Colette Felton

Honors 391 A

3/13/2017

Relocation of Alaska Native Villages

Alaska is not only home to two hundred and twenty-nine federally recognized tribes

(40% of total US tribes), it is also warming twice as fast as the global average (Chapin 516). This

combination of factors means that climate change is affecting many small tribal villages.

Flooding and melting of permafrost is eroding the land that these villages stand on. Many need to

relocate, but face serious challenges in procuring funding from the government. These villages

represent ancient cultures which would be lost if the villages were swallowed by the sea, even if

the people survive to move to a city. This problem is multi-faceted – to understand it, we must

understand what is happening to the villages from a scientific perspective, how the villagers feel

about what is happening, and what the local and federal government agencies are doing to help

these villages.

In Alaska, many tribes reside on the coast or major rivers connected to the Pacific Ocean.

This means that these settlements are vulnerable to changes in climate. Erosion and flooding

affect eighty-six percent of Alaska Native villages to some extent (Cordalis 47). This erosion and

flooding is due to many different effects of climate change. Alaska has warmed by almost two

degrees Celsius over the past sixty years (Chapin 516). Another paper also notes that some parts

of north Alaska warmed by as much as three degrees Celsius from the early 1980s to the mid-

2000s (IPCC 31). Alaska is projected to warm 1-3 degrees Celsius by 2030 and 3-6.5 degrees

Celsius by 2100 (Bronen i). This means that serious effects of climate change, such as erosion
and flooding are already being seen. It also means that those effects will accelerate as global

warming does, threatening large portions of the coastline.

The warming temperature of the planet contributes to erosion and flooding in two main

ways. Firstly, the warmer temperatures are thawing the permafrost. Permafrost is the frozen

subsoil that keeps the arctic land mass intact. The thawing of the permafrost means that the land

is initially destabilized, which is worsened by any impact from wind or waves. This is also a

serious threat on its own to all infrastructure built on the permafrost. Secondly, the sea ice along

the Alaskan coastline is melting. Less sea ice covers the Arctic Ocean today than during any of

recent geologic history (Bronen 2). This sea ice normally protects the coastline from large waves

and storms. The absence of sea ice not only contributes to sea level rise, but also allows large

waves and storms to hit the coast with full force. Most of the flooding and erosion is caused by

storm surge that can now reach the coast due to the lack of protective ice. One extreme example

of this is the native village of Shishmaref, located on an island called Kigiktaq just north of the

Bering Strait. This village now experiences much higher storm surge than it has in the past and

this, combined with the melting of the permafrost that the island is made of, is contributing to the

loss of an average of twenty-three feet of shoreline every year on Kigiktaq. This severe erosion is

threatening the village – homes have already been lost to eroding land (Cordalis 47). Climate

change also affects native communities in other ways. Many native communities are subsistence

based – they live off the land. As the climate changes, the patterns of vegetation spread and

mammal migration change (Bronen 3). This threatens the livelihood of native people to live off

the land. This also threatens the survival of large mammals such as polar bears, leading them to

seek out urban areas in search of food, threatening the people who live in villages (Cordalis 47).

The problems in Alaska are only getting worse. In 2004, a report by the federal government
identified four villages that were imminently threatened by flooding and erosion. In the 2009

report, the number of imminently threatened villages rose to thirty-one (Donoghue 1). Any land

lost by erosion cannot be regained. In some disaster situations, villages can be rebuilt on the

same site or even nearby, but the nature of this disaster means that the viability of the site and

most nearby sites for building is permanently lost. For most of these villages, the only long-term

solution is to relocate. However, there are difficulties intrinsic to this approach. To understand

these difficulties, we must first understand the Alaska Native peoples and their relationship to the

government.

Historically, Alaska Native communities didn’t rely on built infrastructure. They often

migrated seasonally between several different hunting and fishing camps. They didn’t settle

down into permanent villages until the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Education

required that all Alaska Native children attend permanent schools. The sites for these schools

were selected by the federal government based on the ease of transporting construction materials

to them (Bronen 5). Settlements with permanent infrastructure then grew up around the schools.

This is one of the reasons why so many sites are now threatened – they were not very carefully

chosen to begin with.

Alaska Natives don’t have reservations – instead, their land is owned by regional native

corporations. However, each village is mainly self-governing, with a governing village council,

which is not recognized by the US as a level of formal government. The subsistence nature of the

community and the historical occupancy of the land means that most villages are in very remote

areas. They are often only accessible by airplane (Donoghue 3). This consideration significantly

raises the cost of relocating the village. Most villages have a population of several hundred

people, but most want to relocate to a spot as similar to their original location as possible, which
often means only accessible by air. The cost of flying building materials and workers to a site to

build a community is much higher than the cost would be if there was a road. Therefore, the cost

of relocating a village of less than a thousand people ends up being about $120 million, with

some variability depending on the village (Donoghue 2). This is much more than these

communities can afford on their own, so they need help from the government.

