THE ANCHORAGE DAILY PLANET

Who knew there could be so much dough in trying to persuade Alaskans to screw up a fairly straight-forward election system?

Alaskans for Better Elections is pushing a 25-page ballot initiative that would, if it wins a spot on the ballot and voters eventually approve, make transformational changes to the state’s election machinery – none of them good.

It wants to institute ranked-choice voting, open or “jungle” primaries and limit campaign contributions. Additionally, candidates no longer would have to disclose a political affiliation when their names go onto the ballot.

The initiative would do all that – and destroy political parties – without the first hint of legislative input, review or debate. It is sponsored by former independent state Rep. Jason Grenn, Bonnie L. Jack, and former Gov. Tony Knowles’ attorney general, Bruce Botelho.

Well, make no mistake, trying to make those kinds of changes – changes aimed at getting more Democrats and centrists elected – costs money. Luckily for the initiative group, getting Outside money and help has not been a problem.

Its fourth-quarter Alaska Public Offices Commission campaign disclosure report, filed Tuesday, shows the effort has taken in at least $619,590, the vast majority of it from Outside groups – with $600,000 alone coming from Denver-based Unite America, formerly the Centrist Project. United America endorsed former Gov. Bill Walker’s failed re-election bid.

In a 10-day APOC report, filed Dec. 3, 2019, the group showed a debt of $315,000 to a Dallas-base political consulting firm, Advanced MicroTargeting, for signature-gathering.

Backers of the proposed ballot initiative Jan. 9 turned in more than 41,068 signatures in a bid to qualify the measure for this year’s ballot. It needed only about 28,000.

Alaska state law holds payment to signature-takers, or petition circulators, as they are called, to no more than $1 a signature, plus a small amount for meals and such when they travel more than 100 miles from home.

That means the circulators should be paid in the neighborhood of $41,068, leaving about $275,000 for Advanced MicroTargeting. That means every signature cost $7.67.

The late Washington Post political columnist, David Broder, was no champion of initiatives. He said they were a way for demagogues and charlatans to get around the legislative process to further their own ends; a way to have laws without government. One of the things he lamented in is book, “Democracy Derailed” was that grassroots campaigns too often are turned into a lucrative political industry – and anything but citizen-driven.

The money involved in the Alaskans for Better Elections initiative is a case in point. It is Outside money, from only a few sources, aimed at furthering an Outside group’s political interests.

How is any of that good for Alaska?

[Read The Anchorage Daily Planet at this link.]

WILL FOUNDATIONS START MASSAGING NEWS COVERAGE?

The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner has laid off four of its 55 employees, more than 7 percent of its entire staff.

The newspaper is owned by a nonprofit foundation but is operated as a business that supports itself with subscriptions and advertising. But times are tough in the newspaper industry.

Now, the Helen E. Snedden Foundation, which has owned the News-Miner since 2016, is gearing up to apply to the IRS for nonprofit status for the newspaper, so it can accept donations directly and apply for grants.

This month, the Juneau Empire laid off two people from its news staff — the staff photographer and the sports reporter. The news staff is down to four from a high of 20 or more in the 1990s. Last year, it stopped printing on Mondays and shuttered the Capital City Weekly, which it owns, because it was competing with the daily paper.

The Homer Tribune folded last year, leaving that community with one weekly newspaper.

But the News-Miner may survive under its new nonprofit model with the help of major grants.

“Community support could eventually come through an additional means. The company will be applying to the Internal Revenue Service this year to become a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation as a community asset, which could open the possibility of receiving grants and other types of financial support,” the News-Miner wrote to its readers.

According to the Pew Research Center, total U.S. daily newspaper circulation (print and digital combined) in 2018 was 28.6 million for weekday and 30.8 million for Sunday, down 8 percent and 9 percent respectively, from 2017.

Weekday print circulation decreased 12 percent and Sunday print circulation decreased 13 percent in one year.

With that trend having continued and no relief in sight, last year the Salt Lake City Tribune became the largest newspaper yet to seek 501(c)(3) status, a request that was approved by the IRS in October.

The Tampa Bay Times has been owned by the nonprofit Poynter Institute, and the Philadelphia Inquirer is owned by the Lenfest Institute. Like the News-Miner, they have remained for-profit entities owned by Foundations.

Nonprofit foundations are also driving the news narrative. A series on crime and lawlessness in Alaska is now in its second year at the Anchorage Daily News, with funding from ProPublica, which itself receives a large portion of its support from the Sandler Foundation. The Sandler Foundation supports numerous liberal political causes, including the Center for American Progress, which is pushing the impeachment narrative, and anti-Trump/anti-oil messaging. ProPublica does not fit the mold of a more neutral news organization, such as Associated Press or Reuters.

The role of foundations in influencing news coverage has some journalists skeptical of the strings that are attached. But their very jobs increasingly depend on the kindness of strangers: Journalism philanthropy has nearly quadrupled since 2009, according to Nieman Labs. The Institute for Nonprofit News reported that 43 percent of its members’ revenue now comes from foundations.

The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority Board of directors approved a resolution allowing the agency to modify terms of its loans related to development of the Southern Miluveach Unit (known as the Mustang Field).

The loan modifications come with a $60 million investment commitment from Brooks Range Petroleum Corporation (Brooks Range) shareholders in the USA, Asia, and Western Europe.

Brooks Range Petroleum has been in default since October.

The 2020 commitment into the Alaska company is intended to bring the Mustang Field into sustained production, and begin repaying creditors while putting Alaskans to work. 

The company has a long list of creditors with familiar names in the Alaska oil patch, including Doyon Remote Facilities and Services, Fairweather LLC, Nana Construction, North Slope Borough, and Little Red Services, among dozens of other Alaska-centric businesses. The list includes large companies, such as ExxonMobil, as well as small ones, such as the Alaska Legislative Digest, owned by Tim and Mike Bradner, and Petroleum News.

AIDEA consented to the sale of certain oil field equipment and other assets that are not essential to the Mustang Field, with proceeds to be applied to past-due Brooks Range payables. Most of these payables are owed to the Alaska companies, but the total amount owed to companies exceeds $17 million.

If certain financial benchmarks are met, including establishing a debt service reserve fund and hitting specified oil production targets, AIDEA will allocate additional funds through a mid-year line of credit that can only be used for drilling additional wells necessary to meet state lease requirements, the agency wrote.

“The AIDEA mission to advance economic development and create job opportunities can sometimes run into delays, disappointments, and missed production deadlines,” said AIDEA Board Chairman Dana Pruhs. “Brooks Range startup problems and the oil tax credits veto three years ago, along with other factors, created the largest workout situation at AIDEA as identified by the Dunleavy transition team in early 2019.

“With the increasingly favorable state business climate, together with oil price and tax stability, Brooks Range owners and creditors took another look at Mustang. So here we go, and I hope the equity holders can obtain a buy-in from the entire list of creditors,” Pruhs concluded.

AIDEA took a $10.5 million allowance from earnings for Fiscal Year 2019 when Brooks Range failed to meet targets. Other creditors are agreeing to workouts with similar rationales, but thus far not every creditor has come on board, AIDEA acknowledged in its press release. AIDEA and equity holders generally concur that final agreement on these matters is needed by the end of January 2020.

“I want to thank the AIDEA Board and Governor Dunleavy for assigning a high priority to fixing this problem,” said Brooks Range CEO Majid Jourabchi. “Brooks Range and our contractors on the North Slope are completely aligned in what needs to be done, and the urgency to have it be so.”

The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority is a public corporation of the state whose purpose is to promote, develop and advance the general prosperity and economic welfare of the people of Alaska.