As legislators in Juneau and Alaskans statewide debate the state budget woes and how to turn things around, the impacts of those decisions may be most felt in some of the state's smallest communities.
In Cold Bay, for example, dwindling state funds mean the Aleutians East Borough School District will no longer be able to pay the additional cost of keeping the small town's school open. It's had fewer than 10 students for more than four years, the local public radio station reports, the magic number for a school to receive state funding. Now, four sixth-graders will have to find their education elsewhere. Their families may have to move, and despite the availability of jobs in the community, attracting employees with children to a place without a school is next to impossible. Lose the school, many rural Alaska communities have found, and you lose the core of the town. Other services dwindle as the population shrinks.
It's a trend that has been seen across the state for decades. More than two dozen rural schools have shut down in the last 15 years in Alaska, in part because of a 1999 ruling that cut off state funding for schools with fewer than 10 students. More than a dozen other schools are clinging to the magic number of 10 students. The schools provide not only education, but jobs. And the buildings themselves are often a community resource, providing shelter in emergencies, a place to gather for celebrations, and in some cases, the only facility with plumbing in the town. The school is literally the heart and soul of many small towns. Without it, they die.
Some might say this shift away from rural communities is inevitable. Our economy is changing. Small, remote enterprises that drew people to the far corners of the state to live are shifting, and life is getting more and more expensive as televisions turn on and subsistence hunting depends on filling gas tanks.
Alaska, however, is not Mainstreet America. Few of us live here for convenience. It is the rural, the rugged, the unique willingness to haul water and get stuck in the snow that binds this state together. The question is whether or not we realize what it is we are about to lose with our fiscal policy choices before some things, like Cold Bay, are gone forever.
Many Alaskans don't like to consider the idea of taxes until our state savings account -- the Constitutional Budget Reserve -- is a bit leaner than $10 billion. Perhaps that's reasonable. Many of the people thinking that way, however, are probably hoping that the state savings account will buy us enough time to figure out a way to make money that doesn't involve taxes.
In many ways, the state's fiscal situation isn't all that different from the one we all face each month as we balance our family budgets. Few of us would argue that the prudent thing to do during a financially lean time would be spend all of your savings without coming up with an alternate way out of the red.
Perhaps some relief will be found for Alaska in development. Perhaps the price of oil will return to its former glory in time. Perhaps there are cuts that need to be made, excesses left over from our former days of plenty that need to be removed. Perhaps the sky will rain purple ponies. Perhaps we should stop dreaming of what could be and deal with what is -- we are a state in need of a new, dependable revenue stream.
It's not a fun time to talk about taxes. Most Alaskans have just finished the painful act of handing over a chunk of money to the federal government. But here's the alternative -- we cut programs that sustain our state -- programs that teach our children, protect the weak and the old, inform us, prepare for emergencies, build our roads and make our state an attractive place to live, to do business, to invest in.
Perhaps those who oppose taxation and call for more cuts to state spending are right -- perhaps there is really too much excess at the moment to start talking about new income streams. But if that's the case, those excesses exist on the backs of communities like Cold Bay and countless other small communities across the state who are struggling to survive with dwindling support from the state. Because in Cold Bay, the excesses just don't exist, and in a few years, it is likely neither will the community.
Let's hope for the sake of many small communities across the state feeling the crunch of our state fiscal situation in a life-or-death way that answers come sooner rather than later.
Carey Restino is the editor of The Arctic Sounder and Bristol Bay Times/Dutch Harbor Fisherman, where this commentary first appeared.
The views expressed here are the writer's own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)alaskadispatch.com.