The Juneau Assembly has proposed updates to the city’s disorderly conduct laws, tightening rules around blocking sidewalks, public disturbances, and behavior in public spaces.
The focus of the new updates- making it easier for the Juneau Police Department to arrest individuals, particularly unhoused individuals for disruptive actions in public areas.
The ordinance adds language allowing police to intervene when people stand, walk, or camp in places like sidewalks, stairwells, parking lots, and garages.
“We had a long conversation about the community impacts of public camping, and that was probably the longest agenda item that we discussed.” Said Deputy Manager Robert Barr, “it would make it a bit easier for our police department officers to do some enforcement activity that they already do.”
Deputy City Manager Robert Barr said the changes bring city code in line with state law, removing steps that currently delay enforcement, which lie within officers arresting individuals for trespassing rather than disorderly conduct.
“Our first course of action whenever we’re engaged in that sort of activity with folks who are unhoused, is to try and connect to resources and seek voluntary compliance.” Said Barr, “but sometimes it’s not possible.”
Alaska already grapples with its growing unhoused population, Juneau currently operates under a “dispersed camping” policy for its homeless population, allowing camping on unimproved public land as long as it minimizes impact and doesn’t violate specific regulations like blocking public rights-of-way.
Juneau Police cleared the unhoused encampment on Teal street back in June, Barr said the assembly asked to bring back more information at a future meeting, likely the next Committee of the Whole, on creating a shelter safety zone in the Teal Street area, “just to investigate whether other tools that we could implement would protect our social service providers out there.” said Barr.
Juneau has had the highest average sale price for a single-family home in the state for the past two years and a report from the Department of Labor and Workforce Development, shows that housing costs are nearly half of most Alaska residents’ annual income.
These proposed updates come amid nationwide trends, with the Supreme court ruling that cities can ban people from sleeping and camping in public places last year.
Artist Crystal Worl has completed restoration work on her mural honoring Tlingit civil rights leader Elizabeth Peratrovich in downtown Juneau.
The project was made possible thanks to equipment donated by Tyler Rental, which provided the use of a forklift from July 6 to 12.
The lift allowed Worl to safely access and restore the 60-by-25-foot mural that spans the south-facing wall of the Juneau Public Library and Marine Parking Garage.
The mural that Worl, who is Tlingit and Athabascan, began planning in 2018 was originally installed in September 2021, and is a tribute to Elizabeth Kaax̱gal.aat Peratrovich, a member of the Lukaax̱.ádi (Sockeye Salmon) clan. She is remembered for her advocacy in the fight for equality for Alaska Natives, and for her pivotal role in the passage of the Anti-Discrimination Act of 1945, the first civil rights legislation of its kind in the United States.
The restoration is part of an ongoing commitment to preserving public art that celebrates Alaska Native heritage and leaders. “We appreciate this generous support in helping to maintain a public artwork that honors the legacy of a great Alaska Native leader,” Sealaska Heritage Institute said in their Facebook post.
Located on Áak’w Kwáan territory, the mural is now fully restored.
Crystal Worl writes on her website about the mural, “Educating the public about the local Indigenous values, culture, and history is important for Alaskans and visitors alike. I hope that this mural will contribute to the movement to transform Juneau into the Northwest Coast arts capital of the world and will beautify and enhance the downtown Juneau area. With the world recovering from the COVID pandemic and embracing racial and social justice ideals, artists must also rise to the occasion to tell our history and our stories.”
RADM Bob Little, the new commander of the Coast Guard's Arctic sector, smiles as he shakes hands with RADM Megan Dean, the departing commanding officer, during a change of command ceremony Friday, July 11, 2025, in Juneau. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
RADM Bob Little, the new commander of the Coast Guard’s Arctic sector, smiles as he shakes hands with RADM Megan Dean, the departing commanding officer, during a change of command ceremony Friday, July 11, 2025, in Juneau. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
By: James Brooks, Alaska Beacon
Last week, President Donald Trump signed a budget bill with almost $25 billion for new Coast Guard construction, including almost $9 billion for new icebreakers and $300 million for new Coast Guard facilities in Juneau.
