A hiker walks on May 30, 2018, on the trail to the Tongass National Forest’s Tern Island campsite in Wrangell, Alaska. (Photo by Xavier Rivera/U.S. Forest Service)
The Trump administration is planning to close some U.S. Forest Service offices in Alaska under a national reorganization announced this summer by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.
The Forest Service, which is part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, currently has offices in Anchorage, Juneau, Cordova, Valdez, Girdwood, Seward, Craig, Hoonah, Ketchikan, Petersburg, Sitka, Thorne Bay, Wrangell and Yakutat. It isn’t clear how many of those offices will remain open after the reorganization.
The status of the Forest Service’s tourist-focused visitor centers in Portage, Juneau and Ketchikan also isn’t clear.
Contacted for details, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Agriculture said by email on Friday, “Some aspects of the reorganization will take place over the coming months, while others will take more time. We will continue to provide updates as the reorganization moves forward.”
They added, “We recognize this may be difficult, but we are hopeful that affected employees will remain with us through this transition as we work to improve and continue delivering benefits to the people and communities we serve.”
In a July memo outlining the basic details of the plan, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said she intends to close the Forest Service’s nine national regional offices “over the next year” but “will maintain a reduced state office in Juneau, Alaska, and an eastern service center in Athens, Georgia.”
Research stations, like the Juneau Forestry Science Laboratory in Auke Bay, will be closed and “consolidated into a single location in Fort Collins, Colorado.”
Nationally, Rollins said she intends to scatter more than half of the Agriculture Department’s 4,600 Washington, D.C.-based administrators to five regional hubs; one each in Utah, Colorado, North Carolina, Missouri and Indiana.
A sign advertising the cashing of Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend, or PFD, checks hangs outside a business in Anchorage, Alaska, Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen)
AP- The truck that arrived ahead of schedule at Allyssa Canoy’s home in Fairbanks brought enough heating fuel for the frigid winter months ahead — and a surprise bill for $2,600.
Canoy and her two sons have checks arriving that will cover that expense and leave some money for the boys, too. Starting Thursday, Alaska plans to begin distributing to residents their annual dividend derived from the state’s $83 billion oil wealth fund, a sort of bonus that Alaskans get for living in the state.
For some, it’s extra spending money for a new set of tires or a vacation to a sunnier clime during the long, dark winter. For others, it’s a vital supplement in a state where the cost for internet service, gas and groceries can be sky-high.
Here’s what to know about the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend:
This year’s payout is one of the lowest in 20 years
Alaskans are getting $1,000 per person — the lowest amount since 2020, when they each received $992. The payout has been below $1,000 only two other times since 2006.
There used to be a formula for calculating the amount, tied to the fund’s market performance. But lawmakers widely consider that formula unaffordable and within the last decade have abandoned it.
Politicians now set the amount. It’s often one of the last items settled during sensitive budget negotiations. Lawmakers must weigh the check’s size against other programs and public needs, including education, and in 2018 began using earnings from the fund — long used to pay dividends — to also help balance the budget.
This year, $1,000 is what lawmakers argued they could afford while also backing an increase in K-12 funding and trying to limit draws from savings.
Had the old formula been followed, residents would be getting about $3,800 each.
The Alaska Permanent Fund is nearly 50 years old
Voters created the fund in 1976, during the heady, early years of oil in the state. The goal was to save some of Alaska’s mineral wealth. The fund has grown through investments, and while the state constitution protects the fund’s principal, its earnings can be spent.
Dividends have been paid since 1982. Proponents saw them as a way to ensure Alaskans maintained a vested interest in the Alaska Permanent Fund.
More than 600,000 of Alaska’s roughly 740,000 residents are set to receive this year’s check. To qualify, one must meet residency and other requirements.
For some Alaskans, the check is a nice extra. Some put it into college funds or savings accounts or donate to charities. Others rely on it for necessities, such as heating oil, winter tires or snowmachines, which are critical modes of transportation in rural villages where residents rely on hunting or trapping.
