ALASKA NATIVES COMMISSION
JOINT FEDERAL-STATE COMMISSION
ON
POLICIES AND PROGRAMS AFFECTING
ALASKA NATIVES
4000 Old Seward Highway, Suite 100
Anchorage,
Alaska 99503
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ANCHORAGE TESTIMONY - OCTOBER 15, 1992
DEPOSITION EXHIBIT #10 - TESTIMONY
OF FELIX HESS
TESTIMONY BEFORE THE ALASKA NATIVES COMMISSION
Statewide Hearing in Anchorage, Alaska
October 15, 1992
Good afternoon, my name is Felix Hess and I am chairman of the Board for Calista Corporation. We would like to thank the Alaska Natives Commission for holding statewide hearings today. We feel this is a good opportunity to hear the ideas of Alaska Natives throughout Alaska, We would also like to thank you for the time and effort that you took to hold an August public hearing in Bethel. We hope that the testimony you heard at that particular hearing will be the basis for developing recommendations and identifying solutions which address the problems facing the Yupik people.
During the last two months you have been conducting hearings throughout Alaska. As you hear the recommendations and suggestions of the Alaska Native people we hope the Commission will take to heart what is being said and concentrate on making recommendations to Congress which benefit the Alaska Native people and regions of the state with the greatest needs.
It is recognized that as a whole Alaska Natives face a wide range of problems and the culture is under a tremendous amount of stress and pressure to change. However, the problems and pressures are much greater in some regions of the state than others. For example, in Anchorage, most Alaska Natives live in homes with sewer and running water; health care services are within a cab ride away at the Alaska Native Medical Center; and the Anchorage School District is one of the best funded school districts in the country. There are jobs available, although finding one may take a bit of effort. In contrast, however, Alaska Natives living in most villages in western Alaska and the Calista region do not even begin to have any of these services. The sewer facilities are honeybucket systems if that; health care comes from a community aide, if there is one or else it is a plane ride away; there are no jobs, unless you are a school teacher or the village store clerk; and the school systems are unable to provide an education comparable in quality to Anchorage's schools.
I know this is a reiteration of the litany of problems facing Alaska Natives, but there is a point to be made here. The point is the Alaska Native Commission must focus and target recommendations the areas of the state with the greatest needs, and the recommendations must be designed to benefit the Alaska Natives most in need. It should be a goal of this Commision to recommend program and policy changes which will ensure that all Alaska Natives are able to live in the villalges without fear of their health, safety and economic well-being. In a perfect world there would be resources enough to take care of all Alaska Native needs. We all know however that resources are limited. Consequently, this is the basis of our recommendation that effort to get the most needy to speed with the rest of the state should be the emphasis of this Commission.
The Calista Corporation has already testified at the Bethel hearing and prepared a detailed report on the condition of the Yupik people living in the Calista region. In the book, The Calista Region: A Gentle People, A Harsh Life, at Commission hearings, and via Martin B. Moore at Economic Task Force meetings, we have made suggestions and recommendations on how to help the Yupik people. We sincerely hope the Commission will take the time to review the recommendations made in the book, Calista Region: A Gentle People, A Harsh Life. These recommendations and the ones we will be submitting at the hearing on Saturday are actions which will greatly benefit both the Yupik people and other Alaska Natives as well.
The Yupik people of the Calista region need programs and funding to develop a better education system, improve health and social programs, increase economic opportunities in the villages, and develop the region's natural resources. The introduction of sewer and water facilities alone in the villages in the Calista region would have a monumental impact on improving health and living conditions in the villages.
Just recently, the Anchorage Daily News did a five day series on the sewer and water safety problems facing villages in rural Alaska. It wasn't just a coincidence that the examples and stories were focused on-villages in the Calista Region. These communities were selected because they are the ones experiencing the problems. Problems of this magnitude simply do not occur in communities like Anchorage, Ninilchik, Nenana, Seward or Ketchikan. It is for this reason alone we keep telling the Commission that the recommendations developed by this Commission must focus on the areas of the state with the problems. Generic, broad-range programs are no longer the answer. In this time of limited funding and tight financial budgets, programs and monies must be targeted to areas and people where they can do the most good and the most needed. Priorities for implementing programs and providing funding must be based on need, not on which region or entity has the greatest political clout.
Reports have been compiled on a statewide basis which address the social and economic difficulties facing Alaska Natives. These studies are not designed to compare or identify those areas of the state with the best or worst living conditions. As a result it appears that all Alaska Natives and all villages share the same problems, when in reality that is not the case. If the reports were written so that they compared different areas of the state, the results would show that regardless of the problem - suicide, alcoholism, unemployment, lack of economic growth, substandard sanitation facilities, inadequate infrastructure, etc. - the Calista region consistently has the most extreme set of problems and is always at the bottom of any ranking based on good to bad.
The fact that studies use the Calista villages as examples of the problems of extreme living conditions facing Alaska Natives today is no coincidence. By adding the statistics for the Calista region to any analysis on Native problems and issues, it skews the numbers enough to show that the native community or a whole has serious problems, yet in fact that is not the case. The bulk of the problem is in one region alone - the Calista region.
For example, of the communities lacking
sewer and water facilities more than half of the villages are
in the Calista region. It is the Calista region whic has the
highest incidence rate for hepatitis in the state. The Calista
region also is the region most impacted by Section 22(g) of
ANCSA which gives the USF&WS the right to control development and use of lands in national wildlife refuges owned by the village corporations. Of the 22 villages affected by this section of ANCSA, 16 of the villages are in the Calista region. The 22(g) languange has been used by USF&WS
to justify lower values for village lands being appraised for
land exchanges. We have identified over 20 recommendations,
including actions to be taken, to address problems such as
the ones I have just mentioned. We request that the Commission
review these recommendations and include them in the final
set of recommendations to be submitted to Congress.
