Omnibus education bill stopped by Democrats, and a flurry of bills introduced in House

The Democrat minority in the House, plus Republican Rep. David Eastman, stopped Senate Bill 140 from moving forward in the House on Monday, to the dismay of half the body. On a vote of 20-20, the House version of the education bill was stuck.

It started out as a bill that would award grants to broadband companies through rural Alaska school districts, ended up being a vehicle for myriad Republican education priorities, such as support for correspondence education and charter schools, help for deaf and hard-of-hearing students, teacher pay incentives, and more.

The House majority and minority appear to be continuing to work together to resolve differences over the bill.

Pending for floor votes are two bills:

HB 143 – Advanced recycling and facilities

HJR 7 – Constitutional amendment regarding the Permanent Fund dividend calculation

On Tuesday, the House briefly met and several bills were read into the record and assigned to committees. Most of the bills introduced this late in session will not make it through both the House and the Senate before the 120-day session ends around May 15, but the bills may end up getting reintroduced next year. Some of them have been introduced in years past, such as the bill establishing a law school at the University of Alaska, and they have not made progress through committees. The bills introduced Tuesday before the body took an “at ease to the call of the chair,” are as follows:

In addition, several House committee resolutions were introduced on Tuesday:

House joint resolutions introduced on Tuesday include: