Well….It’s that time of year again. Our Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly is just about ready to allocate funding for Borough operations in Fiscal Year 2013.  That means that the Assembly is getting ready to spend tax dollars, tax money from you and from me.

Right now the funding Ordinance is calling for an expenditure of just over $73 million dollars for general borough government operations, school operations, capital projects, health insurance and money for payment of bonds and interest. These are all legitimate expenditures for our Borough government and you may want to argue about the amount of money to be appropriated but at least most of the budget items are all good and proper uses for our tax money.

However, many of us are wondering where in the Borough budget are those expenditures which have nothing to do with the operation of our Borough Government.

For many years now our Borough Assembly has made donations of taxpayer dollars to several non-profit organizations.  The Assembly has annually in their budget given donations to the Central Area Transit System, The Kenai Peninsula College, The Economic Development District, The Small Business Development Center and the Tourism and Marketing Council. Earlier this year, outside of their budget, the Assembly donated $100,000 of your tax dollars to the Kenai Watershed Forum for what they said was for culvert restoration but they could actually spend the money any way they so desired.

Many taxpayers are concerned about the Borough Assemblies practice of making these donations to non-Borough organizations. In fact, earlier this year voters sent a resounding “No” to an Assembly promoted .1% sales tax to fund these organizations.

Many taxpayers suspect that the reason these annual donations are not listed in the current proposed Fiscal Year appropriations is that they plan to sneak it into the budget at the last moment several weeks down the line.

The big question is “How could any Assembly person, in their own mind, vote to donate our tax dollars to organizations not even under Borough jurisdiction”. Each  of these organizations have their own board of directors and agendas over whom the Borough Assembly or Borough Mayor have no control at all”?

Think About It!     JCD   5-16-2012

For some reason it seems to be a truism that whenever the federal government steps in, costs rise and efficiency declines. This is especially true when it comes to college education. Remember when President Obama promised in 2008 “We’ve got to make sure every young person can afford to go to college?”  Well that is what he said running for office.

Instead, tuition costs keep rising, along with the debt owed by increasing numbers of graduates, many of whom are now campaigning for Congress to stop interest rates on their subsidized Stafford loans from doubling in July.

If students and their parents choose expensive schools, and most of them are, they should accept the responsibility and cost accompanying that decision. These students knew that borrowing for their education would put a huge debt monkey on their back and they would be many years paying and paying trying to get the monkey off their backs. Taking a student loan was their decision, they went in with their eyes open and now they need to live with that decision.

This in-spite of the fact that almost 54% of college grads under twenty-five can’t find a job or are under-employed and working in low income jobs where paying back those student loans will take a lifetime. It all makes one ask the question is a $50 or $150 thousand dollar debt for a college education even worth it.

The federal government has no constitutional authority to require people to receive an education. Education should be the primary responsibility of state and local entities. Taxpayers should not be expected to pay for college tuition when these same graduates default on their loans that they have agreed to repay.

What kind of life lesson is it when this early test of a young person’s character is said not to matter in that default of a student is an ok deal.

Students and parents should have the right to choose when it comes to college, but if they choose a costly private institution, they should assume the financial obligations that go with that choice. Either earn the money to pay for that education themselves, which may mean up to a year off between each year of classes or know that a student loan places the debt monkey on their back for a long, long time after graduation.

Before choosing their college they must look at these studies and consider whether, in the long run, the supposed prestige and expense of a well-known school are worth the cost, especially if the job or career the student wants doesn’t require a degree or worse, than there isn’t a job waiting after graduation.

Think About It!      JCD   5-09-12

You have no doubt heard rumors and observed over the past legislative session in Juneau, that we have a “do nothing” bunch of Democratic Senators. The “Do Nothing” label is very true when it comes to bringing a natural gas line from the North Slope to the Rail Belt, but the term Democratic Senators is only partially true.

