Protester tells truth, gets fined

Published on October 8th, 2009

By ALEX DEMARBAN

Wildlife protection investigators touched down in Marshall in July and asked Jason Isaac if he'd fished illegally to protest subsistence fishing restrictions on the Yukon River.

Isaac said yes.

After all, he's the village's only police officer, and his dad, now a Russian Orthodox priest in another Yukon village, told him growing up, "Always tell the truth."

So while the others kept their mouths shut, Isaac told investigators he'd fished during a closed period as part of a community act of civil disobedience.

"If they were calling it a protest fishery, why lie about doing a protest?" asked Isaac, 32.

He even told investigators they should ticket his oldest son, 10-year-old Dominic, for helping haul in the fish the group shared with the elders and needy.

The investigators laughed, said they wouldn't do that, he said.

So last week, when the feds brought charges, Isaac was the only person ticketed.

Jim Hjelmgren, the top national refuge officer in Alaska, flew to the village of 400 on Sept. 30 and handed Isaac a $275 ticket at the airstrip.

Isaac is a leader who stood up for what's right, said Nick Andrew Jr., head of a tribe in Marshall and himself a protestor who kept quiet.

"He did that to show the direness of the situation, to show the pressing matter to authorities. He did it to show his stern support of our traditional and customary ways of life," said Andrew.

Illegal fishing trip

On June 26, the two men joined more than a dozen others and traveled about 10 miles upriver to fish illegally in the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge.

Soon after, several admitted the act to journalists. Through the media, they told the world they did it send a message to fishery managers and to feed villagers who had no king salmon in their freezers.

At the time, state and federal fishery managers had sharply reduced subsistence fishing, even shutting it down for several days early on, hurting families who had long relied on the oil-rich kings as a staple in their diet.

The managers also had closed commercial king fishing on the lower river to protect the struggling king run, removing a critical source of money in a village where unemployment approaches 20 percent.

The protestors lashed out at the high-seas pollock fishing industry. In its quest to catch pollock for use in food such as fish sticks, trawlers snag and toss aside thousands of kings yearly. A record 120,000 were unintentionally caught in 2007.

The protestors also blamed the managers, saying they were more concerned with fulfilling a treaty with Canada than protecting rural Alaskans.

The managers met the treaty's goal, and then some — a sonar count and test fishing underestimated the lower Yukon run because silty high waters made counting fish difficult.

Just under 70,000 kings went across the border into Canada this year. That's about 10,000 to 13,000 kings over the goal for harvest sharing and spawning agreements with Canada, said Dani Evenson, the Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim research supervisor for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

About half the run typically originates in Canada, so it's important to get enough kings to the spawning grounds, Evenson said.

It was all really unfair to the lower Yukon villagers who sat on shore as the fish swam by, Isaac said.

"So, you know, I'm glad we went out to get some fish for the community," he said. "A lot of the elders are happy. At least they got some fish in their freezer."

On Thursday last week, Hjelmgren, who works for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, didn't return a reporter's phone call. Instead, agency spokesman Bruce Woods called back.

"I can't say anything because it may be contested and head to court," Woods said. "All we can say is there is one ticket issued, and we don't anticipate any more."

Woods would not say why other protestors weren't ticketed, or why such a high-ranking officer, based in Anchorage 430 miles to the southeast, delivered the ticket.

Andrew said the tribe will fight to have the citation dismissed with free legal help from Bethel attorney Jim Valcarce and support from the Association of Village Council Presidents, the Native regional nonprofit company in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.

'A lot of money'

On Oct. 1, Isaac spoke by phone on a break between his jobs.

Kids chattered in the background. He and his wife have five children at home.

"It's a lot of money, especially because we're not on public assistance," he said of the ticket. "Out here, groceries cost darn near 100 bucks a bag."

But Isaac's lucky — he's been working a lot lately.

Years earlier, Isaac learned plumbing skills. The state's been updating home plumbing systems in the village, so he's been installing pipes in the day and heading to the police office at night, clocking about 90 hours a week.

The plumbing work is about to end, he said.

But the extra cash he's earned will come in handy when he runs out of fish this year. He put away about four kings, several less than he usually does, plus some chum and silver salmon.

The fish won't last all year like it usually does, he said.

What will the family do then?

"I have no idea. Probably go and buy some fish sticks at the store."

Alex DeMarban can be reached at 907-348-2444 or 800-770-9830, ext. 444.