Hiring for a key position in the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Haines office, vacant since February, has been slowed by budget worries, Fish and Game regional coordinator Patrick Fowler said this week. The department will not begin recruiting for the position until at least early next year.
The position, previously held by management biologist Alex Tugaw, has a range of duties, including data-collection and input into Fish and Game policy-making on local issues. The sportfish manager is also a public-facing role, hosting events for the community and fielding questions from the public on sportfishing in the area.
When Tugaw left in February, the department waited to fill the position, not knowing whether they would have funding for the role after the end of the state fiscal year in June. Then in May, Governor Mike Dunleavy issued an executive order freezing all hiring in state agencies due to the state’s budget woes.
That meant Haines was without a sportfish manager for the summer season. Fish and Game Douglas-area manager Daniel Teske has taken on some of the role’s responsibilities, including access site inspections, permitting, and monitoring escapement data. All of the “critical things” in the Haines Fish and Game office have still been completed, Fowler said, even in the absence of a full-time sportfish manager.
That didn’t include Chilkat River coho index counts, which estimate the population of the river’s returning coho population each year. Those counts have been conducted annually since 1987, Fish and Game Chilkat salmon researcher Brian Elliott said, calling it “unfortunate” that there will now be a gap in the data.
In the absence of the survey, Fowler said the department looked at coho returns elsewhere in the region, as well as commercial fishery data, to make management decisions.
Going forward, Fowler said he just recently got a “green light” from the department to hire a new management biologist. But even with the department’s approval, the position still needs a waiver from the state Office of Management and Budget to bypass the still-in-place hiring freeze.
Fowler said the waiver process “has slowed the pace of recruitment down,” but he expects it will be approved.
Publicly available salary data shows that the last time the department hired for the position in 2023, it paid just just over $35,000 annually.
The state’s current financial challenges notwithstanding, long-term, Fowler said he sees the position as a priority.
“My desire is to keep it filled,” Fowler said. “My perspective is we get a lot of value out of those personal connections in the community, having the public on board with management decisions,” Fowler said.