Sorted by date Results 476 - 500 of 660
JUNEAU (AP) - Gov. Mike Dunleavy said President Joe Biden’s push to require millions of U.S. workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19 is “ill conceived, divisive and un-American.” “At a time in which we are called to work together, forced medical procedures run counter to our collective sense of fairness and liberty,” the Republican Dunleavy said Sept. 10. “My administration is aggressively identifying every tool at our disposal to protect the inherent individual rights of all Alaskans.” Biden a day earlier outlined plans to mandate that...
With less than a week to go before the deadline to finish this year’s third special session of the Legislature, not only are the governor and most legislators unable to agree on the amount of the Permanent Fund dividend, they also don’t agree on two key numbers central to the fiscal debates. Legislative leadership and the nonpartisan Legislative Finance Division see a billion-dollar average annual budget deficit if the governor wins his push for a Permanent Fund dividend of $2,400 or so. The governor wants to cement the annual PFD into the con...
Assembling a long-term fiscal plan for Alaska has been like putting together a jigsaw puzzle with some key pieces missing from the box. It's frustrating and you can't win, no matter how much you try pounding the pieces to fit together. In this case, the puzzle would fit together better with a governor who doesn't stretch the numbers to suit his arguments, and who thinks more about public services that can build the state's future and less about dividends that can build his reelection campaign....
The Department of Fish and Game decided that money appropriated to partially restore a commercial fisheries job in Wrangell would be better spent this year to provide in-town assistance for moose and elk hunters who need to register their harvest. Legislators had added $66,000 to this year’s budget, intended to go toward bringing back a commercial fisheries management position to Wrangell which lost the job to a budget veto by Gov. Mike Dunleavy more than a year ago. But the $66,000 would not cover the full salary for a year-round staffer, p...
The Alaska Symphony of Seafood competition is back and the call is out for entries. The contest has showcased new products since 1994 but was canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “It encourages value-added seafood production and promotes high-quality Alaska products that are coming into the marketplace. And we help promote those across the country and the world. There isn’t anything else like this for Alaska seafood,” said Julie Decker, executive director of the Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation which hosts the event. A panel...
The state House has approved a Permanent Fund dividend of about $1,100 this fall, but even if the Senate agrees and the governor signs the appropriations bill, it is too late to avoid a delay in sending out the payment to Alaskans. Full approval was needed by Tuesday if the state were to meet its traditional date of issuing the annual PFD by the first week of October, according to a Department of Revenue spokesperson, who added that the dividends could be issued about 30 days after elected officials settle on the amount. The House passed the...
ANCHORAGE (AP) - Alaska last week reported its highest daily number of resident COVID-19 cases so far this year as health officials struggle to keep pace with testing and contact tracing and hospitals juggle a surge in patients amid staff shortages. Gov. Mike Dunleavy told reporters Aug. 26 that Alaskans should talk to their doctors about getting vaccinated “if that’s what they want to do.” “We know what we need to do. People know what they need to do,” Dunleavy said. “They need to have conversations with their doctor and make a decision, i...
JUNEAU (AP) - The campaign aimed at recalling Gov. Mike Dunleavy is closing down, with a gubernatorial election looming next year and the group short of the signatures needed to force a recall vote. The Recall Dunleavy group said that as of Aug. 21 it had gathered 62,373 signatures, shy of the 71,252 needed. Collecting signatures during the pandemic has been difficult, said Joelle Hall, a member of the group’s steering committee. Hall called the decision to halt the recall effort strategic and wise. The primary election for the governor’s rac...
JUNEAU (AP) - Former state Rep. Les Gara on Aug. 20 announced plans to run for governor in next year’s election. The Anchorage Democrat joins Gov. Mike Dunleavy, a Republican, and former Gov. Bill Walker, an independent, who have previously announced their intentions to run. Libertarian William “Billy” Toien, who unsuccessfully ran in 2018, is the only official candidate listed so far with the state Division of Elections. In a statement, Gara cited as concerns state public works construction needs, Alaska’s education and university systems...
JUNEAU (AP) - The state’s decision to not seek further legal review of a split court ruling that struck down several campaign contribution caps in Alaska has been criticized by a state lawmaker who said the state should have pressed forward with a legal fight. The case was heard by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Gov. Mike Dunleavy has an obligation to defend the laws of the state, said Sen. Bill Wielechowski, of Anchorage. “He doesn’t get to pick and choose which laws he wants to defend and not defend,” Wielech...
As legislators meet in special session this week, Gov. Mike Dunleavy continues to push his plan for much larger Permanent Fund dividends, saying “cash is the ultimate program” to help Alaskans. “Cash in the form of the Permanent Fund dividend … is really the answer to helping Alaskans and our private economy,” the governor said in a prepared statement Monday, the day lawmakers went back to work in Juneau. While promoting his plan to pay dividends almost double the average of the past 10 years without any new revenues to cover the state spe...
Just over 20 years ago, half of the Alaska House of Representatives banded together - Democrats and Republicans, urban and rural - in a concerted push to balance the budget, raise new revenues and put the state on a path to a long-term, fiscally responsible future. They called themselves the Fiscal Policy Caucus, and even wore lapel pins of an open umbrella to signify that the rainy day had arrived and Alaskans needed to protect themselves from falling oil revenues. They studied the math,...
