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For decades, Alaska’s economy has depended on the harvest of natural resources — industries like pumping oil out of the ground and cutting timber. Now, Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy wants the state to make money by leaving trees standing, and by pumping carbon emissions back into the ground. Investment is currently flooding into those kinds of projects, driven by the increasing urgency to slow global warming by cutting human-caused carbon emissions. Dunleavy has long rejected the scientific consensus that those emissions are causing cli...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who has made a political career out of promising more than the state can afford while never supporting taxes to pay the bills, has a new, almost magical plan to help cover his budget deficits. It’s all about collecting so much money for essentially doing nothing that the state could continue avoiding taxes, continue paying the fattest Permanent Fund dividends in history, and continue avoiding an honest long-term fiscal plan to pay for public services. It sounds like a politically induced mirage. The plan? Promise never to l...
A monthslong backlog in processing food stamps applications is now the responsibility of a new director. Shawnda O’Brien, who had served as director of Alaska’s Division of Public Assistance, departed with no explanation or indication of moving on to another position, according to an email sent Jan. 9 by Department of Health Commissioner Heidi Hedberg to department employees. Hedberg did not mention the food stamp problems that have received widespread media coverage in recent weeks and stated twice in her message that staff transitions within...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy issued a memorandum last Friday prohibiting the use of social media platform TikTok on state-owned devices. In doing so, Alaska follows in the footsteps of more than a dozen other states. Several predominantly Republican-led states have banned the Chinese-owned social media platform on publicly owned computers, tablets and smartphones, citing national security concerns. Former President Donald Trump first attempted, unsuccessfully, to ban TikTok in 2020. Several states began banning the use of the app on state-owned devices...
Governments levy taxes to pay for community services, such as schools, police and road repairs. And to help pay the public treasury costs of what can be unhealthy personal choices, such as excessive alcohol consumption and smoking. The state and federal governments pick up a large share of the expense of treating smoking-related illnesses, alcohol abuse and responding to alcohol-related crimes, and targeted taxes can help cover those bills. In addition, research has shown that adding taxes to cigarettes discourages consumption. Cigarette...
Alaska teens have largely ditched cigarettes over the past two decades, but they have substituted that unhealthy habit with another: vaping. About 25% of surveyed high schoolers reported using electronic cigarettes in the past 30 days, according to the Alaska Tobacco Facts Update, released last month by the Alaska Department of Health. The national rate of teen e-cigarette use, also known as vaping, is even higher, at 33%, the report said. Among Alaska youth, cigarette smoking has declined drastically since the 1990s, from 37% in 1995 to 16%...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy introduced a first-draft $7.3 billion state budget last week, meeting a legally required deadline but acknowledging that the spending plan is likely to change significantly as the administration negotiates with lawmakers in the upcoming legislative session. “This budget that we’re submitting, as always, is a talking point with the Legislature,” Dunleavy said. “It also reflects values, what our revenue picture looks like, and where we’re headed.” The biggest single expense in the entire proposed state budget is $2.5 billio...
Newly reelected Gov. Mike Dunleavy last week unveiled his proposed state spending plan for the next budget year. By far, the largest single expense in the entire state budget is the Permanent Fund dividend. The governor’s budget proposes no increase in state funding for public schools and a reduction in funding for the university system. No significant increases for road repairs, snow removal, mental health services, or more staff to help the backlog of food stamp applications which has created hours-long hold times for callers needing help. L...
After last month’s elections, the Alaska Capitol, so far, is split. Voters re-elected conservative Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, and a centrist, bipartisan coalition is set to take control of the state Senate. The makeup of the House governing majority is still uncertain. And it will likely be weeks before the 40-member House coalesces into a new majority of 21 or more legislators. It may not even happen before the session starts Jan. 17. Election results that evenly split the House between two different factions, plus a high-profile l...
Ballots from six rural Alaska villages were not fully counted in Alaska’s November elections, the Division of Elections said. A division official said the U.S. Postal Service failed to deliver them to the state election headquarters before the election was certified on Nov. 30. “You’ll need to contact the USPS to find out why there were some that never arrived — as we were told from poll workers, everything had been mailed,” Tiffany Montemayor, the division’s public relations manager, said by email on Dec. 2. As a result, 259 voters in S...
New controls on how fish are commercially harvested and more research to understand the effects of climate change in the ocean and freshwater spawning grounds are some of the key recommendations of an Alaska task force examining ways to address bycatch, the term for capture of untargeted species in commercial seafood harvests. Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who created the task force a year ago, released the group’s final report on Dec. 8. The collapse of salmon runs vital to western Alaska — and public complaints that too many salmon were being int...
ANCHORAGE (AP) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Dec. 1 proposed restrictions that would block plans for a copper and gold mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay region that is home to the world’s largest sockeye salmon run. A statement from the regional EPA office said discharges of dredged or fill material into the waters of the U.S. within the proposed Pebble Mine footprint in southwest Alaska would “result in unacceptable adverse effects on salmon fishery areas.” The rarely employed agency action would effectively veto the project b...
Seventeen of Alaska’s 20 state senators and senator-elects have banded together to form a bipartisan majority coalition that members promise will be moderate and consensus-focused. Gary Stevens, a Kodiak Republican and veteran lawmaker known as a moderate, will be president, returning to the role he held from 2009 to 2012. “It’s a pleasure for me to announce that we have a very healthy majority and we’ve found a way to share responsibilities between all of us,” Stevens said at an Anchorage news conference late Friday. Cathy Giessel, a Republica...
