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The Roadless Rule protects more than half of the Tongass National Forest from road development, and it’s on the chopping block again. Tribes and environmental groups are strategizing to keep it in place. 

A host of Alaska Native communities in Southeast Alaska, which rely on the Tongass National Forest for their food and culture, say they want to make the Roadless Rule permanent. 

Tlingit advocate Xaawk’w Tláa Yolanda Fulmer presented one tactic at the Southeast Tribal Environmental Forum in Juneau this week. She explained how a bill that was reintroduced to the U.S. House of Representatives this summer called the Roadless Area Conservation Act, or RACA, could codify the Roadless Rule once and for all.

“The current situation is a political struggle between the proposed repeal of the Roadless Rule and the introduction of RACA,” Fulmer said. “The outcome of RACA will determine the future protection of vital national forest lands, including the Tongass.”

She said that if the bill passes into law, it could end the political ping pong between promoting extractive industries and preserving traditional foods and practices in National Forests. 

“Road construction often leads to logging, mining, forest fires and development — development which fragments ecosystems,” she said. “The Roadless Rule helps maintain intact forests, streams and shorelines where traditional foods thrive.”

The Roadless Rule has flip-flopped multiple times since it was established to protect undeveloped lands in 2001. It was rolled back during President Donald Trump’s first term before being reinstated in 2023 by former President Joe Biden. 

The proposed rollback aligns with Trump’s executive order earlier this year to end a ban on constructing roads in undeveloped areas of the forest. The USDA’s announcement comes on the heels of Representative Nick Begich’s visit to Juneau, where he said that he supports the expansion of logging in the Tongass National Forest. 

“This is something I hear from folks from Ketchikan all the way up to Yakutat on a regular basis,” he said. “How do we bring timber back?”

Tribal leaders at the forum in Juneau spoke to the value of keeping the forest ecosystem intact. Joel Jackson is President of the Organized Village of Kake, an Alaska Native tribe based on Kupreanof Island. He said it’s vital to keep the forest healthy, in part because the salmon that feed his tribe rely on it. Old growth trees shade the streams, making the water cold enough for salmon to swim up.

“If the stream isn’t cool enough, those fish aren’t going to be able to spawn,” Jackson said.

After the fish spawn and die, their decaying bodies feed the forest with nutrients they gathered at sea — and the cycle continues.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday that the public can comment on the proposed rollback from Friday through Sept. 19. 

“This administration is dedicated to removing burdensome, outdated, one-size-fits-all regulations,” said U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins in a press release. 

Nathan Newcomer advocates for the Tongass with the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council. He worries that the USDA won’t listen to the public’s wishes to keep the rule in place. 

“We know what they’re going to do,” Newcomer said of the department. “They’re not going to listen to anybody, but we still need to get on the record and make it sure and clear that people in Southeast Alaska and across the nation want to see the Roadless Rule kept in place.”

When the first Trump administration rolled back the Roadless Rule in 2020, people had about 90 days to comment and nearly all of the public comments were in favor of keeping the rule.

Newcomer said that he’s organizing quickly since the federal government has expedited the public process to allow for less than a month of public comment. 

Kate Glover is an attorney at Earthjustice, an environmental law firm that has challenged past rescissions of the Roadless Rule on behalf of tribes, conservation nonprofits, tourism and fishing groups. She said a few weeks is not enough time for a meaningful public process.

“It doesn’t allow time for the agency to meet its obligation to consult with tribes on a government-to-government basis,” she said. “Typically, at least 120 days is needed for that.” 

Glover said she had not seen such short comment periods before this administration.

Skagway is inching toward building a dock that Canadian mining companies could use to once again export ore from the local port.

The municipality of Skagway has been in talks with officials in Yukon, Canada for several years about building a new dock that would allow mining companies to get bulk minerals to market.

But doing so would require a handful of federal permits. Skagway’s borough assembly voted unanimously earlier this month to begin that process, which can take up to two years. During an assembly meeting last week, Yukon Minister of Economic Development Ranj Pillai said kickstarting the permitting process is an important next step.

“If an agreement is reached and approved by Skagway and the Yukon, the project will be able to move quickly to tendering and construction,” Pillai said.

Skagway will need to secure three federal permits for the project: one from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and two others under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.

The permitting process will cost upwards of $120,000 – and the Yukon government has committed to footing the bill. The job will be handled by contractors, including Washington-based KPFF Consulting Engineers.

