Fees will increase to help pay for a backlog of neglected harbor maintenance after the Homer City council passed a measure Monday night to pursue matching grant funding with a $5 million revenue bond.
The Port and Harbor Improvement Committee recommended four main areas to target for fixes with $9 million. Of that, $4.7 million would come from revenue bonds and the rest from grants, including two Denali Grants totaling nearly $1 million.
One noticeable absence from the list was the Homer Harbormaster’s Office, a building that has caught fire twice, and dates back to the early 1980s in a cobbling together of three other buildings. Council member Francie Roberts asked why it was taken off the list. A replacement building has been on a town priority list for nearly 30 years.
“It always ends up getting removed for some reason,” said Mayor Jim Hornaday.
But, Councilmember Barbara Howard explained, on behalf of the committee, that they were put in a difficult spot trying to keep it on the list of projects to be funded with the revenue bond-grants.
“We wanted to keep it on, but it was not eligible for matching funds. It was the committee’s wishes to only bond for the amount that we could get matching funds.”
Buffering the harbor entrance against erosion also was removed for the same reason.
The council agreed to allow the city administration to prepare grant applications and sell bonds for the four main projects:
The Ramp 3 gangway and approach
A harbor float replacement
System 5 upgrades
Load and launch ramp
The bond debt would be serviced by an increase in fuel wharfage, moorage, ice and dockage fees. The projected amount based on use is to raise $496,590 over two years. The new fees are: fuel wharfage is now .02 per gallon. Moorage increased 15 percent. Large ship dockage is now 100 percent similar to Anchorage rates.

Kachemak Drive bike trail
An enthusiastic contingent of commuter and recreational cyclists testified on the need to build a bike trail on Kachemak Drive. Bumpo Bremicker, the chair of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee, talked about funds already set aside specifically for trails that would be available to get the project started.
“The only trail I’ve heard a lot of vocal support for is the Kachemak Drive Trail. Its connectivity benefits is that it connects the two biggest trails we have now: The Homer Spit and the East End Road trails,” Bremicker said.
The group estimated it would cost about $1 million to build the four miles of trail. Bremicker said he was told that in using trail funds, the city could leverage a revenue stream. Volunteers could help build it.
Beth Cummings, a former member of the Parks and Recreation Committee, advocated for a route that would avoid a need for approval from all the property owners on Kachemak Drive. It would include three portions, one through the marine industrial area and two on government-owned lands.
Lindianne Sarno told the council a trail has both safety and economic benefits.
“Surveys emphasized (the public) wanted a path to be separate from the road. We live there, and we see up to 50 bicycles go by every day. It has increased a lot … we (speculate) because the Arctic bike technology has grown,” she said. The scenic ride on Kachemak Bay is made dangerous because it lacks a shoulder for bikes. “The funds are there. This is not a huge project figure. We figure it can be built in one year. When bikes are put in, business access increases. A bike path is a long, safe park.”
But when it came to voting on a resolution that would approve getting started on the trail – or at least supporting the concept – the council turned it down.
Councilmember Howard said she had five reasons to vote it down. The idea wasn’t passed through the Transportation Advisory Committee. She wasn’t convinced this trail carries more priority over other city trail desires. A financial plan isn’t far enough along to consider annual maintenance costs, she said. “And there’s the legal costs for acquiring the right way through moose habitat, wetlands.”
Councilman David Lewis said he supports putting a trail in.
“Through the years, I’ve been running on it, walked it, biked it. It’s a lousy (route). It’s dangerous,” he said. But, he too wanted to strike the endorsement to construct it just yet, until more of the funding questions are answered.
The group was advised to work with the Transportation Advisory Committee. Councilmember Beth Wythe also recalled the difficulty of working with homeowners on that stretch when it came to gaining easements for water and sewer line installations. Not all homeowners would agree.
“We need to know the costs associated with it, and have answers to access issues before a package for construction can actually be put forward,” Wythe said.
If both the water-sewer line easement and the trail could be tied together, it could answer both matters at once, Roberts said.
Councilman Beau Burgess expressed support, but wanted to know more about what the price tag is before “signing the dotted line.”
Bremicker told the council they will pursue the plans based on the council’s requests for more information.
• The Homer Boys and Girls Club has until December to retain its lease on the old Homer Intermediate School, the council agreed in a new resolution signed Monday night. Kelly Cooper, who is working on a task force devising financial solutions for a permanent home, asked the council to carry the lease through December. That way they could apply for capital funding and grants, Cooper said.
One plan is to share the building with the city’s Community Parks and Rec program. It could then become a community center for a variety of healthy family activities.
• Passed: The council agreed to spend $900,000 on repaving roads in Homer. The money comes from the Homer Accelerated Roads and Trails Program.

