Greenpeace

As many of you know, in another life, I served as a Priest of the Holy Orthodox Church for about twenty years. I was happy. I knew my mission and I wallowed in it. As time went on, I stumbled and fell, behaving in ways unbecoming a person of my position, and so the Holy Synod of Bishops did me a blessing and releaved me of that awesome responsibility. For that love I am grateful. But, this is not what I wanted to talk about.

No matter whom and what we might believe in, either Jesus Christ as the Son of God, Mohammad as a Profit, Moses, or Budda, we all know there is right and wrong at play in this world. There is good and evil. In that line, and for those who will, it is our responsibility to root out evil, or bad, when we know of it. All of us know when that "something" is happening and present. We can sometimes feel it, taste it and know of its works. It is divisive, separating and not caring what it does. It rejoices in greed, division and suffering of others. Simply, evil or bad, celebrates our differences and uses those differences against us. This is common when we speak about resources and those who will take and take without any concern for those who do not have the ability to take advantage of its bounty. 

In our work, it seems, that division is particularly noticeable. We work day in and day out, trying to find a balance between the haves and the have nots. We struggle to make the playing field even for all. And sometimes we falter in our efforts, not because we no longer believe, but because as people we often come up against a brick wall. And we lose hope.  You see, if we do our work with good and pure intentions to right what is wrong, our work will be successful and we will not lose hope. But if we do our work with dark internal intentions of hurting another with a different opinion, we will lose hope and our work will not be good. Oh, we may have some victories, but they will be short lived. What we want to do is right wrongs, do good, and work for that end. Our mission as advocates is to walk a fine line, a sharp edged sword, to fulfill that goal. And it begins with purity of heart. I am doing this because it is right and for no other reason. If we save one species of plant or animal from extinction and have not a pure heart, our work is for naught. Examples abound. I with my work with the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, others with climate change and forests and whales. We can only succeed with purity of mind and heart. Our reasons and efforts must be to teach and help others understand what is right and good. As my friend reminded me not too long ago, this kind of work will take time. I cried at those words because I had forgotten my mission. 

I know there are many who will "spin" this with thoughts and better arguments. I am not trying to convince you of my beliefs. I am simply asking that we think about this. This is not to say that I think we are doing otherwise, nor focusing on something I see we are either doing or not. Just saying something. Something to think about, because I do know, if what we do is not without truth and honesty, no matter what we do it will not work. 

As the season of peace and love draws and the promises of a new year appear, the promise of a new administration offer us hope, let us renew our efforts to work with honesty and truthfulness. Only in this way will we have any real success.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have just read the action alert sent out by my coworker John Hocevar, Director Ocean's Campaign, Starving For Your Help. I have worked with John going on four years now, mostly working on Alaska's vast Gulf and Seas, surrounding our Great Land. I am writing in total support of Mr. Hocevar's statements. 

As many, if not all of you know, I was born and raised on St. George Island, one of the two inhabited Pribilof Islands. These Islands are a wonderful place, not only for the richness of its wildlife, but imagine what it is like for the people, the Unangan (Aleut) who call this home. As a young Unangan boy, my entire life was surrounded by this richness. This is perhaps why I grew up to major in biology when I went to college. My life, as I understand now, was rich and filled with beauty. There were millions of fur seals, whales, stellar sea lion and countless millions of just about every marine birds one can imagine. That was just a short 30 years ago.

 Today, as John said, it is a totally different place. It is becoming bleak, forelorn, empty of its once abundance. We Unangan said: "God put us here to take care of His creation." This is what we believe. Sadly, we are not even close to the numbers of people, the money of large fishing companies with their lobbyests, nor close to having the political clout to fulfill this belief. 

 I ask you to please consider helping us and our fragile home. Often, as you know, seeing something is always preferable to reading about it. If you saw what these Islands and the Bering Sea is being turned into, you would understand what John and I are saying. 

Thank you very much for your help.

 

George Pletnikoff

Fishing Villages

It is very difficult for people to get an understanding of what happens to an entire village in Alaska that is dependent upon fishing for their economy.

