Alaska
Legislative task force offers possible actions to rescue troubled Alaska seafood industry • Alaska Beacon
Alaska lawmakers from fishing-dependent communities say they have ideas for ways to rescue the state’s beleaguered seafood industry, with a series of bills likely to follow.
Members of a legislative task force created last spring now have draft recommendations that range from the international level, where they say marketing of Alaska fish can be much more robust, to the hyper-local level, where projects like shared community cold-storage facilities can cut costs.
The draft was reviewed at a two-day hearing in Anchorage Thursday and Friday of the Joint Legislative Task Force Evaluating Alaska’s Seafood Industry. It will be refined in the coming days, members said.
The bill that created the task force, Senate Concurrent Resolution 10, sets a deadline for a report to the full Legislature of Jan. 21, which is the scheduled first day of the session. However, a final task force report may take a little longer and be submitted as late as Feb. 1, said Senate President Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, the group’s chair.
The draft is a good start to what is expected to be a session-long process, said Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, a task force member.
“We can hit the ground running because we’re got some good solid ideas,” Stutes said in closing comments on Friday. The session can last until May 20 without the Legislature voting to extend it.
Another task force member, Sen. Jesse Bjorkman, R-Nikiski, urged his colleagues to focus on the big picture and the main goals.
“We need to take a look at how we can increase market share for Alaska seafood and how we can increase value. Those two things aren’t easy, but those are the only two things that are going to matter long term. Everything else is just throwing deck chairs off the Titanic,” he said Friday.
Many of the recommended actions on subjects like insurance and allocations, if carried out, are important but incremental, Bjorkman said. “If the ship’s going down, that stuff isn’t going to matter,” he said.
Alaska’s seafood industry is beset by crises in nearly all fishing regions of the state and affecting nearly all species.
Economic forces, heavily influenced by international turmoil and a glut of competing Russian fish dumped on world markets, have depressed prices. Meanwhile, operating costs have risen sharply. Climate change and other environmental factors have triggered crashes in stocks that usually support economically important fisheries; Bering Sea king and snow crab fisheries, for example, were closed for consecutive years because stocks were wiped out after a sustained and severe marine heatwave.
In all, the Alaska seafood industry lost $1.8 billion from 2022 to 2023, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Those problems inspired the creation of the task force last spring. The group has been meeting regularly since the summer.
The draft recommendations that have emerged from the task force’s work address marketing, product development, workforce shortages, financing, operating costs, insurance and other aspects of seafood harvesting, processing and sales.
One set of recommendations focuses on fisheries research. These call for more state and federal funding and an easy system for fisheries and environmental scientists from the state, federal government and other entities to share data quickly.
The draft recommends several steps to encourage development of new products and markets for them, including non-traditional products like protein powder, nutritional supplements and fish oil. Mariculture should be expanded, with permitting and financing made easier, according to the draft.
The draft recommendations also propose some changes in the structure of seafood taxes levied on harvesters and processors, along with new tax incentives for companies to invest in modernization, product diversification and sustainability.
Other recommendations are for direct aid to fishery workers and fishing-dependent communities in the form of housing subsidies or even development of housing projects. Shortages of affordable housing have proved to be a major challenge for communities and companies, the draft notes. More investment in worker training — using public-private partnerships — and the creation of tax credits or grants to encourage Alaska-resident hire, are also called for in the draft recommendations.
Expanded duties for ASMI?
The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute, the state agency that promotes Alaska seafood domestically and internationally, figures large in the draft recommendations.
The draft calls for more emphasis on the quality and sustainability of Alaska fish and, in general, more responsibilities for ASMI. An example is the recommended expansion of ASMI’s duties to include promotion of Alaska mariculture. That would require legislation, such as an early version of bill that was sponsored by outgoing Rep. Dan Ortiz, I-Ketchikan. It would also require mariculture operators’ willingness to pay into the program.
