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Stuart DeDSloH Tongass Testinony Page 7 



business community would be financially devastated, and perhaps a third of all 

 businesses would close, accompanied by bankruptcies, defaulted loans, loss of 

 hundreds of jobs, and collapse of the real estate market. 



The decline certain to be caused in Sitka by an APC closure would have 

 twice to three times the proportional impact which the Alaska recession had on 

 Anchorage. Declines of the potential Sitka magnitute made have unknown impacts 

 in addition to those quantified and qualified in the McDowell report, since no 

 Alaska community has experienced so severe an economic contraction in recent 

 times. With the additional potential loss of U.S. Forest Service employment, a 

 33 percent or greater loss to the community's economic base would follow, and 

 the impacts would be even more exaggerated than previously assessed. 



The forest products industry is critically important to Southeast Alaska. 

 The loss or severe restriction of this industry would impact every resident of 

 the region, forcing many to leave with huge financial and emotional losses, and 

 causing continuing personal losses and devastating socioeconomic consequences 

 for those who remain. The crippling impact on the community of Sitka caused by 

 the forced closure of Alaska Pulp Corporation would be almost impossible to 

 measure adequately, and no amount or form of reparations could begin to 

 compeanate either the community as a whole, or its individual residents. I 

 urge you to recognize the urgent need to resolve the continuing controversy 

 over the Tongass by providing for adequate timber supply, in order to permit 

 Sitka and other affected communities to continue to remain economically viable. 



Thank you for the opportunity to comment. 