On Friday, Rear Adm. Bob Little, the new commander of the Coast Guard in Alaska, said it remains to be seen how those new ships will be used and when they will arrive in the Arctic.
“What I hope is, regardless of where in the service that capacity ends up, is that it will overall increase the capacity for the Coast Guard and that the Arctic District can certainly benefit from that increased capacity,” he said.
Until last week, the Coast Guard’s Alaska force was known as District 17. As part of a nationwide renaming project, it’s now the Coast Guard Arctic District. In a ceremony held at Juneau, Little took command of the newly renamed district from Rear Adm. Megan Dean, who has been assigned to Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C.
“It’s a change in name, but our missions, our priorities remain the same,” Little said.
Alaska has the largest commercial fishing fleet in the United States and produces more than half of the nation’s seafood. Key maritime trade routes between Asia and California run through Alaska waters, and cruise ships carry more than 1.5 million passengers through Southeast Alaska each year.
Altogether, the Coast Guard employs almost 2,500 people, including almost 2,000 active-duty Sentinels, as active-duty members are formally known.
Vice Adm. Andrew Tiongson, commander of the Coast Guard in the Pacific Ocean, speaks during a change of command ceremony Friday, July 11, 2025, in Juneau. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Speaking at the ceremony, the head of the Coast Guard in the Pacific Ocean, Vice Adm. Andrew Tiongson, noted that it has been an extraordinarily busy year for the agency, which responded to fishing disasters, medical emergencies, foreign ships near American waters, and the recent sinking of a cargo ship carrying 3,000 cars.
Last year, the Coast Guard responded to 16 cases of foreign ships approaching the international border near Alaska, Tiongson said, calling it “the most significant foreign military presence in our waters near Alaska … in decades.”
Tiongson, who will retire later this month, said he expects the number of foreign ships near Alaska to grow.
Both China and Russia have sailed military ships through international waters near Alaska recently as part of freedom-of-navigation missions to demonstrate their right to travel through international waterways. The United States conducts similar missions near both countries.
Foreign fishing vessels frequently catch fish near the international boundary that marks the economic activity zone between Russia and the United States.
“We have an obligation to be present and to push back, to deter or deny malign activity anywhere that we have sovereign U.S. rights, and in the Arctic District, we have a lot of those and a lot of interest,” Little said.
Right now, the big budget bill isn’t expected to bring immediate help for the Coast Guard in dealing with those issues.
The Coast Guard’s Polar Security Cutter program, which received $4.3 billion under the federal budget bill, isn’t expected to deliver its first new ship until 2030 at the earliest.
When that ship, the Polar Sentinel, arrives in service, it likely will replace the Polar Star, which was commissioned in 1976 and is primarily used to keep open the sea lanes to American research stations in Antarctica.
Additional ships are expected in the following years.
The budget bill also contains $3.5 billion for a new Arctic Security Cutter program, which seeks to launch a lighter icebreaker within three years of a contract being awarded.
That ship, according to published specifications, would only be able to break ice up to 3 feet thick, less than the capability of the Coast Guard’s sole medium icebreaker, the Healy, and equivalent to a Class-5 icebreaker, second-lowest on the six-level international standards rankings.
The bill also contains $816 million to procure additional, unspecified light and medium icebreaking cutters.
That could involve buying and converting commercial ships.
Next month, the Coast Guard is expected to commission the icebreaker Storis in Juneau. That ship was formerly the Arctic oil drilling support ship Aiviq but was purchased by the Coast Guard as an interim icebreaking solution.
Speaking Friday, Little confirmed that the Storis will be operating on a more limited basis until it undergoes a comprehensive refit.
“She’ll be transitioning from kind of an initial operating capability into what we’ll eventually consider full operational capability,” he said. “But that doesn’t diminish the fact that we’ll have a U.S. Coast Guard cutter, painted red with a Coast Guard stripe, operating in the region this summer.”
The budget bill includes $300 million to construct a new port and support facilities in Juneau to support the Storis, but Little said he didn’t have any information Friday on the timeline for construction and development.
For this summer, he said, the plan is to “limit the mission space” for the Storis until its crew and the Coast Guard are familiar with the ship.
“We’ll step into that very thoughtfully,” he said.
