From a PR standpoint, probably the most effective signs at yesterday's rally to prevent Republicans from transferring billions of Alaska's oil
revenues to oil companies, are the ones that predicted the demise of the Permanent Fund.
That's a cause all Alaskans will fight. But it only makes sense - if our oil revenues plummet, so will the
Permanent Fund*.
If a journalist is watching a mugging, should she just take notes or try to intervene? When does once humanity take precedence over one's profession? I've heard photojournalists argue that they've been in terrible situations where intervening might not have helped, but their photos calling attention to atrocities can help in the long run. In this post I can't quite help myself. I don't see two valid sides to this story. I'd like to think I'm being both a human being and a reasonable journalist here. But I'm sure others will disagree.
Despite what Republicans may have talked themselves into believing, all their rationales are just cover for transferring billions of dollars from the State of Alaska to the oil companies. These 'incentives' by the state are matched by absolutely no commitments on the part of the oil companies. Remember this is brought to us by the party that includes not a few members who think global climate change is a hoax, that the world is only 6000 years old, and who take their marching orders on gay rights from Deuteronomy. There is a reason Republicans want to gut the public schools - education hurts their election chances.
Right now, the State of Alaska is being fleeced by Republican legislators lowering the taxes on oil companies in the vague hope that this will stimulate production. Our Governor was a lobbyist for Conoco-Phillips before becoming Sarah Palin's Lt. Governor and then, when she quit, Governor. Two of the Senators who voted for Senate Bill 21are currently employees of oil companies when they aren't on leave to be in the legislature. Without those two votes, the bill would not have passed. The Senate majority voted they didn't have a conflict of interest. If they had been members of the Sierra Club and their votes would have stopped the bill, do you think they would have been allowed to vote? I don't think so.
So, the legislature is emptying the Bank of Alaska and taking the loot to the getaway cars driven by the big three oil companies. We are like a third world nation, except that this seems to have become standard operating procedure in the US now as well. (I don't understand how Alaskan Tea Party folks who fume over the bank bailouts aren't equally upset about their legislators actions on oil (yeah the most conservative supporters of this were elected by Tea Party supporters).
The sequester will strongly weaken government's ability to not only maintain vital infrastructure - transportation, health and safety, education, crime prevention, etc. - but also makes it much harder for the government to regulate industry. Exactly what the Koch brothers, who have funded much of this, want. I do have to admire their ability to get ardent support from some of the people who will be hurt most.
Facts and reason have had little effect at all against the power of the oil companies. Six years after the FBI video taped VECO executives bribing Republican legislators over oil taxes in the Baranof Hotel's Suite 602, and with most if not all of those convicted back on the streets, they've returned to business as usual.
In any case, here's a video that shows those who mustered 9 votes to the Republicans' 11 votes in the Senate, on
4th Avenue yesterday in front of the Legislative Information Office.
[Update April 7, 2013: Whoops, the video wasn't there. It should be now.]
The speakers include a number of former legislators, Wally Hickel's long time aide and biographer Malcolm Roberts, two people - Katie Hurley and Vic Fischer - who were participants in the Alaska Constitutional Convention, and Anchorage Assembly write-in candidate, Nick Moe, who's challenge to Assembly Chair Ernie Hall is still too close to call.
*We have in recent years, gotten more income from investments than oil revenue, which is how things were originally projected when people thought the oil would be almost depleted by now. However, it appears that last year's oil revenue was greater than our investment revenue. The Annual Report (p. 6) shows that investment gains were less than the drop in the overall portfolio value, meaning the real gain was from oil revenue. Oil revenue last year was $915 million, about what the Governor's bill proposes to cut each year.
Drastically reducing our oil revenue like this will keep the Permanent Fund from growing as it should. Our $45 billion Permanent Fund is dwarfed by Norway's $700 billion oil fund which started much later and is supported by smaller oil reserves.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Vic Fischer oil. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Vic Fischer oil. Sort by date Show all posts
Friday, April 05, 2013
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Symbolic Protest Against Parnell's Intimidation Of Public Interest Lawsuits
When Alaska Constitutional Convention member Vic Fischer and the wife
of the Governor who established the Alaska Permanent Fund, Bella
Hammond, signed onto a lawsuit protesting action taken by the Pebble
Mine developers, little did they think they would be hit with a $1 million bill for legal expenses.
People were out to protest the Governor's decision to stick it to Vic and Bella.
