We're in the Money.

This is an article about the debt-free status of Alberta, Canada, and what will be done with the freed-up money. Thanks to soaring oil and natural gas prices, the provincial treasury is bursting with surplus dollars. Alberta recently revised its projected royalty revenues for the current fiscal year to over $8 billion--nearly double the figure forecast in last spring's budget--and announced that the bulk of the resource windfall will go to retire the province's outstanding$ 3.7-billion debt. That will make Alberta the first debt-free province in more than three decades, a goal Klein has doggedly pursued since becoming premier in 1992. For an encore of sorts, Klein is urging Albertans to engage in a public debate over what exactly should be done with the freed-up money. Among the options the premier has already floated: lowering taxes, issuing annual dividends to every Alberta resident, socking more away in the provincial piggy bank (otherwise known as the Heritage Savings Trust Fund, now standing at $12.4 billion), or spending more on a variety of services and infrastructure needs.