CSHJR 58(FIN): Respectfully requesting the members of the Alaska Congressional delegation to sponsor and support passage of an amendment to the statute relating to the disposition of federal funds received by the state from oil and gas leases in the National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska to authorize use of the funds for the state's power cost equalization program.
00CS FOR HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 58(FIN) 01 Respectfully requesting the members of the Alaska Congressional delegation to 02 sponsor and support passage of an amendment to the statute relating to the 03 disposition of federal funds received by the state from oil and gas leases in the 04 National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska to authorize use of the funds for the state's 05 power cost equalization program. 06 BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA: 07 WHEREAS the United States Congress, by passage in 1980 of P.L. 96-514, Title I, 08 94 Stat. 2964, later codified as 42 U.S.C. 6508, requires the federal government to share 09 equally with the state the receipts derived from competitive leasing of oil and gas in the 10 National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska; and 11 WHEREAS the federal statute requires that, in the allocation of the funds that the state 12 receives, the state must give priority to those political subdivisions of the state most directly 13 or severely affected by the development of oil and gas in the National Petroleum Reserve - 14 Alaska leases; and
01 WHEREAS, to comply with the substantive requirement of the federal law, the state 02 has established in the state treasury the "National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska special revenue 03 fund," into which is deposited and from which is paid amounts intended to assist the affected 04 municipalities in responding to actual or probable effects; and 05 WHEREAS virtually all of the National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska lies within the 06 corporate limits of the North Slope Borough, a home rule regional political subdivision of the 07 state that exercises areawide regional land use planning and zoning and taxation authority and 08 provides services of a regional nature for its residents; and 09 WHEREAS, like so much of the state, the North Slope Borough and the communities 10 within it are rural in character; in contrast to communities in other parts of Alaska, however, 11 the North Slope Borough, the regional government that is the chief beneficiary of the financial 12 assistance provided under the federal statute and the state's special revenue fund, has enjoyed 13 exceptional revenues based on its ability to levy and collect taxes on other sources, notably 14 the petroleum properties on state-leased land within the borough outside the National 15 Petroleum Reserve; and 16 WHEREAS other rural areas, whether organized as municipal governments or 17 remaining unincorporated within the state's unorganized borough, face problems of providing 18 government services without having the benefit of the tax base that has developed on Alaska's 19 North Slope; and 20 WHEREAS, by providing for the distribution of a significant portion of the revenue 21 due each regional corporation from timber resources and the subsurface estate among all 22 regional corporations, Congress, in 43 U.S.C. 1606(i) (sec. 7(i), Alaska Native Claims 23 Settlement Act), initiated the concept of sharing the net revenue from the development, 24 production, and marketing of subsurface natural resources in one geographical area for the 25 wider benefit of the residents of rural Alaska; and 26 WHEREAS, in 1993, as a partial response to a problem faced by rural residents in 27 common, the state enacted legislation to establish a power cost equalization program, intended 28 as a long-term commitment to respond to the need for adequate, reliable electric service at 29 affordable rates, with the expectation that the electric industry and its lenders would develop 30 plans, make investments, and take other actions to meet the utility needs of rural residents; 31 within the program, the legislation identified the power cost equalization and rural electric
01 capitalization fund as the source of money intended to subsidize and reduce per kilowatt-hour 02 costs of electricity in rural areas and to provide grants to improve rural utility operations; and 03 WHEREAS, with the expectation that leasing and early development of key National 04 Petroleum Reserve - Alaska tracts under a 1997 Congressional Act would return additional 05 revenue to the state's special revenue fund, the legislature recently amended the power cost 06 equalization and rural electric capitalization fund to identify money provided to and 07 appropriated from the state's National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska special revenue fund as a 08 source of additional financial assistance; and 09 WHEREAS, with probable development of leases in the National Petroleum Reserve - 10 Alaska, there is now an opportunity to extend the benefits from the development of these 11 subsurface resources through the state's power cost equalization program for the ongoing 12 direct benefit of rural residents, but the legislature is reluctant to act without a clear expression 13 by the United States Congress that the legislature may make a commitment of this anticipated 14 additional revenue for that purpose; 15 BE IT RESOLVED that the Alaska State Legislature respectfully requests the 16 members of the Alaska congressional delegation to sponsor and support passage, during the 17 106th Congress, of an amendment to 42 U.S.C. 6508, the statute relating to the disposition 18 of federal funds received by the state from oil and gas leases in the National Petroleum 19 Reserve - Alaska, to authorize appropriation of the money received from this source for the 20 continued support of the state's power cost equalization program for the general benefit of the 21 residents of rural Alaska. 22 COPIES of this resolution shall be sent to the Honorable Ted Stevens and the 23 Honorable Frank Murkowski, U.S. Senators, and the Honorable Don Young, U.S. 24 Representative, members of the Alaska delegation in Congress.