Eagle River area legislators say they want to hear from constituents at town hall

EAGLE RIVER — Four local legislators, all women, all Republicans, listened to concerns from local citizens at a town hall on Tuesday evening, January 10th, at the city meeting room in Eagle River. Rep. Dan Saddler couldn’t make it due to being held up on a ferry getting back to town.

They heard from everybody who wanted to speak. About three dozen citizens attended and most voiced their thoughts, giving lawmakers the salted jerky of their Alaskan-sized worries to chew on before they head to Juneau to start a new legislative session.

Overriding all the issues was the budget. Senator MacKinnon, representing Eagle River (Dist. G), laid it out flatly, “Folks, we can’t make payroll. We are $2.7 billion short this cycle. We have got to do something.”

She said, “The Senate is proposing $750 million worth of cuts in a three-year plan. It’s called R-543.” That stands for reductions of 5% the first year, 4% the second, and 3% the third. Whether it’s achievable, she admitted, will be a conversation between the newly elected House majority and the Senate. “We will do everything we can to propose cuts,” she emphasized.

Another big concern brought up by at least three community members had to do with problems in SB91, last year’s major crime bill legislation. Both Rep. Reinbold, (Eagle River, Dist 14) and Rep. Tilton (Chugiak, Dist 12) echoed those concerns and mentioned their desire to roll back parts of it. From their perspective, it has created a risky environment for public safety officers and a lenient one for criminals.

The idea of a sales tax was mentioned often during the course of the evening and whether restructuring of the PFD will happen. All the legislators underscored this topic by emphasizing how important it will be this session to get input from the people. They need to hear from the people on this, they said.

Senator Hughes said that this year has the potential to be “the session of the people, because the people are going to have to wake up and watch what we’re doing.” That’s why these town halls are so important. “We are going to be listening to you.

When asked about their individual priorities for this upcoming session, each legislator outlined three key objectives for this session.

Senator Anna MacKinnon’s Priorities:

“I’m looking at limiting legislation that can be introduced, so that legislators have to prioritize their bills.” She stated that some legislators introduce upwards of 15 or more bills, in total more than 800 pieces of legislation get introduced that end up jamming the legal department and costing us.

She knows this idea could be controversial and would appreciate hearing from people about it. She explained, “This is not an attempt to silence anyone. It’s not an attempt to stop anyone advancing good ideas, for that can all happen under the committee, the committee chairman could introduce legislation.”

Her second issue is how to help contain costs in education. She pointed out that we have 54 school districts in Alaska that adopt a new curriculum every five years. She then asked, “Is there not a way that the state board of education could provide curriculum that is okay to choose from for all these smaller communities that don’t have all the expertise that Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau might have as a cost saving measure?”

Then it comes to our health costs. The Eagle River Chamber had revealed information that of the five highest cost provider cities in the nation, Alaska has four of them: Anchorage, Kodiak, Fairbanks, and Juneau. Further, pharmaceuticals are charging Alaskans more than anywhere else in the nation. She’s going to be looking at reforms in that area.

Senator Shelley Hughes’ Priorities:

Senator Hughes is newly elected to the seat vacated by Sen. Bill Stoltze, representing Chugiak and Palmer (Dist. F). She mentioned the idea of revamping the constitutional spending limit that because its so high, it is not effective. “It’s something that will help us to have assurance that we will get on the path of fiscal sustainability,” she said.

Then she proposed getting independent, objective “efficiency auditors” that can dive into the weeds of the budget within each department and tell us what really is working and what is not, what is appropriate spending and what is not.

She explained that “various departments heads come up to the table in front of the finance committee and answer questions. They are good people, trying to protect their turf, we get that. But they are also telling the finance committee only what they want to them to know. There is something not quite right with that,” she concluded.

“In the short period of time we have in Juneau, it is very difficult for the finance committee to sort it all out and get the information they need.” So, she thinks it would be a good thing to hire what she called “efficiency auditors.”

Secondly, Sen. Hughes, who mentioned that she and her family members have long been in the health industry, expressed frustration at knowing how much medical procedures cost.

“In the health industry, with the increase in costs everywhere, I’m looking at something called ‘cost-transparency.’ You walk into McDonald’s and you know what things cost. With healthcare, you don’t know. People on the insurance side point fingers at the medical side. And the medical providers are pointing fingers at the insurance people, saying that it’s their problem.”

Her third priority is education. “We can’t continue to escalate the education budget. It’s not sustainable.” She’s exploring the idea to consolidate the 54 school districts across the state, all those superintendents and administrators. “You’ve probably heard, Prince of Wales has four school districts on its one island.”

She would couple this effort with creation of a virtual or online high school for the villages. She suggested having instructional aides in villages, while the best teachers are online teaching to hundreds of students at the same time.

“I think we can save a lot of money and improve the quality of education and that the kids would love it. I want to talk to the families in the villages and get their input. The idea of a virtual high school is something we want to look at.”

And don’t worry, she assured the audience, “I can take the heat from the NEA.”

Representative Lora Reinbold’s Priorities:

“We should never forget why government was instituted. It was instituted to protect the rights of citizens.” That is her first priority.

Then she mentioned her concerns with SB91. “I think there’s been a huge outcry from law enforcement. They’ve been stripped of a lot of key tools to prosecute crime, which I think is a huge tragedy.” The second mandate of government she emphasized is to keep our people safe. “We don’t have a more important mandate than keeping our people safe and right now they are at a higher risk once SB91 was passed.”

Her third priority is to protect the pocketbooks of Alaskans. “We have roughly 25,000 employees in the State of Alaska. We cannot continue to do business as we have been doing until now. We have to cut government. I’m absolutely tired of the shifting of funds. We must look at the real budget and not play games with the people’s money.”

Another priority of hers is to provide pushback on federal overreach or on “federal tyranny,” as she better described it. She wants to provide the ability for Alaskans to responsibly develop our resources without undue federal oversight.

Representative Cathy Tilton’s Priorities:

Rep. Tilton said, “My number one priority is the budget, because everything comes back to the budget.” She will sit on the finance committee; her two subcommittees will be Administration, and Health and Social Services.

“I’m looking at some kind of a work fare bill that can help people to get on their feet, be productive, and to get off of public assistance. Some people may need it for short periods of time but not as a lifestyle.”

She’s also going to be pushing for land grant legislation for the University, so they can use their lands to be able to fund the university.

Outside of the budget, she’s going to be looking at some reforms to SB91. The third priority for her is developing a federal overreach access bill that would allow access into our public lands.