Southeast Alaska timber industry perseveres

By Shelly Wright

Very few organizations in the United States can persevere against a continuous onslaught of a nationally organized campaign by wellfunded outside environmental organizations. Yet that is exactly what the remains of the Southeast Alaska timber industry have done.

Our industry has been pummeled and beaten up and is hanging on by a thread, but in the spirit of a true Southeast Alaskan, it has endured. Lawsuit after lawsuit. Letter writing campaign after campaign – in which unsuspecting nature lovers have been told that their pens and pocketbooks are responsible for saving the last remnants of wilderness in this world.

The truth is of course quite diff erent. If you take the environmentalists number regarding the number of acres logged in Southeast Alaska over the past 60 years – only 2.6% of the Tongass has ever been cut since the industry began in earnest in the 1950s.

At one point the outside groups with their lawsuits and their teams of well-funded lawyers wanted to make the point that the Southeast Alaska timber industry was too large. They wanted it to have a smaller footprint, they said, and then they would be satisfied. Through the concerted eff orts of these organizations and their continuous onslaught, the industry became 90% smaller. Of course there were elements of shifting economic trends that also caused some of this decrease, but much of it was due to the fact that environmental groups waged a full-scale war on our timber industry.

An analysis of the last 51 lawsuits on timber sales in the Tongass for which we have data show that these lawsuits cost the federal government nearly $100 million (adjusted for infl ation) simply to carry out the NEPA process – at an average cost of nearly $2 million each. These fi gures don’t include the cost of lost business, bankruptcies, or the lost earning potential of our region’s workforce. The true cost each of these lawsuits is devastatingly high.

And yet, even though the industry has that smaller footprint, the war on this industry has not subsided, as many of these groups exist only to be against timber. Their organizational purpose is this war. After all the heartbreak that has occurred in our region, and because of their war on timber, their new argument is this: Look at how small the Southeast Alaska timber industry is. The federal government should not be focusing on such a small industry.

We disagree. What is left of the timber industry represents family owned businesses that have been passed down through generations, and Native owned and operated organizations.

The timber industry represents our heart, and we resent these arguments from outside groups.

Last year the timber industry in Southeast Alaska directly supported 325 direct jobs, and $17 million dollars in wages. With an average wage nearly $10,000 higher than the average private sector wage, these are important jobs that support families and communities. The timber industry also supported 105 federal jobs last year, with an associated payroll of $8 million.

Using a jobs and wages multiplier of 1.5, the total economic impact of the timber industry in Southeast Alaska last year was therefore 645 jobs and $37.5 million in wages. Because of Sealaska involvement in the timber industry, along with the remote nature of logging locations, these are jobs and wages that disproportionately go to our Alaska Natives and our smaller, less wealthy communities. These are jobs that are critical to our economy.

Yet, we also agree that the industry is too small. The Tongass makes up 80% of our region’s lands. Other federal ownership brings total federal land ownership to 95%. Our truly private lands make up just 0.05% of our total acreage.

We can’t charge taxes on our federal landholders here, and as we have alluded to above, it is extremely diffi cult to run businesses that depend on our federal lands. Our high level of federal ownership and lack of lands open for economic development is unique to Southeast Alaska, and because of this most of our commerce as a region has been pushed out to the sea.

While we support and cherish our maritime economy – it seems ridiculous that we cannot generate more jobs, income or economic prosperity from the 17 million acres of our region that is the Tongass. The wood products industry is one of the most eff ective ways to use the Tongass to create jobs, and yet, even taking into account Forest Service employment, it takes 40,000 acres of the Tongass to support a single timber related job in the region.

We think it is also important to stress that the timber and wood products industry of today is one that is operating at a high level of environmental stewardship. This is not a slash and burn industry. This is our home, and we intend to live here with our children and grandchildren. The logging and restoration contracts are being carried out with a high level of integrity by experienced Southeast Alaska men and women that care about our region. To imply otherwise is preposterous. Our timber workers of today have shown that timber harvesting can go hand in hand with wildlife protection, and that forest practices can be implemented to protect cultural resources, enable wildlife, and also improve the social wellbeing of the region and communities.

We are simply asking for the opportunity to live and work in our region. With 17 million acres there needs to be room in the Tongass for the residents of Southeast Alaska to earn a living.

Shelly Wright is Executive Director of the Southeast Conference

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