Subsistence rights on the Kuskokwim River are in the news again (ADN, Oct. 16). That issue concerns rights on the river within the federal Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge.
But farther upstream, Alaska Native people are suing in state and federal courts over another threat to subsistence on the Kuskokwim: the Donlin mine.
The suits say that the mine could diminish subsistence resources, especially the growth and return of salmon that the people there depend on.
The state has shown a lack of concern about subsistence. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation granted Donlin a permit for discharging waste waters into the river. The DEC commissioner who issued the permit, Jason Brune, stated on Aug. 18 that water temperatures and salmon are outside the scope of what his department needs to consider (Alaska Beacon, Oct. 5).
Brune’s statement is false: DEC is required by law to consider water temperatures and salmon.
I looked up Alaska’s regulations that govern the DEC. Alaska administrative code (18 AAC 70.020 (a) (1)(A)(10)(C)) says that where “fish, shellfish, other aquatic life, and wildlife” depend on natural fresh water, its “weekly average temperature may not exceed site-specific requirements needed to preserve normal species diversity.”
— Vivian Mendenhall
Anchorage
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