The morning after the Alaska Legislature averted a statewide shutdown, you could find more tourists than legislators in the Capitol.
Though the Legislature’s second special session continues, work has all but stopped as lawmakers seek to decompress after months of budgetary debate and discussion.
“I think that one thing that all of us in the Capitol can agree on is this has probably been the single most contentious legislative session that most of us have experienced,” Speaker of the House Bryce Edgmon said Thursday night.
“I think we have more work to do. I think both sides understand that,” said Senate Majority Leader Peter Micciche, R-Soldotna, shortly afterward. “I think the Legislature needs to take some time off, cool down, come back together and work out solutions to the remaining issues that have to be dealt with this year.”
Those issues include a capital construction budget and the state’s multibillion-dollar deficit.
Despite five months of work, the Legislature passed no bill that addressed that deficit.
The compromise budget does include some spending cuts, but many of those involve one-time decisions that won’t be possible next year.
Shortly before the Legislature passed its compromise budget, Gov. Bill Walker added the oil and gas tax-credit bill, House Bill 111, to the agenda for the second special session.
Walker declined an interview Friday, and he declined to hold a press conference, but he has repeatedly said he believes the Legislature must come up with a comprehensive, long-term plan to address Alaska’s deficit.
Cuts to the state subsidy of oil and gas drilling are part of that comprehensive plan, legislators and the governor say, but the proper approach is an open question.
The House has passed one version of HB 111; the Senate has passed another. In an aborted compromise proposed in early June, the governor offered a third option.
By adding HB 111 to the special-session agenda, Walker is placing the oil and gas issue at the top of the priority list.
Legislators, however, have different ideas.
Speaking Friday, Rep. Geran Tarr, D-Anchorage, said she does not know when the HB 111 conference committee will meet.
Tarr is the House chairwoman of the joint House-Senate committee tasked with compromising the House and Senate versions of the bill. Until that committee meets, there will be no progress on the bill.
Lawmakers also said they do not know when they will begin work on a capital construction budget. Without a capital budget, hundreds of millions of dollars in road construction projects, funded primarily with federal money, will be canceled.
“The Legislature’s work for calendar year 2017 is likely not over,” Edgmon said.
When, then, will the Legislature resume that work?
“I think both bodies needs some time to decide amongst themselves when the right time is to take up those issues,” Micciche said. “The most important thing is the shutdown has been averted.”
• Contact reporter James Brooks at james.k.brooks@juneauempire.com or call 419-7732.
