keep track of your— of the new, uh, trigger?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood, it would be through harvest reporting, both the in-season harvest reporting that we receive from the processors. Um, we would adjust probably what we require as far as reporting, we generally have broader reporting groups when we're doing in-season harvest, but we will also have fish ticket information through e-landings. We can sometimes peek at those before we actually get physical copies of fish tickets. Not always, and whether or not it's in a timely enough manner for fish tickets is different, but we would certainly be on the processors inquiring about specific areas if we see problems. Thanks.

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Approve.

This proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional cost to the department. And I'd call the question. Question's been called. Errors and omissions. Director Nelson, please call the roll.

Final action on Proposal 141. Godfrey? No. Wood? No.

Chamberlain? Yes. Erwin? Yes. Carpenter?

Yes. Svenson? Yes. Carlson-Vandort? Yes.

Motion carries, 5 in favor, 2 against. Madam Chair. Proposal 143.

Proposal 143, 5AAC09.366, Post-June Salmon Management Plan for the South Alaska Peninsula. Move to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please.

This would close both the commercial purse seine and set gillnet fishery in an area to to be determined by the department if more than 100 immature king salmon are present per set during July. Ximénez Island section, same test fishery. The proposal defines immature salmon as the number of immature king salmon observed to be under 28 inches in length from tip of snout to tip of tail, sockeye salmon observed to be under 16 inches in length from tip of snout to tip of tail, and coho salmon and chum salmon observed to be under 18 inches in length from tip of snout to tip of tail caught in the same Furthermore, tissue samples would be collected to determine point of origin for each species. In addition, a June test fishery for king salmon would be established. Adoption of this proposal would significantly increase costs for the department.

This would change definitions in the July seine test fishery that assess the presence of immature salmon. Currently, immature salmon are defined as the number of salmon gilled in the seine web. It is proposed that immature salmon would instead be defined as how many salmon per set fall under length restrictions for each species. If the fishery were to be closed for seine gear, it would also close for set gillnet gear. If the department were to measure every fish in a set first, or a subsample of fish in every set, this would significantly increase the time it would take to conduct the test fishery.

This could have implications for the department attempting to open July fishing periods in timely fashion, thus reducing overall fishing time for the fleet. It could show a decrease in pay for the charter operator, which could disincentivize vessel operations from wishing to participate in the test fishery, potentially leading to the department being unable to conduct a test fishery. Furthermore, this would introduce an unvalid— unvalidated methodology and be impractical and expensive to implement. A new study would be required to develop a new index of immature salmon using length to determine immaturity, as using the current index of 100 immature salmon gilled in the fishery would be unnecessary. Due to lack of abundance— sorry, the department believes that conducting a June King immature test fishery would be unnecessary due to a lack of abundance of king salmon in the area during the time of the season.

This— the proposal would also require the department to sample the test fishery each for genetic stock identification. The department opposes this proposal. The department does not have The board does not have administrative or fiscal authority and does not have the authority to direct the department to expend funds or create a new program. The adoption of this proposal would reduce the department's ability to effectively execute the July test fishery and apply test fishery results in a timely manner. The department understands the complexities of determining maturity status by species in a test fishery, and there's no available information to suggest these sizes— size thresholds are appropriate.

Thank you, Mr. Godfrey. I'll be opposed to this for the very reasons that the department decided. Mr. Owen, and then Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I'm—.

I think I'm gonna have to agree with Member Godfrey on this simply for the purpose of the department's comments and the board's authority being outside of that. However, I'd like to just speak to the proposal itself a little bit. I, I really appreciate the author's intent of Looking at these immature kings, I think it's important for us to continue developing ways to gather data, especially on ASL data, and recognizing how not only quantity of escapement but quality of escapement is integral to understanding how these stocks are going to be coming back and how they're doing. I think I like the idea of this And I hope maybe there's a way for, for some other organization or somebody with the fiscal authority to do this. But at this time, due to the board's authority, I can't support this.

Mr. Carpenter and then Mr. Wood. Yes, thank you. I actually agree with both members with their last comments. I think we've seen this in many other proposals, and once again, to the public, The board does not have authority, administrative authority, to direct the department to spend money. So please consider that when putting proposals in.

Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. To the department, I see that under 5AC09.366 under I that the department shall conduct the same test fishery in the Chumigans. Is this something You still do regularly?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood. Yes, we conduct this every season. We started on July 2nd, 3rd, and the final one is July 5th, the day before the first opening.

Cool. Thank you. I agree with my other board members and will vote like them. Yeah, I think that again, I appreciate where the intent of how this was written, but I think the practical application of it is difficult. You know, the test fishery is conducted.

You're counting immatures. That are gilled, you don't really have a quick way or an easy way to assess which ones are which that are in the gill net, or that are in the gill— that are gilled in the net. Boy, it's getting late. And the other thing that I would note is that the department does report all of the species apportionment within these test fisheries. So that's released publicly.

It's part of the announcement, I believe. And I think that that sort of got to some of the issues that I wanted to get to. While they may not be The apportioning the immatures while they're in the net and gill, those counts are still being made and are made public and presumably will assist, you know, in the future. But, you know, actually I think it has more of an intended effect because you're not apportioning out the immatures in terms of species. Is just all the ones that are there that are immature.

So I'm not going to be supportive of this as written. Mr. Bowers. Thanks, Madam Chair. I just wanted to point out that, you know, this test fishery was initiated by the department prior to any regulations related to the test fishery being adopted by the board. So, you know, it was, it was an issue that the department was concerned about.

So we initiated the test fishery to to assess the presence of immature salmon in the area. And so while the, the board has adopted regulations related to this test fishery, it was something that was ongoing that the department believes was important. So I just— that kind of relates to the authority question that came up earlier. Thanks. Thank you, Mr. Bauer.

Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. This proposal is not expected to result in additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal Would result in a significant direct cost for the department. I call the question. Question's been called.

Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 143. Carlson-Vandort. No.

Carpenter. No. Wood. Nope. Godfrey.

No. Swenson. No. Chamberlain. No.

Erwin. No. Motion fails 0-7. Madam Chair. Thank you.

