While the fight over the state's tax structure is riding furious momentum on TV and with back-and-forths between those for and against, the actual legislative discussion is off to a remarkably slow start.
Taking up the first of a couple contentious proposals to change the state's oil tax, a House committee on Monday afternoon spent the first hour-plus of a two-hour hearing debating Alaska hire. More specifically, the talk focused on whether Rep. Craig Johnson's plan to give a bigger tax break to companies with greater percentages of Alaska workers would hold up under a court challenge, and how it compared to tax credits for the film industry.
Johnson, an Anchorage Republican, was the first to file a bill on the state's oil tax system - he proposes a sweeter deal for oil companies that spend more in exploration and production. But through the last couple weeks, that bill turned into an Alaska job security bill.
The committee, chaired by Mat-Su Republican Rep. Mark Neuman, never really got into the meat of Johnson's plan, and legislative consultant Dan Dickinson's deep analysis was cut seriously short as time ran out.
The committee debate got a little tense as some of the committee Democrats - including Fairbanks Reps. David Guttenberg and Scott Kawasaki, and Anchorage Rep. Chris Tuck - challenged Johnson's local hire provision as one that may not pass muster under a court challenge.
Democrats typically embrace jobs bills, but adding that onto a bigger tax break for oil companies drew their hackles up.
"If you don't want to support jobs for Alaskans, we'll go with the original CS (committee substitute bill)," Johnson said. "But right now, this is about jobs."
The House Democrats have resisted changes to ACES, laying out figures that show investment in Alaska's oil patch and job numbers are up since the tax scheme passed in 2007. They, like the governor and some Republicans, want oil companies to ante up with financials to demonstrate the need for any changes.
Johnson wants to jack up the dollar value per barrel of oil that triggers progressivity, with the state getting more of the companies' profits when the companies are making the most. His plan also calls for decreasing the progressivity tax rate from .4 percent to .2 percent, and increasing the credit available for some capital expenditures.
