Budget negotiators in Alaska’s House and Senate have agreed to fully fund the per-student funding formula for the coming year.
Work on items such as whether to honor cost-of-living increases in negotiated union contracts continues for the legislature’s finance committees.
Funding those pay increases has been a major sticking point in budget talks.
Alaska’s new fiscal year will begin on July 1 and over 10,000 letters have already gone out to state employees warning of possible layoffs.
Although Governor Bill Walker is preparing for a partial government shutdown in case no budget deal is reached by July 1, many legislators have promised that a compromise is coming very soon.
House Finance Committee co-chair Mark Neuman says a tremendous amount of work has been happening behind the scenes to try to find a compromise, and that work continues.
