Moira Smith, who was Alaska’s Southeast coordinator for Fran Ulmer’s campaign for governor in 2002, is in the news, accusing U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of groping her in 1999, when she was 23.
She is now 41 and works for Enstar Natural Gas as an attorney.
Smith is married to Jake Metcalfe, who briefly ran against Rep. Don Young in 2008 but was shamed into dropping out of the race when one of his campaign workers established fake websites attacking Ethan Berkowitz, one of his Democratic competitors who went on to lose against Young. That matter went to court, and Metcalfe lost.
Although simply referred to in the media as a citizen who donates to Democrats, Smith is much more than that. She was National Committeewoman for the Young Democrats of Alaska and has been a Democrat activist for two decades.
Her first husband worked for the Obama White House until this year. Paul Bodnar served as President Obama’s senior director for Energy and Climate Change at the National Security Council. He also was the director for climate finance and counselor to the special envoy for climate change. They divorced in 2006, according to Alaska court records, and she married into the old Juneau Metcalfe family in 2007.
The Metcalfe empire is purely Democrats, and includes Kim Metcalfe, National Committeewoman for the Alaska Democratic Party, and Peter Metcalfe, who has a contract with Gov. Bill Walker.
Smith’s husband is also the former chair of the Alaska Democratic Party and served on the Anchorage School Board. He now runs a union as the executive director of the Public Safety Employees’ Association Local 803.
Moira Smith’s LinkedIn and Twitter accounts have been disabled.
Four years ago, Sen. Lesil McGuire commissioned a report on the status of women in Alaska. The result was shocking: Alaska is the one of the most dangerous places for women to live in the nation.
The report was a call to action for a senator who had never taken on the softer social issues. A lawyer by training, Sen. McGuire had more forcefully championed Arctic development and is known for her economic and budget-related legislation.
Rosie Rios, U.S. Treasurer
The report was the beginning of the Alaska Women’s Summit. McGuire collaborated with Janet Weiss of BP, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, and Karen Hagedorn of ExxonMobil to launch the annual conference and try to create momentum on the economic and social conditions of women in Alaska.
This year’s featured speaker is Rosie Rios, who is the Treasurer of the United States, overseeing the U.S. Mint, Bureau of Engraving and Printing and Fort Knox and who is a key liaison with the Federal Reserve. She will be introduced by Julie Fate-Sullivan.
The fourth annual summit is Friday, Oct. 28 beginning at 8 am at the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage.
“When you invest in bringing up the quality of life for women, you grow the domestic product of the state and in turn improve the quality of life for all people,” McGuire said. “If women better understand their relationship with money, if they understand home ownership, this is all traced back to the economic empowerment of women. It’s about trying to meaningfully improve ourselves so we can improve the statistics around women generally.”
The history of women’s conferences sometimes looks adversarial to men, and McGuire is determined to change that.
“This is not the conference for bra-burners, and it’s not anti-men,” she said. “But if you look at women in Alaska, while those who are single are much less likely to be homeless than men, once they have children then those numbers shoot through the roof, and so do suicide rates, which are 10 times the national average.”
“We need to do what we can to support mothers who still need to make an economic contribution because of their children,” she said. “If we have a better quality of life, our children benefit, and because women are the primary caretakers for aging parents, our seniors also benefit, and so do our husbands and partners.
A curious subject line in an email from Joe Miller suggested a bit of violence on Alaska Republican Party Chairman Tuckerman Babcock:
Subject:Let’s take a sledgehammer to…, Tuckerman?
The letter was a plea for cash for Miller’s Libertarian bid for U.S. Senate. He is at odds with Babcock, who has been sending out mailers opposing Miller and supporting Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the Republicans’ nominee.
BELTRAMI DROPPING THE F-BOMB
An audio is floating around out there where AFL-CIO president and Senate candidate Vince Beltrami is heard cursing out a constituent, just like you knew he would. We’re working to get our hands on it.
Beltrami is running against Sen. Cathy Giessel for District N.
TRUMP HQ POLICE CALL
Speaking of foul mouths, police were called to Trump/Pence headquarters at the corner of Klatt Road and Old Seward Highway last Friday, where an enraged woman had pulled up in a 2016 Lexus, with a load of Trump signs that she had pulled up off the street rights of way.
She was well-dressed and loaded for bear, according to witnesses. And she was cussing a blue streak, making the people in the office believe that she was trying to pick a fight.
