Over the past week, I have had one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I’ve climbed glaciers, walked alongside brown bears, and caught, filleted, and cooked king salmon right out of the water. Saying this trip was epic would be a gross understatement. At the edge of the world in Alaska, I’ve learned about the harmony of a sustainable ecosystem — one where industry and nature work and live hand in hand.
Since I last checked in, we met with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game for Bristol Bay and met with Travis Elison and Paul Salamone, who are biologists with the fishery. They explained how management of the fishery works. It’s a three-part system, including subsistence, recreational and commercial fishing.
The subsistence fishing allows natives to fish for salmon and allots around 120 salmon per person to subsist on for the year, which helps to stock their freezers and pantries with a local, healthy protein. The recreational fishing accounts for less than one percent of the total amount of salmon harvested in the Bristol Bay region and is regulated at five sockeye salmon per day per recreational fisherman. This section of the industry accounts for a large economic boost to the region during fishing season due to the draw of tourism for fishing and viewing wildlife. The commercial fishing accounts for the largest portion of the industry and accounts for an average of 40-50 million sockeye salmon per year (in only a six-week fishing season).
The commercial fishery is highly regulated by the state and only opens when the fishery allows for enough escapement upstream to properly feed the ecosystem and allow for the circle of life with the salmon to continue.
While in Bristol Bay, we also had the chance to visit the Pederson Point Cannery with North Pacific Seafoods where we toured the company’s commercial processing operation. There we met with plant manager Robert Torres, who led us on a tour of how the salmon are brought in from the fishing boats, processed, frozen and shipped out for the world to eat. We saw seafood buyers from the Japanese sushi markets as well as buyers from around the world. It’s an amazing, all-inclusive operation where the facility can process tens of thousands of pounds of salmon per hour.
On the other end of the spectrum, we visited Naknek Family Fisheries — a small, locally owned processing facility run by fisherwoman Izetta Chambers. Ms. Chambers operated a couple of fishing boats and collaborates with other fishermen in the region to hand-select fish to process, sell and direct market to customers in Anchorage and the lower 48 states. She also has a small smokehouse where they hot-smoke their salmon to make salmon candy and smoked salmon products (delicious!). Their commitment to promote local seafood, agriculture and the sustainability of the fishery stands at the forefront of their business model. It was great to see a like-minded business model in Alaska, where local sustainable come first when it comes to food. I told her she would fit in great here in Asheville!
On the last day of our Alaskan adventure, we made our way up to the headwaters of the Naknek River to Brooks Falls in the Katmai National Park. It’s the place I have dreamed about since being a child, where the brown bear fish for salmon straight from the epic waterfall at Brooks Falls. Walking among these giants was amazing and unnerving to say the least. I definitely felt like I wasn’t at the top of the food chain. The bears really showed me how important these sockeye are to the ecosystem and that the fish feed more than just our people. They feed everything from people to the birds, bears and everything in between.
The lifestyle of the fish touch everything they pass, from river to ocean and back again. After they make their way past Brooks Falls, they lay their eggs and die. But their lives go on past there; as their bodies decompose, they feed nutrients into the water, which feeds the land and trees. The native culture even dictates that the salmon are a part of everything and even live on as part of the trees after they’ve passed on. It’s all so connected and amazing.
In our everyday lives, we get caught up with meetings and running around from place to place. We don’t take time to appreciate how everything in our world works in harmony with one another. My time in Bristol Bay really helped to show me how this is true and how we need to respect our environment and the world around us in order for it to be around for generations after us to appreciate.
I am honored and humbled to have had the chance to work with the Chef’s Collaborative and the Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association to take this journey to Alaska. This trip is one I will remember for a lifetime. Alaska is “the Last Frontier” for wilderness, but it’s first in sustainability and protecting the state’s most precious commodity — nature.
Chef Dissen’s Alaskan trip
BOAT TO TABLE: Chef Dissen’s Alaskan trip included tours and trips through “one of the most sustainable fisheries on the planet.” Photo by Dissen
If S.C. lawmakers vote to remove the Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse grounds in the days ahead — as is widely anticipated — the NAACP’s 15-year-old economic boycott of South Carolina could be lifted in short order.