It is said that for every fishing boat, most fishing boats in villages are under 55 feet in length, there are at least 10 jobs crated to support that boat. First, of course, is the crew. Usually on a boat this size, and depending upon what species of fish or crab they are fishing for, there is a crew of 5 people: the skipper and four deck hands. Then you have the fuel handlers, gear shops, grocery stores, and transportation industry. So you can see that in a village of 500 people, a lot of jobs in the support industry is created the more fishing boats there are in the village. Now, imagine that same scenario when we are talking about a billion-dollar a year industry such as there is in the pollock fishery. Together, in both the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea, that billion-dollar fishing industry harvests approximately 3,000,000,000 pounds of fish. Three billions. Imagine, if you will, the amount of jobs created in a village when that amount of fish has to be caught, delivered and processed, then shipped to the markets. The amount of people and expense to do this is staggering. Now imagine what happens to that village if the total allowable catch is severely lowered by the fishery managers and then if that fishery collapses. Imagine what happens to that village. Worse yet, imagine what happens to the environment, the ecosystem if such a scenario were to materialize.

The other side of this picture is people living in villages who are not a part of this economic activity and way of life. They are, as was labeled by politicians several years ago, the silent majority. They are the people who work everyday in local jobs created by the State and Federal governments, the health care system, the municipal government and some by private business not necessarily related to the fishing industry. Often, the fishing industry is only a seasonal economy, as in the Bering Sea crab fishery, or the Bristol Bay salmon fishery.  These silent majorities work day in and day out, searching, hoping and planning on some semblance of the great American dream, that of being able to afford a Christmas tree, and all that that dream encompasses.

The silent majority of people in our villages supplement their incomes with cultural and ancestral activities. We go hunting, fishing and gathering for our foods. We go to the same places on the beach our ancestors have done for hundreds and thousands of years. We go, looking, searching and hoping for that sea lion, fur seal, walrus, duck, and other foods we grew up eating with our parents and grandparents, knowing of that security and the goodness of that life. We go to the familiar places to search for our spirit. We hear the voices of people long gone. We smile at the wisdom taught at this place, by people long revered. We are in a familiar place where life truly is lived. It is said that a gay person has no choice about their sexuality. The same is true about a person or people who live in that familiar place. We have no choice. It is a calling. It is life. It is, not a way to live, but simply life, such lived, above the noise of choices.

Fishery managers do not consider this life. Their only mission is to ensure that an industry has enough resource to continue. Here is where that mission, it seems to me with the problems of the pollock fishery, fails. Fishery managers rely on what they call best available science. Not sound science, but science that is best available to provide answers. What is that?

If the pollock fishery collapses, as the surveys done by National Marine Fisheries Service has shown, it will be because the fishery managers were wrong. Their best available science did not take into account the reality of what is on the ground. If and when this happens, it means entire ecosystems are in trouble, is suffering a stroke, or worst yet, a heart attack. We cannot call 911 for help. It does not work that way.

Now, consider this. If, because of this best available science, one community, one human spirit is killed, not only have we committed a crime against the environment, but worse, against another human being. We have snuffed out a spirit. We have committed cultural genocide, a holocaust. Where is the best available science, best available medicine, best available intentions, that’s going to repair that? As a friend of mine said: “Man is a spiritual being.” Best available person.

Growing up on the beaches of St. George Island, one of the five Pribilof Islands in the Bering Sea, I remember combing the beaches. There was, and is, so much to be found. Glass balls, I even found a container with chopsticks, very fancy, that I took to the Governments Island Manager’s house to find out what it was, and lots of other debris that we thought interesting and valuable. And so, after large storms, we went out on our favorite beaches looking to see what was there.

I remember that as children, growing up on this little Island, we used to collect glass balls, little balls of glass about the size of softballs today, covered with woven net. This was a prize. We used to, as kids in school, brag about how many we found, what sizes, and sometimes where. We exchanged stories about them. We talked about what we did with them, what trinkets we made, how we glued them together to make Christmas trees, and how we used files, a steel tool used to sharpen other tools, to cut a slit in them to make banks. And in these banks we put our dimes, nickels, pennies and the occasional quarter to go to the company store, or canteen run by the United States Government to buy candy. And we wondered where they came from and what they were used for. We did not know. Now we know they were used to hold up the miles long nets on the surface of the water used to kill hundreds and thousands of animals, mostly for fish, but birds, seals, whales, and anything else that would come into contact with them. And they were used by either the Japanese or Taiwanese Governments. We know that now, but not then. And they were a prize.

As time flowed by, now into the 60’s and 70’s we began to see different things coming ashore on our Islands.  Along with the occasional coke bottle, plastic bottle, glove and basket, large pieces of net began to show up. Again, being on a small Island, we did not know what these things were being used for. So, as far as we were concerned, all of this debris was normal. After all, everyone else in the world, our small world to be sure, was going through the same thing. Sure. If it was happening here it was surely happening elsewhere. Or was it?