By the time the police officer had arrived, she and her screaming were gone.
“She wanted us to help her unload all the Trump signs she had just pulled up, but we said, ‘no, you stole them so you unload them'” said one witness. “She kept yelling that she hated Trump. We were trying to be polite to her.”
Must Read Alaska has a photo of the alleged sign-ripper-upper, but we’re waiting for a call back from Anchorage Police.
SINCE A YEAR AGO, HIS PLAN TO BORROW HAD DOUBLED FROM $1.6 BILLION TO $3.3 BILLION
Governor Bill Walker has backed out of his unilateral move to sell bonds in order to pay off Alaska’s enormous pension obligation. He earlier this month had met with members of the Senate Finance committee, where he faced stiff headwinds.
“Given their lack of support, I have decided not to proceed with the issuance at this time,” Walker said. “Building a collaborative relationship with the Legislature will be necessary to reach our primary goal, which is a long-term fiscal plan for our state.”
Six weeks ago, the governor wrote to lawmakers that he would, with or without the Legislature’s input, borrow up to $3.3 billion to reduce the obligation the state pays into the various pension funds for state workers (PERS) and teachers (TRS) every year.
Alaska’s pension obligation for this fiscal year is about $340 million for PERS ad $116 million for TRS, short of one-half billion dollars.
The plan was to borrow money at a low rate and invest it for higher returns, using the proceeds to pay the pension obligations. That plan was predicated on earning 8 percent on investments, while only paying less than 4 percent on the bond interest payments. It might have earned the state $1.756 billion, but it could also lose money if the markets tank.
In September, Walker wrote that “Concern around market timing and the impact of delay on maximizing the benefits of this type of transaction is one of the reasons the legislature provided the administration in AS37.15.900 to AS37.16.900 with the authority to sell up to $5 billion in bonds.”
The market, some fear, is prone to instability since it is hovering at an all-time high.
Recently the rating agencies have signaled that such a loan would again lower the state’s credit rating. Moody’s had assigned the bond a AA2 rating, which is its fourth highest rating, making it a fairly stable investment. But the state’s overall creditworthiness could have been downgraded, making it more expensive for the state and municipal entities to borrow money.
While not acknowledging the market’s disapproval, Walker wrote today: “While we believe the financial benefits of issuing state pension obligation bonds significantly outweigh the financial risks, we recognize the need for legislative input.”
POBs, as they’re called, are a gamble. The payments are smoothed out across time, but they allow municipalities and states to not trim their budgets, and continue spending beyond their means.
The worst underfunded state pensions are: Alaska, Hawaii, Illinois, Connecticut, Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
Walker first floated the idea of borrowing-and-investing a year ago in November, announcing he would explore a $1.6 billion POB. Before the end of 2015, he had increased the number to $2.6 billion. By September of this year, he had ratcheted it to $3.3 billion.
Today, the idea has been put to rest until he can repair trust with the Legislature, an endeavor that may have now gained some traction with lawmakers.
The Bureau of Indian Affairs has received its first request from an Alaska tribe to bring its land into “trust” status with the Federal government.
The State of Alaska was notified earlier this month and has until Nov. 9 to comment on the application of the Craig Tribal Association, which is requesting that a one-acre lot in the City of Craig be placed under federal management.
The land in question is the location of the tribe’s administrative building, tribal hall, a Head Start program, and commercial space. It also includes parking. The City of Craig currently exempts the property from the tax rolls, so there will be little impact to the city’s budget.
But moving the land into trust would allow the tribe to start a gambling casino in Craig, a town of 1,200 people, although no such plans have been announced.
The tribe has, however, spoken openly about starting a marijuana business on the property.
Prior to this summer, the State of Alaska had stood in opposition to allowing tribes to put their lands into federal control, effectively as reservations.
That was until Gov. Bill Walker stepped away from the legal challenge this summer, allowing tribes to request of the BIA the special status that had been denied them under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act.
Some municipal leaders are concerned. One told us: “The State is starving the municipalities because the State budget problem, and now taking lands right in the heart of downtowns and taking them off the tax rolls — this is going to hurt some communities.”
The Alaska Municipal League meeting in Anchorage on Nov. 14-16 will delve into the lands-into-trust issues with a workshop, and the Alaska Conference of Mayors, headed by Craig Mayor Dennis Watson, will also take up the issue and how it affects communities when it meets on Nov. 17 in Anchorage.
