Legislature(1999 - 2000)
03/29/2000 03:15 PM Senate RES
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
SB 296-FEES FOR STATE SERVICE
CHAIRMAN HALFORD announced SB 296 to be up for consideration.
MR. MIKE TIBBLES, Aide to Representative Therriault, said he has
the companion bill in the House. He said this bill establishes
three categories of services, a standard designated regulatory
service, a designated regulatory service, and regulatory services.
They are each applied differently in the bill.
The standard designated regulatory services are services that they
believe are not complex. The bill mandates that DEC fix as many of
them as possible. That fixed fee would be based upon the average
actual reasonable and direct cost in providing the service.
The bill also provides for negotiated agreements between DEC and
the industry. There is no mandatory provision that they reach
agreement, but it provides that if the permittee requests
negotiation, DEC at least make the attempt. If negotiations are
unsuccessful, billing would fall back to time and expense which is
actual and reasonable direct costs of providing the service.
Additionally, the bill establishes a process for petitioning the
agency or agencies involved. If you desire a single project fee, a
permittee can petition DGC to come up with a single fee. There is
also a provision regarding invoicing which they require on a
monthly basis. There is a provision for the industry to petition
a resource agency to adopt additional fixed fees if they believe
they have a category of services that would be suitable for a fixed
fee. This perhaps is a repetitive permit that is used on an annual
basis or every four years.
The designated regulatory services that are used in this bill are
limited to water, waste water, and solid waste.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD asked regarding page 8, section 3, where line 14
deletes "not including travel" as a basis of fees. The laundry
list includes all the agriculture inspections, food, drugs,
cosmetics, public accommodation. That looks like a broad list
that's outside of the interests of the advocates of this
legislation. And yet by taking out the exclusion on travel their
fees may be increasing. He asked if that was a necessary part of
this bill.
MR. TIBBLES responded that they are opening the possibility that
additional services under AS 44.46.025(a) may see an increase in
their fees for travel. It wouldn't be every single program. Some
of them don't even charge. For drugs and cosmetics there's no fee.
Some individuals in the industry felt they should be able to pay
for travel. There were concerns from small operators that they
were going to be "killed" by the travel.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD said this was not a service that the owner of a
small bed and breakfast in a rural area with expensive travel
particularly wants. He asked if that section was essential for the
bill.
MR. TIBBLES replied that language was added in this section for
consistency. The goal of this bill is to establish a model for
particular programs - water, waste water, and solid waste. This
provision is outside the model they are attempting to build.
SENATOR TAYLOR said his concern was that by adding more words to
the statute they are trying to get a handle on these folks and
still you are leaving the fox in charge of the hen house. You
still have the agency telling you what is a reasonable time.
TAPE 00-15, SIDE B
MS. JANICE ADAIR, Director, Division of Environmental Health, said
that all issues they agreed upon are reflected in SB 296, but there
are few issues remaining that she hopes are minor that they will be
meeting with the RDC on. Their overriding concern with this
legislation is that it doesn't answer the policy question of how
the cost of state services should be divided between the users of
those services and the public. They believe the State desperately
needs a rational basis for apportioning costs to State programs in
setting fees. There has never been a holistic debate on how the
cost of government services should be apportioned. They believe
equity must be a cornerstone of any allocation of costs. To the
extent there are inequities, there should be some rational basis.
While this bill may result in an equitable distribution of costs
for those programs and users covered by it, not all the programs
within DEC for which fees are charged are included in it. In some
cases, some of the smallest and least profitable businesses
permitted by DEC are not covered by this bill. That remains a
significant concern to them.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD said it sounded like she said it's unfair not to
charge those who can't afford to pay.
MS. ADAIR responded that they believe this bill is equitable for
the people it covers; it should be equally equitable for those who
aren't covered by it.
Number 2270
SENATOR TAYLOR noted that last year the legislature did an
unallocated cut across the board and her department chose where to
take it. She took out the food inspectors and then told the press
how dangerous it was to go to restaurants because the legislature
had cut them. They, then increased fees (by $1.1 million)to all
the people who were out there and were licensed that had anything
to do with food preparation. He thought they made a profit for the
Department of $700,000 - $800,000.
