I would like to give an update on our efforts to create a report card for Alaska's infrastructure. As you may know it is an effort that we have been trying to get underway for a while now. We really have traction now and are in a data gathering phase during February.
Many may be familiar with the National report card efforts. The big difference is that we only look at Alaska's infrastructure and how well it fares. We have some unique challenges in Alaska with our two basic types of infrastructure. Sometimes we think of Alaska as having a rural part and an urban part or we just call the rural part "the bush". To address this we will add a white paper discussion on how the infrastructure challenges are different between the portion of Alaska that is on the Road system vs. off.
Each category that we evaluate will be given the "30,000 ft" view where we review all of Alaska as one, to stay on format with how the report card is done in other states, and leave the on vs. off challenges to the white paper.
Another thing that is unique with Alaska is our marine highway system for which we are creating a new category.
The categories for our report card are: Schools; Bridges; Highways; Rail; Aviation; Water; Wastewater; Dams; Energy; Ports & Harbors; Solid Waste and hazardous waste; and Marine highways
Like I mentioned we are gathering this information during the month of February, so if you are interested in participating in this or future efforts please contact me and I will team you up with the leader for the category you want to help with.
The next phases are Scoring, First Draft of category white papers, peer review, second draft followed by society review, final draft and publication. Our aim is to release the report card towards the end of September.
What is so exciting is that we have student members, YMF members and branch members from Fairbanks, Juneau, Matsu, and Anchorage all working together on the phenomenal task of a report card for our state. I have just a few days ago met with the president of Alaska Planners Association and they are very excited to help up with both data gathering, scoring, review and rollout. They see the value of the report card and want to help us in any way they can. we have support from some key legislators as well as key agencies and plan to build a partnership with Chamber of Commerce for the roll out of the report card. Another partnership that I am currently working on is to get the support of Alaska's Municipal League in the data gathering effort, I also hope they will join us when it comes to the roll-out. Getting the report card available and understood by the public and our decision makers is the goal. As REgion 8 Governor Chris Veis from Montana put it. Once the report card is done, the real work starts. having key partners in the roll out will be important as our state is large and there are only so many of us that are active in this effort.
If you think you can help with data gathering, scoring, write-ups or review we would sincerely appreciate your help and ask that you contact Tor Anderzen tjanderz@... 907-306-3450
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Tor Anderzen P.E., M.ASCE
Senior Aviation Engineer
HDL
Palmer AK
(907)564-2103
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