Kaktovik lies within the Arctic Refuge. Rev. Akootchook made this statement after Sen. Domenici and Interior Secretary Norton's trip to Kaktovik.

"It seems like we get caught unawares. Our leaders don't let us know about anybody coming until the last minute. But we have our own minds. We who live by the ocean we decided things. But they badly want to open ANWR. If they don't take away our hunting its O.K. but they will affect our hunting. It's true we elders don't hunt anymore but our children's lives will be changed something terrible. That is so. We have to talk about it and tell them not to open it and we know for sure that if they start on ANWR they will begin on the ocean. That is their reason for wanting to open it. Once they start losing the land they will pave down there towards the ocean and that is how it is. I myself will not work for them to open ANWR." 

Reverend Isaac Akootchook
President Native Village of Kaktovik 
(KBRW Radio, March 9, 2005)