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Keep up-to-date on the latest news from Juneau

JUNEAU — The University of Alaska’s No. 1 priority for new construction, a new biological sciences facility on the Fairbanks campus, likely won’t get any money from the state this year.

“We keep trying to move that forward, but it doesn’t seem to catch fire with people,” Sen. Joe Thomas, D-Fairbanks, said Thursday.

The facility, dubbed BIOS, is expected to cost $113 million. The university was hoping to get $66 million this year to get it started, but Gov. Sarah Palin didn’t include money for BIOS in her budget proposal and lawmakers didn’t add any.

Sen. Gary Wilken, R-Fairbanks, and others talked about trying to put the project into a bond package with a new state crime lab. But lawmakers decided not to issue bonds for the crime lab, so the bond package never came together.

Thomas said he thought the project would need more statewide support if it was going to happen. He added that he thought some lawmakers had a skewed view of how much state money has gone to the Fairbanks campus in recent years — a lot of it was federal or even international money, he said.

Lawmakers are likely to fund the university system’s No. 1 overall request — roughly $50 million for deferred maintenance — as well as it’s No. 3 request, a new health sciences facility in Anchorage.

ID theft bill moves ahead

A broad-reaching bill aimed at protecting Alaska residents from identity theft moved to the Senate floor Friday.

The bill requires companies to disclose security breaches involving personal information, restricts the sale and distribution of social security numbers and requires the complete destruction of records containing personal information, among other things.

Versions of the bill have been in the works for years; the current version is sponsored by Reps. John Coghill, R-North Pole, and Les Gara, D-Anchorage.

The Senate Finance Committee moved a substitute version of the bill out of committee Friday afternoon.

On the Senate floor Friday evening, Sen. Gene Therriault, R-North Pole, succeeded in amending the bill to undo one of the committee’s changes. The amendment required companies to notify the state’s attorney general of any security breaches.

The bill, HB 65, was held over without a floor vote.

Veteran benefits bill heard, stalled

A bill aimed at making military veterans aware of the services they could receive was heard and held in the Senate Finance Committee on Friday.

The bill would instruct the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. to add a check-off box on the permanent fund dividend application that a veteran could check to receive information about benefits. The veteran’s contact information would be provided to qualified veteran service organizations through the state’s Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.

The bill’s sponsor, Rep. David Guttenberg, D-Fairbanks, told committee members Friday that federal benefits for veterans already bring a huge amount of money into the state, but many veterans don’t claim the benefits to which they’re entitled.

Maurice Bailey, head of the Mat-Su chapter of Vietnam Veterans of America, spoke in favor of the bill and described the challenges of doing veterans outreach in rural Alaska.

“The people are not receiving the information that is needed,” he said.

The bill, HB 44, was held in the committee.

Committee co-chair Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, said later he didn’t know if he would give it another hearing.

Another bill sponsored by Guttenberg that would allow the state to establish veterans’ cemeteries is also before the committee. When asked if he intended to hear that bill, Stedman said, “I think we’re pretty much done (with hearings).”

The bills are HB 44 and HB 45.