By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
Sitka’s Senator Bert Stedman says the permanent fund dividend and the marine highway are among the casualties in Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s vetoes last week.
“It’ll take some time to sort out – my staff has to review the specifics,” Stedman said today.
Stedman is a member of the Republican majority in the Senate and co-chairman of the Finance Committee, where he is in charge of the operating budget on the committee.
Dunleavy signed the budget Wednesday and announced a number of vetoes Thursday, including the legislatively approved $4 billion transfer from the Permanent Fund Earnings Reserve to the fund’s principal.
Stedman said that transfer of funds into the principal would’ve “protected the $4 billion in the Permanent Fund from being liquidated and it’s pretty clear a lot of people including the governor want to spend it.”
But he added today that the veto is moot because it was not properly executed, so the funds will be transferred into the corpus after all.
“If it isn’t, we’ll be in court,” Stedman said.
(At press time today, the Anchorage Daily News reported Dunleavy said he will not seek to block the $4 billion transfer.)
After the first special session this year, the governor had threatened not to sign the budget bill at all, which would have caused the layoff of 15,000 state workers and a government shutdown. But the Legislature convened a second special session and members fixed the technical issue that had led to Dunleavy’s shutdown threat.
At a press conference Friday the governor blamed the Legislature for the $525 Permanent Fund dividend in the budget, and he vetoed it. But Stedman said it was the governor and a group of lawmakers from the Kenai peninsula and the Mat-Su Valley who ensured there would be a lower – or no – dividend.
“They didn’t support funding the dividend and reduced it by half of $1,100,” Stedman said.
Stedman said that, in general a majority in both chambers favor funding an $1,100 PFD, while Kenai and Valley lawmakers supported the governor’s push for a payout of $2,300 or more – and “overdrawing the Permanent Fund.”
“I voted in favor of $1,100,” the senator clarified. “I don’t support zero, I don’t support $500.”
But Stedman said it will be tough to hold the previously scheduled special session on Aug. 2 because the governor has vetoed the per diem costs that were in the budget to pay for it. The special session was scheduled at the call of the governor.
“It’ll be difficult to get (legislators) to show up – to get the numbers there,” Stedman said. “It’s wishful thinking that people would go to Juneau for nothing. It’s ridiculous. A lot of elected officials have families.”
Stedman said a majority in the Legislature favored a budget that would have resulted in dividends of $1,100, but the motion fell short of the three-quarters majority needed to use the Constitutional Budget Reserve to cover the dividends, resulting in the $525 figure.
Stedman said he will have more information on the specific effects of the vetoes at a later time.
