| August 25, 2006 Red Alert by Soren Wuerth Clear-cuts & Cold Feet in Blind Pass
My wife and I were sitting by a fire when we heard the distant roar of a boat engine. A small boat pulled into our cove at dusk, its motor thrusting repeatedly, a rooster tail spraying each time across the calm, black water. We reserved the Forest Service cabin at Blind Pass reluctantly. Above the cabin, and over the stretch of two-days of paddling (40 miles), we saw mountain after mountain patched with clear-cuts the color of brown paper sacks. At the mouth of a trickling stream below one clear-cut, we watched hapless salmon trying in vain to return to waters reduced by sedimentation, road gravel and downed trees. The carcasses of dozens of chum salmon rotted on the beach. The Forest Service has spent millions from the public treasury trying to keep the giant Southeast Alaska pulp mills in the black. It’s built thousands of miles of logging roads and given away rich, old-growth groves. Though the pulp mills shut down almost a decade ago, the Forest Service continues to subsidize the remaining timber industry. Why should we have to pay $35 for a cabin while our tax money subsidizes corporate clear-cutters? It was tempting to forego the reservation fee and take our chances, but we gave out credit card number to a private east coast company handling the public cabin system anyway. The boat pulled into shore. I walked over and stood in front of the boat’s bow. A husky bald man jumped to the deck. “Beautiful evening, isn’t it?” I asked. “Yeah, sure is. Uh, we have reservations for the cabin,” he said. “Really? Wow, so do we. It wouldn’t be the first time the Forest Service’s reservation system screwed up,” I said. He spit flecks of tobacco from the end of his tongue. “When did you make the reservation? We called them just before we left today.” In the dim light, I saw others in the boat and a dull orange glow of a cigarette. “Sunday, three days ago. You’re welcome to stay here if you want. We’re about to hit the hay. We’ve been paddling all day,” I said. As we talked, the receding tide grounded the boat and I helped the pilot try to push it back into the water. A heavy-set man crawled to the bow and dropped into the water and began to push. “Boomer! You don’t have no boots?” the bald man asked. Together we launched the boat up off the rocky beach. “Try Anchor Pass,” I called as they drifted away, “It’s only ten miles up.” Later, I found out the Forest Service is considering a proposal to shutter one-third of its cabins in the Tongass, citing a lack of money for maintenance. We paddled to the Anchor Pass cabin the following day. We could tell the confrontational boaters from the night before had stayed here: cans tossed in the fire pit, cigarettes littering the grounds, no wood replaced. In the cabin’s logbook, no one thanked the Forest Service for its clear-cuts. But many boaters and kayakers thanked the agency profusely for the cabin. And though he didn’t leave a message in the registry, Boomer had a fire to dry his shoes by. Soren Wuerth is perhaps Alaska's best known community activist, and is the winner of the Alaska Press Club's 2006 'Best Columnist' award. He resides in an undisclosed location in rural Alaska and can be reached at soren@insurgent49.com. |
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