Federal Coordination and Compliance Section NWB

April 6, 2015

Civil Rights Division

U.S. Department of Justice
Attn: Vanita Gupta
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20530
Yukon River Gold LLC
Doug Karlberg/owner/manager
PO Box 4397
Bellingham, WA 98225
Ph. 360.961.2618
Email douglaskarlberg@yahoo.com
Re: Civil Rights complaint under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Dear Ms. Gupta,
I am not an attorney, so please bear with me.
I represent Yukon River Gold LLC, which I own with a partner Mr. Gary Nelson. Both of us are
white, or Caucasian, and non-residents of the State of Alaska. Yukon River Gold LLC (YRG)
operates a seafood processing plant in the small village of Kaltag Alaska. Because of a failure of
Chinook salmon returns, this area of the Yukon River was declared1 a resource disaster which
triggers a funding for relief to effected (commercial) fishing communities under Federal Statute
MSA 312(a). 2i
This will be the fifth time since 1997 that this area has been declared a fishery disaster, and none
of the disaster monies ever makes it to the effected communities. It keeps getting stolen by the
politically powerful, before it ever reaches us in Kaltag and the surrounding commercially
fishery reliant villages.3
It is hard to imagine what would happen elsewhere in the US, if Congress sent money to help the
effected victims of a disaster, and it never made it to the intended victims, but in this area, some
of the most remote, poorest, and politically helpless areas of our nation, this is precisely what is
happening. This is so difficult to watch, that I thought I should bring this to your attention.
In fact to obtain these disaster funds, the Governor of Alaska had to certify commercial fishery
economic losses. As these funds have been purloined continuously until this year, it is no
wonder that folks in the middle Yukon remain poorer than necessary. With record surpluses of
chums salmon, transitioning fishermen from the Chinook salmon to the chum salmon is a no1

Feds declare disaster for king salmon fisheries

BY MOLLY DISCHNER, ALASKA JOURNAL OF COMMERCE
Published: 2012.09.21 09:58 AM
The U.S. Department of Commerce issued a resource disaster designation for the Yukon River, Kuskokwim River
and Cook Inlet king salmon fisheries Sept. 13.
2
http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/sfa/sf3/disaster.htm
3
http://www.deltadiscovery.com/story/2014/06/04/speak-your-mind/western-alaska-groups-call-for-emergencyaction-on-salmon-bycatch/2159.html
Federal fishery disasters have been declared by the Secretary of Commerce for nine out of the last sixteen years:
1997, 1998, 2000-2002 and 2009-2012.

brainer for both conservation and the economic well being of these communities until the
Chinook stocks rebound, unless you are NOAA Alaska and under political pressure to get these
disaster funds to people, who never felt the economic distress in the first place.
Fact is 90% of all commercial fishing in the Upper Yukon takes place around Kaltag, AK., and
the Governor carefully measured the economic losses five times now, and NOAA Alaska cannot
find this commercial fishery.
It is like the economic distress felt by these communities is the bait for more disaster grants to
be purloined in the future.
If this commercial fishery became a success, how would NOAA Alaska and Tanana Chiefs
Conference get more disaster monies from Congress??
This fishery in the middle Yukon River on chum salmon was sustainable for 160 years before
collapsing in the wake of salmon interceptions in new fisheries often managed by NOAA
Alaska. When a fishery often without Federal management collapses after 160 years, maybe
NOAA Alaska put these ancient and wholly reliant people at economic risk in the first place.
The regions of fisheries disaster administration have been divided along Alaska Native tribal
lines in in the area we operate (Upper Yukon River), and the sole deciding representative
appointed by NMFS in our area, is a Alaska Native race based organization Tanana Chiefs
Conference, and this organization has on several occasions communicated to us, that they
cannot represent us at all, because essentially we are the wrong race.
We have no vote within Tanana Chiefs Conference and I know of no document that allows
Tanana Chiefs Conference to represent the commercial fishermen, crewmembers, processor
workers, or the American processor Yukon River Gold LLC.
Hence the fishing community4 as defined in the statute has no voice in the spending plan as
intended by Congress.
Only place that NOAA has ever managed commercial fisheries disaster funds in this fashion.
Because of this and other facts to be laid out further in this letter, we believe that we have had
our Civil Rights violated under title VI, Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other rights guaranteed by
the US Constitution.
We believe that these Civil Rights violations are intentional, as this situation was brought to
senior administration officials in 2011, during the last fisheries disaster declaration, and now in
the current situation NOAA/NMFS has chosen to administer these funds again in a method that
is clearly discriminatory to both white people and non-residents of Alaska. (Equal Protection
violation)

