Legislature(2001 - 2002)
04/16/2002 01:40 PM Senate L&C
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
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ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
SENATE LABOR & COMMERCE COMMITTEE
April 16, 2002
1:40 pm
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Ben Stevens, Chair
Senator Alan Austerman
Senator Loren Leman
Senator John Torgerson
Senator Bettye Davis
MEMBERS ABSENT
All Members Present
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
CS FOR HOUSE BILL NO. 504(FIN) am
"An Act relating to the wages of people working in the fisheries
business."
SCHEDULED BUT NOT HEARD
SENATE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 44
Relating to preparation of a joint state-federal research and
development plan.
MOVED CSSJR 44(L&C) OUT OF COMMITTEE
PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION
SJR 44 - No previous action to consider.
WITNESS REGISTER
Mr. George B. Newton, Chairman
U.S. Arctic Research Commission
4350 N. Fairfax Dr., Suite 630
Arlington VA 22703
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SJR 44.
Mr. Mead Treadwell, Managing Director
Institute of the North
Anchorage AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SJR 44.
ACTION NARRATIVE
TAPE 02-21, SIDE A
Number 001
SJR 44-STATE-FEDERAL JOINT RESEARCH PLAN
CHAIRMAN BEN STEVENS called the Senate Labor & Commerce Committee
meeting to order at 1:40 pm and announced that HB 504 was pending
on referral and that they would take up SJR 44.
SENATOR LEMAN explained that SJR 44 talks about research in
Alaska and how we can better coordinate among state and federal
agencies. They have seven of the eight commissioners present from
the U.S. Arctic Research Commission. He noted that Russ Kelly who
is working on his staff is an intern from the University of
Alaska Fairbanks and this is one of his projects.
MR. GEORGE NEWTON, Chairman, U.S. Arctic Research Commission,
introduced Mead Treadwell - Institute of the North, Dr. Jackie
Grebmeier - University of Tennessee, Mary Jane Fate - Indigenous
member, Dr. John Hobbie - Woods Hole MA, Mr. Jack Roderick -
Anchorage, and Mr. Jim Llewellyn - Bell South as the commission
members who were present. He said that he was from McClaine,
Virginia and had been on the commission since 1992 and this is
his second term as chairman. He said the Arctic Research
Commission was formed in 1984 as is primarily the product of the
work of Senator Frank Murkowski.
It consists of seven members as mentioned earlier. We
are all presidential appointees. It's important to
recognize, I think, in the make up of the commission
there are four of us who must be associated with some
research entity or some research activity. Two of us
come from the business sector and one member must be
representative of the indigenous peoples of Alaska.
We do no research. We rely on our ability to motivate
research in the proper direction from effectively the
bully pulpit by convincing other organizations that the
research they are planning or the research we recommend
should be undertaken for the betterment of the state of
Alaska and the United States. Our primary function is
to recommend policies and priorities to the president
and to congress and that, I think, is one of the unique
elements of the Arctic Research and Policy Act in that
it allows us to talk directly to both the president and
to the legislative branch.
Among our more detailed duties are things such as to
promote cooperation - to get federal agencies to
cooperate with the state of Alaska and the towns and
cities of Alaska, to share data, to promote a
cooperative effort and logistics to further Arctic
research and lastly, to work with the state, as I
mentioned.
He was very excited about the future prospects of the Arctic even
though there are problems, like the protection and preservation
of the Arctic as we know it today. He added that he includes
Alaska as part of the Arctic. The boundary comes from the Arctic
Circle down the Yukon River into the Bering Sea. They are
concerned about the problems of Alaska's infrastructure and
preservation of the Bering Sea ecosystem. The rapid warming of
the Arctic is a direct and immediate concern as the impacts will
be realized by our children and grandchildren.
Among the opportunities to exploit are the possible shipping of
oil from the North Slope to supplement the activities on the
TAPS. This makes ports like Adak and Dutch Harbor potential
opportunities as trans shipment points, where cargo shifts from
ice-strengthened ships that have traversed the Arctic into ships
that ply the oceans of the warmer temperate oceans. The reason
for this hearing is to work with the State, the Alaska Science
Technology Foundation and the University of Alaska in a
cooperative effort to develop a plan for the future economic
development within the State of Alaska. It is one of the direct
important mandates that is held under the Arctic Research and
Policy Act.
He left the committee with a report on Goals and Objectives,
which they public every two years and he encouraged them to read
it.
SENATOR LEMAN asked what their annual budget is and to compare
what the U.S. spends on research in the Arctic to what is spent
on the Antarctic.
MR. NEWTON replied that their budget is just over $1 million and
they fund no actual research. They might have $5,000 - $10,000 to
fund a conference or meeting at which Arctic research is the
primary function. The rest goes to salaries, lights, heat and
real estate and publishing things like their report.
The research dollars for the Arctic and Antarctic are essentially
equal if he limits it to the National Science Foundation. "It is
in the research logistics budgets where there exists a
significant disparity."
The costs of getting there and buying the equipment to support
research and staying there, etc. is about $25 million per year or
about half of the total Arctic budget at NSF.
In the Antarctic there is $25 - $30 million for research and
almost $180 million for getting there and staying there. This is
in response to a presidential directive that was signed many
years ago that committed the United State to maintain three
stations in the Antarctic, Palmer Station, McMurdo and the South
Pole Station. It also pays for the entire infrastructure of the
bases.
MR. NEWTON said when he joined the commission, there was almost
no Arctic research logistics budget. The commission supported a
study that was done by the Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S.
in Fairbanks in conjunction with some support from the National
Science Foundation. It was used by the Senate to create a
separate budget line item for Arctic research. Now their research
grants are used on research.