Canoy, a single mom of two, is selling her home and downsizing. She had planned to fill her home’s fuel tank as a gift to the new buyers at closing, but the fuel truck came early while she was away. So instead of putting the $3,000 her family is receiving toward other projects, as she’d hoped, she’s using it to pay that bill. She plans to let her sons spend the remaining $400.
Canoy said she lives comfortably and sees the dividend as a blessing. Still, she wishes lawmakers would find a better way to set the amounts — “at least to just give Alaskans maybe a little peace of mind that, yeah, we’re actually doing everything that we can to make sure that you guys get the most out of the permanent fund dividend.”
Serina Fast Horse, left,of Sicangu Lakota & Blackfeet Tribes, talks with Jacy Bowles, of Xicana and Diné descent, as they walk to the former Elwha Dam site during the 2023 Tribal Climate Camp on the Olympic Peninsula, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023, near Port Angeles, Wash. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson, File)
AP- A new report from Portland State University found that budget cuts under President Donald Trump’s new spending bill threaten nearly half of federal funding allocated to federally recognized Native American and Alaska Native nations last year.
Roughly $530 million of the $1.19 billion allocated to Northwest tribal nations in fiscal year 2024 — used to fulfill the federal government’s trust and treaty obligations to Native American and Alaska Native tribes — is at risk of being cut. The congressionally allocated funds serve myriad functions for tribes in the Northwest, including providing clean drinking water, affordable housing, schools, transit and land management. Funding is decided by Congress on a yearly basis and can be disbursed over a period of time that exceeds the calendar year it is allocated.
“All across the board tribes are worried about the funding cuts that are happening right now,” said Serina Fast Horse, who is Lakota and Blackfeet and serves as the co-director of the Northwest Environmental Justice Center, which provides grant application assistance and advising to Indigenous communities in the Northwest.
Fast Horse says there are serious concerns among Northwest tribes about further cuts to vital programs ranging from health and wellness to early childhood education. The report warns of vulnerabilities to programs and grants that tribes rely on for resilience in the face of climate change, like improving home weatherization, managing forestland and renovating aging homes. Federal dollars to help Northwest tribes bolster their infrastructure against the increasing threats from wildfire, drought and sea-level rise could also be slashed.
The Portland State report found millions in Clean Air Act funding could also go away — the Environmental Protection Agency earmarked nearly $2 million in 2024 for Northwest tribes in a series of grants for monitoring air quality and pollution. Much of the congressionally allocated funding has yet to be distributed to tribes and is now at risk of being cut altogether.
The report demonstrates how proposed major reductions across the federal government, including at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of the Interior and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association, could reverberate across Indian Country.
Tribal officials shared concerns that drastic cuts could cause the federal government to fall short of trust and treaty obligations that mandate the federal government support tribal services, uphold tribal sovereignty and protect tribal treaty resources — responsibilities that courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, have repeatedly upheld.
“All the funding reductions addressing clean water, air and dealing with climate change have impacts on the Tribes’ culture and treaty protected resources,” said William E. Ray Jr., chair of the Klamath Tribes.
Researchers declined to disclose specific projects at risk of elimination for fear of retaliation, and a number of tribes and tribal organizations declined to comment to InvestigateWest, citing similar concerns.
“Trump and Congressional Republicans are wreaking havoc on Tribal communities with their ‘Big, Ugly BETRAYAL’ of a law that arbitrarily cuts many programs supporting folks in Indian Country, where chronic underfunding is already impacting services and exacerbating disparities,” said Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, a Democrat.
He added that the federal government plays an outsized role in funding essential services to tribal communities, including health care, education and public safety, and that the Inflation Reduction Act took important steps in advancing funding for water infrastructure and environmental programs for tribes.
In 2024, Clean Air Act related funds were used to fund 15 projects for 12 Northwest tribes. The Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, and the Tulalip Tribes are some of the Native American nations set to receive research grants for improving air quality and pollution monitoring. Among 12 tribes selected for funding, several of them focus on minimizing exposure to poor air quality and harmful pollutants to their elderly and medically vulnerable residents. Other tribes intend to study impacts of pollutants on important first foods — culturally significant staple foods consumed before colonization — that officials say are critical to improving health outcomes for their citizens.