The State of Alaska is gathering information about the application and any jurisdictional problems or land-use conflicts that may present themselves.
The period for submitting comments to the State of Alaska has passed, but comments can be sent to the BIA’s Alaska Regional Office at 3601 C Street, Suite 1100, Anchorage, AK 99503.
Craig’s city council has sent a letter to the BIA asking a wide range of questions and requesting that the agency send fact-finding staff to the Prince of Wales Island community to fully vet the proposal and help residents understand the implications of lands-into-trust. The city council has also asked for an extension of time for the comment period.
Who is Robin Brena, cunning lawyer and political needle-mover in Alaska?
Until a couple of years ago, no one had much heard of him.
Since 2012, Brena has poured a quarter million dollars into Alaska Democratic races and to independent groups opposing Republicans.
And that’s only the known amount. No other single Alaskan is putting so much money into campaigns — no Republican, no Democrat, no undeclared. Only the Gottstein empire comes close.
In 2014, Brena also purchased Gov. Bill Walker’s law firm for an undisclosed amount, although records show it was between $200,000 and $400,000.
What does he get out of being the kingmaker? He becomes the governor’s top adviser. He calls the governor and you can be sure Walker picks up the phone. This is a tight relationship, and it’s what is running government in Alaska today.
To see what Brena and Walker are pushing, one need only observe his drumbeat on the “Our Fair Share” theme to know that there is something in the works to raise taxes on oil companies. His Alaska Dispatch News column of Oct. 24, 2016 is the foreshadowing of what is to come because Brena is not giving out money for no reason. The people he supports will need to follow his direction in oil and gas taxation or he can just as easily take them out during the next election cycle.
THIS YEAR’S TALLY
Since the beginning of 2016, Brena and his wife Barbara have spent what is technically known as gobs of cash on Democratic races in Alaska, making them the biggest players in Alaska politics today.
Here’s the tally from this year, as reported through the primary. Make no mistake, any of these politicians who are elected will take a call from Brena at any time of day, for any length of time. And they won’t argue with him.
Robin and Barbara Brena’s known contributions for 2016:
01/27/16 $ 500.00 Shirley Ann Cote’ 02/09/16 $5000.00 Alaska Democratic Party
10/13/15 $ 500.00 Matt Claman
06/29/16 $ 500.00 Jason Grenn
07/15/16 $ 500.00 Paul Seaton
07/12/16 $ 500.00 Jim Colver
06/27/16 $ 500.00 Harry T. Crawford Jr.
07/01/16 $500.00 Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins 06/23/16 $5,000.00 Alaska Democratic Party
06/27/16 $ 500.00 Daniel (Dan) H Ortiz 06/25/16 $ 5,000.00 House Democratic Campaign Committee
06/24/16 $ 500.00 Matt Claman
06/29/16 $ 500.00 Les Gara
06/27/16 $ 500.00 Zach Fansler
07/10/16 $ 500.00 Adam Wool
06/27/16 $ 500.00 Ivy A Spohnholz
06/12/16 $ 500.00 Luke Hopkins
06/27/16 $ 500.00 Dean Westlake 08/03/16 $35,000.00 Together for Alaska
08/13/16 $ 500.00 Louise B. Stutes
08/15/16 $500.00 Jeff Landfield
09/29/16 $500.00 Patricia Faye-Brazel
06/29/16 $500.00 Jason Grenn
06/24/16 $500.00 Matt Claman
06/27/16 $500.00 Ivy Spohnholz
06/12/16 $500.00 Luke Hopkins
06/27/16 $500.00 Harriett Drummond
08/01/16 $478.87 Dean Westlake Total: Brena known 2016 expenditures to date: $61,978.00
Port Clarence is on the Bering Sea, to the right of the satellite photo in what looks like a shark’s mouth.
Gov. Bill Walker once again appears to be doing the bidding of the publisher of the Alaska Dispatch News.
In a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Walker has asked that Port Clarence once again be included in plans for an Arctic port. Alice Rogoff, who owns Alaska’s largest newspaper, has long had a desire to see a deep water port built there. She has financial interests through her advisory capacity at PT Capital, an Arctic investment entity, and her husband’s firm, The Carlyle Group, which has developed an Arctic investment strategy.
PT Capital’s cofounder is Hugh Short, who also sits on the board of the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation, which is tasked with building a gasline to tidewater.
