Oil Development





For years, the federal government has been interested in the petroleum potential of the North Slope.  In 1923 President Warren Harding proclaimed 23 million acres west of the Colville River to be Naval Petroleum Reserve Number 4.  In 1957 Secretary of Interior Fred Seaton declared another 20 million acres eastward to be additional federal oil reserves, including lands he declared three years later to be part of a new Arctic National Wildlife Range or ANWR.  ANWR was expanded to become the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with the 1980 passage of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA).  That law brought the formal designation of wilderness to the North Slope and in Section 1002 set aside part of the previously designated oil reserve for oil and gas development, but only with Congressional approval.

So, like it or not, and seldom if ever informed of any of these federal actions, our homeland, the country that defines us as a Native American people, has become oil country, and we are now a part of it.  We can choose to ignore this reality or we can choose to face it and do whatever we can to survive it.  We have chosen the latter.  That is our nature, to adapt to all the things that come to our shores and to try and survive them.

We have carefully studied and taken a position on petroleum development.  We have reached a consensus that we have held now for over two decades.  That consensus is not what most people think, it is much more complex.  The essence of the Kaktovik position is that we would support oil exploration and development of the coastal plain provided we are given the authority and the resources to ensure that it is done properly and safely.  Without the necessary provisions to ensure this protection, we would not.

The details of this position are stated in much greater detail in what we call the Kaktovik Papers, a set of documents entitled: In This Place: A Guide to Those Who Would Work in the Country of the Kaktovikmiut click here to download.  We also have stated our position in a documentary video also entitled In This Place.  We urge any who care about this place and its people to read and view these statements before forming their own opinions.  As the resident and only resident Native people of this place, we believe we deserve that respect.  We believe our homeland deserves that respect.
City of Kaktovik, Alaska.
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