Researchers at PSU examined 469 programs impacted by President Trump’s reversal of former President Joe Biden’s Executive Order 14008, which sought to address climate change and created a number of environmental justice initiatives. Sixty of the programs identified by researchers were specifically named in the Republican-led spending bill for cuts, and 17 of those provided funding directly to tribes. The programs accounted for roughly 35% of all federal investments in tribes in 2024. The report says not all of the funding will be cut, but a significant portion of it could be.
The cuts come at a time when Native Americans and Alaska Natives already have limited access to federal services and funds, according to a December 2024 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan congressional watchdog. It found when tribes had to compete with other entities for federal funding, they may receive a small portion of the total amount, and that limited access to federal services and funds contributes to known disparities for Native Americans and Alaska Natives compared to other Americans.
Of the $20.15 billion in federal funding that went to tribes between 2010 and 2024, tribes within the boundaries of Idaho received a total of $304.56 million, Washington tribes $1.81 billion, Oregon tribes $690.76 million, and Alaska Native tribes received $2.35 billion.
Other programs at risk of being cut include the EPA’s embattled Environmental Justice Government-to-Government Program, which funded initiatives by states, tribes and local governments to support activities that lead to measurable environmental or public health impacts.
Under that program, in 2023, the EPA awarded the Tulalip Tribes $977,000 to work in conjunction with the Confederated Tribes and Bands of Yakama Nation to create a tool to detect which homes are at greatest risk from wildfire smoke infiltration and dangerously hot weather, which are growing issues affecting both communities.
While the federal government has repeatedly affirmed its obligations to tribes, actual allocations remain disproportionately small compared to population figures. In 2024, Native American tribes received just 1.7% of federal energy and environment spending, despite Native people making up 2.9% of the U.S. population.
Between 2010 and 2024, tribes within the bounds of Idaho, Washington and Oregon received roughly $2.81 billion in federal investments in energy and environmental infrastructure, which represents roughly 14% of the $20 billion in allocations made to tribes nationwide.
The researchers determined that programs funded under the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden’s 2022 climate, health and tax law, are at particular risk of being eliminated. The funding allocated to tribes under the IRA represented a historic investment in infrastructure in Indian Country, more than doubling energy and infrastructure investment from $1.51 billion nationwide to $3.94 billion in 2024, around .04% of total federal grant spending obligations for 2024.
“When you put them in the context of how much money the federal government actually spends on certain things, it’s pennies on the dollar,” said Sophie Lalande, a co-author of the PSU report.
Soon after taking office and without consulting Congress, the Trump administration suspended some grants that tribal communities used heavily, such as community change grants, distributed by the EPA’s Offices of Environmental Justice and of External Civil Rights Compliance during the Biden administration, to support climate resilience and clean energy. Distributed as a part of the Inflation Reduction Act, the grants were suspended as part of the Trump administration’s anti-diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
The grants helped tribal communities in the Northwest tremendously, according to Fast Horse.
“They were providing hundreds of thousands of dollars to communities for infrastructure improvements, like access to clean drinking water and climate resilience hubs, just really essential pieces of community development for health and safety of communities,” she said.
The report stresses a multiplier effect from investments made in tribal communities. Infrastructure dollars invested on tribal lands often serve as anchors for broader local development, since tribal lands often share regional infrastructure like power grids, roads or water systems with non-Native communities, with the power of dollars rippling outward into surrounding rural towns and cities.
Bobby Cochran, a researcher with Portland State University and senior project manager at the National Policy Consensus Center, co-authored the report.
“We just haven’t made a major investment in infrastructure since the ’60s or ’70s, so this wasn’t fluffy,” he said. “It’s really important stuff that was just trying to play catch-up.”
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This story was originally published by InvestigateWest and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.
NOTN- A powerful storm system developing in the Gulf of Alaska is expected to bring hurricane-force winds to Southeast Alaska, forecasters said on Thursday.
Satellite imagery shows the system strengthening as it tracks toward the southern Panhandle, according to the National Weather Service in Juneau. Winds over the gulf are expected to reach 75 mph with gusts up to 92 mph).
