June 2026 Food Advocacy Update

Budget & Bills 

Following the end of the regular session, the Governor has 20 days after receiving a bill to take action on all bills passed by the Legislature. For all bills, including the budget bills, he can veto, sign, or just allow them to pass without a signature. For statute bills and resolutions, he is limited to a full veto – he can’t go in and strike individual sections or make other similar changes. For the budget, he can (and does) go through and veto individual lines of the bill – ‘line item vetoes’. I have been keeping my eye on the bills and budget items we followed through the session. 

• SB 208 (ag land leases, cabbage as the state vegetable, and hemp bill) is still awaiting transmission from the Legislature staff to the Governor, but the other passed bills we tracked this year have been adopted into law. 
• HB 25, the ban on styrofoam containers at restaurants we followed last year, was passed by the legislature and vetoed by the Governor this month (read more here). 

The state Office of Management and Budget has all of the budget documents posted. You can see the budget veto summaries for the operating budget and the capital budget. Our primary interests – the emergency food purchasing funds and the AK Farmers Market Association Market Match funding both made it through the veto process, for which we’re grateful. In the capital budget, the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute’s funding was reduced from $6M to $4M. 

Alaska’s SNAP Error Rates 

On June 24, USDA released 2025 SNAP payment error rates for all states. Alaska’s error rate remains stubbornly high at 23.15%, only a small improvement over last year. See all the data here. It is always worth reminding ourselves that these error rates are not indications of fraud – they are administrative errors that lead to over- or under-payments. What does this mean for Alaska? The One Big Beautiful Bill added a heaping ton of new administrative work for all states to manage, on top of an already challenging bureaucracy. 

While Alaska’s high error rate earned us a delay on the SNAP cost-share penalty (to FY2029 instead of FY 2027), we are looking at tens of millions of dollars (on top of the roughly $10M already shifted) shifted to us from the federal government. And at the end of the day, we are seeing Americans dropping off of SNAP at alarming, and predicted, rates. Unfortunately, it’s not due to some miraculous improvements in economic well-being. We are simultaneously seeing continued skyrocketing demand at food banks and food pantries around the nation, including in Alaska. People are hungry, and with history as a guide, we will likely see the ramifications over time reflected in our workforce and military readiness. Read more on the SNAP error rate in this June 29 ADN article. 

Get Out the Vote! 

Election season is fully upon us. AFPC is excited to work again with partners through our Advocacy Working Group to help educate voters and candidates on food systems issues as we head to the polls in August and again in November. Stay tuned for more Get Out the Vote information coming soon. In the meantime, make sure you’re registered to vote – check here with the Division of Elections! The Primary is August 18, and the deadline to register to vote is July 19 (the registration deadline for the November 3 General Election is October 4). Register to vote here – it’s easy!