104-297

(16) The term "fishing community" means a community which is substantially dependent on or substantially engaged
in the harvest or processing of fishery resources to meet social and economic needs, and includes fishing vessel
owners, operators, and crew and United States fish processors that are based in such community.

1) We respectfully request that the Department of Justice thoroughly investigate this

situation and these practices by employees of NOAA/NMFS, which are in charge of

administering this fisheries disaster funding program for the American people, for Civil
Rights violations under Title IV of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, other Constitutional
violations, and adherence to the statues set in pace by Congress for administering these
funds.

2) We request that this investigation utilize an expedited process allowed under 28 C.F.R.
50.3 Sec. 50.3 Guidelines for the enforcement of title VI, Civil Rights Act of 1964.5
Preferably, halting any more monies to be disbursed from this program until this Civil
Rights investigation is completed.
3) We request that all evidence of how the fisheries disaster decisions were made, be
preserved, so that our right of private action as allowed for intentional violations of Civil
Rights, is also preserved.
4) Remind all parties involved that retribution for filing a civil rights complaint is frowned
upon, and may lead to more serious charges.6
Detailed history of this situation.
National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) administers these fishery disaster monies, and
NMFS is a division of NOAA, which is then a division of the Department of Commerce.
In 2014 YRG submitted a written response listing our approximate economic losses for the
qualifying years 2010, 2011, and 2012. This public comment listed not only economic losses by
YRG, it also approximated the economic losses for fishermen and seafood processing workers.
As this fishery is small, YRG knew virtually everybody involved and knew there economic
history. This amounted to about 15 fishermen and 70 processing workers. These communities
are very small. Kaltag, where the plant is located is officially 189 people in the City of Kaltag. The
response was acknowledged by a computer generated email from NMFS as timely for the public
comment period.ii We have heard nothing since.

(a) c. short-term programs

Special procedures may sometimes be required where there is noncompliance with title VI regulations in connection
with a program of such short total duration that all assistance funds will have to be paid out before the agency's usual
administrative procedures can be completed and where deferral in accordance with these guidelines would be
tantamount to a final refusal to grant assistance.

- Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000d 2000d7, and its implementing regulations, 28 C.F.R.
42.401 et seq., govern DOJs compliance and enforcement authority. These provisions provide that no recipient or
other person shall intimidate, threaten, coerce, or discriminate against any individual because he/she has made a
complaint, testified, assisted, or participated in any manner in an investigation, proceeding, or hearing conducted
under DOJs jurisdiction, or has asserted rights protected by statutes DOJ enforces.

Alaska received monies for two distinct fishing areas, Cook Inlet and the Yukon-Kuskoquim
fishing areas. In Cook Inlet NMFS got together six different stakeholder representatives of the
effected fishing community as defined in the MSA 312(a) and decided how to allocated the
disasters funds. This is absolutely normal, and consistent with NMFS practices nationwide, and
historically.
For example in 2014 the Alaskan portion of these fisheries disaster funds allocated from
Congress went to Cook Inlet where six stakeholder groups were selected.
Kenai Peninsula Borough
Matanuska-Susitna Burough
Northern District Setnetters Association
Kenai Peninsula Fishermens Association
Kenai River Sportfishing Asociation
Kenai River Professional Guide Association.
Note: none of these organizations, represent a single racial group, but a broad mix of effected
fishing community members as defined by MSA 312(a). Even Non-residents of Alaska are
represented. Seafood processors in Cook Inlet, such as ourselves were awarded $700,000.7
In the Yukon-Kuskoquim River area, NMFS decided without consulting us, to divide the YukonKuskoquim area into two distinct geographical areas by establishing lines delineating the two
major Alaska Native organizations in the region.
Then in the geographic area that we operate (Upper Yukon River), NMFS nominated a single
entity to represent the fishing communities as defined by MSA 312. We have never been
consulted through this process, and we have made ourselves available and known. Consultation
with the fishing community is a requirement of the MSA 312, before disbursement of these
disaster funds.8
We believe that by nominating a single entity to represent our circumstances and that this entity
is a race based organization, that our Civil Rights have been violated. The exclusive
representative of the Upper Yukon River is the Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC) a Non-profit
which is an Alaskan Native only organization.
This will be the fifth time that a fisheries disaster has been declared in the Upper Yukon River,
and each time the Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC) has purloined the disaster relief monies. In
the first four cases not a penny has ever been directed to the parties in the effected fishing
communities. Usually these monies were directed to pet projects of TCC, or subsistence
fishermen. One caveat is that since I began to question the uses of these disaster monies NOAA
7

