At Anchorage town hall, a rallying cry emerges: More taxes, please

Twenty state legislators convened in Anchorage on Saturday for an annual town hall that brings together the delegation representing the state’s biggest city.

Like last year, the town hall was used by education advocates to call for what they say is a desperately needed increase in the state’s education budget, which has not kept up with inflation for years. But speakers at the two-hour meeting had a new addition to their plea: To make education funding possible, impose more taxes.

A third of the Alaska Legislature — including Democrats, Republicans and independents representing every neighborhood of Anchorage — listened to request after request for an increase to the Base Student Allocation, along with laments from students who fear the elimination of beloved theater and sports programs.

Lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle, along with Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, a Republican, have said some amount of education funding increase would be needed this year. But they have also pointed to the state’s dwindling revenue — which comes primarily from oil taxes and Permanent Fund earnings — to reason that an increase that meets the demands of school districts may not be viable this year.

Several Anchorage residents who attended the town hall on Saturday had a ready reply: “Tax me.”

Alaska had a state income tax until 1980, when booming revenue from the oil industry compelled the state’s political leaders to eliminate it. Oil revenue is no longer booming, but political appetite to reinstate a personal income tax — or any new taxes, for that matter — has been slim.

Lawmakers in the Senate this year have floated several ideas that would increase taxes on Alaska’s oil industry and other corporations, but have stopped short of introducing any personal taxes. Republicans in the House last month largely rejected ideas for new taxes on the resource industry. Dunleavy has shown no interest in introducing or signing off on new taxes, ever since he promised in 2023 to introduce a statewide sales tax — and then never did.

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“I hear some of you are not wanting to tax the people and industries that can afford to contribute — no statewide income tax, no S-corp tax, corporate oil breaks still in place,” Rozlyn Grady-Wyche, an education graduate student, told lawmakers during the town hall. “You have options, you have power. What’s missing is the will.”

“We need a revenue plan — a fair, equitable one that asks for more from those with more,” Grady-Wyche added.

The question of whether — and how — to establish new revenue has long been treated with hesitancy by state lawmakers, amid fears of backlash from voters. But speakers during the packed-to-the-gills town hall meeting often elicited loud cheers and applause from the crowd when they spoke about the prospect of new taxes as a tool to afford new education spending.

“There’s an old adage in business — I don’t know if anybody knows it — revenue fixes everything,” said Ben Kellie, an entrepreneur and former SpaceX engineer who lives in West Anchorage.

“Amen!” someone shouted from the crowd, as others and clapped.

“It’s not enough to throw your hands up and say you can’t do it. Figure it out. Do your jobs,” Kellie said.

Nick Moe, representing thread, a child care nonprofit, told lawmakers that critical child care funding is “at risk if we do not find new revenue and a solution to this budget crisis.”

“The thread board has taken the unprecedented step of supporting new and diverse revenue as a way to fund essential searches, so that’s my message: Please pass new revenue. Pass it now,” said Moe.

Moe said he’s “heard eight good revenue ideas” in the Capitol in Juneau.

“I think you should pass them all,” he said.

Pat Higgins, a member of the Anchorage School Board, excoriated lawmakers for refusing to levy taxes that would allow the state to more easily send the district the funding it says it needs.

“You make up the decisions on where the funds are going to come from. You decide the oil taxes. You decide corporate taxes. I’m willing to pay an income tax. I’m willing to pay a sales tax,” said Higgins.

“I demand to be taxed. Tax me now,” said Erin Dougherty Lynch, an attorney who lives in South Anchorage. “It is patriotic to pay taxes.”