But ASMI, as it is currently configured, is not equipped to tackle such expanded operations, lawmakers said. Even obtaining modest increases in funding for ASMI has proved to be a challenge. A $10 million increase approved by the Legislature last year was vetoed by Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who cited a failure by ASMI to develop a required plan for the money.
The governor’s proposed budget released in December includes an increase in state money for ASMI, but his suggestion that $10 million in new funding be spread over three years falls far short of what the organization needs, Stevens said at the time.
Incoming House Speaker and task force member Bryce Edgmon, I-Dillingham, said there will probably be a need to reorganize or restructure ASMI to make it more autonomous. That might mean partnering with a third party and the creation of more managerial and financial independence from whoever happens to be in political office at the time, as he explained it.
“The umbilical cord needs to be perhaps cut to some degree,” Edgmon said on Friday, during the hearing’s public comment period. The solution could be to make ASMI more of a private entity, he said.
“Because the world is changing. It’s a global marketplace. We need to have ASMI to have as large a presence as possible,” he said.
But for now, ASMI and plans for its operations have been constricted by political concerns. “People are afraid of how it’s going to go back to the governor’s office,” Edgmon said.
Federal assistance
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, spoke to the task force on Thursday about ways the federal government could help the Alaska seafood industry.
One recent success, she said, is passage of the bipartisan Fishery Improvement to Streamline Untimely Regulatory Hurdles post Emergency Situation Act, known as the FISHES Act, which was signed into law a few days earlier.
The act establishes a system to speed fisheries disaster aid. It can take two to three years after a fisheries disaster is declared for relief funds to reach affected individuals, businesses and communities, and that is “unacceptable,” Murkowski said. The bill addresses that situation, though not perfectly. “It’s still not the best that it could be,” she said.
Another helpful piece of federal legislation that is pending, she said, is the Working Waterfronts Bill she introduced in February. The bill contains provisions to improve coastal infrastructure, coastal energy systems and workforce development.
More broadly, Murkowski said she and others continue to push for legislation or policies to put seafood and fisheries on the same footing as agriculture. That includes the possibility of fishery disaster insurance similar to the crop insurance that is available to farmers, she said.
But getting federal action on seafood, or even attention to it, can be difficult, she said.
“It is a reality that we have faced, certainly since my time in the senate, that seafood has been viewed as kind of an afterthought by many when it comes to a food resource, a source of protein,” she said.
Inclusion of seafood in even simple programs can be difficult to achieve, she said. She cited the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s decision, announced in April, to include canned salmon as a food eligible for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, also known as WIC. She and others had been working for several years to win that approval, she said.
Tariffs a looming threat
Seafood can also be an afterthought in federal trade policy, Murkowski said.
Tariffs that President-elect Donald Trump has said he intends to impose on U.S. trade partners pose a serious concern to Alaska’s seafood industry, she said.
“The president-elect has made very, very, very, very clear that this is going to be a new administration and we’re going to use tariffs to our advantage. I don’t know what exactly to expect from that,” she said.
In the past, tariffs imposed by the U.S. government have been answered with retaliatory tariffs that cause problems for seafood and other export-dependent industries.
Jeremy Woodrow, ASMI’s executive director, has similar warnings about tariffs, noting that about 70% of the Alaska seafood, as measured by value, is sold to markets outside of the U.S.
“We tend to be, as an industry, collateral damage in a lot of trade relationships. We’re not the main issue. And that usually is a bad outcome for seafood,” he told the committee on Thursday.
To avoid or mitigate problems, Alaska leaders and the Alaska industry will have to respond quickly and try to educate trade officials about tariff impacts on seafood exports, Woodrow said.
Task force members expressed concerns about impacts to the export-dependent Alaska industry.
“If we raise tariffs on another country, won’t they simply turn around and raise tariffs on us?” asked Stevens.
Tariffs on Chinese products, which Trump has suggested repeatedly, could cause particular problems for Alaska seafood, Stutes said. She pointed to the companies that send fish, after initial processing, to China for further processing in preparation for sale to final markets, some of which are back in the U.S.
