Stalling by right-wing assembly members kills resolution on Kinross trucking for now

The Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly had sufficient time to debate and vote on a resolution about the Kinross trucking plan late Thursday night or Friday afternoon, but three right-wing members refused to let it come to a vote.

Kinross Gold wanted to see the resolution die, which happened because of the obstructionist tactics of Tammie Wilson, Jimi Cash and Frank Tomaszewski.

The trio knew the resolution would pass 5-3 and they tried to kill it by running out the clock and refusing to extend the meeting past 11:30 p.m. or allowing the group to reconvene Friday afternoon. But some version of the resolution is likely to resurface.

Wilson, who abandoned her seat in the Legislature in 2020 so she could take a new job created for her by Gov. Mike Dunleavy and health commissioner Adam Crum, complained about her work schedule.

After leaving her first state job, Dunleavy named her the head of his Fairbanks office last summer. With the Dunleavy reelection campaign now going, Wilson is doing campaign work for Dunleavy on state time, though she will deny that. Her state job and her assembly job are in conflict.

Wilson is still listed on the state directory as a “program coordinator” in the state health department.

“Some of us have jobs, you know, so I don’t think it’s really fair that some of us stayed till 11:30 tonight and others can be at jobs. I mean I have obligations tomorrow until 6 o’clock for work. And I would really like to participate in any further discussions that we have,” Wilson said.

I think that the only member of the assembly who doesn’t have a job is retiree David Guttenberg.

After Wilson, Cash and Tomaszewski refused to extend the meeting, Assembly member Guttenberg moved to reconvene Friday afternoon. The vote was 5-3 to extend the meeting, but six votes were required, under the arcane rules, and Assembly member Aaron Lojewski had to leave early.

As the seconds ticked off, Wilson kept talking and the meeting ended at 11:30 p.m., per assembly rules, before a vote on resuming the next day could be held. That vote would have been 5-3.

Wilson said if the assembly decided simply to resume Friday afternoon, it wouldn’t be “fair” because people would not know about the meeting.

“We’re just gonna pick a time tomorrow and hope everybody can make it back? That just doesn’t seem like it’s a good public use,” she said.

The resolution in question called upon the Army Corps of Engineers to extend the comment period on the proposed Kinross trucking plan from Tetlin to Fort Knox. It also called on the Corps of Engineers to hold at least one public hearing in the Fairbanks North Star Borough on this proposal.

The comment period expires Sunday, so it’s too late for official assembly action on the matter before that deadline, but it does have majority support. The Corps of Engineers should take that into consideration and extend the deadline.

In refusing to extend the assembly meeting or reconvene the meeting Friday, Wilson and her two comrades did not admit that they wanted to delay the resolution until after Sunday when the comment deadline expires.

The resolution states “there has been very limited access to information for our residents on the complete development plans for this proposed mining operation,” which is true.

Kinross officials are angry about that statement and point to the many meetings they have held. The problem is that the meetings organized and run by Kinross have mainly been sales and promotional sessions that stress jobs and money to communities and contractors.

The company and the Dunleavy administration have failed to address the safety and road maintenance concerns about running heavy trucks every 7.5 minutes either from Tetlin or Fort Knox on the Alaska, Richardson and Steese highways for many years to come. The first mine is expected to last 4.5 years, but others may follow if this approach is used.

(In the original version of this blog post, I said that Contango ORE has said that other mine developments “will” follow. The company president contacted me Saturday to say that statement was false and that the company had never said that. He is correct. I replied that on numerous occasions he has said he expects that other resources may be developed. Expect and may are not the same as “will,” and I removed that reference because it was inaccurate. I will elaborate on this in a future blog post.)

Kinross spent $93 million on this project, apparently without investigating the potential opposition to its trucking plan. This was a mistake on the company’s part. Perhaps Gov. Mike Dunleavy and others in his administration signaled that the state was on board and the company decided that was enough to proceed.

The Permanent Fund investment of $10 million in Contango ORE, a minority owner in the venture, is one bit of evidence supporting that hypothesis, an investment that the company has pointed to as a sign of state support.

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