Thursday August 1, 2024
Alaska Beacon —
The Biden administration has rejected a nominee for a key Alaska fisheries management post who could have tipped decisions toward the interests of tribes and conservation groups and away from the priorities of the large-boat, Seattle-based trawl industry.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo skipped over the top choice of Washington Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee, conservation advocate Becca Robbins Gisclair, and instead reappointed the last-ranked nominee on a slate of four candidates that Inslee offered: Anne Vanderhoeven, a trawl industry employee who has served on the panel for several years.
Raimondo’s choice for the open North Pacific Fishery Management Council seat, initially confirmed Tuesday by Inslee’s office before being formally announced Wednesday, comes after what advocates describe as weeks of intense lobbying by supporters of both Gisclair and Vanderhoeven.
The council regulates lucrative commercial fisheries for pollock, cod and other species off Alaska’s coast. It’s been the site of polarized, emotional debate in recent years over the trawl industry’s unintended harvest — known as bycatch — of chum and king salmon that spawn in the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers in Western Alaska.