“If there is a huge tariff put on products going and coming from China, that would seem to me to have another huge gut shot to those processors that are sending their fish out for processing,” Stutes said.
Bjorkman, a former high school government teacher, said history shows the dangers of aggressive tariff policies.
The isolationist “America-first” approach, as carried out at turns over the past 150 years, “hasn’t worked out very well. It’s been real bad,” Bjorkman said.” As an alternative, he suggested broader seafood promotions, backed by federal or multistate support, to better compete in the international marketplace.
YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE.
An Alaska Railroad train derailed north of Talkeetna early Friday morning with no injuries reported.
Three crew members were aboard the work train at the time of the incident, according to a spokesperson for the railroad. The cause of the derailment was not immediately clear, they said.
Catherine Clarke, an Alaska Railroad spokesperson, said the derailment led to a puncture on the derailed locomotive’s 2600-gallon diesel fuel tank. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation is responding to the incident.
“The damaged fuel tank has been secured and initial containment strategies put in place, as efforts continue to remediate the impacted site,” Clarke said by email on Friday afternoon.
Department of Environmental Conservation staff are coordinating with the railroad and other agencies on cleanup, officials said. In a situation report, DEC said Friday afternoon that the amount of fuel spilled “is unknown at this time.”
The derailment took place just after 3 a.m., approximately 22 miles north of Talkeetna on the Curry loop track — a section of the railroad that provides access to a quarry and is not accessible by road, Clarke said.
The derailment occurred around 400 feet from the Susitna River. There are barriers between the fuel spill and river, DEC said.
“The nearest culvert leading toward the river has been secured and blocked as a precautionary measure. No reports of impacts to surface water have been reported. No wildlife impacts have been observed,” the agency said in its situation report.
The Alaska Railroad typically transports around half a million passengers per year. The derailment was not expected to impact the railroad’s main line, which operates trains between Fairbanks and Seward, Clarke said.
Alaska
Alaska Gatorade Player of the Year Rilen Niclai leads Service to opening-round victory in state baseball tournament
For the third year in a row, a player from the Service High baseball program with the same last name was awarded Alaska Gatorade Player of the Year. But for the first time, the honor belongs to Rilen Niclai after his older brother Coen received it in each of the previous two seasons.
“I’m doing it for the family and to make them proud,” he said.
Niclai did just that Thursday afternoon as he helped lead the reigning champion Cougars to a 5-0 win over Juneau-Douglas in the opening round of the Division I state tournament at Mulcahy Stadium.
He hit a solo home run over the left-field fence in the bottom of the third inning in his second at-bat to extend Service’s lead to 2-0 which also meant he got to uncork his signature celebration with head coach Willie Paul.
“It felt great just seeing it go out and jogging the bases and going to see Paul for that celebration,” Niclai said.
During the winter workouts the duo came up with it and said ‘We have to do that’ during the season whenever he hit a home run. As Niclai embarks on the final stretch after touching third base, Paul imitates a quarterback faking a handoff and pretends to throw a back-shoulder touchdown pass to Niclai as he crosses home plate.
“It’s awesome to have those guys on the roster and be able to step up there exactly when you need them,” Paul said. “He’s a stalwart on defense and he’ll hop on the mound for us during this tournament and we expect big things. He’s pumped for (GPOY) and it’s been on his mind since he saw his brother win it twice.”
Coen is currently a freshman playing for the University of Oregon baseball team. Coen texted his younger brother every day of the season telling him ‘You’ve got this’ and ‘Go win this for me’ and texted him as soon as the Gatorade announcement was released at 5 a.m. Alaska time on Monday morning.
“I was happy to wake up to that,” Rilen said.
Paul thought his team’s overall performance on Thursday was good although he would’ve liked to have seen them perform better offensively given the emphasis they put into that aspect of the game in practice leading up to state.
