Opinion ID: 2509091
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Department's Authority To Authorize Harvest of Wild Stocks

Text: The state asserts that these statutes leave the department no authority to grant shellfish farmers a right to harvest and sell the wild geoducks already populating their farm sites. The state's argument has merit. The act describes only two ways for the department to giveand for aquatic farmers to receiveaccess to wild geoduck stocks: through an operation permit issued under AS 16.40.100 or through a stock acquisition permit issued under AS 16.40.120. If the applicants have any claim to the wild stocks on their proposed sites, then, their claims must arise under these provisions. The operation permit statute, AS 16.40.100, neither states nor implies that a right to harvest and sell wild stocks arises from an operation permit. It allows farmers to acquire and sell aquatic farm products and stock only when the products or stock are used or reared at the hatchery or aquatic farm. [22] By requiring all aquatic farm products and stock acquired or sold by an aquatic farm to be used or reared at the farm, this provision precludes harvesting unfarmed, wild geoduck stock for the purpose of sale. Similarly, no right to harvest wild geoducks for general commercial purposes emerges under the stock acquisition permit statute, AS 16.40.120. As we have seen, stock acquisition permits issued under this section only allow their holders to acquire wild stock for limited purposes: to supply stock to the department or to a licensed aquatic hatchery or farm. [23] In arguing their case before the department, the applicants proposed several theories for finding that a stock acquisition permit would authorize harvesting and selling the wild geoduck stocks on their sites. For example, pointing to the act's definition of stock, which would only encompass geoducks that were intended for use ... for... further growth or propagation, [24] the applicants suggested that the wild geoducks they intended to harvest and sell would qualify as stock covered by their acquisition permits because the geoducks would undergo further growth between the time the permits were issued and the time the harvest and sale occurred. Yet by requiring stock to be intended for use for further growth or propagation, the statutory definition of stock demands something more than passive growth: its express terms command an intent to  use  the wild stock  for  further growth. These purposive words unmistakably signal an intended use that will produce growth through actionan active use of the stock by the farmer for promoting its further growth. A mere waiting period between issuance of a permit and commercial harvest would not meet this definition. The applicants also claimed a right to harvest existing geoduck stocks under another provision of the stock acquisition permit statute, AS 16.40.120(f). This provision directs the department to issue a stock acquisition permit if wild stock is necessary to meet the initial needs of farm or hatchery stock. Contending that commercially harvesting wild stocks is necessary to make geoduck farming a viable enterprise, the applicants reasoned that subsection .120(f) would allow them to receive permits to harvest wild geoduck stocks. Thus, in the applicants' view, the department acted unlawfully in proposing to condition their permits on their willingness to surrender existing geoduck stocks. But this argument disregards the specific terms of AS 16.40.120(f). Subsection .120(f) authorizes the department to issue acquisition permits for wild stock when necessary to meet a farm's initial needs of farm ... stock.  Hence, this provision does not address a farm's general startup needs; it only addresses a farm's initial needs for stock. A stock, as discussed above, may only be used for further growth or propagation. [25] Here the applicants' proposal to harvest and sell wild geoducks from their sites and to plow their earnings back into their farms has no direct relation to their initial needs for farm stock. Nor do the applicants' arguments fare any better under the statutory provision governing operation permits, AS 16.40.100. As already explained in discussing the relevant statutory framework, an operation permit issued under section .100 does not generally authorize geoduck farmers to sell wild geoduck stocks; instead, it only permits them to acquire or sell stock and aquatic farm products if they are used or reared at the... aquatic farm. Although the applicants maintained below that their proposed harvest and sale of wild geoducks would amount to a use under subsection .100(b), their argument strains the statute's plain meaning beyond plausible limits. Moreover, the argument disregards the need to interpret subsection.100(b)'s references to stock and aquatic farm products in light of AS 16.40.199's provisions defining those terms: to qualify as salable stock, a wild geoduck would have to be intended for use by [an]... aquatic farm for the purpose of further growth or propagation ; and to qualify as a farm product, the geoduck would have to be propagated, farmed, or cultivated in an aquatic farm. [26] In short, no provision of the aquatic farming act empowers the department to grantor entitles the holder of an operation or stock acquisition permit to claimexclusive rights to harvest and sell existing wild geoduck stocks. We thus conclude that the commissioner properly denied the disputed applications. Our reliance on this statutory ground makes it unnecessary to decide whether the Alaska Constitution would be violated by giving geoduck farmers exclusive rights to existing wild stocks.