At separate press conferences Tuesday, the Alaska Senate majority and minority both previewed conversations about education funding and energy that will be among the first and most demanding issues of the legislative session.
Both conversations come as the Kenai Peninsula is facing a deficit in school funding and a projected shortfall of Cook Inlet natural gas — where supply is expected to outpace demand as soon as winter 2026.
The Kenai Peninsula Borough School District’s Board of Education during budget discussions last week said overcoming a projected $17 million deficit without heavy cuts would require a substantial increase to the base student allocation — the amount of funding schools receive from the state per student.
“We’ve seen exploding classroom sizes all across the state,” Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage, said during the majority conference Tuesday. “We’ve seen increased teacher vacancies all across the state, and we have a real crisis in education. We have not increased the base student allocation since 2017 and with inflation — with rising costs — our schools have fallen behind. We need to — desperately — do something for schools this year.”
A Senate education funding bill is likely to materialize, he said, “within the next week” and will be the subject of “thorough debate.” He said that he wanted to see the funding problem tackled separately from education policy — and first.
The Senate minority declined to share details about what they would or wouldn’t support in education conversations this year. Sen. Robert Myers Jr., R-North Pole, said “more money is probably going to be part of the package,” but also “that can’t be the only thing that we’re talking about.”
Last year, an education bill was passed by the Legislature that would have, among other things, increased the BSA by $680. That bill was vetoed by the governor and an effort to override the veto failed by one vote. KPBSD leadership said last week that an increase of $680 would no longer be sufficient to avoid cuts.
Minority Leader Sen. Mike Shower, R-Wasilla, led their discussion with energy — “that’s where our focus is.” He cited the executive order titled “Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential” by U.S. President Donald Trump as creating momentum for resource development.
Sen. Cathy Giessel, R-Anchorage, during the Senate majority press conference was more skeptical.
“With the new president, we’re hearing that Alaska will be opened to resource development, which is great,” she said. “We are, actually, already open to resource development … It’s important for us to think about the fact that we’re not a colony to be pillaged, and by throwing open all of the regulations related to resource development, we could be jeopardizing our lands and waters.”
Still, she said the majority is eager to dig into conversations about energy, kicking off with a presentation on Cook Inlet gas that was held Wednesday.
“We’ll be talking about the LNG pipeline, multiple topics like that, right out of the gate,” she said.
Full recordings of both conferences are available at ktoo.org/gavel.
Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.
