Halong relocation: Citing bureaucratic confusion, future homes of Kipnuk, Kwigillingok remains uncertain
BETHEL, Alaska - “Not sustainable” is how tribal advocates have described navigating a bureaucratic jungle to help typhoon-ravaged communities meet their basic needs following the devastation from October’s storm.
“My message today is simple,” Thaddeus Tikiun, Chairman of the Association of Village Council Presidents, said in a U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs field hearing in Bethel, “We cannot keep responding to Arctic typhoons and other disasters with a patchwork system and expect it to work. ” After the initial investment into the most rural parts of the state, village leaders, Alaska Native advocates and evacuees say they’ve been forced to navigate a complicated system with little help.and devastated two villages: Kipnuk and Kwigillingok.
Homes were lifted off their foundations and floated across the Western Alaskan tundra. One person, Ella Mae Kashatok, 67, was found dead and two men,have voted to relocate, with residents saying their land is no longer safe and the trauma of returning is too deep.
“This was the first time I’ve ever felt so helpless where I knew I couldn’t protect my own daughter and my family,” state lawmaker Rep. Nellie Jimmie, D-Toksook Bay, said in a “How do you leave the looks that were passed down to you from your grandmother or your ancestors? How do you leave family pictures? How do you just leave everything and carry what you can?
But my people had to do that,” she added. Navigating the federal and state government has been a challenge, many on the panel said. Natasha Singh, president and CEO of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, said the federal government’s help is appreciated, but spotty.
“The federal government has demonstrated that it has the funding, expertise, and capacity to serve as a committed partner to communities,” she said. “At the same time, these experiences highlighted the policy and funding gaps that emerge when agencies operate strictly within their own lanes, rather than working towards a shared end goal. ” Committee chair Sen. Lisa Murkowski raised a pointed question: if residents don’t want to return, what are these dollars going towards?
“Why would we spend good federal money in a place that is not going to be safe for families,” she asked. The state’s Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management and tribal advocates agree on one big solution: a single central agency to coordinate the relocation process.
“Helping communities identify which federal programs can support the different components of this process ... should be coordinated through a single agency, even if the work itself involves multiple parts of the federal government,” Singh said. Singh named two options for that role: the Denali Commission, an independent federal agency which according to its website is “designed to provide critical utilities, infrastructure, and economic support throughout Alaska,” or the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Bryan Fisher, director for DHS&EM, concurred, saying the state has also had trouble managing dollars through the federal government.
“FEMA is hard to work with I’ve been working with FEMA for 32 years,” he said. “I think my experience working with folks in the region and statewide here is it’s much easier for our tribal governments to work with the Bureau of Indian Affairs than it is with FEMA.
” Jocelyn Fenton, director of programs for the Denali Commission, said the structure of the commission would make it difficult and that it would need “durable statutory authority, sustained technical capacity, predictable resources to then coordinate the implementation across the federal government. ” Billy Kirkland, Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, offered a contradictory answer when asked what role the bureau would play.
“The Department of Interior and the BIA are... we’re not the lead agency,” he said. “But we are the lead agency, if that makes sense. ” “Alaska’s a priority. We need help from y’all to give us direction on how we can best assist.
Alaska is not a problem needs to be managed. It’s a partner that needs to be empowered,” he added. Alaska’s News Source asked Murkowski what the next steps are on the relocation efforts but was unavailable for comment Wednesday.
“If we are able to align disaster response, infrastructure resilience, and relocation around a community-driven vision, we can move from reactive response to true resilience,” Singh said. When it comes to federal dollars, Murkowski has urged caution — a warning she also delivered to state legislators.
“Federal debt projected to reach a shocking level of $64 trillion in a decade,” Murkowski said in her annual address. “Not there yet. It’s not Alaska’s fault, but it’s also not sustainable.
“We’re going to have to address it, and Alaska will need a legitimate fiscal plan as the federal budget inevitably tightens,” she added. Whether — and when — residents can return home has been unclear for some time, but Wednesday, the state set new goals after previously spelling doubt for a swift return. Fisher told state lawmakers in February residents of Kipnuk and Kwigillingok would be unlikely to return to their homes by summer.