That concludes deliberations on Group 3. Let's take a 15-minute break and begin with deliberations on Group 4, North Alaska Peninsula Salmon.

Okay, welcome back. Time is 2:58. You're on the record. We're going to be again deliberating Group 4, North Alaska Peninsula salmon. There are 6 proposals in this group.

We will begin with 116. Proposal 116, please. For the record, my name is Charles Russell. I'm the North Alaska Peninsula area management biologist. Proposal 116, 5AAC09.320, fishing periods and 5 AAC 09.369, Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan.

Move to adopt. Again? Staff comments, please. This would impose mandatory windows or closures throughout the Northern District fisheries from June 20th through July 20th to conserve Nelson River sockeye salmon stocks. As proposed, fishing time within the Bear River, Three Hills and Ilmik, and Outer Port Huyden sections will be closed concurrently for a 96-hour period during a 7-day period However, if sockeye salmon returns to the Bear, Sandy, and Ilnek Rivers are expected to exceed the upper end of the escapement goal, the waters of the corresponding sections can be opened from the shore out to 1.5 miles during the 96-hour closure period.

Unlike the current abundance-based management plan, this approach could result in lost harvest opportunities and surplus escapement, as mandatory regulatory closure would likely allow more fish to migrate into rivers and would not allow for in-season management based on real-time estimates of salmon abundance and run timing. Increasing the likelihood that escapement goals are frequently exceeded. Sockeye salmon escapement goals have been consistently met in Nelson Lagoon over the past 20 years.

The department opposes mandatory windows in the existing abundance-based management plan since surplus escapement would likely occur. The department currently provides harvest opportunities on surplus fish and ensures escapement goals are met. The department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal.

Mr. Carpenter, then Mr. Wood. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks, Charlie. Um, we've talked about the, the escapement levels in Nelson Lagoon, so I don't know that we need to reiterate that all that much. Needless to say, they've been very good for a long time.

And I know you've only been out in the peninsula for a couple years now, but Kind of, if you could just kind of explain the last 2, 3 years, how much opportunity Nelson Lagoon has been provided, you know, in regards to fishing time, how many days a week, etc.

Through the chair, Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, the last 3 years have been, have been good in the Nelson Lagoon section. Typically, this, the season starts out on a schedule, 3 or 4 days a week. Early on. There's a low participation level over there, so we're not too concerned about the harvest power, so we can stay on that schedule early on.

As we move into June, we'll EO and allow more opportunity, you know, as the escapement numbers improve at the weir. The last few years we've been able to open up to continuous fishing by the end of June, the last 3 years. I'll have to look up specific dates for those years if you'd like, but It's been towards the end of June. Okay, no, I think that's a broad perspective, and I just wanted to kind of put that on the record. So that's all I have for now.

Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you. So there's a lot of literature on this submitted. So in trying to read it all, I'm trying to understand, like, if between the escarpment goals and all these different rivers, if there's a concern with any of those being met. And is there a pattern of how the fish come in that somehow they're maybe going to Outer Port Haiden and getting caught before they might come back to Nelson Lagoon?

Like, I'm just trying to understand what the need for this proposal is. Like, what am I missing here?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood. Yeah, so kind of the pattern, the way the fish move through the North Peninsula here is they do tend to go north and then come south, particularly in our sections from Port Moller north. We tend to see the Bear River, Sandy, the Ilnek stocks, they kind of take a turn there near Outer Port Haiden, Ilnek, and then start working their way down the beach. There is a little bit of Nelson in that component as well based off the wasp stock compensation. But Nelson fish also tend to they tend— or they appear to come in from a different direction as well, maybe more directly off the beach.

At least that's what it seems like the last few years. So—. And are you comfortable with the escapements as they are? Or I think the argument that I'm reading in this paperwork is that perhaps the escapements would be higher if it weren't for so much fishing activity, therefore the reason for these windows or closures. Is there any validity to that?

No, so the north, you know, the North Alaska Peninsula salmon fisheries, they're managed based off abundance and that's our primary objective in season is to make sure we're achieving those escapement goals and providing escapement throughout the run. And so the area is based on the weir counts and aerial surveys, so we do, you know, we'll make adjustments in season throughout these sections as needed to make sure we're getting escapement back to all these systems. And the escapements the last few years have been, you know, have been within the goals. Thank you.

Other board discussion? Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, I want to thank the proposers for being here and speaking on this during Committee of the Whole Group 4. I have some notes that they are, you know, hopefully then Bear River will have more fish.

And as I'm looking at the the runs, it's the both the early and late on the Bear River as well as the Ilnek and the Nelson are meeting their escapement goals. And I'm grateful for the local community being concerned about the conservation of their stocks. However, it's to me, this doesn't— this seems like an over-restriction without a lot of validity and numbers behind why we're going to do that. So I don't think I'll be supporting this proposal.

Any other board discussion? Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct costs for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional costs to the department. I call the question.

Question's been called. Errors and omissions? Seeing none. Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 116.

Irwin? No. Chamberlain? No. Godfrey?

No. Svenson? No. Wood? No.

Carlson-Vandorp? No. Carpenter? No. Motion fails 0-7, Madam Chair.

Proposal number 113. Proposal 113, 5AAC09.310, fishing seasons, 5AAC09.350, closed waters. Move to adopt. Second. Staff comments.

This would reopen the Caribou Flat section and allow commercial set and drift gillnet gear to fish in the section if the upper end of the Nelson River sockeye salmon biological escapement goal is expected to be exceeded between June 20 and July 31. July 1st. In some years, the upper end of the escapement goal of 97,000 to 219,000 sockeye salmon has been achieved in late June or early July. Depending on fishing activity in other sections of the Northern District, there could be significant effort in the Caribou Flats sections if those sections are closed to commercial fishing and the fleet has no alternative fishing options. If substantial fishing effort takes place on Caribou Flats, harvest of all species of Nelson River salmon would increase and the number of salmon entering Nelson Lagoon and Nelson River would decrease.

