2024 was a perfect storm for king salmon – or chinook – fishing in Southeast Alaska. The sport fishery, driven primarily by guided nonresidents, exceeded its allocation of kings for the second year in a row, and the overage was deducted from the commercial troll allocation. Hence, there was no second commercial troll opening for kings last August.
Meanwhile, resident sport anglers were caught in the middle, and they couldn’t retain kings in August, either. This was frustrating for many, since resident sport fishing for kings in Southeast is more or less a subsistence fishery, important to filling freezers for the winter.
Enter Proposal 109, penned by Sitka troller Jacquie Foss, which would give Fish & Game the authority to manage these competing interests on the fly, during the season, by dialing up or ratcheting down bag limits for nonresidents, while trying to preserve a stable, season-long bag limit for residents, and maintaining the three-decade old 80/20 allocation split between commercial and sport harvesters.
Longtime Sitka troller Jeff Farvour supported the proposal, saying his industry had no way to recover the losses from the last two years.
“The 2023 and ‘24 sport overages, driven by nonresident angler harvest, push the sport fishery to exceed its allocation by over 30,000 fish,” said Farvour. “This overage was deducted from the trip from the troll fishery at a cost of $2.2 million in ex-vessel value, which is about $4.4 million in first wholesale value.”
Linda Behnken, another Sitka troller and the director of the Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association, also believed 109 would stabilize the Southeast king fisheries.
“In recent years, one sector, the guided nonresident sport sector, has exceeded its allocation and preempted other sectors,” she said. “That is the problem we ask you to solve.”
Behnken asked the board to preserve the historic 80/20 split, and to give the Department of Fish & Game the tools to accomplish that. “No sector should be rewarded for allocation overages,” she said.
The board also heard compelling testimony from the charter sector, particularly arguments about the downstream economic benefits to communities and the region from out-of-state sport fishermen who book expensive trips to lodges. Board member Greg Svendson, an ardent sportsman, focused on this math, even though he didn’t quite have the vocabulary.
“The sports fishery brings in six times to the economy that the trawl fishery brings in,” said Svedson, making the classic trawl/troll substitution, common among those unfamiliar with Southeast’s fisheries. “Trawl… troll, I’m sorry, I got it. Troll, trawl: they’re close together. I know the difference as all you do too. So anyway, to continue on, the sports fishery brings in six times more to the economy than the troll fishery, yet the troll gets four times as many fish. I find this hard. You know, the fish belong to all of us.”
The board’s middle-of-the-road solution was to not lean too far into the positions of the sport or commercial industries, and instead to find a way to keep sport fishing open for residents for the entire season. Board chair Märit Carlson-Van Dort offered an amendment adjusting the 80/20 split to 75/25, to ensure that there would be enough kings on the sport side for residents.
“So the intention with the language as it stands right now was to provide the Department that flexibility to manage to primarily, first and foremost, a resident priority,” she said.
Board member Mike Wood, a commercial set-netter from Talkeetna, proposed amending the split yet again to 77/23. Wood’s amendment passed, over the objection of board vice-chair Tom Carpenter, a commercial fisherman from Cordova.
“What it comes down to for me is this: there will be a substantial management change based on the language associated with these two numbers,” Carpenter said. “I do not feel that this three-percent buffer is going to guarantee the residents a king salmon priority.”
Dropping another three-percent from their allocation of king salmon was an unwelcome development for the Southeast commercial troll fleet. The guided sport industry would not be particularly happy with a three-percent increase that was created for the benefit of residents.
To board member Curtis Chamberlain, the deal sounded like a win.
“I’ve been through about 500 to 1,000 mediations over the course of my career, and every mediator will tell you that he’s done a good job if both sides walk away equally unhappy,” said Chamberlain. “And to Mr. Wood and Ms. Carlson-Van Dort, based on the discussions I’ve had with everyone in the crowd following this, great job!”
Chamberlain voted in favor. Carpenter and Gerad Godfrey opposed. Proposal 109 passed the Board of Fish 5-2. The new regulations will take effect this year.
