FAIRBANKS \u2014 Alaska residents could soon need more than a driver\u2019s license to gain access to military bases and other federal facilities, because Alaska\u2019s state-issued identification cards remain out of compliance with federal law.<\/p>\n
Alaska IDs will be invalid for entering federal buildings as of Oct. 10. They won\u2019t be sufficient to get people through airport checkpoints starting in 2018, The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported.<\/p>\n
Alaska is one of 28 states and U.S. territories that issue IDs that don\u2019t comply with the federal REAL ID Act of 2005.<\/p>\n
The Department of Homeland Security has delayed the law\u2019s implementation several times and granted Alaska a waiver in 2015. The state has applied for another waiver, but officials say they aren\u2019t sure it will come before next month\u2019s deadline.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt will be difficult to get the waiver this time, so we are advising people who need to access military bases that they should consult whatever federal facility they are trying to access about what kind of identification will be required,\u201d said Alaska Department of Administration spokeswoman Minta Montalbo.<\/p>\n
Congress approved the REAL ID law in 2005 after the 9\/11 Commission recommended more secure forms of personal identification.<\/p>\n
Montalbo said a 2008 law signed by Gov. Sarah Palin has prevented the state from spending the money needed to meet all requirements of the federal law.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo do this (nationally mandated) verification process, we would have to have better software, better digital cameras,\u201d Montalbo said. \u201cWe are not allowed to spend money for these things. Because we\u2019ve gone as far as we can, we were warned (by the federal government) that it\u2019s not guaranteed that we\u2019ll get an extension.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gov. Bill Walker plans to ask the Legislature next year to allow the state issue two types of ID cards \u201cto offer Alaskans a choice,\u201d Montalbo said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose who want the REAL ID and are comfortable with it could get it and those who either don\u2019t need it or are not comfortable with it don\u2019t have to,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
FAIRBANKS \u2014 Alaska residents could soon need more than a driver\u2019s license to gain access to military bases and other federal facilities, because Alaska\u2019s state-issued identification cards remain out of compliance with federal law. Alaska IDs will be invalid for entering federal buildings as of Oct. 10. They won\u2019t be sufficient to get people through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-30304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30304\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30304"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=30304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}