Alaska is the largest state in the union—encompassing 586,412 square miles, it is one-fifth the size of the lower 48 contiguous states combined. The state is bounded on three sides by saltwater bodies—the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas to the north, the Bering Sea to the west, and the Gulf of Alaska to the south (see fig. 1). Measured on the most detailed maps available, including islands, Alaska has 33,904 miles of shoreline. In addition, there are more than 3,000 rivers in Alaska, including the major interior river systems of the Yukon and the Kuskokwim Rivers. Despite its size, Alaska is one of the least populated states, with about 680,000 people—90,000, or about 13 percent, of which are Alaska Natives. Many Alaska Natives live in places long inhabited by their ancestors in rural areas in western, northern, and interior Alaska. Alaska Natives are generally divided into six major groupings: Unangan (Aleuts), Alutiiq (Pacific Eskimos), Iñupiat (Northern Eskimos), Yup’ik (Bering Sea Eskimos), Athabascan (Interior Indians), and Tlingit and Haida (Southeast Coastal Indians). Many of these Alaska Natives live in villages near the sea or river waters, which they rely on to hunt, fish, and gather wild plants for food. These subsistence activities are intricately woven into the fabric of their lives and form the foundation for continuity between generations by promoting the basic values of Alaska Native culture—generosity, respect for elders, self-esteem for the successful hunters, and community cooperation. Typically, a coastal or river Native village has a population of a couple of hundred people and generally contains only basic infrastructure—homes; school; village store; health clinic; church; city or tribal offices; post office; and washateria that provides laundry, shower, and toilet facilities for a fee to residents of villages without running water. Most of the villages are not accessible by roads; instead, they have an airport runway adjacent or nearby that provides the only year-round access to the community. Other infrastructure in a village may consist of a bulk fuel tank farm; a power plant; a water treatment facility; a water tank; meat drying racks; a village sewage lagoon or dump site; and, for some villages, commercial structures, such as a tannery or fish processing plant. Most river villages also have a barge landing area where goods are delivered to the community during the ice-free period. While villages on Alaska’s shorelines and river banks provide Alaska Natives with access to food, transportation, and recreational and cultural benefits, these locations also present dangers to the inhabitants. In particular, these dangers include flooding—in coastal communities, from seismic activity, such as tsunamis associated with earthquakes, erosion, and surges from coastal storms, or in river communities, from heavy rainfall, snow melt, or the sudden release of water from behind breaking ice jams. According to the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, since 1978, there have been 228 flooding events that have led to state disaster declarations for 119 different Alaska communities. About 40 percent of these flood disasters occurred from 2000 to 2008, with 23 occurring in 2005, the worst year on record. Figure 2 shows the 2005 state flooding disaster in Golovin, on Alaska’s northwest coast. The effects of climate change are believed by state officials to be growing in Alaska, potentially having the greatest impacts on the already vulnerable Alaska Native villages and the subsistence lifestyles of their inhabitants. Permafrost (permanently frozen subsoil), which is found over approximately 80 percent of Alaska and in northern barrier island communities, literally helps to hold the land together. Rising temperatures in recent years have led to widespread thawing of permafrost, causing village shorelines and riverbanks to slump and erode, threatening homes and infrastructure. Rising temperatures also affect the thickness, extent, and duration of sea ice that forms along the western and northern coasts. The loss of sea ice leaves shorelines more vulnerable to waves and storm surges and, coupled with the thawing permafrost along the coasts, accelerates the erosion threatening Alaska Native villages (see fig. 3). In addition, the loss of sea ice changes the habitat and accessibility of many of the marine mammals that Alaska Natives depend upon for subsistence. As the ice melts or moves away early, walruses, seals, and polar bears move out of hunting range. The state of Alaska’s government structure that may interact with Native villages to help them meet their needs, including making decisions about how to address flooding and erosion, may involve several distinct entities. Alaska’s constitution and state laws allow for several types of regional and local government units—such as boroughs, which are units of government that are similar to the counties found in many other states. About one-third of Alaska is made up of 16 organized boroughs. The remaining two-thirds of the state is sparsely populated land that is considered a single “unorganized borough.” Of 