Alaska’s Senate President was the featured speaker at the most recent Kenai/Soldotna joint Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Kenai Visitor Center. Sen. Peter Micciche provided a legislative update while also issuing a few citations – one for Tom Hu and for his mother. The Senate President discussed the budget from this past legislative session as well as the Permanent Fund Dividend that’s set to go to Alaskans in September of this year.
Sen. Micciche said:
“Here’s the bottom line – that river’s loaded with fish, we’ve got a beautiful place to live, it’s relatively safe depending on where you live in the state, we have no broad-based taxes, and people give us a part of the earnings at the state every year to spend however we’d like. I spoke at the Senate President’s forum and talked about that with the Senate President from Idaho. I said, ‘I want to be the Senate President from Idaho.’ He said, ‘Why is that,’ he looked a little worried like I was going to move down there and take his job. I said, ‘Because I could imagine if I finished a session and said, folks from Idaho, we’re done with the session, we have no broad-based tax, we’ve got a balanced budget, bills are paid, and we’re sending each one of you $3,300, I would be the king of Idaho forever! I’d be on bronze horseback on every town square and here you’re a thief that’s lining your pockets with people’s PFD.’ We are so blessed. That’s the number one message that we need to spread around this state.”
In discussing the budget, Micciche said that the budget is higher than he prefers, but there was some ‘catch up’ to pay in several key areas due to funding constraints of the past several years. He added that inflation strongly affects the state’s budget, but praised that the Legislature finished on time, with no special sessions, with a fair PFD.
He also showcased the priority pieces of legislation passed during this session that he sponsored, which includes his alcoholic beverage control bill(SB 9), and the termination date extension for the beverage control board (SB 151), personal use cabin permits bill (SB 219), extending termination date of chiropractic examiners (SB 193), minimum wage exemptions bill (SB 185), and approval of the railroad revenue bonds bill (SB 218). Sen. Micciche praised the actions and priorities of the Alaska State Legislature this year, which included splitting the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services.
Additionally, Sen. Micciche talked to voters about those running to represent them in the state or municipal elections. He challenged voters on the Kenai Peninsula to listen to potential candidates to see if they are giving hollow promises or if they are willing to have a plan to get past issues lawmakers have been stuck on.