This would likely decrease the number of salmon available for harvest for both set and drift gillnet permit holders who primarily commercial fish within the Nelson Lagoon section. The Caribou Flats section, like much of the North Alaska Peninsula, would operate as a mixed stock fishery. Because it has been closed to commercial salmon fishing for many years, we do lack stock-specific composition data. And the Nelson River sockeye salmon would likely make up the bulk of the harvest along with varying proportions of local and non-local sockeye salmon stocks. The department is neutral on this allocated proposal.

To meet the board's statutory responsibility to the subsistence law, it should consider whether subsistence regulations continue to provide a reasonable opportunity for subsistence users if this proposal is adopted. Thank you. Mr. Swenson.

Charlie, If you allow the fishermen into the Caribou Flats, obviously they're gonna catch, if it's above the mid, you know, higher escapement. If you don't allow that, how could that affect in the future that run?

[FOREIGN LANGUAGE] Yeah, it's so, you know, the—. Over the last 20 years or so, we have seen a cyclic effort of—. Or cyclic pattern in Nelson Lagoon of over-escapement and then down to a lower period of productivity. So based off the recent years, one can assume we're probably going to go into a period where we'll probably go back into a period of lower productivity for Nelson Lagoon. Obviously, controlling the surplus escape.

Could help maybe, you know, make the harvest opportunities more consistent, you know, consistent moving forward. Thank you. Ms. Irwin. Yeah, thank you. Question for the department: Is there concern for catch of Nelson River Chinook at this time during this run?

Depending on when it, if this proposal were adopted, that could be a concern.

You know, kings start to be harvested in the fishery in early June. Over the last 10 years, you know, the peak of the harvest typically does occur between June 10th and July 1st, and which is about 80% of the harvest during that time frame. Harvest is about 50% complete in the Nelson Lagoon section June 20th, June 21st, give or take. So, you know, if we had a run similar to 2024 and we were going to open earlier, that would be something that we would have to take into consideration. So you would consider also the Nelson River strength of the run in addition to the— in addition to the Nelson River sockeye when opening?

Yeah. You know, during that overlap period of when the Chinook would be vulnerable to harvest out in Caribou Flats, that would be something we would consider as well. Okay, then my— one more, sorry. And then my final question for the department is, what is your confidence of being able to, by this time, interpret whether or not the upper end, the escapement goal, is going to be exceeded?

Um, let's see here. Um, it would kind of depend on the raw and what we're seeing for escapement and harvest in the, in the, uh, in the lagoon. You know, the last couple— I went back and looked at the last 10 years, um, just kind of get— trying to get a feel of, uh, if this had been in effect when I would have potentially had the opportunity to open, uh, open Caribou Flats. And it, uh, the last 2 years, it would have been right around July 1st is when we would have been considering an opener. Um, there was a— from, uh, 2018 to 2022, there would have been no, uh, opener in the Caribou Flats.

And then 2015 through 2017, the opener probably would have been around July 10th to July 15th, somewhere in that range. And again, it would have been— it would depend on what— depend on king salmon escapement as well as potentially other local stocks. Thank you.

Mr. Swenson and Mr. Wood. So for that— so, Charlie, for them to reach their— the mid-upper goal probably on the average is after when the majority of the king run is through. And if it did happen earlier, like you said, you guys could make the judgment of whether to open it or not for those stocks, correct? Through the chair, Mr. Spencer— excuse me, Mr. Spencer— yeah, most years the fishery would not open until after July 10th. The last couple years with these exceptional runs, the potential for an opener would have, you know, been around that 1st of July.

And then you would take into account whether to open it or not? Correct. Thank you. So by that July 1st—. Mr. Wood.

Oops. Go ahead now. Thanks, Madam Chair. God, I'm so excited to do this. I just want to get out of here.

Sorry. I'm all yours. So by July 1st or July 10th, you could be pretty certain that the Chinook run has passed through, you will have met escapement, and there's been plenty of harvest opportunity for Nelson Lagoon fishermen?

Yeah, I can kind of give you the last like 10-year average there. Usually about 50% of our harvest in the Nelson Lagoon sockeye fishery is is around July 8th, July 9th in the lagoon.

And yeah, so the peak of the harvest inside Nelson Lagoon occurs during that July 1st to July 15th period. So yeah, the majority of the harvest that Nelson Lagoon typically, you know, if it was to open after July 10th, they would have had their traditional amount of harvest opportunity. King Passage? There would be a little concern of King Passage after July 10th.

There wouldn't be much concern after July 10th? Yeah, after July 10th. Copy. Okay, thank you. Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you. Thanks, Charlie, for all that. So I guess my first question is— I guess it is probably not even a question at this point. I see no sustainability issues with the sockeye into this system, quite frankly, nor the king sustainability in this system, which is great. I mean, we can't say that in a lot of places around the state.

I think that the way the proposal is written, I mean, there has to be a pretty lofty goal goal here for the department to even think about doing this, and a lot of times it probably wouldn't. But when I think about the escapements that have happened over 50 years, um, and I think about the escapements that have happened recently that were quite excessive, I think— I personally don't think there's the harvesting power in Nelson Lagoon. I've thought that for a long time. And I think that adapting to having multiple pieces of gear like most other people do around the state for fish sizes, I think that's probably an important part of that. But I think— and so the only way that you can really control this escapement is by providing some opportunity outside of the bay.

And I think this is a great option for the department. Probably won't be used very much. No sustainability issues. I just think it's a great tool for the department to have. And so I'm supportive of it.

I have a couple of questions. So this regulation is predicated on sockeye, and we've talked a little bit about kings, but which trumps? So I mean, I've been in the situation where I've seen sockeye doing well, kings doing not well, and the pressure is then on to open a fishery to go after the sockeye when you have kings in the dumpster. What would be your decision in that instance?

Mr. Bowers. Thanks, Madam Chair. So, so yeah, the way this proposal is written, it's, it's focused on sockeye escapement, but that doesn't mean that we aren't going to be considering the escapement of other species in managing this fishing opportunity. So what I've heard about the run timing here is that, and, you know, when the potential opening would occur in July, most of the king salmon have already escaped into the Nelson River. But, you know, if we were in a scenario where sockeye escapement was adequate to open this area, but we had not met the king salmon escapement goal at that point in time, you know, then that sockeye opportunity might be foregone to try to meet the king salmon escapement goal.