You see? What was happening during the 60’s and 70’s while beach combing, miles and miles, and yards and yards of monofiliment nets were used to catch fish. Nets made of plastics, which would never degrade, made of by products of oil, to stretch out over the Bering Sea to kill. We did not know that, but now we do. And kill they did. They did not fall apart or come loose. They were made of a product that would last years and years. And they would, even if those who put them into the water, the fishers lost them, continue to kill and kill until there was nothing else to kill. Whales, fish, birds, seals, walruses, plankton and seaweed, no matter what came into contact with them, they were doomed to death.

Today, in the 2000’s, not much has changed, really. We still comb the beaches of the Pribilof Islands, both St. Paul and St. George and pick up stuff. Now instead of glass balls and chop sticks, we pick up nets, plastic balls, plastic gloves, plastic, plastic, plastic. Pop can  rings used to hold a six pack together is common. Plastic nets, ropes, lines caught in and around the necks of curious fur seals is oh so frequent. Often the nets are so tight around the necks of these animals that their flesh shows because it cuts into their fur. Plastic whatever. Imagine it and we pick them up. I remember not too long ago when I first began working for Greenpeace that we were on St. Paul Island. I took my buds to see one of the long sandy beaches on the Island, to walk and talk. To discuss what it was that they expected of me, an Unangan person working for a conservation group, and how I expected to fit in. We walked the beach and talked. At one point, one of the guys/gals stopped to pick up a plastic something, handed to one of the other Greenpeace persons with me and said, now its your responsibility. I did not know what that meant. Come to find out, if you pick up some piece of trash, no matter what it is, and handed it over to another of your buds, that person was now responsible for it. Needless to say, I did not accept anything from anyone else on our walk.

Today, large nets are still used to kill. The difference now is, is that they are not left to drift out in the ocean to arbitrarily kill, but are focused. Its called “directed fishery.” I am gonna kill these fishes, but sadly in the process, hundreds of millions of metric tonns of non directed fishes, called by-catch, are killed also. But, this is legal. It is considered fishing for fish using the best available science.

You know how it is said? That no matter how much has changed, everything remains the same? It’s true. Today, instead of collecting glass balls, our Tribal Government of the Aleut Community of St. Paul cleans our beaches every year. They go out to the same beaches that I used to collect collectibles and collect trash, tons of trash. And its all plastic trash, made to never degrade.Look at  www.tribaleco.com/entang/

Instead of talking to our friends in school about making Christmas trees and glass ball banks with what we found on the beach, we are now talking about what kind of people live out there who allow this to happen. Who are they? What are there values? What are they thinking? Indeed, what are we thinking that we allow this to happen?

When the fishing gear, be they larger than football field sized nets that drag the oceans floor for fish, crab pots, longline fishing hooks, or other gear used to catch and kill fish, much more than fish are being destroyed. Lets look at one of them. The deep-sea trawlers that hunt and search for pollock and other flat fishes.

The first major commercial groundfish fishery in the Gulf of Alaska targeted Pacific Ocean perch. The size of the catch rose quickly through the early 1960’s until the resource was depleted.  The fishery then began targeting walley pollock. As happened with perch, the catch of pollock rose gradually through 1980 when a large spawning aggregation was discovered in the waters off of Kodiak Island. Over the next 5 years the spawning aggregation was heavily exploited and the fishery peaked and collapsed. (Trites 1991).

The same picture can be painted for these fisheries in the Bering Sea. Yellowfin sole catches rose from 1954 to 1961 until the stock declined due to overfishing. As the yellowfin sole declined, the fishery moved to pollock. (Trites 1991).

Now we know that the pollock fishery in the Kodiak waters, the Bogoslov Island waters, and the Aleutian Islands have either been shut down due to overfishing or their catchable amounts severely cut because of overfishing. So what’s new? Outside multinational fishing companies see an opportunity to exploit beyond reason, come into our waters and destroy. Sounds like a familiar tune when discussing other resources in our Great State? Oil and gas, minerals, forests, salmon populations and sadly, people.