NOAA Press Release Jan. 12, 2015

SEC. 312. TRANSITION TO SUSTAINABLE FISHERIES[7] 16 U.S.C. 1861a

(a) FISHERIES DISASTER RELIEF.-(c) (2) Upon the determination under paragraph (1) that there is a commercial fishery failure, the Secretary is
authorized to make sums available to be used by the affected State, fishing community, or by the Secretary in
cooperation with the affected State or fishing community for assessing the economic and social effects of the
commercial fishery failure, or any activity that the Secretary determines is appropriate to restore the fishery or
prevent a similar failure in the future and to assist a fishing community affected by such failure.

did come up with some monies for our fishermen. Approximately 5% of the Upper Yukon River
monies went to fishermen in 2014.
Before I criticize Tanana Chiefs fisheries policies, let me say simply that not everything that TCC
does is wrong-headed. TCC provides many good and necessary services to far flung villages
within their region, but their policy towards these commercial fisheries disaster funds and the
previous disaster funds, has not helped establish commercial fishing opportunities for the very
people who they have a duty to assist.
Further, we hired an attorney for a time during the summer salmon harvest period to watch over
this process for us; Mr. Bruce Wheyrauch.
Mr. Wheyrauch was in my view, given the run around. NOAA told Mr. Wheyrauch to contact
TCC. TCC told us to contact NOAA. NOAA agreed to provide us with the documents that were
involved in making decisions amongst stakeholders for $1,701 in cash. I assume the primary
stakeholders were provided their copies of this same information, for free.
Finally we did receive a letter from TCCs General Counsel, which essentially blamed all the
decisions on NOAA, failed to recognize any responsibility to represent the fishing community
as defined in MSA 312(a), and finally revealed their goal, which is to get monies for TCC
fisheries research staff and to subsistence fishermen. (See attached Exhibit 1.)
In previous fisheries disaster, TCC was actively engaged to get valuable assistance for
subsistence fishermen, even though subsistence fishermen do not qualify for fisheries disaster
monies under MSA 312(a).
From TCC General Counsel letter August 7, 2014
The TCC portion {of disaster monies} is separate from compensation to eligible
commercial fishermen All of the components of the grants were based on NOAA
requirements. The TCC portion of funding must be utilized for the benefit to all
subsistence users within the TCC region.
There is just one small problem it is not legal to utilize Fisheries Disaster funds for
subsistence fisherman.
TCC knows this is the case, and TCC lives off of Federal funding. They have a complete and full
time in-house legal staff that has told TCC leadership this. TCC annually manages approximately
$90,000,000 in Federal grants now, and is well schooled in the restrictions on Federal dollars,
but has chosen to ignore these rules when it comes to Fisheries Disaster Funds.
As proof of this knowledge I offer the following. One, a TCC resolution from their annual
meeting.
Tanana Chiefs Conference Board Resolution
Resolution No. 2014-42
Amendment of the Magnuson-Stevens Act
WHEREAS, The Magnuson-Stevens Act has no mechanism for disaster relief for traditional and
customary users, for Indigenous communities and governments; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED the Tanana Chiefs Conference and its members formally request
that the United States Congress amend the Magnuson-Stevens Act to include the following:
A mechanism for disaster relief declarations and funding for individual fisherman and for federally
recognized tribal governments affected by subsistence/customary and traditional use fisheries
collapse.