“We’ve got a bunch of guys that stepped up in a time that we needed them and I thought that our defense played solid,” he said.
The got the Cougars back in the win column coming off a hard-fought loss to Eagle River in the Cook Inlet Conference tournament title game. It took 10 innings to decide a victor but Paul said “in a tough battle like that, there really is no loser in that game” and that his players didn’t dwell on the defeat.
“It feels like it because there’s a loss in the loss column but you get your guys together and you say ‘Hey man, we went toe-to-toe with one of the other best teams in the league’ and we fought hard for 10 innings and had a little bad luck,” he said. “They were all pumped coming out of that game, looking forward to this.”
Sitka 3, South 1
The Southeast champion Sitka Wolves remain undefeated against in-state competition after using a strong hitting performance in the bottom of the fifth inning to overcome a 1-0 deficit and score all the runs they’d need to beat the Wolverines. Leading the way on the plate was senior Tyson Bartolaba who was responsible for two RBIs off of one hit in his two at-bats.
Colony 6, Dimond 1
After being held scoreless through the first five innings, the bats for the Knights finally got going in the bottom of the sixth when they recorded all six of their runs to mount and complete a late comeback. Hayden Sherman and Brock Baker each recorded a pair of RBIs in the pivotal frame.
Division I Softball pool play roundup
South 11, Juneau-Douglas 3
The Wolverines were powered to victory by strong outing on the mound by right-handed pitcher Millicent Wurst who struck out 12 batters and only allowed four hits and three runs over five innings.
Colony 15, East 7
The Knights used an explosive performance on offense to outpace the defending state champion Thunderbirds. They were led by Kaidence Browning who recorded a hit on all three of her at-bats that included a home run to center field in the fourth inning and doubling in the first and third.
Juneau-Douglas 15, Dimond 0
The Crimson Bears notched their first win of the day in their second game when they shut out the Lynx in a game where they made the most of their at-bats while capitalizing on their opponent’s mistakes.
Colony 4, Chugiak 2
The Knights completed their comeback over the Mustangs in walk-off fashion when Browning came up clutch with her second home run of the day at the perfect time. With the game tied in the bottom of the seventh inning, she hit the ball to left field, resulting in the two runs needed to secure the decisive victory.
Alaska State Division I Baseball Tournament
Thursday-Saturday
At Mulcahy Stadium
Thursday
First round
Sitka 3, South, 1
Service 5, Juneau-Douglas 0
Colony 6, Dimond 1
Eagle River vs. Wasilla, 7 p.m. (late)
Friday
Consolation
South vs. Juneau-Douglas, 10 a.m.
Dimond vs. Loser Eagle River/Wasilla, 1 p.m.
Semifinals
Sitka vs. Service, 4 p.m.
Colony vs. Winner Eagle River/Wasilla, 7 p.m.
Saturday
4th/6th place, 11 a.m.
3rd/5th place, 1:30 p.m.
Championship, 4:30 p.m.
The Alaska Railroad Corp. has a clear mission: to provide safe, efficient and economical transportation and real estate services that support and grow economic opportunities for the State of Alaska. However, despite decades of operation and hundreds of millions in annual revenue, the ARRC has built no significant new track since Alaska purchased it in 1985. While the railroad thrives on tourism and maintains its infrastructure well, it has largely ignored its most critical responsibility — helping to unlock Alaska’s immense natural resource wealth for the benefit of Alaskans.
President Trump’s 2025 Executive order, Unlocking Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential, underscores what many of us have known for years. Alaska’s oil, gas, critical minerals, timber and coal are not just important to our state economy; they are vital to America’s national security and pivotal to our energy future. The EO directs federal agencies to expedite projects like the Point MacKenzie Rail Spur, a 32-mile rail extension that would connect the Alaska Railroad to Port MacKenzie, one of the deepest-water ports in the state and a future export hub for our resource industries. With 75% of the project already built, including embankments, bridges and culverts, the remaining work is straightforward and shovel-ready. All that’s missing is the will to finish the job.