Its beginning to sound like a problem that needs some serious attention from our state and federal governments. After all, our governments lay claim to represent all the people of both our State and Nation. Oh ya, we do have such oversight boards and councils. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and the Alaska Board of Fish (ABF) are legally charged with that responsibility. And to help in these processes, Advisory Councils are put in place to help give direction. NMFS has the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) and the ABF has regional advisory Councils. But guess what? The NPFMC and the ABF are stocked, not with fish, but with commercial fishing representatives and interests to make these decisions. And these councils and boards are ripe for the plucking. Industry lobbyists and lawyers often wine and dine these “representatives of the people’s resource” to get their quotas, no matter the science. And they often get their way. Take a quick look at the NPFMC’s web site and see who the Council members are and whom they work for.

“Drill, baby, drill” is not a new cry for resource development at any cost. In the 1980’s and 1990’s and up to this day it has been “fish, baby, fish” before there are no more fish to catch. With the problems of climate change, other animals’ populations crashing and people being dislocated, it is time to reappoint “representative” people to these councils and boards. Industry greed and ways of doing business has got to stop. There is a lot of talk these days about reform. If ever an industry needed reform, this is it.

Just last year, the NPFMC cut the total amount of pollock catch a whopping 24% from the year before! If that same amount of decline were done to, say, the oil and gas industries, you would hear a loud cry from the public. We need to pay close attention to the reasons for this kind of management of our resources. One of the reasons given for the drastic cut the pollock fishery took was lack of recruitment. Oh ya. I forgot to tell you that twice a year, millions of pounds of pollock roe, the caviar of the Bering Sea, is auctioned off to a hand full of “by invitation only” companies.
“Fish, baby, fish.”

This is the people’s resource put into the trusting hands of appointed Councils. We must hold them accountable. They work for us, not the industry.

Greenpeace applauds the decision by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) to limit bottom trawl fisheries in the northern Bering Sea. Any cutback on this destructive fishery practice is welcome news. However, in this case, it’s misleading.

Industrial fishing, with the exception of the use of bottom trawlers, will continue in these areas. And provisions included in the decision raise alarm bells that plans may be in the making to eventually re-open the area to bottom trawlers to do their damage.

Bottom trawl lobbyists are pressuring the NPFMC to open more of this “northern boundary” because, as they themselves have testified before the Council, the fish are moving north due to climate change, and their boats have to travel further north to find fish. The other reason, one which they are not talking about, is that heavy fishing pressure in the southern Bering Sea has dramatically reduced populations of many groundfish stocks.

The size of the closure area is also misleading. As with the Aleutian Island bottom trawl closure adopted previously, a large percentage of this area of no trawl fishing is in an area where no fishing has taken place due to its depth and distance from on shore processors. No one fished there anyway. So while this is a forward-looking and precautionary step, action is urgently needed to address damage from bottom trawling that is occurring now in known coral and sponge habitats.  

Incorporating Greenpeace research, NOAA has identified several deep sea coral areas that currently lack protection. Last year, Greenpeace used submarines and a Remote Operated Vehicle (ROV) to survey seafloor habitats in two underwater canyons along the highly productive Bering Sea shelf break. Zhemchug Canyon, the world’s largest, had never been explored.  We found at least 14 species of coral, and more than 20 species of sponge – including one that was previously unknown to science. Alarmingly, we also saw documented considerable evidence of fishing impacts – trenches dug through the seafloor, and broken and overturned corals.

Virtually none of the Bering Sea or Gulf of Alaska is protected from all fishing, despite the growing body of evidence of the value of marine reserves in fisheries management.  Fully protected marine reserves can help speed the recovery of fish stocks and degraded habitats, and have proven to increase yields in surrounding areas due to a spillover effect. By serving as experimental controls, marine reserves can also help us understand the impacts of climate change on our oceans and fisheries.

It’s time for the NPFMC to take a more ecosystem-based approach, and to protect the habitats that sustain Alaska’s fisheries. So far, most of what we’ve seen has looked good on paper but has had little impact on the status quo. And in the meantime, fish stocks continue to dwindle, critical habitat continues to be destroyed, and fishing communities continue to await relief.


-- George

One of the most used comments bantered in the halls of the hotels where the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) holds their meetings where many of the decisions are already decided with the big, wild, commercial fishing industry with the public is “best available science.” The NPFMC usually holds their meetings at the Hilton hotel in Anchorage four times a year. And, although no one says it, the process is a “good ol boys” conference. My brother is fond of telling me; the industry writes the regulations. But, even though the cards are stacked up against me and others who have concerns and try to offer alternatives toward habitat protections, I attend. Its part of my responsibility. I often feel like my attendance is futile and a waste of time. Anyway, “best available science.”

