OPINION: Richard Fineberg’s profound but little-known Alaska legacy

Alaska recently lost a servant of the public interest — Richard Fineberg. Fineberg died at the Fairbanks Pioneer Home on Sept. 27.

Fineberg lived an extraordinary life. He was a professor of political science, investigative journalist, policy analyst for two governors, oil and gas watchdog, environmental and labor activist, and tireless advocate for Alaska’s public interest. His trajectory took him from a middle-class upbringing in St. Louis, to a participant in civil disobedience against Alaska nuclear testing, to an indispensable insider who shaped Alaska energy policy.

A young Fineberg marched with Cesar Chavez in the grape workers strikes of 1968 — also the subject of his doctoral dissertation. He earned a Ph.D. in government, but for the rest of his life declined the title “doctor.” He wanted citizens to read his work and make their own conclusions, not accept his conclusions because of his formal academic training.

As a new political science professor at the University of Alaska, he investigated chemical and biological weapons testing in Alaska, and his unpublished manuscript, “The Dragon Goes North,” is still an alarming read. RAF, as his friends called him, ultimately quit the university and committed himself to journalistic truth-telling.

His early investigative work earned him an invitation on a rickety halibut boat to protest the underground nuclear explosion scheduled to take place at Amchitka in 1971; Cannikin would be the largest nuclear test in U.S. history. While invited as a journalist, Fineberg agreed with the mission of the group and wanted to peacefully disrupt the test. While he ultimately had a falling-out with its leaders — they mistakenly thought he was a CIA spy — the historic voyage spawned Greenpeace, the most enduring and successful global environmental organization. Perhaps the best portrayal of this historic journey — and earnest images of Fineberg — can be found in the 2015 documentary “How to Change the World.”

His launch into investigative journalism coincided with the national backdrop of Watergate-related journalism that would topple a presidency and a wholesale reordering of Alaska society with the pipeline boom. Fineberg wrote almost 100 articles about the construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline — including breaking news stories like the Galbraith Lake oil spill. Throughout his long career, his work appeared in national publications like The Nation, the Chicago Tribune and the Boston Globe. He also regularly contributed to Alaska newspapers, including the Anchorage Daily News, Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Alaska Advocate and All Alaska Weekly.

“His articles during the building of the pipeline were a major factor in the safety of the line today,” former Gov. Steve Cowper told journalist Brian O’Donoghue in 1994. “Richard’s been a major player in Alaska for 20-25 years,” he said. Gov. Cowper especially appreciated Fineberg for his ability to put the facts first and admit it when he had been mistaken.

After the pipeline’s construction, Fineberg’s tenacious and fact-forward reporting earned him a job as a policy analyst for the state of Alaska in the Sheffield and Cowper administrations. His reputation was as a numbers guy who wasn’t afraid to question official orthodoxy or powerful interests. Through his role as a state analyst and Gov. Cowper’s main oil and gas adviser, Fineberg uncovered several alarming issues.

He recognized serious flaws in the Sheffield administration’s decision to legally settle the issue of pipeline tariffs between 1977-1985. A tariff is a fee charged by the oil companies for moving the state’s oil; the more the companies charged, the less the state earned. Fineberg did everything in his power — including haranguing other Sheffield staffers — to stop what became the worst deal in modern Alaska history: the 1985 tariff settlement between the state and pipeline owner companies.

For the next 15 years, Fineberg warned Alaskans were being massively ripped off. If Alaska had properly regulated TAPS tariffs between 1977 and 2002, Alaska would have collected an additional $10 billion and the Permanent Fund would be roughly twice its size today.

Fineberg became intimately involved in the successful regulatory efforts that enacted just and reasonable tariff rates — which ultimately earned the state billions of dollars and made North Slope oil development more competitive.

Fineberg also discovered another major public interest issue with the TAPS tariff — funding for the ultimate dismantling, removal and restoration (DR&R) of the pipeline. As part of its-right-of way permit, TAPS owners must remove the pipeline system and restore the environment at the end of its useful life. Fineberg realized that TAPS owners were keeping DR&R funds internally, not placing them in an escrowed trust fund, and earning tens of billions of dollars in off-book profits — at Alaskans’ expense.

While the intent of DR&R was to ameliorate the environmental impact of old oil infrastructure, Fineberg warned that without an escrowed trust fund, oil companies would delay clean up or go bankrupt rather than spending the billions they owed. This would mean Alaskans would get stuck with a multibillion-dollar cleanup. His warning was as prescient in the 1990s as it is still relevant today.

“I wish we had a half-dozen like him in the state,” said Walt Parker, chairman of the Alaska Oil Spill Commission, in 2006.

The 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill had a profound impact on Fineberg. He spent more than a month assisting with the cleanup and frequently returned to Prince William Sound.

After the spill, Fineberg returned to fundamental questions about the operational integrity and safety of the pipeline system. Armed with information from Alyeska whistleblowers, his reports revealed major problems with the pipeline system and earned him the begrudging respect of many in the oil industry. His reports were read in the U.S. Congress, and he provided expert testimony in legal cases and regularly offered presentations before the Alaska Legislature.

It was during these years that Fineberg also became convinced that industry was dramatically overestimating the oil potential of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and that development would destroy the pristine environment for very little economic benefit. Much of his advocacy in the 1990s and 2000s was dedicated to the fight over the refuge. He would be happy today that the leasing of the refuge has thus far been thwarted.

One of the many rich ironies of his career is manifest in his personal living situation. Since 1978, Fineberg lived in a 600-square-foot dry cabin in Ester, outside of Fairbanks. From this humble but beautiful dwelling with no running water, he went head-to-head with some of the largest corporations in the history of money.

Yet Fineberg understood that to fight, from his cabin, for the wildness and lifeways of Alaska, one needed to speak the language of corporate capitalism. He recognized that the forum where key battles were won and lost were obscure regulatory agencies — places like the Regulatory Commission of Alaska and Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

It’s ironic but fitting that Fineberg passed away on the 50th anniversary of the construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, that megaproject that overwhelmed Alaska and demanded so much of his energy and intellect. He would have been outraged at the lack of oversight of the BP-Hilcorp deal, the continued refusal to secure DR&R funds in an escrowed trust fund, and the alarming replacement of oil majors for secretive, less-resourced companies. But by 2019, Fineberg’s brilliant mind had been all but silenced by health problems.

Farewell, citizen Fineberg. You never became famous because you refused to tell the powerful what they wanted to hear. You brought intelligence, tenacity, and courage to the fight. Along with our deep thanks, you have earned your rest.

Philip Wight is an assistant professor of history and Arctic and Northern Studies at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. He lives in Ester.

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