Opinion ID: 1138725
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Background and Purpose of the 1986 Statute

Text: Prior to 1978, urban residents could engage in subsistence hunting and fishing. However, there was no statutory preference given to subsistence over sport or commercial fishing or sport hunting. With the enactment of chapter 151 SLA 1978, subsistence hunting and fishing was given such a priority. Madison, 696 P.2d at 174 n. 12. The 1978 statute did not bar urban residents from eligibility as first-tier subsistence users. Madison, 696 P.2d at 176. However, a regulation adopted by the Board of Fish and Game did exclude urban residents. 5 AAC 01.597. Madison held that this regulation violated the 1978 statute. Id. In 1985 the Alaska House of Representatives adopted a letter of intent which accompanied the bill that became the 1986 subsistence act. 1985 House Journal 1246. The letter explained the rural preference of the 1986 act as follows: This limitation of the definition of subsistence uses recognizes that Alaska is unique, and unlike any of the other forty-nine states, the economy of many rural communities in rural areas in Alaska is significantly dependent upon participation by the residents of these communities in the taking of fish stocks and game populations for personal and family consumption. Further, the legislature finds that the general health and welfare of these citizens is significantly tied to their participation in these activities. Id. at 1229-30. In making this determination, the legislature sounded a theme that was also expressed by Congress in enacting ANILCA. The House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs determined that: After consideration of the testimony at the subcommittee's hearings and town meetings throughout Alaska and review of studies done by a variety of federal, state, academic, and other agencies and groups, the Committee has no doubt about the importance of subsistence uses to the rural people of Alaska. Reliable evidence was given to the Committee demonstrating that fifty percent of the food for three-quarters of the Native families in Alaska's small and medium villages is acquired through subsistence uses, and 40 percent of such families spend an average of 6 to 7 months of the year in subsistence activities... . H.R.Rep. No. 1045, 95th Cong., 2d Sess., at 181 (1978). The intervenors in this appeal similarly expressed the purpose of the rural preference as follows: If village access to fish and game is overwhelmed by competition from the tens of thousands of sportsmen who Alaska's fortuitous oil wealth has drawn to the urban centers, the effect on the rural village economy would be adverse, and the effect on the health and welfare of rural residents would be even more so. An additional purpose of the 1986 subsistence law is to retain state management of fish and game on federal lands by meeting the requirements of ANILCA. [7]