Ten out of the twenty Senators are in-deed Liberal thinking Democrats, but they have been joined by six Republicans who also think like Democrats, making a coalition of sixteen Senators who control the body. That is like having sixteen Democrats and only four Republicans in the Alaska State Senate. So when the Democratic Coalition in the Senate decides that it will “do nothing” about reducing taxes on oil to bring about more development on the North Slope and to “do nothing” to help build an in-state gas pipeline, that stops everything.

The House and the Governor on the other hand, had worked hard to fully fund the Alaska     Gas-line Development Corporation, AGDC, who had hoped to get to an “Open Season” to gauge interest among potential shippers by next year.

The proposal by Representative Mike Chenault, Mike Hawker and the governor’s office had been waiting for more than two weeks for action by the Senate when they abruptly adjourned. That proposal for an in-state gas line was never taken up by the Senate at all.

The refusal of the Senate Democrats and so-called Coalition Republicans to even consider working with the House and the Governor is a hard “slap in the face” to we Alaskans who realize we are running low on natural gas for our homes and businesses. Shortages of natural gas have already caused brown-out conditions and warnings from South Central City and Borough Mayors of more shortages to come.

One would think that regardless of political party affiliations, the “do nothing” Alaska Senators, from the last Legislative Session, would have placed a top priority stamp on doing whatever is necessary to bring about an in-state gas line. As Alaskans with much to lose because of the inaction and political posturing by the Senate we must work to hold them responsible. There appear to be a lot of Senators who need to be sent packing, people like: Gary Stevens, Hollis French, Dennis Eagan, Bettye Davis, Johnny Ellis, Lesil McGuire, Linda Menard, Bert Stedman and many more. These people are part of the problem not the solution. They have set the gas-line project back at least one and maybe two years.

One way or another, we must have political leaders who will dedicate themselves to bring our natural gas from the North Slope to our homes and businesses in the rail belt just as soon as possible.  Anything less will sooner or later derail our economy and our way of life.

Think About It!       JCD    5-2-12

 4-25-2012

The Environmental Baseline Document has finally been completed for the proposed Pebble Copper, Gold, Silver and Molybdenum mine, near Illiamna, in Southwest Alaska. A team of over 100 independent scientists and researchers completed the enormous document over several years. The findings represent one of the most extensive environmental research programs ever undertaken for a resource project in our state.

With any project, it is crucial to understand the science in order to determine if any resource project is viable and responsible. The Pebble Partnership obviously understands this and is doing everything in their power to present the science in an understandable, transparent format. They are certainly showing good faith.

We should show them the same good faith.  The Pebble project deserves the chance to present their mine plan and navigate the permitting process which has many steps and obstacles set-up in both state and federal law.

However, now opponents of the project are trying to stop these studies by convincing the Environmental Protection Agency to use its 404c veto authority. The 404c authority is an emergency power that the EPA has used just 13 times in the past 40 years and never on a project in the pre-permitting phase, such as the Pebble Project.

The EPA will have the opportunity to perform a full evaluation of the proposed project, later, as part of the NEPA permitting process. The permit application will trigger these mandatory reviews by the agency. Surely the Federal EPA would not consider pre-mature review of the project until all the studies are completed. That would be foolish. That’s like saying “We don’t even want to know about any of the scientific studies at all.”

Exercising the 404c review in such a pre-mature situation, as we have right now, would set a very dangerous precedent that presents investment risk to all future development projects in Alaska and could result in potentially disastrous economic results.

All of us need to be informed about the proposed Pebble mine and the Pebble Partnership deserves to go through the established permitting requirements and prove they can meet them one by one. This is how the public process works, and this is the only way to truly allow everyone to evaluate whether Pebble can be a viable environmentally sound project of which we can all be proud.

Think About It!      JCD    4-25-2012

Over the years most everyone has felt that the Chamber of Commerce, in any city, was a creature of the local business community. As such the Chamber of Commerce was always funded by local business people and Chamber of Commerce initiated fund raising projects in their community.

