Larry Persily is a newspaper publisher and former Federal Coordinator of the Alaska Natural Gas Transportation Projects 2010–2015. The office was charged with coordinating federal agency responses to private-sector efforts to develop a natural gas pipeline from Alaska's North Slope to supply the North American market. The Federal Coordinator is nominated with advice and consent of the Senate by the President of the United States. He was nominated by Barack Obama on December 9, 2009, and was confirmed by the United States Senate on March 10, 2010. The office closed down in 2015 as the private companies turned their attention to a gas export project instead.