Anchorage Assembly expects to receive mayor’s proposed 2025 budget by end of day

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) - Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance is expected to deliver the 2025 Anchorage budget to the Anchorage assembly by the end of the day Wednesday.

As mayor, LaFrance is required to deliver the next year’s budget no later than 90 days before the end of the year. The budget will outline the administration’s proposals for operating costs, including but not limited to local services, maintenance of roads, snow removal, and utilities.

Anchorage Assembly Chair Chris Constant said it’s not unusual for the the budget to be delivered late in the day.

“Bottom line, the real time constraint is that we have to have the budget passed by 30 days before the new year starts,” Constant said.

Once the budget is submitted, the Assembly reviews it, holds public hearings and discusses possible amendments, and then typically approves it at the last Assembly meeting in November.

Constant said some of the topics he anticipates being the main focus in next year’s budget are snow removal, updating the city’s fleet vehicles, homelessness and housing needs, as well as the mobile crisis team, which he would like to see available and operating 24/7.

“We have qualified professional mental health people on the streets every single day, all the time,” Constant said. “Once we have a 24/7 program, it becomes Medicaid billable, which means they actually generate revenue, which means we reduce the burden on the taxpayer for managing the incidents of people experiencing mental health challenges on the streets.

“And so it’s win, win, win,” he continued, “and when we get that, I’m going to be really happy. So those are the priorities that I bring, which thankfully align really closely with this current mayor. Solve the problems people keep talking to us about.”