A Hurricane Wind Warning has been issued for the Gulf, while a High Wind Warning is in effect for areas of the southern Panhandle from Baranof Island through Frederick Sound South.
Officials urged residents to prepare by checking on family and friends, securing vessels and loose outdoor items, and monitoring updated forecasts at weather.gov/juneau.
“We will continue to watch the development of this system closely and make updates as needed,” forecasters said in a post Thursday.
NOTN- A 35-year-old man was hospitalized early Wednesday after police say he was likely struck by a vehicle on Vintage Boulevard.
The Juneau Police Department said officers received a report around 12:37 a.m. of an unconscious man lying in the roadway near First Bank. When first responders arrived, the man regained consciousness but had injuries to his face, hands and legs.
Pieces of a vehicle were found nearby, and investigators, as well as relatives on Facebook believe the man had been hit by a car.
NOTN- When Emma’s son, Cade, was just five months old, she noticed he was falling behind on developmental milestones. Doctors told her he was “just a late bloomer.” But after years of searching for answers, specialists diagnosed Cade with SPG50, an ultra-rare genetic disease that slowly robs children of the ability to control their bodies.
The Juneau community has rallied behind Cade’s cause, A daylong radiothon hosted by KINY on Saturday raised $35,000 to support 4-year-old Cade Jobsis.
The event, ran from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and featured prizes such as a helicopter ride from NorthStar Helicopters, an Eaglecrest ski pass, and a yearlong membership to the Rainforest Playzone.
Funds will support Cade, who was diagnosed at just 2 years old with SPG50, a rare form of hereditary spastic paraplegia that causes progressive loss of mobility. Fewer than 100 cases are known worldwide.
His mother, Emma, said her family spent years searching for answers before receiving Cade’s diagnosis. Doctors initially told them there was no treatment.
“There’s only around 100 cases in the world, and because of that, there really isn’t any interest in treating this disease or developing treatments for a disease that’s so rare.” Said Cade’s mom, Emma Jobsis, “So when we left the hospital after hearing his diagnosis, the doctors basically told us, there’s nothing we can do. Take him home, love him, he’s going to fade way in front of your eyes, basically. And we were distraught, as any parent would be.”
Because of the disease’s rarity, pharmaceutical companies and government agencies have shown little interest in funding development. Instead, families like Cade’s are leading grassroots efforts to raise millions for research.
“We decided we just have to do it by any means necessary, we have to raise the money and get this drug through clinical trials, because I can’t live with the fact that the next mom is going to be sitting in the office hearing what I heard when there’s a drug that exists, but you just can’t get access to it because it’s not approved.” Jobsis said.
Emma said the Juneau community’s response has been overwhelming.
“My town has pulled off something incredible that I never expected. This kind of showing up from my community.” Said Jobsis, “People that I’ve never met in my entire life are texting, emailing, calling, telling me they heard my story, they heard about Cade, and they want to help. And it’s just, it’s so surreal to feel like the community backs you in such a huge way.”
Listeners heard interviews with Cade’s family and others around the world affected by SPG50, as well as with the Canadian father who helped create the experimental gene therapy.
“I have found so much good in people through this process, through this fundraising and advocacy, I’ve felt so much compassion and generosity.” Jobsis said, “Leaning on each other, that’s what it means to be in a strong community. And I’m so grateful to be here and to all Juneau and beyond, supporting us in this way.”
Organizers say the true prize was seeing the community come together for Cade’s future. Donations can still be made at cureforcade.com.
In this Sept. 23, 2024, image taken from video, a U.S. Air Force F-16 operating under the direction of North American Aerospace Defense Command, conducts a routine intercept of a Russian Tu-95 aircraft in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) when NORAD said a Russian Su-35 aircraft conducts an unsafe maneuver directed at the F-16. (Department of Defense via AP)
AP- U.S. fighter jets scrambled to identify and intercept four Russian warplanes flying near Alaska, the North American Aerospace Defense Command said Thursday.
