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What do you know about the condition of TAPS? Educate us.

Speaking of revenue. Heard this today on proposed fuel taxes.

Gasoline - 8.9 cents to 16
Av Gas - 3.5 cents to 10
Marine Fuel 5 cents to 10

No idea how much additional revenue this generates though. I know I'll probably burn a little more boat gas this year with the price so low. (If you call over $3/gal "low")

The refinery in NP was not closed by the price of crude, either.

price of oil was low back in '07 or '08 IIRC

though twice as much was flowing through the pipeline.

I've no problem kicking in some tax and taking a hit on the PFD, no problem at all.

Provided the gov and legislature shrink gov't to the budget we ran under back then.


both those things would make for a meaningful process towards a solution.


one without the other? sorry no dice whereas I'm concerned.

I am going to disagree with a bunch of people but I feel that right now is a critical time for Walker to put the real big boy pants on!

He needs to establish an endowment for the non-discretionary part of the main budget.

He can't blatantly cut the budget.

He needs to set his budget and work with the brighter representatives and senators. We need to use that AAA bond rating that is the best in the US. We establish our endowments and advertise our budget rating on Television. With the way that the stock market is presently, it will be jumped by open arms we have a greater budget reserve than any other state. The State can put some of its constitutional reserve in this bond fund. We could do it right and then look at creating a nested sustainable long term budget that could deal with lows and highs.

However, my guess is that we will get taxed, they will spend our money and we will loose all of our budget reserve because our state can't think beyond the immediate.

Sincerely,
Thomas

One of the things that I feel we've failed at - that I failed to be a better, more effective proponent of- as educators in rural schools, was trying to help students become more productive in an independent way. Back in the early 80s when I started, there was more latitude for that - if fewer resources. (As a result, I become pretty resourceful, sometimes frustrating my superiors with my failures to spend enough money, once it became available.) But the emphasis in education for the past decade or two has been to make students become contributing members of a global market. Does anyone really think that rural Alaskan, subsistence oriented people really look at their lives in that way. Sure, there are some who do, but the majority stay where they grew up, and those who do try to "better themselves", "reach their potential", or whatever you want to call it, do so most often with the idea of giving back - helping- "their people" in some way. What we have now - and some of that is the vast array of choices that western culture offers: television, videos, cell phones, video games, internet, crap "food" of every sort, etc - are villages where larger and larger percentages of young people who are losing their connection to the land, who, if they hunt, have become fair-weather hunters, or one season hunters. They'll gladly do the fun hunting or gathering. Granted, that's not everyone, but it's becoming more and more common. Those who are still at home (in the village) could revert if they were forced by economic need if they had to. Then there are those who have moved to 'town' (Anchorage/Nome/etc) who either don't work or do the most menial of jobs to get by. It's not like they add much if anything. (Though perhaps the Fed Gov aid they receive in order to live in and apartment is someone else's windfall?)

There are a lot of things we did which I never regretted. I'm not a certified welder, but I can weld well enough to teach some of the basics, to make kids functional in a practical way. I never regretted teaching any of those skills. I graduated college with some skill in fine cabinetry. I tried my hand at passing those skills along but quickly realized that wood had a more beneficial purpose when applied to things like sleds in rural Alaska. I never regretted teaching those skills either. Nor did it ever trouble me that I got kids' hands dirty working on engines....not B&S lawnmower engines either. Nobody ever came to me years later and asked or thanked me for anything related to algebra, language arts, or science (though they still remember mapping the lake bottom of the lake which the engineers decided to switch our water supply to based on the data the kids had gathered). But I watched quite a few kids become young adults who could take care of themselves, who didn't have to pour their family's dividends into new machines each year because they knew a few things that were useful for being independent.

Hate to break it to you, but our credit rating was downgraded a couple of weeks ago . . .

http://www.adn.com/article/20160105/sp-drops-alaskas-credit-rating-and-warns-further-downgrades

Mark,

I don't mean to disparage the villages, the problem I mention is both on and off the road system and covers a small percentage of society, but they devour a large portion of social services.

The issues the villages face are complex and state and federal funding play but one of many roles that lead to their issues both positive and negative. Reduced funding will likely exacerbate existing problems, cause new ones and perhaps fix some as well. What I would like to see, and don't expect to see, is for the Native Corporations to be more proactive in dealing with the issues in the villages vs. being just another voice to ask for more government funding.

But whether or not one lives in the bush, on the road system having a portion of society not pulling it's own way is detrimental. And looking at various social programs across the country, not a one of them has fixed the problem they claimed to solve.

Paul,

I don't take it wrong. I know what you're getting at, but I think there are lots of reasons and plenty of blame. And obviously some of it falls right in the bullseye. But, some of it is well beyond the level of individuals too. Places like Nulato, Tanana, Saint Michael...they were military forts, and they had the backing of the Federal Government, just as Fairbanks and Anchorage are now. And they remained important until, through no fault of their own, they became 'nowhere'. A place like Anchorage didn't have a name much less a reason to exist until the railroad came through....until the Federal Government ensured that the railroad came through. With a railroad, river traffic to the growing, thriving mining camps around Fairbanks was no longer important. That killed the most significant port along the west coast: Saint Michael, and that, together with the new technology involving oil-fired boats meant that the wood cutting jobs along the Yukon- which supplied the steamboat traffic- were no longer important, and they died out. And those were big hits to rural economies. And now we have people living in stick frame houses. They pay for them. It's based on incomes which are generally not even high enough to pay the interest. Anyone who owns or builds their own home in rural areas has virtually no equity. Who is going to buy a house and pay $1000/month when they can wait for, and get, a house for which they only pay a portion of the interest for 20 years, after which they own it? And these houses are often built by a low bidder and shipped in. Some batches are so inferior that they require twice the fuel to heat that even poorly build local houses do.

