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Alaska lawmakers open a new legislative session Tuesday towards the backdrop of an election 12 months, with a docket that features training funding, vitality proposals and the continuing quandary of how large to make the yearly dividend test paid to residents. They’re additionally starting the session with a pay increase.
Here’s are some issues to know:
EDUCATION
School officers have been pleading for a everlasting improve within the Ok-12 per-student funding allocation. They say inflation has eaten away at their budgets, in some instances forcing program cuts or elevated class sizes. They additionally say they’re struggling to rent lecturers and fill different positions.
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Lawmakers final 12 months authorised a one-time, $175-million increase however Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed half that sum.
Dunleavy, a former educator, didn’t suggest a rise within the funding allocation as a part of his funds plan launched final month however stated training is bound to be a outstanding matter this session. He has expressed help for homeschooling and stated he desires to duplicate successes constitution faculties have had.
He additionally hopes a invoice he launched final 12 months will get renewed consideration. It requires a three-year program that might pay full-time lecturers bonuses as a technique to retain them.
The Alaska Legislature will open a new legislative session right here on the Alaska Capitol in Juneau on Jan. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer, File)
Tom Klaameyer, president of NEA-Alaska, a lecturers’ union, stated faculties are in “crisis.” He stated a rise at school funding and passage of laws that might permit for pensions for public staff, together with lecturers, are urgent wants.
Nearly 20 years in the past, the Legislature voted for the state to cease providing pensions in favor of 401k-style retirement plans in response to multibillion-dollar unfunded pension liabilities.
Senate President Gary Stevens, a Republican who leads a bipartisan Senate majority, stated it is time to revisit the pension subject. But he stated lawmakers wish to watch out of their evaluation, to make sure that in the event that they take motion it doesn’t result in sudden prices.
Republican House Speaker Cathy Tilton stated members of her caucus are desirous about whether or not adjustments could possibly be made to the present outlined contribution program that might make it extra engaging for staff. She additionally expects a broader dialog round training.
THE DIVIDEND
For years, legislative leaders have cited the necessity to finish the divisive fights over the dimensions of the yearly test Alaskans obtain from the earnings of the state’s nest-egg oil-wealth fund. And 12 months after 12 months, the difficulty persists.
Expectations seem low that this may change throughout a marketing campaign 12 months, when most legislative seats are up for election.
The debate dates to 2016, when, amid low oil costs and deficits, then-Gov. Bill Walker vetoed roughly half the quantity obtainable for dividends. Before that, the quantity of funding earnings allotted to dividends was based mostly on a rolling common of the fund’s efficiency. Check sizes assorted. They have been $845.76 in 2005 and $2,072 a decade later, the final 12 months the method was used.
The checks since then have turn into a political soccer.
In 2018, lawmakers started utilizing Alaska Permanent Fund earnings, lengthy used to pay dividends, as a recurring income to assist pay for presidency. They have caught to caps on yearly withdrawals however didn’t set a new method for a way the cash ought to be cut up between dividends and authorities bills, igniting fights which have snarled funds negotiations and distracted from different points.
Dunleavy in 2021 proposed a constitutional modification that was supposed to be a part of a broader fiscal plan that might dedicate half of what is withdrawn from the fund to dividends. But it went nowhere.
He included in his newest funds proposal a test based mostly on the method final utilized in 2015, which is extensively seen as unsustainable. Dunleavy efficiently ran for governor in 2018 pushing for a dividend in line with the method however he is by no means gotten that by means of the Legislature. He was reelected to a four-year time period in 2022.
His funds plan would spend $2.3 billion on dividends of about $3,400 a particular person and require about $990 million from depleted state financial savings to stability.
Last 12 months’s dividend was $1,312, and Stevens stated there will likely be efforts to pay a “reasonable” dividend this 12 months. The Senate final 12 months handed laws calling for 75% of annual earnings’ withdrawals to go to authorities and 25% to dividends and making that a 50/50 cut up if the state generated at the least $1.3 billion in new recurring revenues and hit a financial savings goal. That method faltered within the Republican-led House.
“Are we ever going to solve it?” Stevens stated of the yearly debate. “Probably not. It’s always going to be a battle, and when we have a governor that insists on this gigantic dividend in his budget, we’ll always have that battle with the governor.”
ENERGY
Dunleavy stated he expects dialogue of vitality points, together with updates to transmission traces in Alaska’s most populous Railbelt area. The pure fuel provide relied on by south-central Alaska residents and Dunleavy’s proposal for underground storage of carbon dioxide additionally may get consideration.
PAY RAISES
A wage improve rapidly superior final 12 months by new appointees to the Alaska State Officers Compensation Commission — and accepted by lawmakers — will increase yearly salaries for legislators from $50,400 to $84,000. The governor, lieutenant governor and chief division heads additionally acquired raises that took impact July 1.
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The legislative raises take impact on the start of the session. Half of lawmakers’ pay for January will likely be on the previous price and half on the new, which can equal about $80,000 this 12 months, stated Jessica Geary, govt director of the Legislative Affairs Agency.
All lawmakers, besides the three who dwell in Juneau, are also entitled to a each day $307 allowance throughout session. Regular periods last as long as 121 days.
The wage fee has struggled with tackle legislative pay. The per diem lawmakers obtain has come beneath scrutiny, significantly throughout years with drawn-out particular periods. Lawmakers have complained that with out a wage improve, it’s laborious to draw youthful individuals or these with households to run and serve within the Legislature.
Lawmakers final 12 months rejected a fee proposal that known as for rising govt department pay however didn’t tackle legislative pay. After that, two members resigned and three others have been eliminated by Dunleavy. With little dialogue, new appointees proposed the pay hike for lawmakers, along with the manager department raises.
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