Court sides with UCIDA on Cook Inlet Salmon management

Alaska Public Media | By Ellen Lockyer

Published September 23, 2016 at 10:00 PM AKDT

Chum salmon in water — Chum salmon migration. (USFWS/Togiak National Wildlife Refuge)

A federal appeals court has sided with United Cook Inlet Drifters Association in a lawsuit seeking to return Cook Inlet salmon management to federal fisheries control. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled this week

to send the suit back to federal District court to have an earlier judgement entered in favor of the commercial fishing organization.

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The suit, filed in 2013, charges state salmon management disregards certain regulations of the Magnuson - Stevens Act, resulting in underharvesting of Inlet salmon. UCIDA vice president Eric Huebsch said the organization filed suit after a North Pacific Fishery Management Council decision

removed Cook Inlet salmon from the federal management plan.

Huebsch said the decision requires the NPFMC

go back and work with the state on a salmon management plan for Cook Inlet that complies with the Magnuson - Stevens act, and then delegate day-to-day management back to the state.

Chris Oliver, executive director of the NPFMC, , said he is not able to comment on the 9th Circuit decision until there is time to confer with other federal agencies on the meaning of the decision. State Department of Fish and Game officials did not return calls for comment by newstime.