{"id":1511,"date":"2011-05-06T12:39:46","date_gmt":"2011-05-06T20:39:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/?p=1511"},"modified":"2011-10-25T23:11:25","modified_gmt":"2011-10-26T07:11:25","slug":"legislature-passes-operating-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/?p=1511","title":{"rendered":"Legislature Passes Operating Budget"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Legislature has passed the FY2012 Operating Budget<\/a>.\u00a0 The budget funds the workings of state government, provides important public services, and is the only bill the legislature is required to pass during session.<\/p>\n

Part of my role as Co-Chair of the Senate Finance Committee is working with colleagues to draft appropriation bills.\u00a0 Through this year\u2019s process, the Senate made several revisions to improve the state\u2019s operating budget.\u00a0 This included cutting $4 million from the governor\u2019s budget request, and only adding select items to meet the needs of Alaskans.<\/p>\n

The Senate included several provisions in the budget that will benefit Alaskans.\u00a0 First and foremost was savings.\u00a0 The operating budget adds $1.4 billion to state savings, bringing our proposed savings to nearly $2 billion this year.\u00a0 It\u2019s vital that Alaska set aside surplus revenue to solidify our state\u2019s economic future, and I\u2019m pleased the Senate took the lead on this issue.<\/p>\n

The budget also includes two items that will aid communities and improve transportation across our state.\u00a0 Community Revenue Sharing received $80 million to share state wealth with local governments and help communities and schools deal with high fuel prices.<\/p>\n

The legislature also set aside $60 million to construct a new vessel for the Alaska Marine Highway system.\u00a0 Our state\u2019s ferry fleet plays a vital role in the economy and quality of life in our communities.\u00a0 Currently, over one-third of our state ferries were brought on-line shortly after statehood.\u00a0 It\u2019s time to make upgrades to our aging fleet, and our state has the resources and facilities to do so.\u00a0 Along with previously allocated funds, AMHS now has the funds needed to move the Alaska Class Ferry<\/a> project forward to fully design and construct a new vessel for our fleet.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m pleased with the legislature\u2019s work and look forward to advancing these issues during the last few weeks of session.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Legislature has passed the FY2012 Operating Budget.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[11,7,22,6],"class_list":["post-1511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-alaska-marine-highway","tag-bert-stedman","tag-budget","tag-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1511"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1511\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1663,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1511\/revisions\/1663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bertstedman.com\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}