MS. ADAIR responded that there were two cuts; one was an
unallocated reduction of $340,000 and that was taken in the Water
Quality Program. Another cut was taken specific to the Food Safety
and Sanitation Component of $339,000. That was a reduction to that
component and was made by the Conference Committee. In addition,
another $548,000 was switched from general funds to general fund
program receipts in Seafood Safety and Sanitation component. They
increased fees by $548,000. So their fee authority totals $1.5
million. Prior to that it was about $1 million. That is if every
single person pays.
SENATOR TAYLOR said it still looked like they are raising more fees
than the amount of their cuts.
MS. ADAIR responded that they had raised their fees to the level
necessary to bring in the amount in their budget that is authorized
as general fund program receipts which is $1,530,000. Their
analysis shows that they will actually under-collect, because not
every single person paid.
SENATOR TAYLOR asked if they didn't have flat fees 10 or 15 years
ago.
MS. ADAIR recollected when fees were first established for this
program, there was a flat $50 fee for some time. This program is
general funded; there are very little federal dollars and those are
contract dollars to hire people to go out and do inspections.
SENATOR TAYLOR asked if some of the choices made within the
department as to the level of interest or risk.
MS. ADAIR answered that the number of positions any agency has to
be authorized; the total amount of fees they are authorized to
collect has to also be authorized. How they allocate those costs
amongst the permittees is part of the regulatory process. They
make a proposal to the public; they mail out to areas that are
going to be affected and work with them to the maximum extent they
can.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD asked how the section worked if you're an employer
of less than 20 in the category of fees that are going to be
covered.
Number 1900
MS. ADAIR said that was the definition of direct deposit fee and is
on page 7, line 5. This is an amendment made in House Finance. It
was explained that there may be placer miners out in remote areas
of the state, people would call up and complain about them and DEC
would have to out numerous times to follow up on essentially
specious complaints. The maker of the amendment does not want the
businesses to have to pay for that travel. They agree with the
goal and don't charge people the inspection fee for a complaint
that turns out to be invalid. People do that to their competitors.
However, the language in the bill doesn't read that way and the way
they think it will work is to have two separate flat fees - one for
businesses with 20 or more employees and one for businesses with
less than 20. They haven't figured out yet how they will know how
many employees a business has. It's somewhat problematic the way
it is written.
SENATOR TAYLOR said he was troubled that there was an incentive
within the Department to do more inspections, because the revenues
upon which it is based will depend upon the level of inspection.
He wouldn't want to go into a court where the judge's salary
depended upon whether or not he was convicted.
MS. ADAIR said in this case, the bill is premised on the Department
having as many flat fees as possible. A permittee would pay a flat
fee annually and that fee would be the same whether they were
inspected once or five times.
Number 1774
MS. CHARLOTTE MACCAY, Senior Administrator, Environmental Affairs,
Cominco Alaska, and Vice President, Producers Council, said as Red
Dog Operations they have paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in
fees to DEC. They supported this bill so there are some side bars
and structures, some consistencies and accountability for the fees
they have paid. There has been very little of that in the past.
Regarding the travel, they have often gone into legal uncertainties
to be able to request to pay DEC to travel up to see the operation
before they attempt to regulate it - as well as legal obstacles to
being able to pay to get everyone to Seattle and coordinate with
the federal agencies. They can't pay to bring EPA up here.
Having the travel in the bill is so they have clear ability to do
so. They feel that other solutions could help protect the small
operators from having it imposed on them unwillingly. They have
viewed this bill as part of a multi-faceted solution.
MS. MACCAY said that industry has a responsibility to pay for some
of the permitting; but they also feel the need to pay for a core
management within those permitting functions that is experienced,
seasoned, and also knows their authority and when not to bow to
EPA's authority. Third party consultants and new inexperienced
people do not have that confidence to do so. Third party
consultants do need to be brought in for the permitting staffing
for the technical work and the general permit writing.
Number 1585
MR. KEN FREEMAN, Executive Director, Resource Development Counsel
(RDC), said their work group had worked over the last 13 months to
develop a permit fee structure based upon two underlying principles
- predictability and accountability. He stressed the productive
working relationship their group has developed with both the
legislature and the administration on this bill. He said he could
address Senator Taylor's concerns one of which was the agencies
ability to determine reasonable and direct costs. There are a
couple of protections within the bill that give industry comfort.