During the last legislative session, the capital budget included $1.6 million for the Nome Deep Draft Arctic Port design at the behest of the conservative majority. The money was appropriated to the City of Nome as a grant, allowing Nome to take over as the 50/50 cost sharing partner on the project.
Sen. Anna MacKinnon and the Senate moved the project forward by adding the needed $1.6 million to a very slim capital budget to help the project stay on track.
Once design work is complete, the project will go to Congress for construction funding.
The project goes back many years: In 2011, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began studying a port deep enough for large ships that would eventually traverse ice-free Arctic waters.
The option finally chosen by the Corps will expand the Port of Nome, dredging the harbor to a depth of 28 feet. Port Clarence lost out in that decision.
The Department of Transportation had previously been the cost sharing partner but Gov. Bill Walker neglected to include the cost share money in his DOT budget.
Enter Alice Rogoff. She has been a proponent of the Port Clarence project both publicly and privately. And her relationship with the governor is probably closer than any publisher in America has with a sitting governor.
She’s been part of Walker’s financial restructuring advisory team — a group of highly accomplished Alaskans who have met with the governor at his invitation to help him navigate the financial crisis. Many Alaskans believe she also worked hard to get him elected.
Why is Port Clarence not in contention for the project any longer? Because after a year of study and evaluation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers selected Nome as more economical and more likely to be an ice-free port first.
While Nome has a protective jetty that shelters a large outer harbor, and boasts a fully functional airport, housing, roads, electricity, Port Clarence has none of these things. In fact, Port Clarence would require a 70-mile road to complete the project.
In his Oct. 20 letter to the U.S. Department of Defense, Walker has asked the federal government to not only re-insert Port Clarence, but to call it the Nome/Port Clarence project.
Funding for two Arctic ports in Alaska is unlikely, but delaying the entire project to open up a two-port alternative could be the result of Walker’s actions.
Why does the governor insist on returning to the Port Clarence discussion?
There are myriad business interests afoot in the Arctic, and Rogoff has ties to many of the known players.
In a 2014 news story in the Dispatch, Sen. Lesil McGuire said she had met with Guggenheim Partners, Carlyle Group, and Citibank Energy. “There’s nearly $100 billion in development planned, but it may not come to Alaska,” she said. Carlyle Group is run by the husband of Rogoff, David Rubenstein.
In Foreign Policy Association blog in 2011, the Carlyle-Guggenheim-Rogoff relationship came to light:
Countries, non-profit organizations, indigenous peoples, and natural resource companies are all interested in obtaining a part of the Arctic. Now, we can add a hedge fund to the list. Guggenheim Partners, the financial services company which manages over $125 billion in assets, has confirmed that it is looking into establishing an investment fund in the Arctic, perhaps with a focus on Alaska. Alice Rogoff, publisher of the online newspaper Alaska Dispatch and wife of the co-founder of the Carlyle Group, David Rubenstein, first announced the news at the World Affairs Council’s “Politics of Global Climate Change” conference at University of Alaska Southeast in Juneau earlier last week. Rogoff also suggested that one investment possibility for Guggenheim would be to privately fund the construction of an icebreaker, which it could then lease out to the U.S. Coast Guard. However, Lawson Brigham, a professor and retired Coast Guard captain, observed that this would likely not be practical, given that the Coast Guard would need full and unrestricted access to a federally-funded ship during war, should it ever break out in the Arctic.
Rogoff added, “The single biggest source of investment dollars in Guggenheim’s or probably anybody’s fund will be China.” This would be an indirect way for China to invest in and potentially profit from the Arctic even though it does not have any territory there. This would not be the first instance of private Chinese investment in the Arctic: Businessman Huang Nubo is planning to buy a swath of land equal to one percent of Iceland to turn into an ecoresort.
Guggenheim spokesman Jeffrey Kelley remarked, “We are in the very early planning stages for an Arctic investment fund. At this point in time it would be premature to comment further about potential structure or investment parameters.” Guggenheim reportedly posted a link to the article in Alaska Dispatch about the fund, but they seem to have removed it from their website, as I am unable to locate it.
With Chinese money in the mix, and in the interests of transparency, Gov. Walker should come clean and tell Alaskans why he is trying to change the Arctic Deep Water Port project, who will benefit from the inevitable delay of the Nome deep water port, and why he’d take such a risk with a project that is already so difficult to fund.
Norway is weighing a new innovation – floating tunnels.