Friday’s ceremony didn’t include as much discussion of aviation. The budget bill includes $2.3 billion for up to 40 new MH-60 helicopters, the long-distance workhorses of Coast Guard heliborne aviation.
It also allocates $1.1 billion for six new HC-130J fixed-wing aircraft. In Alaska, five of those aircraft are based at Kodiak and used for extremely long-range search-and-rescue missions, as well as “Arctic domain” flights that can involve flights along the American border in the Arctic Ocean.
The budget bill also contains $2.2 billion for new maintenance facilities nationally, $4.4 billion for shoreside facilities — including the $300 million for Juneau — and $266 million for long-range drone aircraft, an under-developed area for the Coast Guard.
Little said that kind of spending is a “fundamental change” for the Coast Guard, whose annual budget is only about $14 billion.
Coming into his new job, he said he’s aware that as ship traffic increases in the Arctic Ocean and surrounding waters, there are “increased risks, increased commercial traffic, increased tourist traffic, cruise ships, and increased access to what were otherwise hard-to-access waters.”
The risk of a “no-notice incident that we might have to respond to — and it might be a large incident in a more remote area than we’re accustomed to operating, that would be the thing that would maybe keep you up at night.”
A school bus drives in front of the Alaska State Capitol on Monday, Feb. 3, 2025. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
A school bus drives in front of the Alaska State Capitol on Monday, Feb. 3, 2025. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Governor Mike Dunleavy has called a special legislative session beginning Saturday, August 2, in Juneau.
The session will focus on two issues, education reform and the creation of a new Alaska Department of Agriculture.
The Governor’s recent budget vetoes have been raising concerns, the Governor cut over $122 million from the state budget, including $50 million from per student funding and major school maintenance projects. Juneau Senator Jesse Kiehl spoke with News of the North about the Base Student Allocation and had this to say, “when we look at the budget issues and the Governor’s special session coming up, what that really has to do with is, are we going to fund the BSA that we passed? it took an override to get that $700 per kid increase, and of course, the Governor vetoed that down, actually below a level that he proposed at one point during the session.”
Senator Kiehl is also a part of an education task force created by House Bill 57 which will look at a wide range of financial challenges and school policies, It’s charged with making recommendations before the 35th Alaska State Legislature convenes in January 2027.
When asked if the governor’s vetoes would affect the Education Task Force, Senator Kiehl said “I think those are going to be pretty separate issues. The task force has a lot of work ahead of us, to look both at the adequacy of how much we’re putting into schools and whether we’re doing it as well as we can be- Are there better ways to fund? are there more fair ways to fund? And then some other education policy issues.”
The group will dig into rising costs in transportation, energy, insurance, and school maintenance, along with accountability and student outcomes. The task force will present recommendations in a report on the first day of the January 2027 session.
This map from the U.S. Geological Survey shows the former Nazi Creek on Little Kiska Island. (U.S. Geological Survey photo)
By: James Brooks, Alaska Beacon
A small creek on Alaska’s Little Kiska Island has been renamed, more than 80 years after it was named after Germany’s Nazi Party by World War II soldiers fighting in the Aleutians.
Nazi Creek was the last landmark in the United States to bear the Nazi name. Its new name is “Kaxchim Chiĝanaa,” meaning either “gizzard creek” or “creek or river belonging to gizzard island” in Unangam Tunuu, the language of the Indigenous Unangax̂ people.
On Thursday, the Domestic Names Committee of the U.S. Board on Geographic Names voted 17-0 to approve the new name, without discussion.
The board’s decision allows the federal government to officially change the creek’s name in federal databases that are the official repository of geographic names. That repository is used by federal agencies and commercial companies that provide maps to the general public.
The board also approved the renaming of nearby “Nip Hill,” named by soldiers using a derogatory term for Japanese people. That hill was renamed “Kaxchim Qayaa,” or “gizzard hill,” again using the traditional name for Little Kiska Island, which is not far from Kiska Island, site of a World War II battle.
Michael Livingston, an employee of the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, has been working for almost two years to have the names changed. Moses Dirks, an expert on Unangam Tunuu, recommended the new names.
“I think that’s pretty awesome. I think elders … and others are happy about it. It really should have never been there in the first place,” Livingston said of Thursday’s vote.
