The state House advanced a plan Wednesday to get natural gas to Fairbanks, though it remains to be seen how the measure will be handled in the Alaska Senate and whether a $45 million past appropriation will be retained by the project.
House Bill 105 won approval on a 37-2 vote, a tally that doesn't reflect the degree of controversy triggered by the measure, which started as a plan to broaden the natural gas source for Fairbanks so it would not be limited to the North Slope.
The bill allows the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority to pursue an energy project using financial tools first approved by lawmakers in 2013.
The biggest controversy this year occurred after Anchorage Republican Rep. Mike Hawker amended the bill in the resources committee in ways that Gov. Bill Walker and Fairbanks leaders said would handcuff AIDEA and stall the project. Three Fairbanks mayors wrote to Hawker asking him to "cease and desist" with efforts that they said would harm the Fairbanks area.
The House Finance Committee, co-chaired by Fairbanks Republican Steve Thompson, rewrote the bill to rework Hawker's additions. Thompson said there are safeguards built into the system with AIDEA over the years.
"If it doesn't pencil out, it won't happen," he said, adding that AIDEA is a good way to get major projects accomplished.
He said the bill is needed to get low-cost energy to the Interior.
For his part, Hawker said he wanted to know several things, including how the bill would impact the "fragile natural gas market" in Cook Inlet and the communities in Southcentral Alaska that depend upon that source of energy, the ultimate cost and what consumers would pay.
He didn't like the letter from the Fairbanks mayors. "I would like to state very clearly that I, as a legislator, will never be bullied by threatening letters from anyone demanding that I cease and desist performing my legislative duties to the best of my abilities," he said.
Commenting later, Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Luke Hopkins said he and the other mayors were not asking Hawker to stop being a legislator, but to cease acting against the interests of the Interior. He also said that the letter was not threatening or bullying and that what Fairbanks wants is for the Legislature to carry through on commitments made in 2013.
Hopkins said one of his key remaining worries about the bill is whether the $45 million that is left from a 2013 grant for the Fairbanks project will be reallocated to the project during the final days of the session. It has been 'parked' by the Senate Finance Committee in an account that has prompted Hopkins to fear additional delays in getting gas to Fairbanks.