The chairman of the Senate State Affairs Committee wants to vet several ideas surrounding the use of Alaska Permanent Fund earnings.
Sen. Bill Stoltze says that could include a constitutional amendment to allow for voters to weigh in. So far, such a measure has not been introduced.
Stoltze’s committee held its first hearing Tuesday on the governor’s plan to use the permanent fund as an endowment of sorts, fed by oil tax revenue and a portion of royalties. Earnings from the fund would help pay for state government. The plan would change how the annual dividends most Alaskans receive are calculated.
Questions have been raised about whether the fund’s earnings reserve account must be swept to repay money taken from a constitutional reserve account. The Department of Law says it wouldn’t.