“Like one of my teachers … used to say, if you know something that can make our community better, our villages better, be brave and stand up and say something about it, do something about it,” Livingston said.
The new names were previously recommended by the Alaska Historical Commission, which considered them in April. The changes were endorsed by local Native tribes and Native corporations, the Museum of the Aleutians, the manager of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, Congregation Beth Sholom of Anchorage, and the Alaska Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League, among others.
Kiska Island is located 242 miles west of Adak, at the far end of the Aleutian Islands. The area has been mostly uninhabited since World War II, when invading Japanese forces took 42 people on Attu Island prisoner. More than half died in Japanese internment camps.
The United States forcibly relocated almost 900 Unangax̂ residents of the Aleutian Islands, housing them in unsuitable internment camps in Southeast Alaska and elsewhere. Many became sick and died from the conditions imposed by the government.
Aleutian Islands residents subsequently received reparations from the federal government under legislation that also paid reparations to Japanese Americans also interned during the war.
Livingston’s work isn’t yet complete. He’s also seeking to rename Quisling Cove, a small body of water named after the Norwegian Nazi collaborator Vidkun Quisling. That name change remains pending.
For the second consecutive year, student reading scores in Alaska have risen, a trend state officials attribute to the success of the Alaska Reads Act.
According to new data from the Department of Education and Early Development, the percentage of students reading at or above average increased from 41% at the beginning of the 2023–2024 school year to 57% by year’s end.
In the 2024–2025 school year, that percentage rose again, starting at 44% and climbing to 60% by the end of the year, an increase which outpaces the national average for growth.
“This is promising evidence for our Alaskan students and their teachers as all the hard work and focus they have put in is coming to fruition,” said Education Commissioner Deena Bishop. “This achievement shows that the Alaska Reads Act was the right policy direction for our state, and more importantly, for our youngest learners. Congratulations!”
The Alaska Reads Act was signed into law in 2022 by Governor Mike Dunleavy with the goal of ensuring all students can read at grade level by the end of third grade. The legislation focuses on evidence-based instruction, early intervention, and high teaching standards.
“These results show why it’s critical to tie clear goals and strong commitments to education policy,” said Governor Dunleavy. “The Alaska Reads Act proves that coupling funding with real reform works. We made the right decision, and students across Alaska are seeing the benefits.”
However, despite those gains, the governor has made deep cuts to education funding in the newly signed state budget.
Dunleavy vetoed more than $122 million from Alaska’s annual budget, including over $50 million from the state’s per-student education funding formula and tens of millions meant for major school maintenance projects. It marks the first time in state history that a governor has failed to fully fund the education formula.
While the rise in student reading scores is being celebrated, many educators and lawmakers warn that continued progress may be at risk without sustained investment.
The governor will hold a special legislative session on August 2, with one of the topics being education reform.
Harlequin Beach on Amchitka Island is seen in this undated photo. The island, now part of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, was the site of atomic weapons tests in 1965, 1969 and 1971. (Photo provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
By: Yereth Rosen, Alaska Beacon
People who might have been exposed to radiation from atomic weapons tests conducted in the Aleutians half a century ago have extra time to apply for compensation from a federal program, under the sweeping tax and budget bill passed by Congress and signed into law last week.
The bill, which was signed by President Donald Trump on July 4, includes a provision reviving the Radiation Compensation Exposure Act, which was enacted in 1990.
The act’s compensation system distributed one-time payments to people who were exposed to radiation from the weapons tests and who later were diagnosed with certain types of cancer. The program has distributed about $2.7 billion to date, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
While most of the tests covered by the act were conducted in Nevada, the program also covers health damages from underground weapons tests conducted on Alaska’s Amchitka Island in 1965, 1969 and 1971.
The program covers former uranium mine workers, as well, many of whom were Navajo Nation members.
The compensation program had been on track to expire, with a previous deadline of June 10, 2024, for any new claims.
The budget bill extends the deadline for new claims to Dec. 31, 2027, and it sets a Dec. 31, 2028, sunset date for the trust fund that administers the claims.
