The Class Menagerie

David B. Williams is a freelance natural-history writer based in Seattle. He is the author of The Street-Smart Naturalist: Field Notes from Seattle and has written for Smithsonian, Popular Mechanics, National Parks, and The Seattle Times.

"For us, this is a human-rights stand," says Luci Beach, executive director of the Gwich'in Steering Committee.

We are back in the classroom at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, for our final talk about the refuge. Beach tells us how in 1988, the elders of the Gwich'in community called a gathering to discuss the proposal to drill in the 1002, which they call Ishik Gwats'an Gwandaii Goodlit, "the sacred place where life began." "Since time immemorial, we have made decisions by our elders gathering. After much discussion and prayers, we chose to protect this area," says Beach. "There would be no compromise on the caribou nursing grounds."

Two days earlier we had heard a similar message from Robert Thompson, a community leader in Kaktovik. He explained how he was circulating a petition against drilling in the 1002, which we could see from where we stood on the runway at the Kaktovik Airport on Barter Island. "We now have 59 signatures of the 173 registered voters. I expect to get the 60th soon," he says, pointing out that of registered voters in town, only 98 voted in the 2004 general election. "We recognize that the refuge is a stepping stone to offshore drilling." (Although they live just across a small lagoon from the coastal plain, and do hunt caribou and other animals in the refuge, the Inupiat culture centers on bowhead whale hunting.)

What is surprising about Thompson's discussion is that until recently pro-development forces justified their argument by claiming that the people of Kaktovik supported drilling. (In the critical March 2005 Senate vote on the Arctic Refuge, Hawaii Sen. Daniel Akaka [D] supported drilling because of the reported support of the Inupiat for development.) "That data is three years old," says Thompson.

As we talked with Thompson, he offered several reasons for his stand against drilling that we had not heard. Promises to Native peoples were not kept. For example, he describes how developers said that the footprint around the new Alpine fields west of the 1002 would be so small one wouldn't even notice it, but now the town of Nuiqsut is completely surrounded by Alpine infrastructure. He is also concerned about pollution from Prudhoe, which can lead to a yellow smoke smothering Kaktovik during inversions.

Two other talks in Fairbanks shed light on the situation in Kaktovik. When one student questioned Sen. Lisa Murkowski's (R) aide, Chuck Kleeschulte, about the Thompson petition, Kleeschulte said that Thompson was not from the village, did not speak the language well, and had misled petition signers. We also heard from Debbie Miller, a naturalist and writer who has spent the last two decades exploring the refuge. Miller told us that when there was a recent town meeting on drilling organized by Alaska senators, they could not categorically deny that there was a plan for offshore drilling. She said that that lack of protection for the offshore environment seemed to be the turning point for the Inupiat.

For the Gwich'in, the debate about the Arctic Refuge is simple. Every aspect of Gwich'in life revolves around caribou. They rely on caribou for as much as 80 percent of their diet, plus tools, clothing, and spiritual guidance. "Caribou retain part of the Gwich'in heart, and Gwich'in retain part of the caribou heart," says Beach. The "place where life began" is such sacred land that few if any Gwich'in even go there. "My family has been through three famines and still never went to the coastal plain," she says.

Beach also tells us that the Gwich'in are leading a six-week vigil in Washington, D.C., timed to coincide with an upcoming congressional vote on a budget bill that contains a provision to open the refuge to drilling. The demonstration will take place across the street from the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, every day from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and include Gwich'in singing, dancing, and drumming. It will culminate during the week of Sept. 20 with a large Rally for the Refuge.

Although the opinions and actions of Native people are critical in the battle over the refuge, one additional cultural group keeps coming up in our talks in Fairbanks. For the past 23 years, every Alaska citizen has received a check directly tied to oil revenue, from what's known as the Permanent Fund. Checks have ranged from $331.29 in 1984 to $1,963.86 in 2000, when oil royalties made up 82 percent of the state's revenue. Payments dropped to $919.84 in 2004. As Fran Mauer puts it, "We are like a family with one member who has an addiction, who takes down the family masterpiece and sells it to pay for his addiction."

This dependence helps explain an odd little conundrum in North Slope oil development. When we were still in Seattle, we heard about the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. In 1923, the federal government set aside 23 million acres west of Prudhoe Bay for oil for the military. Recent reports estimate that between 6.7 billion and 15 billion barrels of oil are under the NPRA, and yet little development has occurred on this land.

We kept asking people why NPRA had not been developed. We finally gained an insight when Bob Swenson talked to us about geology. He made the observation that NPRA is federal land, as opposed to state-owned Prudhoe Bay, which means that Alaskans would receive less money from development in NPRA. The Arctic Refuge is also federal land, but has different provisions governing oil use and would lead to more money going directly to Alaska citizens.

This information ties directly into a statement made to the group by Fran Mauer. He told us that polls show 60 to 70 percent support among Alaskans for drilling in the refuge, while in the Lower 48, 60 to 70 percent support protection. "With dropping oil revenue from Prudhoe, Alaskans can't wait to bring the refuge online," says Mauer.

In floating through the coastal plain, I kept thinking about sacred lands and Native people's rights. How many times in our past have we trampled the rights and history of indigenous people? We cannot correct the past, but perhaps with "the sacred place where life began," we can begin to turn toward a new path and respect and honor the Native people and their wishes.

We arrive back in Seattle on Thursday, Aug. 11, tired and transformed. My feeling is that most of us who went up there were either anti-drilling or leaning that way. We are still opposed to drilling, but we realize that the scientific and cultural issues are far more numerous, complex, and nuanced than we had ever imagined. We can see that both sides use rhetoric and well-chosen facts to make their arguments.

We know how lucky we have been to travel to the refuge, to delve deeply and thoroughly into a topic, and to learn so much from those who are so knowledgeable and passionate. But perhaps the most important parts of the trip were the discovery of the power of the refuge landscape and the recognition that the issue ultimately comes down to a moral decision.