Here on the Kenai Peninsula the cities of Soldotna, Homer and now Kenai have elected to have their Chambers of Commerce partner with the City to operate their Visitor Centers.  In  Soldotna, when the City decided they wanted to have a Visitors Center they built their  building on City land and now give taxpayer dollars each year, to the Chamber,  to operate the facility. This year, Soldotna Taxpayers will give the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce a total of $132,000 for operational costs. That seems to have worked very well and the cooperative effort has been a bargain for the City of Soldotna.

Coming up on May 1^st Soldotna residents will go to the polls to decide the fate of the Chamber / City request for a NEW visitors center. They want taxpayers to purchase the old Hutchings Auto Dealership for $2 million 100 thousand dollars. They also want Soldotna Taxpayers to come up with another $500 thousand dollars for renovation of the old dealerships building and fund additional employees every year into the future. With a known bad roof and entry, major remodel of the second floor, new ADA ramps and restrooms, a possible new road, and the unknowns about the Hutchings building, most people in the know expect that the total cost to renovate the old facility will almost certainly be much more. The total renovation costs could reach as high as $1,000,000. 

That is a lot of Soldotna Taxpayer money to be used to remodel an old building for a Visitor –Convention Center, even if some of the costs could be recovered from the sale of the present facility. That facility, located near the Kenai River Bridge is a beautiful Visitor Center on one of the very best locations in Alaska.

The location of the Hutchings property is one of the most desirable commercial properties not only in the city but the entire Kenai Peninsula. That property in the hands of retail business would generate new property and sales tax revenue every year for City Taxpayers. Now the proposed new Convention Center will not only NOT generate any tax dollars but will cost taxpayers thousands of dollars every year far into the future.

If the City Council and the Mayor want a Convention Center, they need to remember that the city already owns a lot of revenue losing and tax exempt properties in prime locations in the City.  Certainly they must realize that an all new Convention Center, on City land, would be much better than the make over building, and promising retail business location, they have now placed before voters.

Soldotna Taxpayers need to look this deal over very carefully and vote accordingly on May 1^st.

Think About It!     JCD     4-18-2012

Years from now, historians may regard the 2008 election of Barack Hussein Obama as an inscrutable and disturbing phenomenon, a baffling breed of mass hysteria akin perhaps to the witch craze of the middle ages.  How, they will wonder, did a man so devoid of professional accomplishment beguile so many into thinking he could manage the world’s largest economy, direct the world’s most powerful military and execute the world’s most consequential job?

Imagine a future historian examining Obama’s pre-presidential life: ushered into and thru Ivy League despite unremarkable grades and test scores; cushy non-job as a community organizer; brief career as state legislator devoid of any achievement at all; and finally an unaccomplished single term as a U.S. Senator which time was devoted entirely to his presidential ambitions.

Then the matter of his troubling associations: the white hating, America loathing preacher who for decades served as Obama’s “spiritual mentor”; a real life, actual terrorist who served as Obama’s colleague and political sponsor. Yes, it is easy to imagine a future historian looking at it all and asking; how on earth could such a man possibly be elected president?

The incomparable Norman Podhoretz addressed the question recently in the Wall Street Journal;

“To be sure, no white candidate who had close associations with an outspoken hater of America like Jeremiah Wright and an unrepentant communist terrorist like Bill Ayers, would have lasted a single day. But because Mr. Obama was black, and therefore entitled in the eyes of liberalism to have hung out with protestors against various American injustices, even if they were a bit extreme, he was given a free pass.

Let that sink in; Obama was given a pass  –  held to a lower standard – because of the color of his skin.  And Podhoretz continues: And in any case, what did such ancient history matter when he was also so articulate and elegant and (as he himself said) “non-threatening,” all of which gave him a fighting chance to become the first black president and thereby to lay the curse of racism to rest?  Holding someone to a separate standard merely because of the color of his skin  –  that’s affirmative action in a nutshell, and if that isn’t racism, then nothing is. And that is what America did to Obama.

