Entries in Capital Focus for February, 2008
Quotable: Doogan
“I don’t want wolves as pets because they’ll eat your face off.”
Chamber pleas: Gas, energy, and BIOS
A team of folks from the Greater Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce are in Juneau this week to lobby on local issues.
When it comes to gold jewelry...
Every once in a while, there’s a bill that catches your eye.
Philosophical choices
Steve Porter, a consultant hired by the Legislature and a former member of Gov. Frank Murkowski's gas pipeline team, is scheduled to give a talk tomorrow evening on the development of a pipeline.
The $200 question
Teachers and school officials are in the House gallery this morning as state lawmakers get ready to vote on a long-in-coming K-12 education funding package. But before they vote, there's one big question that needs resolution.
Gas line chatter 3
Wow. Lots of gas line news in the last few days. Here's a quick roundup.
Caucus criticises capital criteria
Or lack thereof. The Senate minority Republicans make the capital budget process one of their main issues today at their weekly presser, with Sen. Fred Dyson calling for clearer criteria for evaluating state spending on capital projects. The process has become something of a hot topic this session, and not just with the minority.
One small step toward fixing the PERS/TRS
OK, so I had a bit of a process lesson this morning at the conference committee hearing on SB 125, the PERS/TRS fix bill. And I learned what the plan is.
Gas line chatter 2
Gas and the gas line continue to be major topics down here, obviously, so here's an update.
Compassionate gifts
Gov. Sarah Palin just held a bill signing in the Rep. Richard Foster's office. At least half a dozen lawmakers were there, along with the governor, some of her staff, and a gaggle of reporters. Foster, who has kidney disease, was not.
Contingencies and competition
They're not contingencies. That's one message TransCanada's Tony Palmer wanted to get across yesterday when he presented his company's gas line proposal to the Senate Resources Committee, referring to suggestions in the application that the US government pay for cost overruns and/or pipeline tariffs under certain conditions. Palmer brought them up in an effort to clarify questions floating around, later when he talked about the federal role, and again in his conclusion.
Reworking the oil tax
I asked Gov. Sarah Palin for her thoughts yesterday on Sen. Charlie Huggins' bill making changes to the recently changed oil production tax. Here's her response.
Drive it, ditch it, torch it
There's a bill up for a hearing today titled "An Act relating to damaging a vehicle on public land by starting a fire or causing an explosion." Kinda catchy, huh?
Little Susitna, big puzzle
It's hard to know what to think of the Little Susitna Construction Co. The company's head, Dominic Lee, explained his company's AGIA pipeline bid to the Senate Resources Committee this afternoon, and it was a puzzling presentation.
BG explains lack of AGIA bid
BG’s David Keane just finished a presentation to the Senate Resources Committee. The company put a bunch of money into studying a gas pipeline project and worked on a proposal under AGIA but ultimately didn’t apply because of underlying regulatory and resource risks.
CORRECTION
I got something wrong in my last post about when to change the gas tax. Here is Pat Galvin’s explanation:
Gas line chatter
Before I came down here, I assumed gas line talk was going to heat up at the end of the session. Wrong. It’s pretty much the big item down here already. Here’s my take on a few of the issues floating around.
Woah! Blog gets facelift
With the switch to the new and improved News-Miner Web site, we're still in the process of bringing the old Capital Focus stuff to the new blog site, so bear with us. The next few posts are actually old posts, but once they're up, I promise I'll start writing new posts again.