I might state that the function of this committee is not to review everything in the bills that I referred to previously. Our function is to look at the refuge lands. The function of this committee is to establish and manage a 200-mile fishing limit, to develop agriculture legislation, and to establish and manage the national refuge program. We do not deal with national parks or the forests or the wild rivers, though we are interested in those.

So, we have a split jurisdiction from the jurisdiction that is currently operative under the Interior Committee. I would hope that the testimony presented to this committee will relate to the 43 million acres of refuge lands that we are concerned with, more or less, and we would hope that the testimony will be probative, that it would be reasoned, that it would give us some evidence to make judgments to make judgments when we go back to Washington.

We have a 29-member committee. We have four members of the committee present; we have most of our staff here. It will be our intention to go back to Washington and present our view to the balance of the committee and to attempt to get a degree of consensus among the subcommittee and then to present the matter to the fourmember full committee and to obtain a consensus on that committee and to later present the consensus to the full House of Representatives to meet with the Senate and have the synthesis of conference resolved in legislation which President Carter undoubtedly would be asked to sign.

So, it's a procedure that we're involved in. We are not locked up in any former bill. We do not intend to lock up the State of Alaska. The committee has not prejudged this matter. We've held hearings for several days. We've thought about this matter considerably. We've consulted with members of Federal agencies. We intend to consult more, and now at this time I'll yield first to the ranking member of this committee, minority side, Mr. Forsythe of New Jersey.

Mr. FORSYTHE. Thank you Mr. Chairman. I support the things that you've said this morning, although perhaps with somewhat more concern than what you've expressed. However, I know that is why we are here. One area I am concerned about is that we do not move precipitously. Two things that do worry me a little are that neither the State nor Native land issues are resolved and that it would be dangerous to try to come down to a final resolution on the lands remaining. I think a matter we may have to get into sometime, but not here today, is how that transfer process can be speeded. While it's true that legislation gives a date of 1978 for resolution on D-2 lands, anything that Congress does it can always change and the easiest thing is perhaps to just extend the status quo. I think it is very important that we give this whole matter very serious consideration and I'm hopeful that the committee will move in that direction. I'm sure it will. Thank you Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LEGGETT. Thank you. Do any of the other members wish to express themselves at this point?

Mr. PATTERSON. No, Mr. Chairman, I don't.

Mr. AKAKA. No; I don't.

Mr. LEGGETT. Very good and certainly you can fully cross-examine all of the witnesses that are presented. We have a number of folks on the panel today and I'll run through them so you can get a feeling for where we are.

The first witness group will be Esther Wunnicke, the Federal Cochairman of the land use, Federal-State Land Use Planning Commission and Walter Parker, State cochairman; then the Honorable Joe Orsini, State Senator from Alaska wishes to express himself; then we have a panel made up of Joseph Ruzicka, Virginia Burns, Robert Johnson, Leo Schachle, and Frank McGuire; then we have a second panel made up of some environmentalists groups, Barnett, Rice, McDonald, Gordon, and Scholes; then another group unidentified, Croff, Harmon, Skillingstad, Hale, and Fernette; then another group, the fourth, Meicham, Robinson, Harris, Reid, Finklestein, and Lowe; a fifth group, Stratman, Castle, Bigelow, Degenhart and Gallagher; a sixth group, Jensen, Anderson, Hemmons, Benesch, Benesch, and Lohr; a seventh group, Nelson, Bassett, Shane, Levine, Tlougan, Georgette, and Englebach; an eighth group, Riley, Dwyre, Durkin, Stewart, Gonder, and Bernhardt; and a ninth group, Haugen, Misko, and Karmun. Mr. Karmun is with the Reindeer Herders Association.

It's 10 o'clock now, We're going to break for lunch hopefully a little after noon. We want to take as much time as you want to take to go into any matters that you want to go into. You can fully educate the panel here in any matters that you think are pertinent and we hope we will not have to cut anybody off. We don't necessarily want long monologues and we don't necessarily want huge repetitious statements. If somebody has preceded you to the witness stand and has made a statement with which you fully agree, say so and don't necessarily repeat what has gone before. We would like to save out time and make it as valuable as possible because these hearings can be immeasurably valuable to the committee in making decisions. So Esther, and Walter, if you'd like to come forth first.

Mrs. WUNNICKE. We have two members of our staff.

Mr. LEGGETT. Very good, if you could identify all of them I'd be very welcome to it. Let's see, now our microphones are not working so it might be well if we turned that table around so that you're speaking so the audience can hear you.

