The Alaska Legislature approved trips for 40 lawmakers and staff to a conference in Seattle earlier this month, in spite of recent calls from its leaders to limit state agency travel because of the budget crisis.
Those approved to travel to the conference include House Speaker Mike Chenault, R-Nikiski; House Finance Committee Co-chair Mark Neuman, R-Big Lake; and Senate Finance Committee Co-Chair Anna MacKinnon, R-Eagle River. The three signed a letter to Gov. Bill Walker in December referencing the state's huge deficit and revenue shortfall, and urged him to consider limiting travel by his administration "to only that necessary to carry out administrative duties or emergency response."
Information about how much state money was actually spent to send lawmakers to the conference won't be available until next week at the earliest, once final paperwork is turned in, said the Legislature's finance manager, Jessica Geary.
In an interview, Chenault defended the approved travel for 17 House members and nearly a dozen House staffers by saying some didn't need his permission to go because their trips were paid for with committee or other budgets outside his authority.
"I don't control all of those staff members, and I don't control all the legislators," he said.
The organization that convened the Seattle event, the National Conference of State Legislators, covered most of the costs for Chenault's own trip, and for some others, he added.
But even at that, the organization also gets substantial funds from Alaska. In the previous fiscal year, the Legislature gave more than $150,000 to the NCSL, according to state records.
Chenault described the conference as an opportunity for Alaska legislators to have a voice in national policy discussions.
"I can't say whether everyone that went there got valuable information, or that we got 110 percent of our value out of them," he said. "But I certainly think that a majority of those members participated in the committees that they were assigned to, and they'll bring something back that will benefit the state of Alaska at some point in time."
MacKinnon, meanwhile, was the only senator whose travel was approved to the conference, and she said she went because she's a co-chair of an NCSL committee on labor and economic development. Costs for her trip, she added, were partly offset by a stipend attached to a session on oral health that she attended, and at which three Alaska House members were also present.
"The Senate is very concerned — I think that was obvious in the special session — about money," MacKinnon said, referencing the Legislature's extended negotiations over the state budget earlier this year. "So, I think it was intentional that only one person went."
Those approved to travel to NCSL's annual summit included 16 House members, and MacKinnon. There were also 23 staffers, about half of whom work for individual legislators, and half of whom work in nonpartisan support positions.
Fourteen legislators and 22 staffers were approved to travel to last year's summit in Minneapolis; another legislator who attended the Seattle event, Rep. Charisse Millett, R-Anchorage, noted that this year's conference was closer to Alaska.
Approval for the Seattle trips came from a variety of sources, since the Legislature has various accounts that can be used for travel allotted to the House and Senate, to committees, to individual lawmakers and to support staff.
Chenault approved trips for himself and nine other House members, including five members of the Democratic minority. The House Finance Committee, chaired by Neuman of Big Lake and Steve Thompson, R-Fairbanks, approved travel for two lawmakers and three staff members. Individual lawmakers like Millett and Rep. Chris Tuck, the Democratic leader, authorized trips for their staff members using their own office accounts.
Other staff members had their travel approved by the director of the Legislature's nonpartisan support department, the Legislative Affairs Agency.
At least one legislator whose trip was approved, Rep. Geran Tarr, D-Anchorage, didn't end up going.
The Legislature's robust attendance, however, could complicate the message from its leaders that the state is nearing a budget crisis one lawmaker has termed a "deficit tsunami."
The Legislature this year cut $400 million from the state's $4.5 billion operating budget, following a sharp drop in the price of oil -- revenues from which pay for the vast majority of state spending.
The cuts included a 4.5 percent reduction to the Legislature's overall budget. But money allotted to travel — including for committees and nonpartisan staff — actually increased 3.8 percent between this year and last year, to $3.78 million from $3.64 million.
Asked about those figures, Chenault responded that the Legislature has, in fact, cut back on travel.
"It may be budgeted, but is it spent?" he said. "Just from my previous experience, I think our travel's probably quite a bit less than what it has been in the past."
Lawmakers this year did skip what's been a traditional break during the legislative session for members to travel to a conference in Washington, D.C., called Energy Council. In the past, as many as 28 legislators have attended.
The NCSL conference in Seattle was billed as "the nation's largest gathering of legislators and legislative staff."
The four-day event included a series of sessions in more than a dozen different "tracks," from health to immigration to information technology and telecommunications.
The "early bird" registration fee was $549 for legislators. There were also "optional tours," which ranged from a $70 cruise of Puget Sound to a $110 trip to boutique wineries, though there was no indication any Alaska legislators or staffers attended those.
In interviews, House members who attended the conference defended it as a one-stop policy shop where they could help advance Alaska's agenda on a national level, and learn how other state lawmakers are solving regional problems.
House legislators approved to go included six members of the Democratic minority and 10 members of the Republican-led majority.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle said they tried to cut costs for the trip. Millett said she shared a room with another female legislator, while Rep. Andy Josephson, D-Anchorage, eschewed what he called expensive conference hotels.
Instead, he said, he found a place to stay for $100 per night through the rental website Airbnb — which he called "comfortable," not "living in splendor" — and took a city bus to the conference each day. His travel to Seattle, he added, was already paid for by a scholarship he'd received to attend a separate conference just beforehand sponsored by the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators.
Asked whether it made sense for so many lawmakers to attend given the state's fiscal problems, Josephson responded that the costs are "not even a drop in the bucket."
"It's a portion or a fraction of a drop in the bucket," Josephson said. "The Legislature shouldn't just completely hunker down and not participate in the outer world."
Josephson described the NCSL conference as "educational networking," and an "incredible opportunity for learning."
Another lawmaker who attended, Rep. Jim Colver, R-Palmer, said he met a high-ranking legislator from Colorado, where marijuana use was legalized following a 2012 vote — two years before Alaskan voters approved legalization.
"We've been flailing around with implementation of state statutes," Colver said. "So, now we have that contact to help us this session."
"There's a value," Colver added, to his participation.