For years, critics of state finances have said government should run more like a business. OK, let's see how that works. When companies are short of revenue, they first look at how to boost sales. Makes good financial sense to go out and attract more business, draw in new customers, maybe even raise prices while staying competitive. And companies look at their expenses. Are there better ways to run the operation that would save money. The absolutely last thing a well-run company would do is pay...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has decided not to appeal after a judge ruled against his interpretation of state law that would have stopped assistance payments toward utility bills in almost 200 small communities across Alaska. A state court judge on Aug. 11 sided with a coalition including the Alaska Federation of Natives and electric cooperatives that had sued Dunleavy to force release of the money. The governor announced the next day he would not appeal the court decision. This year’s estimated $32 million in payments will help reduce electricity b...
JUNEAU (AP) - Former governor Bill Walker announced plans Tuesday to run for the job again in 2022 and said his former labor commissioner, Heidi Drygas, would be his running mate. Walker dropped his 2018 reelection bid just weeks before the November election after the resignation of his lieutenant governor, Byron Mallott, disrupted the campaign. Republican Mike Dunleavy won the 2018 race against Democrat Mark Begich, who was trying to return to elected office after losing his reelection bid for the U.S. Senate in 2014. Dunleavy recently filed...
JUNEAU (AP) - Alaska law enforcement agencies failed to collect DNA samples from more than 21,000 people arrested for or convicted of certain crimes over the past 25 years, in part because of confusion caused by changes to state law, officials said. The state Department of Public Safety identified 21,577 individuals who were required to have a DNA sample on file but did not. Of those, 1,555 are dead, the report states. Gov. Mike Dunleavy on Aug. 10 announced plans for the state to pursue samples in the remaining cases. It’s not clear, t...
The governor’s Revenue commissioner has presented legislators with several revenue-raising options so that the state could afford a significantly larger Permanent Fund dividend and still balance its budget. A statewide sales tax is among the options the administration presented to the Legislature’s fiscal policy working group last Thursday. Deciding the amount of the annual dividend should come first, Senate President Peter Micciche told a meeting of Alaska mayors last week. “We have to determine what dividend we can afford,” and then decide...
Yes, the amount of this year’s Alaska Permanent Fund dividend will be at stake when legislators convene in another special session on Monday. And while the PFD is important, legislators — and Alaskans — should not let the political fights over the dividend overwhelm the importance of resolving other financial disputes that jeopardize the lives of tens of thousands of Alaskans. In particular, there are the Power Cost Equalization (PCE) payments that benefit about 82,000 Alaskans in almost 200 rural communities across the state. The Legis...
Alaska’s salmon landings have passed the season’s midpoint and by Aug. 7 the statewide catch had topped 116 million fish. State managers are calling for a projected total 2021 harvest of 190 million salmon, a 61% increase over 2020. Most of the salmon being caught now are pinks, with Prince William Sound topping the list at 35 million humpies, well over the projection of 25 million. Pink salmon catches at Kodiak remained sluggish at just over three million so far, out of a forecast calling for more than 22 million. Southeast was seeing a sli...
ANCHORAGE (AP) - Gov. Mike Dunleavy has urged Alaskans to get vaccinated, amid a spike in COVID-19 cases driven by the Delta variant. “There is a safe, free and widely available tool to put COVID-19 in the rearview mirror,” Dunleavy said in a statement Aug. 4. “That tool is the vaccine.” Alaska has reported hundreds of new COVID-19 cases a day since mid-July, with several more deaths bringing the state close to 400 since the pandemic started 18 months ago. Infection rates and hospitalizations have been trending up. As of Monday, the vaccina...
JUNEAU (AP) - Gov. Mike Dunleavy has delayed until Aug. 16 the start of the next special session of the Legislature, following a request by legislative leaders for more time to find a compromise on the state’s fiscal future. The special session had been set to begin Monday. Special sessions can last up to 30 days. The letter requesting that the governor postpone the session was signed by Senate President Peter Micciche, House Speaker Louise Stutes, Senate Minority Leader Tom Begich and House Minority Leader Cathy Tilton. The Republican and D...
Wrangell would see one northbound ferry every other week during October and November, and one southbound ferry the other weeks in October and November under the draft winter schedule released by the Alaska Marine Highway System. That’s down significantly from the current summer schedule of one northbound and one southbound stop each week. “At what point do we just say, ‘We don’t have a ferry system anymore,’” Mayor Steve Prysunka said. “We just get these schedules that are horrendous in the fall.” The community received one northbound ferry in...
JUNEAU (AP) - U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski ended the latest quarter with a big cash-on-hand advantage over conservative Republican rival Kelly Tshibaka, according to fundraising reports released July 15. Murkowski, a Republican who has not officially announced plans for reelection next year, came into 2021 with about $1 million in her campaign coffers. She reported bringing in about $1.1 million during the most recent fundraising quarter and having $2.3 million available as of June 30, her report shows. Tshibaka, a former state Department of...
Could anything be more difficult than getting the Alaska Legislature to settle on a workable, affordable, sustainable fiscal plan for the state? Yes. Getting a clear majority of Alaskans to accept the reality and the need for a workable, affordable, sustainable fiscal plan for the state probably is more difficult - and yet it has to come first. Most legislators understand the numbers, even if they disagree or dislike the math and the choices. Many just need a permission slip from their...
Alaska lawmakers are scheduled to reconvene in another special session in just over two weeks to consider a long-term fiscal plan for the state — and to set the amount of this fall’s Permanent Fund dividend. The Aug. 2 start date for the special session could be delayed by legislative agreement with the governor, or the session could drag on all month. The dominating deadline will come sometime in September, when the Department of Revenue will need to know the amount of the PFD payment, which usually is issued the first week of October. Gov...