House pledges to work weekends after GOP Rep. Cronk tests positive for covid-19
Time to make up for lost time.
alaska legislature
The House is finally ready to get to work
The largely Democrat-led coalition put mostly Democrats in charge of every committee.
Anchorage Rep. Tarr is out of the House Coalition over committee dispute
It’s not an immediate death knell for the House Coalition’s hold on the House but it’s not great.
House teeters toward organization as Merrick joins majority coalition
They’re finally, nearly ready to get to work.
Dunleavy rolls the dice on pandemic by allowing disaster declaration to run out
It’s a bet that Alaska’s generally promising trends, declining case counts, relatively few deaths and fast vaccination rate will keep up without the state’s disaster powers.
House elects Kodiak Rep. Stutes as speaker but organization not yet finalized
Stutes was elected on a 21-19 vote after a lone party-line Republican broke ranks to support the moderate Republican member of the House bipartisan coalition.
Legislature’s inability to extend disaster declaration could cost Alaska $8 million a month in food stamps
The program typically has about $15 million go out each month in benefits but was boosted by Congress to address a sharp increase in food insecurity and hunger amid the pandemic.
Legislation would give Alaska’s essential workers free college education, job training
Begich said the measure is particularly warranted because the economic impacts of the pandemic have largely fallen on low-wage workers, who are still unemployed at a far higher rate than high-wage workers.
Meyer: Legislature must act quickly on COVID-19, listen to health care experts
Unfortunately, instead of inviting Alaskan public health experts and health care professionals who have been on the front lines fighting the pandemic for the last year, they have chosen instead to invite individuals pushing false claims and theories that aim to undermine guidelines and recommendations that that keep people safe.
As GOP senators push to end disaster declaration, health officials raise alarms
The state warns that repealing the disaster declaration would undermine its vaccination efforts.