The Forever Corporations of the Kodiak Archipelago

Major Resources

That abundance extends to the major resources that Kodiak’s Native corporations have on their lands. For some, timber has proved an important, if more generational, crop to fund projects and other investments. James says forests that NOK logged until 2018 will take about sixty years to regrow before they can be harvested again. “It was a significant driver for economic activity,” James adds, “including the dividends that we paid to our shareholders.”

Jana Turvey, president and CEO of Leisnoi, says logging on the village corporation’s lands provided a vital infusion of capital after a 2009 US District Court ruling finally settled decades of litigation by rancher Omar Stratman. He had challenged ANCSA’s treatment of Woody Island. As deciding Judge James Singleton Jr., put it, Stratman sought “to have Leisnoi, Inc., the village corporation for Woody Island, stripped of the status and benefits conferred upon it under ANCSA.”

Despite Leisnoi’s eventual victory, more than thirty years of litigation exhausted nearly all the corporation’s finances. Things were so tight, Turvey says, that for many years, the corporation was essentially defunct, with important documents stored in a director’s garage. When Leisnoi finally turned from legal defense to the kind of “economic activity” Congress intended, “we were significantly behind,” Turvey says. Logging about 6,000 of its roughly 50,000 acres helped jumpstart new businesses and provided long-awaited shareholder dividends.

Fisheries represent another significant, if volatile, Kodiak resource. “The waters provide… a bounty for the community,” says Woolston, who once ran her own commercial fishing venture. Though fishing provides less income than before, she says it remains very important for the people of Kodiak. OHNC is also active in exploring and harvesting other underwater resources, like kelp and oysters. Woolston says, “The mariculture economy on Kodiak has real potential.”

OHNC is also working to develop onshore food resources, which include a bison herd and “hoop house” orchard and garden project.

Even Kodiak’s rocks have value. Hegna says Koniag has both gravel and granite on its lands. The latter comes in uniquely large chunks known as armor rock. Mined in pieces the size of trucks or cars, Koniag’s granite has strengthened projects like ferry docks and even parts of the Homer Spit.

However, leaving land and resources untouched has just as much importance to corporations as developing them, in some cases. The reasons vary. Hegna says Koniag has set aside some lands for cultural purposes like burial or protecting important archeological sites. It also protected some areas—often near villages—where the Alutiiq people have hunted and gathered for millennia.

For NOK, contamination at old Fort Greely has limited any use that would require digging water wells. The US Army Corps of Engineers continues its decades-long project of cleaning up that site.

Several corporations also leave land undeveloped for public uses like recreation. Many of the corporations issue land-use permits. NOK, Ouzinkie Native Corporation, and Afognak also have a joint permit system.

In at least one situation, leaving land untouched ultimately required some development. Hegna recalls when Koniag constructed the mile-and-a-half long Portage Trail between Larsen Bay and the Karluk River to protect the land in between. Much of the trail, completed in 2022, consists of an elevated boardwalk wide enough for four wheelers.

Before it was built, “we were seeing ‘spider webs’ as people created their own trails, trying to be able to access the river,” Hegna says. “It was damaging a lot of our lands.” The boardwalk, built by an all-shareholder team, has both protected those lands and increased use of the river area.

Key Industries

As the boardwalk shows, some of Kodiak’s resources directly connect to one key industry: tourism. How much corporations gain from that seasonal traffic depends on both the size and location of their land allotments. As the regional corporation, Koniag has the largest allotment. Its diverse portfolio of businesses includes the investment arm that operates a popular lodge, the Kodiak Brown Bear Center & Lodge, located on Karluk Lake, which is only accessible by float plane.

Tourism can be a struggle for village corporations like OHNC with lands only accessible by boat or air. That separation presently puts them outside the reach of many of Kodiak’s tourists. As a remedy, Woolston says OHNC is working on a hydroelectric project that could eventually sustain smaller, “more curated” cruises.

A little way down the coast, the joint village corporation Akhiok-Kaguyak connects visitors with guides for hunting and fishing opportunities around the southern tip of Kodiak Island.

Many of the corporations and their subsidiaries also work in industries far from Kodiak. OHNC has leasing and telecommunications businesses that work across Alaska. Hegna says one Koniag subsidiary recently installed a series of web cameras inside the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel to Whittier to help improve safety within that long corridor. Koniag also has a real estate business and one focused on IT services.

A lot of work extends into the Lower 48 too. NOK has a lot of environmental projects, plus some construction work. Leisnoi’s four subsidiaries provide professional, construction, environmental, and marine services. And Koniag, NOK, OHNC, and Akhiok-Kaguyak all have numerous government contracts.

Community Projects

The more these corporations succeed, the more they can reinvest in their shareholders and communities. James says NOK has “three pillars”: land and cultural stewardship, shareholder benefits and engagement, and sustained financial growth. The last pillar drives the other two.

For some corporations, revenue funds a very practical community investment: housing. Leisnoi, for one, is working with the Woody Island Tribal Council (Tangirnaq Native Village) to re-establish the entire village. The first road in Alaska was built on Woody Island in the 1800s by Russian colonists, but by the 1940s the Indigenous inhabitants moved away. To revive the homeland of the Tangirnarmiut people, Turvey says the project will start with a multi-use tribal center, for which construction should start soon.

As an urban corporation, NOK has a different opportunity: helping address the housing crunch in the city of Kodiak. Gronn says the corporation has developed a new subdivision with fifty-five lots that it is currently evaluating how to handle. The US Coast Guard’s expansion—which Gronn thinks could bring between 200 and 300 more people to the island—makes thoughtful housing development especially important. “If we don’t grow along with their growth, we’re really going to feel the pinch,” he says.

Related to that, NOK is also weighing how to steward a roughly 800-acre piece of land it owns, less than two miles from the city’s downtown. “We’re trying to determine the highest and best use of the property,” Gronn says. Among the possible uses, he suggests, “We’d love to have another [grocery] store in town,” since only one Safeway serves the entire community.

At Koniag, Hegna says the corporation has partnered with the city of Kodiak, RurAL CAP, and the Kodiak Island Housing Authority to develop “the first mutual self-help housing program off the road system.” The partners are designing a subdivision that will occupy six and half acres in the city of Kodiak. Once development starts, the families chosen to move in will learn construction skills to build their own homes in collaborative fashion. Subcontractors will handle “specialty services,” Hegna says.

Other projects focus on cultural preservation. Sabrina Ben, president and CEO of Akhiok-Kaguyak, says the corporation has a board member who teaches Sugpiaq, the language of the Alutiiq people, to younger generations. Koniag and NOK also partnered with the Kodiak Area Native Association to help the Alutiiq Museum with a $14.3 million renovation. Hegna says the three entities—Koniag, Natives of Kodiak, and Kodiak Area Native Association—bought half of the original facility and donated it to the museum. That gift helped the museum fund a 3,400-foot expansion, completed in May. “The Alutiiq Museum is now a very modern, beautiful facility that has incredible collections and exhibits,” Hegna says.

Preservation informs other projects, too. OHNC worked with the Alutiiq Tribe of Old Harbor to develop a tsunami safety center in the village, completed in March. After the 1964 earthquake, tsunamis demolished Old Harbor, Woolston says, and only the Russian Orthodox church survived.

The new, nearly 8,000 square foot tsunami safety center provides both emergency refuge and expansive community space. “This is a transformational development for our community,” Woolston says. It’s already hosting a preschool and provides space for other programs.

Whatever the future’s challenges and opportunities, Kodiak’s regional and village Native corporations are working to ensure they, their shareholders, and their descendants can meet them with the creativity and resilience the Alutiiq people have refined for millennia.