National Bike Month is an opportunity to celebrate the unique power of the bicycle and the many reasons we ride. Whether you bike to work or school; to save money or time; to preserve your health or the environment; to explore your community or get to your destination, get involved in Bike Month in your city or state — and help get more people in your community out riding, too.
Somehow we’re already into the thick of Bike To Work Week, and by the time this goes to press several events have already concluded. On May 13, there was a group Spit ride which was open to riders of all ages and abilities. The afternoon was blustery, but still people showed up and enjoyed a mellow bike out to Coal Town Coffee for treats before the ride back. Even blustery snow showers could not stop the fun.
Energizer booths and group rides are happening coast to coast, with Homer building on that tradition. Monday morning saw 22 bikers pass through the Energizer Booth at WKFL Park. Treats from Two Sisters were a welcome boost at the start of the work week.
Mayor Hornaday made a proclamation at City Council, declaring that for the City of Homer, May is Bike Month, 14-18 is Bike to Work Week and Friday the May 18 is Bike To Work Day.
Tuesday evening was a Bike Movie and Social evening. We screened “Ride The Divide,” an award-winning feature film about the world’s toughest mountain bike race, which traverses over 2700 miles along the Continental Divide in the Rocky Mountains. “The film weaves the story of three characters’ experiences with immense mountain beauty and small-town culture as they attempt to pedal from Banff, Canada to a small, dusty crossing on the Mexican border,” the summary states.
Afterward, Heidi Herzog and Andrew Peter shared more stories and slides from their bike trip in Central Asia.
It’s not too late to join in the Bike Week fun.

On Friday, Bike to Work Day: Swing by the Energizer Booth at WKFL Park between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m., there’ll be treats, juice and coffee, served with a big portion of camaraderie. There are sign in sheets for recording miles biked at the booth, and at various locations around town. New this year is online mileage recording, available on our website. Membership renewal is also available online.
A group ride kicks off the final celebrations for the week. Bicyclists will gather at WKFL Park after work on Friday, with the ride starting at 5:30 p.m. The ride will be at a pace designed for cyclists of any experience level to participate. As a primary focus of HCC is safety, helmets are mandatory! We will ride around town, ending at the Beluga Lake Lodge in time for the second Annual Meeting of the Homer Cycling Club. Paid up members of HCC will vote for the Board of Directors, which is one of the final hurdles in preparing to apply for 501c3 non-profit status.
The purpose of the HCC is to improve conditions for bicyclists at the local level, to establish bike routes and mountain bike trails, host group rides, organize events such as races and promote bicycling as environmentally friendly, healthy and enjoyable.
Monthly meetings are on the first Wednesday of each month in Room B103 at Homer High School at 6:30 p.m.
Further information available at homercyclingclub.com.

Catriona Lowe is a local biking enthusiast and mother who contributes recreational and cultural ideas to Homer life.