The Governor's former Attorney General, Dan Sullivan promised in his confirmation hearings, that he would fight the US government by filing suit against every action that infringed on Alaska's sovereignty (just about any action the feds take in their minds). The administration sees this as a way to wear down the Feds and keep them from requiring resource extracting corporations - large and small - to prove they won't do any serious environmental damage while they are taking Alaskan resources to the bank. When they sue the federal government, the administration is using money that belongs to the State of Alaska, that is, money that collectively belongs to all the residents whether they agree with the Governor or not.
So it's no wonder that when others sue those corporations and oppose what the Administration wants to do, they assume it's the same sort of political tactics they use. They go into win-lose mode and declare these people enemies of the State (anti-development is one such term) and set up obstacles to do what is their own strategy against the feds. Parnell and his associates can't imagine or understand that there are people who do this sort of thing out a belief in public duty and public good. For Parnell it's just a tactic to maintain and increase their power.
But some people use these sort of lawsuits the way they were intended. Not simply as a way to clog up the process or to protect their personal financial stake, but because they strongly believe it's in the best interest of the future of the state. Of course, Parnell says he believes that too, but when his actions are always on the side of large corporations - ones he used to work for like being the lobbyist for Conoco Philips - the lines between public and private good are seriously blurred. A large, multinational corporation that, despite their feel good ads and pocket-change-to-them strategic contributions to the community, really have no interest in Alaska except how our resources will help their company's bottom line. Sure, as individuals, their employees may enjoy Alaska's wonders, but their collective work as employees is NOT for Alaska, it's for the corporation and its stockholders.
Individuals who raise objections to their projects are dubbed "anti-development" as though all development were good and all opposition to development were bad. These folks go to court, risking their own money, to fight their case. Most jurisdictions recognize this sort of public interest lawsuit and protect the folks that undertake them. But the Parnell administration got legislation passed to prevent such suits that oppose their projects and their corporate backers by intimidating them with the threat of having to pay the State's legal fees. Now if they sued the state over offering abortions or for the right to buy as many automatic weapons as they can afford, I'm sure he would not think they needed to pay the court costs if they lost. And I don't think the State of Alaska will pay the Feds' legal costs if they lose any of their suits against the Feds. And even if they do, it's our money, not the Administration's personal money. This is part of the stifle dissent campaign that shut down coastal zone management programs. We're the state with the largest coast and the only coastal state without a coastal zone management program. No program means no pesky local folks raising objections to corporations developing projects that threaten their community and environment.
The Feds, in other words, should leave Alaskans alone to do things their own way, but the local communities should simply let the State do whatever it pleases to them. This inconsistency suggests to me that the issue isn't so much to protect Alaskans' best interests, but to protect the Parnell Administration to do what it wants to protect its corporate sponsors.
I realize that Parnell and Sullivan (the one running for Senate, not the mayor) have converted to the church of commerce which says that whatever corporations do is good, so that their sense of the public good is consistent now with their actions. We all seek confirmation in ideologies that support what we want to do. But some ideologies better match what how things actually work in the world. And they make us, sometimes, give up what we want for what is the right thing to do.
And so I'm sure that Parnell and his backers looked at today's rally with disgust and condescension. Taking to the streets to protest simply demonstrates your lack of power. If you have real power, you talk to the Governor privately without inconvenient questions being raised. You work out your deals and you do what you want as unobtrusively as possible. But you are always ready to squash any opposition.
The protestors used all the symbolism of the location they could.
On the plaza of the Atwood Building that houses so many state offices, with the large faceless building looming over them, they mocked Parnell's "Choose Respect" anti-domestic violence campaign by holding a large sign in defense of two Alaskan icons: the last active signer of the Alaska constitution Vic Fischer; and the wife of the governor who established Alaska's Permanent fund, Bella Hammond. It read: "Real Alaskans Don't Bully Their Elders."
They mocked the anti-tax line often used by conservatives, and used by Anchorage Assembly Chair last night, to justify the draconian anti-union ordinance passed last spring, that seniors will lose their homes because they can't pay the property tax. The other big sign said, "Don't Evict Bella Hammond" (with the attempt to charge her exorbitant court fees.)
These
are the same kinds of tactics the Palin administration (of which
Parnell was a part) used by charging huge sums for public records
requests.
And behind the demonstrators loomed the huge (and in my opinion, awful) mural of some of Alaska's founders - Ernest Gruening, Bill Egan, Bob Bartlett, and Ralph Rivers.
