Author: Poppy Benson

I’m writing this on July 4, a day we normally celebrate for our American freedoms. This year is different. Today, President Trump signs the big bill that encompasses his agenda for reforming American life.  In nearly a thousand pages, policy and funding changes will influence nearly every aspect of our lives, including the management of our public lands.

This comes on top of what we’ve already experienced in the refuges–huge staff losses through unrelenting pressure, incentives to quit and firings, a hiring freeze, and interference with public communications, exhibits and programming. The bill mandates the opening of public lands to increased extractive industries with reduced environmental oversight or mitigation and curtails scientific research–especially anything related to climate. Incentives for wind and solar projects have been replaced with incentives for fossil fuels.

An effort to sell off public lands was successfully beaten back but may well return in another place or form. One proposal would administratively transfer BLM lands in Alaska to the state to expedite development projects.

Your Friends organization has repeatedly reached out to Alaska’s congressional delegation to emphasize the importance of our refuges and the need to fund their protection and management, not just for their resident fish and wildlife but for human visitors, communities, and future resilience. We asked you, our Friends, to do the same.

Alaska Senators Murkowski and Sullivan and Representative Begich all fell in line with the Republican party to approve the bill. They are particularly happy with the requirement that four lease sales be scheduled within the Arctic Refuge (as well as others in sensitive areas in Alaska) and the loosening of environmental regulations. They consider it a win to “unlock Alaska’s resources.”

While close analysis of the bill’s provisions and their specific effects is just beginning, we can say for sure that Alaska’s public lands are and will be losing the protections and management that they require.

While it’s easy to be discouraged, we must not let up our advocacy!

Please continue to let your elected representatives know that you value our refuges and all they provide for wildlife, environmental quality, recreation, public enjoyment, and the future. Their values cannot be maintained without adequate funding and staffing, adherence to environment laws, and mitigations for environmental harm. Stress that climate change in the north is a very significant threat, not only to plants and wildlife but to the safety of people and the future of the entire warming planet!

Please visit our website regularly for updates and action alerts, and do the same by friending us on Facebook.

The Kenai National Wildlife Refuge staff on this nearly two million acre refuge is down to 19 employees from the 33 who worked there at this happy time when Friends helped them on a trail clearing project in 2017 (pictured here).  With that staff they manage incredible varied habitat and wildlife resources including important salmon runs, a dense moose population, caribou, Dall sheep, bears, eagles and waterbirds and a large public use program of visitor centers, campgrounds, public use cabins, an extensive trail network and two canoe systems all of which attracts a million visits a year from all over the country.

By Caroline Brouwer, Advocacy Chair

Friends, this is a call to action. Our elected leaders are in the process of dismantling large swaths of the federal government, and public lands are high on their target list.

National wildlife refuges are YOUR lands. National parks are YOUR lands. National forests are YOUR lands. You should be able to visit, hunt on, birdwatch on, and hike on these lands. You should be able to expect these beautiful landscapes, rich wildlife habitat and the wildlife species that call them home to be well managed for the purposes laid out by Congress in their establishment.

In the past eight weeks, many thousands of federal employees have been illegally fired. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to these firings, and they are cutting deeply into the services that you, an American taxpayer, should be receiving. At least 12 Fish and Wildlife Service staff in Alaska were fired, four of them from refuges. In addition, about 14 have taken the “Fork in the Road” (resignation with several months of pay) buyout offers.  Others have had positions that were offered and accepted rescinded, some as they were packing to move to Alaska and important positions like refuge managers are not being filled!  It is a chaotic situation and difficult to determine just how many employees we have lost. Fish and Wildlife Service leaders are required to submit plans March 13 about how to further downsize. We expect many more people to be terminated in reduction in force actions or early retirements.

We expect these reductions in the workforce will lead to minimal to no management on Alaska’s 76 million acres of refuges. The Fish and Wildlife Service goes into this in a weakened position as refuge staff had already been reduced 30% over the last 15 years.  An important refuge like the two million acre Kodiak Refuge home to the largest brown bears now has only 7 staff where five years ago it had 14. Only one staffer (they used to have 4)  covers visitor services managing their visitor center (30 cruise ship visits per year), outreach to eight villages on the refuge, public use cabins, bear viewing sites, and over 100 special use permits to be evaluated and administered annually (bear viewing, float plane transporters, set net sites, research projects, hunting guides), and a formerly-active environmental education program. Because of these ongoing cuts, the Kodiak visitor center has been closed all winter for the first time and Salmon Camp, one of the oldest and best children’s refuge education programs, has been reduced from five week long sessions in Kodiak city and the villages to three short visits to villages.  The enthusiastic young woman Kodiak had just hired to manage the visitor center and start supplying services to the public again was fired one month into her job by DOGE in the Valentine’s Day Massacre.