Mr. FORSYTHE. Then the recorder might not be able to hear her. Mr. LEGGETT. Well we can change the recorder-as long as the microphone is working. If anybody wants to stand at that microphone and give their presentation, that might be immeasurably helpful. We can take the microphone of the recorder and place it over there. Mrs. WUNNICKE. Well, whatever is best, I don't mind standing. Mr. LEGGETT. All right, we'll suspend for just a minute while we reorganize our logistics.

[Off the record.]

STATEMENT OF ESTHER C. WUNNICKE, FEDERAL COCHAIRMAN, JOINT FEDERAL-STATE LAND USE PLANNING COMMISSION, ACCOMPANIED BY WALTER B. PARKER, STATE COCHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT FEDERAL-STATE LAND USE PLANNING COMMISSION Mrs. WUNNICKE. Thank you Mr. Chairman. My name is Esther Wunnicke, I'm Federal cochairman of the Federal-State Land use Planning Committee for Alaska and I'd like to introduce at the table, the State cochairman of the Land Use Planning Commission,

who has appeared before you before, Mr. Walter B. Parker and members of our staff, Mr. Richard Stenmark and Mr. Jay Bergstrand, both whom have worked with members of your staff in the past. We have other members on the Federal-State Land Use Planning staff in the audience. I'm very pleased to welcome you to Anchorage for these hearings and we appreciate the opportunity to testify.

On June 10, Mr. Parker, the State cochairman of the Commission appeared before you and presented testimony on the issues that you are now considering. We appreciate the fact that your opening remarks laid the foundation for our testimony. I'll not duplicate any extensive testimony before you but merely reiterate the major issues of land use and management which have been considered by the Federal-State Land Use Planning Commission in its deliberations with respect to the D-2 issue. Also I should like to outline to you briefly the simple concepts of the Commission's recommendations with respect to this issue. Our process, like yours, is a continuing one, we're working very closely now with the Department of the Interior and other departments of the Federal Government in assisting in the formulation of recommendations to the Congress on behalf of the Carter administration.

The Commission's recommendations reflect at this time the care and study that has been possible for a body instituted between the Federal and State governments, an interdisciplinary group, to give to this issue. We recognize the issue is not only one of the most important decisions on conservation of land resources which Congress may face in this centruy, but it is also the opportunity for Congress to complete a modern land policy for Alaska insofar as Congress and the Federal Government can effect such a policy. As your opening remarks indicated, needs are changing, technology is sweeping us along and the congressional task before you is much more than one of designating which of four Federal systems should manage Federal land in Alaska. As you indicated in your opening remarks, by making land available to the State of Alaska under the Alaska Statehood Act and by making land available to Alaska Native corporations under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, Congress set in motion the beginning of the land use and land ownership pattern for Alaska. And as you also indicated, to date, those selections have not been finalized. The result of the selections thus far of the Alaska Native Corporations and the State of Alaska has been to move the Federal lands back away from predominantly lowlands and river valleys near existing communities. This is particularly true of all land designations under Federal ownership except those which lend themselves particularly to designations for wildlife refuge management, ah, there, those boundaries of lands providing major waterfowl habitat. Such lands are often adjoined by and often encompass, the lands which were selected by Alaska Native corporations.

At the time Mr. Parker testified before you, he introduced for the record, a draft report which had been prepared by the Commission and I would ask that the final copy of that report, which has been supplied to all the members of your committee, be introduced for the record.

Mr. LEGGETT. We'll accept that and incorporate such parts of that in the record as we deem appropriate. I might state that your 21-page

NATIONAL TRIBAL CHAIRMEN'S ASSOCIATION RESOLUTION: No. 5/77-4

Whereas, the Tlingit Indian community of Angoon, Alaska, has submitted and there has been introduced in the Congress of the United States legislation, designated H.R. 5605 and S. 1546, to establish the Admiralty Island National Preserve; and

Whereas, one of the stated purposes of this legislation is to protect and preserve the Tlingit culture and heritage on Admiralty Island; and

Whereas, it is in the interests of all American Indians and Alaska Natives throughout the United States to support the preservation of our culture and heritage;

Now, therefore be it resolved, That the National Tribal Chairmen's Association supports the passage of such legislation on behalf of the Tlingit Indians of Angoon, Alaska; and

Be it further resolved, That this resolution be submitted for the record at hearings concerning this matter.

CERTIFICATION

It is hereby certified by the undersigned that the foregoing Resolution was adopted by the general assembly of the National Tribal Chairmen's Association in a duly constituted meeting on the 27th day of May 1977, at which meeting there was a quorum present.