First, fixed fees will go through a regulatory process and the
public has the to test the reasonable question. Page 6, line 18
has the definition of direct costs. Those things which will not be
allowed to be in direct costs include the cost of salaries of
administrative support and supervisory personnel who are not
directly engaged in providing a service, other budgeted overhead
expenses, interagency charges that would not meet the requirements
if those charges were incurred or invoiced by the agency providing
the designated regulatory service.
Secondly, if negotiated permit activity doesn't come together for
the permittee and the agency, time and expense invoices can be
appealed to OMB, an opportunity for an additional check for the
permittee.
Thirdly, negotiated contracts as written in the bill are contracts
(page 3, line 12).
SENATOR MACKIE said he first became aware of the need for this bill
last year. He asked him what the concerns of the agencies were and
what had been done to accommodate them.
MR. FREEMAN said RDC met for over a year and Mr. Jon Tillinghast
helped them craft the initial draft which was given to DEC. They
reviewed it with some changes which were incorporated. That
exchange before the legislative process happened three or four
times. When they got to the Finance Committee, agency staff had
all been giving them input on a daily basis.
SENATOR MACKIE asked if he was satisfied that they had accommodated
90% of agency concerns with DNR.
MR. FREEMAN replied that all of DNR's concerns were taken care of.
DEC's original fiscal note was within the millions of dollars and
at this point in time it's down to $0.
MR. FREEMAN said with regard to Senator Taylor's concern about
giving DEC the discretion to come up with what is reasonable and
direct costs, that there are several clauses that give comfort.
First is the establishment of fixed fees. The second is if there
is a dispute on time and expense invoices, it can first be appealed
within the agency. If you still have a dispute, particularly with
regard to direct and reasonable cost, you can appeal to OMB. The
objective there was to appeal to an entity outside of DEC. A third
item is on page 3, line 12 where their intent was to have the
negotiated agreements actually be contracts.
Number 466
SENATOR TAYLOR said he had gone over interport cost differential
with DNR where he wrote it into law and foolishly believed someone
would try to enforce it. Our boats continued to not be worked on
in Alaska because he didn't have listed specifically what interport
cost differential would be. He didn't think he had to tell them to
include cost of travel. What they did to diminish the cost of
interport differential is to put nothing down or they would bid the
contracts out with the differential being figured off of Seattle,
Washington, because that's where they would end the run.
MR. FREEMAN said there was a lot of discussion about this issue.
He didn't think they had accomplished all the goals of the members
in the legislation, but he thought they had something they could
all support.
MR. STEVEN DAUGHERTY, Department of Law, said they had resolved
most of the legal issues that had existed with the original version
of this bill. They have worked to give the departments adequate
regulatory authority so they could adopt regulations to implement
the bills. There are still some significant costs for the
Department of Law under reimbursable service agreements will be
from contracts that will have to be reviewed according to statute.
Another cost is increased regulation lawsuits and appeals generated
out of what is a reasonable and direct cost.
SENATOR MACKIE asked him to explain the fiscal note. He asked if
it is was for the review of contracts and wasn't that what DOL is
being paid to do right now or do they have to hire new people.
MR. DAUGHERTY answered that they are operating beyond capacity
right now, particularly in the natural resources area. In order to
take on new functions, they have to either drop work that is
currently being done or hire new employees.
SENATOR MACKIE said he didn't know money was an issue with the
Department of Law.
MR. DAUGHERTY responded that particularly in the environmental
arena they worked largely on reimbursable service agreements from
the agencies and not on general funds. If they don't get the money
from DEC for the services, basically the Department of Law can't
provide them. They have some environmental general funds, but they
are quite limited. In the first two years, the costs are
approximately $74,000. After that they would have a quarter of an
attorney primarily for contract review and review of regulations.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD asked if there was any legal problem with the
provision that doesn't apply travel to employers of less than 20.
MR. DAUGHERTY answered that he didn't see a real legal problem.
The number of regulations is increasing, but they could argue that
equal protection isn't applicable, because they aren't similarly
situated. There would also be some problems with defining what is
20 employees. That can be resolved through court action or
regulation.
Number 466
SENATOR TAYLOR asked about the reimbursable fee agreements that are
contracts and if there was anything in the fiscal note about the
times when the State makes a mistake and gets sued under the
contract.
MR. DAUGHERTY answered that he didn't think that was taken into
consideration since it was a normal risk of doing businesses. They
don't normally put that in a fiscal note unless they are certain
they will incur the expenses.
SENATOR TAYLOR asked if they had thought about the constitutional
aspect of this and the legislature's power of appropriation.
MR. DAUGHERTY said they hadn't looked at that particular question,
but he didn't believe that was a problem because DEC will always be
operating off its appropriation from a previous year. They will
just be using the reimbursable service agreements to collect the
fees to collect the money that was already authorized by the
legislature.
SENATOR TAYLOR said then the legislature's power of appropriation
merely becomes a rubber stamp each year annually to grant to the
Department a certain level of authorization to use receipts
sufficient to allow these arrangements to move forward.
MR. DAUGHERTY said he saw his point - with a multi-year contract
that could be a problem. Normally that's not the case. Permitting
is usually a year and, at most, two. On-going projects are not
covered by this bill.
SENATOR TAYLOR said he was concerned about the overall pattern of
agencies working out a fee arrangement with the people they
service.
MR. DAUGHERTY said he would suggest adding the standard language
"subject to appropriation" to the contracts to deal with his
concern. On the policy issue of fees being set by the legislature,
that is an issue DEC is concerned with. He thought Ms. Adair
should answer that question.
TAPE 00-16, SIDE A
Number 001
MR. DAUGHERTY said they try to avoid any violation of the
Constitution and believe that appropriations go through the
legislature and that program receipts do not violate the
Constitution just from the fact that they are being raised because
they are still subject to appropriation by the legislature.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD said on line 14 he wanted to put back "not
including travel" so they're not passing something that's going to
add to the rate base for all the little guys.
SENATOR MACKIE said his only concern was what effect it has in
terms of the consensus building approach that's been taken.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD said the reason he mentioned it is because this is
an area that's not in the group that's working on it. His goal is
to not change the provisions as it applies to the inspections of
others than this working group.
MR. TIBBLES pointed out, if they remove the deletion and put back
in the prohibition to charge travel they will take out DEC's
ability to charge travel in all cases. That's including the
designated regulatory services.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD asked how to do it so they didn't include their
friends in CHAR, etc.
SENATOR MACKIE said he understands what he wants to do and supports
that, but wondered what the overall effect was to non-RDC
industries as well.
Number 372
CHAIRMAN HALFORD said if RDC and their group is willing to accept
travel because of the other things they gain in this process and
the side boards they get on the whole process, that's fine. This
part of the bill (page 7, line 5) goes back to an existing statute
that was an exemption and applied to everybody else. Conceptually,
he wanted to delete "not including travel" for any of the services
that are part of the RDC package. If it is agreeable to have a
conceptual amendment that deletes number one in whatever way the
legal department says to do it, that's clear enough so that
everyone knows what they are doing.
MR. TIBBLES suggested adding "However travel may be charged for
designated regulatory services under AS 37.10.058. They have a
specific definition of what a designated regulatory service is in
this bill. It only includes water, waste water, and solid waste.
SENATOR MACKIE asked if all the industry would fall within that
category anyway.
MR. TIBBLES said that was correct.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD asked if they would go back to the original
language of not including travel and add that phrase.
MR. TIBBLES said that was right.
SENATOR TAYLOR said this was still going to include anyone out
there who has a trailer court with a water or sewer system hooked
up to it. By making this change, people who have been sending in
water samples will now have to pay the cost of travel for some DEC
inspector to come out. He asked if the 20 employee exemption would
keep them from being involved.
CHAIRMAN HALFORD explained that the 20 employee exemption was a
blanket exemption for everyone.
MR. TIBBLES said that was correct.
SENATOR TAYLOR moved Mr. Tibble's amendment. There were no
objections and it was so ordered.
SENATOR TAYLOR moved to pass CSSB 296 from committee with the
accompanying fiscal note with individual recommendations. There
were no objections and it was so ordered.
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