August 8, 2023 — The city of Bethel, Alaska, U.S.A., wants to join a federal lawsuit against NOAA Fisheries led by two major tribal organizations.
In April, the Association of Village Council Presidents (AVCP) and Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC), which together represent around 100 Alaskan tribes, filed a lawsuit challenging NOAA Fisheries’ management of industrial trawl fisheries in the Bering Sea. The tribes, along with the nonprofit environmental law group Earthjustice, claim that the amount of salmon bycatch allowed in the pollock trawl fishery is reducing the king salmon and chum salmon populations, leading to restrictions on subsistence fishing in the Yukon and Kuskokwim regions.