Japan’s decision to walk away from nuclear power has it scrambling for natural gas, giving the U.S. a chance to be a large-scale energy exporter.
A week ago, Japan pulled the plug on the last unit of the Tomari nuclear plant, leaving the country without nuclear energy for the first time since May 1970. Just across the Pacific a few days earlier, Alaska approved a plan for a pipeline to move natural gas from the North Slope to the coast for liquefaction and export.
The two seemingly unrelated events mark the beginning of an emerging strategic energy partnership, built around the United States’ growing glut of natural gas, that could reduce its trade deficit with Japan and strengthen its bond with the world’s third-largest economy.
Just over a year after an earthquake and tsunami caused a meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, Japan is facing power shortages as it heads into the summer without the source of energy that had provided nearly 30 percent of the nation’s electricity. As the country works to make up for lost capacity, natural gas is the obvious choice.
Enter the United States. With the recent discoveries of vast shale deposits of natural gas around the country, energy companies are scrambling to build gas-export terminals nationwide. Because of its location, Alaska has emerged as the likeliest supplier to Japan.
For four decades, the state has been sending small quantities of liquified natural gas to Japan from a ConocoPhillips export facility on the Kenai Peninsula. The facility’s export license is good for another year of small-scale exports, but as interest grows in larger exports to the Asia-Pacific, Alaskan officials are looking to develop the rich natural-gas resources on the North Slope.
Most of the ConocoPhillips exports to Japan have come from the Cook Inlet basin, but production there has slowed, and much of that gas goes to fulfill the high winter demand in the local market. The bigger opportunity is in northern Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay and Thompson Point, which together contain an estimated 35 trillion cubic feet of proven gas reserves.
Alaska needs Japan as much as Japan needs natural gas. No pipeline transports gas from Alaska to the lower 48, and the economics—near-record-low prices for gas combined with the shale boom across the country—don’t support building one. In fact, the state recently directed pipeline builder TransCanada to focus on expanding an existing pipeline built for exports, diverting attention from an alternative that would have brought natural gas through Alberta, Canada, down to markets southward.
Meanwhile, profits are far higher in Asia than in Europe and the United States. Asian LNG prices hover around $14 to $16 per million British thermal units, while the U.S. surplus has brought domestic prices down to $2 to $3 per MBtu. This stark disparity means that no viable market for Alaska’s gas exists in the rest of the U.S., but the Japanese government is the perfect customer, because it badly needs the fuel and is willing to pay above the market price.
Although Tokyo is still evaluating its energy policy, public opinion remains largely opposed to nuclear power, and a permanently nuclear-free Japan remains highly possible, leaving the country more dependent on energy imports as a result.
That likely future has Japan’s government closely watching the debate in Washington about the impact of exports on domestic natural-gas prices, says Jane Nakano, a fellow in the energy and national-security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Nakano adds that the Japanese are also following the administration’s licensing decisions for new export facilities and its moves to regulate hydraulic fracturing, the extraction process that has created the shale boom.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, the ranking member on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, met with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda during his visit to Washington in late April. “An LNG line from the North Slope could deliver long-term, stable energy supplies to Japan at a reasonable price,” Murkowski said.
She and others believe that Alaska could serve Japan’s needs while also ensuring that local customers don’t suffer. A pipeline from northern Alaska to export terminals in the south could have distribution points along the way to provide for the state’s energy needs, they say.
For the U.S., the benefits of exporting natural gas to Japan are also clear. Not only would it help reduce the $63 billion bilateral trade deficit, but an energy partnership could also have a strategic value as the U.S. pivots its foreign policy toward Asia.
And Washington may want to move quickly. Tokyo has also been weighing a pipeline from Russia, which holds the world’s largest natural-gas reserves, and expansion of its renewable-energy portfolio. But both options are problematic. Japan is wary about entering the fray of Russian pipeline politics that has been plaguing surrounding nations for decades. Expanding renewable energy, meanwhile, is a long-term and costly prospect, and it remains a less tangible resource than natural gas.
Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, said he is not sure that natural-gas exports will do much to alter the thorny U.S.-Japan trade relationship, citing U.S. companies’ limited access to Japanese markets. “It’s not a particularly open economy,” he said.
Reinsch noted, however, that if America shies away from natural-gas exports, it risks isolating itself like China has. Possessing more than 90 percent of the global rare-earth mineral supply, Beijing has kept a tight lid on exports, infuriating the rest of the world. “We would not want to end up like the Chinese on rare earths, trying to keep control of the commodity,” he said of America’s vast natural-gas resources. “I would hate to see us fall into the same trap.”