The use of that term as an acceptable tool to manage our fisheries seems to me is like saying: “best available truth.” Remember the most famous question ever asked in all of humanity? “What is truth?” And so I wonder, what is “best available science. What does that mean and how does that help our people in the villages?”

Well, NPFMC, Mr. Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez of the U.S. Department of Commerce, we have a problem. What does your “best available science” or “best available truth” tell you about our out of control salmon by catch problems in Western Alaska? The problem is this. Really huge, large, big industrialized fishing machines, called boats, use huge, large, big nets and go out into the waters of southern Bering Sea, just north of the Alaska Peninsula to fish for 3.2 billion pounds of pollock, the total allowable catch from both the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea. And as they vacuum up these fish, a very important food source of the foods we depend upon for our survival, they “accidentally catch”  hundreds of thousands, and millions of salmon during the past 30 years, in their pursuit of happiness. This is by catch. In 2004, they caught, as far as we know, 63,000 king salmon. In 2005, 75,000 kings. Chum salmon took a huge hit. In 2004, 447,000 chums, and in 2005, 700,000 chums. That’s according to their best available truth. If I remember correctly, in 2007, they said they caught 117,000 king salmon while in pursuit of happiness, their happiness. Never mind our people’s food security in our villages that depend on these fish for survival. The song and dance is getting old. Outside multinational fishing companies, meeting with the federal government in a hotel somewhere destroying our home. Destroying our dreams. Destroying our children. And saying, well, sorry. It’s legal. It may be, but it is immoral.

A really good friend of mine once told me: “our commercial fishing season for king salmon on the Kuskokwim River lasted for 60 minutes, all year!” And he has a family, Children. And he cannot do anything, anything about it, because like you and me, he is poor. He cannot afford to attend one of them meetings in a hotel somewhere to testify for three minutes about his concerns, nor, like you and me, he cannot afford a lawyer or a lobbyist. And so, he hears “best available science” spoken from reputable scientists and NPFMC members. And to further add salt to the wound, the Council will say, we are only an advisory council. Mr. Gutierrez makes the final decision. Know what? Uncle Ted in his wisdom thru the Magnuson Stevens Act set it up like this.

Well, the NPFMC says they have a solution to deal with this salmon by catch, stolen fish problem. Here it is, in brief. Lets not force our good buddies who go out to the Bering Sea to fish for a share of the 3.2 billion pounds of pollock they catch every year to suffer to much. After all, they are our buds. Lets let them continue stealing food from the people on the Kuskokwim River, but, really, not too much. Lets put a cap on how much they can take out of the mouths of our children. Now, really. And further, lets let one of the biggest fishing companies who participate in this immoral practice, Trident Seafoods, give that fish to Bean’s Café to feed the hungry. Peter stealing from Paul to feed people? And now, others are caught up in their circle of destruction, being used to make themselves feel better about what they are doing and getting a huge tax write off to boot. See how this “best available science” and “best available truth” works? And so the question: “what is truth?”

The only real solution to this problem is stop it. Stop the insane practice of by catch. Stop raiding our people’s food. Stop. And use your “best available science” to figure out how not to do it any more. After all, you use that statement to justify what you do. And, in many cases, you give the scientists who use that statement, grants to provide research to justify that behavior. We the people in Western Alaska have had enough of supporting your pursuit of happiness. We need to pursue ours and that of our children. Please, level the playing field. Your quarterbacks are just too “best available.” You can afford it. We cannot even afford to feed our children.


George Pletnikoff is Unangan from the Pribilof Islands. He now works for Greenpeace as the Alaska Oceans Campaigner in Anchorage. He can be reached at george.pletnikoff@greenpeace.org

As we look to our trusty dictionary put together in Webster’s name, Third College Edition, to find the word “confidence” we find a part of the definition: belief in ones own abilities; the fact of being or feeling certain. Very cool words. Words that as young people we have been taught to believe in, to accept and to cherish because they, the meanings of these words, will carry us a long way to success in our lives.

In Alaska today, as in many other places throughout our shrinking planet, we are experiencing something so ominous that never before in the history of humanity we have ever experienced anything like it. We debate; question; lay out facts; make movies; win Nobel Peace Prizes, and yes, write opinions about global warming, or climate change as some choose to call it. Global warming. Interesting group of words. As in the globe is warming. The Earth is warming. Very interesting choice of words. And the facts are indisputable. It is happening.

