Tree cutting along Kenai Peninsula salmon streams falls to fewest since 2018

The number of trees removed from the 50-foot buffer along Kenai Peninsula salmon streams has dropped to 391 so far this year, the fewest since 2018 and down from 2,772 in 2022, according to the borough's annual review of the buffer. River Center Manager Samantha Lopez presents the review to the borough Planning Commission on Monday, Oct. 26, in Soldotna.

The buffer, which the borough calls the Habitat Protection District, covers all land within 50 feet of the borough's listed anadromous waters, the streams, rivers and lakes that salmon and other fish use to spawn, rear or migrate. Cutting trees, restoring banks, building walkways or structures, filling, grading, and putting in culverts, bridges or roads there takes a permit. Trimming, planting native vegetation and removing trees that fell naturally don't.

Cutting surged during the spruce bark beetle outbreak, according to a 2024 borough review. Tree removal permits fell from 226 in 2021 to 58 this year.

Requests for the borough's restoration tax credit went the other way. The borough received 32 this year, the most of any year in the review's chart, which begins in 2020. It has approved three so far, compared with 15 of 19 last year; the review doesn't say whether the rest are still pending or were denied. The credit repays up to half of the land tax assessment or the project cost, whichever is less, for three tax years after work such as a walkway, spruce revetment or bank restoration within 150 feet of protected water. The 2024 review put the credits' value at $13,056 to $34,101 a year from 2019 through 2023.

The buffer now covers 980 waterbodies, 875 streams and rivers and 105 lakes, up from 793 in May 2024. The Assembly added waters newly documented in the state's anadromous waters catalog in the South District in 2024 and the West District in 2025.

Of about 6,770 parcels in the buffer, about 2,790 are owned by people or groups on the Kenai Peninsula, according to the review. About 2,390 have Anchorage owners, a group the review breaks down as 36% private, 34% state, 18% Native and 12% federal. About 1,240 belong to owners elsewhere in the U.S., and 22 to owners outside the country.

Habitat permits overall fell from about 164 in 2020 to about 110 so far this year. Since 2020, 87% have been on the Kenai River and 5% on the Kasilof. In June, a company's request to put a cabin inside the Kenai River buffer went before the commission.

The review is an informational item at the commission's 7:30 pm meeting, not a public hearing.