Is the 90-day legislative session working? Gary Stevens, the Senate president, would say no. As one of the prime sponsors of the ballot initiative that went before the voters in 2006, I say yes.
As a six-year member of the Alaska State House of Representatives, I saw from inside the fishbowl not only the excellent work product produced by my colleagues, but also the extraordinary measure of wasted time manufactured by the obtuse, bloated, legislative process.
It isn't the endless gallery introductions or special orders or birthday songs or the long weekends away from Juneau (all of which I participated in as much or more than other elected officials) that drove our decision to attempt to shorten the legislative session ---it was how we lost the value of time. How the first 30 days were so dilutive and how time was artificially compressed in the last days and hours of each session to manipulate an outcome generally favorable to the most powerful of elected legislators. We're seeing it again, deja vu, just this week.
The Senate president has forgotten his manners and what it is to wear out shoe leather for something you believe in, to say: "Some seemed a little selfish; some seemed a little self-serving. Some, it was convenient for them to have a shorter session to get back to their hometowns and run their hotels. ..."
The Senate president has a distinguished career in academics and now a tenure as well in the Legislature with a record of some accomplishment.
We are friends and we share a passion for hotels -- I enjoy operating one as a small businessman employing 200 Alaskans and he enjoys staying in them as he galavants around the globe on legislative junkets. We use our time differently. But our Legislature is supposed to be made up of citizen legislators -- businessmen are welcome, as are retired academics. It's what makes the mix so rich and reflective of Alaska itself.
To have the Alaska legislature meet for fewer days is working. We elect people who want to get reelected. They do this by demonstrating accomplishments and by passing laws and spending money. This is what government does. When we pass a law, it looks good on an incumbent's website, but it generally means you just lost a measure of your liberty. And when an incumbent spends money, it usually means we just grew the size of government or perpetuated its growth.
Less legislative time in Juneau doesn't keep elected officials from meeting with constituents, it just changes where and when it happens. Fewer trips abroad and to D.C., whether during or outside the legislative session, is always a good prescription for more voter contact.
Time is a resource. And precious resources are more valued. A 90-day legislative session compresses time and results in fewer bad bills, less legislative song, and a more focused work product delivered with more precision and efficiency. In the private sector we call that working a five- or six-day work week and sometimes a ten- or twelve-hour day.
I collected 46,000 signatures, a fifth of these with my own sweat equity by criss-crossing Alaska for a year. It was hard work, as it should be, to do a ballot initiative. The voters voted for it.
A little private sector efficiency in government ought to be welcomed, not undermined. But for a lifelong academic and politician like the Senate president, it must be easier to cast aspersions on motive than to embrace a voter mandate that says: Do good work, but do it in less time.
Or, as this year's session seems to show, under the Senate president's leadership -- we seem to be doing less with less time -- and that's not all bad.
Either way -- put Alaskans first, respect the legislative session length and focus on delivering good, lean, efficient, user-friendly government.
Jay Ramras is a former member of the state House of Representatives and a hotel owner in Fairbanks.
By JAY RAMRAS