By SUZANNE DOWNING
Feb. 16, 2026 – A bill moving quickly through the Alaska Legislature under the banner of fixing Mount Edgecumbe High School could quietly expand the state’s financial responsibilities far beyond the troubled Sitka boarding school, opening the door to what some critics warn could become a blank check for rural teacher housing across Alaska.
Senate Bill 146, titled “REAA Fund: Mt. Edgecumbe, Teacher Housing,” makes two major changes. It would place Mount Edgecumbe on equal footing with other districts for major maintenance funding, and it would expand the Regional Education Attendance Area and Small Municipal School District school construction fund to include major maintenance grants for rural teacher housing statewide.
The bill represents a significant policy shift that could permanently increase state spending at a time when Alaska’s budget is already strained. What is being sold as a Mount Edgecumbe bill is an expansion of the state picking up the tab for housing costs that have traditionally been handled locally.
Mount Edgecumbe High School has been under intense scrutiny this year after up to one quarter of the enrolled students quit. Lawmakers visiting the campus described conditions as “deplorable.” Reports and photos released during legislative hearings showed rat infestations, leaky roofs, mold, exposed wiring, ceiling stains, cluttered stairwells, and makeshift repairs.
While Mount Edgecumbe’s needs are urgent, SB 146 reaches far beyond the Sitka campus. The bill would allow rural school districts to apply for major maintenance grant funding for teacher housing, a major departure from the traditional model in which housing has just about the only local responsibility in rural areas.
In many rural communities, teacher housing varies widely. Some communities provide quality housing and are able to recruit strong educators. Others provide poor conditions and struggle with constant turnover. SB 146 moves Alaska toward a new framework in which the state increasingly assumes responsibility for maintaining and upgrading housing stock in remote areas with limited or no local tax base.
That is where the larger concern emerges. Many REAA communities do not contribute property tax revenue toward education funding, meaning the financial burden shifts almost entirely to the state treasury.
The REAA fund itself was created in 2010 following the Alaska Supreme Court ruling in Kasayulie v. State of Alaska, which found the state’s rural school construction funding process unconstitutional, calling it arbitrary, inadequate, and racially discriminatory compared with the bond reimbursement system available to urban districts.
Sponsors say SB 146 is intended to put Mount Edgecumbe on equal footing with other schools, since it is state-owned and cannot independently apply for major maintenance projects. But the teacher housing provision is what could have the widest and most expensive ongoing implications. Rather than a targeted fix, it’s the beginning of a broader statewide commitment — one that could grow year after year.
What begins as an emergency response to a failing boarding school could turn into a permanent expansion of state responsibility — with the Legislature effectively writing a blank check for rural housing maintenance under the guise of helping Mount Edgecumbe.
2 thoughts on “Mount Edgecumbe fix or blank check? Bill permanently expands state spend on rural teacher housing”
This is a pathetic approach. In Western Alaska teachers and Villagers alike can’t buy property in the majority of Villages.
If you can’t buy a lot and invest in your own future, by building a house of your own to sell as you please, then there’s absolutely no need to provide housing for teachers at the tax payers expense.
The simple solution is make the Villages build the housing and provide it for the teachers that will only be there a year or two…
Where’s the help from the regional Native Corporations that sit on their 8a money???
In Sitka you can buy property. So what’s the problem?
Is it possible students left Mt Edgecombe simply because there are now other options that do not require leaving family and community? I think it is time to close Mt Edgecombe. Why in the world is the state supporting a boarding school when every village and town has a school and there are now choices of on line distance as well as home school learning.