This editorial first appeared in the Ketchikan Daily News:
It’s a crossroads of sorts for both Ketchikan and the state.
The crux is budget deficits.
It begins with the state, which sought a solution to a $3.5 billion deficit in the past legislative session and continues to seek ways to whittle that figure down. As the state has started, the Ketchikan Gateway Borough picked up a state responsibility or two, and that has contributed to the borough’s own almost $1 million budget deficit for fiscal 2018. The deficit is expected to be thoroughly discussed in the next few months before the next budget is approved by the Assembly.
New revenue and spending cuts — the same as for the state — will be the specific discussion.
New people joined the Assembly this past election season, and the elections resulted in a shift of influence in the state, as well. Last legislative session’s Republican-led House has become controlled by Democrats, with participation of a handful of Republicans and an Independent.
With new philosophies in decision-making positions, new solutions should follow.
This is true nationally, too. Putting aside the criticisms — deserved and undeserved — and the controversial tweets from President-elect Trump, the man is largely about domestic, private-sector jobs — the kind that energize U.S. economies.
Trump is likely to listen to Alaska’s congressional delegation when presented with topics of natural resource development — oil, natural gas, mining, timber.
For at least the next two years, Trump and Alaska’s delegation also enjoy the benefits of their political party controlling both houses of Congress.
There’s no better time to discuss Alaska’s resource development potential in Washington, D.C.
Ketchikan and Southeast have teed up two timber topics for the new era beginning with Trump’s swearing-in on Jan. 20. They include:
—The Deer Mountain land swap. Two bills — one in the Senate and one in the House — detail a land trade designed to allow timber harvest but avoid it on Ketchikan’s scenic backdrop of Deer Mountain.
The trade involves 20,000 acres of federal land on Prince of Wales Island and 17,000 acres of land owned by the Alaska Mental Health Trust. The trust has a fiduciary responsibility to generate revenue from its land. It currently controls the future of a portion of Deer Mountain.
—Rescinding the Tongass National Forest Transition Plan. The plan’s record of decision took effect a week ago. It effectively diminishes timber harvest in the Tongass, meaning fewer jobs in an industry struggling for life. The transition document, which spells out the U.S. Forest Service’s plans for switching from old-growth to young-growth timber harvest, is viewed as a death knell by the industry that has contributed to the community’s and the region’s economy for 50 years.
Ketchikan, the region and the state need resource development. It’s the basis for Alaskan jobs, rebuilding community and state economies and, as a result, eliminating government budget deficits.
With most of Alaska in federal ownership, the Legislature and local governments should be looking at opportunities to persuade the feds to renew natural resource development here.
Alaska was built on its natural resources. Those resources are its future, too.