Calista Corporation is taking an active role in identifying possible solutions to the problems facing the Yupik people. So that you may better understand life in the Calista Region and see why we are recommending specific actions to be taken, I would like to briefly describe to you the Calista region.
The Calista region is in economic and social distress. The people in the region are coping with rapid transition from a traditional subsistence-based culture to away of life that combines cash and subsistence economies. This change is impacting every facet of life in the region including the growth of the villages, population patterns, the environment, education, development of infrastructure systems, employment opportunities, and the social well-being of the Yupik people.
We have found that three major attributes influence change in the Calista region. They are the Yupik way of life, availability of human and natural resources, and institutional structures.
The Yupik way of life is the heart and soul of the Calista Region. subsistence remains at the center of the Yupik culture and society. As a result, it must be protected. In recent years, the Yupik people have been plagued by alcoholism, suicide, domestic violence and child abuse. Now murder and assault are common events in the villages. These are all signs of a culture under extreme stress and in dire need of help. If help is not provided, in 20 years, there will be no Yupik culture as we know it. Much of the change now occurring in the villages is a result of no jobs, lack of response to compete in today's world, and few opportunities for future growth and development.
In the villages, more and more of the young people leave never to return. The reasons -- there are no jobs to sustain them. There is no housing for them to live in to start their own families. The one thing still keeping most Yupik people in the villages is their ability to continue living a subsistence lifestyle. However, even that is being threatened by political disputes over who has the right to practice subsistence and where it can occur.
Natural resources found in the Calista Region are not easily developed because they are far from roads or ports. Consequently, there is little economic development occurring in the region so people are still very dependent on subsistence for food. But subsistence only provides a small portion of what is needed to live in a village. The rest of the necessary goods and services must be paid for with cash. For the Yupik people, public assistance, food stamps, Permanent Fund dividends, income from commercial fishing and the occasional construction job are the sources of cash found in the Calista region.
In our region, there are no Red Dog mines or world-class commercial fishing grounds such as that found in the Bristol Bay area. There is no timber or oil. There are no roads connecting us to the outside to bring in commerce or reduce transportation costs. The Calista Corporation and Yupik people would like to see the federal and state government implement programs and incentives which encourage economic development in depressed areas of the state.
Even though the Yupik people have made social and economic gains, they still have not caught up with the rest of the state. So the problems confronting the Yupik people persist. The dimensions of our problems are broad and complex. There are no quick or easy solutions to the problems facing the Yupik people. While joblessness is high and income levels are low for all Alaska Natives, these conditions are far worse for those Alaska Natives living in villages in the Calista region. The same applies to health and social problems. They may be poor for all Alaska Natives, but nowhere are they greater than in the Calista Region.
Finally, while other villages and areas of the state are also limited in their opportunities for economic and natural resource development, these opportunites are virtually absent in the Calista Region. In light of this, time must be taken to examine the economic and social conditions of the Calista region. An effort must be made to document the severity of the problems so that decisions can be made on how to remedy the existing problems, while keeping the problems from getting worse, thereby allowing the Yupik people to work toward improving their situation. It must be recognized that the Calista Region does not have the same level of resources to deal with its problems. There are no tax revenues coming in from property tax or taxes on the oil industry. No matter how hard this region tries, unless policies and programs change drastically, you will never see an elementary school such as that which was just recently opened in Barrow.
Unless things change dramatically, the Calista region is likely to continue to experience severe economic difficulties while the rest of Alaska begins a gradual recovery. There are no easy answers to the problems, especially those involving economic development. Profitable resource development has been an elusive goal in the Calista Region, even when the State of Alaska was wealthier. If programs and funding are not targeted to the Calista Region there will be more unemployment, lower incomes, and a decline or even disappearance of some villages.
The recommendations the Calista Corporation will be submitting to the Commission outline actions which can be taken to improve income levels and employment opportunities in the Calista Region. The development of a strong regional economy, when coupled with other improvements related to education and health, can lead to significant improvements in the quality of life for Alaska Natives, in particular the Yupik people.
In the absence of any change to the Calista Region's economy to counter the current conditions and trends, the net result will be continued unemployment, with little or no gain in personal income, and continued decline of the social well-being of the residents of the Calista Region. In the future, the plight of the villages will only get worse in the absence of systematic efforts to address the problems. There will be even more people looking for fewer jobs because the population and labor force are growing. A major obstacle to grappling with the plight of the Alaska Native people is that no one quite knows what to do or what will work. Because we are familiar with the Yupik people and the Calista Region we feel we have a good idea of what will work in our region. With chat in mind, we ask that the Commission seriously consider recommending the actions that Calista Corporation presents to this Commission.
A long-term commitment to implement a long-term comprehensive program addressing the problems facing the Yupik people is necessary to make a noticeable change. A solution to many of the region's social, health and economic problems will not be found until efforts are made to focus on and specifically help the Yupik people. Without that assistance few, if any, changes will be made. A comprehensive, long-term cooperative effort by this Commission, other Native entities, and the state and federal government if necessary to deal with the overwhelming conditions in the Calista region.
I would like to thank you for your time and attention with respect to listening to our concerns. We hope the Commission will think about what we have said today and act on it. You are one of the last sources of hope for the Yupik people in terms of finding solutions and gaining support for helping the Yupik people survive into the next century.
This document was ocr scanned. We have made every
attempt to keep the online document the same as the original,
including the recorder's original misspellings or typos.
