Gov. Mike Dunleavy has pledged to engage with British Columbia to protect Alaska’s natural resources and environment. That’s in response to lawmakers’ concern over potential threats from transboundary mining.

Lawmakers across party lines penned a letter last month urging the Dunleavy administration to keep a close eye on Canadian mines in shared watersheds.

Twenty two legislators signed the letter urging the governor and lieutenant governor to pick up where the Walker administration left off.

This month they got an answer. A two-page letter signed by the governor catalogued high-level contacts between state and provincial officials. He called it “important work” to remain engaged over transboundary rivers.

“They said in the letter that they were going to continue with the process, so I was heartened by that,” said Ketchikan independent Rep. Dan Ortiz. “But it was not quite as energetic as I would have liked to seen.”

There was no specific mention of mining in the governor’s letter. Lawmakers had raised concerns over the roughly dozen B.C. mines that are permitted, operating or lie abandoned in shared watersheds with Southeast Alaska.

Last year Gov. Walker had urged B.C. to require mine operators post reclamation bonds before work starts. That’s in line with Alaska regulations designed to ensure mining companies can afford to pay for clean up later. It’s also insurance toward catastrophes.

Environmental and fishing groups on both sides of the border have been pushing B.C. reform its mining regulations for years.

Jill Weitz is with Salmon Beyond Borders in Juneau.

“There’s a need for financial assurances, essentially liability and accountability, to be placed on the B.C. mining industry for impacts to our shared water,” said Jill Weitz with Salmon Beyond Borders in Juneau. “As opposed to the communities of Southeast Alaska having to pay the burden of those impacts from their mining practices.”

Gov. Dunleavy’s letter didn’t get into specifics. But it said a teleconference between his cabinet and B.C. ministers is planned for June 18.

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Pat’s Lake is a popular fishing area near Wrangell that could be the site of a restoration project under the Southeast Alaska Mitigation Fund. (Katarina Sostaric/KSTK)

Wrangell’s tribe and city have won a year-long fight to protect a fishing stream and popular recreation site. The state had planned to dispose of tons of lead-contaminated soil at a rock pit near Pat’s Creek as soon as possible. But many in the community spoke out against disposal at the contentious site.  Legislators took note of those concerns and allocated $5 million to ship the waste entirely off the island. 

The Wrangell Cooperative Association never budged from its original position: no disposal near Pat’s Creek. The tribe looked for alternative sites, extra federal funding and outside scientific opinion. All options were on the table, but most did not pan out.

Then, the tribe reached out to elected officials and met with Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott. And Gov. Bill Walker went to bat for the concerned citizens of Wrangell. He requested $5 million to ship the soil off Wrangell Island. Then, the Senate and House just passed that appropriation in its capital budget.

“I told my children and my daughter Natalia was so happy she said, ‘Mom this means we can go ice skating on Pat’s Lake this winter,'” said Esther Ashton, WCA’s tribal administrator.

The contaminated soil comes from the old Byford Junkyard, where residents dumped dead cars for decades. The lead came from their batteries. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation cleaned up much of the junk and treated the soil with a stabilizing agent.

The state agency proposed placing the soil at the rock pit, which is a thousand feet from the creek. ADEC says it is a more-than-safe option for hundreds of years to come. But DEC’s director Jeff Rogers understands the public’s concern.

“When you have a contaminated site in your backyard it is a passionate local issue. We believe the site at Pat’s Creek to be environmentally viable. But people don’t want it in their backyard and there is a higher cost option and the governor supports that option,” Rogers said.

The city also contacted politicians in support of the off-island option. Wrangell’s representative in the House, Dan Ortiz, voted in favor of the funding during House Finance Committee meetings.

“I felt like I was advocating for what I felt to be the majority opinion in Wrangell,” Ortiz said.

Of course, not everyone in the Southeast city wanted this option.

Brett Woodbury is a local contractor. He has been working with the Department of Environmental Conservation on the cleanup. He says he’s prepared tons material for the rock pit that he might not be paid for. And work for him and his employees has shut down at times, when he could be pursuing other contracts in town.

The state is in the early stages of shifting gears for off-island disposal. Officials are unsure exactly where the waste will go. And it may have to find additional funding later. But the state says one thing is for sure: no disposal near Pat’s Creek.

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The ferry Taku sails into the Wrangell Narrows on its way south. Now, the ferry has been sold to a Dubai-based company. (Photo by Ed Schoenfeld)

The future of the Alaska Marine Highway System is decidedly a Southeast issue.  The ferry system has seen cuts in service due to aging vessels and decreased funding. But Southeast legislators agree the system is still vital to folks in the region. 

Here’s Rep. Justin Parish.

“When you have a sports team that’s looking to travel. When you’ve got an elderly person that needs to get to town to get medical treatment, sometimes a flight isn’t going to be a realistic option,” Parish says.

But Alaska representatives have different opinions on funding and management for the system. Gov. Bill Walker’s proposed budget allots $88 million to the ferry system. A budget provision threatens that the ferry system won’t have enough funds to operate in the Spring. The governor’s proposal does fill that gap.

Rep. Dan Ortiz says that at this point, he’s not going to ask for more than that.  

 “I called the marine highway system and asked them flat out is this amount that the governor is proposing in his budget going to meet your needs and are you going to be able to provide services at the level that you have been providing services with this budget amount. And they said flat out yes, they would be able to do that and perhaps offer a few more weeks of service than before,” Ortiz says.

Stedman believes that’s still not enough.

“But it doesn’t replenish the Marine Highway Fund, which has been thoroughly depleted. I advocate a replenishment of those funds. And we’ll get thoroughly outvoted in the Senate, I expect, but the fight is broader than that,” Stedman says.

The Southeast Conference recommended last fall to make the ferry system its own public corporation, like the Alaska Railroad. Rep. Sam Kito says he will help draft a bill to do just that, though it might not succeed.

“There’s probably not a whole lot of motivation to make something like that happen in a single session. But the issue has to be out there in order for us to be able to discuss it. And so we’re working on trying to get a bill drafted so we can have something to discuss,” Kito says.

Ortiz needs to see a plan, but supports the idea of a public corporation.

“As a part of the Department of Transportation, as it sits right now it is part of a big department and it doesn’t necessarily receive the attention of that department to level it that it might if it were more independent,” Ortiz says.

Stedman has some concerns about incorporating the ferry system.

“One of the major concerns is I don’t want it easier for the rail-belt to isolate and not fund the Marine Highway. We need to protect the Marine Highway and not accelerate a restructuring of it to our demise,” Stedman says.

Sen. Dennis Egan said to Juneau assembly members last Friday, that he also thinks Southeast legislators will end up butting heads with those from the interior when it comes to the ferry system.    

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