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Years ago in the Bristol Bay Times-Dutch Harbor Fisherman: Region unites in CDQ application

February 17th 3:15 pm | Jim Paulin Print this article   Email this article   Create a Shortlink for this article

June 5, 1992

Bristol Bay Region - Regional communities plan to apply jointly for one big share of the Pollock community development quota. The plan is to act soon, although many details need to be worked out. That was the outcome of a Monday, June 1, session at the Dillingham Village Council building. About 50 people attended.

A steering committee was appointed to form a management organization composed of at least 75 percent regional fisherman, which would prepare an application. The regional organization requires resolutions of support from each community's governing body, such as a city council or traditional council.

The Western Alaska Community Development Quota (CDQ) program aims to give coastal Bering Sea communities' a share in the rich bottom fish fisheries. The villages, ranging from the Aleutians to the Bering Straits, have lacked the resources to share in the business off their shores, now dominated by the big boats of the Seattle-based high seas fleet.

CDQ's threated by lawsuit?

However, CDQs are now threatened by a lawsuit filed the American Factory Trawler Association in U.S. District Court in Seattle last week. The lawsuit is an attempt to overturn a North Pacific Fisheries Management Council decision guaranteeing a pollock percentage, as well as banning at-sea processors from 18,000 square miles of sea reserved for shoreside catcher vessels.

AFTA spokesman Bruce Buls said the lawsuit doesn't mention CDQs, but both CDQs and the onshore- offshore allocation were approved in the same amendment, so both will swim or sink together in federal court.

"If we prevail, the whole package is null and void," Buls said. Buls contends the amendment was approved with insufficient public review.

"It's not because of the CDQs, its because they're tacked onto this other allocation scheme we can't live with," Buls said from Seattle Tuesday."

The CDQs are kind of a hostage in this whole process," observed Jim Cornelius, NPFMC staff economist in Anchorage. The CDQs apply to the Bering Sea Pollock harvest. The 63 eligeble coastal villages may apply either individually or jointly. The maximum that any one applicant can seek is one-third of the annual CDQ allocation.

Quotes may come by November

The First CDQs may come as early as November, but most aren't expected until January. The CDQ plan sets aside 7.5 percent of the maximum annual Bering Sea Pollock catch for the 63 villages, which will compete among themselves in a state-administered program.

At current prices at between $25- and $45-million, based on 97,500 metric tons of the 1.3 billion metric ton Bering Sea total allowable Pollock catch for 1992.

"This is not a dividend program. You will not get a quota to sit back at home and wait for a check. You have to be physically involved," said John Walsh, of the state Department of Community and Regional Affairs.

Group projects work best with Pollock, Walsh said. "It's going to be a bulk operation. It's a low value, high volume species." He added that a small one-village operation would probably fail.

Walsh describes a competitive application process that favors "a marriage" between applicants and fish processors. The state will review applications and make recommendations to the federal North Pacific Fisheries Management Council.

"It's best to work with an existing operation," Walsh said. Fish processing companies are already salivating over CDQs. Two processors were represented at the meeting, Golden Age Fisheries and Arctic Alaska Fisheries.

Even if a federal court strikes down CDQs because of their onshore-off shore linkage. Walsh said he expects the CDQ program will survive on its own merits.

David Bensen, of Seattle- based Arctic Alaska, suggested a partnership or joint venture with his company offers production, marketing, employment and management strengths.

We have the the capital to invest, and we have the corporate management structure to help manage the company, Bensen said. He offered to prepare a business plan required for a CDQ application.

"Arctic Alaska's management could put something together pretty easily, and we could pick up the cost of doing that," Bensen said. Responding to Hazel Nelson's question, Bensen admitted Arctic Alaska is talking to other groups of CDQ-eligible Bering Sea villages as well.

Terry Hoefferle, executive director of the Bristol Bay Native Association, the meeting's sponsor, estimated the cost of preparing a business plan at as much as $40,000.

Concerns about CDQ's

Several concerns were raised, including village representation and affiliation with the trawl fleet.

Joe Clark of Clarks Point expressed fear of Dillingham domination. He insisted Dillingham's representation on a regional CDQ organization should be equal to Clarks' or Ekuk's, regardless of size. Dillingham Mayor Tom Tilden quickly agreed.

Appointed to a CDQ steering committee were Val Angason, Robin Samuelsen and Harvey Samuelsen, all of Dillingham; Davis Nanalook, Togiak; Hazel Nelson, Egegik; Norman Anderson, Naknek; and Emil Christiansen, Pilot Point.

Doubts were expressed about linking up with the big bottom fish business.

Aleknagik Natives Ltd. Business Manager Fred Nishimura worried about involvement in unfathomable "high sea politics," where motices aren't always clear.

BBNA lawyer Bruce Baltar said CDQ groups could require environmental protection by starting " we don't want to get into the raping and pillaging business."

Bensen said Arctic Alaska offers various job opportunities, including management positions, not just "slime line" processing jobs.

Nishimura, Harvey Samuelsen, and Moses Toyukak of Manoktak expressed concern for area villages geographically excluded from CDQ eligibility, including Ekwok, New Stuyahok, Koliganek, Levelock and Lake Iliamna villages. CDQ eligibility is limited to villages within 50 miles if the three-mile offshore state water boundary.

 

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