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CLARION P E N I N S U L A
MONDAY, JANUARY 19, 2015 Kenai Peninsula, Alaska
Vol. 45, Issue 93
KPB assembly considers a ban on commercial pot cultivation
Question Should lawmakers be constitutionally prohibited from using the earnings of the Alaska Permanent Fund to pay for state government? n Yes n No
By Dan Balmer Peninsula Clarion
To place your vote and comment, visit our Web site at www. peninsulaclarion. com. Results and selected comments will be posted each Tuesday in the Clarion, and a new question will be asked. Suggested questions may be submitted online or e-mailed to news@peninsulaclarion.com.
In the news C Y
No plea deal likely in Boston Marathon M bombing case K
WASHINGTON (AP) — The focus of the Boston Marathon bombing trial figures to be as much on what punishment Dzhokhar Tsarnaev could face as on his responsibility for the attack. With testimony expected to start later this month, the Justice Department has given no indication it is open to any proposal from the defense to spare Tsarnaev’s life, pushing instead toward a trial that could result in a death sentence for the 21-year-old defendant. In a deadly terror case that killed three people, including a child, and jolted the city, there may be little incentive for prosecutors who believe they have incontrovertible evidence to negotiate away their ability to seek the maximum penalty possible. “There would be now, in my judgment, no reason for the government to reverse course and not let 12 citizens decide if the death penalty is appropriate,” said Larry Mackey, a former Justice Department prosecutor involved in the case of Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, who was executed in 2001.
Photo by Ben Boettger/Peninsula Clarion
A competitor lifts a weighted steel log during the Kenai River Strongman Challenge on Saturday at the Kenai National Guard Armory.
Feats of strength Kenai hosts its first strongman competition By BEN BOETTGER Peninsula Clarion
Kenai’s National Guard Armory hosted the first Kenai Strongman Challenge weightlifting competition on Saturday, January 17. Some of the participating lifters were local, such as Kenai’s Sarah Belle and Kasilof’s Lesley West. Others came from longer distances, such as the group from the
Opinion.................. A-4 Nation.................... A-6 World..................... A-7 Sports.....................A-8 Classifieds............. B-3 Comics................... B-6
JUNEAU, Alaska — There’s big question as the Legislature convenes Tuesday: How low will oil prices go? Plunging prices have contributed to massive budget deficits that cuts alone can’t erase. Alaska has billions of dollars in its constitutional budget reserve, but oil prices and spending will dictate how long that cushion lasts. Here are five things to watch for over the next 90 days:
Budget Check us out online at www.peninsulaclarion.com To subscribe, call 283-3584.
Heavy Metal Gym in Anchorage, or North Slope worker Roger Smith, of Bloomington, Indiana. The twenty two competitors began lifting at noon and continued until 7 p.m, taking on five challenges: a race to transport two 160 pound sandbags and a 200 pound keg, lifting a weighted steel log, dead-lifting a vehicle, loading large stones over a bar and into a crate, and a one-on-one weight pulling
race. The events The competition’s organizer and promoter Danny Autrey said that a Strongman Challenge has no set events. “There’s no standard picture of what a strongman competition looks like,” Autry said. “It’s essentially all on the promoter to choose different events that showcase and focus on different aspects of strength.” See STRONG, page A-10
AK lawmakers will scrutinize budget, pot and Medicaid BECKY BOHRER Associated Press
Index
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It’s the top priority of leaders who have spent the past month or so warning of rough times ahead. Many lawmakers aren’t expecting much in the capital budget beyond the federal-match projects generally found in the placeholder budget put out by Gov. Bill Walker two weeks after he was sworn in.
Walker is scheduled to address the budget situation in a special speech Thursday night. The size of the budget hole is unprecedented, according to Legislative Finance Director David Teal. The current year deficit is estimated at $3.5 billion, up $2.1 billion from May, when the 2015 budget was signed. Next year’s deficit is forecast to be comparable. A number of lawmakers want to focus this session on cuts, prioritizing spending and looking at ways to deliver services more efficiently or differently. Incoming Senate Democratic Leader Berta Gardner said she will consider it a win if education, a major driver of the state’s operating budget, isn’t cut. But she said the way education is funded is open to change, including taking a look at the current per-pupil funding formula. Alaska doesn’t have a state sales or personal income tax, and Sen. Peter Micciche, R-
Soldotna, said he’d like to keep it that way. “In order to do that, we have two choices, and that is to cut services or ask Alaskans how they want to pay for those services that are outside of our core constitutional responsibility as a state,” he said.