The ARRC made $250 million in revenue in 2022, generated $39 million in net income and did it all without a dime of operating subsidies from the state. That’s amazing and commendable, especially just a year after the pandemic. But in the process, the railroad has focused disproportionately on maintaining current operations and catering to the tourism industry. Freight, which made up 44% of revenue, remains ARRC’s core competency. It moved nearly 1.5 million tons of gravel in 2024 and continues to support oilfield operations and barge connections to the Lower 48. Yet when coal exports collapsed after 2011, the railroad chose to dismantle the Seward Coal Terminal instead of pursuing new freight corridors to diversify revenue. The lesson is simple: Alaska needs infrastructure that serves the real economy, and serves Alaskans — the owners — not just sightseeing tourists.
Port MacKenzie and the spur that would serve it are central to Alaskans’ future. Located just across Knik Arm from Anchorage, the port has a deep draft, no congestion and 9,000 acres of industrial land ready for development. The rail spur connecting it to Houston is already 75% built, with $184 million invested. The final cost to complete the spur is hotly debated. The ARRC cites a $290 million estimate, but some experts believe it can be done for closer to $100 to $150 million. Regardless, what’s clear is that the return on investment it delivers will far exceed the cost.
This spur is not speculative. It is a strategic necessity. Companies like Trilogy Metals have already committed to shipping copper concentrates from the Ambler Mining District through Port MacKenzie. Timber exporters are eyeing the spur to reduce trucking costs. The $43 billion Alaska LNG project could use it to transport construction materials, pipe and heavy equipment. And coal and fly ash exports could resume through this more efficient port, reducing our dependence on imports and creating jobs in the process. The possibilities are endless.
The spur would also bolster Alaska’s military logistics. Fort Greely, Eielson Air Force Base and Fort Wainwright all rely on the ARRC to transport munitions, Stryker vehicles and other equipment. Completing the spur would shorten transport distances and give the Department of Defense another access point for Arctic defense. In today’s geopolitical environment, rail access to secure ports is a national security issue.
Despite this, the ARRC continues to prioritize projects like the $137 million Seward passenger dock, set to open in 2026. While tourism is important, the revenue it generates is limited, seasonal and often tied to flat-fee contracts with cruise lines. Many passengers travel in privately operated dome cars under “pull” agreements — where the cruise company pays ARRC a set fee to haul its cars — yet those riders may still be included in total passenger counts. This can give a misleading impression of the railroad’s fare-based revenue and economic impact. Alaska’s long-term prosperity lies not in cruise ships, but in our resources.
We need to finish what we started. Completing the Point MacKenzie Rail Spur is the fastest, most cost-effective way to deliver results for the Alaska economy. It aligns directly with Trump’s EO, addresses freight needs, supports national defense, and creates the foundation for job growth in mining, timber, energy and construction. It reduces shipping costs by 32 miles compared with Anchorage, and by 140 miles compared with Seward. That’s a competitive edge Alaska cannot afford to ignore.
The ARRC must remember who it works for. It is a state-owned corporation, funded by public investment, accountable to all Alaskans. Our citizens expect it to grow the economy, not just maintain what already exists. The time for half-measures is over. The Point MacKenzie Rail Spur is ready, relevant and overdue. It is the key to unlocking the next chapter of Alaska’s resource economy, and we must not let bureaucratic inertia or competing port politics stand in the way.
Let’s finish the spur, open Port MacKenzie to full-scale development, and secure Alaska’s place as a global resource and strategic powerhouse. The time to act is now.
Kevin McCabe is the representative for House District 30, which encompasses Point MacKenzie, Big Lake and follows the Parks Highway all the way up to Anderson.
• • •
The views expressed here are the writer’s and are not necessarily endorsed by the Anchorage Daily News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)adn.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@adn.com or click here to submit via any web browser. Read our full guidelines for letters and commentaries here.
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