The bill also raises compensation amounts. For “downwinders,” people who were not on site at the time of the tests but may have been exposed to radiation carried by the wind, the compensation is hiked from $50,000 to $100,000. For on-site workers, the compensation is raised from $75,000 to $100,000.
Of the Alaska weapons tests, the third — called Cannikin — was the most controversial.
It was the biggest underground nuclear test ever conducted by the United States. The tested bomb was 5 megatons, about 250 times as powerful as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945. There was widespread opposition to the project, including from environmentalists who later founded the organization Greenpeace.
Legal opposition to the test went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ultimately allowed the project to proceed.
The test created what was the equivalent of a magnitude 7 earthquake, killing up to 2,000 sea otters and thousands of fish.
Stock photo by Jose A. Bernat Bacete, Courtesy of Alaska Beacon
By: Corinne Smith, Alaska Beacon
After a Fox News interview raised the possibility of Alaska building a “Bear Alcatraz” Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility, the office of Gov. Mike Dunleavy said on Tuesday that the state has no such plans.
The Dunleavy administration statement was prompted by an inaccurate story by Newsweek that summarized the interview, asserting that the state had suggested the idea.
“The story is false,” said Jeff Turner, Dunleavy’s director of communications by email. He said that he had demanded a correction from the Newsweek reporter.
The Newsweek story referred to a July 1 interview on Fox News by host Laura Ingraham of Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for pPolicy and homeland security adviser. Miller is known as the architect of the Trump administration’s immigration policies, and a vocal proponent of ramping up ICE arrests, detention and mass deportations.
In the interview, Ingraham and Miller praised Florida for building a new ICE detention facility in the Everglades, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” for its isolation and being surrounded by wildlife in the Big Cypress Natural Preserve in Ochopee, Florida. It was constructed in just eight days, and can hold up to 3,000 detainees before deportation, and opened last week.
Miller said he had pitched all Republican governors to build similar ICE detention facilities. “We want every governor of a red state, and if you’re watching tonight, pick up the phone call, DHS, work with us to build facilities in your state,” Miller said.
Ingraham said Fox reached out to states, including Alaska, for comment. “Alaska told us that ‘we don’t have alligators, but we have lots of bears.’ However, they aren’t aware of any plans for an Alaska version,” she said.
“Of, I said, ‘Bear Alcatraz,’” Ingraham added, chuckling.
When asked to comment on Alaska’s response to Fox News, Turner repeated there were no state plans to build such a facility.
“I am not aware of any response from the state to Mr. Miller for a facility like the one in Florida,” Turner said. “The governor’s office was asked by Fox News if there were any such plans and the answer was no.”
Last week, President Donald Trump signed his signature domestic policy bill, dubbed the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which allocates a historic increase of $165 billion to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which administers ICE, through 2029. ICE’s budget is currently $10 billion.
The Department of Homeland Security said $165 billion includes $45 billion for new ICE detention facilities, $46 billion for border wall construction along the U.S.-Mexico border, $14 billion for deportation operations, and billions for hiring 6,000 new Customs and Border Patrol agents, and 10,000 new ICE agents.
The first-ever Bitcoin Alaska Conference was held July 5–6 at Centennial Hall in Juneau.
The conference brought together policymakers, energy experts, and Bitcoin enthusiasts to examine the role of cryptocurrency in shaping Alaska’s economy and energy future.
One of those experts was Alex Gladstein, chief strategy officer at the Human Rights Foundation.
Alex Gladstein offers an argument for technology as a critical tool for individual empowerment and freedom in an increasingly complex global landscape.
“So the organization that I worked for, the Human Rights Foundation, was founded with a very specific mission, which was to address authoritarianism.” Said Gladstein , “5.7 billion people live under an authoritarian regime in nearly 100 countries around the world, where they don’t have free speech, rule of law, separation of powers, or property rights. So while our country is not perfect, it is something that you know, billions of people aspire to, and we focus on helping human rights activists, journalists, labor leaders and environmentalists, who live under authoritarian regimes. And that often brings us to look at what the tools are that they’re using.”
Gladstein, working with the Human Rights Foundation since 2007, has witnessed firsthand the power of technology in some of the world’s most restrictive environments. His journey began with underground internet efforts in Cuba, where he and his team would smuggle contraband media and help citizens access information forbidden by authoritarian regimes.
