The special session in the Alaska State Legislature is winding down with the final day being June 18th. It was scheduled to discuss state budgets and to consider Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s dividend proposal.
Senate President Peter Micciche says the goal is to get done by the deadline:
“The House is having a hard time with the Senate cut and, of course, the Senate’s position is the $2,300 50/50 PFD, in agreement with the governor’s plan. The House has a $0 PFD in their budget. We have not gotten to the part where the PFD struggle is holding us up. We’re still waiting on the mechanical corrections from fund sources and things that were in the House’s budget that had to be corrected in the Senate and, of course, the Senate is trying to hold the cuts that we passed in our budget. We have had hearings on SJR 6. What we are trying to do is pull together the data that we need for the fall special session to stop this annual fight on the PFD.”
Sen. Micciche says that a budget needs to be passed:
“Technically the budget needs to be passed by June 30th but that’s unacceptable to take it down to the deadline. Our goal is to get it done by the end of this special session. We’ve explained to the governor that the actual comprehensive plan is going to be something we want to work on over the summer when people are not receiving per diem, when they’re home to their districts and their constituents. We plan to have separate meetings and committee meetings where we invite the administration in to talk about the various pieces of the comprehensive plan. We feel that the legislature will be prepared to be back to come to Juneau to vote as opposed to processing all of that data and evaluating the different pieces.”
The deadline for the first special session is scheduled for Friday, June 18th.