Fortunately, this is an area in the state where we've been having relatively strong king salmon escapement. So, You know, I don't foresee having a King Salmon escapement issue right now, but we're certainly not going to do anything to jeopardize that or change that in the future. Thank you. [Speaker] Thank you. I appreciate you saying that, because that, for me, that then begs the question about whether having this section closed for the last 45 years or however long it's been hasn't been a significant contributor as to why this is a bright spot, as to why this is one area in the entire region that hasn't had significant king problems because there's a closure rate at the mouth.

Yeah, I think there's a couple factors with that, Madam Chair. I mean, the— there isn't, you know, a directed fishery offshore or a commercial fishery offshore of Nelson Lagoon. And, you know, we've got catch and release sport fishing regulations in the river as well. Thank you. Yeah, thank you.

Appreciate that. And I guess for me, I understand the why the proposer submitted the proposal. I get it.

But for me, it's kind of, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, necessarily. And there are other opportunities on the North Pen and throughout the entire South Peninsula as well to drift in. I don't know why this particular section is totally necessary. And if I had to guess, I would think that because of this closure, that's why you're seeing decent returns and, and one of the few places in the state where Chinook are actually meeting their escapement goals. So, man, I'm having a hard time supporting it even though I'm very sympathetic to the harvestable surplus of sockeye.

Mr. Wood and then Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thanks. I'm looking at that too as we're talking and I see where it's closed and how, you know, you got the Nelson Lagoon there. But then, you know, you look in front of—. You look at the Bear and the Sandy and the Ilnek.

I mean, and they're.

Those aren't closed there, and are those rivers doing pretty good with kings?

Through the chair, Mr. Wood, the Ilnek, Bear, and Sandy— the Ilnek and Bear don't have a king salmon run, but Sandy does. Sandy's last year was a fairly strong king salmon return. It was a little bit below average as far as we could tell the previous seasons, but it seems to be doing okay. Okay, thanks. Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one last point. And this is really kind of where I'm focused on. If there was a sustainability issue at all, or I thought king salmon in particular would, you know, be affected by this, I wouldn't do it. I just think this is such a limited opportunity that would only exist in extreme cases of sockeye escapement.

But the other thing that I'm considering, and I've looked back through the escapements over time, it appears to me that this system has shown vulnerability to large levels of escapement. It's happened a few times. And when you look at the lag effect for 2, 3, 4 years after, you know, that happens, um, I personally think that in the next year or two, I think it's going to happen again. And even if it— if that did happen again, this area wouldn't even be open anyway. You know, it's just— it's a tool to the department.

And I think it's going to be very rarely used. But I think in high levels of escapement that, like the last 2 years, I think that it gives the department an ability to harvest fish entering the system when the harvesting power inside the lagoon is minimal.

Mr. Swenson. Well, as you all know, I'm a king guy.

But in this instance, I'm leaning to support this because I'm comfortable with the fact that it probably won't happen very often. And the fact that the kings, the government, you know, AFNG, they're going to be watching the king run. And if it did happen early, you know, they're not going to allow them to fish the sockeye because of threat to the kings. But I think we've taken a bunch of opportunity away from our commercial guys in other ways. And I think I'm going to lean to support this.

Any other discussion? Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll reference my subsistence review from prior proposals. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional cost to the department.

I'd call the question. Thank you. Just one last thing. I just want the department's commitment that if you start to see those kings drop, you will curtail the sockeye opportunity in the Caribou Flats and elsewhere.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Appreciate the question. Yeah, this— you have my commitment in that regard. And, you know, we're— I like to point to the North Peninsula Chinook stocks as, you know, an example of a place where we're consistently meeting escapement and providing opportunity. So I don't want to see that jeopardized.

Okay, question's been called. Errors and omissions.

Director Nelson, please call the roll. Final action on Proposal 113. Chamberlain. Yes. Carlson-Vandork.

No. Erwin.

Yes. Svenson. Yes. Godfrey. Yes.

Carpenter. Yes. Wood. Yes. Motion carries, 6 in favor, 1 against, Madam Chair.

Proposal number 115. Proposal 115, 5AAC09.369, Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 115. The proponent has withdrawn support found in RC 218. Second that and ask for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 115. Proposal 117.

Proposal 117, 5AAC09.369, Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan. Boo doo dah. Second. Staff comments, please. This would require steelhead to be reported as bycatch during Northern District commercial coho salmon fisheries.

These proposals are redundant to statewide regulations and would likely have little effect on reported steelhead catch.

The department supports accurate reporting of steelhead bycatch on fish tickets. The department is neutral on the proposal because in accordance with statewide regulations, steelhead bycatch is currently required to be reported on fish tickets.

Thank you. Any more discussion?

Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Carpenter. Oh, OK, I'm going to make this one simple. If it's not needed, I, I'm not going to, I'm not going to support it. Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, I likewise agree with Mr. Chamberlain.

I think the department's told us basically that this is something that is supposed to happen anyway. And so if there's nothing that's going to change, I don't feel a need for it. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery. And approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional cost to the department. And I'd call the question.

Question's been called. Any errors or omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 117. Svenson?

No. Wood? Nope. Chamberlain? No.

Carpenter? No. Carlson-Vandork? No. Erwin?

No. Godfrey? No. Motion fails 0-7. Madam Chair.

Proposal number 118.

Proposal 118, 5AAC 09.369, Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on proposal 118 based on its action on 117. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 118. Proposal number 114.

Proposal 114, 5AAC09.369, Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan. Move to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please. This would repeal language from the Northern District Salmon Fisheries Management Plan that sunsetted on December 31st, 2018.

No impact to current management. The language sunsetted on December 31st, 2018 is no longer in use. The department supports this proposal. Thank you, Mr. Swenson. I would support this.

It looks to me like a housekeeping measure. Thank you. Other board discussion? Mr. Wood? I'm in agreement with Member Swenson.

Mr. Carpenter? Yeah, I would also agree with the comments of My fellow board members, approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct costs for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional costs to the department. I call the question. Question's been called. Any errors or omissions?

Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 114. Godfrey? Yes. Wood?

Yes. Chamberlain? Yes. Irwin? Yes.

