Federal Approval of Emergency Moose Hunt Potentially Unlawful

Federal authorities may have acted illegally when they allowed an Alaskan tribal village to hold an emergency moose and deer hunt, the Ninth Circuit found Tuesday, reversing a district court’s dismissal of the claim.

Alaska sued after the Federal Subsistence Board approved two short-term changes to hunting practices on federal lands in 2020—the opening of an emergency hunt for the Organized Village of Kake and the partial closure of public lands in a game management unit to nonsubsistence users. The changes violated the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act and the Administrative Procedure Act, the state’s fish and game department ...