A contentious land exchange that paves the way for a road through Alaska’s Izembek National Wildlife Refuge includes safeguards the Fish and Wildlife Service will enforce that are aimed at protecting wildlife if the road is built, according to the agreement made public by the Interior Department on Thursday evening.
It also commits the federal government to pay the King Cove Corp., an Alaska Native corporation that owns the lands needed to complete the exchange, an unspecified amount of cash “to equalize the value of the exchange.”
The details of the land exchange agreement follow the proposal the FWS outlined to local residents in public hearings held in August, and first reported by POLITICO’s E&E News last month. It involves conveying to King Cove 490 acres within the Izembek refuge for a potential 10.5-mile-long gravel road, in exchange for 1,739 acres that that would be added to the Izembek site.
King Cove would also agree to relinquish any future claims to 5,430 acres of federal lands within the refuge site under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, according to the agreement.