I realize that I'm sounding a little ideological myself here. But how else can you explain what's going on? With corporations being seen by the Supreme Court as 'people' deserving the constitutional rights reserved for individual human beings (though actual human women, Indians, and slaves weren't originally given all these rights) like freedom of speech, we now have inordinate corporate money funding pseudo think tanks to pump out studies that discredit legitimate science on everything from evolution to the link between cigarettes and cancer, or the harmful effects of all the chemicals in household products, to global climate change and they push a corporate agenda that has created the greatest disparity in wealth America has seen for nearly a century. They're funding the Tea Party members of Congress who shut down the government over the Affordable Care Act. While they justify this because, they say, the ACA will bankrupt the US, and they want to keep federal spending sustainable, they absolutely refuse to consider any new taxes to help reduce our debt, even though the tax rates today are the lowest in 50 or 60 years. And they had no such misgivings about the money to be spent on their (and it was mostly their) war against Islam (well for some that's what it is) which brought huge corporate profits for defense contractors at the cost of countless lives interrupted and ended.
Not only do they kill in the name of Christ, they promote guns, not helping the poor, and treating foreigners with hostility and deportation. That's not the Christ I've been told about who said things like:
But I think my words and actions are moderate compared to the people who support the Governor and encourage him with model legislation from ALEC to pass laws that intimidate publicly minded citizens from legally protesting programs they see as harmful to our way of life. People like Vic Fischer, Bella Hammond, and the other, less well known, people who expect that Pebble Mine, like most other huge mining operations around the world, will take its money out of state and leave in the state huge environmental degradation. The history of mining suggests this is not an unreasonable expectation.
I would note that Michael Dingman has a piece in the ADN today that argues in part, that:
Vic Fischer and Bella Hammond and I are not anti-development. He was part of the constitutional convention that wrote in Article 8:
Bella Hammond's husband ushered in oil development and, understanding that oil was a finite resource added a program to reserve a portion of the wealth raised for the use of future generations.
Governor Parnell's notion of public interest appears to have been affected by his years arguing the interests of Conoco Phillips before the legislature. The real problem in Alaska is that people are not at all alarmed by this obvious conflict of interest. I guarantee you that if the former lobbyist for the Sierra Club were running for Governor, the Right would create such a screech and howl in the election that you'd think Satan himself were running. Alaskans - and the Democrats play a role in this - would see that conflict, but don't seem to have a problem with the Governor's obvious conflict. I think we have petro dollars - we know about the Corrupt Bastards Club before Citizens United - and later Citizens United to thank for this.
Bella Hammond and Vic Fischer (and I) are for development that will benefit the people of Alaska and is sustainable and won't damage the other resources important to Alaska. Immediate short term profit for political supporters shouldn't be the standard, but rather the long term benefit to Alaska's current and future residents. These don't seem to be worries for the Governor and his people. And that worries me too. What also worries me is their stifling of channels of dissent where citizens can raise legitimate questions. To the Parnellites, any hint of a question of their intent brings out a loud charge of anti-development. It's either or. Development is good. Any opposition is bad. It's an almost biblical application of good and evil, and they always see themselves among the good.
[I've been having problems with feedburner lately intermittently working and not working to connect my posts to subscribers and other weblogs. This one was posted Oct. 23 but has not been linked elsewhere, so I'm reposting it to see if that will help..]
People were out to protest the Governor's decision to stick it to Vic and Bella.
The Governor's former Attorney General, Dan Sullivan promised in his confirmation hearings, that he would fight the US government by filing suit against every action that infringed on Alaska's sovereignty (just about any action the feds take in their minds). The administration sees this as a way to wear down the Feds and keep them from requiring resource extracting corporations - large and small - to prove they won't do any serious environmental damage while they are taking Alaskan resources to the bank. When they sue the federal government, the administration is using money that belongs to the State of Alaska, that is, money that collectively belongs to all the residents whether they agree with the Governor or not.
So it's no wonder that when others sue those corporations and oppose what the Administration wants to do, they assume it's the same sort of political tactics they use. They go into win-lose mode and declare these people enemies of the State (anti-development is one such term) and set up obstacles to do what is their own strategy against the feds. Parnell and his associates can't imagine or understand that there are people who do this sort of thing out a belief in public duty and public good. For Parnell it's just a tactic to maintain and increase their power.
But some people use these sort of lawsuits the way they were intended. Not simply as a way to clog up the process or to protect their personal financial stake, but because they strongly believe it's in the best interest of the future of the state. Of course, Parnell says he believes that too, but when his actions are always on the side of large corporations - ones he used to work for like being the lobbyist for Conoco Philips - the lines between public and private good are seriously blurred. A large, multinational corporation that, despite their feel good ads and pocket-change-to-them strategic contributions to the community, really have no interest in Alaska except how our resources will help their company's bottom line. Sure, as individuals, their employees may enjoy Alaska's wonders, but their collective work as employees is NOT for Alaska, it's for the corporation and its stockholders.