Carpenter? Yes. Svensson? Yes. Carlson VanDort.

Yes. Motion carries 7-0, Madam Chair.

All right. Thank you for your patience. We were just figuring out orders of, of roadmap and how we're going to take up these proposals. So here's how it's going to go. We're going to— for Group 5, which is subsistence salmon sport and sport fishing.

There are 8 proposals in this group. We are going to take up proposal number 106, proposal number 161, and then we are going to move up proposal number 156 under 161, and then we will go from there depending upon action since we have substitute language for proposal number 156. Does that make sense to everybody? Okay, great. Let's go ahead with proposal number 106, please.

Good afternoon again. For the record, my name is Matt Keyes. Proposal 1065AAC01.360, fishing seasons. Move to adopt. Second.

Staff comments, please. This would amend the fishing season to allow for more fishing time for subsistence salmon fishers in the Unalaska District, where fishing would be allowed from sunrise until sunset from January 1st through December 31st. The intent of this proposal is to increase the fishing time for subsistence salmon users. Current regulations allow for 15 hours per day of fishing time throughout the entire year. Using sunrise and sunset as start and end times as proposed provides additional fishing time in June and July, but by the end of August, a fisher would have less time for subsistence fishing.

Overall, there is likely to be a minimal effect on the number of salmon harvested by subsistence users. The department supports the intent of this proposal to provide additional fishing time. However, using sunrise and sunset as start and end times could cause issues with enforcement and confusion among fishers as to when subsistence fishing is permitted. The department recommends aligning this, this regulation with the Alaska Peninsula area fishing seasons, which provide that salmon may be taken at any time. Allowing subsistence at any time is also permitted in other areas around the state.

Department staff contacted Alaska Wildlife Troopers in Dutch Harbor regarding the proposed subsistence fishing times, and allowing fishing at any time— at any time was preferred over sunrise and sunset for start and end times.

Thank you. I have a question. Why—. Do you have any idea why this time sort of constraint or these time boundaries were inserted in the first place?

Madam Chair, I— my guess is when it was adopted in, I think in 1993, it was likely established as a management tool to restrict harvest. And I think maybe some of the concern is more around the road system areas that may be overharvested. There's some other areas that aren't as easily accessible, like Reese Bay or what we refer to as McCleese Lake.

But I imagine that was probably the primary reason for having these specific times. But I think Mr. Bowers might have some additional information. Thank you. Mr. Bowers. Yeah, thanks, Madam Chair.

So I've spent a lot of time in this area. And Iliulik Creek, which flows through the community of Unalaska, has a small sockeye run, and there's a— a really great beach just adjacent to the creek that, where there's a number of homes on that beach and it's a really easy place for elders to subsistence fish. And so it's kind of reserved for an elder's fishing area in the community. And common practice, you know, in years past was for people to leave their gillnets out, you know, 24 hours, 24/7. And This is a small run at Iliulik Creek.

There's been a lot of development in the headwaters of that creek, and so it's less productive than it was in the past. So, you know, fishing hours was a conservation measure for that stock. And then there's some other small sockeye stocks on the road system that probably migrate through that area. [Speaker:COMMISSIONER_MCCARTHY] Does the department— I mean, I know that you support it here. Do you have any conservation concerns around those systems, given what you just shared?

Madam Chair, no, we don't. Um, you know, we, we do monitor escapement there periodically. We've been kind of experimenting— it's one of the areas we've been experimenting with drones to monitor escapement. Um, I think with, with the fishing hours that are, you know, currently in place, or as proposed with the modification that Mr. Keyes mentioned, we don't have any concerns. Thank you.

Mr. Chamberlain. Thank you, Madam Chair. I, I was going to move to change this from to any time, but given Mr. Bauer's statement on that one beach, I'm now reluctant to do so. So I'll leave it to see if any other board members inclined to do so. Mr. Carpenter.

Yeah, maybe to the Department of Public Safety. So understanding, you know, the enforceability of sunset and sunrise.

Would just putting times in there like it is now be satisfactory, or would just striking the idea of time-specific and just having an open date and a closing date for the year, which would basically mean you could subsistence fish at any time you want, would that be also enforceable? Mr. Carpenter, through the chair, I believe it would. One of the things we kicked around is using civil twilight for the area. So it's something folks can look up and we can look up if we wanted to put a time on it.

But we would agree with Fish and Game if there's not a concern there, having an opening and closure that we have to police would be helpful. We do have just one wildlife trooper in Dutch Harbor for the entire peninsula. So it would free him up to do other more pressing things, but I would recommend civil twilight as an option.

Mr. Swenson. Well, I'm not sure what civil twilight is, but I know I can, you know, on a phone or a newspaper or a— all kinds of things, easy to find sunrise and sunset. I've run into this stuff in the past where You get certain times, not in Alaska but other places, where it's very difficult then, you know, well, what, you know, they're allowing this, but what does this time mean? Sunrise and sunset, it's pretty easy to find that somewhere. I can also go along with just leaving it open, but I don't understand why you would go to civil twilight or whatever you called it.

I've never heard of that.

Mr. DeBath. Through the chair, this came up recently, board a game for deer hunting in Southeast. Where sunset and sunrise is just a generic term, and it can be argued either way what that really means with not a specific basis. So it made it challenging to enforce that timeframe. Sunset, what does that mean to certain people versus a very specific time?

So I don't know if the department has more that they can add to it, but that was my understanding that's come up very recently. So would you tell me what civil twilight means then? Is that a half hour after sunset or something? How do you judge that? Be looked up online, much like a tide chart could be for a specific area.

Okay, thank you. Okay, so my thoughts on this, and I'm going to miss Irwin. I don't understand why this is overly complicated. I—. This just seems like if there's no conservation, it's a, you know, where there's very few streams in the area, this vast area that, that this would apply to.

It seems to me that the easiest and simplest— I don't see any reason to be restricting subsistence arbitrarily at this point, would just be to align it with much of the rest of the area in the peninsula where you can harvest subsistence anytime. And if people who have homes in front of the creek are dealing with noisy partiers who are subsistence fishing in the middle of the night, well, I'm sure that there's other laws on the books that they could take a look at in order to try and get them off their— get off my lawn. So, I mean, that's my thoughts on it. I would prefer to just see alignment get rid of the restriction. It doesn't seem necessary to me.

