Board Chair Survives Ethics Challenge Over Village Corporation Ties

The Alaska Board of Fisheries voted 6-0 Thursday that Chair Marit Carlson-Van Dort can fully participate in Area M proposals despite her role as CEO of a Chignik Bay village corporation that previously took a position on the fishery.

The vote followed an unusual roll-call process directed by the Alaska Department of Law after a public letter from Tele Aadsen questioned whether Carlson-Van Dort's leadership of Far West Inc. created a conflict. The Attorney General's office issued an opinion finding no substantial conflict, but Vice Chair Tom Carpenter said the department requested the transparent roll-call vote to address public concerns.

The ethics challenge represents the latest in a pattern of scrutiny that has followed Carlson-Van Dort's board service. United Fishermen of Alaska opposed her confirmation in January 2025, alleging failure to disclose conflicts at past Board of Fisheries meetings. Public testimony submitted to the board in 2024 criticized her for not following protocols and voting for Chignik interests without balanced engagement.

Carlson-Van Dort disclosed that Far West Inc. took a position in 2018 on an emergency petition affecting Chignik Management Area fisheries, before her appointment to the board. She told the board that nothing has materially changed since a 2022 ethics review of a similar issue involving Proposal 282. The board voted 5-1 that year that no conflict existed. In 2023, the board raised no objections when she chaired the last Aleutian Islands Alaska Peninsula Chignik Finfish meeting.

"In 2018, Far West Inc. took a position with respect to an emergency petition before the board affecting fisheries in the Chignik Management Area. This was prior to my appointment to the board," Carlson-Van Dort said. "Nothing has materially changed since that ethics disclosure I made, which was reviewed by my ethics supervisor on Proposal 282."

Far West Inc. derives no income from fisheries, Carlson-Van Dort said. The corporation's revenue comes primarily from federal government contracting with the Department of Defense, supplemented by Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act revenue sharing, a guided hunting access agreement, and rental properties. The corporation has roughly 550 shareholders, most living in Southcentral Alaska and Kodiak rather than Chignik Bay.

The Department of Law opinion referenced a 1994 Attorney General ruling on similar questions about board members' ties to organizations. That opinion found no impermissible conflict when an organization advocates on fisheries issues but derives no direct financial benefit from board decisions.

Board member Jared Godfrey said the Department of Law analysis was "extremely instructive" and that he would support full participation based on the legal guidance. "It would have to be pretty egregiously off the mark for me to overrule the Department of Law for the sake of consistency and the precedent," Godfrey said.