Now, I can list the many examples and scientific facts of how we know for certain that global warming is happening, tell you who is saying what, where, and why. I can use the models that say this part of the globe is warming a degree here, a degree there. We can assemble a whole bunch of lists of examples of weather changes all examples of how temperature changes impact our weather, and ultimately our people, humanity. But, you can read that elsewhere. This is not one of those articles. This is a simple paper, thoughts, words about what I see and how I understand what is happening to my people here in Alaska, the Last Frontier.   

We, Alaska’s Native Peoples, indigenous peoples, have a long and proud history in our home. We settled here, in a place some call a frozen wasteland, birthplace of the winds, to raise families, develop cultures and a lifestyle from a rich but often unforgiving environment. And today, we take much pride, a healthy pride in what we have accomplished. We still speak a language handed down to us over hundreds and thousands of years. We still-hunt and gather our foods, as did our ancestors. We still call this place our home. We are still here. Now, as never before, we wonder in our homes, beside our wood fires, gathered around our dinner places, speaking to our children, wondering how much longer we are going to be here. Where are we going to be? In our villages or moving to the larger and more unforgiving cities, places where crime is rampant and food is scarce. Food, that is, that we know and have confidence in that is healthy for our diets. We just don’t know.

Local and national newspapers are filling with news about the plight of our home. Erosion from ocean storms is cutting into the security, the places on land where we live and have lived. Land is washing away, giving way to angry water. Winter is settling in, in ways never before experienced. And we are hunting for foods growing more and more scarce. Our animals, once respectful of our ways, are moving away and not coming back to offer themselves to us. They don’t respect us any longer. And we grow hungry. And we only drive motor bikes, bikes that leave such a small footprint of carbon that it is not we who have brought this plight, but someone else, someone far from our shores. But we are suffering. And the animals don’t respect us any longer.

We at Greenpeace have gone, on two consecutive seasons, to the Bering Sea to bear witness, to learn first hand the plight of our people. We have traveled hundreds and thousands of miles in our boats; a leased MV Pacific Storm and our own MY Esperanza to seek insights from our people about what is happening and how we can help to make a change. We came to the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska to find answers, only to find more questions. We listened, interviewed, filmed, talked, and planned. We are here. And we are still seeking answers.

Food is becoming scarce. Not only is the food we depend upon harder and more difficult to capture, but the food we use as economy to buy food from our shrinking shops, imported to supplement our diets. Fuel to drive our motor bikes, power our skiffs our boats, is expensive, in some places a gallon well over seven dollars. Oil to heat our homes comes from Venezuela, a foreign government. And we are here.

From our works, our interviews, our films, and our talks, we think we might have found a way to help insure longevity for our people in our villages, for all of us actually. To ensure food, health and a return to a vibrant culture, perhaps we can etch out zones in the water, in the Bering Sea, the Gulf of Alaska, where we can begin to rebuild a home for our animals and plants. We call these zones, cultural heritage zones to emphasize the best of what we are. (I speak of “we” in both the sense of being Alaska Native and a member of humanity) Zones in the water protected from the destructive practices of the way western man harvests fish and now think is normal.  Ways that destroy, perhaps forever, in one’s lifetime, that is forever, habitat critical to the needs of our foods and our homes. Ways that, unless we put a stop to their insidious creeping crawling scraping of the oceans floors, are insuring our end to survival as Alaska’s first peoples, not to mention the creation of another George’s Banks. Large commercialized factories on the water called trawlers are doing this and the animals are blaming us. They don’t know we respect them. They, our foods think, it is we, collectively, destroying their homes, and perhaps they are right. For if we do not speak up to put an end to this practice of sweeping up the floors of our waters, yes, it is a collective destructive force no matter who is doing it. Cultural heritage zones! What an idea. What an answer to our needs, to our questions. Protective areas where we can ensure the health of our foods, where they, our foods can regain their respect for us, where once again, we can have confidence in who we are and what we do.

The water changes color, temperature and viscosity. We wonder about its health, leading to our way of life. The globe, the Earth, the planet is warming and our hearts have become colder, facing questions too difficult to answer. But, we are here, working and seeking. Join us in our quest to regain confidence, to regain the trust of our foods, our animals and plants. Join us as we move to continue our cultural heritage place on this planet we call Mother Earth.