There is no point whatsoever to spending any additional state money on a third special session of the Legislature to take up the governor’s bill which he claims is essential to getting an Alaska North Slope natural gas pipeline built.

The Legislature and the governor are too far apart to reach agreement.

Much of it is the governor’s own fault for publicly proclaiming last fall that the multibillion-dollar project was ready to go, that there was “nothing standing in the way,” and that the private company leading the project would be ordering steel pipe by this past January.

No pipe was ordered and later the governor and the developer said the project needs hundreds of millions of dollars a year knocked off its state and municipal property taxes or the venture can’t get financing.

When asked by reporters last week what changed from last fall’s all-systems-go pronouncements and this year’s taxes-gotta-go request, Gov. Mike Dunleavy said “calculations” determined the property tax bill was unaffordable.

As if state officials and the private company leading the charge, an energy project developer named Glenfarne, didn’t think to check out property taxes before getting people and politics hyped up over starting construction.

But after getting out their calculators, the governor and Glenfarne a few months ago said they needed a big change in property taxes before going ahead. So the governor asked the legislation to give a gift that would keep giving — perpetual property tax relief.

His argument was that it’s not really a tax cut because if lawmakers don’t approve the deal there will be no project. It’s the something-is-better-than nothing argument.

Although there is no question that the state’s heavy property tax structure needs changing to improve the project’s economics, legislators need to be certain it’s the right deal on all provisions.

After months of working on the bill, Dunleavy and many lawmakers disagree on what belongs in the legislation. 

A large group of lawmakers want to use the legislation to change the state’s corporate income tax code to collect from privately owned oil producers the same as publicly owned corporations like Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips. They say it’s fair to treat all producers the same.

The governor doesn’t see it the same way. He refuses to consider a gas pipeline bill if it includes the corporate tax provision. The stalemate is plugging up the pipe, which is not surprising since anything with the word “tax” is a problem in Alaska.

Lawmakers should gavel in on July 29 as required by the governor’s call that they report for a special session and then let the clock run out.

Alaska has waited 60 years for a North Slope gas pipeline project and can wait six more months until a new governor and new Legislature convene in January and can try again.