[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 14]
[Senate]
[Page 20604]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       TRIBUTE TO JOSEPH DARNELL

 Mr. SULLIVAN. Mr. President, I want to say a few words about 
someone in Alaska who has been very important in my State. Joseph 
Darnell, who we know as Joe, is the Alaska Regional Solicitor for the 
Department of the Interior, in Anchorage, AL. He has been in that 
office since 1992, was made acting regional solicitor in 2010, and was 
appointed to his current position in 2013. He will be retiring from his 
job at the end of this year.
  The Department of the Interior is Alaska's largest landlord, managing 
61 percent of Alaska's lands. The way the Department of the Interior 
manages its lands and resources is critical for Alaska's economy and 
for the well-being of our citizens.
  I know that I often talk about Federal overreach, and while it is 
true that, under certain administrations, Alaska has bared the brunt of 
much of that overreach, but it was people like Joe who made sure that 
rules and regulations were followed, that the people had a voice, and 
worked to see that good policy prevailed. A former staff member for the 
late great Senator Ted Stevens, Joe learned from the best.
  During his tenure, Joe worked on numerous land management and land 
conveyance issues for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National 
Refuge System, the Bureau of Land Management, and the National Park 
Service. Among the more notable was the land exchange between the 
United States and the Aleut Corporation, which resulted in the Aleut 
Corporation acquiring ownership of the closed Adak Naval Air Facility 
on Adak Island in the Aleutian Islands.
  Joe was born in Seward and raised in Juneau, Kenai, and Fairbanks. 
According to his wife, Joan, they enjoy cross-country skiing, riding 
bicycles together, and spending time in their cabin outside of 
McCarthy. One of his great passions is small airplanes. After the first 
of the year, they will both be spending a lot of time in their Cessna 
175, flying across the great State of Alaska, and watching their 
daughter Anna ski for the ski for the Nanooks at the University of 
Alaska, Fairbanks.
  Through his decades of dedication, Joe acquired and maintained a 
peerless understanding of how both national and Alaska-specific laws 
operate on our Federal public lands in Alaska. He has advised on and 
navigated a great many challenges for our State during his time in 
public service, and his knowledge and contribution will be dearly 
missed.
  Best of luck to him and to his family and thanks for all he has done 
for all of us.

                          ____________________