JUNEAU (AP) —Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy has won reelection, becoming the first governor in the state since 1998 to win back-to-back terms. Dunleavy received 50.28% of the vote after final tallies were released Nov. 23. Because he won a majority of votes, the race did not go to ranked-choice voting. Dunleavy said he was “relieved that it’s over and behind us and now we can focus on the next four years.” Dunleavy, who during his first term faced a recall effort, overcame challenges in the Nov. 8 election from former Gov. Bill Walker, an inde...
A woman accused of voting illegally in both Alaska and Florida during the 2020 elections will face charges in a Florida court on Dec. 8, according to online court records. When Cheryl-Ann Leslie is arraigned on felony counts of casting more than one ballot, she will become just the second person charged with voter fraud related to Alaska’s 2020 election. Despite claims by some Alaskans that fraudulent voting changed the state’s election results two years ago, no evidence of fraud on that scale has been uncovered by investigators. After the 202...
School districts statewide, including Wrangell, will be looking to the Legislature next year for an increase in state funding, but any boost in the state’s per-pupil formula likely will depend in large part on oil revenues and also Permanent Fund earnings. And neither looks good this month, less than eight weeks before lawmakers are scheduled to convene in Juneau. The state funding formula for K-12 education hadn’t moved in about five years before this year’s 0.5% mini-nudge upward. Meanwhile, districts statewide are facing budget defic...
Renewable energy advocates will try again at next year’s legislative session to win approval for extending the life of the state’s Renewable Energy Fund and creating a “green bank” to help finance clean-energy projects. The Renewable Energy Fund (REF) provides grants for renewable energy projects via a competitive process. The fund was established in 2008 with an initial investment of $100 million, plus additional deposits over the years. The program ends in 2023, unless extended by lawmakers. Legislators convene in Juneau on Jan. 17. Over 10...
All three incumbents likely clinched victory in Alaska’s statewide elections when the Alaska Division of Elections updated vote count results on Friday with thousands of additional absentee, questioned and early ballots from this fall’s general election. Final unofficial results will not be available until 4 p.m. Wednesday, when the division implements the state’s new ranked-choice sorting system, but voting trends have made the results clear in most races. With 264,994 votes counted, incumbent Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy had 50.3% of the v...
The numbers are not final — that will not happen until the last votes are tallied and ranked-choice tabulations kick in Nov. 23 — but it appears that incumbent elected officials representing Alaska, and Wrangell, will stay on the job for another term. Gov. Mike Dunleavy, U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, state Sen. Bert Stedman and state Rep. Dan Ortiz all appear headed toward re-election. And while the outcomes are not surprising, what’s interesting is to look at how Wrangell voted the same, or differently, than other preci...
Wrangell voters cast their ballots to re-elect Gov. Mike Dunleavy and to toss out congressional incumbents Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Mary Peltola. While a majority of Alaskans also voted for Dunleavy, though by a slightly smaller margin than in Wrangell, the statewide count gives Murkowski and Peltola solid odds to re-election. The Alaska Division of Elections will announce final vote counts and ranked-choice voting results on Nov. 23. Statewide, as of Monday, Dunleavy was ahead of challengers former Anchorage Democratic state Rep. Les Gara...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy appears on pace for re-election to a second four-year term, based on preliminary numbers from last week’s election. Dunleavy, a Republican, held a substantial lead over challengers Democrat Les Gara, independent Bill Walker and Republican Charlie Pierce, taking 52% of the 217,769 first-choice votes counted after the Nov. 8 statewide election. That tally was as of Monday this week, with updated numbers expected this week as more absentee, mail-in and questioned ballots are counted. If Dunleavy’s vote share stays above 50% by...
The state sued the federal government one week before Election Day, seeking ownership of part of Alaska’s most-visited tourist destination. Filed Nov. 1 at U.S. District Court in Anchorage, the case asks a federal judge to award ownership of the land beneath Mendenhall Lake and Mendenhall River to the state. Located in Juneau’s residential Mendenhall Valley, the lake rests at the base of the Mendenhall Glacier, within the Tongass National Forest, and is seen by more than 700,000 tourists annually, more than Denali National Park and Pre...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy cares about Alaska and wants good things for its citizens. But that doesn’t change the fact that he has done serious and likely permanent damage to the state ferry system; that he has not supported adequate school funding; that he sliced the University of Alaska budget, cutting into student enrollment; and that his fixation on the size of the Permanent Fund dividend is politically popular but fiscally irresponsible. If re-elected, will Dunleavy’s second term be a repeat of his first year in office in 2019, when he was hea...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has requested a federal disaster declaration and U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola has requested $250 million in relief funding after the failure of this year’s Bering Sea snow crab and Bristol Bay red king crab fisheries. Last week, Peltola asked Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and the chair of the House Appropriations Committee to include relief funding for crab fishermen and the crabbing industry in Congress’ year-end appropriation bill. Disaster relief funding could be available if Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo declares a f...
With Election Day less than a week away, the leading group encouraging Alaskans to vote no on a constitutional convention has raised much more money than its opponents after attracting a broad bipartisan group of supporters and a growing list of influential organizations backing its cause. Dwarfed in spending, the leading yes group is fighting on two fronts: In secular public forums, supporters are staying focused on a convention as a way to resolve Permanent Fund dividend debates. Meanwhile, some of the same conservative supporters are also...