Individuals who raise objections to their projects are dubbed "anti-development" as though all development were good and all opposition to development were bad. These folks go to court, risking their own money, to fight their case. Most jurisdictions recognize this sort of public interest lawsuit and protect the folks that undertake them. But the Parnell administration got legislation passed to prevent such suits that oppose their projects and their corporate backers by intimidating them with the threat of having to pay the State's legal fees. Now if they sued the state over offering abortions or for the right to buy as many automatic weapons as they can afford, I'm sure he would not think they needed to pay the court costs if they lost. And I don't think the State of Alaska will pay the Feds' legal costs if they lose any of their suits against the Feds. And even if they do, it's our money, not the Administration's personal money. This is part of the stifle dissent campaign that shut down coastal zone management programs. We're the state with the largest coast and the only coastal state without a coastal zone management program. No program means no pesky local folks raising objections to corporations developing projects that threaten their community and environment.
The Feds, in other words, should leave Alaskans alone to do things their own way, but the local communities should simply let the State do whatever it pleases to them. This inconsistency suggests to me that the issue isn't so much to protect Alaskans' best interests, but to protect the Parnell Administration to do what it wants to protect its corporate sponsors.
I realize that Parnell and Sullivan (the one running for Senate, not the mayor) have converted to the church of commerce which says that whatever corporations do is good, so that their sense of the public good is consistent now with their actions. We all seek confirmation in ideologies that support what we want to do. But some ideologies better match what how things actually work in the world. And they make us, sometimes, give up what we want for what is the right thing to do.
And so I'm sure that Parnell and his backers looked at today's rally with disgust and condescension. Taking to the streets to protest simply demonstrates your lack of power. If you have real power, you talk to the Governor privately without inconvenient questions being raised. You work out your deals and you do what you want as unobtrusively as possible. But you are always ready to squash any opposition.
The protestors used all the symbolism of the location they could.
On the plaza of the Atwood Building that houses so many state offices, with the large faceless building looming over them, they mocked Parnell's "Choose Respect" anti-domestic violence campaign by holding a large sign in defense of two Alaskan icons: the last active signer of the Alaska constitution Vic Fischer; and the wife of the governor who established Alaska's Permanent fund, Bella Hammond. It read: "Real Alaskans Don't Bully Their Elders."
They mocked the anti-tax line often used by conservatives, and used by Anchorage Assembly Chair last night, to justify the draconian anti-union ordinance passed last spring, that seniors will lose their homes because they can't pay the property tax. The other big sign said, "Don't Evict Bella Hammond" (with the attempt to charge her exorbitant court fees.)
And behind the demonstrators loomed the huge (and in my opinion, awful) mural of some of Alaska's founders - Ernest Gruening, Bill Egan, Bob Bartlett, and Ralph Rivers.
I realize that I'm sounding a little ideological myself here. But how else can you explain what's going on? With corporations being seen by the Supreme Court as 'people' deserving the constitutional rights reserved for individual human beings (though actual human women, Indians, and slaves weren't originally given all these rights) like freedom of speech, we now have inordinate corporate money funding pseudo think tanks to pump out studies that discredit legitimate science on everything from evolution to the link between cigarettes and cancer, or the harmful effects of all the chemicals in household products, to global climate change and they push a corporate agenda that has created the greatest disparity in wealth America has seen for nearly a century. They're funding the Tea Party members of Congress who shut down the government over the Affordable Care Act. While they justify this because, they say, the ACA will bankrupt the US, and they want to keep federal spending sustainable, they absolutely refuse to consider any new taxes to help reduce our debt, even though the tax rates today are the lowest in 50 or 60 years. And they had no such misgivings about the money to be spent on their (and it was mostly their) war against Islam (well for some that's what it is) which brought huge corporate profits for defense contractors at the cost of countless lives interrupted and ended.
Not only do they kill in the name of Christ, they promote guns, not helping the poor, and treating foreigners with hostility and deportation. That's not the Christ I've been told about who said things like:
For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home.As you can see, I'm agitated today. I can find you links to support all I say, and I'm confident that in 20 years, most sane and rational folks won't see anything amiss in a post like this. (I'd like to think that's true of sane and rational folks today.) But I'm also mindful not to fall into the same strident rhetoric of the people I oppose because of their abuse of facts, of truth, of the people they are supposed to represent, of their power.
