Legislature(2021 - 2022)BUTROVICH 205
03/29/2021 03:30 PM Senate RESOURCES
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Audio | Topic |
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Start | |
Congressman Don Young's Seward's Day Address on Alaska Resources | |
Presentation: 30 by 30 Initiative | |
SB101 | |
Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
*+ | SB 101 | TELECONFERENCED | |
SB 101-ADVISORY COMMISSION ON FEDERAL MGT AREAS 4:29:23 PM CHAIR REVAK announced the consideration of SENATE BILL NO. 101 "An Act extending the termination date of the Citizens' Advisory Commission on Federal Management Areas in Alaska; and providing for an effective date." He described the legislation as an important affirmation of the compelling need to maintain the vital efforts of the Citizen's Advisory Commission on Federal Areas (CACFA). The bill extends the sunset date of the commission eight years, from June 30, 2021 to June 30, 2029, as recommended by the [Division of Legislative Audit] Report that was completed in 2020. 4:29:57 PM BETTY TANGEMAN, Staff, Senator Joshua Revak, Alaska State Legislature, Juneau, Alaska, introduced SB 101, a committee bill, on behalf of the Senate Resources Standing Committee. She paraphrased the following sponsor statement: [Original punctuation provided.] SB 101 is an important affirmation by the Alaska Legislature of the compelling need to maintain the vital efforts of the Citizens' Advisory Commission on Federal Management Areas in Alaska (CACFA). This bill extends this commission's sunset date from June 30, 2021 to June 30, 2029. CACFA was first established in 1981, shortly after Congress passed comprehensive legislation governing all federal public lands in the state, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA). Under the balanced compromise Congress crafted in ANILCA, 104+million acres were set-aside in permanent federal ownership as conservation system units,-(e.g., parks, preserves, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas) with many unique provisions enabling Alaskan's to maintain their traditions and livelihoods, accommodating the States and ANCSA corporations' social and economic needs, safeguarding opportunities for responsible resource development, and facilitating improvements in transportation and utility infrastructure. Those provisions included opportunities for the State, its communities, and rural populations to access and develop inholdings, allotments, and adjacent lands; construct and maintain transportation and utility systems; access, manage, and use State lands and waterways; retain state management of fish and wildlife; and provide for access and necessary facilities on federal lands. Adding in the Alaska Statehood Act and Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, most Alaskans and most of Alaska are regulated under an extremely unique and complex legislative web. CACFA's mission is helping Alaskans navigate these complex rules and regulations and work with federal agencies to ensure Congressional intent is implemented with respect to their interests. As nationwide directives frequently ignore the Alaska context and balanced requirements in ANILCA, CACFA serves as a vigilant and knowledgeable resource for Alaskans to defend the rights and protections they were promised as stakeholders. While the State's ANILCA program and CACFA both monitor federal actions, the State cannot represent individuals/businesses and CACFA cannot defend State agencies' authorities. As institutional memory and expertise is lost, and as agency decisions that revise our history and upend our reasonable expectations are deferred to by the courts, federal managers have little incentive to uphold Congress's promises to Alaskans. The Sturgeon v Frost, U.S. Supreme Court case, is an example of a private citizen's $1.5 million battle against federal laws being enforced on state land. More recently, President Biden issued an Executive Order directing that at least 30% of our lands and waters be placed in permanent protection status by 2030 (30 by 30), placed a moratorium on new oil and gas leases and halted leasing in ANWR's 1002 area. These examples emphasize the need for vigilance to fight against the erosion of ANILCA protections by uninformed federal managers and politicians. With federal land management policies increasingly at odds with Alaska's desire to access, manage, and sustainably develop its natural resources, CACFA is an essential tool in ensuring Alaskans have a strong and powerful voice. Over the 62 years since statehood, the federal government has consistently failed to keep its promises to honor the Alaska way of life. Now is not the time to allow CACFA to sunset. I urge you to join me in allowing CACFA to continue its important mission by passing SB 101. 4:33:42 PM CHAIR REVAK asked Kris Curtis to go through the sunset audit. 4:33:59 PM KRIS CURTIS, Legislative Auditor, Division of Legislative Audit, Alaska State Legislature, Juneau, Alaska, stated that the division conducted a sunset audit of the Citizens' Advisory Commission on Federal Areas (CACFA). She advised that the purpose of a sunset audit is to determine whether a board or commission is serving the public's interest and whether its termination date should be extended. MS. CURTIS directed attention to the April 2020 audit report in the bill packets. Starting on page one, she read the following: CACFA is responsible for identifying and reducing potential negative impacts on Alaska and its citizens from federal actions on any of the over 200 million acres of federal land in the state. Per AS 41.37.220(a), the commission shall consider, research, and hold hearings on the consistency with federal law and congressional intent on management, operation, planning, development, and additions to federal management areas in the state. The commission may request the attorney general file suit against a federal official or agency if the commission determines that the federal official or agency is acting in violation of an Act of Congress, congressional intent, or the best interest of the state. 