Pillai emphasized during the meeting that moving forward on permitting does not mean the project itself is a done deal.

“A positive decision on this item will not bind the municipality of Skagway to future decisions on this project but will support our ability to meet potential demand in the near future,” Pillai said.

Demand for the dock would stem from Yukon mining projects set to come online in the coming years. During an interview earlier this week, Skagway Assembly Member Deb Potter nodded to a copper, gold, molybdenum and silver deposit that the Casino Mining Corporation is developing northwest of Whitehorse, Canada.

“It’s going to be a massive operation,” Potter said. “And they want to ship out of Skagway.”

There’s a long history of mining companies shipping ore out of the small, tourism-dependent town. The municipality previously had an ore loader on one of its docks that was most recently used by Minto Metals’ Corp. Minto used the facility up until March of 2023.

But the loader wasn’t in great shape, Potter said, and was removed when Skagway replaced that dock last summer.

Potter said the project could help diversify the local economy and provide a major financial boost, given that mining companies would pay fees to use the dock. That’s different from how it worked before, when the White Pass and Yukon Route Railway held a 55-year lease on the Skagway port.

“The benefit now that that lease has expired is, we’re just looking at bringing in a bunch more money,” Potter said. “That money goes to Skagway now, not to White Pass.”

Negotiations are ongoing between Skagway and Yukon officials on an export cooperation agreement.

Skagway will need to hammer out more details as the project moves forward. That includes making sure that exporting ore via the new dock would not lead to contamination in the area, which was a problem in the past. The assembly has already passed an ordinance that says the ore would need to come through the port in sealed containers, for that purpose.

Correction: This story previously misstated Ranj Pillai’s official title. Pillai was formerly the Yukon premier, but stepped down from that role earlier this year. He is currently the Yukon Minister of Economic Development.

Back when she was an art manager at the Sealaska Heritage Institute in 2017, Sydney Akagi would frequently spot people using weaving kits. Inspired by the weaving surrounding her, she scored a spot in Ravenstail and Chilkat weaver Lily Hope’s class, and Akagi was hooked.

“Weaving felt pretty, almost addictive at first. I couldn’t stop,” said Akagi. “I was up late at night. I’d be sitting in bed with tiny projects and wouldn’t go to sleep, and I kind of just lost time.”

Since then, Akagi continued to study under Hope’s tutelage as an apprentice in Juneau, mastering the intricate finger-twining steps of Ravenstail weaving and the geometric designs of the Chilkat style. As her skills improved, Akagi says she was able to find healing and empowerment in her own Lingít identity.

“I think it started to kind of heal some maybe cultural things, a little bit of cultural trauma that I had had from growing up and not feeling accepted and kind of keeping my culture kind of like just at bay and not fully accepting it,” Akagi said. “So it was kind of like my gateway into having that healing with my culture.”

With Hope’s encouragement, Akagi quit her job at the Sealaska Heritage Institute in 2020 to pursue weaving full-time. Now, with nearly a decade of weaving under her belt, she is excited to share her knowledge with Sitkans as the current Native artist resident at the Sheldon Jackson Museum.

There, visitors can view a killer whale Chilkat tunic Akagi completed in 2023. The tunic immediately captures attention as people enter the museum, with its vibrant yellows and blues blasting through its black and white borders to define the whale’s geometric shapes. The tunic’s design mirrors itself on either side in what is known as a distributive design. The tunic is a recreation of one Akagi observed at the Anchorage Museum back in 2022, in order to learn how to weave a traditional tunic.

“There’s not very many weavers that understand the process of creating the shoulders on that tunic, so it felt more almost 3-D versus the flat surface of like a robe that’s hanging on a loom,” said Akagi. “So what I really wanted to do was understand that shoulder, the techniques of creating that and that construction.”

Next to the tunic is one of Akagi’s works-in-progress – a black wall of thread with diamonds swimming across a budding yellow line below it across her weaving loom. These initial threads will eventually culminate into a Chilkat robe depicting a salmon. This robe is unique in that unlike Akagi’s previous pieces like the distributive killer whale tunic, this one will have a configurative design, or an asymmetrical design across the piece.

“So I might be a little anxious before starting that and just having that understanding, but again, that I think that’s part of my evolution as a Chilkat weaver, and like understanding that and gaining all that knowledge,” said Akagi.