“Just because of the sheer impact, particularly to those two communities, it’s unlikely that every survivor that was impacted by this disaster displaced from their home is going to be able to get back there this summer,”and villages using the disaster funding they claimed from the federal government, though he could not provide a number for how many, or from which villages. On Wednesday, Patricia Smith, Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation interim president and CEO, said Kipnuk and Kwigillingok are preparing to be returnable by summer.
Smith added that about 50 residents from Kipnuk and about 50 residents from Kwigillingok have already returned. Zidek told Alaska’s News Source the state’s goal is to have the villages ready for return around the same time.
“We anticipate people will be able to return to their villages this summer and fall, how many people is unknown at this time,” he said in a Wednesday statement. “This will likely happen in stages. As homes and infrastructure are repaired, cleanup of contamination is completed, and the Tribal Council lifts their resolution asking residents not to return home, people will be able to go home,” Zidek added.
House Speaker Bryce Edgmon, NA-Dillingham, has repeatedly said providing relief for communities impacted by the typhoon would be a priority — but has called relocation a situation largely out of reach for the legislature.
“It’s something we cannot lose sight of,” Edgmon told Alaska’s News Source back in February, saying the body had plans to address storm-related funding — but that relocation was part of a “larger conversation. ” “I know there’s conversations ongoing for sure, but it’s not really reached the legislature’s doorstep, but it will,” he said.
“I think there’s so much more to be learned and to always keep in mind that this may be the new norm. ”Alaska’s News Source reached out to the office of Rep. Nellie Jimmie, D-Toksook Bay, for comment.
Jimmie was not at the Bethel hearing, with her office saying she was needed to uphold the majority in the state legislatureAlaska’s News Source also reached out to Murkowski following the news conference, asking whether she had any recommendations for the state legislature on relocation — but she was unavailable Wednesday. Alaska’s News Source asked Edgmon whether if Murkowski made a request on relocation, the legislature would have the appetite to act with just two weeks left in session.
“If she were to turn to the legislature, I could anticipate her asking for like a resolution of support or something to express the will of the legislature,” he said. “As Speaker of the House and certainly with other powerful rural legislators ... we would move heaven and earth to make it happen.
” 4-year-old girl dies after grandmother allegedly forced her to drink more than half a bottle of whiskey, police sayDomino’s delivery driver accused of hitting customer with his car after ‘not receiving a tip,’ reports sayDunleavy warns of a veto on LNG bills, but hopeful legislature will pass ‘something that works’
Kwigillingok Alaska News Anchorage Halong Typhoon Halong Fairbanks News Alaksa News Anchorage News Ak News Alaksa
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Dolly Parton cancels Las Vegas residency, citing health concerns“It’s gonna take me a little while before I’m up to stage-performance level,” Dolly Parton shared on Instagram, “because some of the meds and treatments make me a little bit swimmy headed, as my grandma used to say.”
Read more »
Dolly Parton cancels Las Vegas residency, citing health concerns“It’s gonna take me a little while before I’m up to stage-performance level,” Dolly Parton shared on Instagram, “because some of the meds and treatments make me a little bit swimmy headed, as my grandma used to say.”
Read more »
Figure targets Fannie and Freddie in first-lien push, citing 91% cost cutThe firm offers rapid service, with HELOC applications approved in 5 minutes and funding in 3 days, targeting the sub-$300,000 loan segment.
Read more »
Port of Port Townsend quits social media, citing studies on its harm on human connectionThe Port of Port Townsend, one of Washington state's major shipping hubs and a key port of entry for the Puget Sound, has announced it's quitting social media.
Read more »
Alaskans rocked by Halong plead with feds for help relocating: ‘Our land is no longer safe’U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski held a roundtable in Anchorage with Interior Department officials Tuesday to hear from Kipnuk and Kwigillingok leaders about challenges the communities still face and ideas for how to move forward.
Read more »
Villages devastated by Halong criticize state and federal response at US Senate hearing in AnchorageLeaders of Kipnuk and Kwigillingok at the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs hearing urged Alaska’s elected officials to embrace plans to move villages rather than rebuild them.
Read more »