70 



in the hands of one man, and now you want to give him more. So 

 much for Alaskan independence. 



Privatizing the Tongass also means no trespassing signs in 

 places where we once visited to hunt and fish. How would folks in 

 Thome Bay like to be denied access to the banks of the Thome 

 River? That could happen here with the passage of this bill. 



Another dangerous portion of this bill is it calls for the creation 

 of five new Native corporations, which would then be allowed to se- 

 lect at least 200,000 acres of our forest. This solution to the land- 

 less Native issue is a disaster waiting to happen. At this time, 

 there is no official determination whether the landless Native 

 claims are valid. A full public review must be completed, and if the 

 claims prove legitimate, then the public must work to find a solu- 

 tion acceptable to all Tongass users. 



Mr. Chairman, I suggest you take a drive from here to Craig, 

 paying close attention to the devastation in the Big Salt area before 

 pushing any Native claims bill which would do the same to other 

 parts of the Tongass. 



Also, it is beyond belief that at the same time you are holding 

 these hearings, you are trying to ram this through Congress as an 

 amendment to the Presidio Parks Bill presently in conference com- 

 mittee. 



I also wanted to point out there appears to be a ridiculous double 

 standard at work here today. In championing this radical proposal, 

 you have relentlessly attacked what is described as distant deci- 

 sionmaking by Forest Service bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. In 

 all fairness to the Forest Service, they recently held 32 public hear- 

 ings on the proposed provisions to the Tongass Land Management 

 Plan. You, by comparison, have held a mere four invitation-only 

 hearings, two of which were scheduled at the worst possible time 

 of year for working folk. 



If anyone has short-circuited the public process, Mr. Chairman, 

 it is you. As a matter of fact, at your February 15 hearing in 

 Wrangell, I was actually ordered to take down a small video cam- 

 era in a blatant display of censorship. While the concept of State 

 rights may sound appealing to many, closer examination of this bill 

 reveals it to be a radical proposal that guts 15 years of conserva- 

 tion law in Alaska. From a Prince of Wales Island standard pro- 

 spective, protection for Kartar Rivers, Calder-Holbrook, Salmon 

 Bay, Outside Islands, South Prince of Wales Wilderness, and 

 Nutkwa would be eliminated. The bill would also certainly seal the 

 fate of Honker Divide, the treasure I had the privilege of dragging 

 my canoe through a couple of weeks ago. 



And, for all you Ketchikaners, kiss Misty Fjords and Naha good- 

 bye. Fishermen, you stand to lose, as well. Not only will Noyes, 

 Baker and Lulu Islands, as well as Salmon Bay, Kartar River, and 

 Nutkwa be stripped of their protections guaranteed as part of the 

 Tongass Reform Law, but you would lose your hard-won, 100-foot, 

 no-logging buffers around salmon streams, as well. This is just a 

 small sampling of the rash irresponsible proposals laid out in H.R. 

 2413. 



The bill also resurrects the Alaska Pulp Company's long-term 

 contract, even though the people of Sitka do not want it. The fact 

 is, the APC mill never stood on its own two feet. Its survival was 



