The Alaska House hasn’t taken any action on the budget since Monday. That’s when the body more than doubled the size of the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend.
The House voted 21 to 19 to set the PFD at roughly $2,700. The vote split both caucuses.
It was a particularly difficult split for the majority.
Since the majority couldn’t agree on the dividend, it can’t agree on the overall size of the budget. The added dividend money would cost $892 million.
The split has opened up the majority to criticism. House Minority Leader Charisse Millett, an Anchorage Republican, questioned the majority’s capacity to act.
“The three Republicans organized with the Democrats and independents because they had the plan. They had the votes. They were all aligned on Alaska’s future. And we’re seeing now that that alignment is not there,” Millett said. “Unfortunately, when you are in leadership and you are the speaker, it’s your obligation with 22 people to get a budget passed with 21.”
House Speaker Bryce Edgmon, a Dillingham Democrat, said the majority is working to come to a consensus on both the size of the budget and the PFD.
Edgmon voted to increase the PFD amount. But he said the closeness of the vote shows a growing sense that PFDs will have to be lower as part of a broader budget solution.
“I count it as being historic, because a couple of years ago … that vote easily could have been 35 to 5 as opposed to 21 to 19, if it had even come to the floor at all,” he said. “So, things are changing in Alaska.”
Edgmon said the House will send the budget to the Senate “soon,” but he didn’t say exactly when.
Andrew Kitchenman is the state government and politics reporter for Alaska Public Media and KTOO in Juneau. Reach him at akitchenman@alaskapublic.org.
