Official: Lawmaker repays allowance she didn’t want to claim

JUNEAU, Alaska – The head of the Legislative Affairs Agency says an Alaska legislator repaid $302 for a daily allowance she had not intended to claim earlier this year.

Information provided by the agency in August showed 19 legislators did not claim an allowance for the time between the end of the drawn-out regular session in May and passage of a state operating budget nearly a month later.

The records showed Rep. Kelly Merrick as claiming the $302-per-day allowance for one day. Four lawmakers claimed the maximum allowable daily allowances.

But the agency’s executive director, Jessica Geary, says Merrick hadn’t intended to claim an allowance for that day and wrote a check refunding the cost.

Merrick, an Eagle River Republican, confirmed this via text message Monday.