OPINION: Legislators, we must override Dunleavy’s vetoes

Without explanation, Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed $5.2 million in funding targeted to support the READS Act goal of reading improvement for kids in grades K-3. What is hard to understand about this is that the READS Act was his pet legislation from two years ago. The Act has been criticized as an unfunded mandate that sets new standards but withholds the means to meet those standards. Alaska’s reading scores are among the lowest in the nation. The vetoed funding would have provided additional in-class instructional support for those early readers who need extra help. It is unrealistic for the governor to expect reading scores to improve just because he says so, while withholding the resources necessary to actually bring reading scores up.

Preschool education was also a casualty of the governor’s budget cuts. Despite overwhelming scientific evidence supporting the substantial benefits of preschool programs in preparing children for kindergarten, critical funding was vetoed for Head Start and the Parents as Teachers program. Currently, only one-quarter of Alaska’s kindergarteners start the year meeting the ‘ready to learn’ standard.

Moreover, the governor also vetoed millions in funding to bring broadband internet to schools across rural Alaska. In 2024, it is unconscionable to leave rural students behind to deal with internet speeds that cannot download a lesson plan, let alone participate in a virtual learning session.

The governor’s power to line-item veto individual expenditures out of the budget is an important part of Alaska’s constitution. How a governor exercises that authority reveals their values and can highlight differences in priorities between the Legislature and the governor.

I am relieved that, unlike last year, Dunleavy did not veto any of the $175 million one-time school funding boost that will be distributed through the foundation formula along with the Base Student Allocation (BSA), the per-student amount set in state statutes. While this one-time formula funding remained, the governor did veto other funds that will cause our public schools to suffer and put our children further behind. After more than 12 years of effectively flat-funding education while costs soared due to inflation, our public education system is a shell of its former self. Stable new funding is needed now.

Though a momentary relief, providing only one-time funding to our schools is like giving our road-clearing crews a collection of snow shovels when they really need loaders and graders. While this funding is desperately needed, any amount of one-time funding will not satisfy the true needs of our public schools. School districts can’t realistically use one-time funds to attract and hire qualified teachers, which is the current number-one crisis in our public schools. These funds are limited to the upcoming school year and cannot be relied upon to fund jobs in future years. Recruiting qualified teachers in such a scenario is next to impossible. It’s no wonder we’re in the midst of Alaska’s largest out-migration of public school teachers at 8% per year.

The survival of the one-time formula funds is a stark reminder of the governor’s veto of Senate Bill 140 earlier this year. That bill provided a similar funding increase as was ultimately included in the budget, but provided it within the BSA statute, which would have made the funding increase permanent, rather than a temporary one-time increase. I cannot underscore enough the importance of bringing stability and predictability to school districts across the state with a permanent, inflation-adjusted, increase in school funding through a BSA increase.

When the BSA increase was vetoed, and after House majority caucus members tragically refused to override that veto, we settled for one-time education funding to at least partially address the growing crisis in our schools. Part of that funding was the one-time formula funding that supplemented the BSA amount, but there were other components as well. Those additional funds were targeted to address particular areas of concern. But the governor has vetoed them.

The governor’s vetoes of education funding will have long-lasting effects on Alaska’s children, and by extension, Alaska’s economy. We must continue to raise the alarm about the crisis in Alaska’s schools until the Legislature and the governor come together to provide the funding in the amount and the form that is needed. Sadly, the education vetoes are only a portion of the governor’s vetoes that are shortsighted and damaging to Alaska’s job and economic growth. At its first opportunity, the Legislature must override the governor’s harmful budget vetoes.

Alyse Galvin represents Anchorage’s Midtown district in the Alaska State House; she is a mother, business owner, and longtime education advocate.

Andrew Gray represents Anchorage’s U-Med district in the Alaska State House; he is an army veteran, a physician assistant, and host of the East Anchorage Book Club podcast.

The views expressed here are the writer’s and are not necessarily endorsed by the Anchorage Daily News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)adn.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@adn.com or click here to submit via any web browser. Read our full guidelines for letters and commentaries here.