{"id":8773,"date":"2016-08-05T08:02:50","date_gmt":"2016-08-05T15:02:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/walker-im-the-only-guy-with-a-bucket\/"},"modified":"2016-08-05T08:02:50","modified_gmt":"2016-08-05T15:02:50","slug":"walker-im-the-only-guy-with-a-bucket","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/walker-im-the-only-guy-with-a-bucket\/","title":{"rendered":"Walker: ‘I’m the only guy with a bucket’"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOMER<\/strong> \u2014 In a talk before the Homer City Council on Tuesday, Gov. Bill Walker mentioned a historic photo of Metlakatla villagers Lt. Gov. Byron Mallot gave him. It showed the villagers pulling together to remove a stump \u2014 a Tsimshian tradition.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018This is what we need to be doing,\u2019\u201d Walker said Mallot wrote on the photo. \u201cWe need to find our place on the rope.\u201d<\/p>\n

That was Walker\u2019s message as he spoke to citizens and officials about what he called Alaska\u2019s greatest fiscal crisis in its history.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlaskans are resilient,\u201d Walker said. \u201cWe can pull together because we\u2019ve done that in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Along with the council talk, the governor and First Lady Donna Walker visited Homer to tour a local farm and speak to a combined meeting of the Homer Downtown and Kachemak Bay Rotary Clubs at Land\u2019s End Resort. Instead of summer governor\u2019s picnics, Walker has been visiting Alaska cities and local governments to impress upon them the need to address a $4 billion deficit in Alaska\u2019s budget. With declining oil prices, Alaska\u2019s main source of revenue has dried up to about $1.2 billion a year.<\/p>\n

Walker\u2019s visit comes out of frustration getting the Alaska Legislature to act on his plan to address the gap between declining oil and gas revenues and funding state government. Of his proposals, only one passed, an increase in fishing and hunting fees that will raise a few million dollars.<\/p>\n

The Legislature passed a budget that makes up part of a deficit by dipping into the Constitutional Budget Reserve. Budget analysts say the CBR only has enough left to fund the state budget for another two years. Rep. Paul Seaton, R-Homer, said he anticipates a 25-percent budget cut if the CBR is used to fund those budgets. Walker said that since 2013 state spending has been reduced 40 percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know what will happen if we don\u2019t fix this. In two to three years we won\u2019t have any Permanent Fund Dividends,\u201d Walker said. \u201cI know what would happen if we continue to wait and go through our savings and draw $3 billion off our savings.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a press conference with local reporters at KBBI Public Radio, Walker said he was disappointed the Legislature didn\u2019t take action to solve the fiscal crisis. In response to a question from the Homer News asking if legislators might be waiting to see what happens after the fall election, Walker said, \u201cI think that may be correct for some, to sit back an not doing anything until after the election, knowing that some of the tools you pick up might be politically uncomfortable so you don\u2019t touch any of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his talk before the council, Walker acknowledged that the failure to address state deficits will cause problems for local governments.<\/p>\n

\u201cDeficits roll downhill,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s what concerns me. If we don\u2019t fix this, that doesn\u2019t fix the problem. It becomes your problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

A solution of raising revenues through a state sales tax won\u2019t be helpful to local governments, Walker said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that a lot of times sales taxes are a source of revenue. If we stack ours on top of yours it\u2019s going to be uncomfortable,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s why we looked at an income tax.\u201d<\/p>\n

An income tax would have one benefit, Walker said, noting $2.6 billion in nonresident wages that go south.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to invite them to be a solution,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Walker praised Homer Rep. Paul Seaton for proposing a revenue plan that combined an income tax and allocating half of Permanent Fund Dividends into the general fund. Walker said he welcomed ideas like that \u2014 even criticism.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t mind being attacked, but I say, \u2018What is your plan?\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

At the news conference, he elaborated on that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like I\u2019m in a boat taking on water and I\u2019m the only guy with a bucket,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Council member Heath Smith said he\u2019s heard criticism from constituents that the state allowed budgets to grow to the point they become unaffordable.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe we should never have reached the level as far as spending, as far as a sustainable budget,\u201d Smith said. \u201cWe will now be rewarding the Legislature for building a budget that is unsustainable. They don\u2019t feel so good about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walker said he was glad to hear the word \u201csustainable.\u201d That\u2019s the challenge, he said. The budget has to be sustainable regardless of the price of oil.<\/p>\n

\u201cEmbrace the solutions. It takes 5 miles to turn an oil tanker. We\u2019re going to find out how long it takes to turn a state and turn it back to where it used to be, where the resources don\u2019t pay for all the revenues,\u201d Walker said. \u201cI\u2019m optimistic that we will get this done, because we have to. The price tag of not fixing Alaska is too great.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u2022 Michael Armstrong is a reporter for the Homer News. He can be reached at michael.armstrong@homernews.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HOMER \u2014 In a talk before the Homer City Council on Tuesday, Gov. Bill Walker mentioned a historic photo of Metlakatla villagers Lt. Gov. Byron Mallot gave him. It showed the villagers pulling together to remove a stump \u2014 a Tsimshian tradition. \u201c\u2018This is what we need to be doing,\u2019\u201d Walker said Mallot wrote on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":417,"featured_media":8774,"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-8773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8773","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\/417"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8773"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=8773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}