Alaska's growing gap between income and expenditures has been the state's top issue for several legislative sessions.

But following the November elections the administration of Gov. Frank Murkowski likely will focus on more short-term issues such as negotiating new labor contracts with the state's 12 labor unions, and streamlining the permitting process for oil and gas development.

Majority and minority leaders in the House and Senate said they are waiting for Murkowski to lay out an agenda before establishing one of their own.

And with a new administration and a high turnover of lawmakers in the Legislature this session, it could be weeks into the session before an agenda is established.

Speaker of the House Pete Kott, an Eagle River Republican, said one of his top priorities is to complete the session in a timely manner.

"And at this point we as a caucus have not established any priorities," Kott added. "Clearly from my own standpoint I would be premature in putting forth any priority that I would like to see accomplished without conferring with the other 27 members."

When asked whether he expects cuts in the state budget this year, Anchorage Democratic Rep. Ethan Berkowitz noted: "You know, it's too early to say what happens. I'm willing to let the Murkowski administration lay out its budget. ... But it's our commitment as responsible legislators to try and make the budget work, but we also have a responsibility to constituents to make sure that they're served."

Senate Minority Leader Johnny Ellis, an Anchorage Democrat, said he expects the honeymoon between the administration and the Legislature to last no longer than a session.

Here are some of the issues to look for in the upcoming session:

• Labor contract negotiations: The administration is negotiating with the state's 12 unions over labor contracts ­ 10 of which are set to expire in June. Former Department of Administration commissioners Andy Warwick and Bill Hudson have been meeting with the unions since early December on behalf of the administration. The Alaska State Employees Association, the state's largest labor union, is seeking increases in wages and benefits. But as the state's fiscal gap quickly approaches $1 billion, significant increases might be unlikely.

Key issues for state lawmakers in the 2003 session Labor contract talks: 10 of 12 state union contracts set to expire in June. Oil and gas development: State leaders looking to streamline permits, increase production. Prisons: Gov. Murkowski has proposed building new facilities to house Alaska prisoners now housed in Arizona. All-Alaska Gasline Authority: Voters approved it last November; now the state must study it. Road construction: Gov. Murkowski wants to build more roads to create jobs and increase access to areas of the state, including Juneau.

• Oil and gas development: Senate President Gene Therriault, a North Pole Republican, listed streamlining drilling permits as a personal priority: "... I've focused this past couple of years on permit streamlining and finding out why it is that our process is now just as much of a discouragement to attracting private investment as our environment, our severe environment up here." Murkowski Chief of Staff Jim Clark would not go into specifics about what permits would be streamlined or what cumbersome regulations would be pursued but added: "... (W)e're looking at things like what we can do to increase heavy oil production, what we can do to increase the wells from which we are presently producing. ... We're just looking at whatever we can do to speed up the oil and gas development, particularly oil, to fill up the excess capacity in the pipeline."

• Private prisons: Democrats oppose them but the minority and majority expect the issue to return this session. Murkowski was unavailable for comment, but during the campaign said he would overhaul Alaska's public-safety system. He proposed expanding Alaska prisons or building a new one to bring home prisoners who are being housed mostly in Arizona. Murkowski said during the campaign that he opposes private prisons in Alaska.

"By bringing our prisoners home we can create jobs here in Alaska, not in Arizona," Murkowski told The Associated Press in August. "By incarcerating them at home, near their families and communities, we can give them a better chance at rehabilitation."

• All-Alaska Gasline Authority: The All-Alaska Gasline Initiative approved by voters in November directs the Legislature to fund an exploratory authority to research the feasibility of a state-owned gas pipeline from the North Slope to Valdez. The authority would develop the cost of construction and a market plan. Backers of the measure say the study would cost between $3 million and $5 million. Chief of Staff Clark said the administration is in the "homework phase" in looking at what the voters approved and what the state must do to fulfill those obligations.

• Construction of transportation infrastructure: Gov. Murkowski in late December directed the Department of Transportation to restart the Juneau Access project, which has a preferred alternative of building a road from Juneau to Skagway.

Clark said the administration also is looking closely at projects that will increase access and provide jobs throughout the state.

"A bunch of these other projects, we are looking at what can we do to increase jobs through road construction. An example of that is the Donlin Creek Mine (northwest of Bethel in the Kuskokwim Mountains). Is this a road that if we construct it we could produce natural-resource jobs in Alaska? We'd accomplish several things at the same time with such a road. It's the same kind of results we got from building the Red Dog road (near Kotzebue)," Clark said.

• Subsistence: Subsistence could be dead on arrival this year, according to leaders in the minority and majority. Sen. Therriault and Senate Minority Leader Ellis agree that lawmakers' opinions on the issue have changed little despite a high turnover of legislators in the November election.

"The people that block a vote of the people on (a rural subsistence priority) are the people who were very strongly in favor of Sen. Murkowski becoming Gov. Murkowski, so the governor is going to have to do a lot of heavy lifting if he wants to solve that problem," Ellis said.

Therriault added that an amendment to the state constitution would not go on the ballot until the next general election anyway.

"... (T)hat's not to say that if there was an idea that had some traction we should wait until the last possible second in the next legislative session," Therriault said.

Timothy Inklebarger can be reached at timothyi@juneauempire.com