4:35:10 PM MS. CURTIS reported that CACFA was active from 1981 until 1999 when its funding was eliminated. It was reestablished in 2007 and operated through FY 2017 when its funding was again eliminated. She said concerns over federal overreach and unfulfilled commitments led to CACFA being reestablished to advocate on behalf of Alaskans on issues related to federal management of Alaska lands. MS. CURTIS turned to the report conclusions that start on page seven, and noted that the audit looks at the period of February 2015 through June 2017 when CACFA was defunded. She read the following finding: Beginning in FY 17, funding CACFA has not been a priority. While not a consistent priority for either the governor or the legislature, both entities supported the commission at separate times. The legislature approved funding for the commission in FY 17; however, the governor vetoed the appropriation. Funding for the commission in FY 18 and FY 19 was not included in the governor's request, nor the final operating bills passed by the legislature. The legislature approved funding in FY 20, but the governor vetoed the appropriation. The governor's amended FY 21 budget included funds to restore CACFA in recognition of the continued need for the commission. The proposed funding was not included in the legislature's approved budget. MS. CURTIS paraphrased the report conclusions that read as follows: The audit concluded that, from the date of the prior audit in February 2015 through the time CACFA was defunded in June 2017, the commission operated effectively and did not significantly duplicate the efforts of other entities. During this period, the commission actively monitored the effects of federal regulation and management decisions in accordance with statutory duties. The audit also concluded that there is a continuing public need for the commission. In accordance with AS 44.66.010(a)(10), the commission is scheduled to terminate June 30, 2021. We recommend the legislature extend the commission's termination date eight years, to June 30, 2029 MS. CURTIS stated that the division found that during the time that CACFA was active, the executive director monitored the Federal Register for new information related to CACFA's mission, provided comments on proposed changes, and brought relevant information to the commission's attention. If it was determined necessary, CACFA would send a formal comment letter to the appropriate federal agency to summarize their concerns with proposed management plans and changes to regulations and laws. CAFCA sent 14 comment letters and testified four times from February 2015 through August 2016. When this commission was funded, it was very active. 4:38:07 PM MS. CURTIS paraphrased the following to demonstrate that the commission was very active when it was funded: According to a prior CACFA member, CACFA invited federal agencies to present information and discuss federal plans and policies via panel discussions to help facilitate communication between the public and state and federal agencies. Meetings generally lasted for one or two days and included multiple presentations from individuals representing federal agencies such as the U.S. National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Land Management, and State agencies such as Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and Department of Fish and Game Per the prior CACFA executive director, the director and staff assisted between 15 and 20 Alaska citizens at a time with issues related to federal land management by helping write complaints and requests for information, and guiding citizens to the appropriate agencies. In addition, staff accompanied citizens to permit and informational meetings to provide support and expertise. 4:39:20 PM MS. CURTIS directed attention to the agency response on page 21. In that letter the commissioner of the Department of Natural Resources concurred with the recommendation to extend the commission's termination date eight years to June 30, 2029. SENATOR KIEHL asked about the nature of the comments and testimony the commission submitted and whether it was on behalf of the State of Alaska. MS. CURTIS replied the commission represents Alaska citizens so their efforts were generally to hold federal agencies accountable to the provisions and intent in ANILCA, ANCSA, and the Statehood Act. SENATOR KIEHL asked if the commission was commenting on behalf of individual Alaskan applicants. MS. CURTIS replied the commission is essentially a watchdog to ensure that federal actions comply with those Acts. She deferred further explanation to Legislative Auditor Danny Morse. 4:40:47 PM DANIEL MORSE, Auditor, Division of Legislative Audit, Alaska State Legislature, Juneau, Alaska, said he would continue to look, but he had not identified any specific comment letters. CHAIR REVAK asked Senator Kiehl to restate the question for CACFA commissioner Susan Smith. SENATOR KIEHL asked if CACFA is speaking on behalf of individual permit applicants or the State of Alaska when it provides commentary to the federal government. 