By SUZANNE DOWNING
May 6, 2026 – A proposed constitutional amendment to create a dedicated public education fund in the state budget is advancing through the Alaska Legislature, setting up what could become one of the most consequential fiscal policy debates facing voters in 2026.
The House Finance Committee reported out a committee substitute for Senate Joint Resolution 29, a measure sponsored by Senate President Gary Stevens and carried in the Senate by Sen. Lyman Hoffman.
The resolution would amend the Alaska Constitution to establish a protected fund for public education spending, effectively elevating education funding into a constitutionally recognized priority.
The committee recommended replacing the original version with House CS for SJR 29(FIN), carrying the same title. Representatives Andy Josephson, Zack Fields Schrage, and Neal Foster signed the report as co-chairs.
The measure now heads to the Rules Committee, which means it’s positioned for a vote on the House floor.
Unlike ordinary legislation, a constitutional amendment cannot be vetoed by the governor. If two-thirds of both the House and Senate approve the resolution, the proposal would go directly to Alaska voters as a ballot measure.
Supporters appear to already have the votes needed in the Senate. The House remains the more uncertain battleground, where the two-thirds threshold could prove more difficult.
The proposal arrives after years of political fights over whether Alaska should constitutionally protect the Permanent Fund dividend. Efforts to constitutionally guarantee the PFD have routinely been dismissed in the Legislature as fiscally reckless or too restrictive. Now, lawmakers are applying a different standard when it comes to education spending.
SJR 29 would create another protected class of government spending at a time when Alaska is already struggling with structural deficits and competing demands on state resources. This elevates one government service above all others; once education receives constitutional protection, every other constituency would be able to argue for the same: prisons, roads, public safety, disaster.
The state constitution already protects public employee pension obligations in practice through legal precedent and contractual guarantees. The education amendment would continue a trend toward carving out constitutionally favored spending categories that future legislatures cannot easily adjust during economic downturns.
Teacher unions and education advocates have long pushed for more stable funding and this legislation is a major victory for Alaska’s education lobby, which has successfully pushed lawmakers toward long-term funding guarantees even as other state priorities remain subject to yearly budget negotiations.
The fiscal notes attached to the resolution include a zero fiscal note from the Office of the Governor and an indeterminate fiscal note from the Department of Revenue, reflecting uncertainty about the long-term financial implications of constitutionally dedicating education funding.
2 thoughts on “Constitutionally protected ‘education fund’ clears House Finance, heads toward floor vote”
What they really need to pass is a State version of the Federal RICO Laws… Put a version of RICP in Statue…Think what we could do by using past APOC statements to tie Legislators to the Mobsters running the Public Service Unions .. You’d think after Billions of our PFD dollars making the same circular trip, year after year, the Troopers would have arrested a double handful of crooks… Oops, I just remembered, the Troopers are part of it.
Constitution says no Dedicated Funds, for a damn good reason..
This is the education lobby doing exactly what the public employee unions just accomplished with their PERS & TRS DB legislation; staking out their piece of the Permanent Fund corpus as the buying power of the Permanent Fund (the actual buying power) continues to erode, and state and municipal government continue to grow. For that reason alone it’s a very bad idea. However, it’s also a bad idea because we have accepted decades of terrible education results in our schools and in our state university.