The Chugach National Forest holds some of the county’s most stunning resources and landscapes, stretching from Prince William Sound’s rain forests, the internationally recognized Copper River Delta, throughout the Kenai Mountains, and inland to the Chugach Mountains.
The forest was established in 1907 under Presidential Proclamation by President Roosevelt for conservation of its fisheries and wildlife resources. Today conservation drives multiple use stewardship goals that integrate local and global recreation, travel, and tourism demands with urban and rural community interests for natural resources such as gravel and stone, mining, and forest products, including firewood. The forest continues to contribute significantly to commercial, sport, and subsistence values.
Today’s stewardship priorities are focused on partnerships for access, conservation and restoration, collaborative communitybased problem solving, international connections, and organizational effectiveness. This vision challenges us to enhance public access, engage in conservation and restoration projects, leverage our international role, be increasingly relevant to our communities through a collaborative learning approach, and continuously strive to establish a culture of business acumen in our work.
The size and shape of the forest has changed over the last century as land was transferred to Alaska in support of statehood and as a result of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. The forest today is 5.5 million acres, covering three broad landscapes: the actively managed Kenai Peninsula; Prince William Sound (managed in the west to maintain wilderness character and in the east for backcountry uses) and the Copper River Delta, primarily managed for fish and wildlife conservation.
Despite changes in its borders, the Chugach remains true to the intent of its Presidential Proclamation, conserving the land for the public good and conserving fish and wildlife habitat. Taken in all its astonishing beauty and wealth of natural resources, the Chugach is a jewel in the crown of the National Forest System.
This forest is truly a land of multiple uses, and it benefits its citizen owners in many ways.Considering the variety of recreational opportunities, the resources in the forest, and how each benefits a diversity of users large and small, is the heart of the meaning of multiple use.
An average forest user can park at a trailhead and spend a week alone, camping and hiking the wilderness, far from civilization. On a different day, the visitor could take advantage of one of the many permitted guides that do business in the forest. They could take a ride on the railroad that enters into the heart of the Kenai Peninsula on the way to the inaugural Spencer Glacier Whistle Stop, or charter a flightseeing trip into Prince William Sound. They could even mine for gold on the Kenai Peninsula.
These few examples illustrate an ideal synthesis of resource and recreation: the hiker treks and camps in the wilds of Alaska; the permittees and the Alaska Railroad provide the hiker access to otherwise unreachable locations or goals. Each user serves the other.
While logging on the Chugach is not commercially viable for various reasons (the size and location of trees, lack of roads), a house log program allows for the harvest of logs for individual home building. The Hope Fire Station was built using logs from this program. The forest’s firewood program allows for 25 cords of wood and benefits users throughout the area. All these things, in their relative and important scale, represent the multiple use mission where the Chugach connects with its communities across the landscape.
The Chugach actively works with commercial enterprises, such as recent efforts involving Chugach Electric with both its Cooper Creek hydro facility and its power corridor for Hope, ensuring our communities have sustainable transmission of electricity. We are currently working with mineral materials suppliers and the existing mining claims in Southcentral to bring the Spencer area’s resource of rock, sand, and gravel to market. Projects like the recently completed restoration of Resurrection Creek create local jobs, and at the same time a direct line can be traced back to the original mandate of resource conservation.
Our Centennial celebrations this year have placed an important spotlight on multiple use, community involvement, and partnership. As Forest Supervisor, looking ahead to the next century of service, the single most important value we can all contribute towards is relevancy: connecting people to their forest through community based problem solving, youth based conservation education activities, and through shared stewardship of our public land.
The benefits reaped from involving communities and Alaska’s youth make the Chugach relevant to current and future generations. They are the future stewards to whom the forest will be entrusted!
Forest Service Chief Gifford Pinchot’s foresight more than a century ago has proved accurate and invaluable to the people of Alaska. The original intent to conserve the Chugach National Forest, its resources, fish and wildlife, and land, provided a sound base for its evolving mission: to watch over a forest that can benefit all Americans. This is the essence of multiple use!
