Coastal communities on edge ahead of joint exercise

Exercise Northern Edge is a mock war. Mostly.

Decades into its existence, Northern Edge - an important chance for the military to prepare for some of the most devastating security threats to the United States - continues to cause concern, particularly for environmentalists and coastal communities.

"Biologically, ecologically, economically, this is a very important area," said Emily Stolarcyk, Program Director for the non-profit Eyak Preservation Council headquartered in Cordova. "These activities are going to have impacts. And those negative impacts, who's going to be left dealing with them?

"Not the Navy," she said, "because they don't live here. They don't depend on those waters for food. It's going to be us, the people who live here."

For Stolarcyk, this is no mock anything, especially when it comes to the wildlife community getting blasted during the training.

"Where the Navy wants to do this is designated, critical habitat for more than 400 species," she said. "Letters (of complaint) are coming back to our office by the hundreds."

This year, the massive training exercise led by the Alaskan Command is set to include some 5,000 military personnel of all kinds, from airmen to sailors and everyone in between. It's meant to prepare joint forces to respond to crises in the Indo-Asia-Pacific Region that's right in Alaska's backyard.

"We're trying to exercise to protect the U.S. rights in the way we would do if we had to, in the case of any aggression toward the United States," said Tommie Baker with Alaska Command Public Affairs. "You're never going to please everybody."

But there's something else: At this point, the Navy is actually not yet permitted to conduct the 2017 exercise.

"What we're waiting on right now is a record of decision," Baker said.

Operations were being done under an Environmental Impact Statement that counted from 2011 through 2015. However, a supplement to that EIS has yet to be completed. It must be signed by both the Navy and the National Marine Fisheries Service in order for it to be valid, and for the permit to be cleared.

"Even though the EIS allows us to do certain actions in there, it doesn't mean we're going to do everything that's in there," Baker said. "That's a big misconception. They see the big numbers and say, 'Oh! They're going to do all of this.'

"We're not going to do all of that," he said. "Very rarely will we go to max capacity."

But, Baker said, the group is on track and on the "expected timeline."

"We're not worried about it," he said. "This is the normal time frame. We anticipate - hopefully - sometime this week is when we have it done."

In general, the exercise takes place every other year, and in 2017, Northern Edge is scheduled to take place across the state for 12 days in May. The dates during the year have changed, but traditionally, planning for the exercise begins about a year and a half out.

"They're moving full speed ahead, yet, they don't have full authorization," Stolarcyk said. "What kind of position does that put the public in, relying on these agencies to do the due diligence of conservation, when it's like, 'Oh, yeah, we're going to get on that,' but we're just a few weeks out?"

Should the exercise happen, as military officials said they expect, he training crews will focus on multiple areas in the Last Frontier.

There are three main sections: Inland Ranges, spanning south of Delta Junction all the way up toward Fort Yukon; Stony MOA, or the Stony Military Operations Area, which includes separated sections north of DIllingham and east of Aniak all the way north through the Interior toward the Arctic Circle; and finally, there will be a large military presence in the Gulf of Alaska, which - for this exercise - will be referred to as the Gulf of Alaska TMAA, or Temporary Maritime Activities Area.

"The TMAA is where the marine activities of the exercise are able to take place, according to the Environmental Impact Statement," said Capt. Anastasia Schmidt, Alaskan NORAD Region Dir. of Public Affairs. "But the bulk of the exercises will be taking place in the center, not on the edges. So the vessels will be even further from the coastal communities when conducting training."

Still, the aquatic space and what's set to be in and above it are proving most controversial: With hundreds of fish, mammals, birds and more, some of which people depend on for their livings, many members of coastal communities and environmental groups are sounding off, whether by verbalizing general complaints or passing actual resolutions within their communities.

"Are you going to have some shells and the actual bullet that goes down? Yeah, you are," Baker said, "but where are most of the fish? Down below.

"We try to minimize it as best we can," he said. "We're doing it near the Copper River Run, where the fish are coming in, but the Naval part of the exercise is more than a hundred miles out from that area."

Ten communities have already passed resolutions on the exercise. In order of most recent filing, Kodiak Island Borough, Seward, Seldovia, Whittier, Girdwood, Tenakee Springs, Sitka, Valdez, Homer, and Cordova are included on that ten-community list.

And those moves haven't gone unnoticed.

Schmidt said areas near Kodiak, for example, won't be used for training due to specific environmental sensitivities in that area.

"We agreed not to conduct training in that area during government-to-government consultations with the tribes and our community relations efforts," she said.

Baker said it's unsurprising that people are against the exercise.

"Do we have people opposing it? Yes," Baker said. "You're going to have people opposing just about anything. But we're doing our best to please everybody."

Barring unforeseen circumstances, Exercise Northern Edge is set to commence on May 1.