It takes staff to manage a refuge and help the public responsibly enjoy and learn about the wonders of the refuge.  Salmon Camp on the Kodiak Refuge was one of the most successful programs serving more than a hundred families a year, many of them from the Coast Guard Base Kodiak.  With the public use staff cut from four to one, Salmon Camp in Kodiak is no more.


These cuts will affect all public land users, and biological work that keeps our wildlife safe. Next, Congress and the Administration may question why we are holding on to these lands that are “unproductive” and unmanaged. And after that, Friends fear they may add oil and gas as a purpose for all refuges as they did during the first Trump term for the Arctic Refuge, sell off some refuges for development, permit mining, and allow “intensive management” (such as predator control) which is contrary to the refuges’ purpose of maintaining natural biodiversity. Even if refuge lands are not sold, there will be few refuge staff left to protect the original purposes of refuges. These are OUR refuge lands, park lands, and forests. The Administration has already announced plans to heavily log national forests and suspend provisions of the Endangered Species and Migratory Bird acts.

We need you to call your Congressional representatives. Every day. Ask that the staff fired under DOGE be rehired, the vacated positions be refilled, the refuge manager positions filled (only 7 managers for 16 refuges) and credit card use restored so they can  buy supplies for the rapidly approaching field season (DOGE put a $1 limit on credit cards). Remind them that you value refuge employees and the work they do to protect wildlife and refuges. Refuges are not for sale!  Many members of Congress are starting to complain that they are getting too many phone calls. Good. These elected officials work for US, and they should respond to us, their constituents, not the President. We cannot allow them to dismantle public lands.

Alaska’s two senators are Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Sen. Dan Sullivan. Our House member is Rep. Nick Begich. You can also reach them or any state’s delegation at the Capitol switchboard at 202-224-3121.

If we do nothing, and do not use our voices to speak up in protest, we predict that we will lose many of the public lands and the values they protect that make Alaska great.

The President’s Message
By Marilyn Sigman, President Friends of Alaska National Wildlife Refuges

There has never been a time like the present in my lifetime when National Wildlife Refuges—and their hard-working staff dedicated to carrying out the mission of the Refuge system—need friends who share the mission of stewardship of these lands and waters. Many of our members have spent part or all of their careers working in fields related to fish, wildlife, and habitat conservation. Others of you have joined Friends because you enjoy spending time outdoors hunting, fishing, hiking, birdwatching, and canoeing on refuges. You have responded to our calls in the past to speak out to our elected officials in support of good refuge policies and public land management actions. But now the entire system and its mission is under attack.

We are faced with an Administration that is likely to cut the federal budget more deeply than it has already been cut, which has already left Alaska’s refuges woefully understaffed to do the necessary research, conservation work, and outreach and education that promotes long-term stewardship. The Kodiak Refuge Visitor Center has already cut back with a seasonal closure and refuge outreach and education programs in Fairbanks have been canceled indefinitely. Oil and gas development is being targeted on all federal lands. Future layoffs could mean shuttering refuge facilities completely. Some refuges in Alaska are heavily visited, such as Kenai and Alaska Maritime, but others are used almost solely by subsistence users. Visitors would still be able to access refuges, but without any staff on site, we can anticipate increased poaching, garbage dumps, and other illegal uses of refuge lands.

What can we do? An immediate advocacy action you can take is to send in comments on the Izembek road draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement by this Thursday, February 13. Please click the link below to comment. Tell the Administration to choose the no-action alternative.

The Friends Board is committed to developing fund-raising strategies to greatly increase the amount of financial aid we can provide to refuges. If you would like to be involved in this effort, please contact a Board member.

I urge all of you to be friends to the Refuge staff who are feeling attacked by buyout demands and the removal of all references to climate change and the importance of diversity, equity and inclusiveness in the federal workforce as well as the participation of the diverse stakeholders in refuge management. Call, text, or send a thank you email to staff members you know or may have worked with as a Friends’ volunteer. We will also need more volunteers, so look for opportunities posted on the Friends website.

I urge all of you to be a friend to Alaska’s National Wildlife Refuges by writing and calling your Congressional representatives. For Alaskans, Senators Murkowski and Sullivan and Congressman Begich have the power to stop these impacts to OUR refuge lands as do the representatives of Friends’ members in other states. The Capitol switchboard is 202-224-3121.

I urge you to be persistent and relentless in speaking up about what is so valuable about the refuges and the mission of stewardship of these unique conservation lands.