2008 Alaska Election Coverage

Transportation bonds beg for attention

Proposition A would fund more than 24 projects

By WESLEY LOY
wloy@adn.com

Published: November 1st, 2008 11:35 PM
Last Modified: November 2nd, 2008 02:08 AM

Want to upgrade some Alaska roads?

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Expand the Port of Anchorage?

Build a bridge to somewhere?

You'll have a chance Tuesday, when voters can pass or reject Proposition A, which would give state officials a green light for issuing $315 million in bonds to pay for more than two dozen transportation projects statewide.

Chances are you didn't even know the proposition was on the ballot. Intense presidential and congressional races have captured most of the political attention this year.

Truckers, construction contractors and others who say the bond issue would finance badly needed road, port and bridge projects worry voters might not know enough about Proposition A to pass it.

"I have a feeling it will creep up on them," said state Transportation Commissioner Leo von Scheben. "But I think people have enough sense to understand that anytime we can build something it creates jobs and it is a stimulant to the economy."

Aves Thompson, executive director of the Alaska Trucking Association, was pushing his members Friday to turn out for Proposition A.

"We're going to flood them with e-mails and ask them to inform their employees about the importance of this bond package," he said.

Among the projects the bond issue would fund:

• $22.1 million to create a Dowling Road connection between the Old Seward Highway and Minnesota Drive in Anchorage. It's part of an effort to open another east-west thoroughfare to relieve Tudor Road traffic.

• $10 million toward the Port of Anchorage expansion, a project that could cost up to $700 million in federal, state and local funding.

• $20 million for safety improvements at Windy Corner on the Seward Highway, where motorists cause dangerous traffic jams by stopping to look at rock-climbing Dall sheep.

• $22 million to reconstruct Fairview Loop in Wasilla.

• $14 million for heavy maintenance on the Dalton Highway, a gravel road important for trucking equipment and supplies to the Prudhoe Bay oil field.

• $20 million for statewide emergency bridge repairs.

Voters will decide whether the state should sell bonds to pay for these and other projects. Investors would buy the bonds, with the state promising to pay them back over many years with interest.

State Rep. Kevin Meyer, R-Anchorage, helped pass a law during the last regular legislative session to put the bond package up for a public vote.

He believes Proposition A has a decent chance of winning voter approval, noting the last statewide transportation bond issue in 2002 "passed pretty easily."

A key for voters, he said, is knowing the state would rely mainly on its oil revenue, not property taxes, to pay off the bonds.

"I'm cautiously optimistic," he said.

But not everyone likes Proposition A.

Rep. Mike Doogan, D-Anchorage, said he opposed a bond issue. Back in the spring, the state was flush with billions of dollars in surplus revenue, so lawmakers could have paid cash if the projects really were so important, he said.

Instead, the bonds will hang over future generations of Alaskans as debt, Doogan said.

"It's a bad idea. It's irresponsible," he said.

Meyer disagrees. He said the state actually could come out ahead if investment profits on its savings exceed the cost of paying interest on the bonds.

Anyway, the matter now is before the voters. To bond or not to bond? That is the question Tuesday, along with, of course, whether we like McCain or Obama, Begich or Stevens, Berkowitz or Young.

In a statewide survey conducted in early September for the American Council of Engineering Companies of Alaska, Dittman Research found that only 8 percent of the 408 people called knew a transportation bond would be on the ballot.

Once people heard some basic details, however, almost half said they'd likely vote yes, Dittman found.

Because lawmakers included projects all over the state -- from Southeast road improvements to a major Fairbanks street widening to Kodiak Island dock replacements -- Proposition A should attract broad voter support, proponents say.

It definitely has some friends in Aleknagik, a tiny village straddling the Wood River north of Dillingham. Residents there are tired of seeing snowmachiners take deadly plunges while trying to cross the river. Proposition A includes $20 million for a bridge.

"This will be the fulfillment of a dream once the bridge is built," said Fred Nishimura, business manager for Aleknagik Natives Ltd., a village Native corporation.

Find Wesley Loy online at adn.com/contact/wloy or call 257-4590.

Proposition A would fund these statewide transportation projects

Roads, bridges and ports

Alaska voters Tuesday will vote on Proposition A, a $315 million state bond issue to pay for these projects:

• Anchorage: Dowling Road link between Old Seward Highway and Minnesota Drive, $22.1 million

• Anchorage: Victor Road upgrade between Dimond Boulevard and 100th Avenue, $14 million

• Port of Anchorage expansion, $10 million

• Seward Highway safety improvements at Windy Corner, $20 million

• Kenai Peninsula road projects, $8 million

• Soldotna: Sterling Highway repairs from Mackey Lake Road to Sterling, $11 million

• Wasilla: Fairview Loop reconstruction, $22 million

• Juneau: Intersection upgrade, Glacier Highway and Back Loop Road, $5 million