Opinion ID: 2631894
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Does Subsection 5.02(c) of the Charter Give the Mayor Power to Veto and Reduce the Assembly's School District Budget and Local Source Appropriation Ordinances?

Text: In interpreting a constitutional document such as the Anchorage charter, [36] we first look to its language. [37] We therefore begin with the text of charter subsection 5.02(c), which provides in pertinent part: The mayor has the veto power. The mayor also has line item veto power. The mayor may, by veto, strike or reduce items in a budget or appropriation measure. [38] We first consider whether the charter gives the mayor power to veto the assembly's school budget ordinance in its entirety. We next consider whether the charter grants the mayor item veto power over the school budget ordinance such that the mayor may reduce its total amount.
The municipality argues that the first sentence of subsection 5.02(c) gives the mayor power to veto all assembly ordinances, including school budget ordinances, unless a specific prohibition provides otherwise. Repasky, Long, and the school district argue that because the charter does not expressly allow for a mayoral veto over the school budget, no such power exists. The municipality's reading is more persuasive. First, the language of charter subsection 5.02(c) is sweeping. It expresses no limit on the general veto power. And charter subsection 16.03(a) supports the idea that subsection 5.02(c) grants a general veto power unless specifically enumerated exceptions apply. Section 16.03 established the former Anchorage Telephone Utility (ATU) and stated that the mayor's veto power did not extend to assembly actions concerning the appointment of ATU directors. [39] No comparable provision of the charter prohibits the mayor from vetoing assembly actions regarding the school budget. We therefore conclude that the charter grants the mayor a general veto power over the entire school district budget ordinance.
In 1990 the following language was added to charter subsection 5.02(c): The mayor also has line item veto power. The mayor may, by veto, strike or reduce items in a budget or appropriation measure. [40] The municipality points out that this amendment came about because the municipality's 1990 Charter Review Commission believed it necessary to clarify whether the mayor had line item veto power. The municipality argues that even before the 1990 amendment, the mayor could reduce the total amount of the municipality's school budget appropriation and that the amendment simply clarified that budgets were also measures the mayor could reduce by veto. Long and the school district respond that this added language does not extend the line item veto to school budgets. They argue that the terms budget and appropriation as defined in the charter do not encompass the school budget.
The charter defines appropriation as a unit of funding ... in the municipal budget. [41] Long and the school district argue that the school budget is not a unit of funding ... in the municipal budget. They think it significant that separate sections of the charter discuss the municipal and school budgets. [42] The school district argues that this separation is highlighted by the mayor's ability to transfer unencumbered funds between departments within all appropriations except the school budget appropriation. [43] Long and the school district therefore argue that the item veto extends only to the municipal budget and not to the separate school budget. The school district also asserts that the term budget in the charter does not encompass the school system budget, because the Charter Review Commission did not mention the school budget when it discussed the item veto and because we have held that the assembly has no legislative power to make appropriations for specific items, programs or priorities provided for by the school board's budget. [44] The municipality replies that the Anchorage School District is part of the municipality, and that therefore the assembly's annual school budget ordinancewhich approves the total amount of the district's annual budget, determines the amount of funding from local sources, and appropriates the local source funds for the district's budgetis by its terms a municipal budget or appropriation measure. [45] The municipality also notes that the subsection 5.02(c) veto power does not distinguish between the budgets for general government, the school district, and the utilities, each of which has a separately identifiable municipal budget. [46] Finally, the municipality offers two reasons why the school budget process is described in a separate section of the municipal charter: first, because the school system operates on a separate fiscal year, and second, because the procedures for approving the school budget differ from the procedures for approving other budget items, not because the school budget was intended to be segregated from the municipal budget. We find the municipality's interpretation more persuasive. First, the school budget ordinance qualifies as a budget measure under subsection 5.02(c). A school budget ordinance is in appearance and substance a budget measure. Appellees provide no persuasive reason why it should not be treated as such. Second, it is significant that the school district is governmentally part of the municipality, [47] that the school district budget is for amounts that must be expended in order to operate public schools in the municipality, and that the school district budget includes amounts the municipality must contribute from local sources to operate the school system. We therefore agree with the municipality that the term municipal budget as used in the charter's definition of appropriation [48] inherently includes the school district budget. Further, as the municipality points out, the charter uses the term appropriation in sections which deal exclusively with the school budget. [49] This usage indicates that the charter framers considered the school district budget ordinance to be an appropriation. Subsection 6.05(c) directs the assembly to appropriate funds for the school district. [50] The ordinance appropriating these funds is both an appropriation and an appropriation measure for purposes of the charter. [51] Placing the topic of the school budget in a charter section apart from sections concerning other municipal budgets does not mean that the school budget is not part of the total municipal budget. Finally, given its absolute and relative size, it is counterintuitive to think that the school district's local source appropriation is not part of the municipal budget. The 1997-98 local source school appropriation required the municipality to contribute $100,228,823; this was about twenty-nine percent of the district's total operating budget of $358,723,000. [52] The local source school appropriation is also a very large part of the total municipal budget. [53]
We have thus concluded that the language of subsection 5.02(c) granting the mayor or line item veto power encompasses the school budget ordinances. But as Long recognizes, giving the mayor line item veto power over a school district budget ordinance is potentially problematic because the assembly's school budget ordinance only addresses the total amount of the budget. The ordinance does not list the individual proposed expenditures that make up the total proposed school district budget or local source appropriation. The mayor's veto messages characterized his 1995 and 1997 vetoes as line item vetoes. Perhaps the mayor felt he was exercising a line item veto because he was not vetoing the entire school budget ordinance, but was only reducing its total amount. [54] In this sense, the mayor exercised an item veto over a single-item appropriation. Is a single-item appropriation an item for purposes of the item veto? The item veto historically originated as a reform measure conceived in part to prevent legislators from logrolling when enacting appropriations bills which necessarily address many subjects and need not be confined to a single subject. [55] The item veto therefore typically addresses appropriations containing numerous items. [56] But another historical purpose was to give the executive branch some ability to reduce a legislature's excessive appropriations [57] a purpose still recognized as valid. [58] Thus, the fact that the assembly's school district budget ordinance only specifies the total amount, and lists no component items, does not mean that the total amount is not an item. The ordinance appropriates a sum of money dedicated to a particular purpose. [59] We therefore hold that the charter grants the mayor the power to veto the entire school district budget ordinance, or to exercise an item veto and reduce the total amount of the budget ordinance and the total amount of the local source appropriation.