Alaska
Alaska marks last state for 50-state marathon runner
Before last weekend, William Coumbe had never set foot in the Last Frontier. But, he had a bucket list to complete. He was 49 for 50 of not only visiting, but running a marathon, in every U.S. state.
Coumbe raced in Kenai’s annual Kenai River Marathon Sunday and is now part of a small group of athletes to have run marathons in all 50 states. Coumbe says there are slightly less people who have been to outer space than have accomplished this milestone.
“I just checked a bucket list item, which is huge,” he said. “If you can check an item off your bucket list before you expire, that’s huge, and I did that half an hour ago.”
Coumbe’s marathon days began 20 years ago, when he worked for an insurance group in Philadelphia. He says company leadership helped interested employees sign up for marathons. At that point, Coumbe had already run a 10-miler and half marathon, so he decided to go all in.
Coumbe, now 55, has since participated in a number of notable races, including the prestigious Boston Marathon. He says he enjoys racing marathons around the country because it allows him and his wife to exercise while seeing new places.
The couple picked the Kenai River Marathon because it worked with their schedule. They also wanted a unique Alaska adventure.
“We really wanted to see a little bit more of Alaska than fly in, take a Lyft to a hotel, walk around, just stay in the big city,” Coumbe said. “We wanted an Alaska experience, and I think we got it.”
Coumbe admits he didn’t exactly know what he was getting himself into when he agreed to come to Kenai. He researched the city and was fascinated by its history, specifically the 1797 Battle of Kenai when Dena’ina people attacked a Russian fort. He also didn’t know what weather or terrain to expect, so he packed for every possible scenario.
Coumbe says he’s thankful the marathon course was relatively flat and the rain held off.
“We know that it gets cold, but while it’s somewhat temperate, what a neat place. A neat place indeed,” Coumbe said.
Although he’s throwing in the hat for full scale marathons, Coumbe’s future plans are to run half marathons in countries around the world.
Until last weekend, Coumbe’s 50-state marathon goal was one of three things still on his bucket list. Still to be done? Smoke a cigar and drink a Cuba libre in Santiago, Cuba, and watch the Buffalo Sabres take home the Stanley Cup.
U.S. President Joe Biden delivers remarks from the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, U.S., November 26, 2024.
Nathan Howard | Reuters
The U.S. state of Alaska has sued the Biden administration for what it calls violations of a Congressional directive to allow oil and gas development in a portion of the federal Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Monday’s lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Alaska challenges the federal government’s December 2024 decision to offer oil and gas drilling leases in an area known as the coastal plain with restrictions.
The lawsuit said curbs on surface use and occupancy make it “impossible or impracticable to develop” 400,000 acres (162,000 hectares) of land the U.S. Interior Department plans to auction this month to oil and gas drillers.
The limits would severely limit future oil exploration and drilling in the refuge, it added.
“Interior’s continued and irrational opposition under the Biden administration to responsible energy development in the Arctic continues America on a path of energy dependence instead of utilizing the vast resources we have available,” Republican Governor Mike Dunleavy said in a statement.
Alaska wants the court to set aside the December decision and prohibit the department from issuing leases at the auction.
The department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for the Bureau of Land Management declined to comment.
When combined with the department’s cancellation of leases granted during the waning days of Donald Trump’s presidency, Alaska says it will receive just a fraction of the $1.1 billion the Congressional Budget Office estimated it would get in direct lease-related revenues from energy development in the area.
The lawsuit is Alaska’s latest legal response to the Biden administration’s efforts to protect the 19.6-million-acre (8-million-hectare) ANWR for species such as polar bears and caribou.
An October 2023 lawsuit by the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority contested the administration’s decision to cancel the seven leases it held. Another state lawsuit in July 2024 sought to recover revenue lost as a result.
Drilling in the ANWR, the largest national wildlife refuge, was off-limits for decades and the subject of fierce political fights between environmentalists and Alaska’s political leaders, who have long supported development in the coastal plain.
In 2017, Alaska lawmakers secured that opportunity through a provision in a Trump-backed tax cut bill passed by Congress. In the final days of Trump’s administration, it issued nine 10-year leases for drilling in ANWR.
Under Biden, two lease winners withdrew from their holdings in 2022. In September, the interior department canceled the seven issued to the state industrial development body.
Attorneys for the state of Alaska filed a lawsuit Monday to try to invalidate a federal lease sale for oil and gas drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The lawsuit says the Biden administration is offering so little land for lease and has put so many restrictions on it that the lease sale doesn’t comply with the law.
So the state, a stalwart supporter of drilling in the refuge, is asking a judge not to let the federal government issue leases to oil companies. The role reversal is the latest wrinkle in a long saga over what to do with the coastal plain of the refuge, in the northeast corner of Alaska.
After decades of hot debate in Congress, Sen. Lisa Murkowski championed a provision in a 2017 tax law mandating two lease sales, of at least 400,000 acres each, on the coastal plain of the refuge.
The first was held in 2021, in the final days of the Trump administration. As a measure of industry interest, it was a dud. None of the big oil companies offered a bid. Two private firms won leases but then relinquished them. The main bidder was the state-owned Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority.
In 2023, the Biden administration cancelled the leases, saying the process was flawed.
The state, citing an earlier congressional estimate, said it was in line to get more than $1 billion in lease revenues, plus royalty payments and the indirect economic benefits that come with more industrial activity.
Bids for the second sale were due Monday, and they’re scheduled to be unsealed Friday. The state lawsuit notes that this time, the government made only a third of the coastal plain available for bidding.
“Worse,” the legal complaint says, “it makes the lands available for lease impossible or impracticable to develop by significantly restricting surface use and occupancy. In essence, the [lease sale conditions] are designed to inhibit and deter, rather than promote, development of the Coastal Plain’s mineral resources.”
The Biden administration says its restrictions are the best way to balance all of the laws it has to follow. Before the 2017 law ordering lease sales, Congress set other goals for the Arctic Refuge, including conserving birds and wildlife, and protecting subsistence hunting and fishing opportunities.
If the lawsuit succeeds the Trump administration could get a do-over to offer more land for lease and under terms that would facilitate drilling.
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