It’s the third time in about a month and the ninth time this year NORAD has reported such an incident involving Russian aircraft flying near Alaska. This latest incident happened Wednesday.
NORAD said in a statement issued early Thursday that it detected and tracked two Tu-95s and two Su-35s operating in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone.
Nine U.S. aircraft — an E-3 Sentry command and control aircraft, four F-16s and four KC-135 tankers — scrambled to positively identify and intercept the Russian jets, NORAD said.
The Russian aircraft remained in international airspace and did not enter American or Canadian sovereign airspace, it said. Such Russian activity near Alaska occurs regularly and is not seen as a threat, it added in its statement.
Trump on Tuesday said NATO countries should shoot down Russian aircraft if they enter their airspace. Asked if the U.S. would back up NATO allies in such a situation, Trump said “it depends on the circumstance.”
Following a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska last month, Trump said he was arranging for direct talks between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. But Putin has shown no interest in meeting with Zelenskyy, and Moscow has only intensified its bombardment of Ukraine.
Alaska Republican U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan (Alaska Beacon file photos)
Alaska Republican U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan signed on to a letter with 10 other U.S. senators, calling on the U.S. Department of Education to reverse the decision to cut millions in congressionally approved grant funding for Native American-serving colleges and universities nationwide.
The letter, addressed to U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, argues that an estimated $36.1 million in grant funding already allocated under the Higher Education Act should be distributed to colleges and universities serving Native students nationwide.
Senators wrote the funds are already authorized and appropriated by Congress and should go toward its intended colleges and universities nationwide, “including dollars that are part of ongoing grants – projects, programs, and services that are already in motion and that are serving currently enrolled students,” they said.
“These institutions are statutorily authorized to receive federal support from the Department to strengthen their capacity to serve American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students, and rely on this federal support to adequately serve enrolled students,” they said.
“The Department’s decision to reprogram this critical source of funding for these colleges jeopardizes not just their continued existence, but also undermines the federal government’s trust and treaty obligations to provide Native students an education,” they wrote.
Earlier this month, Sec. McMahon announced that $350 million in congressionally approved funding for minority-serving institutions, a federal grant category that includes funding for Black, Hispanic, Asian-American and Native American students, would be reallocated. McMahon cited “racial quotas” as discriminatory and unconstitutional. “To further our commitment to ending discrimination in all forms across federally supported programs, the Department will no longer award Minority-Serving Institution grants that discriminate by restricting eligibility to institutions that meet government-mandated racial quotas,” McMahon said.
The group of three Republican and nine Democratic senators rejected the claims, saying “to be clear, these grants do not impose racial quotas or restrict admissions based on race, but support institutions that deliver on the federal trust responsibility to provide an education for American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians because of their unique legal status and political relationship with the United States.”
In Alaska, University of Alaska officials say they are still reviewing the extent of the funding freeze, but University of Alaska Fairbanks officials report the grant elimination totals at least $8.8 million across campuses.
Senators argued that the funding cut contradicts the Trump administration’s expressed focus on career and technical education, and said the funds boost capacity for institutions serving not only Native students, but wider student populations.
“As such, we again urge you to reverse the decision,” the senators wrote, “to release these funds, as appropriated by Congress, so that the work these schools do to support the trust responsibility, as well as the next generation of leaders as part of our nation’s bright future, can continue.
The letter was signed by Murkowski, as the chair of the US Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, and committee co-chair U.S. Sen. Brian Shatz, D-Hawaii; along with Sens. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska; Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii; Thom Tillis, R-North Carolina; Ben Ray Luján, D-New Mexico; Ruben Gallego, D-Arizona; John Hickenlooper, D-Colorado; Michael Bennett, D-Colorado; Mark Kelly, D-Arizona; Tina Smith, D-Minnesota; and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota.
A spokesperson for Murkowski said as of Wednesday they have not had a response from the department
NOTN- The Juneau Assembly voted to purchase two floors of the Michael J. Burns Building to serve as a new City Hall, citing the need to consolidate operations and cut costs.
“The reason we’re trying to move is the buildings that we have historically leased are either no longer available or have major problems.” Said Mayor Beth Weldon, “We’re just trying to consolidate. We’re trying to cut our rent money, and this makes fiscal sense.”