But I think my words and actions are moderate compared to the people who support the Governor and encourage him with model legislation from ALEC to pass laws that intimidate publicly minded citizens from legally protesting programs they see as harmful to our way of life. People like Vic Fischer, Bella Hammond, and the other, less well known, people who expect that Pebble Mine, like most other huge mining operations around the world, will take its money out of state and leave in the state huge environmental degradation. The history of mining suggests this is not an unreasonable expectation.
I would note that Michael Dingman has a piece in the ADN today that argues in part, that:
"Something happened in court last month that the anti-development folks don't want you to know about.I would argue that my claims about Parnell's pro-corporate stands are much easier to document and much more accurate than Dingman's characterization of Fischer and Hammond as part of the anti-development movement.
Rather than focusing on the facts of the court case -- which they don't want you to know -- they are going to show you photos of former State Senator and Alaska Constitution Delegate Vic Fischer and former First Lady Bella Hammond because they are sympathetic Alaskan heroes.
Don't fall for it."
Vic Fischer and Bella Hammond and I are not anti-development. He was part of the constitutional convention that wrote in Article 8:
"It is the policy of the State to encourage the settlement of its land and the development of its resources by making them available for maximum use consistent with the public interest. "And then went on to innumerate how to allocate those resources. That's not anti-development, but apparently Governor Parnell believes his administration alone should determine what 'consistent with the public interest' means.
Bella Hammond's husband ushered in oil development and, understanding that oil was a finite resource added a program to reserve a portion of the wealth raised for the use of future generations.
Governor Parnell's notion of public interest appears to have been affected by his years arguing the interests of Conoco Phillips before the legislature. The real problem in Alaska is that people are not at all alarmed by this obvious conflict of interest. I guarantee you that if the former lobbyist for the Sierra Club were running for Governor, the Right would create such a screech and howl in the election that you'd think Satan himself were running. Alaskans - and the Democrats play a role in this - would see that conflict, but don't seem to have a problem with the Governor's obvious conflict. I think we have petro dollars - we know about the Corrupt Bastards Club before Citizens United - and later Citizens United to thank for this.
Bella Hammond and Vic Fischer (and I) are for development that will benefit the people of Alaska and is sustainable and won't damage the other resources important to Alaska. Immediate short term profit for political supporters shouldn't be the standard, but rather the long term benefit to Alaska's current and future residents. These don't seem to be worries for the Governor and his people. And that worries me too. What also worries me is their stifling of channels of dissent where citizens can raise legitimate questions. To the Parnellites, any hint of a question of their intent brings out a loud charge of anti-development. It's either or. Development is good. Any opposition is bad. It's an almost biblical application of good and evil, and they always see themselves among the good.
[I've been having problems with feedburner lately intermittently working and not working to connect my posts to subscribers and other weblogs. This one was posted Oct. 23 but has not been linked elsewhere, so I'm reposting it to see if that will help..]
Monday, October 23, 2023
Good Bye Vic! Miss You Already
 |
| [Fishcher photo from a University webpage which no longer is working.] |
I believe this is a picture of Vic when he was a delegate at the Alaska Constitutional Convention.
Like his good friend Lidia Selkregg, he was someone who made everyone he talked to feel special.
Here's some of what I wrote about Vic's autobiography - To Russia With Love - on his 95th birthday, four years ago.
"There's something of a Forrest Gump quality to Vic Fischer's life - he lived through many historic moments in the history of the 20th Century, and played important roles in a number of them. His father was the famous journalist, Louis Fischer, who was married to a Russian writer. He was born in Berlin in 1924 spent his early years in Berlin and Moscow, escaping from Stalin purges through intervention from Eleanor Roosevelt in 1939."
Many remarkable men and women have made Alaska their home. None of their lives was more remarkable than Vic's.
Vic at his 95th birthday party in May 2019.
In the legislative halls of Juneau 2010
Vic was at the rally to gather signatures for the Dunleavy recall in 2019. I'm pretty sure Dunleavy would have been recalled if it hadn't been for COVID. The organizers got the required 28,000 signatures in two weeks. That's phenomenal. So getting the recall petition certified was easy. But the next round required another petition to get it on the ballot. And as the group was ready to start the second petition, COVID shut everything down. No gatherings. People weren't going places like the library or the DMV where it was easy to get signatures. And the recall movement died of COVID.
