A special legislative panel is to make recommendations about state policies to rescue Alaska’s seafood industry, a major , would establish an eight-member seafood industry task force, with four state senators and four state House members and with the Senate president as chair.
The task force, to present recommendations to the Legislature by Jan. 21, 2025, is charged with finding some kind of response to the “unprecedented economic implosion of our industry,” Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, one of the sponsors, said in floor comments on April 19. “We have not seen an impact of our fisheries like this, I don’t think, in my lifetime,” he said. Twenty years ago, there was a crisis in the Alaska salmon industry, which spurred the creation of a salmon task force that produced some solutions, he noted. “This time, we’re dealing with virtually all our fisheries,” with effects not just in smaller coastal towns but throughout the state, he said.
As it moved through committees, different ideas about the task force makeup emerged. The original bill proposed a task force of seven, with two House members, two Senate members and two public members representing either United Fishermen of Alaska or the Pacific Seafood Processors Association. The seventh member, under the original bill, would be the commissioner of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game or a commissioner’s designee.
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