The problems are very complex. Nothing is black and white. People know they have been bought off, yet, like the majority of people in this country, they accept the 'buy-off' with some regret - and resent the fact that they do. And then their kids lose further touch with a culture which has sustained them for millennia.

It's not like we can go back in time and erase the urban sores on the state - nor should we even consider that. Yet, while I am as disappointed and disgusted as anyone by the rural 'dregs of society' that land on the streets of the cities , I also get defensive when those who have never really lived "in Alaska" place them in judgement. I truly believe we are in this together. I wish the Fed/Gov would just stay out of our business because I really don't think they've helped - going all the way back to Sheldon Jackson. But I think we have all carried someone else's water at one time or another. I know rural has done so for fledgling cities. I know that's been turned around for a while now too. But we all need each other. If Algore and Lenny D' are right about things, we'll all be more like rural people than like urban folks before it's all over. I don't think we want to lose knowledge that has so much history.

School system uses to much money ...the big guys at uaf and such,the school system is now a government within itself.... Then the moneys paid to the out outstate worker from the sea to the slope , they sail by and fly off with there money's

Independent-Democrat Governor Bill Walker this evening laid out his vision for the State of Alaska.

What he said tonight sounded less like vision for the future, and more like a vision of bigger, bloated government, a reflection of the liberal Democrats to whom he is now beholden. Walker has proposed:



Bigger Government
Bigger Taxes
Bigger Risks
(Just smaller PFDs)
Although Alaska is clearly facing a budget crisis, Governor Walker’s budget has just a 2 percent cut to the general fund. With the “step” and "merit" increases built into labor contracts, the cost of government is actually exploding, and Walker’s budget is coming in hot and fast.

Alaska’s cost of state government per capita is the highest in the nation, at over $16,000 per Alaskan resident, while the average in the U.S. is slightly over $5,500.

The governor said that Alaskans are "all in the boat together," but he has prioritized the crew of the lifeboat over the passengers.

The average state worker has seen pay increases of 60 percent over the past 10 years, while the rate of inflation has been 30 percent.

Until these sacred cows are addressed, Walker cannot deliver a balanced budget. Instead, he has proposed a 6 percent income tax – a transfer of money from working class Alaskans to the ruling class.

Now is the time to address the issue, as negotiations are under way with public employee unions.

Governor Walker has proposed new taxes on everything that moves in Alaska. He has not yet made a good-faith effort to rein in spending before he raids the pockets of working Alaskans.

The Alaska Republican Party rejects the Walker vision of burdening the working men and women of Alaska, who will bear the cost of increased taxes, fewer private sector job opportunities and smaller PFDs - all to support Walker's vision of a bloated bureaucracy.

http://www.alaskagop.org/alaska_republican_party_responds_to_governor_s_state_of_state

For starters, the public employee unions need a stake driven through their hearts. In this day and age with labor laws the way they are, there is no legitimate reason to have them.

While I respect kabuko68 immensely. I respectfully disagree with his position that we shouldn't cut state gov't


By Walkers proposed budget we're not all in this together



The article w4bear posted points that out quite clearly.

Walker should be representing the people, not just the state & state workers

And it's not like there's no examples of people having done so


When Hamilton took over the university of ak. He made the employees there accountable. It created an uproar & turnover


The one state agency we have to deal with the most is a good example of such. They are slow, inefficient, sometimes rude & condescending.

I'm a bit of a hothead I realize, my wife is the opposite. Yesterday she had to hang up on the state worker she was speaking to.

I'm not adverse to paying our state workers a decent wage & benefit package, but just like any other employee you expect some bang for your buck if you're going to do so.

If we're not going to cut expenses of the state now, are we ever going to?

Or must that beast be fed & continue to grow no matter the reality of current economic conditions?

Walker's plan just continues the looting of Alaska.

The last time I checked, the State Employee pension plan was underfunded by $13 billion......I'm sure many of those folks intend for that fund to be made whole from the Permanent Fund.

There was a time when the amount it was underfunded by was less than $4 million.....and the legislature chose to do nothing except kick it down the road.

You are correct and it wasn't all that long ago!

Some intelligent friend told me that the fund is less than 50% funded ........that's damned hard to recover in today's markets.

What was the name of the one that was to go from Alaska to Alberta? I remember the energy conference in Anchorage 6 years ago, where they were all hyped up about it and T. Boone Pickens was a guest speaker at it. I swore it was the Keystone something. ND was putting in 2500 new wellheads per year a few years back.

NG line.

The "big boy pants" must be entitlements. Especially not pursuing Medicaid expansion which will bankrupt the state. Walker made a deal with the devil when he took on a Democrat LG and accepted Democrat votes. Now he owes these people social welfare and support for bush Alaska which has no tax base. He will try to put the burden on wage earners who inhabit the road system.

This is by far the most reasoned and intelligent post I've seen. Walker talking about "making everyone pay their fair share" bullsyte is just mindblowing. How many people actually work on the 'Slope? When I worked there the charter only had 100 people on it. So maybe 200? At any given time? He's blowing smoke up everyone's butt and they're liking it.

The socialists cannot stand Alaskans not having an income tax. They CANNOT STAND IT! Walker HAS to kill that, and the way he will do it is convince the Americans up here (those inurred to taxes and think they are okay), it is very tiny. For the first year. Then they will keep increasing it every year. Walker wants to open that door so he can increase his welfare funding.
Why will he not talk about a sales tax? Because the socialists will not be able to punish those dastardly people making too much money. The socialist wants to take from those who have and give to those who do not deserve, and continue with their sacred cows, the welfare programs.