Olga Belogolova is a writer for Nationaljournal.com

When we first moved to Homer last summer, finding a playground was at the top of my kids’ to-do list.  Not only are playgrounds a good place to run off the extra energy that kids seem to continuously exude, they are also important for meeting new friends and developing social skills.
The closest playground to our house is at Karen Hornaday Park, less than a mile away and a nice walking distance.  We made only one trip to that playground last summer, because once was enough to see that it just wasn’t a fun place for small kids to play. Many structures were missing pieces or just not built for little legs to climb (heck, I even had a hard time climbing up some of the ladders). It was also very dirty, even by Alaska standards, with the base set in gravel and sand. But the location is amazing – views of the bay and mountains, and right next to the hospital so kids can watch the helicopter come and go. After emptying the gravel out of their shoes, my kids begged to go back to “the big Groton playground” that we used to frequent near our previous home in Connecticut.  Um, that’s 5,000 miles away. Sorry, kids. Instead, we made do with the tiny Bayview Park because, although it was really meant for toddlers, it is the only park in town that feels safe and clean.
We went to the Homer Street Faire later in the summer and were so excited when we discovered a fabulous group of community members there who were trying to raise funds for a new playground. They sucked us in with tables full of bubbles and play dough and then told me all about their vision while the kids were occupied. What a wonderful idea, especially for a town like Homer that has such a sense of community and is brimming with creativity.  
The Homer Playground Project (HOPP for short) raised funds all fall and winter, and on the last day of April they topped the $250,000 mark. What a huge accomplishment for a town of this size, in this economy. Thanks to the organization and guidance from Deb Cox and Miranda Weiss, donations of time and money from all corners of Homer, and beyond, started as a trickle and have now become something akin to a spring-breakup-fueled river.
I must admit, my real involvement in HoPP, aside from ordering a picket for the park fence engraved with my kids’ names, didn’t really begin until the past month. A core group of nearly frazzled people has been tirelessly organizing and fundraising behind the scenes, and I finally managed to make it to one of their now-weekly meetings to see what I could do to help. Build Week is just a couple of weeks away, May 20-27. That’s right, a completely volunteer workforce, made up of Homer residents just like you, is building the entire playground in one week. Thanks to the playground firm Play By Design, HOPP has Build Week down to a science, from knowing how many hammers are needed to arranging volunteers for childcare (who will even be background-checked for safety) to securing food donations for the volunteers.  
Now is the time that they need the rest of us to step in and do our part. Do you have a few minutes to gather friends or co-workers to commit to working a building or childcare shift? How about a couple of hours to bake up some snacks for the workers? Do you own a Homer-area business that can donate a meal during a build shift? There are three build shifts per day, with 100 volunteers needed per shift. If you’re into math, that comes out to 2,400 openings to fill for builders alone. Anyone over the age of 14 can take part in the building, and the jobs range from carrying wood and hammering nails to more skilled tasks involving power tools, all under the guidance of Build Captains. Each shift will receive a meal and snacks, as well as the satisfaction of being able to say, “Hey, I helped make this happen!”
When the project is complete, a visit to Karen Hornaday Park will be more than just an hour at the playground. It will be the chance to show your kids and grandkids what Homer can accomplish when we work together to better our town. What better way to teach our younger generations the importance of investing in their community than by doing the same ourselves?
For more information on Build Week and to sign up for building, childcare, or food donations, visit www.homerplaygroundproject.org. You may also call Deb Cox at 299-1516.

Christy Newell is involved in HoPP.

