Alaska News

Friday Anchorage Assembly vote on school district budget postponed

The Anchorage Assembly announced Thursday that it was scheduling a meeting on Friday to vote on the city school district's budget, but then, a few hours later, called the meeting off.

The vote had initially been scheduled for the Assembly's meeting last Tuesday, but members voted there to postpone it until April 8, after next week's municipal election.

But city officials later learned of a provision in municipal code that says the Assembly must vote on the budget within 30 days of its submission by the school district, or it goes into effect automatically.

The last day of that window is April 2 -- just one day after the city election, which Assembly Chairman Ernie Hall said would have posed problems for the municipal clerk and her staff. So the special meeting was scheduled for Friday.

But it turned out that there was a procedural problem with that date, as well, Hall said.

The Assembly could still take up the school district's budget at a meeting on April 2, but Hall said that's unlikely to occur, meaning that the budget will probably go into effect automatically.

"I think it would have been approved anyway," he said.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Assembly already took public testimony on the budget at its meeting on Tuesday.

Reach Nathaniel Herz at nherz@adn.com or 257-4311.

By NATHANIEL HERZ

nherz@adn.com

Nathaniel Herz

Anchorage-based independent journalist Nathaniel Herz has been a reporter in Alaska for nearly a decade, with stints at the Anchorage Daily News and Alaska Public Media. Read his newsletter, Northern Journal, at natherz.substack.com

ADVERTISEMENT