The salmon robe was inspired by Akagi’s experience as a resident of the Taku River near Juneau and her advocacy work as a Salmon Beyond Borders Ambassador fighting mining companies whose wastewater endangers the health of the river’s salmon.

“So I was kind of trying to figure out how the art I make, what I could make to kind of bring in a more traditional conversation to these conversations I’ve been having with the CEOs and presidents of these mining companies to ask them to respect our rivers and to do the cleanup,” Akagi said.

Akagi says the work she does, both on her loom and as an advocate for environmental justice, is connected.

“Every part of what I’m creating is from the earth, and so not protecting the Earth only affects what I am creating,” she said.

In addition to a lecture, as part of her residency Akagi will lead a sold-out weaving workshop where participants can create their very own keychains. Akagi is excited to introduce students to the wide-variety of benefits weaving has to offer.

“For kids, weaving can be used as a hands-on method to teach math,” Akagi said. “There’s pattern recognition for anybody older. Just understanding how to do this and use your hands, and even for the cultural reason of being able to connect with the culture or understand the culture. I think there’s so many things that anybody can benefit from learning about weaving.”

Amidst the chaos of balancing numerous other weaving projects with navigating grants and family life, Akagi is grateful to be present in Sitka and engage with the community, exchanging ideas like two threads being woven together to create something meaningful.

The U.S. Coast Guard rescued a pilot after his small plane crashed near Haines on Sunday.

Chief Petty Officer Travis Magee told KCAW that around 8:30 a.m. the Coast Guard received a signal from the emergency locator transmitter of a two seat, single engine airplane over the Chilkat Range, approximately 35 miles south of Haines.

“The Coast Guard reached out to the Haines airport, who confirmed that there was an aircraft matching that description to the two seat, single engine airplane that had departed earlier that morning, but it had not returned,” said Magee.

Around 10:30 a.m., a 5-person helicopter crew from Air Station Sitka located the pilot and overturned aircraft near the Endicott River. Magee said the pilot walked away from the accident unscathed.

“So we’re very thankful that this case resulted in the way that it did, with this individual having no reported back injuries,” said Magee.

The helicopter crew transported the pilot to the Juneau airport. The pilot met with emergency medical services, but he did not request any assistance from them, and was released shortly afterwards.

This is a developing story and may be updated. 

Southeast Alaska’s regional Native corporation has announced its new president. Aanshawatk’i Sarah Dybdahl will be the first woman to hold the position since Sealaska’s founding in 1972. 

The corporation’s board of directors voted to appoint Dybdahl, according to a press release. She currently directs the Office of the President at the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, and previously led the Huna Heritage Foundation. 

In her new role, she will manage Sealaska’s local operations, like their workforce development program.

Board Chair Richard Rinehart said the search for a president took longer than he imagined. But he said Dybdahl’s background in Alaska Native leadership made her a strong candidate.

“We wanted somebody that was going to have a new, fresh perspective, but still be very knowledgeable of where we’re at and what we’re trying to achieve,” Rinehart said. “And I think she has all of that.”

Sealaska changed its leadership structure amid the 2023 departure of Anthony Mallott, who served as both president and CEO. Now, the roles are separate. Terry Downes, the current Sealaska CEO, leads Sealaska’s business investments. Joe Nelson has served as interim president since last year and will continue to serve on Sealaska’s board.

Dybdahl was unavailable for comment Tuesday. 

“It is an honor to serve Sealaska and our shareholders,” Dybdahl said in the release. “Growing up in Klawock, I was shaped by the strength of our people and our culture, and I look forward to building on that foundation to create opportunities that uplift our communities for generations to come.”

Dybdahl’s salary is undecided, but Rinehart said it will be “competitive.” She starts next month.

In Skagway, at the height of summer, hundreds of tourists wait in line – some patiently, some less so – to return to their cruise ships. But they can’t get there on foot. Instead, they wait for shuttles or small, orange boats.

Jeff Jarvie, of Riverside, California, experienced the rigmarole this week.

“It’s disappointing, because it’s a ship with so many people,” he said. “The water taxi takes a whole, like, process.”

But that process is in place for good reason. Skagway’s largest cruise ship dock, known as the Railroad Dock, has been off-limits to pedestrians since the summer of 2022. That’s when multiple rock slides tumbled toward the dock from a ridge to the east.

