Opinion ID: 1123453
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Is AS 16.05.258(c) Unconstitutional?

Text: Alaska Statute 16.05.258(c) requires the Boards to identify by regulation nonsubsistence areas. [23] In these areas, the subsistence priority over sport and commercial uses does not apply, and the statute states that [t]he boards may not permit subsistence hunting or fishing. However, personal use fishing [24] and sport hunting are allowed. As the methods of conducting these pursuits are similar to their subsistence counterparts, the critical difference in nonsubsistence areas is the absence of the subsistence priority. When this is appreciated, the superior court's conclusion that section 258(c) authorizes the creation of areas where subsistence activities are flatly prohibited, without consideration of whether the resources in the area could support some kind of balance between subsistence, sport, and commercial uses may be critically examined. Subsistence activities  fishing with nets or other devices or hunting with firearms for food for personal and family consumption  are in no sense flatly prohibited in nonsubsistence areas. Though subsistence permits may not be issued, subsistence activities can still take place. What is eliminated in nonsubsistence areas is the statutory subsistence priority. Without the subsistence priority, a balance may be struck in allocating fish and game resources between commercial, sport, and subsistence types of activities. The interests of all competing users can be considered. [25] With the statutory subsistence priority intact no balance is possible as long as a fish or game population is not sufficient to provide for all subsistence uses. A nonsubsistence area is an area or community where dependence upon subsistence is not a principal characteristic of the economy, culture, and way of life of the area or community. [26] Under the 1986 subsistence statute, only fish and game populations in rural areas could be exploited for subsistence purposes. [27] A rural area was defined as a community or area of the state in which the noncommercial, customary, and traditional use of fish or game for personal or family consumption is a principal characteristic of the economy of the community or area. [28] Thus, the areas defined as nonrural under the 1986 statute are now defined as nonsubsistence areas under the 1992 statute. What the 1992 statute adds is the requirement that the Boards jointly consider the relative importance of subsistence in a given area based on twelve enumerated socio-economic factors. [29] Even this did not signal a change in practice, however, as the twelve factors parallel twelve factors expressed in a regulation used by the Boards to determine whether an area was rural. [30] The superior court held that AS 16.05.258(c) is unconstitutional for reasons which we have summarized above. See supra at 635. Much of the court's rationale was based on the proximity of the domicile requirement of AS 16.05.258(b)(4)(B)(ii) which effectively barred residents of nonsubsistence areas from participating in Tier II hunts. With the proximity of the domicile requirement stricken, the remaining detriment to residents of nonsubsistence areas identified by the superior court is a claim of differential treatment based on inconvenience: [O]nly residents outside of nonsubsistence areas... are afforded convenient local subsistence access to fish and game resources. Inconvenience is in no sense the equivalent of a bar to eligibility for participation in subsistence hunting and fishing and does not suffice to trigger an analysis under the equal access clauses. What we recently stated in Tongass Sport Fishing Ass'n v. State, 866 P.2d 1314, 1318 (Alaska 1994), is also applicable to the current case: We have held that the common use clause of article VIII, section 3, the no exclusive right of fishery clause of section 15, and the uniform application clause of section 17 are not implicated unless limits are placed on the admission to resource user groups. McDowell v. State, 785 P.2d 1, 8 & n. 14 (Alaska 1989); see also Owsichek v. State, Guide Licensing & Control Board, 763 P.2d 488, 492 (Alaska 1988). Article VIII limitations on the state's power to restrict access to natural resource user groups do not apply to the state's authority to allocate fishery resources among sport, commercial, and subsistence users. In Kenai Peninsula [Fishermen's Cooperative Ass'n v. State, 628 P.2d 897 (Alaska 1981)] we said: While section 15 does prohibit granting monopoly fishing rights, that section was not meant to prohibit differential treatment of such diverse user groups as commercial, sports, and subsistence fishermen. To conclude that, because a certain species is made available for sport fishing in a given area, commercial fishing of the same species in the same area must also be allowed, would be to go far beyond the purpose of the section. 628 P.2d at 904. The fact that residents of nonsubsistence areas must travel in order to utilize subsistence permits is not a limitation to their admission to a subsistence user group. [31] Further, just as the fact that a certain species is made available for sport fishing in a given area does not mean that the same species must be made available for commercial fishing in the same area, the fact that a certain species is made available for sport or commercial use in a given area does not mean that the constitution commands that the same species be made available in the same area for priority subsistence use. The legislature has mandated that the Boards, in determining which areas are to be nonsubsistence areas, make decisions allocating fish and game resources among competing users. Such decisions are constitutionally required under article VIII, section 4 of the Alaska Constitution. [32] The state may, indeed must, make allocation decisions between sport, commercial, and subsistence users. McDowell v. State, 785 P.2d 1, 8 (Alaska 1989). Allocation decisions entail a complex mixture of biological, historical, and socio-economic factors. [33] These factors are often competing. Tongass Sport Fishing Ass'n, 866 P.2d at 1319. In reviewing allocation decisions made by the Board, a deferential standard of review is employed. Board decisions are upheld so long as they are not unreasonable or arbitrary and proper procedures have been followed. Id. (Board's decision favorable to commercial trollers concerning allocation of king salmon in Southeast Alaska not unreasonable or arbitrary); Gilbert v. State, Dep't of Fish & Game, 803 P.2d 391, 399 (Alaska 1990) (Board's decision allocating sockeye salmon between commercial fishing interests in two areas on the Alaska Peninsula not arbitrary or unreasonable); Meier v. State, Bd. of Fisheries, 739 P.2d 172, 174-175 (Alaska 1987) (Board's decision allocating sockeye salmon between commercial setnetters and driftnetters in Bristol Bay reasonable and not arbitrary.). We have not subjected allocation decisions to the more rigorous least restrictive alternative test employed in cases where entry into a user class is restricted. Compare McDowell, 785 P.2d at 10; Owsichek, 763 P.2d at 498 n. 17; and Johns v. Commercial Fisheries Entry Comm'n, 758 P.2d 1256, 1266 (Alaska 1988), with Tongass, 866 P.2d at 1319; Gilbert, 803 P.2d at 399; and Meier, 739 P.2d at 175. [34] Allocation decisions are so complex and multi-faceted that they are not amenable to analysis under such a test. In this case, the court did not reach the question of whether the joint Boards acted unreasonably or arbitrarily in creating the Anchorage/MatSu/Kenai nonsubsistence area. Instead, the court ruled that the statute was invalid on its face using a least restrictive alternative test. Given the proximity of the domicile Tier II requirement, use of this test was not error, for that requirement erected a bar to admission to a user class. However, with this requirement stricken from the statute, this test no longer applies. Alaska Statute 16.05.258(c), as it stands without the domicile proximity requirement, contains no characteristics implicating the equal access clauses of article VIII. It bars no Alaskan from participating in any fish or game user class. As these clauses formed the basis for the superior court's decision and no alternative grounds for upholding the court's decision have been argued, the decision must be reversed.