213 Alaska Native villages, 147 (or 69 percent) are located within the unorganized borough. At the village level, a federally recognized tribal government may coexist with a city government, which may also be under a borough government. In other cases, the tribal government may be the only form of local government if the village (1) is located in the unorganized borough and (2) is not an incorporated city; however, these tribal governments are not political subdivisions of the state. Alaska’s Governor and DCCED have taken the lead for the state in addressing flooding and erosion threats to Alaska Native communities. The Immediate Action Workgroup of the Governor’s Sub-Cabinet on Climate Change is responsible for the early assessment and development of an action plan addressing climate change impacts on coastal and other vulnerable communities in Alaska. The workgroup is cochaired by state and federal representatives from DCCED and the Corps, and includes representatives from other key state agencies as well as the Denali Commission, a federal-state cooperative entity. In April 2008, the workgroup provided its initial recommendations for actions—including relocation planning—that should be taken in the ensuing 12 to 18 months to prevent the loss of life and property in Alaska’s communities at greatest peril from the effects of climate change. The workgroup updated those recommendations in March 2009. DCCED is responsible for coordinating and directing state agencies in providing relocation assistance to villages. As we reported in 2003, there is no single federal agency responsible for managing and funding flooding and erosion programs in Alaska. Instead, the Corps and NRCS administer key programs for constructing flooding and erosion control projects to protect threatened villages from further damage, and other federal agencies operate programs that can address the consequences of flooding and erosion by, for example, repairing roads or rebuilding airport runways. In 2003, congressional committees acknowledged the impacts on Alaskan villages due to climate change and directed the Corps to assess the erosion threat and estimate relocation costs for 7 coastal villages—Bethel, Dillingham, Kaktovik, Kivalina, Newtok, Shishmaref, and Unalakleet. The Corps completed the Alaska Village Erosion Technical Assistance program assessment in April 2006, and estimated that the villages of Kivalina, Newtok, and Shishmaref have 10 years to 15 years before their current locations are lost to erosion, and that the cost to relocate these villages ranged from between $80 million and $200 million each. In 2004, a congressional committee directed the Corps to conduct an Alaska erosion baseline study. In addition, the Corps was provided with authority “to carry out, at full federal expense, structural and non-structural projects for storm damage prevention and reduction, coastal erosion, and ice and glacial damage in Alaska, including relocation of affected communities and construction of replacement facilities.” However, this authority was repealed in March 2009. The extent to which additional villages may need to relocate as the impacts of climate change increase and of how federal agencies in collaboration with state agencies can assist the villages in their relocation efforts was discussed in an October 11, 2007, congressional field hearing. Testimony was provided by representatives from the Corps; FEMA; the state of Alaska’s Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management; and the villages of Kivalina, Newtok, Shishmaref, and Unalakleet. The federal agency representatives described how their programs have provided assistance to villages and the challenges they face in prioritizing and coordinating assistance with other federal agencies, the state, and the villages. The senators at the hearing also explored with the witnesses ways to expedite assistance to villages (e.g., by waiving the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) requirement for environmental analyses of the impacts of federal projects) and to improve project coordination (e.g., by appointing a coordinator for all federal agencies to work with state and local partners to assist villages needing immediate action). Under NEPA, agencies evaluate the likely environmental effects of projects they are proposing by using an environmental assessment or, if the projects likely would significantly affect the environment, a more detailed environmental impact statement. If an agency determines that the activities of a proposed project fall within a category of activities that the agency has already determined has no significant environmental impact— called a categorical exclusion—then the agency generally need not prepare an environmental assessment or environmental impact statement. In the event that more than one federal agency is involved in the same action or involved in a group of actions directly related to each other, NEPA regulations require that a lead agency supervise the preparation of the environmental assessment or environmental impact statement. NEPA analysis can occur at both the programmatic and project levels.