The city will spend $9.3 million on the property, with an additional $2.7 million reserved for future capital projects. Weldon said the move is more cost-effective than building a new city hall, which was estimated at $48 million.
Assembly member Christine Woll, head of the Finance Committee said the city’s current office spaces are aging and expensive to maintain. “The Burns building has emerged as the most financially responsible option, and makes the most sense to bring all our city employees into a single building that’s not leaking like our other locations right now.”
The plan also includes a $600,000 condominium lease, but Weldon said overall costs will still save the city money compared to current rental expenses.
“I do think it’s important to recognize that we should be seeing thousands of people likely lose coverage from this,” said Jared Kosin, president and CEO of the Alaska Hospital and Healthcare Association.
Speaking to a room at Juneau’s convention center, they said if federal subsidies end, the cost of health insurance would rise so much that many Alaskans will go uninsured, discouraging them from getting checkups that could prevent serious illnesses. Hospitals would see a larger number of emergencies from uninsured people, straining them. It might even lead to an exodus from the state, as people seek alternative options and cheaper places to live.
“I worry about that,” said Kim Champney, executive director of the Alaska Association on Developmental Disabilities. “Because I think people will decide to leave Alaska because we have the most expensive health care in the country.”
Anton Rieselbach, with the Juneau Economic Development Council provided an analysis of cost estimates for Juneau. In Alaska’s capital city alone, 1,389 people receive health care via insurance plans bought through the federal marketplace. Right now, those Juneauites pay an average of $124 per month. If those subsidies expire, that will rise to $1,008 per month, an increase of more than 700%.
The council, a nonpartisan organization devoted to economic growth in the capital city, is worried about what will happen if the subsidies expire.
“We want people to be working and spending money, generating economic activity,” Rieselbach said, “but this just places another huge burden on people’s ability to spend their money in other arenas besides health insurance.”
A problem years in the making
The upcoming problem stems from federal subsidies enacted by Congress in 2021 and extended through the end of 2025. Those subsidies, known as “enhanced premium tax credits,” were applied on top of subsidies included in the original Affordable Care Act, which established the federal insurance marketplace.
Now, almost anyone who buys an individual health care plan through the marketplace gets some kind of subsidy.
Generally, that includes people whose employers don’t provide health insurance, self-employed people, and people who retired early and aren’t yet eligible for Medicare, which insures people with disabilities and people 65 or older.
Subsidies helped expand the number of people on federal marketplace plans from 11.4 million in 2020 to 24.3 million this year, allowing millions of Americans to get regular health care.
They also came at a high cost to the federal treasury: Extending them for another 10 years would cost $335 billion.
But if subsidies end, Alaska would be exceptionally hard-hit. The state has the highest health-care costs in the nation, which means unsubsidized insurance rates are high.
Of the 28,736 Alaskans who have health insurance policies through the federal marketplace, 25,170 receive the enhanced subsidies, according to figures published by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
If the enhanced subsidies expire, the poorest Alaskans will still see their plans subsidized. Middle-class Alaskans would be hard hit.
According to estimates published in March by the Alaska Division of Insurance, a single 50-year-old who earns $58,650 per year would see their monthly health insurance cost rise from $282 per month to $407 per month for a “silver” plan. If they have a “bronze” plan, their costs wouldn’t change.
But Alaskans who earn more than 400% of the federal poverty line — $78,000 per year for an individual — would see their costs skyrocket.
In 2023, 2024 and 2025, the average cost of a health insurance marketplace plan in Alaska rose by more than 16% each year. In 2023 alone, the cost went up by an average of 18.4%.
That same 50-year-old would go from paying $534 per month for a silver plan to $1,415 per month. Under a bronze plan, their cost would go from $9 per month to $890 per month.
Lori Wing-Heier, the director of the Division of Insurance at the time of those estimates, called the increase “pretty horrific” for affected Alaskans.
“It’s an insane amount,” said Rep. Genevieve Mina, D-Anchorage, talking about the increase.
