Feds Offer $83M For Tribal Business Loans
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- Created on Friday, 09 August 2024 15:19
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By BARBARA NORTON
Alaska Beacon
Up to $83 million in federal funds have been approved for small business loans to be offered through a consortium of Alaska tribes. Announced on Tuesday, the funds are part of the U.S. Treasury’s broader effort to support tribal economies, with up to $415 million being funneled into developing the economies of 220 tribes, according to a Treasury news release.
Of that group, 125 tribes make up the consortium from Alaska. “These funds will serve some of the most rural populations in the United States, creating jobs and expanding capital access for Tribes across Alaska,” said Chief Lynn Malerba, the treasurer of the United States. She is the first Native American to serve in the position, which oversees federal gold deposits and other assets, as well as currency and coinage production.
The funds, which are part of the Biden administration’s American Rescue Plan, will be administered by the Alaska Small Business Development Center.
They are part of the center’s State Small Business Credit Initiative, a federally funded program that aims to attract investors and lenders to businesses that aren’t typically competitive for loans and the collateral needed to receive some loans.
Rena Greene, the deputy director and acting executive director of Nome Eskimo Community, said that her Tribe looked forward to the “transformational impact” of the funding.
She mentioned the port expansion and a new graphite mine in Nome, and said that the funding will improve infrastructure, energy, and economic development for the community ahead of the upcoming projects. This funding opportunity, she said, was “once in a generation.”
Jon Bittner, executive director of the Alaska Small Business Development Center, said that the funds will lower the risk profile of businesses in rural Alaska that have not historically received investment. The center, part of the University of Alaska Anchorage, provides resources, advice and assistance to help small businesses grow.
“At its sort of base level, this is going to drive private sector investment into businesses and into communities that otherwise wouldn’t have been able to get it,” Bittner said. He also said that small businesses are especially impactful in rural areas – for example, a store that hires five people could increase the hiring opportunities in that community by 10% or 15%.
Small businesses that meet the criteria of the program can receive up to a 50% loan guarantee, said Bittner, while tribal member-owned businesses can receive up to 80%. “We think that’s going to drive the lenders to really seek out a lot more tribal member-owned business deals than they would otherwise,” Bittner said.
Businesses owned by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals can also qualify for the tribal program, Bittner said, which could include businesses that are rural, women-owned, or LGBTQ-owned.
The new program is similar to the center’s existing state program, which launched in 2023 with $59 million in funding. The key difference between the state and tribal programs, according to Bittner, is the tribal program’s extra incentives for Native-owned businesses. Additionally, borrowers must be socially and economically disadvantaged to qualify for tribal funding. The state program does not have the same requirement, though it does prioritize support for businesses owned by individuals from underserved groups.
According to Bittner, the funds will be deployed into four different programs. The largest portion of funds, $39.7 million, will be directed into a loan guarantee program, while $10.3 will be directed into a loan participation program.
Meanwhile, $12 million will provide loan collateral, especially for “hard to collateralize” businesses, Bittner said. He cited an example of commercial fishing tourism in rural areas, where the isolation typically makes collateral “kind of a nonstarter, to be honest.”
Finally, $22.9 million is directed to an equity capital program, which provides a one-to-one match of private sector investment capital, which the center hopes will drive equity investment into rural and remote Alaska.
The program has already received interest from fish processors in rural parts of the state and some individual fishermen, said Nicole Borromeo, the executive vice president and general counsel for the Alaska Federation of Natives. “A lot of our Native corporations run the general stores out in our villages, and we know that there could be some interest there,” she said.
Bittner said that the center hopes to catalyze up to $750 million in new investments in the state over the 10-year lifetime of the program.
U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, D-Alaska, said in a news release that the funding will help grow the economy “the Alaska way, not the Lower 48 way.”
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https://alaskabeacon.com/barbara-norton
It’s Beluga Whales v. Mine in Cook Inlet Zone
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- Created on Friday, 09 August 2024 15:19
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By YERETH ROSEN
Alaska Beacon
Two environmental groups are seeking new protections for endangered beluga whales in an area of southern Cook Inlet that could be converted into an industrial port for a proposed mine.
The petition from the Center of Biological Diversity and Cook Inletkeeper asks the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries service to establish a protective zone around Tuxedni Bay, on the west side of southern Cook Inlet.
The bay is a quiet refuge and winter feeding site for the rare belugas, which were listed as endangered in 2008.
