Legislature(1995 - 1996)
03/22/1995 01:37 PM Senate JUD
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
SJUD - 3/22/95 SJR 14 CONFIRMATION OF MEMBERS OF PUBLIC CORP SENATOR RICK HALFORD, sponsor of SJR 14, gave the following testimony. SJR 14 has been reviewed by the Senate Finance Committee but was returned to the Senate Judiciary Committee to create specific language to achieve the intent. Had the corporations that control close to $20 billion in state assets been envisioned at the time of statehood, a constitutional mechanism would have been devised to prevent confirmation overlap problems. He stated the question is how specific should constitutional language be. The language needs to clearly cover the public entities that control billions of dollars of state assets and provide the voters an opportunity to amend the constitution so that a check and balance system with regard to the boards and commissions is established. SENATOR TAYLOR discussed the need to keep the language sufficiently generic so as to encompass the public entities that currently exist and will be created in the future, and avoid the problem of providing a specific list of names that will be intentionally avoided by administrations in the future. Number 420 SENATOR HALFORD stated one possibility is to change the words "public corporation" to "entity" but it is not clear what agencies would be considered "entities." He suggested scheduling a work session with the Legislative Legal Services Division to refine the language. SENATOR ADAMS agreed with Senator Halford's statement about which agencies should be covered, and felt CFAB should be included, but he did not believe the list should include the smaller corporations. SENATOR HALFORD stated one consideration was to only include corporations that manage more than $50 million in state assets but that would not include CFAB. SENATOR HALFORD noted in an early draft, the addition of another section was considered, however he felt a constitutional amendment needs to be short, easily understood and self explanatory to gain voter approval. The Administration raised the argument that defining the assets as state assets might increase state liability for default by the entity that controls those assets. SENATOR TAYLOR suggested establishing a work session on record to review the measure and develop new language. SENATOR HALFORD suggested including Judge Stewart since he was a member of the Constitutional Convention. SENATOR HALFORD expressed concern that the Legislature approves all members of the Board of Barbers and Hairdressers, yet has nothing to do with the Permanent Fund Corporation Board, which has been replaced by the past two administrations. SENATOR TAYLOR announced he planned to set up a work session on SJR 14 within the next 10 days. SENATOR GREEN asked if the intent of SJR 14 is to provide legislative confirmation of members of public corporations and does not set up a kind of audit system. SENATOR HALFORD responded SJR 14 allows for legislative confirmation. He recommended the creation of overlapping terms, and the ability to discharge for cause also be included in law. Because the Constitution provides for legislative confirmation of heads of principle departments or regulatory or quasi-judicial agencies only, board members of agencies like the Alaska Railroad Corporation are not confirmed by the Legislature. He stated the boards of public corporations are usually comprised of commissioners as well as public members, therefore the composition of the board changes significantly with a change of administration. He noted the Permanent Fund Corporation Board has only one member that was on the last Board, although some members from the previous board were recently reappointed after being removed by the previous governor.
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