What cheats Alaska hunters of more moose: Wolves and bears, or insects and hares?
I am always amused by people who support America’s mission to establish democracies around the world, yet who are determined to subvert democracy here at home. I am likewise amused by people who protest against government coercion, yet who revel in tyrannizing anyone who doesn’t see the world their way.
According to our state Constitution, the Board of Game is supposed to represent the interests of all Alaskans. Its members should include representatives from all major “interest” groups. It should not be monolithic. Each member should strive to find ways to meet the needs of all interest groups, instead of trying to hog all the wildlife for just one interest — harvest.
Say what you will about people needing moose and caribou to eat. I know what need means first-hand. I have lived deep in the bush where we would have starved if we had failed to bag a moose in the autumn. Now, by contrast, eating moose and caribou is not a need but a luxury for me, one which I enjoy but don’t pretend is still a matter of survival. It costs many Alaskans more money to harvest wild game than to buy meat in a supermarket — at least if harvest requires a rifle worth a couple of thousand bucks, a $10,000 4-wheeler, trailer, pickup truck, or chartering or owning an airplane.
Furthermore, much of the push for “Intensive Management” comes from the hunting guide industry and the businesses that guided hunters support (sporting goods stores, ATV dealers, firearms, air taxi, etc.) That is fine. Perfectly legitimate. But so is the wildlife viewing industry.
According to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, viewing contributes an estimated $700 million per year to Alaska’s economy – much more than hunting does. At least viewing did before “Intensive Management” was shoved down our throats. I have yet to see even a hint that the Board of Game was seriously trying to understand the needs of the wildlife viewing industry, much less to find ways to sustain that industry. Why torpedo one industry to favor another, especially when careful planning would allow them to coexist? Why deny Alaskans one form of recreation in favor of another, when both forms could coexist?
Coexistence? Is that really possible? Easily. Most needs of wildlife viewers, whether viewing is done for profit or pleasure, could be met by tailoring management for viewing in just a miniscule portion of Alaska, leaving rest of our State lands to be managed for hunting. Yet the Board has never, to my knowledge, offered to sit down with viewers and work out a plan.
Of course, viewers are welcome to submit proposals. Some of us have. Only to see them treated with blatant contempt.
Those of us involved in wildlife viewing, especially “predator” viewing, have been stonewalled whenever we try to discuss this issue with board members. They aren’t there to serve Alaskans in all our diversity, but only that small segment of Alaskans belonging to groups such as the Outdoor Council. “Winner take all” politics at its most venal.
Recall the old saying, “Man cannot live by bread alone.” Nor can we live by meat alone, not in the modern world. Think about this: Do you reap benefits from any business supported by the wildlife viewing industry — for instance do you own or work in a restaurant, gas station, lodge/hotel/motel/B&B, grocery store, sporting goods store, etc.? If so, the Board of Game’s fanatical focus on maximizing moose and caribou numbers to the exclusion of all other benefits from wildlife could eventually be taking money out of your pocket. It could be depriving you of a variety of other benefits too.
It’s long past time for our Legislature to refuse to seat any new member on the Game Board who does not represent the wildlife viewing industry. In fact, it should flush the entire existing board and replace it with a whole panel of new members who represent the whole spectrum of interests dear to the heart of Alaskans, as well as deep knowledge about wildlife biology and ecology.
Meanwhile, the existing Board should abandon its comic-book biology approach to wildlife management, and learn enough science to understand what it really takes to sustain game populations in perpetuity.
No, Gov. Parnell, privatizing Alaska’s wildlife is not the answer; and giving kickbacks to hunting organizations that provide your campaign contributions is anything but ethical, even when kickbacks take the form of an organization being able to auction off special hunting opportunities. Graft and corruption aren’t confined to extractive industries.

Stephen F. Stringham, Ph.D., is director of the Bear Viewing Association, a consulting wildlife biologist and president of WildWatch LLC.

Roughly 250 people have been trained on the Kenai Peninsula as Community Emergency Response Team volunteers. Each of us has invested considerable time, effort and devotion to learning how to minimize the havoc wreaked by disasters big or small.
We haven’t been paid for our time or expenses. Rather, we have donated them, asking in return only that our community reciprocate by providing needed equipment, supplies and training, both in the classroom and through exercises like the tsunami drill and Alaska Shield.
To achieve this, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Office of Emergency Management has applied far and wide for grants. Small amounts have trickled in here and there over the past few years. But we haven’t hit any jackpots until a few months ago. The borough was finally offered five state Homeland Security Program grants.
• $23,000 — training CERT instructors and team leaders, CERT background screening and CERT training supplies (instructor and participant manuals, etc.).
• $15,000 CERT Protective and Emergency Equipment and Supplies — Replenishing our supply of basic gear kits for new volunteers, traffic and scene safety gear (including high visibility vests, light wands, vehicle lights), a CERT trailer, radio/GPS units, helmet chin straps, first aid and triage supplies and etc.
• $10,250 — Computing equipment for the KPB Incident Management Team that would be deployed to the Emergency Operations Center during a mass disaster: 10 rugged laptop computers with software, charging system, wheeled weatherproof carrying case, wireless and Internet.
• $5,000 — Security and Vulnerability Study. The Alaska State Vulnerability Team would perform a security and seismic assessment of borough-owned facilities. The results would be used to improve planning strategies and mitigation efforts by the borough and the state and help prioritize projects for future funding.
• $217,000 — A second, portable, self-supporting medical center and shelter system (three-piece insulated shelter with generator, sanitation system, hot and cold water system, heaters and lighting), basic first aid/mass casualty supplies, and two trailers for storage and transportation.
The borough needs a minimum of three of these shelters, for instance one each at Seward, Soldotna and Homer — points from which they can be deployed to any point on the main Kenai Peninsula, across Kachemak Bay or across Cook Inlet, if needed.
These grants were bundled under Ordinance 2011-19-63 and submitted to the assembly for acceptance. Perhaps OEM thought, as I did, that the need for these items was so obvious that acceptance would be a slam dunk, even without any supportive testimony from community members.
I was wrong. The grants were declined. I spoke with two assembly members afterwards and learned that some members either did not understand the need for these items or they were practicing fiscal frugality — not recognizing that this was a case of penny-wise and pound foolish, where the cost of healing after a disaster dwarfs the costs of minimized damage by thorough preparedness. Not only wouldn’t this cost us a dime, it would save us from having to buy these items out of borough funds.
Perhaps more critically, the assembly saw no sign of community support. Live and learn. But we didn’t make that mistake again.
When the amended ordinance, now numbered 2011-19-77, came up for a vote April 3, the assembly passed the measure 9-0 – unanimously.

