Governor Mike Dunleavy held a press briefing on Friday evening to talk about how the Federal CARES Act impacts Alaska. Specifically, the path of the money towards getting to its intended home, as well as the dispute regarding Alaska Native Corporations receiving funding from the tribal entity allocation.
The Governor’s key focus was to offer a primer on how CARES Act money is being distributed in the state: “We have $50 million for non-profits that can go out really quickly, $331 million is being held in contingency for ongoing health response. The remaining CARES Act still needs to be approved. The Legislative Budget and Audit Committee met and they approved $87 million for education, several million dollars for higher education, money for transportation, money for public safety, but they still need to work on some of the most critical components and that’s a $569 million for municipal relief, for our municipalities, close to $290 million for small business relief grants, money for airports still needs to be worked on, money for the Whittier tunnel needs to be worked on, money for fisheries, and money for addressing homelessness in this pandemic.”
He gave a brief overview of his understanding of how the disbursement of CARES Act money can ultimately be released, because of where it is currently sitting: “Right now, it resides with the Legislative Budget and Audit Committee in the legislature. They’ve approved some of these categories to go out and have those moneys go out as soon as possible, but they haven’t approved all of them.”
He feels that the chances of the money being run through the state legislature adds more steps that impedes the speed at which the money can be distributed: “The chances of this money getting out quickly to assist municipalities and businesses and individuals, that becomes a problem because the process takes a long time. This is one of the reasons why our understanding that Congress sent it to the state governments through the Governors. We may be waiting quite some time for this money to get to the intended groups, and every day that goes by is problematic.”
There has been an ongoing legal battle regarding whether Alaska Native Corporations qualify as tribal governments that should receive CARES Act money. The Governor feels that the law is clear that both ANCs and tribal governments should receive funding: “My understanding is that the money was intended for tribes but also, in the law, ANCs. So it’s unfortunate that we’ve gotten to this point with regard to this dispute over whether ANCs are native entities. I’m hoping this gets resolved as soon as possible, because again, in a pandemic, you want to do your best not to politicize these attempts at helping individuals and entities. The individuals, the entities, they’re waiting for these moneys: whether they’re ANCs, tribes, whether they’re municipalities, school districts. The money has been appropriated. Every day that goes by is problematic for these groups. That money was appropriated and intended for both groups, and it’s unfortunate that we’re at this position right now.”
The Governor plans to offer more details about Federal CARES Act funding in Alaska during another conference Monday evening.