It would be much less expensive to simply relocate the population to a city or even a site

accessible by road. In those cases, although the lives of the people and most of their possessions

would be saved, the culture would not be preserved. It is easy to see how it could be lost in a

large heterogenous environment such as an existing city, even a small one. Even moving the

community to a site accessible by road would have serous impacts on its culture. Those sites are

not likely to allow the people to sustain themselves through hunting, fishing, and gathering, as

they traditionally do. Much of the culture of these communities is based on each generation

learning the subsistence hunting techniques their ancestors used and from that, learning the

values and ways of the people. Without the ability to learn these techniques, not only would the

economy of these small villages change, but they would lose a large part of their culture. No

villages in immediate need of relocation have so far voted to do anything except relocate to a

similar site (Mittal 17). In addition, even in the most imminently threatened villages, out-

migration has not increased significantly, showing that people are committed to their ancestral

lands and culture (Hamilton 125). The Alaska Natives are committed to preserving their culture.

Routinely, it is difficult to get the necessary funds for such an extensive project. One

striking example is the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), who must justify any projects

they fund by proving that the benefits outweigh the costs (Donoghue 2). Therefore, some native

peoples are finding themselves in the interesting position of having to monetize the worth of
preserving their culture. There is also some resistance from within the communities, from

members who don’t wish to leave their ancestral lands. Others, despite constant evidence of the

erosion and flooding caused by climate change, don’t see relocation as a priority. But in the most

imminently threatened places, most community members are committed to the relocation

process. Because of the lack of funding, these communities turn to the government. However, for

Alaska Natives, working with the government is especially hard due to a lack of coordination

between departments.

The most immediate problem native villages face when working with governmental

entities, especially those from the federal government, is a failure to qualify. For example, the

federal agency FEMA, who aids communities in disaster preparedness and recovery, could be

very helpful to many of the imminently threatened native villages. But many communities fail to

qualify even to apply for this program, as erosion is not considered a disaster by the US

government. Some do still qualify, as extreme flooding can be considered a disaster. However,

some programs require that the villages participate in the National Flood Insurance Program,

another program offered by FEMA. However, due to the federal status of the villages as

unincorporated boroughs, they are not eligible for this insurance. The problem of the villages

being unincorporated boroughs comes up repeatedly when discussing their interactions with the

federal government, as this designation disqualifies them from many programs. Some villages

have still gotten funding from FEMA. However, this funding has always been a reduced amount,

for some buildings to be moved to nearby higher ground – a stopgap approach, as what the

villages really need is to be moved to a more stable site (Mittal 23).

Another federal agency, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), has

programs that could greatly help the villages relocate. But because of their aforementioned status
as unincorporated boroughs, many villages are not eligible for HUD’s programs that could

otherwise give them funding (Mittal 26). Some other federal agencies, such as the USACE and

NCRS, have also worked with communities in a reactive way. They have helped to rebuild after

flooding or erect structures that will prevent flooding in the short term (Mittal 10). For example,

in the native village of Kivalina in 2006, the USACE built a $2.5 million seawall to protect the

village from flooding and erosion, even though the village really needed to relocate. The seawall

was then partially destroyed in a storm surge the same year it was built (Semuels para. 25).

However, the government lacks any centralization or even directive on what is to be done for

these native villages. For the villages to get the amount of funding they need for a relocation,

there will have to be funding from many different government programs. There must be

leadership at the federal level, but at this point in time, that doesn’t seem to be coming soon.

Congressional committees have acknowledged the threat the communities are under since 2003,

but so far, their only action has been to order assessments of the situation, not funding for

anything to be done about it (Mittal 10). President Obama also visited Alaska Native peoples on

a historic tour in 2015 to highlight their plight (“Obama’s Trip”). But even this tour didn’t spurn

any funding on the federal level for the villages.

The biggest problem is that the US government’s priority is reaction to disaster instead of

prevention. The government has used federal funding to fully relocate villages before, but only

after a serious disaster. For instance, in Missouri, the ton of Pattonsburg struggled with flooding

for years, but after a great flood put the town under twenty feet of water, the town got approved

for full federal funding for relocation (Semuels para. 36). If we wait for this to happen in Alaska,

the consequences could be costly. Most of these towns are only accessible by plane or boat,

which makes evacuations very difficult, especially in bad weather. They are even farther from
hospitals, which makes any injury or sickness much more difficult to treat. For these villages,

even the government programs which they are approved for remain inaccessible. For instance,

one of the most imminently threatened villages, Newtok, was approved for the USACE to build a

road on the new site. But the USACE requires that recipients of its help pay up to fifty percent of

the cost of the project, money that this small community doesn’t have. Newtok overall is a very

interesting case study in observing the challenges that these villages face.