Steve Stringham is a CERT volunteer.

Brett Glidden is a 10-year resident of Homer, mother of two kindergartners at McNeil Canyon Elementary and studying social work with a special interest in youth advocacy.

Ken Taylor, the outgoing vice president of environment for the Pebble Partnership, invited Alaskans to read their recently released Environmental Baseline Document in a Compass piece dated March 16. He encouraged citizens worried about Pebble to dive into its 30,800 pages. The document doesn’t describe mine plans, so it’s unclear how it would alleviate concerns about mine development. But I dived in nonetheless, focusing on their analysis of earthquake risk.
I was actually quite excited to read this document. I’m a geologist specializing in geologic hazards like earthquakes and tsunamis. A year ago, Mr. Taylor promised me the EBD would include a detailed analysis of earthquake risk, incorporating new data from Pebble’s own studies.
Southwest Alaska, like much of the Pacific Rim, is a seismically active and geologically complicated place. But while geologists have scoured places like Japan and California, faults in rural Alaska are not well studied. For example, the Lake Clark Fault’s trajectory relative to the Pebble prospect is unknown.
With access to millions of dollars and specialized survey equipment, I was hopeful that Pebble’s scientists could expand this knowledge.
As it turns out, only seven pages out of 30,800 were dedicated to earthquake risk. No new science. They rely only on a handful of previous studies, none of which pinpoint the location of the Lake Clark Fault where it passes near Pebble, or determine whether the fault might produce large earthquakes. Other developers pursue a much higher standard in planning for seismic risk. For example, the Alaska Pipeline Project put millions of dollars into research on earthquakes along their pipeline route.
Pebble’s conclusions based on these references? Earthquake risk at Pebble is “not considered to be significant.” But the logic used to draw this conclusion is rife with contradictions and faulty assumptions.
Pebble argues there is no evidence of earthquakes on the Lake Clark Fault. A lack of knowledge is not proof the fault isn’t active.
Pebble argues that rocks near the prospect are so strong that faults wouldn’t break them. But Pebble’s own geologic map of the prospect (Chapter 3 of the EBD) charts many small faults.
Pebble implies that faults follow glaciers, so the Lake Clark Fault likely deviates around the mine site, as ice-age glaciers did. But examples across Alaska and elsewhere, including the Lake Clark Fault, show faults can cut right across glacial flow.
These latter two flawed arguments are their basis for concluding that the Lake Clark Fault abruptly veers from its nearly straight path toward the heart of the Pebble prospect.
Getting these details right really matters. Mine facilities and tailings dams are built to a certain engineering standard — designed to withstand an earthquake with a particular strength and location. If this is miscalculated, a tailings dam could fail, flooding downstream waters with potentially billions of tons of toxic waste.
If these seven pages contain bad science on such a critical issue as earthquake risk, what about the other 30,793?
If you want to convince me that Pebble faces no earthquake threat, I have some suggestions:
• Use the best bedrock mapping techniques (e.g. aeromagnetics) to extend the mapped trace of the Lake Clark Fault well beyond Pebble.
• Conduct a high-quality LIDAR (light detection and ranging) survey of any possible paths for the fault, and also of elevated shorelines along Lake Clark and Lake Iliamna.
• Find experts with a proven record of finding and establishing the activity of faults to do fieldwork and analyze the data.
And make the data and results available so that I can convince myself the prospect truly sits in a tectonic sanctuary far from the raucous geology that typifies Alaska.