Mr. Carpenter. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I move to amend Proposal 106, and the amendment would read as follows: In the Unalaska District, salmon may be taken for subsistence purposes from January 1 through December 31st.

Does the department have any qualms with that language? Well, first of all, I need a second. Thank you. Second.

Madam Chair, we don't have any concerns with that language. Thank you very much. Okay. Madam Chair, I just— Matt Key is here. I just— in our regulations for the Peninsula, it says at any time, to be specific.

I don't—. I guess the date range works too. I know within our subsistence regulations it says from January 1 to December 31st at any time, if we want to be consistent with that regulation.

I think that is appropriate to just contain that in the amendment verbally to make it very consistent with regulation. And so I have a motion, I have a second. Is there any objection? We want to do unanimous consent? And I'm asking for unanimous consent.

Hearing no objection, Proposal 106 is amended. We now have the amended version in front of us. Is there any other board discussion? Mr. Owen, did you have something? Oh, thank you, Madam Chair.

Yeah, I would just like— I'll just say that since the department has shown no conservation concern, it sounds like this is a small fishery. Providing more opportunity for subsistence is always good. So I'll be supporting the proposal. And thank you, Mr. Carpenter, for the substitute language. Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll reference my subsistence review from prior proposals. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional cost for a private person to participate in the fishery, and approval of this proposal.

Is not expected to result in any additional cost to the department. I call the question. Question's been called. Errors or omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll.

Final action on Proposal 106 as amended. Chamberlain? Yes. Carlson-Vandort? Yes.

Erwin? Yes. Svenson? Yes. Godfrey?

Yes. Carpenter? Yes. Wood? Yes.

Motion carries 7-0, Madam Chair. Proposal number 161.

Madam Chair, Tyler Pollum for the record. I'm the area sport fish biologist, and I have with me Jay Baumer, the Regional Management Coordinator for Sport Fisheries. Proposal 161, 5 AAC 65, new section.

Move to adopt. Second. Staff comments, please. Thank you, Madam Chair. Proposal 161 would establish a management plan for Bering Sea drainages in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands area that support king salmon populations and have active associated fisheries.

It would—. It specifies that drainage— specifies drainages that have King Salmon runs or Bering Sea drainages and do not currently have a management plan for sport, subsistence, or personal use fisheries. Practically speaking, this is all the drainages of the North Alaska Peninsula, and it covers sport fishing regulations currently. There's no sport fishing management plans in place at this present in this area. And— but there are special regulations for specific drainages such as Bear, King Salmon, Sandy, Nelson.

There's no personal use fisheries in this area as it's a subsistence area, and subsistence is managed under separate regulatory structure. Alaska Peninsula king salmon bag limits as a— for the whole area also apply to the Chignik River. However, this is a Gulf of Alaska king salmon run and not currently— and would not be covered under the intent of this management plan.

But it isn't— but was previously covered under actions taken by the Board of Fish for the Chignik River King Salmon Action Plan. The proposal doesn't outline specific objectives to accomplish, but would likely encompass all of the North Alaska Peninsula drainages in a single set of regulations and could include elements of all the other sportfishing proposals coming before the board at this meeting. The department's unable to support a prescriptive management approach because current stock assessment monitoring tools and management capacity are insufficient to form such a plan. To inform such a plan. And creating new king salmon management plan for the drainages described above might require the department and the board to comprehensively evaluate current sport, commercial, and subsistence fisheries and develop regulation— regulations, bag and possession, and annual limits, and possibly develop new escapement goals for many of these systems.

Stock status and population estimates may need to be performed to inform the process, but the department is neutral on the allocative aspects of this proposal. Proposal. Thank you. For discussion, Mr. Carpenter. Thank you.

Um, I'm not going to get on my soapbox like I did in Bristol Bay, but to the public, these are very extensive management plans have to be developed over a period of time. And so I suggest that if you would like to put a proposal in like this, that you would bring very clear language within the proposal and work with the department to bring something to the board that we could actually do. There's, there's no way that we could pass this in theory right now. So please take that into consideration. And then there's a fair amount of cost associated with doing this too, which, you know, is a little bit beyond the board's purview.

So I mean, for those reasons alone, I can't support it. It's a little soapbox. Just kidding. Mr. Wood. Thank you.

I can understand why people would like to have a plan, probably for every river that we have a management plan. It's kind of tough, and out here, a little further away, I know it could get some, you know, use from remote lodges and stuff like that that may require this, but I don't know, in this case, I'm not into it. There's a lot we're asking of the department that have higher priorities, so I'm not Voting for it. Mr. Owen. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair.

I agree, and I want to thank the proposer. I know that this proposer was up and participating in committee the whole a lot at Bristol Bay, and I understand the intention and the desire to have plans in place for our king salmon stocks right now. But this is too non— it's, it's too vague at this time. But I encourage the continuation of it coming back, and maybe I'll be a little bit more specific next time. Mr. Carpenter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll reference my subsistence review from prior proposals. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional direct cost for a private person to participate in the fishery. The approval of this proposal may result in additional cost to the department. I'd call the question.

Question's been called. Errors and omissions? Seeing none, Director Nelson, call the roll, please. Final action on Proposal 161. Carpenter.

No. Erwin? No. Godfrey? No.

Carlson-Vandort? No. Wood? No. Svensson?

No. Chamberlain? No. Motion fails 0-7, Madam Chair. Proposal number 156.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Proposal 156, 5AAC 65022, Special Provisions for Bag Possession and Annual Limits and Methods and Means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands Area. Madam Chair, move the board adopt Proposal 156 with substitute language found in 146. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board has before it the language in 146 in lieu of the original proposal.

Staff comments, please.

Madam Chair, Proposal 156 as amended by RC146 would create two separate bag limits for Alaska residents and non-Alaska residents in all of the Bering Sea drainages of the Alaska Peninsula, which is the North Peninsula.

