Politics

Palin's dairy rescue continues

The troubling saga of the Mat-Su Valley dairy industry is complex, and part of it will forever belong to Sarah Palin's legacy. In a few words, during Palin's unfinished term as governor, she pressed hard for the state to keep the failing Matanuska Maid dairy afloat, but the board tasked with running it voted to close it. So Palin replaced the entire agriculture board. Eventually, the failed dairy was turned over to private industry, to a company called Valley Dairy, Inc. At the beginning, the company got two seed loans from the State of Alaska through the Board of Agriculture and Conservation, and that board just approved another loan, which will be used to pay the balance of one of the first loans and settle debts to local farmers. Shortly before the company was approved for the new loan, a legislative report called the first loans' collateral insufficient and called into question the wisdom of continued state support. Read more from The Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman about the recent loan, here, and read its editorial opinion concerning the matter, here. The blog, Palingates, has an excellent, Palin-centric summary of the story, some key players and their close connection to the former governor. Read it here. And it's worth reading Andrew Halcro's frank comments on the topic, which include a call to replace the whole board and start legislative oversight hearings on the debacle, here. Halcro's subtitle? "Cow-a-bungled."

Craig Medred

Craig Medred is a former writer for the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Dispatch and Alaska Dispatch News. He left the ADN in 2015.

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