Here's Vic in Juneau talking to Rep. David Gutenberg. I was blogging the legislature and a question had come up about what was intended in the Alaska Constitution regarding the Boundary Commission. Vic, who'd been a member of the Constitutional Convention was there and I was able to get his interpretation of what the Constitution intended on that issue. Unfortunately, that video is a blank on the page, so I can't post it now. [I saved some videos on Vidler which eventually started charging. They did help me by sending me all the video I had up there, but it was a complicated process of redoing them all. I got a number redone and up on YouTube, but not all. I'm guessing that's what happened to this one.]
But I do have this video of Vic speaking at the "It's Our Oil" rally in 2013. You can see the whole video (with other speakers) at the original post.
Alaskans have lost one of our greatest statesmen and a great human being..
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Alaska's Prop 2 - Why Have Alaska Miners Association and Shell Each Spent As Much To Defeat Prop 2 As The Yes Side Raised Altogether?
Overview
Here are the basic parts of this post:
Alaska's governor opposes most federal regulation of Alaska on the grounds that we know best what we need. But when local Alaska communities make the same argument about the feds and the state, he dismisses them. He doesn't really seem to be as much concerned about local needs and power as corporate needs and power. The real issue, it seems, is that the former Conoco-Phillips lobbyist in our Governor's mansion, is against anyone having the power to raise questions, slow down, or, even worse, stop any development. We should all, the opponents seem to be saying, trust the developers to do the right thing.
The Context of US Coastal Zone Management Programs
The Coastal Management Program was set up in 1976 by Gov. Hammond, the governor who fought to establish the Alaska Permanent Fund. Hammond was a governor that most people agree had Alaskan people as his top priority.
Local powers were reduced by new legislation introduced by Gov. Murkowski in 2003.
In 2011 the program expired when the legislature and Gov. Parnell could not agree on specific legislation to renew it. [This history comes from the Alaska Sea Party website which supports Prop 2.]
Coastal Management programs exist under the federal Coastal Zone Management Act established in 1972 (under Republican president Richard Nixon) and all the states and territories with coast lines - Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf of Mexico, and the Great Lakes - have programs affiliated with the Act. Except Alaska which is supposed to have more coast line than all the others combined. From NOAA's website, here is the list of states and territories with links to their programs. (I checked them all. Only Alaska has withdrawn.)
Supporters and Opponents
You can learn a lot by who supports and who opposes something.
Prop 2 Supporters
The Alaska Sea Party which set up and backs the initiative is led by Juneau's mayor Bruce Botelho. Its list of supporters include local mayors from around the state and other citizens who tend to stand up for the benefit of Alaskans. People like Alaska Constitutional convention member Vic Fischer and former state senator Arliss Sturgulewski. You can see a list of Prop 2 supporters here. These are people who tend to represent the needs of their local communities.
Prop 2 Opponents
The Alaska State Chamber of Commerce President Rachael Petro signed the Statement in Opposition in the State Ballot Guide. The list of Prop 2 opponents from a No on Prop 2 website is a list of developers, chambers of commerce, and industries supported by strong Outside interests (Cruise industry, Mining, Oil and Gas).
Comparing the websites of the Yes and No sides offers an interesting contrast. I have only fact-checked a few points so I can't vouch for everything, but the style of the two sides is so enormously different that it tells you a lot.
There are lots of complaints about the language and reach of Prop 2, but little or no acknowledgment of the need for the program at all or the kind of changes that would make it more reasonable.
The Sea Party website (pro Prop 2) is long and detailed with factual statements that can be easily tested. Conclusions are in generally neutral direct language supported by facts.
The No on Prop 2 website appears to be put together by the same sort of lucrative PR firm. (The expenditure reports shows they've paid Porcaro Communications over half a million dollars.) It's light on facts and heavy on slick visuals and unsupported and inflamatory generalities like this header on all their pages:
Money Raised
This information comes from the July 31, 2012 APOC reports for No on Prop 2 and The Alaska Sea Party
No on Prop 2 - Total raised $767,995.31.
Contributors giving $10,000 or more (all these were June and July 2012) You can see the No on Prop 2 APOC report here:
Alaska Sea Party (Yes on Prop 2) - Total raised $150,122.07
[Contributions below were between April 1, 2012 and July 31, 2012, Income of $63,688.86 was reported for this period. I can't find information on the source of the $86,433.21 income received before this period. All but one $100 contribution have Alaskan addresses.] You can see the Alaska Sea Party APOC report here.
Contributors giving $10,000 or more:
North Slope Borough - $15,137.97
Bristol Bay Native Corp - $10,000
Note that the Alaska Miners Association and Shell have each contributed as much as the Alaska Sea Party raised altogether. While I haven't found a list of members of the Alaska Miners Association, if the other mining contributions is an indication, their membership includes many huge multi-national mining corporations.
