Southeast Alaska: Low use, increasing costs, dwindling budgets force closure of some Forest Service cabins - Tightening a budget, whether for your family or for the federal government, can be stressful, difficult, sad, and sometimes even painful. The Tongass National Forest took a necessary step this week as it finalized the decision to remove 10 low-use public recreation cabins.

The Red Alders Cabin, near Ketchikan, was crushed by a tree
in 2012. This cabin will be removed.
Photo courtesy USFS

On Sept. 8, Forest Supervisor Forrest Cole signed the final Decision Notice and Finding of No Significant Impact for the Tongass National Forest Sustainable Cabin Management Environmental Assessment. The decision affects 12 cabins on seven ranger districts. The final decision is nearly the same as the draft decision that was sent to the public in March 2014.

In the final decision, the Forest Service will convert Distin Lake Cabin, located in Admiralty Island National Monument back to a three-sided shelter as originally constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps. The Forest Service will remove 10 other cabins and monitor the condition and use of Checats Lake Cabin for potential closure in the future.

The Forest Service will continue to rent the Checats Lake Cabin through the National Recreation Reservation System and provide minor maintenance. However, the cabin will only remain open as long as the Forest Service can keep its primary structural elements in a safe, serviceable condition. Also, use of the Checats Lake cabin must remain at or above 10 reserved nights per year to remain open.

Three cabins; Beaver Camp, Big Goat Lake, and Red Alders, located within the Ketchikan Ranger District, will be removed. Maksoutof Lake and Rezanof Lake Cabins on the Sitka Ranger District will be removed. Harvey Lake Cabin and DeBoer Lake Cabin on the Petersburg District will be removed, but the trail from saltwater to Harvey Lake will remain available for public use.

Wrangell Ranger District’s Binkley Slough Cabin will be removed. The McGilvery Cabin within the Thorne Bay Ranger District will be removed. Finally, Square Lake Cabin within the Yakutat Ranger District will be removed. No cabins are being removed from the Juneau Ranger District.

In March 2014, a draft Decision Notice was released and a “Pre-decisional Administrative Review Process,” better known as an “objection” period, began. No objections were received on the draft decision during the 45-day objection period.

“Many people saw this decision when it went out in March. We are just finalizing the decision at this stage…and while public comments certainly point to people’s frustration over the loss of these cabins, they also, largely agree that these are cabins that receive little use and are not as important as other cabins on the Tongass,” said Cole. - More...
Monday PM - September 10, 2014

Southeast Alaska: Wrangell keeps fishing base through decades of change By CONOR BELL - Wrangell Island was originally home to Stikine (Shtax’héen) Tlingits, who had a population of about 1,500 in the early 19th century when Russians first engaged them in trade. The Tlingits traded furs, which they gained mostly through trading with the Athabascans in the Interior, to the Russians for textiles and other European goods.

Float houses rest on the mud in Wrangell.
Photo courtesy of Flickr user brewbooks

The Russian American Company built a fort by the Stikine River in 1834, which it began leasing to the British Hudson Bay Company six years later. The British company continued the fur trade until 1849, when it abandoned the fort due to a poor relationship with the Tlingits.

Two minor gold rushes renewed the area’s economic activity during the 1860s and 1870s. In 1880, Alaska’s first census put Wrangell’s population of white settlers at 106 and area Tlingits at 817. Later, during the Klondike Gold Rush, prospectors stopped in Wrangell on their way up the Stikine River.

Traffic through the town slowed as other routes proved easier, but a base of businesses was already in place, allowing other industries to develop.

A history of timber

The fishing and logging industries gained prominence in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. While fishing’s presence in Wrangell’s economy has been steady, logging grew continuously through the 20th century.

Initially supplying wood for local construction and crates for shipping salmon, the local sawmill provided lumber for airplane manufacturing beginning around 1920. It also produced wood for U.S. military bases through World War II and for Japanese industries through most of the second half of the century.

Total employment in Wrangell fluctuated between 900 and 1,100 through the 1980s and early 1990s, with logging by far the largest employer.

The Tongass Timber Reform Act of 1990 limited harvesting areas and ended heavy federal subsidization. The Wrangell sawmill, which had been the town’s primary economic driver, closed in 1995. Just one year prior, the sawmill alone had provided almost 20 percent of the area’s employment and 30 percent of wages.

Between 1994 and 1997, the population decreased from 2,800 to 2,500, and in 2006, it bottomed out at 2,200 0 20 percent lower than in 1994. Since then, the city’s population and jobs have never fully rebounded. - More...
Wednesday PM - September 10, 2014