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Outgoing commissioner concerned about changing attitudes Where there was a ‘can do’ attitude in the state 35 years ago, John Shively tells RDC, today the view seems to be ‘I got mine’ Kristen Nelson PNA News Editor
The Resource Development Council for Alaska billed it as “Last Shot at the Commissioner” — and in fact John Shively said the Sept. 7 talk was the last he would be giving as commissioner of the Department of Natural Resources before he stepped down the next day.
But it was more in the nature of a fond farewell to the commissioner — and a last shot from the commissioner.
In introducing Shively, RDC President Bob Stiles said Shively has done “the finest damn job of any commissioner that I’ve seen in my 20 years of working in this state. I didn’t always agree with John,” Stiles said, “but he always made sure you got a fair shake.”
“We’ve had a lot of fun, a lot of good issues,” Shively said. In oil and gas the high points are Northstar, Alpine, NPR-A, areawide leasing and the sea lift module industry developed in the state in the last few years, he said. What’s left undone? We need a fiscal plan, Shively said. “We have a current plan. Our current plan is to pray for high oil prices. And, right now God is being particularly good to us, for reasons I don’t particularly understand, but… But we’re going to have to do better.”
There has been some success in simplifying regulations and laws, Shively said, but that is an area that needs more work, particularly in the area of overlapping laws and in areas where the process is used to block any development.
Permitting and regulatory reform will take a huge commitment, he said. A bill on the issue submitted two or three years ago was “28 pages long and virtually incomprehensible.” That’s “some recognition of how difficult it is to grapple with this issue. But people need to put in the work.”
And it’s most important to the little guy, Shively said. “I mean the big companies can deal with the morass of government. But the smaller the operation, the more difficult it is and many people are being run out of business just because they cannot afford the government process that presently exists.” Changing attitudes “I am particularly concerned about a change of attitude that I see in our state in the last 35 years that I’ve been here,” Shively said.
“When I arrived here the state had a real ‘can do’ attitude as we worked to build a stable economy in what was then arguably the poorest state in the union.
“Now we’ve become much wealthier and I think attitudes have begun to change… Many of our citizens seem to have the attitude that once I get mine, I don’t care about anybody else… “
Shively said he was concerned that after six years of public process on the intertie and 16 public hearings, some political leadership on both sides of the aisle “are encouraging the governor — not publicly, but privately — not to proceed with this project and to have more public process.”
The Pogo Road issue, he said, demonstrates the change in attitude — 20 or 30 years ago, if a project like this had been proposed, people would want and use access — now, he said, people who have recreational properties that they got from the state want to limit access.
“Now we’re being asked by everybody, not just the environmental community, to not provide access, to limit access… “
Shively said he wasn’t opposed to protecting state lands.
“But we have to be allowed to have rational development opportunities… “
“I know those of us who are interested in development in the state worry about the enemy from without, but right now I’m increasingly concerned about the enemy from within,” he said. Subsistence needs to be solved internally Shively said we really have to solve the subsistence issue internally. “We just cannot let a handful of legislators continue to prevent a vote on a constitutional amendment.
“We are driving the Native community into the hands of the federal government and international groups which I think will be to the detriment of the state and I believe to the ultimate detriment of Alaska Natives.”
People are afraid of the tribes, but Shively said “the question for the state really is, what role can the tribes play in helping to deal with some of the very difficult social and economic issues that we find in rural Alaska… “
One important economic issue is work for people. Shively said we can’t provide jobs in all the communities for everybody — but Red Dog, the firefighter program and some of the oil companies are doing things that work
“There are 70,000 jobs in the state that are held by outsiders. … it’s going to take a lot of thinking, but we have some great tools in Native corporations…”
Working on rural-urban issues is important to the state, Shively said:
“We really can’t, I think, allow the first Alaskans — or many first Alaskans — to always be found at the end of the economic line.” Difficult questions for state “There are a lot of challenges in front of us,” Shively said, “… however, I’m an optimist about our future. I believe we can recapture the spirit that I found when I first came here in 1965.”
Shively said he believes Alaska can celebrate the diversity of its people and “include all Alaskans in the wealth we create from our great land…”
But first, he said, “we need to answer some very difficult questions:
“Are we too comfortable?
“Have we become spoiled by free checks and an oil industry who’s been paying for almost everything … ?
“Are we planning to let the prosperity of our state bypass many of the first Alaskans?
“Is it always the other guy’s responsibility to bear the burdens of development in their backyard?
“Are wilderness values and development opportunities mutually exclusive?
“Are we unwilling to make the sacrifices it takes to build a great state?
“The answer to these questions has to be a resounding ‘no’ — it just has to be no…
“I believe in Alaska. I love the state and that’s why I’m looking forward to my next adventure here — no matter what it might be.”
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