The numbers here are from the APOC reports. I have only double checked them, so there may be some minor errors but nothing, I think, that make a significant difference to the overall impact.
My Take On What's Going On
This is about large corporations, many if not most headquartered outside of Alaska, opposed to regulation. After 25 years in existence, Alaska's Coastal Zone Management program was weakened by the Murkowski administration in 2003. The Parnell administration was able to end it by fighting with the legislature over the wording of legislation to renew the program. Alaska is now the only coastal state without a program affiliated with the national Coastal Zone Management Act. A group of coastal communities have come together to reestablish the program that gave them some meaningful input in decisions by larger corporations that would affect their way of life.
We have a governor who is fighting the feds on all fronts because, he argues, we have the right to make the decisions that affect our state without the federal government interfering.
But when it comes to local government, our governor thinks the state knows best and local governments should have no say on what happens to their communities.
The real issue, it seems to me, is that this former oil company lobbyist (Gov. Parnell) doesn't want anyone, whether it's the feds or local people doing anything to interfere with corporations and businesses making money in Alaska.
Finding Out More
I had been getting hits for Alaska Prop 2, which were going to the 2010 post on the Prop 2 that year which was about parental notification before a minor could have an abortion or the 2008 post on Prop 2 for that year which was on aerial wolf hunting. Thus I decided I should do a post for this year's Prop 2. I haven't had the time I'd like to do a better job on this, but the primary election (when this is voted on) is in less than two weeks (August 28) and people can vote early already. So I need to get this up.
Here are the basic parts of this post:
- The Context of US Coastal Zone Management Programs
- Supporters and Opponents
- Money Raised
- My Take On What's Going On
- Finding Out More
Alaska's governor opposes most federal regulation of Alaska on the grounds that we know best what we need. But when local Alaska communities make the same argument about the feds and the state, he dismisses them. He doesn't really seem to be as much concerned about local needs and power as corporate needs and power. The real issue, it seems, is that the former Conoco-Phillips lobbyist in our Governor's mansion, is against anyone having the power to raise questions, slow down, or, even worse, stop any development. We should all, the opponents seem to be saying, trust the developers to do the right thing.
The Context of US Coastal Zone Management Programs
The Coastal Management Program was set up in 1976 by Gov. Hammond, the governor who fought to establish the Alaska Permanent Fund. Hammond was a governor that most people agree had Alaskan people as his top priority.
Local powers were reduced by new legislation introduced by Gov. Murkowski in 2003.
In 2011 the program expired when the legislature and Gov. Parnell could not agree on specific legislation to renew it. [This history comes from the Alaska Sea Party website which supports Prop 2.]
Coastal Management programs exist under the federal Coastal Zone Management Act established in 1972 (under Republican president Richard Nixon) and all the states and territories with coast lines - Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf of Mexico, and the Great Lakes - have programs affiliated with the Act. Except Alaska which is supposed to have more coast line than all the others combined. From NOAA's website, here is the list of states and territories with links to their programs. (I checked them all. Only Alaska has withdrawn.)
Supporters and Opponents
You can learn a lot by who supports and who opposes something.
Prop 2 Supporters
The Alaska Sea Party which set up and backs the initiative is led by Juneau's mayor Bruce Botelho. Its list of supporters include local mayors from around the state and other citizens who tend to stand up for the benefit of Alaskans. People like Alaska Constitutional convention member Vic Fischer and former state senator Arliss Sturgulewski. You can see a list of Prop 2 supporters here. These are people who tend to represent the needs of their local communities.
Prop 2 Opponents
The Alaska State Chamber of Commerce President Rachael Petro signed the Statement in Opposition in the State Ballot Guide. The list of Prop 2 opponents from a No on Prop 2 website is a list of developers, chambers of commerce, and industries supported by strong Outside interests (Cruise industry, Mining, Oil and Gas).
Comparing the websites of the Yes and No sides offers an interesting contrast. I have only fact-checked a few points so I can't vouch for everything, but the style of the two sides is so enormously different that it tells you a lot.
There are lots of complaints about the language and reach of Prop 2, but little or no acknowledgment of the need for the program at all or the kind of changes that would make it more reasonable.
The Sea Party website (pro Prop 2) is long and detailed with factual statements that can be easily tested. Conclusions are in generally neutral direct language supported by facts.
