The Federal Subsistence Board on Friday voted 8-2 to uphold Ketchikan’s rural designation. That’s after two tribal organizations on Prince of Wales Island submitted requests for reconsideration to the federal Office of Subsistence Management last July.
The Federal Subsistence Board voted in 2025 to reclassify Ketchikan from a non-rural status, allowing all residents to hunt and fish on federally managed lands and waters that were previously closed to them. That designation was challenged by Craig’s Tribal Association and Shaan Seet, a tribal organization on Prince of Wales Island. They said the board failed to “fully consider the unintended consequences” of allowing 13,000 new subsistence hunters from Ketchikan to access POW’s deer population. Elders from both tribes report that hunts were getting harder and the deer population was declining even before Ketchikan’s rural designation.
The Ketchikan Indian Community was in favor of the rural designation, and worked for years to get rights to federally regulated subsistence activities. The tribe argued that the rural designation allows its tribal citizens to exercise traditional subsistence practices.
The vote to sustain Ketchikan’s rural designation came in the final hours of the board’s 4-day wildlife regulatory meeting in Anchorage. The vote also followed an executive session on Thursday to discuss the requests for reconsideration.
Hunter Morrison is a Report for America corps member for KRBD. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep him writing stories like this one. Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution.
