In Alaska, a Road Marked With Controversy

"These are lagoons essential to a whole suite of waterfowl, and there's reason to think a road going through it could have serious and negative consequences," said Stan Senner, executive director of the Audubon Society of Alaska.

Senner, Hirsche and other opponents say the road would harm the lagoon in many ways. Construction work could disrupt the fragile ecology, the road would bring more hunters into the area and pollution from cars and trucks could harm the eelgrass and the animals.

But Della Trumble, president of the King Cove Corp. and an Aleut, said that the fears are unwarranted. Aleuts have lived in the region for 4,000 years, she said, and have been superb stewards of the environment. The people of King Cove -- about 550 full-time Aleut and non-Aleut residents -- feel so strongly about building the road that they have offered to give the refuge another fertile lagoon on nearby tribal land.

"What we want is simple -- a safe and direct way to get from King Cove to the airport for medical emergencies," she said. "We were not consulted when the wildlife refuge was set up, and so our needs weren't taken into consideration. That just isn't fair."

Congress has indirectly acknowledged that point, and lawmakers thought they had solved the problem in 1998 with a compromise bill that allocated $37.5 million toward building a medical facility for King Cove, a road to a landing and a hovercraft to take residents across the bay to Cold Bay Airport, even in bad weather.

But Trumble and other King Cove officials say the plan has not worked out. The community -- on a small strip of land below a snow-covered volcano -- has been unable to attract a doctor, has had difficulty keeping the hovercraft running, especially in bad weather, and says the cost of operating and maintaining it is far beyond its means. Soon after the hovercraft went into partial operation last year, some town leaders raised the possibility of selling it.

Further complicating the equation is the presence of a large fish cannery in King Cove. Opponents of the road fear that it might someday want to truck salmon, salmon roe and king crab (as well as its many transient workers) to and from Cold Bay Airport.

The opponents worry that the Peter Pan Seafoods cannery, one of the largest in North America, is the hidden force behind the current push. That Peter Pan has been a timely campaign contributor to both sponsors of the bill, Sen. Murkowski and Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), adds to their concern.

But advocates of the road say that Peter Pan plays no role in their efforts, and that they are working only to give native people reliable access to emergency care. In an interview, Peter Pan manager Dale Schwarzmiller said the company has no plans to use the road if built, but he did not rule out the possibility of trucking fish to Cold Bay Airport in the future.

Researcher Madonna Lebling contributed to this report.