The No on Prop 2 website appears to be put together by the same sort of lucrative PR firm. (The expenditure reports shows they've paid Porcaro Communications over half a million dollars.) It's light on facts and heavy on slick visuals and unsupported and inflamatory generalities like this header on all their pages:
Ballot Measure 2 is a defective, deceptive measure that would create confusion and legal uncertainty, establish a new government bureaucracy and hamstring the state’s economy and job creation.
Money Raised
This information comes from the July 31, 2012 APOC reports for No on Prop 2 and The Alaska Sea Party
No on Prop 2 - Total raised $767,995.31.
Contributors giving $10,000 or more (all these were June and July 2012) You can see the No on Prop 2 APOC report here:
- Alaska Miners Association $150,000
Plus in-kind staff time - $468
Plus in-kind travel - $7,000
(note additional mining interests also contributing below
- Shell - $150,000
- Fairbanks Gold Mining Inc. (wholly owned by Kinross Gold Corp) - $75,000
- Alaska Oil and Gas Association - $80,000
Plus in-kind staff time - - $22,000 - Resource Development Council for Alaska $50,000.00
Plus in-kind staff time - $8350 - Donlin Gold - $50,000
- Council of Alaska Producers (Mining trade group)- $25,000
Plus in-kind staff time - $753.22 - Pioneers Natural Resources USA - $20,000.00
- Cook Inlet Regional, Inc. - $10,000
- Tower Hill Mines, Inc. - $10,000
- Alaska Cruise Association - $10,000
Alaska Sea Party (Yes on Prop 2) - Total raised $150,122.07
[Contributions below were between April 1, 2012 and July 31, 2012, Income of $63,688.86 was reported for this period. I can't find information on the source of the $86,433.21 income received before this period. All but one $100 contribution have Alaskan addresses.] You can see the Alaska Sea Party APOC report here.
Contributors giving $10,000 or more:
North Slope Borough - $15,137.97
Bristol Bay Native Corp - $10,000
Note that the Alaska Miners Association and Shell have each contributed as much as the Alaska Sea Party raised altogether. While I haven't found a list of members of the Alaska Miners Association, if the other mining contributions is an indication, their membership includes many huge multi-national mining corporations.
The numbers here are from the APOC reports. I have only double checked them, so there may be some minor errors but nothing, I think, that make a significant difference to the overall impact.
My Take On What's Going On
This is about large corporations, many if not most headquartered outside of Alaska, opposed to regulation. After 25 years in existence, Alaska's Coastal Zone Management program was weakened by the Murkowski administration in 2003. The Parnell administration was able to end it by fighting with the legislature over the wording of legislation to renew the program. Alaska is now the only coastal state without a program affiliated with the national Coastal Zone Management Act. A group of coastal communities have come together to reestablish the program that gave them some meaningful input in decisions by larger corporations that would affect their way of life.
We have a governor who is fighting the feds on all fronts because, he argues, we have the right to make the decisions that affect our state without the federal government interfering.
But when it comes to local government, our governor thinks the state knows best and local governments should have no say on what happens to their communities.
The real issue, it seems to me, is that this former oil company lobbyist (Gov. Parnell) doesn't want anyone, whether it's the feds or local people doing anything to interfere with corporations and businesses making money in Alaska.
Finding Out More
- Check out the Alaska Sea Party Website and the No On Prop 2 website.
- Check out the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAH) website that maps out the Coastal Management Act and the programs around the country.
- Check out the Alaska Voting Guide. The online link is packaged differently from the hard copy that was mailed to Alaska households. In either case, this is hard to read. Here's an overview of the pamphlet that came in the mail.
- Pages 20-21 - Ballot Language - this is the summary that appears on the ballot
- Pages 21-22 - Legislative Affairs Summary - Legislative Affairs tends to give non-partisan analysis
- Pages 22-27 - Statement of Costs - this was prepared by the Governor's Office of Management and Budget. I can't vouch for their estimates. The Governor strongly opposes this measure.
- Pages 27-37 - Full Text of the Law - you can check both sides' claims against the actual wording of the law, though you can't always understand the implications from the wording
- Page 38 - Statement of Support
- Page 39 - Statement of Opposition
I had been getting hits for Alaska Prop 2, which were going to the 2010 post on the Prop 2 that year which was about parental notification before a minor could have an abortion or the 2008 post on Prop 2 for that year which was on aerial wolf hunting. Thus I decided I should do a post for this year's Prop 2. I haven't had the time I'd like to do a better job on this, but the primary election (when this is voted on) is in less than two weeks (August 28) and people can vote early already. So I need to get this up.
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