Bill to designate tribal seats on Alaska Board of Fisheries pending in Senate committee

Legislation that would reshape who sits on the Alaska Board of Fisheries is waiting in a Senate committee, and the board's seven seats stay as they are until senators act.

The Alaska Federation of Natives, in its 2025 President's Report, said the bill designating tribal seats on the Board of Fish passed the Alaska State House and is now pending in the Senate Community and Regional Affairs Committee for the 2026 session. AFN convention delegates have separately called on the Alaska State Legislature to amend the membership statute to include a designated tribal voting seat on the Board of Fisheries.

House Bill 125 would create designated seats for subsistence, commercial, sport, and science representation. The board's seven members are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the legislature, and they set subsistence, commercial, and sport fishing regulations statewide.

Rep. Nellie Unangiq Jimmie, quoted in a May 17, 2025, Alaska House Majority release after House passage, said, "My family has subsisted for generations, and many of us fish commercially."

At the committee's April 16, 2026, hearing on the bill, Tanana Chiefs Conference Chief Sharon Hildebrand said the board's makeup has "been skewed to be over represented by commercial interests."

The Association of Village Council Presidents, in written comment submitted to the Legislature, said HB 125 "addresses this long-standing inequity by ensuring that subsistence users have a guaranteed seat at the table."