Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed more than $140 million in funding for education at all levels, but refused to explain or try to justify his latest attack on education.

The Anchorage Daily News has the best coverage. Dunleavy’s publicity office claimed he didn’t have time to appear in public and speak about any of this.

His PR office later released a statement for him that provided nothing specific, just the claim that “The vetoes resulted from a thorough evaluation and consistent application of the priorities of the Dunleavy Administration to grow savings and ensure fiscal stability.”

He didn’t mention the pay raises for himself and legislators that he engineered.

His vetoes included cutting half of the education increase approved by the Legislature to prevent layoffs and cutbacks in districts across the state. Dunleavy cut $87 million from the one-time boost that districts said wasn’t enough to offset years of not adjusting for inflation.

Dunleavy also cut $3.5 million for Head Start, $10 million for K-12 school repairs, and more than $35 million for a variety of projects for the University of Alaska, most of them to fix buildings that need repairs.

Last December, when Dunleavy introduced his proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins in July, he included no additional funds for K-12 education and refused to answer when asked why.

Dunleavy insisted that public radio reporter Wesley Early tell Dunleavy exactly what increase for education Dunleavy should have placed in the budget.

That exchange came to mind Monday when I saw that Dunleavy focused his vetoes on K-12 schools and the university, leaving much of the rest of the budget alone.

I wrote this last December after the governor launched a colloquy worthy of a junior high principal on why it wasn’t his job to put an education increase in his budget:

“I would ask you this, ‘How much?’” Dunleavy said to Early. “Give me a number. You wanted me to put a number in this budget. How much? Don’t say you don’t know.”

Early said that five years in a row without an increase means a decrease because of the impact of inflation.

“So how much should I have put in this budget to deal with the question that you had?” Dunleavy asked Early for the third time.

Early replied, “I’m not the governor. And I’m not a school administrator.” He said that an administrator at the Anchorage School District told him that had the base student allocation risen with inflation in recent years, Anchorage schools would not have a deficit.

Dunleavy meandered for the next 90 seconds with a disjointed soliloquy about why he won’t take a leadership role on this. He claimed it wasn’t his job to put a new number in the budget because not everyone would agree with him.

“So I am the governor. And I’ve been a superintendent. And I’ve been a school board president of the second largest school district in the state of Alaska. And I’ve dealt with budgets.”

“You have to have a discussion with the Legislature and what factors they want to look at. What do they want to do with the BSA and any other discussions related to education, transportation costs, etc. For me to put a number in the budget, some will say it’s too little. Some will say it’s too much.”

“So what we’ve done is we’ve put forth a budget here on December 15th to begin that discussion. And I'd be willing to bet you a couple dollars that the number that you may be thinking in your head, and I don’t know if you are, probably won’t be the number that’s agreed upon by the Legislature. That’s part of the process.”

“So we’re gonna see testimony from educators, testimony from superintendents, teachers, you name it, that will be putting forth various figures and numbers. We understand that. But in terms of putting forth a number right now, I could tell you that people would say, you would be probably asking a similar question. ‘Why did you put that amount in there instead of this?’”

Dunleavy treated the 2023 Legislature the same way he treated Early last December, not taking a position on the base student allocation, while also bragging he should be listened to on education because he was a teacher, a principal, a superintendent, a school board president, and is the father of three girls.

“I think I can say this without any, any braggadocio, but probably out of all the governors the state’s had, probably the one governor that’s had more experience in education in its various, various levels across the state of Alaska,” he said about himself at his March 7 press conference, promoting his version of the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

On education, Dunleavy still doesn’t have anything to brag about.

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