White House, Congress, and the State of Alaska
Ideally, governments are viewed as objective entities, mediating conflicts between various vested interests for the overall 'good' of the nation' as well as that of particular constiuencies. In reality, of course, federal, regional, and local governments all have their vested interests in which one branch of government or agency struggles with another for greater power and monetary control. The present controversy between the executive and members of the legislative branch of the federal government, and between the White House and the Alaska's state government, over the future of the Arctic National Widlife Refuge provides an excellent case in point.
Irrespective of specific environmental policies of the major political parties, those in power at the federal level see the issue of oil development in Alaska largely in terms of national energy needs, national security, international trade, and the state of the national economy. Furthermore, while the federal government is the primary owner of petroleum-producing property in Alaska (including offshore localities), for the most part, its general revenue needs are only minimally tied to these lands.
On the other hand, the revenue base of the state of Alaska is intimately connected to oil. The Prudhoe Bay field, with its huge accumulation of crude oil, is located on lands owned by the state. In the first 25 years following that discovery in 1968, the proportion of the state budget utilizing petroleum reserves rose from an average of about 12 percent to over 90 percent. At present, it is relatively stabilized at approximately 85 percent.
Following the recent dramatic shift in fortunes of the Democratic and Republican parties in Washington, a new Congressional economic policy has emerged linking oil development in the Arctic Refuge to balancing the federal budget. More specifically, in legislation now being put forward by Republican Congressional leaders, $1.3 billion dollars in lease sales of Arctic Refuge land would be used to balance the budget by the year 2002. Since the proposed legislation requires that the proceeds of these lease sales be divided equally between the federal and state government, this means that the total return from oil company leasing of Coastal Plain Refuge tracts would have to reach $2.6 billion -- a figure not at all assured by a profit-conscious oil industry.
Since the political future of the two U.S. senators and one house representative from Alaska is directly linked to their ability to promote legislation that meets the economic needs of the state they represent, it is hardly surprising that these three individuals are the most ardent legislative advocates of oil development in the Arctic Refuge. Over the years they have worked closely with the oil companies in seeking public support for oil exploration in the Arctic Refuge, promoting bills in Congress, and seeking support from Alaska businesses and regional Native organizations such as the Alaska Federation of Natives [AFN]. Significantly, in June of 1995, the AFN Board voted a resolution,19-9, in favor of opening the Arctic Refuge to oil exploration. The strong opposition to this resolution expressed by Gwich'in Athabascan Indian representatives highlighted internal divisions within the AFN, an organization that previously had regularly sought to take a neutral stance on inter-regional conflicts facing its members. Strongly promoting the resolution was the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation and its President, Jacob Adams.
Another recent endeavor uniting governmental supporters with oil interests, business and community leaders, is the formation of Arctic Power, an Alaska-based, pro-oil development lobbying group. Shortly after President Clinton's electoral victory in 1992, this newly formed organization hired three strategists with diverse political backgrounds to help difuse what they perceived to be a major push by by the Clinton administration to place the Refuge off limits to oil development; either giving it a wilderness designation, or using an executive order to make it a national monument.
Stressing that eventually, oil from the Prudhoe Bay region will decline, leaving an empty pipeline and the loss of many thousands of jobs, the members of Arctic Power have engaged in substantial regional and even national outreach campaigns, speaking before numerous audiences ranging from the Daughters of the American Revolution to American trucking associations, rotary clubs, chambers of comerce, retired citizens associations, military and teacher's groups. As summed up by the chairman of Arctic Power in 1993, "We want to reach every sector of the Alaska population and let them know the impact ANWR and oil development have on their lives." They have also utilized the Internet and World Wide Web to make their presentations and those of governmental legislators who support this cause.
[The www presentation by Arctic Power with specific statements by Senator Frank Murowski, Representative Don Young, and Governor Tony Knowles can be found in the next section of this report, as can those by Secretary Bruce Babbitt, summarizing the position of President Clinton and the U.S. executive branch of government.]
In closing, it should be noted that whether the focus is political or economic, national or regional, in general, both the federal and state governments have an important vested interest in developing Alaska's mineral resources and assisting those corporations extracting them -- for revenues from companies such as these are central to the economic welfare of both forms of government. What remains to be seen is the extent to which the intangable issues of wilderness values, combined with efforts to revise our conservation practices in keeping with a more sustainable form of economy and society, offers an effective counter to economic "needs" as defined by present-day standards.