Not only was TCC aware of the fact that Fisheries Disaster monies cannot be utilized for
subsistence fishermen, but are now attempting to get the Magnuson-Stevens Act modified ex
post facto to allow for fisheries disaster monies to subsistence fishermen.
Fisheries Disaster money is only for commercial fisheries.9
Fairbanks and is at the lower reaches of the TCC area, the commercial fishery here has had scant
support from TCC since it collapsed in 1997.
This is robustly evidenced by TCCs grabbing of prior years disaster monies and providing none
to the commercial fishing communities as defined by the statute MSA 312(a) and related
statutes. Even though TCCs own Mission Statement defines a responsibility for the economic
well being of its villages.
For context, the Yukon River is almost 1,800 miles long. Over 50% of TCC members are located
in the urban Fairbanks area which is located 900 miles upstream from the ocean. TCC has
seldom supported any commercial fishery which takes place before the salmon arrive upstream
to the greater Fairbanks area. which Kaltag is located 450 miles downstream from
On July 17th, 2014 TCC had a delegation of senior staff including their new President Victor
Joseph traveled to Kaltag and have a community meeting which I attended. President Victor
Joseph made it clear that TCC could only represent members of TCC and all the disaster monies
had been allocated, and none were for the fishing community as defined by the MSA 312(a).
NOAA had made a decision to allow only a single exclusive representative for the Upper Yukon
area, and according to TCCs President Victor Joseph, TCC would not represent Yukon River
Gold LLC.
Virtually all of this situation described about the Disaster monies in 2014 are identical to the last
disaster declaration in 2011. During the disaster declaration in 2011, I wrote to NOAA
complaining about the process, and our inability to participate. Because I highlighted virtually
every complaint here three years ago, and NOAA ignored the complaints, I believe this
discrimination is intentional, as NOAA was clearly aware of it. I even met in person with Lisa
Lindeman NOAAs Counsel in Juneau, to no avail.
I received some bizarre objections. One, the head of NOAA stated that TCC represented the
village of Kaltag. This is laughable, as the Village of Kaltag, is an arm of TCC. The City of Kaltag
is a legally registered city with the State of Alaska. The term village and city are often universally
9

NMFS Instructions 31-108-01 June 16, 2011 POLICY GUIDANCE FOR DISASTER ASSISTANCE UNDER MSA
312(A)
Fishery Disaster - means a general term that refers to a commercial fishery failure, a catastrophic
regional fishery disaster, significant harm incurred, or a serious disruption affecting future production
due to a fishery resource disaster arising from natural or undetermined causes, consistent with MSA
and IFA.

used out here where cities are pretty small, but the Village of Kaltag is a tribal organization and a
member of TCC. The City of Kaltag on the other hand has a Mayor and a City Council.
Early last year Mr. Peter Jones contacted the City of Kaltag along with some other cities along
the river adjoining Kaltag to inquire whether TCC could have authority to represent them with
the disaster declaration money coming. The City of Kaltag told them no. NOAA has been told
by TCC that they represent the whole region. I know of no written documents that give TCC this
authority, and certainly this processor and the others in the fishing community as defined by
MSA312(a), have not authorized TCC to speak or act for them, as everyone knows what
happened to the disaster funds from prior years, which never made it to the fishermen or
processors.
Essentially the political fix is in. Powerful political interests want TCC to have this money. One
of the prime political influences is Senator Begich. Senator Begich lost the election last
November, but before he did, he was close to TCC and its sister for-profit organization Doyon.
Doyon was formed by TCC and shares identical shareholders which together represent
approximately $400,000,000 in annual revenues, and ~$20,000,000 in profits. Together these
two spent approximately $5,000,000 in lobbying, and Senator Begich was their favorite
politician in 2014 for campaign contributions.
Senator Begich chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries and Coast
Guard which has jurisdiction over the National Marine Fisheries Service and has been active in
reauthorization of the Magnuson Stevens Act, the nations main fisheries law. As a member of
the Senate Appropriations committee Begich supported funding, including the Pacific Coastal
Salmon Recovery Fund and other NOAA grants.
Senator Begich has powerful influence over the NOAA/NMFS budget, so when he calls NOAA
with suggestions on whom to favor with Federal dollars like Fisheries Disaster funds, NOAA
listens carefully.
TCC/Doyon which is the recipient of these disaster funds, then supports Begich. The TCC region
has lot of votes. In 2011, when the last disaster monies were being decided, my FOIA request
revealed emails from Bob King, Begichs aide closely guiding the allocation of these funds to
whoever TCC decides.
NOAA appeared to be abdicating its role to the politicians, and away from adherence to the
statutory demands of Congress.
The night before the election Senator Begich spent in TCCs offices, getting out the vote.
I am not nave enough to believe that political arm twisting does not go on, but when it
eliminates the desperately needed monies to the victims of an economic disaster, I have to
wonder if Senator Begich was not abandoning his duty to his constituents, who were dire need of
relief. NOAAs Alaska staff played an enabling role in this failure to get the disaster monies to
those in need, and that is likely an understatement.
One of the other objections we hear, is that we do not harvest any Chinooks in the middle Yukon
River. While this may be true, we have been severely impacted from catching an abundance of
chums dues to restrictions placed of chum salmon fishing to preserve the declining Chinooks.
The middle Yukon has not harvested a single commercial Chinook since 1997, as we did not wish