But it could become the site of a port serving a mine producing gold and other metals that is proposed for a slice of Native-owned land within Lake Clark National Park and Preserve. Called the Johnson Tract project, it is located on land owned by Anchorage-based Cook Inlet Region Inc. that lies within the park’s boundaries.
That pending development prompted the petition, which was filed last month.
“The threat of development in this area is so profound we think this needs to be addressed immediately,” said Cooper Freeman, the Center for Biological Diversity’s Alaska director.
His organization followed up the petition to NOAA Fisheries two weeks later, on July 29, with a notice of intent to sue the National Park Service over its plans to allow an access road to the Johnson Tract mine site.
The Park Service is currently contemplating an easement that would be an early step in establishing a road and port. The easement under consideration would allow project design and engineering to start. A 14-day public comment period ended on June 24.
The Center for Biological Diversity argues that the Park Service would be violating the Endangered Species Act if it fails to adequately consider impacts to belugas, which already face a combination of threats that inhibit their recovery. Any such development threatens to be a major setback to the recovery plan required by law and adopted by NOAA Fisheries, the notice said.
“In short, if the easement is granted and the marine ore terminal built in Tuxedni Channel, it would threaten Cook Inlet belugas with nearly every threat detailed in the whale’s Recovery Plan: destruction and loss of habitat, pollution, catastrophic event, prey reduction, unauthorized take, and anthropogenic noise. It is hard to imagine how a major industrial port development in the beluga’s currently only known winter foraging area, where they are frequently present September 1-May 15 and likely occasionally during the summer, would not hinder their recovery and potentially their survival altogether,” it said.
A spokesperson for Department of the Interior declined to comment on the notice of intent to sue.
The petition and threat to sue come as new information is emerging about the importance of Tuxedni Bay to the endangered beluga population. The beluga number only about 330 now, down from a 1979 estimate of 1,300.
A recently published study by scientists from the NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center, the University of Washington and other organizations identifies the site as a key place for the belugas to be in the winter.
Using acoustic monitoring – recordings captured by devices in fixed positions – the scientists tracked the movement of belugas and other marine mammals in winter. The result was that Tuxedni Bay was the first identified winter foraging site for the endangered belugas.
The site has multiple characteristics that draw belugas there in the winter.
The quiet is a key attraction for the belugas, which call to each other to navigate the inlet’s notoriously murky waters, said the study’s lead author, marine mammal specialist Manuel Castellote.
“They are acutely designed to be very sensitive to noise because they use sound for everything. It’s their main modality to connect with the environment. For us, it’s vision. For them, it’s sound,” said Castellote, a University of Washington scientist who also works at the Alaska Fisheries Science Center’s marine mammals laboratory.
Sound travels long distances underwater, added Castellote, who has spent years studying the effects of ship noise in the inlet. Beneath the water’s surface, noises made by a big container ship sailing in the inlet can be heard from several miles away, he said.
Another important attraction is the low number of mammal-hunting orcas, or killer whales, found there. In contrast, Chinitna Bay to the south – a site that is also largely free of manmade noise and that also might have a lot of winter food for belugas – is well-used by the orcas swimming in from the wider Gulf of Alaska, the scientists found through their acoustic monitoring. For the orcas, Chinitna Bay is easier to access, and its waters contain less of the glacial silt that makes Tuxedni so murky, said Castellote and coauthor Verena Gill, a NOAA fisheries senior scientist. Orcas tend to avoid murky waters, they noted.
Exactly what fish the belugas are eating in Tuxedni Bay remains undetermined, Castellote and Gill said. Cook Inlet belugas follow the herring and eulachon runs in the spring and the salmon runs through the summer, but there have not yet been studies to identify the winter food, they said. Smelt, flounder and halibut are possibilities, Gill said.
Their study recommends that regulators establish seasonal restrictions on human activities, like seismic surveys and pile driving, to keep Tuxedni Bay quiet in the fall and winter months when belugas are there. Such restrictions on noise-generating activities at certain times and in certain areas “offer one of the most effective means of protecting cetaceans and their habitats from the cumulative and synergistic effects of noise as well as from other anthropogenic stressors,” the study said.
Freeman said the environmental groups’ petition seeks more than mere seasonal restrictions,
Seasons will not matter much if the development goes through, he said. “When you build a marine terminal, it’s going to destroy the habitat,” he said. “We’re talking about turning Tuxedni Bay into an industrial port.”
A public information officer with the Alaska Fisheries Science Center declined to comment on the petition, citing its status as pending litigation.
Castellote and Gill also said they could not comment on the specifics about the environmentalists’ efforts to establish protections, partly because details about any proposed development are yet to emerge.
