The Kenai City Council adopted a joint resolution of the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly and Councils of the Cities of the Kenai Peninsula Borough, supporting a request for federal aid submitted to Alaska’s U.S. Congressional Delegation for the purpose of Spruce Bark Beetle Mitigation. The risk of wildland fires has substantially increased due to the expanding range of the spruce bark beetle infestation. Southcentral Alaska is experiencing a forest crisis in the form of a resurgence of the 1990s spruce beetle outbreak where over one million acres were impacted on the Kenai Peninsula before the infestation was addressed.
Kenai City Mayor Brian Gabriel:
“Just going to say that I do support this wholeheartedly and I think we almost, in a way, feel like we are playing with fire, in some way. This summer, we had kind of a cool, wet summer, which tamped down the fire potential throughout the peninsula, but if we have a year like we had several summers ago where we had a really super-hot dry summer, things could progress pretty quickly. I think this definitely is something we need to do and something that needs to happen fairly quickly. I think for a lot of private property owners, they have done a lot of their own mitigation. I know in our neighborhood, that’s been going on. Certainly identifying areas of slash disposal would expedite that and get people a little more motivated because when you go over to the dump over in Soldotna, they do have a slash site over there, but for a lot of people, especially when you’re dealing with branches of spruce trees, it’s pickup load after pickup load that they would have to run if they live in Clam Gulch, that’s a long way to go, to try to dispose of that. it’s certainly on the right path and I support this.”
An aerial detection survey conducted in 2019 mapped 150,000 acres of spruce beetle damages revealing the initial outbreak that the Kenai Peninsula is currently experiencing. In the city and surrounding areas, the outbreak is visibly apparent with tens of thousands of dead and dying spruce trees, impacting all lands, whether private or public.
The Borough submitted a federal aid request for the amount of $35 million to the Alaska U.S. Congressional Delegation for spruce bark beetle mitigation. The Kenai Peninsula Borough, City of Homer, Kachemak City, City of Kenai, City of Seldovia, City of Seward and City of Soldotna are supportive of Joint Resolution No. 2021-002 to complete hazard mitigation projects across Kenai Peninsula Borough lands.
