NEAH BAY — The public has until June 11 to comment on a draft environmental impact statement on the Makah tribe’s request to resume hunting and killing gray whales in the Pacific Ocean.
The National Marine Fisheries Service of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration released the draft Friday.
It proposes six different options ranging from prohibiting an annual hunt for North Pacific gray whales to allowing up to 24 to be harvested within a six-year period.
The document is part of the process that could lead to more whaling by the Makah.
The 1855 Treaty of Neah Bay gave the tribe the right to hunt whales in their usual and accustomed stations, but in the 1920s they stopped hunting whales because their numbers had declined.
The Makah last legally killed a Pacific gray whale in 1999, triggering lawsuits that resulted in a 2004 ruling from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the hunts needed to comply with the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The tribe seeks a waiver from the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The fisheries service offered these alternatives in the draft document:
■ A no-action alternative would not authorize a whale hunt. It would continue a moratorium under the marine mammal act.
■ Alternative 2 would let the Makah harvest as many as five Eastern North Pacific gray whales a year and a maximum of 24 over six years in tribal fishing grounds in the Pacific except for a zone around Tatoosh Island and White Rock.
No more than seven whales could be “struck” — penetrated by harpoons or bullets — in a year, and no more than three struck and lost. The fisheries service, however, could limit the hunt to three whales a year.
■ Alternative 3 would also prohibit Makah hunters from making any “initial strike” within 5 miles of shore and would set a probable “mortality limit” of 2.7 whales a year.
■ Alternative 4 would limit the hunt to June 1 through Nov. 10 to avoid killing Western Pacific gray whales and limit mortality to one whale “member” of the Pacific Coast Feeding Group that the fisheries service says ranges from Northern California to northern Vancouver Island.
■ Alternative 5 would open two three-week-long hunting seasons — Dec. 1-21 and May 10-31 — to avoid killing a Western Pacific gray whale or a feeding-group whale. It also would set a probable limit of 0.27 whales a year, including any whale struck but not landed.
■ Alternative 6 would limit strikes to seven a year and set a probable mortality limit of 2.25 whales.
The Marine Mammal Protection Act moratorium waiver would expire after 10 years, and a permit to hunt would last no more than three years.
The draft’s source, the fisheries service, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, will accept written comments on the draft for three months.
In late April, according to Makah General Manager Meredith Parker, the fisheries service probably will hold public meetings in Neah Bay, Port Angeles and Seattle on the alternatives.
Comments can be submitted by email to Makah2015DEIS.wcr@noaa.gov
To see the draft and for more information, visit http://tinyurl.com/PDN-drafteiswhaling
The draft also is available at public libraries in Clallam Bay, Forks, Port Angeles, and Sequim; the Seattle Public Library, 1000 Fourth Ave.; and at NOAA Fisheries offices at 7600 Sand Point Way, NE, Building 1, Seattle (call Leah Mattox, 206-526-6150) and 1201 NE Lloyd Blvd., Suite 1100, Portland, Ore. (call Steve Stone, 503-231-2317).
Copies on CD are available by contacting Steve Stone at 503-231-2317 or steve.stone@NOAA.gov.