to see the Chinook salmon decline further. If only the other users had shown some additional
restraint maybe this situation would not be so desperate.
In Cook Inlet, sockeye salmon fishermen have been prohibited from commercially harvesting
Chinook for years, but the real economic impact is the closure of sockeye salmon fishing due to
Chinook conservation concerns. NOAA rightly recognized the economic losses of these
fishermen and processors of sockeye salmon, even though because of no commercial Chinook
harvests for years, the actual economic losses for Chinooks salmon was zero. We are in a
virtually identical situation as Cook Inlet, except our losses are due to forgone harvesting
opportunities on chums salmon, instead of sockeye salmon.
Clearly, most of these objections are trumped up as to not dilute TCCs bundle of cash coming
from the Fisheries Disaster funds.
INSERT Non-public confidential information.
There are only three seafood processing plants left in operation on the Yukon River. One in the
lower river with ~70% of the harvest allocation on the Yukon River. One, Kaltag operated by the
Alaska licensed processor Yukon River Gold with approximately 25% of the Yukon River salmon
harvest allocations, and one in the upper Yukon River with approximately 5% of the harvest.
We believe that we qualify for some of the fisheries disaster funds, by statute, if the funds were
administered properly. We have endured no less than four fisheries disasters in the last 7 years.
Managers have not taken a salary since inception. We operate this plant paying the highest
starting wages of any seafood processing plant in the State, and are virtually 100% local hire. We
are proud of what we have accomplished re-starting this historical fishery.
What needs to be emphasized is there is only one processor left in the area, and if we go under,
there will not be any place for the fishermen to sell.
The stakes are high, and this disaster money has been earned, and critically needed. After being
ignored that last four times that commercial fisheries disaster funds have been sent to this area
by Congress, we deserve a turn for relief.
Respectfully,

Doug Karlberg
Doug Karlberg
Yukon River Gold LLC / manager / owner
Ph. 360.961.2618

https://alaskafisheries.noaa.gov/omi/grants/dfunds/soa0712_0812.pdf

ii

Dear government officials and fellow stakeholders,

It is great news that Congress and especially the Alaskan delegation were successful at securing Federal
Disaster funds for Alaska. It took a lot of work.
As the process begins to allocate these disaster monies I wanted to point out the small, but historical
commercial salmon fishery in the Yukon River harvest area Y-4A, centered around Kaltag, which is where the
only processing plant is located. I manage the plant in Kaltag which has been making steady progress towards
rebuilding this historical fishery. We wanted to make our presence known, so that we could be considered for
a few dollars from these disaster funds. We completely understand that there are a lot of stake-holders and
the money will have to be spread thin.
There have been a lot of fisheries disaster monies appropriated to the Yukon River over the last decade, and
to the best of my knowledge, the middle Yukon commercial salmon fishery has not received a dime from any
of these Fishery Disaster Declarations. We would like to be considered this time. We think this is a mistake,
as a sustainable commercial fishery on extremely strong chum salmon returns is the largest economic
opportunity available in the middle Yukon River.
Re-starting a historic commercial fishery makes eminent sense, especially with the chum salmon surpluses
occurring.
We operated in 2012, and created approximately 130 direct jobs including fishermen, processing workers and
tradespeople. Over 95% of these jobs are local hires which is one of the few fish processing plants in Alaska