True, Obama himself was never troubled by his lack of achievements, but why would he be? As many have noted, Obama was told he was good enough for Columbia despite undistinguished grades at Occidental; he was told he was good enough for the U.S. Senate despite a mediocre record in Illinois; he was told he was good enough to be president despite no record at all in the Senate. All his life, every step of the way, Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, in spite of ample evidence to the contrary. What could this breed if not the sort of empty narcissism on display every time Obama speaks?

In 2008, many who agreed that he lacked executive qualifications nonetheless raved about Obama’s oratory skills, intellect, and cool character. Those people – conservative included – ought now to be deeply embarrassed.  The man thinks and speaks in the hoariest of clichés, and that’s when he has his teleprompter in front of him; when the prompter is absent he can barely think or speak at all. Not one single original idea has ever issued from his mouth – it’s all warmed-over Marxism of the kind that has failed over and over again for 100 years.

And what about his character? Obama is constantly blaming anything and everything else for his troubles.  Bush did it; it was bad luck; I inherited this mess.  It is embarrassing to see a president so willing to advertise his own powerlessness, so comfortable with his own incompetence. But really, what were we to expect?  The man has never been responsible for anything, so how do we expect him to act responsibly?

In short: our president is a small and a small minded man, with neither the temperament nor the intellect to handle his job.  When you understand that, and only when you understand that, will the current erosion of liberty and prosperity make sense.  It could not have gone otherwise with such a man in the oval office.

Think About It!     JCD    04-11-2012

Our Think About It feature aired yesterday on April 4^th was in error.

In 1990 the Associated Press reported that a group called State Department Watch made it its business to claim that the eight islands off of the coast of Alaska and Russia were “100% American” and are still pressing that argument today.

Despite the objections of the organization the US Senate ratified “a treaty establishing the current maritime boundary between the Soviet Union (now Russia) in 1991. The vote was a lopsided 86 to 6.  Our Senators Stevens and Murkowski both Republicans, voted in favor of ratification.

Voting against the treaty boundaries which took away the islands from Alaskan waters were Senators John McCain, Chuck Grassley and four other Republicans led by Jesse Helms.

The treaty did not specifically cede sovereignty over the islands to the Soviets but merely clarified the location of the maritime boundary to settle squabbles over fishing rights and undersea mineral and oil rights. Nevertheless, Helms and the other senators said they would vote against it because “I doubt that the State Department will make use of the opportunity to press U.S. claims to the islands…..even though that right is preserved.

Sure enough, no president or secretary of state has shown any interest in disputing the Soviet/Russian claim to Wrangel Isand or the others. Which brings us to the present accusation by the group that President Obama is somehow giving away something the US has never claimed to own anyway. How can that be?

For one thing, the maritime boundary treaty has never been ratified by the Russians which is required for it to take full force. Ironically, in view of claims of a US “giveaway” it is the Russians who have sought to renegotiate the terms of the boundary treaty on the grounds that they give up too much to the United States. Other Russian officials have voiced their opposition to the treaty not only because if lost fishing opportunities, but also due to the loss of potential oil and gas fields and naval passage for submarines.

One thing is obvious, it is an old issue.  World Net Daily published on July 29, 2008 and article critical of the State Department for the “island giveaway”. Of course, Republican George W. Bush….not Obama….was president at the time and his administration in their official Arctic Region Policy  stated that the US would abide by the 1990 maritime agreement and continue to urge the Russian Federation to ratify it.

It is simply false to claim that Obama, or his State Department, is “giving away” islands to which no US president has asserted  United States rightful claim, for more than 85 years.

Think About It         JCD   4-5-12

Students across the Kenai Peninsula are in the last quarter of the school year, and over 500 students will soon be leaving the school system and entering into the next step, however, are students graduating from schools not only on the Kenai Peninsula, but across the State of Alaska and the US truly prepared to enter into the “real world” after they walk across the stage?

