Southeast Alaska Is Our Home

And we’re here to protect it

The Southeast Alaska Conservation Council is a homegrown conservation group of Southeast Alaskans fiercely fighting to protect our home: the ancient and mighty Tongass National Forest and the crisp, vibrant waters of the Inside Passage.
This is our backyard. We’ve been protecting it since 1970, and continue today.

Our Staff

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Our Work

TAKE ACTION TO PROTECT THE CHILKAT

Meredith Trainor Note

Keep Up with our Tongass Work! 

Meredith Trainor Note

SIGN UP FOR OUR CLIMATE NEWSLETTER!

Tell DOWA to stop funding the Palmer Mine!

Japanese smelter company DOWA Metals and Mining has taken control of the Palmer Mine Project at the headwaters of the Chilkat Watershed. Not only does the mine project threaten the Chilkat Watershed’s biological diversity, pristine water, and the downstream communities of Haines and Klukwan, but it’s a boondoggle, unlikely to generate profitable returns. Send this letter DOWA today, telling them to stop funding the mine!

Southeast Alaska Is Under Threat, and We’re Doing Something About It

We are facing daily, hostile threats to our environment and way of life in Southeast Alaska.

Out-of-touch Alaska politicians want to repeal decades-old safeguards on the Tongass to open it up to clearcut logging and road building. National, state, and local agencies constantly propose new timber sales to clearcut the forest. The mining industry here in Alaska and across the border in Canada willfully ignores environmental regulations and tries to extract more and more minerals from the earth’s near-critical salmon-producing watersheds.

On top of it all, Alaska is on the front lines of climate change, warming twice as fast as the rest of the country.

All of this threatens the 35 communities that make up Southeast Alaska.

We are commercial fishermen. We are hikers and kayakers. We are small business owners. We are Alaska Natives. We are hunters. We are parents, grandparents, and youth. We are family. And we are here to say enough.

To us, Southeast Alaska, though beautiful, is not just pretty scenery. It is where we live, work, and play. We rely on this living forest and its waterways for food, jobs, clean air, and water.

SEACC has galvanized our supporters into action to successfully protect this place for over 50 years. We are a truly grassroots advocacy nonprofit organization, supported by the members who work with us to take action. We use our collective regional voice — united by the love of this special place — to win in the courtroom, to watchdog harmful industries, and to advocate for laws that point us toward a more sustainable future.

We are Southeast Alaskans: this is our home. And we’re not going anywhere.

Read more about our roots and who we are →

What We’re Working On

Tongass National Forest

With its ancient, towering trees and pristine waterways teeming with salmon, the lush Tongass National Forest spans Southeast Alaska’s panhandle and is the largest national forest in the United States. We work to protect, restore and honor this living temperate rainforest — traditional homelands of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian peoples — that drives our region’s economy and sustains us with food, jobs, and clean air and water.

Inside Passage Waters

Southeast Alaska is as much water as it is land. Here, the interconnected web of the Inside Passage is home to lush wild salmon rivers and immense watersheds that feed the trees of the Tongass and the oceans of the world. It is a place teeming with biodiversity — from whales and wolves, to eagles, deer and bears, to salmon and communities.

Grassroots Community Organizing

SEACC brings people together in our region and around the world in support of the greatest place on Earth: Southeast Alaska. We believe people power is key to protecting this special place from industrial-scale clearcut logging, mines that threaten our salmon strongholds, political threats, and a climate that is changing at a dizzying speed.

Happening Now

How do public lands become private and why does it matter?

How do public lands become private and why does it matter?

We all benefit from public lands — what happens if they become private lands? Companion bills HB 282 and SB 199 would allow Alaska Departments of Education & Early Development and Transportation to lease or sell state land directly to private parties (instead of the current...

Should big industry have more say than Alaskans on forestry issues?

Should big industry have more say than Alaskans on forestry issues?

You've heard the old question: "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" But here's the real question: if a constituent has a voice but our government never hears it, does it make a difference? The Alaska Board of Forestry is meant to represent diverse...

Ask the Legislature to reject the Governor’s Executive Orders!

Ask the Legislature to reject the Governor’s Executive Orders!

UPDATE: Several executive orders, including 132 and 126, will be heard in a Joint Session on March 12 for up-down votes. You can still let your Legislators know you'd like to see these orders rejected! Governor Mike Dunleavy issued a dozen executive orders this session and if there's one trend...