The conversation centers on two primary technological innovations: Bitcoin and open-source AI tools. Bitcoin he says, emerges as a powerful instrument of financial sovereignty.
“even the most hardened skeptic admits that it’s got some sort of speculative investment quality to it, given that it’s been the best performing financial asset in the world since it was created, I think there’s a risk in ending the story there. I mean, that’s really what a lot of people see. They see an investment, and that’s about it.” Said Gladstein “I think what they don’t see is the freedom money part of it, which is that it doesn’t require paperwork to use. You don’t need an account. You can be any gender, any faith, any religion, any nationality, and you can use it and connect to it and trade and commerce and transact with other people. The second part of it is the censorship resistance. You know, it’s unstoppable.”
In Alaska, particularly in the North Slope, where abundant “stranded” natural gas from oil production could power cryptocurrency data centers, Stax Capital Partners, a Wasilla-based startup, recently proposed building a 50 MW Bitcoin mining facility south of Prudhoe Bay, about the same amount of electricity used as Alaska’s largest coal plant, according to the Alaska Beacon.
A New York Times investigation found that U.S. Bitcoin mining operations can require power comparable to small cities, and during crises like Texas’ 2021 Winter Storm Uri, some operations were actually paid to shut down to protect vulnerable power grids, Critics warn that large-scale installations, like those proposed in Alaska, risk similar grid strain and could push fossil fuel consumption higher.
On the technology front, according to Gladstein, it’s a double-edged sword. “there’s the centralizing force of the state, and they are using AI tools to better understand their population, map their population, surveil their population. But at the same time, these open AI tools that are available to anybody, are allowing individuals to have, essentially, a fortune 500 company in their pocket.”
Gladstein acknowledges the risks of digital intrusion and recommends people spend more time offline to reduce their digital surface area as these same technologies can pose a threat to individual privacy.
Yet, he remains fundamentally optimistic about technology’s potential to expand human freedom. “It’s going to be super empowering for individuals and small businesses that don’t have a lot of resources. I’m excited about that.”
The offices of the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development in Juneau are seen on Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
The offices of the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development in Juneau are seen on Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)
Approved by voters in November, it states that someone working at a business with 15 or more employees will earn one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, up to a maximum of 56 per year, unless the employer voluntarily increases that limit.
Someone working at a business with fewer than 15 employees earns sick leave at the same rate, but the maximum per year is 40 hours.
The law also raised the state’s minimum wage to $13 per hour. The minimum wage rises to $14 per hour next year and $15 per hour in 2027. It will rise with the rate of inflation for each year after that.
The law also forbids bosses from forcing their employees to attend meetings about religious or political issues, including whether or not to join a labor union, political group or church.
There are exemptions for religious organizations.
Under the law, sick leave can be used for an employee’s illness or to take care of a family member who needs care. It can also be used in cases of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking.
While workers can access the benefits now, it will be a few weeks before the state formalizes some of the details of how employers must implement the law. On June 25, the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development proposed new regulations. Those won’t take effect until August at the earliest, but they would add some new rules to the sick leave law.
Under those regulations, all of the state’s employers “shall notify each employee in writing” about its sick leave policy.
Those policies may include the amount of advance notice required when using sick leave for a prescheduled medical appointment or “other forseeable absence.”
An employer can’t require more than 10 days’ notice in that case.
If someone is unexpectedly sick, the proposed regulations would require the sick employee to “notify the employer before the start of the employee’s shift or as soon as is possible.”
If someone uses sick leave for more than three consecutive days, their boss may require them to show proof of their need for sick leave, if that requirement is included in the written policy.
Someone who needs to take sick leave because of domestic violence, sexual assault, harassment or stalking, cannot be required to verify that explanation.
Under the law, someone can carry over unused sick leave from one year to the next, but they can’t exceed the maximum, unless their employer voluntarily allows them to do so.
Employers are forbidden from retaliating against employees who use their sick leave, and nothing prevents an employer from “front-loading” sick leave by giving them the hours in advance instead of accruing them over time.
The Department of Labor’s new regulations are subject to public comment through July 31. Anyone with questions may email dol.lss.regulations@alaska.gov.