No one was injured. But the slides damaged infrastructure and resulted in dock closures that took a major toll on the local economy. An assessment by an engineering firm later concluded the entire slide area would eventually collapse, which it said would be “catastrophic in nature.”

That fueled widespread concern in the community.

“We know that we have this one spot that’s active,” said Reuben Cash, the environmental program coordinator for the Skagway Traditional Council, a local tribe. “Where else? Where else can we expect to see these geohazards show up?”

That question is the driving force behind an ongoing research project that aims to study rockslide risk along the rest of that ridge and elsewhere in Skagway. The initiative is part of a regional effort that aims to help seven tribal governments understand and respond to local geohazards.

In Skagway specifically, the issue is rooted in the fact that the area for thousands of years was under miles of ice. Those glaciers retreated long ago. When that happened, they exposed the now slide-prone ridgeline.

“There’s no longer that support,” said Cash. “These valley faces, these slope faces, are beginning to topple because they don’t have anything holding them up.”

A landscape of wiggly rocks and leaning columns

That toppling effect is what brought Josh Roering, a University of Oregon geologist, to Southeast earlier this summer. He’s been visiting the area for research since 2022.

While out on a day-long hike along the town’s most prominent ridgeline in June, he said the project has a few main components.

First, mapping when and where rockfalls have happened before, modeling where they could happen later, and simulating where rocks would end up if they did fall. That work included analyzing hundreds of rockfall events in Skagway between 2005 and 2022.

“We identify that there are parts of this valley that are much more susceptible to rockfall runout than others,” Roering said.

That means some slopes are both rockslide-prone and oriented in a way that could put people and infrastructure in harm’s way.

Another key component is gauging the ridge’s stability – and the extent to which rocks along it respond to everything from wind, frost and rain to trucks, trains and cruise ships. The researchers did that by placing 38 seismometers, which measure movement, in the area for about a month, two years ago. They’re now analyzing that data.

“The more wiggly these rocks are, the more sort of decoupled they are from the underlying mountain,” Roering said. “And so that is a relative measure of how potentially unstable they may be.”

Roering spent several days this summer going back to those sites and gathering more information. Along the way, he and another team member used photos and GPS data to pinpoint exactly where the sensors were placed. Then they mapped the geology around those sites and measured the angle of various rock faces.

During that hike in June, Roering stopped periodically to point out deep, vertical gashes in earth – some of which could fit a human. The ridgeline is covered in them.

Roering explained that the mountain – like others in Skagway – is largely made up of upstanding sheets of granite that are peeling apart, absent support from glaciers. That process speeds up when rocks, trees and other debris fall into the fractures, wedging them open. Then they start bending toward Skagway down below.

“Once you sort of got a big column of rock leaning this far over, it starts to become difficult for it not to flip over,” he said.

For Skagway, no “time bomb just waiting to happen”

The research has generated some good news so far. The ridge above town does not seem to be prone to a deep-seated landslide, like the one that killed two people in Haines in 2020.

“We know that we don’t have a time bomb just waiting to happen,” said Cash, of the Skagway Traditional Council.

That doesn’t mean there’s no risk at all. Right now, rockslide activity that could threaten life or property is concentrated in a handful of areas in the valley, including two main spots along the ridge that towers above the cruise ship dock.

But Roering said it’s clear the instability isn’t limited to those specific areas. It’s also present along the rest of the ridge and elsewhere in Skagway. As a result, he said, it’s likely the toppling effect will continue to ripple across the region far into the future.

A major remaining question is what actually triggers that instability and sparks rockslides. So far, Roering said, it’s not totally clear. But there seems to be more activity during spring, as temperatures warm.

“This was a surprising finding for us because it shows that the timing of thaw is way more important than rainfall for triggering these rockfalls,” Roering wrote in an email this week.

The ongoing research is set to wind down by 2027. It won’t remedy the gargantuan slide in the harbor that has already damaged infrastructure, threatened public safety, and inconvenienced visitors like Jarvie, the cruise ship passenger from California.

But the effort ideally will provide the community the information it needs to better understand the risks it faces – and to prepare accordingly.

“It’s not going to tell you exactly where rocks will fall,” said Cash. “But it tells us the higher risk areas where it’s more likely to happen.”

Correction: This story previously misspelled Luka Silva’s name in a photo caption.