Bretwood Higman lives in Seldovia and is executive director of the nonprofit Ground Truth Trekking. He has a doctorate in earth and space sciences from the University of Washington and is conducting studies of possible seismic hazards near the Pebble Mine prospect.

In 1905, Max Weber wrote “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,” in which he described how a religiously instilled work ethic became a moral imperative reinforcing capitalist economics. Weber went beyond the surface structure of Protestantism and probed deeper political and economic aspects of how religion became the foundation of pre-corporate capitalism.
The economy has moved on, and so has Protestantism. Today the largest and fastest-growing Christian churches in America espouse a new type of Christianity called prosperity theology, also known as gospel prosperity or Christian materialism, which does for 21st-century corporate capitalism what early 20th-century Protestantism did for regular capitalism — connect economics to God’s blessing.
Today, prosperity theology is promoted by megachurches and televangelists. Its message is if you tithe and attend church, God will bless you with material wealth. Some of the best-known prosperity theology televangelists are Joel Osteen, the late Oral Roberts, Pat Robertson and Creflo Dollar. Osteen is head of the largest church in America, the Lakewood Church in Houston and today’s most prominent televangelist. He is quoted as saying, “God didn’t create you to be average or poor,” and, “God wants you to live in abundance.” Dollar has stated, “Some people say it’s about peace, joy and love. No. It’s about money.” Wealth has become a manifestation of the sacred.
Megachurches catering to middle- and upper-middle-class parishioners are the core of prosperity churches. The surface message may be born-again salvation, but the theological backstory is materialist wealth. The most prominent prosperity theology church in Alaska is the Anchorage Baptist Temple, headed by Rev. Jerry Prevo.
In a May 15, 2011, “Judgment Day” sermon posted on YouTube, Prevo concluded, “I’ve got a lot. … God’s blessed me (materially). … I don’t apologize for that. … God says, ‘Seek you first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added unto you’ (paraphrasing Matthew 6:33). I’ve just tried to do what God says to do and he’s added (wealth to me).”
Were he alive today, Max Weber would almost certainly point out that prosperity theology is much more than the delusion of the blessing of wealth. Prosperity theology is the religious basis of corporate capitalism promoting the sacrament of consumption and unsustainable development for the material benefit of the very rich (who may or may not be religious at all).
The thinking goes: God has chosen people, both in human and corporate form, to be wealthy. We should seek wealth to seek God’s blessing. We should honor that blessing by reducing taxes and other restrictions on the rich and their corporations. It’s God’s will people are rich and secular governments should not impede God’s will. Taxation is tantamount to sin. Poor folks, meanwhile, must be nonbelievers or at least backsliders because they aren’t rich and aren’t worthy of God’s blessing. The sacred becomes the profane.
In Alaska the multinational oil company’s wealth is a sign to prosperity theology adherents of God’s blessing and the demand for lower oil taxes is an instance of divine intervention. Resource development, if not sacred, is close to it. By implication, those who would channel Alaska’s wealth into public use such as roads, schools and communications infrastructure via oil taxes must be the devil’s consorts.
Many prosperity preachers also endorse a pre-tribulation Rapture, which they believe is coming soon. The combination of consumerism, resource extraction and end times does not bode well for sustainable conservation. The recent repurposing of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources promoting the oxymoron of maximum sustainable development of natural resources is in line with this type of theology.
That Anchorage’s most prominent prosperity theology church, the Anchorage Baptist Temple, hopes to erect a cross 100 feet taller than the Captain Cook Hotel would clearly brand Anchorage as the northern capitol of Christian materialism. That, of course, may be true.
Some of the harshest critics of prosperity theology are Pentecostal fundamentalists who call the idea that God blesses through wealth blasphemy. They would note, for example, that a few paragraphs before the passage cited above by Rev. Prevo is Matthew 6:19-21: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth. … For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Traditional Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox churches are also critical of prosperity theology.
But prosperity churches will continue to expand as long as materialism is the dominant value of our culture and the corporation’s sole purpose is wealth for shareholders.

Alan Boraas is a professor of anthropology at Kenai Peninsula College. This column appeared in the Anchorage Daily News on April 13.