Most students throughout their educational career are told to aspire to go to school to get a good job like a doctor or a lawyer. But on average, Doctors and Lawyers even though they do have higher salaries, they also pay up to 50% of their annual salary in taxes alone.

The old adage is to graduate high school with high enough grades to go to a good college to get a good job. But does that plan really lead for success? Most students will follow that plan to the best of their ability, but the majority of students entering into college will turn to student loans for obtain that degree. Studies have shown that up to two-thirds of 4-year undergraduate students graduated with a Bachelor’s degree and debt.

The average cumulative debt among graduating Bachelor’s degree recipients at 4-year undergraduate schools was $19,999 in 2007-08. Beyond that, one quarter borrowed $30,526 or more, and one tenth of students borrowed $44,668 or more. This means almost 10% of graduating students in 2007-08 graduated with $40,000 or more in cumulative debt, and that doesn’t even include those who seek a master’s degree.

So with students being told to seek those high level career fields and barrowing their way though school just to obtain a degree to get jobs that are taxed at the highest level while paying copious amounts in student loan payments each month, how is that preparing them to meet life’s challenges as stated in the local school district mission statement?

Think about it—-AMR—–3/28/12

Lately, as I’ve been filling in for the “Think About It” segment, I’ve taken a lot of heat about being “young,” “inexperienced,” and my voice should not hold the water of those who have been around before me. I would like to take this moment to remind many of those who are making these claims, that I am part of the generation who is funding their social security checks and Medicare benefits. Every two weeks there is money taken out for these entitlement programs that was designed by the “all knowing” former generations to ensure that there is medical coverage and living wages once I hit 65 years old. However, with the current social security system after my years of working and contributing to the system have come to an end, and I try to cash in on the money I’ve contributed for years….the coffers will have run dry. If anyone who is currently not receiving social security tries to push for the U.S. congress to reform the program and make it more sustaining for the long term, those currently on the system come out in droves to stop any change and keep the world’s most successful pyramid scheme untouched. Don’t get me wrong, I have the utmost respect for the generations that came before me and what they’ve done to make my life better. But just as my grandfather’s generation worked to make things better for my parent’s generation to pass on to mine, I’d like to be able to fund a system that will help the generation following mine. Unfortunately, the current system is making it so that my contributions, unlike those of my grandparents generation going to future generations; are going to pay for the benefits of previous generations leaving the future for my generation in question, if not worse.

Think about it AMR 3/21/12

Each summer fishing is the largest draw for not only the Kenai River, but for the Cook Inlet. With all the good that the fishing industry brings to the local area, the area is always engulfed in the Fish Wars.

The wars are fought each year with smear campaigns; hear say; propaganda; lobbying; emergency appeals to the board of fish; and protests…..all over fish.

There is no argument here about the economic importance that each fish group has.  However, is it too much to ask to have that economic good come with out the annual headache?

As sure that the tides will rise and fall, each year both side comes out saying that they’re the most important group and that commercial fish would do just fine without the sport fish, and that the sport fish is trying to put com fish out of business. But in reality it’s just fish. The same topic that fills county music with ideas about summer time recreation has split the local area in two.

Each summer on the Kenai would be even more enjoyable if the two sets would just go out and fish, not worry about what the other side is doing, and focus on their role. Because after all the grass will always be greener on the other side.

Imagine if there were no commercial fishermen in the inlet, there would soon be an over abundance of salmon in the Kenai River, and fishing for that Kenai King would not be a sport any more, and the need for guides will go away if the fish become too easy to catch.  On the other side if the only boats in the water each summer were carrying drift nets, the commercial fleet will continue to pull record catches year in and year out and eventually flood the market with salmon, thus driving the price for salmon down, which in turn would lead to major cuts the lifestyles of our commercial fishing neighbor.

So this summer, when it comes time to head out and fish, lets remember that it’s just fish.

Think about it. AMR 3/14/2012