The federal government is suing the Fisheries Directive out of the copper center, and the department’s wildfires started a wildfire in 2019. According to the complaint.
A $ 1 million lawsuit was filed in the Alaska District Court on July 8. The lawsuit was filed by Grove Salmon Charters LLC and led by Joshua McDonald of Fitchburg, Michigan.
Stephanie Holkomb, owner of Alaska-based Grove Salmon Charter, said she was not blind to the allegations and that federal investigators had cleared her directives and business.
In a telephone interview Monday, Holcombom said: “I do not believe we are responsible. “We were not the last users of the site that day.”
The lawsuit alleges that the fire was extinguished. In July 2019, Alaska recorded a record-breaking heat and wildfire.
Grove Salmon Charters has received a license from the Alaska-based Regional Corporation from Sister and Ink for land use.
[Alaska’s fire agencies are preparing for more starts during an already historic wildfire season]
Holcomb, a local camp owner, said she was not on the water that summer because she had just given birth and hired Joshua McDonald as a guide.
“I hired the most professional outdoor guide I know, and that’s Josh,” she says.
According to the complaint, on July 8, McDonald’s and four customers boarded a fishing boat 17 miles from the Clutina River, where McDonald’s fire started “to remove the bugs and warm the customers” along the river.
The lawsuit alleges that the fire was extinguished and that it did not burn out of control.
According to Holcomb, McDonald’s was not the last user in the area that day, following a protocol to put out the fire. She argues that it was a well-known fire barrier at the time.
“We weren’t the last user group at the scene of the fire that day. After we left, there were many other users who used that fishing spot,” she said.
Blaming private companies and individuals over expensive and destructive wildfires is not a new tactic for the federal government. In the Eastern District of California alone, the U.S. Attorney’s Office has set fire to more than $ 200 million on public lands involving dozens of other cases.
But it is unclear how much the federal government has tried in Alaska. Assistant U.S. Attorney Siobhan McIntyre did not respond to questions Monday.
Holcomb has not yet had a lawyer and she only learned about it when a reporter spoke to her on Monday. She says she runs a very small business.
“I don’t have a million dollars – not everything I’ve combined,” she told me. “I mean I’m playing for hundreds of dollars (not millions).”