Big bills await action as session set to close

JUNEAU — As the logjam of bills clogging the House and Senate calendars slowly loosens, the Legislature finds itself down to the final hours sorting out major legislation.

Lawmakers are on a statutory 90-day calendar that ends at midnight tonight. However, the Constitution still permits them to continue working another month, should they deem it necessary.

No one is talking about extra time or even special session just yet. But lawmakers entered the holiday weekend with reams of paperwork to clear off their desks before closing out the second year of the state’s 28th legislative session.

The high-profile items still in the balance were Gov. Sean Parnell’s gas line bill; the education bill; the capital budget; a minimum wage bill and the Knik Arm bridge bill, which still needs House approval of the Senate’s changes.

The state’s operating budget was to receive final approval Saturday from the conference committee established to work out differences between the House and the Senate.

Significant movement began late Friday when the House Finance Committee moved the gas line bill to its final stop for debate and voting: the House Floor.

The legislation — Senate Bill 138 — is deemed “enabling” legislation that essentially authorizes the governor’s administration to enter into project development negotiations with North Slope leaseholders Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and BP, and pipeline company TransCanada.

The Legislature has received plans to market the North Slope’s 35 trillion cubic feet of gas from previous administrations, with ultimately no success.

In 2006, Gov. Frank Murkowski presented the Legislature with a proposed contract that went nowhere, as most of the lawmakers felt it gave away too much to the producers.

In 2008, Sarah Palin’s Alaska Gasline Inducement Act produced a license to TransCanada, which was required to advance a project toward permitting in exchange for reimbursement up to $500 million. Markets changed that overland line to an LNG project.

Both failed efforts have left an odd taste in the mouths of lawmakers around for those offerings.

House Finance Co-Chair Bill Stoltze, a Chugiak Republican, closed out the bill’s final hearing by echoing cautious optimism.

“I have the same mix of skepticism,” Stoltze said. “This is what iteration of efforts? There is probably more promise than hope. We have more cooperation of all the elements.

“I will not say stars aligned, but there are less things to stop this than things in the past. I think there is a lot of will and desire to get this done. This is just the first of a lot of very important steps.

“I think our aspirations and our goals are good. It’s that dose of reality of how difficult, and all of the challenges, of trying to do this. This is not one of the easy projects.”

Meanwhile, the Senate Finance Committee introduced a rewritten education bill, House Bill 278, that generated nearly seven hours of debate in the House before being sent to the Senate.

It was also a bill for which no member of the House offered resounding support. The Senate’s version may produce its own set of unique issues for having kept the base student allocation, or BSA, flat at $5,680 per student.

“It’s not the status quo education bill by any means,” said Kevin Meyer, finance committee co-chair and Anchorage Republican. “A lot of times people just think all the money needs to go into the BSA and just walk away from it. We are actually trying to incentivize change.”

The committee produced a bill that Meyer called an “omnibus bill” for having rolled in features from other bills that never moved.

The bill targets programs such as charter schools, which are apart of the public school system in Alaska, correspondence programs, home schools and residential schools.

The bill is worth about $300 million toward state education — or about $100 million per year. Meyer said about one-fourth of the annual allocation goes toward the programs. Schools can use the remaining funds as they deem necessary.

“We are committed to that $100 million for the next three years,” Meyer said. “We were told school districts want and need long-term planning. For planning purposes, they need to know for at least the next three years. So that’s what we’ve offered up.”

But the Great Alaska Schools, a coalition of parents and ad-hoc school-funding supporters, says the bill won’t keep teachers on the job.

Becca Bernard, one of the parents, says the state needed a BSA of $400 for the upcoming year, and $125 in each of the next two years.

Instead, the bill reflects funding of $200 for next year, and no money for ensuing years.

“Unfortunately, this bill is not going to stop teacher cuts; that’s the bottom line,” Bernard said. “It’s smoke and mirrors. This bill doesn’t get close. We made our voices heard louder, but the committee is not responding to what they’ve heard from constituents.”