Dear Senators Jackson and Wagoner, Please include my testimony included below regarding SB 85 in the Senate Resources official testimony for the bill. Thank you for your time, I am writing to express my opposition to SB 85 and to show support for those Alaskans who wish to maintain restrictions on ATV use in the area surrounding the Dalton highway. The widespread use of ATVs will disrupt caribou and other wildlife, and cause long-term damage to the sensitive vegetation on which they feed. Disrupt the vegetation under foot and you disrupt everything above it as well. I am reminded of the goose-tongue flats out at Eagle River here in Juneau where the furrows in the soil left by truck tires persist to this day. That was just one truck intermittently supplying a camp decades ago; and the goose-tongue has had seven months out of every year since to recuperate from that impact. The vegetation of the tundra has nowhere near that luxury of time or warmth in which to recover. ATVs cannot help but disrupt wildlife and non-motorized hunters alike. The speed and noise of these vehicles overwhelms an entire segment of users whose methods of travel and interaction with the land require a slower pace and an awareness of the sounds and movements around them. Permitting ATV use will also disrupt ongoing research projects conducted through UAF, increase the potential for forest fires in an already sensitive area, and facilitate greater ease of access to the pipeline, potentially creating a security risk and abandoning entirely the integrity of the buffer zone, meant to protect human and animal communities, as well as the pipeline. SB 85 disregards all the current patrons of the area in the interest of expanding the user base without regard to its impact on a landscape incapable of sustaining unrestricted motorized use. For all the reasons stated above, I urge you not to pass this bill. Kai Ottesen |