Council comments on Cook Inlet oil lease sales

Published 9:30 am Wednesday, January 21, 2026

The Homer City Council last week weighed in on the proposed five-year federal oil and gas lease sale program being developed by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

The National OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program was first released by BOEM in November and currently includes 34 potential lease sale areas in three regions on the United States Outer Continental Shelf. Twenty-one of those sales are to be conducted in Alaska, in areas including the Gulf of Alaska, the Bering Sea and the Chukchi Sea.

The public comment period for the program closes Friday.

A resolution passed by the Homer City Council at their last meeting on Jan. 12 includes multiple comments that were also submitted to BOEM through the online comment docket. Resolution 26-007 highlights concerns expressed by Homer and southern Kenai Peninsula residents — many of whom remember vividly the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill and still see repercussions from that event more than 30 years later — and asks BOEM to conduct full environmental review and documentation for the proposed lease sales in Alaska.

According to the resolution, the Gulf of Alaska includes four proposed lease sale areas including Cook Inlet, Shumagin, Kodiak, and the gulf from the tip of the Kenai Peninsula east and south to the Alaska/Canada border.

Council member Donna Aderhold, who sponsored the resolution, said during the meeting that she was asked by Cook Inletkeeper, a Homer-based environmental nonprofit organization, to compile comments from the City of Homer in a resolution to be shared with BOEM. Inletkeeper opposes the dozen oil and gas lease sales slated for the Cook Inlet, including the contentious Lease Sale 258 which was reaffirmed by the federal government in December, and argues that BOEM is making efforts to limit public participation in the review processes for the Cook Inlet sales.

“The city council has commented on a number of things,” she said. “The Northern Edge training that the Navy has put on — community members came to us and asked us to provide comments on that in the past. We have provided comments on oil and gas lease sales. We’ve commented on Lease Sale 258 in the past.

“These oil and gas lease sales do affect our community, our community members (and) potentially our economy, so I think it’s appropriate for the City of Homer to provide these comments.”

Oil and gas leasing in the Outer Continental Shelf could result in positive and negative impacts on the livelihoods and economies of Homer residents, the resolution states. Many residents of the southern Kenai Peninsula make their living, either commercially or through subsistence, from fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska, the Cook Inlet and the Bering Sea, and impacts to those fisheries “directly affects” those residents and Homer’s economy.

The resolution also notes that residents have expressed “considerable concern” about the potential environmental harm posed by Lease Sale 258 and says that those concerns have not been adequately addressed.

“Conducting additional lease sales while the issues of Cook Inlet Lease Sale 258 persist seems ill-advised,” the resolution states.

The city council in the resolution requests that BOEM conduct “full National Environmental Policy Act review and documentation” for the proposed Alaska lease sales.

“Following the NEPA process would allow for evaluation of the practicalities and reasonable considerations of oil and gas leasing and development in Alaska waters and the harsh environment in which oil and gas facilities would operate, include consideration of the overall interest of oil and gas development these regions by industry provide, and provide disclosure of the potential impacts of lease sales and development” Resolution 26-007 states. “The NEPA process, as outlined in law, would allow for public comment from the residents who depend on these waters for their livelihoods, subsistence lifestyles, and economies.”

Find the resolution in full at www.cityofhomer-ak.gov/citycouncil/city-council-regular-meeting-367.

The next Homer City Council meeting will be held on Monday, Jan. 26 at 6 p.m. in the Homer City Hall Cowles Council Chambers and via Zoom.