4:41:53 PM SUSAN SMITH, Commission Member, Citizens' Advisory Commission on Federal Areas (CACFA), Chokosna, Alaska, explained that when CACFA received word that an individual had an issue with the federal government, they would research the law and regulations to determine whether or not the individual was being treated properly. If the treatment was unfair, the commission would speak to the agency about the law or regulation that was being interpreted incorrectly. 4:42:44 PM SENATOR BISHOP stated that the commission's primary mission is to help individual Alaskans navigate the complexities of federal bureaucracy and he could think of no more prominent example of that than the Sturgeon case. CHAIR REVAK asked Tina Cunning to address some of the purposes of CACFA. 4:43:39 PM TINA CUNNING, ANILCA Specialist, Anchorage, Alaska, suggested her brief testimony might clarify the question. CHAIR REVAK asked her to proceed. MS. CUNNING informed the committee that the legislature and the governor adopted the Alaska Position during the ANILCA debates in 1979, and one of the seven consensus points was the importance of retaining Alaskans' traditional way of life and uses on the lands. She said the legislation that originally created the Citizens' Advisory Commission on Federal Areas (CACFA) in 1981 was the brainchild of Senator Bettye Fahrenkamp. She had grown up around mining and was a staunch supporter of the miners and other Alaskans involved in resource development. MS. CUNNING continued to provide the following background on ANILCA and the Citizen's Advisory Committee on Federal Areas: Prior to being elected to the Senate in 1979, Bettye had served on the staff of U.S. Senator Mike Gravel in the previous two years in the negotiations leading up to the passage of ANILCA. She was convinced that Alaskans would, over time, lose their rights to access and uses of the lands and resources that were promised in ANILCA's compromise if a mechanism wasn't in place to involve and educate the public and represent the public in monitoring ANILCA's implementation by federal agencies. Her legislation to establish the citizen's advisory commission was landmark in its structural simplicity and its effectiveness at a relatively low cost. Half the commission members are appointed by the governor and half are appointed by the legislature. In this way, bipartisanship was assured. The commission operated independently of the state agencies who were involved in implementation of ANILCA, whose primary responsibilities were to defend the state's responsibilities and authorities in some of those key provisions for state social and economic benefits. I served as the first state ANILCA coordinator, setting up the ANILCA team in 1981. Then went on to represent ADF&G in that ANILCA program for nearly 30 years. More than once I was told by a political appointee in the administration that the state would not defend specific methods of access or other rights under ANILCA because the administration did not support those provisions in law. 4:46:49 PM MS. CUNNING continued: So thank heavens there was an independent commission that could operate independently, was not interfered by administration politics and able to defend individual all-Alaskans' rights as passed by Congress in ANILCA. CACFA helps individual Alaskans deal with filling out their guide permit applications, for fulfilling their mining rights that they had prior to ANILCA, their property rights, access to their inholdings, and development of those individual inholdings. One of the things that we in the state's ANILCA program learned early on, was that CACFA had their ear to the ground all over the state. They worked where individual federal managers were, for example, withholding permits for guiding because they were inappropriately granting more points to guides who practiced catch and release than those guides that allowed their clients to legally keep fish caught. So while the state's ANILCA program vigorously defends the state's fisheries management authorities in federal plans and regulations, federal managers were applying their own values on individual Alaskans and their individual business opportunities that CACFA could then step in and help resolve. CACFA pursued use of cabins for trapping, which is expressly authorized in ANILCA. But federal managers were destroying cabins. CACFA brought to light where federal managers were not allowing subsistence users to use traditional methods of access for subsistence. CACFA was able to enquire and resolve so that federal managers could not hold a vendetta against the individuals who had a complaint. The agency staffs couldn't and didn't have the resources to help individual Alaskans navigate the red tape of federal permitting or to hold hearings in rural areas where an agency was proposing to limit activities, whereas CACFA was authorized and had volunteers from around Alaska that served as those individual commissioners to pursue resolving those conflicts on behalf of individual Alaskans. 