But in general, they said, they agree that industrial development of the bay would impact the belugas. “Obviously it will introduce noise and obviously that’s not going to be good for belugas, but we don’t know anything about the plans,” Gill said.
Development there would be different from anything that adds more noise to the area around the Port of Alaska in Anchorage or any other heavily developed Cook Inlet area where additional noise would not mean much change, Castellote said. “There is a very drastic difference between adding noise to a place that is already contaminated to a place that is not contaminated at all,” he said.
If development proceeds, it would have to go through what is called Endangered Species Act consultation, and that would be the point at which impacts and mitigation would be considered, Gill said.
The published study grew out of a research project funded by the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the agency responsible for leasing offshore federal waters for oil and gas and renewable energy development. The report that Castellote, Gill and their research colleagues submitted to BOEM noted that Tuxedni Bay could be developed not only for the proposed Johnson Tract mine but also as a marine terminal for the controversial Pebble mine. The bay’s waters are also near an area offered in the past for oil and gas leasing, said the report, which was released in December.
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https://alaskabeacon.com/yereth-rosen
NOAA Climate Fund To Aid 3 Alaska Projects
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- Created on Tuesday, 30 July 2024 15:35
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By YERETH ROSEN
Alaska Beacon
Federal officials have recommended that Alaska get $78.9 million for projects to make coastal communities better prepared to address climate change.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Friday it chose three Alaska projects to be among the 19 selected through the agency’s Climate Resilience Regional Challenge program. In all, $575 million in nationwide funding is recommended for the projects chosen in the competitive process, NOAA said.
Of the $78.9 million recommended for Alaska, nearly $75 million is for an Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium project to assist Native communities that are adapting to climate change. ANTHC’s project aims to help nearly 100 communities address coastal problems like rapid erosion and permafrost thaw, which in turn have led to concerns about food sovereignty, plans for community relocation and other changes, NOAA said.
In a statement released Monday, ANTHC celebrated the award.
“This is the single largest federal grant focused on climate resilience in Alaska Native communities in state history. The recommendation of this funding not only acknowledges Alaska’s Tribes as the rightful leaders in climate change and adaptation but also equips us with the resources necessary to start meeting the infrastructure needs of the many environmentally threatened communities throughout the state,” Natasha Singh, ANTHC’s interim president and chief executive officer, said in the statement. “Baasee’ to the many leaders at NOAA, the U.S. Department of Commerce, and Alaska’s Congressional Delegation for championing this historic funding.”
Another $2 million is recommended for a Bristol Bay planning program to be conducted by the Bristol Bay Native Association, NOAA said. The third selected project, recommended to get nearly $2 million, is for creation of a regional Bristol Bay “guardians” program, similar to the Canada’s Indigenous Guardians program, to help guide resource and land management, NOAA said. That project is to be jointly managed by the Nature Conservancy and the Igiugig Village, a tribal government.
“Alaskan communities are on the frontlines of the climate crisis. Reducing risks for people and infrastructure are critical components in creating a climate-resilient future,” NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad said in a statement.
NOAA’s Climate Resilience Regional Challenge came from the Inflation Reduction Act, NOAA said.
Friday’s announcement follows previous NOAA announcements of funding for Alaska climate-resilience projects, with money made available from the Inflation Reduction Act. Congress passed the act in 2022 without any Republican votes.
In June, the agency said it is investing $2.3 million into the Indigenous Sentinels Network program at St. Paul Island. The program was created by the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island. The money awarded is part of a $60 million national package from NOAA’s Climate-Ready Workforce initiative.
In February, NOAA announced an award of $1 million in multiyear fund0ing for the Alaska Fisheries Science Center Indigenous Engagement Program. The aim is to boost tribal involvement and use of Indigenous knowledge in NOAA Fisheries management, the agency said.
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https://alaskabeacon.com/yereth-rosen
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20 YEARS AGO
December 2004
Photo caption: Dave Dapcevich receives the Girl Scouts Business Donor of the Year plaque from Tongass Alaska Girl Scouts members April Jensen and Kay McCarty. Dapcevich Accounting donates money collected in a client project to youth programs.
50 YEARS AGO
December 1974
Sitka High School has announced the names of students who made 4.00 grade point averages for the quarter: seniors Mary Christoffel, Louise Dennard, Roger Hames, Helen Hannigan, Roxanne McGraw, Peter Munro, Teresa Redston, Christy Roth, Pam Stromme, Gayle Swain and Jack Turner.