Government of Alaska

The government of Alaska in common with state and federal governments of the United States, has three branches of government: the executive, consisting of the Governor of Alaska and the state agencies; the state legislature consisting of two chambers, the House of Representatives and the Senate; and the judiciary consisting of the Supreme court and lower courts.

Alaska has 246 federally recognized tribal governments and one federal Indian (Native American) reservation.

The Governor of Alaska is the senior-most official of the Alaska executive branch. The main Alaska state agencies are the:

Other agencies are the:

The current Governor of Alaska is Mike Dunleavy (R) and the Lieutenant Governor of Alaska is Nancy Dahlstrom (R).

Alaska has a Legislature. It is a bicameral institution, consisting of a lower chamber, the Alaska House of Representatives with 40 members, and an upper chamber, the Alaska Senate with 20 members. There are 40 House Districts (1-40) and 20 Senate Districts (A-T). The Alaska Legislature meets in the State Capitol building in Juneau.

The Alaska Court System is the unified, centrally administered, and totally state-funded judicial system. The Alaska District Court are the primary misdemeanor trial courts, the Alaska Superior Courts are the primary felony trial courts, and the Alaska Supreme Court and the Alaska Court of Appeals are the primary appellate courts. The Chief Justice of the Alaska Supreme Court is the administrative head of the Alaska Court System.

Alaska has two levels of local government, including boroughs (of which there are 19) and cities (currently 144). Boroughs in Alaska play a role very similar to Counties in 48 other states and Parishes in Louisiana. Owing to the state's low population density, most of the land is located in the Unorganized Borough which, as the name implies, has no intermediate borough government of its own, but is administered directly by the state government. Currently (2000 census) 57.71 percent of Alaska's land area has this status; however, its population comprises only 13.05 percent of the state's total. For statistical purposes the United States Census Bureau divides this territory into census areas .