4:48:52 PM MS. CUNNING continued: It is only fitting that CACFA be reauthorized again to continue this valuable job 30 years after Bettye died. Her vision for a public forum to protect individual public rights to use the lands and resources that were legislated in ANILCA is needed as much today as perhaps ever. 4:49:12 PM Let me share one last example. Last week the public comment period ended on national draft regulations proposed by the Fish and Wildlife Service regarding rights-of-way for inholdings and for developing transportation and utility infrastructure between communities. The regulations completely ignored ANILCA's provisions for a process to permit such infrastructure. Not one word. The complete ignoring of that right will have serious impacts on communities in rural Alaska, for development of the ANCSA corporation lands, as well as the state lands. And I'm a person who monitors this stuff fairly closely and I didn't even hear these regulations were out till the last minute. Without CACFA, there was no information or effort to educate the affected Native corporations, the communities, or other interests. The state wrote an excellent letter, but no one else even begins to understand the impacts in Alaska if those regulations are allowed to be finalized as written, particularly the impacts on individuals. 4:50:19 PM CHAIR REVAK described ANILCA as a very complicated law. He commented that it has been 41 years and the federal government has yet to figure out the locations of navigable waters. He expressed appreciation for her comments and said he understands the value of CACFA. 4:50:38 PM CHAIR REVAK opened public testimony on SB 101. 4:50:52 PM STAN LEAPHART, representing self, Fairbanks, Alaska, disclosed that he worked for the Citizen's Advisory Committee on Federal Areas from August 1982 until July 1999 and 2007 to 2014. He was also a member of the Alaska State Lands Advisory Group that advised the commission on issues important to the public. MR. LEAPHART said Senator Fahrenkamp's thinking in creating the commission was how would ANILCA be implemented in a way that protects Alaskans' traditional use of the federal lands because they are essential to Alaskans to use for hunting, fishing, and resource development. For ten years after passage of this unprecedented piece of legislation there were management plans were being written by various federal agencies and regulations promulgated. The public was overwhelmed because most people had never looked at either proposed federal regulations for implementing a statute or an environmental impact statement (EIS). CACFA saw its job as trying to help the public do this. In addition to the regularly scheduled commission meetings where CACFA took testimony from the public, they sponsored public meetings around the state. For example, the National Park Service in the late '80s held three public meetings in urban areas on proposed regulations to regulate the use and construction of cabins in national parks. CASFCA thought that was inadequate so it held additional public meetings. CHAIR REVAK asked, in the interest of time, if he would conclude his comments. MR. LEAPHART urged the committee to support and pass SB 101 because CACFA serves a purpose that no other state agency fulfills. It is a useful tool for the citizens and the State of Alaska itself. 4:55:13 PM JOHN STURGEON, representative, Safari Club International Alaska Chapter (AK SCI), Anchorage, Alaska, related that this club advocates for hunters, promotes conservation based on science, promotes hunting and conservation education, and sponsors humanitarian programs such as Wounded Warriors on Safari. He stated that AK SCI adamantly supports SB 101 to reauthorize CACFA; it does what the average citizen is unable to do. The federal government promulgates a large variety of land use plans and regulations and CACFA does a very good job of tracking these where it is nearly impossible for a private citizen to do so. He concluded his comments by restating that Safari Club International Alaska Chapter supports passage of SB 101. 4:56:41 PM CHAIR REVAK closed public testimony on SB 101, and asked if there were questions or comments. 4:56:50 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI commented that it was unusual to see a zero fiscal note for an extension of a board or commission. He questioned whether authorizing the extension without the money to do the job might be setting CACFA up for failure. CHAIR REVAK noted that a member of the finance committee was on this committee. 4:57:37 PM At ease 4:58:23 PM CHAIR REVAK reconvened the meeting and stated that Senator Kawasaki brought up an important point and he would hold SB 101 so the committee could look into the lack of funding for this commission.
Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
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SB 101 Sponsor Statement-CACFA 3.26.21.pdf |
SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 Support DOC Newsminer Editorial 11.15.2020.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 White Paper Differneces ANILCA Program & CACFA.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 Letter of Support Stan Leaphart 3.28.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 Letter of Support SCI AK 3.28.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 Letter of Support Charlie Lean 3.28.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 DNR OPMP Fiscal Note 3.26.2021.pdf |
SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 LB&A CACFA Audit Report 4.8.2020.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 AOC Letter of Support 3.26.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 30x30 Presentation by Mylius 3.29.21 final.pdf |
SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB101 Letter of Support CAP 4.2.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SFIN 4/20/2021 9:00:00 AM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |
SB 101 Support Leeter Mary Bishop 4.28.21.pdf |
HRES 5/14/2021 1:00:00 PM SRES 3/29/2021 3:30:00 PM |
SB 101 |