Hilcorp does not benefit 'all Alaskans'
Regarding the sale of BP’s assets to Hilcorp, John Shively, former commissioner of Alaska’s Department of Natural Resources and board chairman for the proposed Pebble project, recently wrote that state agencies “have the experience, the expertise and information needed to carefully and thoughtfully evaluate the intricacies of this transaction with the benefit of all Alaskans foremost in mind.”
As an Alaskan, I take exception to Mr. Shively’s assertion that the “benefit of all Alaskans” is the guiding star for state decision-makers when it comes to the fossil fuel industry.
My great-great-great grandparents struggled to turn the thumbprint of land at the mouth of Ninilchik River into a home for Russian-American Company pensioners and their families. My cabin is on land my grandparents — a woman of Russian and Alutiiq heritage and a man who immigrated from Lithuania — homesteaded long before Alaska was a state.
My daughters and I have been offered multiple leases that would relinquish our three-plus acres of family land to oil and gas exploration. If signed, they would give full rein to land where my grandparents lived, my father and his siblings were raised, and my grandchildren, daughters and I cherish as a touchstone to our past. The two most recent came from Hilcorp.
Read more: https://www.anchoragepress.com/opinion/hilcorp-does-not-benefit-all-alaskans/article_06f47410-155c-11ea-b333-9bc4fdc54551.html