School board approves FY26 Legislative priorities for funding, maintenance requisitions

During the September 3 meeting of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District (MSBSD) school board, a list of legislative priorities for FY2026 were approved, as the first priority remains funding, specifically an increase in K-12 public education programs, including providing a foundation formula inflationary adjustment. Although Foundation Formula funding was recently increased, the district would like to see future inflation addressed.

Funding increases for student transportation, the Alaska Reads Act, and an increase of funding through the Correspondence Factor were also included as correspondence students continue to receive funding below their peers and do not receive funding for multipliers for students with special needs or career and technical education.

Justin LaCross, President of the Mat-Su Education Association, told the school board he supports the spoke “I really appreciate your priority number one when you guys are talking about the funding, and if there’s anything I can do to support that effort, please keep me in the loop.

Second on the legislative priority list is providing flexibility and resources which support recruitment and retention efforts, as fiscal challenges require school districts to be innovative in meeting student needs and community interests and recruiting high quality teachers will require expanded flexibility or changes to certain limiting legislative sections.

Another item on the legislative priorities list would be to allow municipalities and boroughs the ability to align board member terms with other elected officials. This would follow the Mat-Su Borough Assembly’s action to extend the terms for assembly members to four years, aligning the local elections with the state and national election cycle and reduce the costs associated with facilitating elections. The MSBSD would similarly like to support the increased efficiency by allowing board members to serve a four year term. Currently, Alaska Statute 14.12.050 does not allow for this adjustment.

Other legislative priorities included supporting legislation that limits in-person instructional services provided by a school district outside of their district’s boundary, and supporting legislation relating to parental rights in a child’s education. During previous sessions, the school board expressed support for legislation which ensured parental rights in their child’s education as well as opposition to legislation intended to limit the inclusion of parents. This included support for such initiatives as required notice and written consent before any activity, class, or program that includes sensitive and personal content involving gender identify, human reproduction, or sexual matters; rights of parents to designate the official name used by schools when referring to enrolled students; and preventing school districts from refusing to release sensitive and personal student records to the child’s legal parent or guardian.

The school board has previously expressed that it opposes legislation where medical, mental, or behavioral health services are available to students at school without the express written consent of the parent. Similarly the school board has not supported legislation that would permit non-medical personnel to refer students for any medical, mental, or behavioral health services within the school environment.

The final legislative priority is to support legislation which establishes a program for selected individuals to be permitted to carry a firearm on school property, with the rationale being that the safety and well-being of students are of paramount concern for the school board, parents, staff, and the community, and establishing a program which seeks to support school districts in implementing strategies to prevent and address the most severe forms of violence in schools is an important priority in maintaining safe learning environments.

School board member Ole Larson followed up, asking for a legislative body review on signs posted at schools that state no guns are allowed or that the school is a gun-free zone.

“When you advertise it as a gun-free zone, people look at it as a soft target,” Larson said, which he believes make schools a soft target for individuals struggling with mental health and looking for the biggest target. “Take the soft target out of the individual that’s mentally ill and looking for a soft target.”

“I can’t stand it,” said board member Andrew Shane of the signs. “It really drives me nuts when we have those things up there because, yeah, I do think that it shows for a soft target.” He then asked if the school board could just address the signage issue separately from adding it to the legislative priorities list.

Deputy Superintendent Katie Gardner said that once the administration finishes researching the item, and if there are no federal regulations or requirements or reasons why those signs are posted, that administratively and/or operationally remove such signs.

Superintendent Dr. Randy Trani said as far as he could examine, there was no such law that says the schools need to put a sign up. “There’s a law that says it is a gun-free zone, and that’s as far as we’ve gotten.”

Meanwhile, several capital requests were also included on the list, with the majority of the requests for upgrades and improvements to existing structures. Roofing replacements for three schools—Colony Middle, Wasilla Middle, and Talkeetna Elementary--totaling $7.8M. The sites have systems that have exceeded expected life and have expired warranties, leading to sporadic leakage and collateral damages.

Another request is being made for Boiler and Boiler Control upgrades for nine sites, totaling $6.8M. Critical boiler and boiler control replacements are needed as the equipment is beyond the manufacturer’s predicted life expectancy of 25 years. The MSBSD has been battling emergency repairs on these boilers for many years, and have crucial items that are and have been affecting the physical environment, building temperature control, and thus the classroom. Several sites have required emergency repairs just to remain operational.

These capital requests are in line with several items on the Major Maintenance List the school board also took up, to be submitted to the Mat-Su Borough Manager for consideration and inclusion in the Borough's Capital Program.

In addition to necessary roof and boiler replacements and repairs on the capital requests, the list includes generator replacements to several schools, additional roof replacements, and secondary schools flooring replacements.

“We’ve had success in working with the Borough for about $2 million annual contribution to support some of these important projects—elevators, boilers, generators—and we’ve been able to receive funding and support of four or five projects on an annual basis,” said Gardner. She said that the three most important projects are the three roof replacements, but they are the costliest, and the board does hold discretion to change the ranking of the projects to present at the upcoming joint MSB Assembly/school board meeting on September 10. She also acknowledged that only one roof is repaired and the district may not have funding for projects for the next two years while preserving resources to support other projects.

Gardner said they could also discuss with the Borough an approach to save for the repairs over time while addressing lower-priority requests. “I would expect the Borough does not have the capacity to fund multiple projects if we stick with this priority ranking.”

“I think the Borough should have some leeway with the school district in what they can and can’t fund,” said Larson, noting the Wasilla Middle School has two issues needing attention, being the roof and the boiler. “If the boiler goes out in the wintertime, it’s going to cost three times the amount of money. So I think you have to take that into consideration. Is the roof leaking? Yeah, we have buckets out there and can patch it up. But if the boiler goes out in the middle of winter, the school stops.”

Both measures were passed unanimously.