By WIN GRUENING
Long admired by uber-liberals for its socialistic-style welfare state, Norway is often held up as an example for Alaska to follow — despite its lack of fit with Alaskans’ independent, self-reliant image.
However, I’ll be the first to admit Norway does some things right and similarities abound.
Norway occupies the same latitudes as Alaska, with an Arctic climate in the north and a more moderate marine climate in the south. Its soaring mountains —the highest of which are less than half the height of Alaska’s tallest peaks — are every bit as beautiful. Its rugged coastal terrain and spectacular fjords could easily be mistaken for Alaska’s southeast coast.
Norway’s economy, like Alaska’s, is over-dependent on the oil industry and faces serious pressure due to collapsing oil prices. The country has wisely amassed a large sovereign wealth fund — similar to our Permanent Fund — but unlike us decided long ago to use it to partially offset the cost of government.
Norway views transportation infrastructure differently as well. While Alaska struggles to build a mere 50 miles of road to connect our state capital with the rest of Alaska and the continental road system, Norway has embarked on an ambitious project to re-route and modernize its E39 highway, stretching 800 miles along their west coast, by eliminating all seven ferry crossings along the route.
Predictably, delays have stalled the project, although not for reasons you might suspect. Local mayors campaigned hard to get the new route built through their municipalities, because of the job opportunities the project would create and new residents it would attract. Arguments over the route caused long delays, drawing criticism over the length of the planning process.
“There have been several different alternatives for the transition ……,” Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg explained. “That has meant it has taken time to go through it. It is a decision that has large local significance. It is clear that where the road goes, it will also give economic injections…”
How different that sounds from the years of delay the Juneau Access project has endured because of environmental opposition and nuisance lawsuits. It’s certainly different than the frantic claims from road opponents that death, destruction and environmental degradation will result by building a road that reduces transportation costs, increases capacity and makes travel more convenient.
It’s interesting that technological challenges in building the East Lynn Canal Highway pale in comparison to those Norway faces in crossing seven different fjords — some over two miles wide and 4,000 feet deep — to provide hard road links the entire length of the route.
Instead of throwing up their hands and saying it can’t be done, Norway chose a visionary process that embraces new technologies to tunnel through mountains, or construct underwater floating tunnels or floating suspension bridges unlike any in the world today.
The reason Norway is investing in a project of this magnitude — a ferry-free main national highway — is because the benefits of doing so far outweigh the cost. The current 21-hour travel time will be cut to 11 hours. Economic expansion will naturally follow resulting in more jobs and an increase in population and tax revenue.
Norway realizes that over time, roads are far less costly in capital and operating costs. Replacing ferry routes with road extensions will greatly increase capacity, frequency, travel opportunity and offer significant travel time and user cost savings. Ferries, because of their limitations, essentially restrict demand, reduce flexibility, and make transportation more costly or prohibitive. Ferry subsidies tend to be very high, increase over time, and continue in perpetuity.
Yet Alaska, facing the same fiscal challenges and sorely needing the economic benefits this road would provide, continues to wrestle with the decision. It’s puzzling why this is so. The federal government would pay for 90 percent of road construction, and the state contribution, already appropriated, is paltry compared to the economic return.
Contrary to opponent’s claims, the Juneau road would not be a “dead-end.” While we cannot make the Lynn Canal Highway a hard road link yet, the benefits of a longer road coupled with a 6-mile shuttle ferry would be enormous, reducing the seven-hour travel time of a mainline ferry to three hours.
Travelers from Juneau could drive to Katzehin and catch a short 27-minute shuttle ferry ride to Haines and beyond. The cost would be $15 plus $4.50 per passenger — 88 percent less than the current $274 one-way ticket for a vehicle and four passengers.
It would also strengthen our existing ferry system, allowing mainliners to serve other ports more frequently while lowering overall system costs.
From President Eisenhower’s big bet on the interstate highway system to Norway’s groundbreaking project, history continues to favor those who build roads. They will always lead us to greater places.
Win Gruening is retired as the senior vice president of business banking for Key Bank. Born and raised in Juneau, he active in community affairs and is involved in local and statewide organizations.
Moira Smith, who was Alaska’s Southeast coordinator for Fran Ulmer’s campaign for governor in 2002, is in the news, accusing U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of groping her in 1999, when she was 23.
Enter Alice Rogoff. She has been a proponent of the Port Clarence project both publicly and privately. And her relationship with the governor is probably closer than any publisher in America has with a sitting governor.