Gordon Chew runs a small logging operation in Corner Bay, just across the inlet from Tenakee Springs. (Photo courtesy of Gordon Chew)
Opinions expressed in commentary on KCAW are those of the author, and are not necessarily shared by the station’s board, staff, or volunteers.
Doing good business means thinking ahead. My name is Gordon Chew, and my son Sterling and I run the Tenakee Logging Company. We are loggers. We make our living in this forest.
Our business model has depended upon sustainable, selective old growth logging. This means no more than one out of every three trees in a unit is marked for harvest, leaving a viable, intact stand.
We are forest users too. We hunt. We gather. We go there because it is beautiful. These stands help all of us fill our freezers and provide for our livelihoods.
The group of local stakeholders that created the Tongass Land Management Plan was thinking ahead when they agreed upon core areas that need protection and set aside other areas for logging and future development. Sterling and I recognize that old growth clear-cutting and exportation in the round is unsustainable and unnecessary.
Shipwrights restoring the aging fishing fleet come to us for old growth yellow cedar. Students in Angoon are making traditional paddles with our wood. Right now, the shop class at Sitka High School is constructing small buildings with the first cut of young growth timber from the Northern Tongass.
On the other hand, Senator [Lisa] Murkowski is doing bad business for the Tongass. She is catering to those who would take us back to the past. Her riders in the upcoming spending bill would sabotage the Land Management Plan and silence the local voices that worked so hard to create it.
We are living now with the legacy of clear-cut lands, but we can’t continue to support an economy that doesn’t value these trees for what they are worth. The transition policy requires a young growth component.
When the Forest Service proposed a selection of 10% young growth in our first sale, we countered with a 40% selection. There is no good reason for dragging our feet into the future when we have the capacity and the demand to be leaders in the new economy.
Senator Murkowski doesn’t think that young growth is viable, but she is wrong. The proof is visible in the Tongass, where young trees are already harvested and utilized across Southeast.
Sterling and I are creating solutions to adapt to the changing dynamics of the Tongass. Our Congressional leaders should support this innovation. Alaskans deserve a sustainable, forward-thinking economy and an end to the boom-and-bust of the old days.
The Tongass Land Management Plan protects what we depend on in the forest and provides us with opportunities to use these resources responsibly. My name is Gordon Chew and my son Sterling and I own and operate the Tenakee Logging Company in Tenakee Springs, Alaska.