Essentially the same as the Northern District for commercial fisheries. Alaska residents would be allowed a bag and possession limit of 1 fish with an annual limit of 2 fish. And non-residents would not be allowed to retain king salmon. And— [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] It would be catch and release for non-residents. And kings must be caught— any king caught must be released immediately.

It would retain the king salmon bag limit for fish less than 20 inches for for jacks of 10 fish, which is currently in place in the Alaska Peninsula. And then it would restrict tackle to only unbaited single hook artificial lures or flies during the king salmon season from January 1st through July 25th. The only exception to this— so essentially this would replace the existing exceptions for King Salmon River, Bear River, Nelson River, and Sandy River. It would retain bait restrictions in the Sandy River year-round, as well as the exceptions for rainbow and steelhead trout in the Sandy River. Those would remain in place as they currently are.

Thank you. Mr. Carpenter, would you like to speak the language? Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that was laid out pretty well.

Appreciate the department for doing that. You know, I like uniformity, and I think this is an area in the state, if you think of this many river systems over a very large swath of really uneasily accessible land. It's— I think it's clear to the public, it's much clearer to identify what the regulations are. I think some of these small stocks of king salmon, you know, they're sustainable, but we need to keep an eye on them. And I think that that's why providing opportunity to residents If they were to seek to go out there to some of these remote places, I do think that, you know, we should provide that opportunity.

And that was specific to the Nelson River. It's like I kept thinking about what we did in Bristol Bay specific to the Nushagak. And we had— we have a stock of concern there and we allowed harvest on both sides. And then I look right down the Peninsula, and here's the Nelson River that's meeting its escapement goal, and it's Kesserie Sone, and it just did not make any sense to me. So this is kind of restrictive still.

It's a 1-fish daily bag for Alaska residents, but it's an annual limit of 2. So I think with the amount of people that are going to actually utilize this, it's probably going to be very limited amount of harvest. The other thing about this is there are a lot of— there are a lot of lodges out there spread out across a big swath of land. I did speak to a few of those lodge owners. I believe we had somebody from one of them show up in Committee of the Whole to lend his support.

And so I haven't had anybody that is either a lodge owner or really anybody that has come up to me and said that they don't support this. This idea. So that's the language. I try to answer any questions if anyone has one. Thank you, Mr. Owen.

Oh, your mic's on then. Oh, I'm so— I have a question. So are there biological concerns that the department has related to the king salmon stocks? And you know what's being contemplated in the substitute language? Madam Chair, we, we don't currently have conservation concerns with North Alaska Peninsula king salmon for sport fisheries.

The harvest is very low. It's—. We don't have, as we discussed earlier, well, last week I guess, as we discussed then, the statewide harvest.

Doesn't estimate harvest by drainage, but the overall harvest for the Alaska Peninsula is average is about 250 fish. This would be more— this would reduce harvest beyond that, even considering it would allow a small amount of harvest in some drainages like Nelson, Bear, and King Salmon. Given that, I guess I just— I'm wondering the need to parse between Alaska residents and non-residents. There's— there are lodges out there. If there aren't conservation concerns, apparent.

I mean, I agree 100% with the bag and possession limits and the annual limit of 2. Is that what the current EO is in the Gulf, like in saltwater?

Madam Chair, there's, there's really no saltwater sport fishing in this area, but in the, in the south side, in the Gulf of Alaska, it's 1 per day, no annual limit in the saltwaters. Bag and possession limit in some of the— in many of the North Peninsula rivers are 2 per day, 5 per year. However, like Cinder, Meshick, North Hills, North Creek, Black Hills. What about the EOs that were recently issued? The one we just issued for, for the Alaska Peninsula and for Kodiak was a bag limit of 1 per day in the saltwater, no annual limit, which is a reduction from 2 per day, no annual limit.

Right. Okay. Thank you. I mean, I guess I would just— I, I'm fine with the bag and possession limits. I think that's great.

I just don't see the need to restrict. There's a [Speaker:DR. LISA JOHNSON] There's— outside of the commercial fishery, there's not a lot of other options in terms of economics and bringing money or attracting folks into the region. I know that some areas are looking at biotourism and things like that, which I think is great, but it seems to me that if there isn't this concern and there is a harvestable surplus, particularly in the Nelson and some of the other rivers that you just talked about, it seems to me that this does become allocative, and I wouldn't want to inadvertently harm some of the bright spots or potential bright spots for some economies out here. So those are my thoughts on it. Mr.

Carpenter. Yeah, thank you for those comments, Madam Chair, and I can speak to that a little bit. You know, I kind of went back and forth on this one, but, you know, generally I mean, when you think about the remote nature of this place, you know, there's not a lot of harvest. But there was a general consensus from the lodge owners who are basically the economic drivers for the most part on a lot of those systems. And a little bit of concern about people maybe around the Nelson River area, you know, kind of coming in there.

There seemed to be a consensus that— of support for the idea, at least for now, to provide opportunity for residents. The other aspect is this— most— some of the lodge owners were basically saying a lot of them have their own lodge policies where they don't allow king salmon to be harvested. They do take one occasionally under 20 inches if they want to eat one or something like that. And that is kind of— was kind of the sentiment that they're not really interested in letting their clients do it. So that's— I guess that's kind of the justification for the route that I went.

Last question, then I'll get other folks in here. What— I'm trying to recall what the action taken in Bristol Bay was. Did we reduce bag possession limits or make specific bag and bag and possession limits and just identify between Alaskan residents and non-residents? No, Madam Chair. So what are the current regs in just the adjacent areas?

Madam Chair, is there a particular drainage you're interested in? Or just north, north, you know, north of the North Penn Cut-Off, I guess. So the Bristol Bay area and those In those areas, Ugashik, I guess, Igugik, Koyukjuk. Well, for the— hold on one second, please.

If memory serves, on the Nushagak, I think we just did single hook, no bait, but kept it. I think it's 4 annually, only 1 may be over 28, for both residents and non-residents. So as the RC is written, basically it is allocated between residents and non-residents for diversity of experience, experience, and not necessarily biological reasons. That is up to the board, you know, to, to weigh in on. But we feel if it was, you know, there is enough yield down there to do, do all fishers under the 2 annual.