S.C. NAACP President Lonnie Randolph Jr. said a likely scenario if the flag effort passes is for South Carolina officials to bring a request to the annual NAACP convention in Philadelphia later this month to lift the embargo via emergency resolution.
“We’re prepared to do that if the measure is addressed in a respectful and proper manner,” Randolph said.
All of the country’s NAACP chapters have signed on to honor the boycott, Randolph said, after lawmakers voted in 2000 to move the flag from the Statehouse dome to the Confederate Soldier’s Monument as part of a legislative compromise.
The effectiveness of the boycott has been an issue of debate in some circles. Hundreds of family reunions, star athletes and sports organizations have been among the most prominent supporters of not traveling, spending money or holding events here for more than a decade, Randolph said.
The Philadelphia convention runs July 11 to 15.
McCann v. Savage
A heated war of words has broken out involving two Charleston attorneys over Magistrate James “Skipper” Gosnell’s awkward handling of accused Emanuel AME Church gunman Dylann Roof’s bond hearing.
In a letter to S.C. Supreme Court Justice Jean Toal, attorney Frank McCann called local defense lawyer Andy Savage “the most pompous and media seeking lawyer in Charleston.”
The letter came after Savage was widely critical of Gosnell’s opening speech during Roof’s initial court appearance on nine charges of murder.
In front of a nationally televised audience, Gosnell started the hearing by saying: “There are victims on this young man’s side of the family. We must find it in our heart at some point in time to not only help those who are victims but to also help his family as well.”
Savage trashed Gosnell’s comments. On Facebook he called them “unprecedented and unwelcome,” and that Gosnell was a “presiding pompous judge.” Savage represents shooting survivor Felicia Sanders, whose son died in the attack.
McCann, former head of the Charleston Bar Association, responded by firing off a letter to Toal defending Gosnell’s two decades of service. He also called Savage out for being a self-promotional media-seeker who was attacking a judge while improperly disclosing he’d previously represented Gosnell in a disciplinary matter.
“I intend to do something about this,” McCann said in the letter, which was widely distributed across the state and in the local legal community. He added, “I hope you will do something about it too.”
McCann called on the judges to help another judge who cannot speak publicly on his own behalf.
The letter marks a diversion from how the two men began their careers. Both attended Fordham University in the Bronx, N.Y., and previously worked together as solicitors in the 5th and 9th circuits.
“Whether you are the bank president or the serial killer, you’re entitled to equal treatment under the law,” McCann said last week. “And if a judge follows the law, he shouldn’t be called names by a local lawyer.”
Savage declined comment, his office said.
GOP to register NASCAR bloc
A new Republican strategy to add numbers to its voting scrolls is to register voters during this year’s NASCAR season, including at the race track in Darlington.
The kickoff starts this weekend in Florida and will carry on to sites around the country heading into the 2016 cycle.
With its huge fan following and a large concentration of race tracks in the South, the move combines the country’s most popular site sport with reaching a mostly conservative audience.
“We hope to have an army of volunteers attending with clipboards and voter registration forms,” said S.C. Party Chairman Matt Moore. “Our team will go anywhere, any time to register voters this election cycle.”
Darlington’s big weekend is Labor Day and includes the Bojangles’ Southern 500.
Ben Carson stumped Charleston
Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson didn’t have any special political appearances planned in Charleston last Thursday, so he walked around The Market area downtown, talking to people.
He bought a palm frond rose made by a local vendor and also stopped by Emanuel AME Church, site of the June 17 shooting of nine church members.
“It’s really quite an amazing place,” he said, praising the power of Christian forgiveness and belief the parishioners have shown in the aftermath.
Carson said he supported what state leaders are doing in addressing the Confederate flag at the Statehouse but also pointed out there was a danger that political correctness may run amok as a result of the flag backlash. He questioned whether networks would stop showing certain movies if they contain the Nazi flag or similar emblem.
He did have words of praise for the artisan who crafted the frond rose. “It’s fascinating watching them put those things together,” he said.
Regional presidential visits this week:
Ohio Gov. John Kasich will be here Wednesday for his fifth visit to South Carolina. Event: Beaufort County GOP Meet and Greet, noon at Aunt Chiladas Restaurant, Hilton Head Island; 4:30 p.m., Lake House Ballroom Sun City North, Bluffton.
Compiled by political reporter Schuyler Kropf
