Some thoughts to ponder about CBM

Spectrum, by Jarel Vinduska

It's been about 10 months since many property owners found out that their land had been leased for coal-bed methane drilling and that many of our legislators had betrayed us.

Our first reaction to this nightmare was disbelief. Then we got angry and started asking questions, trying to determine why they did this and how we can get out of this mess.

The answers have been hard to get and the resolution of this problem seems to be even more elusive.

About the best we have been able to accomplish so far is to talk about rules for future leases. The landowners that are sitting on top of the original leases are still in the same dilemma and asking the same questions. Why would lawmakers believe that any landowner would willingly give up land and privacy that they had worked so hard for? Why would they promote such massive industrialization of their constituents' residential areas when less than 1 percent of Alaska is private property? Why won't they acknowledge that it was fundamentally wrong to lease private property without proper notification or best-interest studies or even basic regulations?

Commissioner Tom Irwin of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources has said ADNR has an obligation to take public concern into consideration before proceeding with full CBM development. Our representatives had that obligation even before the first leases were approved, but ignored that responsibility. Why?

Unfortunately, one of the reasons appears to be the generous financial incentives given to the very people who were supposed to be taking our concerns into consideration. Apparently it was obvious to the lease holder that it would cost less for political posturing than to pay landowners for the use of their land.

What other conclusion can landowners come to when we know we can have property rights and still tap gas reserves?

To add insult to injury we are given the occasional snide reminder that you knew you didn't have mineral rights and we can't change the law. Does that make any sense? That is like, years ago, telling women, "You know you were born a woman, so what makes you think you should have the right to vote?" That is like the plantation owner telling a slave, "You were born a slave, so how dare you want to be free?"

Any law can be changed. In fact, most laws have been made or changed to correct acknowledged injustice or new threats. As always, there will be those who resist any change because they profit from the status quo.

Private-property ownership is a very basic and important freedom. You can't truly be a property owner if someone else can use the surface of your property without your permission.

The surface owner doesn't need mineral rights, but we have to have priority over the subsurface lessee. We are having trouble accomplishing this because our legislators still have an amazing disconnect with reality and the will of the people.

They are still trying to chastise and trivialize us by characterizing us as a small group of anti-development environmentalists. Nothing could be further from the truth. Our state officials should go door to door in the leased area as we have. They would quickly see that at least 95 percent of property owners are very angry at their behavior. We can solve this problem if the people direct their anger toward constructive change.

We have to recall Sen. Scott Ogan.

We have to replace most of his cohorts in November so we can work with reasonable people to enact rational legislation.

The current leases need to be bought back now to avoid more costly litigation later. I believe coal-bed methane can be utilized, but it has to be done safely, in the proper locations and [be done with respect] of private property rights.

Jarel Vinduska lives in Palmer