“It’s got to be the fishing.”
Michael Acevida, Resident of Kake, Alaska
Chopping Away at Unemployment
Logging is big business in Alaska. So big, in fact, that it usually leaves the little guys in the dust. That’s the way it’s always been in Kake, Alaska (population 631), where unemployment tops 80 percent and the small town’s survival is on shaky ground. Although the town has three sawmills, they’re too small to handle the massive logging contracts handed out by the U.S. Forest Service. But things are changing. When the Forest Service was getting ready recently to open up more of the forests surrounding Kake to logging, it did something it’d never done before. It asked the townsfolk what they thought should be done. And when the folks said it’s fine to open up logging but keep it small enough so that locals can bid on the jobs, and keep out of roadless areas so that the blacktail deer can flourish, the Forest Service said OK. The result has been a mixture of sustainable logging, hunting and fishing, and jobs. And a second chance for a small town.
Read the Article ® Forest Service’s new logging approach helps Alaska town
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