that does hire local to this degree. There are certainly more indirect and induced jobs from this effort to restart this historical fishery, but I am not qualified to estimate the indirect impacts, but they are substantial.
This fishery has existed continuously as a commercial fishery since 1837 or thereabouts, until the mysterious
chum salmon crash of 1997. No processing or commercial fishing occurred for the next ten years, when we
got involved, and began to rebuild this fishery. Rebuilding a fishery from scratch in a remote location is
extremely challenging, and financially sustainability is critical, and disasters such as 2010-2012 can make or
break a project like this. Access to capital in these remote areas of Alaska is almost non-existent. If you want
capital, you have to earn it.
We have gone through our records of 2010-2012 and on top of a 2,250-2,850 Chinook quota that was
obviously not caught, our chum harvest was seriously impacted. This situation is exactly like the situation in
Cook Inlet where the majority of the losses are not due to inability to harvest Chinook salmon, but an
inability to harvest their target species (ie. sockeye salmon) due to Chinook conservation closures which in
effect closed or seriously curtailed sockeye harvesting.
The forgone harvest in Yukon River harvest area Y-4A is detailed by ADFG in a letter below.ii
In 2012 and 2010, approximately 50% of the chum salmon run passed through Kaltag without the
opportunity to fish them. We did have difficulty on start-up up, but this was due to not operating at all in
2011 awaiting a regulation change that would make the project at least possible on a financial basis. This
regulation change came April 2012, and in the remote region this is was a last minute change and we threw an
operation together, but it was an incredible struggle.
This last minute regulation change for the first time allowed our fishermen to fish surplus chums salmon, and
return the Chinook salmon back into the river alive. With the best of efforts, without this change, this fishery
would be hopeless as the chum salmon return along with the Chinooks.
This change could not have been more crucial. If the Chinook salmon run had been healthy, none of this
would have been necessary.
The single proximate cause of all these struggles were the lack of Chinook salmon on all counts. With losing
50% of the chum salmon run 2010 and 2012, and all the season in 2011 and the Chinook harvest quota I
have put together our loses due to the low returns of Chinook salmon in 2010 2012. We have added a table
at the end of this letter.
As I said earlier, we do not expect to be made whole on these losses, but only provide these to illustrate we
have a legitimate basis for our asking to be included in disaster funding allocations. If any of you require the
data behind these losses, do not hesitate to ask, and we will provide documentation and a CPAs letter
certifying these losses.
Additionally, in a good faith effort to restore Chinook salmon returns, the commercial fishermen in Kaltag,
Nulato, Koyokuk, and Galena have been voluntarily returning all Chinook salmon harvested back to the river
alive starting in 2007 until present. This effort should benefit all Chinook users on the Yukon River in the
future.
The middle Yukon has not commercially harvested a single Chinook salmon since 1997!
I cannot speak for the City of Kaltag or the Kaltag Tribal Council, but I would hope that we could get some
funds for our fishermen and processing workers. Additionally Yukon River Gold LLC has significant losses,
and I can speak for Yukon River Gold LLC.

Yukon River Gold LLC would also like to be considered for some of this funding. Yukon River Gold LLC is
an American processor and is specifically qualified under MSA Section 312(a). We have worked very hard to
rebuild this critical economic driver in this region. As a manager I can attest to the enormous hard work and
lot of money invested at great risk. We have yet to turn a profit, or even take a wage over the last six years.
This along with our commitment to hire local, which we have kept, we feel we have earned a little of these
disaster monies. If granted some monies, Yukon River Gold will re-invest the money in the fishery.
Rebuilding a fishery takes money, and we would have had more if it were not for this disaster.
In closing, I appreciate the opportunity to present our case to all of you for our consideration for disaster
monies. Please do not forget us this time. We know that losses around the State are significant, and these
funds will have to stretch, and we completely understand that folks will need to share equitably. We have
presented an total funding request on the following table of $ 388,049ii, which is only 15% of our actual
losses. This request includes not only Yukon River Gold LLC which processes the salmon, but our fishermen
and workers, and the City of Kaltag for lost fish tax revenue.
All of these folks suffered real losses, and if granted this request will be distributed to approximately 150
people, who live in 10 villages in the region. With unemployment extremely high in this region and the fishing
season approaching, these monies will have a significant impact right away, and unlike many proposals
provides a real opportunity to have a durable and sustainable fishery into the future.
Sincerely,
Doug Karlberg
Gary Nelson
Yukon River Gold LLC

