Alaska legislators and Gov. Mike Dunleavy are planning a series of closed-door negotiation sessions in an effort to avoid a contentious fight over public education funding and reform.
Beginning at 9 a.m. Tuesday, negotiators from the majority and minority caucuses in the state House and Senate will meet with negotiators representing the governor.
Their goal is to find common ground between legislation proposed by the governor and bills proposed in the state House and Senate.
If they can’t find common ground, Dunleavy is expected to veto one or more education bills passed by the Legislature, and it isn’t clear whether lawmakers will be able to override those vetoes.
Expectations for the negotiations are low — similar talks failed to accomplish their goal last year.
In 2024, the House and Senate passed an education bill, Dunleavy vetoed that bill, then lawmakers failed, by a single vote, to override that veto.
This year, members of the state House split education funding decisions from policy matters and have rapidly advanced a standalone bill that would increase K-12 public school funding by $326 million per year, with additional increases in subsequent years.
That’s in contrast to the governor, who unveiled a large, omnibus education bill last week that includes policy changes and a smaller funding increase.
Some of those policy changes, including alterations to the way charter schools are approved, were adamantly opposed by lawmakers last year.
Many legislators believe that the results of the 2024 election have given them greater chances of overriding a Dunleavy veto. That isn’t certain. Since he took office in 2018, state lawmakers have never overridden one of the governor’s vetoes.
“I think there’s clearly the votes in both bodies to increase education funding. But, you know, I think it’s always better to try to sit down and have something that you get a little bit broader consensus on,” said Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage and one of the Senate majority’s negotiators.
Senate Minority Leader Mike Shower, R-Wasilla, said the negotiating sessions are a good idea.
“I applaud the effort — and this was the governor’s idea — to break the logjam, to see if we can find solutions,” he said.
If Tuesday’s first session is successful, lawmakers are expected to pause the advancement of their education bills for up to two weeks while all sides search for common ground.
“I don’t think it’ll take two weeks,” Shower said. “I think this could go in the first hour. They could go, ‘We’re too far apart.’”
Shower didn’t eliminate all hope, however.
“But if they keep meeting for a while, that means at least we’re finding some common ground, which I hope is what we do,” he said.