Yeah, I guess I mean, I understand where Member Carpenter is coming from. I get it and I appreciate it. And under You know, but again, for— I think the word was uniformity or consistency. It just strikes me as strange that we would allow that in a stock of concern and in other adjacent area rivers and then restrict down here where there's even less pressure or less interest. I don't know, I'm just trying to reconcile it.

I'm open to other people's thoughts. Mr. Swenson. I know by EO it was one king in the Kodiak and out there in the salt, and I believe it was zero for non-residents. Am I correct or not? Mr. Svenson, through the chair, Kodiak has a management plan for saltwater king salmon fisheries that does have a resident and non-resident differential, but the department doesn't have EO authority under that plan.

It's only the board's authority to do that. For the EOs that we issued, those were for all anglers in the salt waters only. All the other king salmon fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska in my area, so Chignik, Karlik, and Nakluk, have been closed in river for quite some time. Those are quite different though. They're not— we could manage the North Peninsula streams by EO, but the conservation concerns are not there like they are for the Gulf of Alaska systems.

Well, I was talking about the saltwater. Yeah. Isn't it one king by EO for residents a day? And non-residents could not keep a fish. Isn't that correct?

Through the chair, no, it's, it's one, one per day for all anglers in the saltwater for the Gulf of Alaska. Okay, thank you.

Mr. Owen. Yeah, thank you, Member Carpenter. I just have two questions for you. So on line 2 of this, the possession limit of 10 fish, just wondering if that's like in alignment with other areas, or, you know, where that number came from. And then for number 3, why the Sandy River is, is an exception.

Um, and the department can correct me if I'm wrong. Yes, that's kind of a standard possession and size limit in lots of areas around the state, and so that's why it was included. And then I believe on number 3, um, there were specific language currently in regulation that dealt with the Sandy River specifically because it's a year-round regulation. And so that was just included to keep that particular river and the restrictions on that one in place. Yeah, Miss Irwin, through the chair, Mr. Carpenter, those regulations are separate from the standard king salmon bag limit for fish over 20 inches.

They're separate regulations, and they both predate actions recently taken by the board in drainages like King Salmon, Bear, and Nelson River. Okay, thank you for the clarification. All right. I am just going to put this to bed, but I guess my preference would be I am all for most of the elements of this. I would prefer to see this with the Alaska resident struck and then 1(b) struck entirely and then the rest of it looks good to me.

But those are my thoughts. I just don't see the reason to differentiate. But, um, that's where it is. Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you.

I'd say I just being somewhat familiar with the idea that some of these lodges allow staff that are local to fly out to these places and have an opportunity just to go sport fishing or bring home some— something is a nice opportunity, and a lot of them don't want to take their clients along that are non-residents, so Mr. Carpenter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Approval of this proposal is not expected to result in any additional direct cost for a private person to participate, and approval of this proposal is not expected to result in additional cost to the department. I call the question.

Question has been called. Errors and omissions?

Seeing none, I'm assuming— I didn't even see a head shake that time. Director Nelson, please call the roll. Final action on Proposal 156 as amended. Wood? Yes.

Godfrey? No. Carlson-Vandork? Yes. Erwin?

Yes. Chamberlain? Yes. Carpenter? Yes.

Svenson? Yes. Motion carries, 6 in favor, 1 against, Madam Chair. Proposal number 157. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Proposal 157, 5AEC 65022, special provisions for bag possession and annual limits and methods means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands area. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 157 based on its action on Proposal 146. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. RC146. RC146.

Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 157. Proposal number 158. Proposal 158, 5 AAC 65022, special provisions for bag possession and annual limits and methods and means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands area.

Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 158 based on its action found in RC 146. Second that. Naskere, unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 158. Proposal 159.

Proposal 159, 5 AAC 65022, special provisions for bag possession and annual limits and methods and means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands area. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 159 based on its actions on RC 146. I second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 159. Proposal 160.

Proposal 160, 5 AAC 65022, Special Provisions for Bag Possession and Annual Limits and Methods and Means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands Area. Madam Chair, I move the board take no action on Proposal 160 based on its action in RC146. I second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal 160. Proposal 155.

Proposal 155, 5AAC 65022, Special Provisions for Bag Possession and Annual Limits and Methods and Means in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands Area. Madam Chair, move the board take no action on Proposal 155 based on its action on RC146. Second that and ask for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, the board will take no action on Proposal Number 155. Director Nelson, do we have any miscellaneous business to attend to?

No, we don't, Madam Chair. The only thing I wanted to point out is that, um, we would have had an emergency petition, uh, which is in your RCs as RC 85. However, just this afternoon we received a request to withdraw from the petition authors, and that is found in RC 271. So I just wanted to note that for the record, Madam Chair. Thank you, Director Nelson.

Um, before we adjourn, are there any board or staff comments? Looking around the table, any comments? Mr. Carper. I will just make a quick one. I really appreciate the public and I really appreciate, you know, considering the nature of the meeting and as far as people had to travel to come here, it was a very civil meeting and I always appreciate that.

And always to the staff, an excellent job at providing the board with information. So thank you very much for that. Thank you. Member Carpenter's comments. As always, I am appreciative.

I'm in awe of the public and their knowledge and that they're willing to come forward and participate and help inform the decisions around their fisheries. And the staff does a great job. I know that there was a prolific amount of RCs at this one, and I appreciate all the work, particularly with board support and helping to get those to us so that we could stay on track. Mr. Wood. Yeah, thank you.

I too would also like to thank everybody over the years actually for helping better understand what's going on in these areas. And as always, especially the department staff, it gives me great insight. And thank you for making these microphones work and all of these RCs, you guys. Director Nelson, did you have a comment? Just wanted to thank my board staff that are here with us.

Annie in particular. You may have noticed that Sam Kirby tagged in for Kyle, who went home last night. And Natalie, thank you very much. Also, thank you to Layla, who is not here for this meeting, but being based in Anchorage, she was a huge behind-the-scenes help and support for this meeting. Thank you.

All right. Thanks. Thanks for putting in the long hours so we could get through all of the, the public testimony, the traditional knowledge. It was An informative meeting for sure. Without seeing any other comments, we are adjourned at 4:01 PM.