advocacy, on the menu, state policy

On the Menu 01.30.26

January 30, 2026

By Rachel Lord, Advocacy and Policy Director, AFPC

I’ve been up in Anchorage for much of the week with the Alaska Student Nutrition Association annual conference, joining school nutrition directors, the state Child Nutrition Program, and others to talk about all things school food! Look for a blog recap in the coming week or so.

In the meantime, it was fairly quiet on the food policy front in Juneau. Senator Giessel dropped a new homemade food bill (see Updates, below). But otherwise, this will be a short On the Menu!

Bills We’re Tracking

SB 226 – Homemade Food 

SB 226 was introduced on Monday, Jan 26 by Senator Giessel, and is referred to Labor & Commerce and Resources. Currently in Alaska Statutes, there is a list of foods that cannot be sold under the homemade food rules, including most meat or meat products, seafood, controlled substances, oil rendered from animal fat, or game meat. SB 226 would add to that list and also prohibit selling “potentially hazardous homemade food in reduced oxygen packaging” under the homemade food rules. Reduced oxygen packaging is also defined in the bill as “packaging for a homemade food product from which oxygen has been removed to maintain product quality or to promote a vacuum seal.” In existing law, “potentially hazardous homemade food” is defined as “…food or drink that requires time or temperature control for safety to limit pathogenic microorganism growth or toxin formation.” We’re looking forward to learning more about this bill, and would love to hear your thoughts! There are no hearings yet scheduled.

HB 202 – Designating the giant cabbage as the State vegetable

HB 202 would designate the giant cabbage as the official state vegetable of Alaska and add this designation to state statute. The bill is in House State Affairs, and was scheduled for hearings on both Tuesday and Thursday, but the committee didn’t get to it on either day. It is now scheduled for a public hearing at 3:15PM on Tuesday, Feb. 3 and again for a hearing on Thursday, Feb. 5.

Rural Health Transformation Program Presentation – Senate Health & Social Services Committee

The Rural Health Transformation Program (RHTP) is a one-time, five-year infusion of federal money that is not meant to sustain but transform our health care system, born out of the passage of H.R.1, the Big Beautiful Bill, this past July. Commissioner of the Department of Health, Heidi Hedberg, provided an in-depth overview of the state’s application for funding. There are so many questions, to which Commissioner Hedberg noted, “we are building the plane while we’re flying it.” A lot of questions have come across about possibilities for food systems work within the RHTP funding – but note that food purchases are not allowed, nor are direct payments to individuals. This is a large amount of money with a lot of moving pieces – keep an eye on the DOH website. There will be a webinar on February 10 at 1pm about the application process (register here). Watch the entire hearing here.

No Changes This Week:

Check out our bill tracker here to see all the food policy bills we are tracking, and where they are in the legislative process.

Budget

Finance Subcommittees are underway analyzing the Governor’s budget in each agency. These committees don’t take public testimony, but they dig into some serious details on the budget, and you can certainly reach out to members with your thoughts and feedback. 

  • House Health & Social Services Finance Subcommittee (Fin Sub) met on Tuesday and heard a presentation from Commissioner Hedberg and staff. There was some interesting discussion around the ongoing SNAP backlog, starting right around minute 7 – You can watch the hearing here. 
  • Friday afternoon at 12PM, the House Natural Resources Fin Sub will hear a presentation from ADNR on the proposed budget (schedule here).
  • The Education & Early Development FinSub is schedule to meet next Wednesday and Friday mornings (schedule here). 
  • Commerce, Community, & Economic Development FinSub is scheduled to meet on Thursday next week (schedule here). 
  • The University of Alaska FinSub is scheduled to meet on Tuesday (schedule here). 

Currently there are no FinSub meetings scheduled for Environmental Conservation or Fish & Game. 

The budget, and long-term fiscal outlook for the state, is one of the biggest topics of conversation in Juneau. While not directly tied to food policy, per se, the financial footing of the state underlies all of our public sector investments – from roads and schools, to agricultural industry support and fisheries management. You can check out a few articles to get some high-level overviews, and budget resources to dig deeper are below.

Raising oil, corporate taxes is least-painful option for reducing Alaska deficits, ISER concludes (Alaska Beacon, Jan 30)

Alaska governor debuts fiscal plan, including statewide sales tax and guaranteed PFD (Alaska Beacon, Jan 27)

Dunleavy introduces sales tax, new dividend formula and other pieces of fiscal plan (APRN, Jan 27)

Alaska State Budget Resources

Upcoming Public Testimony

HB 202 – Cabbage as State Vegetable

Tuesday, February 3, House State Affairs, 3:15PM

Remember – things can (and often will) change! If there is a bill you’re particularly interested in, text the bill number (ie. HB202) to 559-245-2529 and you’ll get text alerts when its status changes!

Hearings can be watched on Gavel/KTOO, and you can check out our calendar of hearings for bills we are watching here.