Attest:

HAROLD H. GOODMAN,
Secretary.

JOE DE LA CRU,

President.

Mr. OBERSTAR. Thank you very much for that presentation on behalf of the National Tribal Chairmen's Association, and on behalf of the Indian people themselves.

Is there a history of logging on Admirality Island at all?

Ms. RECKLEY. Yes. The last sale was in 1968, the U.S. Plywood Champion, and it was the largest sale in U.S. history, 8.75 billion board feet of timber, and it was over a 50-year contract, with the first 15 years of that contract committed to Japan. The Sierra Club brought suit against that sale, and it was in litigation for a number of years, and U.S. Plywood Champion finally pulled out of the sale.

At that time it said it was because of the Sierra Club suit, but an article later in a magazine said it was for economic reasons.

Mr. CAGEY. I do not want to make this statement, that on conservation and subsistence hunting and fishing we look at the world fishery and we look at the sportsmen record of destorying wild animals. and the fish. We are the last ones to get a change at hunting, it seems. Japan, Korea, Russia get their large share of the fish before it gets to the fishes' homeland. The buffalo herd that was mentioned this morning and has been mentioned by a lot of the what we call the backlash and white country blaming Indians for destorying of habitats, and the natural habitats of wild animals. When you get to Alaska they will be able to tell you that they have hunted these hundreds of thousands of years the walrus, and the whale without destroying and the fish was there by the millions and now it's thousands and millions before the white man came there. They were there before the Russians occupied it, and they were there after the Russians sold, illegally sold this land to the United States.

They will have quite a story to tell you on their practices and their subsistence values; that you take the best, and leave the rest to whatever means that nature will take care of them.

The present people of this country come to a land of plenty only because strict conservation methods were practiced. You came to a

virgin country because there were people that understood nature, a land of plenty. It's been mine for 200 years and we have to take a very close look at whatever you call conservation, or whatever you call management. Many places it hasn't worked. Take a look at the Indian's viewpoint, and listen to them, and thay may be able to help

you.

Mr. OBERSTAR. I think that the purpose of this hearipg and subsequent hearings is to get that viewpoint.

When you talk about subsistence hunting, what species of animals or fish and shellfish are important for these subsistence purposes. Recognizing this is an island, I imagine a substantial amount of subsistence is on the sea.

Mr. CAGEY. The animals, too. Shall I say the non-Indians have not touched upon but only maybe a third of the eatable species that are available. I know my country best in the Puget Sound area. I know there are two-thirds of the food available that nobody until recently some people have come up using the flounder, the sea urchin, the sea cucumber, the mussel, just now coming into use as protein. So up in Angoon, Alaska, it's the same. There are namy, many species of food, animals, and fish that have never been utilized at this point. Indians know what they are.

Mr. OBERSTAR. On Admiralty, of the people living there, how many of them are subsistence hunters?

Ms. RECKLEY. There was a survey and we have a draft copy, which indicates of 50 households interviewed and 50 households represents about half of the households in Angoon, 72 percent said that subsistence was an important factor of their living in Angoon. That covers gathering berries, hunting, fishing, and just living with the fruits of the land.

Mr. OBERSTAR. How far is this from Juneau?

Ms. RECKLEY. It is 62 or 64 miles. I had a map that shows the relationship, approximately 64 miles from Juneau.

Mr. OBERSTAR. Is that by water and land?

Ms. RECKLEY. By air. You get there by float plane or by boat. Mr. OBERSTAR. In winter time do you go by snowmobile?

Ms. RECKLEY. No; it's not frozen over.

Mr. OBERSTAR. It's not?

Ms. RECKLEY. No. The waters are rather rough.

Mr. OBERSTAR. So whatever you carry back to the island from Juneau would be by air, and presumably very costly.

Ms. RECKLEY. Primarily the things they get, they have shipped up from Seattle. It's cheaper.

Mr. OBERSTAR. So there is then ocean transport. By what type of vessels?

Ms. RECKLEY. I believe, I am not certain of that, I could tell you I think it's by barge, because there is barge service through southeastern Alaska, and I think that is primarily how the shipments are made. I can provide that for the record.

Mr. OBERSTAR. Yes.

Mr. CAGEY. When you get up there, Mr. Chairman, you will find that a lot of the Alaska, Indian Native fishermen come with fish in the Puget Sound waters and when they return they load their boats with all kinds of foodstuffs from Bellingham area, and bring it to Alaska.