The Stand for Salmon guys started running their ads on local radio last week and have nicely defined at least what they think they are all about. Hint: If you guess they are running against Pebble Mine, take a bow.
The ad does all the expected scaremongering, backlit by somber music, and ends with the flourish that large development projects like the Pebble Mine will dump arsenic and sulfuric acid in salmon streams, killing them always and for all time.
From a persuasion standpoint, this is great persuasion-fu. But it should have been anticipated by everyone on the pro-development side of the argument.
Problem is from all other standpoints, it is a house of cards, all lies, based on the demonstrable falsehood that Pebble will all kill salmon in the state permanently, destroying 30,000 fishing related jobs. They make no mention of current or future jobs that passage of this initiative will destroy.
The first lie was told during signature gathering, when paid signature gatherers were asked if this was yet another of the biannual statewide anti-Pebble ballot initiatives Bob Gillam funded and ran every other year for a decade until he finally got one passed. Their response was always no, no way, we only care about the salmon. Dave Stieren recounted such a discussion with a signature gatherer on his radio show some months ago.
Second lie is related to the anti-Pebble campaign. It attempts to make the case that any outside money or corporation is singularly unable to make intelligent decisions about doing things in Alaska because they are not local. The Alaska Journal of Commerce recently ran an opinion piece tracing all the outside money behind the Stand for Salmon initiative. If outside ownership of a mine is a Bad Thing, why is outside funding (and ownership) of the environmental groups foisting it on an unsuspecting public a Good Thing? http://www.alaskajournal.com/2018-09-12/opinion-following-outside-money-backing-stand-salmon
The third lie concerns the legislative history of this particular ballot initiative. It is presented as a reasonable, logical, science-based update of old, busted, outdated and by inference utterly failing, permitting system that just can’t protect the Sainted Salmon in this dangerous modern world. What they don’t tell you is that the initiative is based on Louise Stutes HB 199, introduced in 2017, something so wildly out of touch with reality and the world as we know it that the even virulently anti-development co-sponsors Andy Josephson, Geran Tarr and Les Gara couldn’t get a single public committee hearing scheduled on it. If this is such a wonderful thing, why didn’t the democrat legislative majority at least talk about it publicly over the last two years? http://www.akleg.gov/basis/Bill/Detail/30?Root=hb%20199
Final lie is what mine dumps in the water. In addition to be unable to point to a single fishery in Alaska that over a century of mining or any other development project has harmed, the backers of the initiative go after substances naturally occurring as the newly identified boogey man.
Arsenic? Horrors. Yes, it is a poison. In large quantities, it will kill you. So will cold water (drowning and hypothermia). But it is also a naturally occuring element, found statewide in varying levels of abundance. Before you rail against arsenic, why not tell me what Its levels are currently is in various salmon bearing streams statewide (hint: that assay data does not exist) and tell me the levels necessary to constitute a threat to a fishery, naturally occurring and otherwise?
Sulfuric acid? Even scarier. Problem is that salmon returns statewide are regularly exposed to and quite comfortable with huge increases in sulfuric acid levels in their waters, particularly in Bristol Bay. Why? Sulfuric acid is a significant volcanic emission, and Bristol Bay and Cook Inlet are downwind from mountains that introduce massive amounts, megatons, of sulfur dioxide and in turn sulfuric acid into the atmosphere, surrounding lands and waters from time to time.
Like I said earlier, the Stand for Salmon guys are using great persuasion-fu, making the case that if we don’t pass the ballot initiative, all salmon will be gone for all time, something demonstrably false, as we haven’t had their solution in place for a century. Other than the damage the commercial fishermen are doing to the resource, the salmon seem to be doing just fine.
OTOH, if you want to destroy lives, livelihoods and jobs here in Alaska for decades, I couldn’t think of a better way to do it than to pass this ballot initiative. Not only does it set up a brand-new permitting system, parallel to the existing system for anything that touches waters with salmon in them, but that new permitting system does not recognize the existence of the current system. Better yet, requirements for the new permit can be applied any time after something is in planning, under construction or complete, meaning that while the original permit still matters, you can be shut down at any time at the whim by the right political appointee (ADF&G Commissioner), lawsuit (and I guarantee there WILL be a blizzard of lawsuits) or suitably agreeable governor (Mark Begich, for instance). What a great way to ensure robust future investment in jobs and infrastructure here in Alaska (/sarc).
Final question: If this is such a good idea, why didn’t the virulently anti-development democrat majority in the House bring it before a committee, any committee over the last two years? If it is such a good idea, why do they need to lie about it is really aimed at? Finally, I will note that Mark Begich supports it (remember that Begich did not lift a finger for either Alaska jobs or ANWR while in the US Senate, which is one of the reasons he is today a former US Senator). https://www.markbegich.com/news/releases/2018/mark-begich-stands-for-salmon/
Alex Gimarc lives in Anchorage since retiring from the military in 1997. His interests include science and technology, environment, energy, economics, military affairs, fishing and disabilities policies. His weekly column “Interesting Items” is a summary of news stories with substantive Alaska-themed topics. He is a small business owner and Information Technology professional.