This spring, Mina sponsored and the Alaska Legislature passed House Joint Resolution 9, a bipartisan letter asking Congress to extend the subsidies.
Across the state this year, the average monthly premium for Alaskans of all ages and all plans was $971.43, but the average subsidy was $866.28, the Division of Insurance said in March.
Kosin, of the hospital and healthcare association, said his group thinks it’s “really important” to extend the enhanced subsidies.
Insurance is based on the concept of sharing risks and costs. The more people in an insurance pool, the better it works. Subsidies encourage healthy people to be a part of the health insurance pool, he said. If people drop off, the cost of caring for any individual person is spread among fewer members, and rates go up.
An extension relies on congressional action
For the moment, Alaskans only have estimates of what will happen if the subsidies expire. Open enrollment on the federal insurance marketplace starts Nov. 1. There’s a “window shopping” period at the end of October that will give a sneak preview.
People must sign up by Dec. 15 to get insurance coverage that starts with the new year. Miss that deadline, and Jan. 15 is the deadline to get coverage that starts Feb. 1.
Kosin said he’s heard the argument that Alaskans could afford health care before the enhanced subsidies came into effect, and so there won’t be many people who drop their coverage.
That fails to take into account the way health insurance costs have gone up since 2020, he said.
In 2023, 2024 and 2025, the average cost of a health insurance marketplace plan in Alaska rose by more than 16% each year. In 2023 alone, the cost went up by an average of 18.4%.
“If there truly is a doubling or tripling of premiums, especially at once, I think I would have to guess it would be a higher percentage than a fifth of the population that would consider themselves priced out of the market,” he said.
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski knows plenty of those people.
“If you are a 60-year-old couple (earning about) $82,000 in Alaska, you would be looking at a premium increase … without enhancements, of $44,556. My husband and I are over 60. Now, granted, we’re not on the exchange, but I have a lot of friends are in that category, and I don’t know very many of them that could swallow an additional $44,000 a year to pay for their insurance if they’re on the exchange,” she said in a Sept. 17 phone call.
Murkowski is among the members of the U.S. Senate who have been trying for months, without success so far, to find enough votes to extend the subsidies.
Impending government shutdown
The issue has now gotten entangled with the impending government shutdown. Senate Democrats have demanded — among other things — a permanent extension of the health care subsidies, without changes, in exchange for their votes on keeping the federal government open.
Sen. Dan Sullivan also supports an extension of the subsidies, but “there’s no way I would ever vote for that,” he said of the Democratic plan.
“I do think there’s bipartisan support to get this done. We’ve just got to power through these different issues,” he said by phone.
He identified three hurdles for the subsidies.
“It’s how long you extend them; are there pay-fors (budget cuts to compensate for the cost of the extension) … but the most important and complicated — and we just did a deep dive on this, and I do think there’s bipartisan support on this, is reforms,” Sullivan said.
“We are looking at ways to reform the system to make it work for the people who need it and are using it honestly, but have a disincentive against those who have been abusing it,” he said.
“We’re getting there. It’s complicated. I think the reform piece is going to be the most complicated, but I’m hopeful, and I’m putting a lot of effort into it,” Sullivan said.
Murkowski is more interested in a straight extension without changes. She introduced a standalone two-year measure and voted against both Republican and Democratic proposals to keep the government open, saying one of her conditions was an extension of the subsidy.
Speaking by phone this month, Mina noted that an extension has the support of groups as far afield as the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce.
“I think if you’re directly on the insurance marketplace, you should be concerned. But also, if you care about economic diversification and startups, you should also be concerned,” she said.
If the marketplace doesn’t work, she noted, it would increase the costs of health care for everyone in the state because hospitals are required to treat people regardless of their ability to pay. If people can’t pay, that means their costs get shifted to people who can, increasing the health insurance rates of everyone, not just those on the marketplace.
“What I fear is that we’re regressing to the state that we were in (a decade ago) when we had all of these news articles about people paying like, $800, $1,000 a month for their health insurance, and we were able to stabilize that and find solutions to help people,” Mina said. “We’re just going backwards in that regard.”