Medicaid Expansions MEDICAID EXPANSION: This is likely to come up as part of the budget debate. As a candidate, Walker pledged to expand Medicaid coverage in Alaska if elected. Medicaid is a program that helps cover health care cost for lower-income people and, like education, is a major budget driver. Walker’s health commissioner, Valerie Davidson, sees expanded coverage as an important investment in the health care of Alaskans and a catalyst for reforming the system to ensure it’s sustainable. The feds are expected to C
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Marijuana advocates are planning to fill Tuesday’s Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly meeting for the introduction of an ordinance that, if enacted, would be put to the voters to decide in October if commercial marijuana cultivation should be prohibited within the borough. The ordinance, sponsored by assembly member Kelly Wolf, intends to exercise the option written in the marijuana initiative that grants municipalities the authority to govern certain aspects of the pot industry within its own boundaries. Wolf said he envisions zoning issues pertaining to marijuana farms and that rural property owners will come to the borough with concerns of where such facilities would operate. The ordinance is set for a public hearing on Feb. 24 — the day marijuana becomes legal in Alaska. Wolf said it was a coincidence that the public hearing date happened to land on legalization day. He said he plans to postpone the ordinance until March after an agricultural farmer approached him because he would be out of town when the ordinance was scheduled for public testimony. “Out of respect and fairness to the public I’m going to request it for the first meeting in March,” Wolf said. “As the author I can kick it down the road.
The Kenai Peninsula is not known as agricultural area and I want to hear from farmers.” The Kenai Community Coalition on Cannabis, a group of more than 140 members, has expressed its opposition to the ordinance. The group has structured a second town hall meeting Monday at the Challenger Learning Center in Kenai to address concerns associated with how the marijuana industry could operate, and educate the public on the plant. Coalition co-founder Marc Theiler said he hopes to carry momentum from one meeting to the next and get as many people in front of the assembly as possible to make a statement. “It’s important to let local lawmakers know where we stand and be able to voice our opinions,” Theiler said. “Mixed in with the state’s budget crisis, we need all the revenue we can get and this is a way to get it out of the black market.” If the ordinance made it on the ballot and passed by voters, marijuana cultivation with intent to resale would be banned outside of city limits. Wolf said home rule cities like Kenai and Seward will have the option to enact any municipal regulations. “This didn’t pass with overwhelming support,” Wolf said of how the Kenai Peninsula voted on Ballot Measure 2. “Everyone has the individual right to make its own decisions.” See POT, page A-10
Oil prices plunge and Alaska faces lean budget times BECKY BOHRER Associated Press
JUNEAU, Alaska — After years of being flush with oil money, Alaska now faces drastic budget cuts and having to dip into well-stocked savings to offset unprecedented deficits exacerbated by an unexpected plunge in oil prices. When lawmakers left Juneau last April, the price of North Slope crude, Alaska’s economic lifeblood, was $107 a barrel. On the eve of a new legislative session, starting Tuesday, the price had dropped by more than half. Alaska heavily relies on oil revenue to fund the cost of state government, but the fall in prices has contributed to an estimated 80 percent decline in the state’s share of production taxes from last year. The new governor, Republican-turned-independent Bill Walker, is among those calling for a look at revenues along with budget cuts, but that could involve ideas that no one who dreams of re-election is eager to take up. Among those ideas are instituting a personal income or sales taxes, or tapping Alaska’s oil wealth fund, which provides nearly every Alaskan with a yearly check just for living here.
“The numbers just don’t allow you to cut your way out of this, not without some severe impacts on the economy,” said David Teal, director of the Legislative Finance Division. Alaska is no stranger to oil’s booms and busts. In the last few years, high oil prices helped insulate Alaska from the brunt of the recession felt acutely elsewhere. Unemployment hit a high of 11.5 percent during a crash that saw about 35,000 people flee Alaska between mid-1986 and mid-1988. The trans-Alaska pipeline system was just 10 years old in 1987. Caroline Schultz, a state labor department economist, doesn’t expect a repeat with the current price drop. The economy is more mature today and diversified, with residents having deeper roots, she said. Today, though, there’s far less oil. Oil production peaked at 2.1 million barrels a day in the late-1980s; production for this year is forecast to average 509,500 barrels a day. The size of government is bigger, as is the population. This year’s budget deficit alone, estimated at $3.5 billion, is bigger than the entire state general fund budget in 2006, Teal said. Gunnar Knapp, director of See BUDGET, page A-10