The U.S. government total budget for Antarctic, including all
federal agencies is approximately $190 million and it has
remained level for the past five or six years. The National
Science Foundation budget has increased significantly to support
Arctic research, almost in an opposite direction to the
Department of Defense budget. The Arctic research budget from DOD
has shrunk from over $20 million five years ago down to $2.7
million this past year. It has been one of his personal goals to
have greater equity achieved in the two budgets. The other way
they can close the gap most effectively is to arrive at more
effective research within Congress and the Office of Management
and Budget, because it's tricky to arrive at a coordinated budget
request for the same project when it appears in the requests of
several different agencies under different budget examiners.
1:55 pm
SENATOR AUSTERMAN asked if he supported the resolution.
MR. NEWTON said he does. It's broad in its statement, but it fits
well with the research elements they have supported in the past.
One of the mandates within the Arctic Research and Policy is Act
is that the Arctic Research Commission is to cooperate in
research activities and guidance with the state of Alaska and the
local communities.
SENATOR LEMAN asked if he had any thoughts on how they would
translate information derived from research either into expanding
the Alaskan economy or defending what we have.
MR. NEWTON responded that the first thing is to identify a
problem and recognize it as a problem and then to generate
concepts into how that can translate into economic improvements.
For instance, the fish in the Bering Sea - they would have to
find out when and where they are and what their threats are and
work that somehow into an improvement. It's a bit more tangible
to identify threats to the infrastructure, which is something
they are working on now - identifying climate change and civil
infrastructure in an effort to identify the particularly
vulnerable elements to the degradation of permafrost, which
underlies approximately 50% of the state.
CHAIRMAN STEVENS said Executive Order 12501 that established the
Commission, section 9, numbers 6 and 8 are to facilitate
cooperation between the federal government, state and local
government and recommend the undertaking of neglected areas of
research and asked for an example or two of things that had been
addressed under that section.
MR. NEWTON replied that one of the things they had started
supporting four years ago is an annual meeting at the University
of Alaska Anchorage that deals with infrastructure within the
State of Alaska, through the School of Engineering. They have
contributed funds to get the meetings started that are now an
annual event. Four years ago they identified a trend in the
warming of the Arctic and the impacts on the state would be very
significant, particularly in harbors, ports and coastlines and in
permafrost.
Most of the attendees, from his perception, have come from
commercial interests in the state, but there hasn't been a great
deal of interest from state officials.
CHAIRMAN STEVENS said that led into section 8, which says to
coordinate with the government and the state of Alaska in
fulfilling the responsibilities of this act.
MR. NEWTON reiterated that they hadn't had much interest from the
state.
CHAIRMAN STEVENS asked if that is the reason they have brought
the resolution to the legislature.
MR. NEWTON replied yes. They need to be more and do more.
CHAIRMAN STEVENS asked him to give an overview of what the
objective or vision of the plan would be.
MR. NEWTON replied he believes that they are working together
with the elements of ASTF, the University and the State to
develop a plan that will lead to greater economic development
within the State. They have regretted that there wasn't greater
industry in the State of Alaska that provided value added to the
resources.
SENATOR DAVIS asked if this resolution had been discussed with
the Science and Technologies Director and what was his input.
MR. MEAD TREADWELL, commissioner, said he is a former member of
the Alaska Science and Technology Foundation and he had extensive
discussions with Dr. Kenworthy, Executive Director, ASTF,
University leadership and federal agencies (whom they would like
to see participate more about this resolution.
SENATOR DAVIS asked if they envisioned being able to bring some
source of funding to technologies or are they looking for a
source of funding for themselves.
MR. TREADWELL replied that they hadn't asked for a grant or a
fiscal note.
SENATOR DAVIS asked what their intentions were.
MR. TREADWELL said that each of the entities have a
responsibility for research in Alaska. The federal agency has to
prepare its own budgets and respond to the Arctic Research
Commission, the Science and Technology Foundation has its own
budget, the University is a large recipient of hundreds of
millions of dollars of research funds that we helped them get.
The idea here is how to take those funds and these
efforts and see where coordination could be helpful for
the economy and the health of the environment of the
state. This resolution encourages trying to get the
four of us to sit down together to begin with. I can
say we've advice to the commission from both senators
in the Alaska congressional delegation that we use our
bully pulpit at the commission to try to bring together
marine research in the state. Our executive director
sits on the Board of the North Pacific Research Fund
and we are advocating that the Research Fund develop a
kind of broad national research council review of
marine fisheries research in this state right now.
That's something that I can say that I've heard the
University people advocate, I've heard [indisc.]
advocate. We've worked together on that.
Just two other elements on Senator Stevens' earlier
question on the economy. There's an element of the
resolution that asks us to work with the federal land
holding agencies to see what kind of research is
necessary to take federal lands and get them into
production. They own much more land in the state than
we do as a state and yet we're doing 90% of the
revenues from that. Any yet they really don't have a
development plan and we'd like to see what research
they feel is necessary to get that land into
development.
SENATOR LEMAN said he had two amendments to offer that are
cleanup brought to his attention by members of the commission. He
moved amendment 1. There were no objections and it was adopted.
SENATOR LEMAN moved to adopt amendment 2 that expands lands of
Alaska to waters and air space. It's consistent with the mission
of the Arctic Research Commission. There were no objections and
the amendment was adopted.
SENATOR LEMAN moved to pass CSSJR 44(L&C) from committee with
individual recommendations. There were no objections and it was
so ordered.
CHAIRMAN STEVENS thanked everyone for being there and adjourned
the meeting at 2:12 pm.
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