The village voted to move in 1996. Over twenty years later, they remain at their original

site. A government evaluation has stated that the original site may be underwater as soon as this

year (Semuels para. 5). They have secured the rights to a new, more stable site on a nearby island

that allows them to keep up their subsistence lifestyle. That relatively simple process took eight

years of lobbying congress. Even with this new site they struggle with the clash of government

funding agencies. Most refuse to provide funding or assistance until some utilities are in place at

the new site, but Newtok lacks the funding to build these utilities, which is why it applied for

federal funding in the first place (Semuels para. 22). It has been over twenty years since they

decided to move and it’s beginning to look like they’ll have to wait for a big disaster to get any

funding at all. An additional problem is that since they announced that they are planning to

move, they have been unable to get funding to maintain their existing village. Therefore, their

current home is deteriorating without them having anywhere to move to (Semuels para. 47).

Newtok is the farthest along of any native villages in the moving process with federal

assistance. Three other villages have voted to relocate, but have not received federal approval or

deeds for relocation sites. Four villages are moving with little federal assistance. They have been

able to build new homes in new sites (which are often very close to the original site), but none

have yet been able to establish infrastructure such as running water, sewer, fuel, roads, or schools
without federal funding and so are currently stalled in their moving process. Four more villages

have access to high ground nearby and are planning to relocate, but have not yet begun the

process (Mittal 16-18). These are only twelve of the thirty-one villages considered imminently

threatened at this time. But the number of imminently threated villages is rising quickly, so many

more will face the same problems.

Again, Newtok is a prime example of what happens in the case of governmental inaction.

Now, not only are the physical structures of the village threatened, so is the heath of its residents.

Flooding and erosion have destroyed the sites where both the garbage and human waste were

deposited. Lack of suitable new sites has led to contamination of drinking water (Semuels para.

50). Also, Newtok has one of the highest rates of respiratory infections in the country, which can

be very dangerous in children (Semuels para. 51). So far, the residents of the village have

remained in the village, due to a serious reluctance to leave behind their subsistence lifestyle. But

some residents are beginning to consider moving to a city to preserve the health of their children.

They would much rather move to a new village site, but will not wait much longer (Semuels

para. 54).

The future of coastal Alaskan Native villages remains uncertain. It has become evident

that within the span of the last twenty years, federal government agencies are unlikely to fund the

relocation of these villages without proof of significant imminent risk to inhabitants. It is

possible that as effects of climate change become more visible in other parts of the country,

federal agencies will be moved to take a more comprehensive approach to mitigating the

problem. But at any point, it is possible that other, more high-profile projects will be prioritized

over the issues facing Alaskan Native villages. For the present as well as the future, the bulk of

Alaskan Native villages will remain unlikely to acquire the necessary resources to relocate on
their own. Thus, without the creation of a government agency specifically tasked to handle the

relocation of these villages, it is unlikely that any of the inhabitants will have the resources to

relocate. However, with the creation of such an entity, it would be possible to relocate these

communities to safer sites and preserve their culture and lifestyle for many generations to come.
Resources

Bronen, Robin. "Climate-Induced Displacement of Alaska Native Communities."

Brookings-LSE (2013): 1-25. Web. 11 Mar. 2017.

Chapin, F. Stuart, III, and Sarah F. Trainor. "Alaska: Native Communities." National

Climate Assessment. US Global Climate Change Research Program, 2014. Web. 12 Mar. 2017.

Cordalis, Daniel. "The Effects of Climate Change on American Indian and Alaska Native

Tribes." Natural Resources & Environment 22.3 (2008): 45-49. JSTOR. Web. 11 Mar. 2017.

Donoghue, Ellen, and Kathy Lynn. "Realities of Relocation for Alaska Native Villages.

“Tribal Climate Change Profile (2011): 1-5 Tribal Climate Change Project. University of

Oregon. Apr. 2011. Web. 5 Mar. 2017.

Hamilton, Lawrence C., Kei Saito, Philip A. Loring, Richard B. Lammers, and Henry P.

Huntington. "Climigration? Population and Climate Change in Arctic Alaska."SpringerLink.

Springer Netherlands, 23 June 2016. Web. 06 Mar. 2017.

IPCC, 2014: Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I,

II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

[Core Writing Team, R.K. Pachauri and L.A. Meyer (eds.)]. IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, 151 pp.

Mittal, Anu. "Relocation of Alaskan Native Villages." Government Accountability Office

551 (2009): 1-49. United States Government Accountability Office, June 2009. Web. 5 Mar.

2017.

"President Obama's Trip to Alaska." National Archives and Records Administration.

National Archives and Records Administration, 31 Aug. 2015. Web. 14 Mar. 2017.

Semuels, Alana. "The Village That Will Be Swept Away." The Atlantic. Atlantic Media

Company, 30 Aug. 2015. Web. 12 Mar. 2017.