State Senate President Peter Micciche of Soldotna appeared on KSRM’s Sound Off on Thursday morning where he expressed a bit of frustration that the State House has yet to organize a majority. He noted that it, ultimately, renders any bill passed by his Senate coalition null until business is able to take place in the House.
Senator Micciche: “The Senate passed its first bill yesterday. We were organized on opening morning – we should be. We hit the ground running. Our committees are in full tilt, we’re processing bills, we’re working on the Governor’s Senate Bill 56 – that’s the Emergency Declaration bill. We passed our first bill yesterday, I can’t find in the records when the Senate has passed one earlier. We’re getting after it! We hope our work doesn’t stack up. We hope our budget work is in move once we finish at the Senate, it would be disappointing if we can’t move forward with the people’s business because things have not been able to process bills on the other side of the building. You can tell that I’m trying to be polite…”
He added: “We’re firing on all cylinders and we had a lot of problems organizing, we worked on it for three months, we had people who hated each other, and we came together. It was very, very, very difficult.”
The House, around an hour after the Senator’s comments, named Independent Representative Josiah Patkotak of Utqiaġvik as the speaker pro tempore. While it does not solidify a coalition majority, it is a step in the direction towards conducting business in Juneau.