Finance committee adopts HB 53 substitute with multiple operating supplementals, sets bill aside for final action

The Alaska State Senate Finance Committee on May 1 adopted the committee substitute for House Bill 53 (operating budget), Version Y, incorporating operating supplementals, governor amendments and multiple language changes, and set the bill aside for final action at the committee's next meeting.

Committee staff said the substitute adds new operating supplemental sections (sections 7–9), adopts governor-requested adjustments received April 25, and includes items agreed with the House. "Included in the CS in front of you are operating supplemental numbers, a new operating number operating supplemental number sections 7 through 9 and multiple language section, for supplementals that were included that that were all included in the agreed upon, supplemental operating supplementals we had with the house," Pete Eklund, budget coordinator and staff to the committee, told members.

Key changes summarized by staff include a $346,000 increase for judgments and settlements (bringing the total to just over $3.1 million), an appropriation of $327,000 to the election fund split between $54,000 from the general fund and $272,000 from federal receipts to meet federal Help America Vote Act requirements, a governor amendment to restore a $7,000,000 reduction to the Department of Corrections' pretrial services, and a $3,000,000 federal award to the Alaska Workforce Investment Board to support refugee services. The substitute also removes $400,000,000 from various retirement funds in one section to reflect investment management fees paid from investments and moves net-of-fee language into the bill's language section to treat fee estimates as informational rather than appropriations.

Eklund also described several technical corrections affecting the University of Alaska, the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation administrative funding, statutory designated program receipt authorities for the Commercial Fisheries Entry Commission, and salary adjustments negotiated last week for selected bargaining units. Committee members adopted the substitute without roll-call votes recorded in the transcript; the chair said the committee will hear one amendment and take final action tomorrow.

No public testimony or external witnesses appears in the transcript for this afternoon session; committee members confined discussion to staff summaries and technical adjustments in the substitute.