Close to 3 million dollars worth of grants will be coming to Galena through the capital budget passed by the state legislature on Wednesday night.   

The largest appropriation – 1 point 4 million dollars - is for Phase Three of the piped water expansion project.  A little over a million dollars of that is federal safewater grant money, administered by the State.  The City of Galena expects that construction along Antoski and Louden Loop could begin as soon as next summer.   

A one million dollar grant for a sprinkler system in the Ptarmigan Hall Dormitory remains in the bill.  The building does not currently meet fire code for a student dormitory.   

Boarding school staff have already started the process of moving into Ptarmigan Hall, and occupancy of the dorm during the upcoming school year was dependant on a sprinkler system being installed as soon as possible. 

A second item related to the expansion of the Galena Interior Learning Academy was added to the capital budget fairly late in the process.  After the senate passed a draft version of the budget, a 387 thousand dollar appropriation was added by the House Finance Committee, to pay for remodeling the Air Force Headquarters Building.   

Galena School District Superintendent Jim Smith explained to the School Board on Wednesday that the funds will go towards carving out classroom space for GILA – which needs the additional space to accommodate its growing student population. 

"The classroom remodeling funds," Smith explains, "were requested with the idea that we would put a couple of classrooms in the basement of the Headquarters Building. Since we began this process through the legislative arena, we adjusted our goal to use the Headquarters Building for 6 classrooms, to be usable in about 2 years." 

Smith adds that the 387 thousand dollar grant for carving out classroom space in the Headquarters building will go largely towards construction, and not design or engineering work.  He also says that the school district has yet to spend more than half of last year’s one million dollar appropriation from the state, intended for the expansion of the boarding school on base.   

The City does not own the Headquarters Building, but may ask the Air Force and the State to hand over the building as soon as June of 2008, several months before the base closure deadline of September 30, 2008.   

The capital budget also sends out municipal revenue sharing grants to Alaska communities.  Despite legislative attempts to revive municipal revenue sharing as a permanent state program, these grants are only one-time appropriations, and not guaranteed to repeat next year. 

Smith told the School Board that he’s pleased with the level of state financial support that Galena received this year…but now the City and School District must pursue larger dollar figures from Congress in Washington DC. 

A non-binding joint resolution passed both chambers in Juneau, affirming the State legislature’s support for the increased use of base facilities for educational purposes.   

If signed by the Governor, copies of the resolution will be sent to the Secretary of the Air Force, and the Alaska Delegation in Washington DC. 

Besides Galena, the state capital budget will spend about 100 million dollars in the Interior villages of across House District 6.

Three multi-million dollar school construction projects get funding through the bill.   The construction of a new school for Arctic Village got its initial funding last year, and receives another 3-point-2 million this year to finish the job.  Russian Mission will get just over 5 million dollars to build a new school, and Fort Yukon gets an additional 1-point-4 million dollars to complete the renovation of its school gym. 

Three airports across the region are slated to receive upgrades.  The Huslia airport will be getting 7 and a half million dollars worth of improvements, the Grayling airport will receive 2-point-5 million, and the airstrip at Allakaket is in line for 400 thousand dollars.  All three projects are funded by the Federal Aviation Administration Airport Improvement Program, and administered by the State DOT. 

Water and sewer projects at Beaver and Hughes are getting money through the Department of Environmental Conservation.  The project at Hughes will get 1-point-8 million, and 820 thousand will go to Beaver. 

The capital budget was passed in the final minutes of the 25^th Legislature on Wednesday night, and awaits the signature of the Governor. 

Under Alaska law, the Governor also has line-item veto power, to cut any of the items currently included in the budget. Governor Palin has indicated that she might do this, to reduce the overall cost of the bill.