January 7, 2009

CHICAGO – Leaders of a northwest Alaskan coastal village that's washing out to sea are disclosing to residents that they must choose another relocation site for the town.

The leaders of Shishmaref, a barrier island village of 560 people, learned recently that the long-chosen site of Tin Creek on the nearby mainland is plagued by degrading permafrost.

"It's more or less ice and not anchored enough for a town," said Darlene Turner, a leader in the traditional Inupiaq village and president of Shishmaref Lutheran Church, a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA).

"It's disappointing," Turner said. "This puts us back at square one."

Shishmaref is among the three most imperiled Alaskan villages endangered by erosion and flooding due to climate change, according to a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

"The impact of climate change is dramatic in Alaska, and the rest of the United States doesn't understand that," said the Rev. Michael Keys, bishop of the ELCA Alaska Synod.

Shishmaref Lutheran Church dates back to 1930 and is the northernmost congregation in the 4.7-million member denomination. The Rev. Robert H. Wentzien, the congregation's 57-year-old pastor, died suddenly in October after a fall.

Wentzien voiced concerns earlier last year about the reduction of water access at the Tin Creek site as well as the long-term impact of any relocation.

"I am very concerned, not just about their commerce and industry, but about their entire culture, oral traditions, family traditions and more," he told ELCA Communication Services.

Shishmaref could be wiped out in less than 10 years, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The cost of relocating the village to the mainland is estimated at $180 million, while moving residents 120 miles south to a designated area in Nome is calculated at roughly half that price.

For residents, relocation is a battle for survival as a people as well as a village. The majority oppose moving to cities such as Nome or Anchorage because of the dramatic lifestyle changes, said Stanley Tocktoo, head of the Shishmaref Erosion and Relocation Committee.

"The majority want to stay on the mainland in the area and subsist on the land and sea like we always have," he said. "We don't want to be separated. We want to keep intact our traditional values and customs."

No roads lead to Shishmaref, where residents live on seals, walrus, fish, birds, caribou and moose that they hunt themselves. Villagers date their culture back thousands of years.

The bishop said two other villages in the synod – Wales and Teller – may also face relocation.

"If you just move people to Nome or Anchorage, you're losing cultural diversity," he said. "You need to consider the cultural perspective. Is there a value that this cultural diversity exists? Is the indigenous lifestyle – culture, values and language – valuable?"

Shishmaref is located on an island about three miles long and a quarter mile wide. Shoreline erosion averages 3-5 feet per year, though more extensive in storms in 1997 and 2001. Shishmaref Lutheran, the island's only church, provided parcels of land so many of those immediately threatened could move to safer ground.

"These are people of deep, deep extraordinary faith and witness," Keys said. "It will allow them to face very, very difficult challenges ahead of them and be a significant part of how they respond."

ELCA News Service