State Plan Would Strike Library Evening, Weekend Hours Rule

Alaska public libraries would no longer be required to offer evening and weekend hours under a regulatory package the state education department has approved and sent forward for legal review.

The requirement sits in the rules governing public library assistance grants. Beside it, in the column reserved for the department's own reasoning, staff wrote: "BURDENSOME. Remove all. Not all Alaska libraries have the capacity to offer evening and weekend hours."

Four people commented on that regulation during the public review. Three asked to keep it, one to modify it, and none to remove the hours requirement.

"These eligibility requirements were developed and refined over decades by the state library with input from communities of all sizes," one, identified only as a community member, wrote. "It would be imprudent to throw all that work away to satisfy an executive order." The department's reply, beside the comment, was the BURDENSOME line, and it gave the same reply to all four.

A fourth asked whether requiring libraries to open at least 48 weeks a year was "overly burdensome for $7K in State Funds." The department rejected that.

Eight entries in the plan's rules spreadsheet open with the word BURDENSOME, and all eight fall in library and museum rules. A ninth sits in a different file. Answering a parent on a school district reading rule, it wrote: "Accepted in part with removing 4 AAC 06.310 (e); BURDENSOME."

Where the Order Came From

The work traces to Administrative Order 360, which Governor Mike Dunleavy signed on August 4, 2025. The order directs every executive branch agency to cut regulatory requirements by 15 percent by December 31, 2026, and by 25 percent cumulatively a year later. The order states that the state's regulatory system "has expanded over time, often adding layers of requirements without considering the burden imposed on Alaska's citizens and businesses."

The Department of Education and Early Development answered by reopening most of Title 4 of the state administrative code. Between October 2, 2025, and December 18, 2025, it held a stakeholder meeting on each chapter, each with a 30-day comment window. The last window closed on January 17. Library services, museum services and state archives were each taken up three times rather than once.

Commissioner Deena Bishop signed the plan, which the department dates February 2 and posts in three parts: a memo, a spreadsheet of the rules, and a spreadsheet of public comments with its reply beside each one. The rules spreadsheet runs about 514 rows, one per subparagraph, with removal marked on 175 of them across about 59 regulations.

Where the Cuts Land

Three chapters are marked for removal in full: library services, 23 rows of 23; state archives, 18 of 18; and museum services, 14 of 14.

No other chapter comes close. Pre-elementary early childhood school carries the largest raw number, 52 marks, but out of 81 rows. Government of schools has 18 of 45 and the virtual education consortium 23 of 43. The rest are in single figures.

Other entries would remove the grant review process, a sentence barring a combined public and school library from buying curriculum materials with public library grant money, and an April 15 reporting deadline. On museums, it proposes striking the requirement to coordinate with the Department of Administration when an artifact is deaccessioned, and dropping from a grantee's financial report the list of service area, population served, facilities, assets and liabilities, personnel, salaries and budget.

Three came from commenters. A teacher called the curriculum materials rule "overly prescriptive," another wrote that the April 15 date "doesn't feel aligned well with school calendar," and a community member asked it to defer to museum staff on the financial report. It accepted all three and marked each BURDENSOME.

School facility planning and construction accounts for 231 of the 514 rows, and none is marked for removal. On nearly every one the department writes that additional research and discussion in the Bond Reimbursement and Grant Review Committee meetings are needed. That committee advises the state on school construction funding, and decisions about how Alaska sizes and pays for school buildings moved to it rather than into the plan.

The Department's Own Numbers

The plan states a baseline of 3,035 requirements, of which 371 are discretionary, with 261 identified for removal and 110 for revision. It also says the baseline consists only of discretionary requirements. Discretionary means everything not required by statute, federal law or court order. The order itself never defines a regulatory requirement.

Its 261 removals, 110 revisions and 84 further requirements it expects to find in guidance documents come to 455, which is 15 percent of 3,035.

The plan's figure of 261 removals does not match the 175 marks in the spreadsheet, and nothing in the record explains the difference.

Removals went to the Department of Law by February 16 and revisions by April 20. The plan proposed a special State Board of Education meeting in July, with an October meeting for a second wave. The record does not establish whether the July meeting occurred.

Nobody in the record is named. Commenters appear as a role, teacher, community member, parent, school administrator, and the department answers each in writing. No legislator appears, and no one was contacted for this account.

The State Board of Education's next regular meeting is scheduled for October 13 and 14 in Sitka. Any removal must still go through separate notice and adoption under the Administrative Procedure Act, a public process the plan does not replace.