Nuna Resources, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Pebble Partnership is out with this well produced trailer for a film that, "explores the struggles of rural Southwest Alaska where a lack of economic opportunity is threatening to destroy native culture and communities, yet the potential of natural resource extraction holds a promise for a stronger future."
That's code for, we should proceed with the Pebble Mine.
Now in a film of this nature you would normally see the individuals offering their opinions identified on screen but not in the case of the trailer.
This is Lake and Peninsula Borough Mayor Glen Alsworth, and if you watched the trailer, you heard him make the appeal that, "we get on the side of being producers, not just people that are taking from the government."
Turns out the Honorable Mayor Alsworh knows a thing or two about sucking off the government's teat.
Lake and Peninsula Borough Mayor Glen Alsworth and Assembly Member Sue Anelon were served with a lawsuit charging them with misuse of public money as well as the abuse of their positions as elected officials for personal gain.
The suit alleges that Alsworth has been paid over $600,000 by the Lake and Peninsula Borough School District for the use of his aircraft company, Lake Clark Air. According to Alaska law, as a public official with oversight of the School District and a direct financial interest in spending by the District, Mayor Alsworth was not supposed to vote on school spending decisions.
According to the suit, not only did he vote to approve the school budget for each of the last five years, but the School District, as reflected in Alsworth's own records, comprises his largest single source of income. In fact, Alsworth was the ultimate beneficiary of nearly all the travel expenses he approved as budget items in the School District's budgets from 2006 through 2011.
Oh it gets better.
Additionally, the complaint states that Alsworth, an ardent proponent of the Pebble Mine, has received $375,000 from the Pebble Limited Partnership and that the Partnership is Alsworth's second largest source of income.
It should come as no surprise that Nuna Resources would showcase an individual whose pockets are lined by the same overlords. It does however completely destroy any objectivity you're trying to portray in your ongoing public relations effort that the mine will be a good thing for native communities. While the mine will certainly not be a good thing for Bristol Bay, it would certainly be a good thing for Mayor Alsworth.