What caused mass die-offs of sea lion pups?

Alaska’s economy isn’t in need of salvage (“Trail Blazing,” HCN, 6/26/17). There is already a multibillion dollar tourist economy in the state. There are glacier tours, whale-watching tours, dog-sledding tours, bear-watching tours and hiking tours, in addition to fishing and hunting tours. Alaska actually has too many tours. We are selling off our wilderness as […]

Replacing the economic benefits of oil production with trail tourism is a nice idea, but the economic reality is staggering (“Trail Blazing,” HCN, 6/26/17). The current Trans-Alaska Pipeline carrying rate is about 500,000 barrels per day. At about $43 per barrel, the value of that resource is $21.5 million. Per day. All year long. Until […]

At a superficial level, this story reveals the contradictions of people who claim to be sympathetic to both environmental preservation and Indigenous people living in traditional ways (“Death Threats,” HCN, 7/24/17). But a little deeper down, we face some real human dilemmas. Beyond “managing” wildlife populations and limiting hunting to sustainable levels, many people do […]

In the story “Death Threats” (HCN, 7/24/17), Jessica Lefevre, an attorney for the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission, says, “The NGOs we deal with are ideologically driven; this is what they do, they save stuff. The collateral damage to communities doesn’t factor into their thinking.” The same could be said for dozens of hard-line animal rights […]