“Six nonprofit groups arose on the Bering Sea shore, and they have invested mightily in ships, real estate and processing plants. Over two decades, the groups amassed a combined net worth of $785 million,” write Lee van der Voo and The New York Times’ Kirk Johnson.
But the results on the ground, in rural community and economic development, have been deeply uneven, and nonexistent for many people who still gaze out to the blinking lights of the factory ships and wonder what happened.
In a series of three pieces for InvestigateWest, Portland-based reporter Lee van der Voo Lee van der Voo visits Alaksa’s fishing industry a generation after it was rationalized. She uncovers absentee landlords, brokers and bankers, and fish quota that costs more than your house — realities that fly in the face of more official, rosy portrayals.
