Very few organizations in the United States can persevere against a continuous onslaught from a nationally organized campaign by well-funded outside environmental organizations. Yet that is exactly what the remains of the Southeast Alaska timber industry have done. Our industry has been pummeled and beaten up and is hanging on by a thread, but in the spirit of a true Southeast Alaskan, it has endured. Lawsuit after lawsuit. Letter writing campaign after campaign -- in which unsuspecting nature lovers have been told that their pens and pocketbooks are responsible for saving the last remnants of wilderness in this world.
The truth is, of course, quite different. If you take the environmentalists' number regarding the number of acres logged in Southeast Alaska over the past 60 years, only 2.6 percent of the Tongass has ever been cut since the industry began in earnest in the 1950s.
At one point, the Outside groups with their lawsuits and their teams of well-funded lawyers wanted to make the point that the Southeast Alaska timber industry was too large. They wanted it to have a smaller footprint, they said, and then they would be satisfied. Through the concerted efforts of these organizations and their continuous onslaught, the industry became 90 percent smaller. Of course, there were elements of shifting economic trends that also caused some of this decrease, but much of this decrease was due to the fact that environmental groups waged a full-scale war on our timber industry.
There have been approximately 50 lawsuits filed against timber sales in the Tongass since the 1990s. The true cost to the region for each of these lawsuits is devastatingly high. They represent lost business, bankruptcies and the lost earning potential of our region's workforce. The cost of wasted NEPA expenditures to the federal government alone is an average of $2 million per lawsuit.
And yet, even though the industry has that smaller footprint, the war on this industry has not subsided, as many of these groups exist only to be against timber. Their organizational purpose is this war. After all the heartbreak that has occurred in our region, and because of their war on timber, their new argument is this: Look at how small the Southeast Alaska timber industry is. The federal government should not be focusing on such a small industry.
We (respectfully) disagree. What is left of the timber industry represents family-owned businesses that have been passed down through generations, and Native-owned and -operated organizations.
The timber industry represents our heart, and we resent these arguments from Outside groups.
Last year the timber industry in Southeast Alaska directly supported 325 jobs and $17 million dollars in wages. With an average wage nearly $10,000 higher than the average private sector wage, these are important jobs that support families and communities. The timber industry also supported 105 federal jobs last year, with an associated payroll of $8 million. Using a jobs and wages multiplier of 1.5, the total economic impact of the timber industry in Southeast Alaska last year was therefore 645 jobs and $37.5 million in wages. Because of Sealaska's involvement in the timber industry, along with the remote nature of logging locations, these are jobs and wages that disproportionately go to our Alaska Natives and our smaller, less wealthy communities. These are jobs critical to our economy.
Yet we also agree that the industry is too small. The Tongass makes up 80 percent of our region's lands. Other federal ownership brings total federal land ownership to 95 percent. Our truly private lands make up just 0.05 percent of our total acreage. We can't charge taxes on our federal landholders here, and as I have alluded to above, it is extremely difficult to run businesses that depend on our federal lands. The high level of federal ownership and lack of lands open for economic development is unique to Southeast Alaska, and because of this most of our commerce as a region has been pushed out to the sea. While we support and cherish our maritime economy, it seems ridiculous that we cannot generate more jobs, income or economic prosperity from the 17 million acres of our region that is the Tongass. The wood products industry is one of the most effective ways to use to the Tongass to create jobs and yet, even taking into account Forest Service employment, it takes 40,000 acres of the Tongass to support a single timber-related job in the region.
We think it is also important to stress that the timber and wood products industry of today is one that is operating at a high level of environmental stewardship. This is not a slash-and-burn industry. This is our home, and we intend to live here with our children and grandchildren. The logging and restoration contracts are being carried out with a high level of integrity by experienced Southeast Alaska men and women who care about our region. (To imply otherwise is preposterous.) Our timber workers of today have shown that timber harvesting can go hand in hand with wildlife protection, and that forest practices can be implemented to protect cultural resources, enable wildlife conservation and also improve the social well-being of the region and communities.
We are simply asking for the opportunity to live and work in our region. With 17 million acres, there needs to be room in the Tongass for the residents of Southeast Alaska to earn a living.
Shelly Wright is executive director of the Southeast Conference and has spent the last 20 years supporting resource development in Southeast Alaska. She lives in Juneau.
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