ii

MEMORANDUM

State of Alaska
Department of Fish and Game
Division of Commercial Fisheries

TO:

Doug Karlberg

DATE:

September 18, 2012

THRU:

Jan Conitz

PHONE NO:

459-7217

AYK Regional Research Coordinator

FROM:

Jeff Estensen/Steve Hayes

SUBJECT:Requested Commercial Harvest AYK Fall/Summer Season Area Managers

Information

Mr. Karlberg,
On September 9, 2012, you requested, via email, an estimate of the foregone commercial harvest of summer
and fall chum salmon in Subdistrict 4-A for the previous 6 years, including 2012. Below are two tables, one
for summer chum salmon and one for fall chum salmon that contain the information you have requested. We
did not include an estimate for 2012 for fall chum salmon as the season is ongoing and information has not
been fully collected and analyzed. Data 2012 data is preliminary.
Please let us know if you have any further questions.
Estimated forgone commercial harvest of summer chum salmon, Subdistrict 4-A, 2005-2012.

Pilot Passage

Estimated Total

Harvestable Surplus

4-A

Run

Above 1.0 Million

28.20%

2005

2,439,616

2,520,050

1,520,050

428,654

2006

3,767,044

3,862,932

2,862,932

807,347

2007

1,726,885

1,941,570

941,570

265,523

2008

1,665,667

1,823,285

823,285

232,166

2009

1,421,646

1,617,767

617,767

174,210

2010

1,405,533

1,601,393

601,393

169,593

2011

1,977,808

2,256,693

1,256,693

354,387

2012
2,130,899
2,382,567
1,382,567
- In 2008 -2009, 2011-2012 because of the severe conservation measures implemented
to protect Chinook salmon to meet spawning escapement goals in Alaska and Cananda,
resulted in foregone harvest of summer chum salmon.
- In 2005 -2006 and 2011, there was no commercial buyer in Subdistrict 4-A.

389,884

ii

Economic losses Chinook salmon failure on the Yukon River 2010-2012

Middle Yukon commercial salmon fishing harvest area Y-4A

2012
Fishermen losses
Processing workers lost wages
City of Kaltag - Fish taxes
Processor Yukon River Gold Lost
Revenue
Subtotal

Chum salmon
Chinook salmon
$
91,930 $
171,000
$
59,595
$
25,560
$
1,609
$
2,993

Total
$ 262,930
$
85,155
$
4,601

$
$

59,850
259,403

$
$

267,989
620,675

Chum salmon
$
183,860
$
119,190
$
3,218

Chinook salmon
$
342,000
$
51,120
$
5,985

$
$
$

525,860
170,310
9,203

$
$

$
$

$ 535,978
$ 1,241,351

208,139
361,273

$
$

2011
Fishermen losses
Processing workers lost wages
City of Kaltag - Fish taxes
Processor Yukon River Gold Lost
Revenue
Subtotal

416,278
722,546

119,700
518,805

2010
Chum salmon
Chinook salmon
$
91,930 $
171,000
$
59,595
$
25,560
$
1,609
$
2,993

$
$
$

262,930
85,155
4,601

Subtotal

$
$

$
$

267,989
620,675

Total economic losses 20102012

$ 2,482,701

Fishermen losses
Processing workers lost wages
City of Kaltag - Fish taxes
Processor Yukon River Gold Lost
Revenue

208,139
361,273

$
$

59,850
259,403

Fishermen losses
Processing workers lost wages
City of Kaltag - Fish taxes
Processor Yukon River Gold Lost
Revenue

$ 1,051,720
$
340,620
$
18,405

42%
14%
1%

$ 1,071,956

43%