Legislature(1997 - 1998)
01/27/1998 01:38 PM Senate L&C
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SENATE LABOR AND COMMERCE COMMITTEE
January 27, 1998
1:38 P.M.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Loren Leman, Chairman
Senator Jerry Mackie, Vice Chairman
Senator Tim Kelly
MEMBERS ABSENT
Senator Mike Miller
Senator Lyman Hoffman
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
SENATE BILL NO. 235
"An Act extending the termination date of the Board of Certified
Real Estate Appraisers."
HEARD AND HELD
SENATE BILL NO. 195
"An Act relating to common law liens, to remedies, costs, and fees
imposed for the registration, filing, or recording of certain
nonconsensual common law liens, and to penalties for recording
common law liens."
MOVED SB 195 OUT OF COMMITTEE
PREVIOUS SENATE COMMITTEE ACTION
SB 235 - No previous action to consider.
SB 195 - No previous action to consider.
WITNESS REGISTER
Ms. Catherine Reardon, Director
Division of Occupational Licensing
Department of Commerce and Economic Development
P.O. Box 110806
Juneau, AK 99811-0806
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 235.
Mr. John B. Wolfe, Chairman
Board of Certified Real Estate Appraisers
P.O. Box 240365
Douglas, AK 99824
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 235.
Mr. Tim Benintendi, Staff
Senator Tim Kelly
State Capitol Bldg.
Juneau, AK 99811-1182
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 195.
Mr. Doug Wooliver, Administrative Attorney
Alaska Court System
820 W. 4th Ave.
Anchorage, AK 99501
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 195.
Mr. Cliff John Groh, Atty.
Municipality of Anchorage
P.O. Box 196650
Anchorage, AK 99519
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 195.
Ms. Sharon Young, State Recorder
3601 C Street, #1180
Anchorage, AK 99503
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 195.
ACTION NARRATIVE
TAPE 98-2, SIDE A
Number 001
SB 235 - BOARD OF CERTIFIED REAL ESTATE APPRAISERS
CHAIRMAN LEMAN called the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee
meeting to order at 1:38 p.m. and announced SB 235 to be up for
consideration.
MS. CATHERINE REARDON, Director, Division of Occupational
Licensing, supported SB 235. She noted there was a $0 fiscal note,
although there is a cost of $35,500 for the Board of Real Estate
Appraisers that is already built into their budget. They agreed
that it is in the public's interest and necessary due to federal
requirements to have licensing of real estate appraisers.
SENATOR LEMAN asked if there were other issues regarding real
estate appraisers that she would like to mention.
MS. REARDON answered not at this time.
Number 63
MR. JOHN WOLF, Chairman, Real Estate Appraisers Board, supported SB
235. He said the Board has identified three areas that would
require statutory change. The first in priority is to license
trainees. Currently it's just an option. The change would be to AS
08.87.310 (a). The reason is that now there are only five
certified trainees in Alaska and there are many more than that who
are working as appraisal assistants. They are unlicensed and under
the supervision of a certified appraiser, but there is no
requirement for them to have any training whatsoever. Board
members know of some people who function in this capacity for three
or four years and actually complete appraisal reports and have it
co-signed by the supervising appraiser. Approximately half of the
United States require licensing of trainees now.
The Board's next concern is mandatory state certification of all
real estate appraisers. Currently State law says you must be a
certified appraiser only for federally related transactions. This
means any privately funded sales transactions can be done by
someone who is not certified.
Finally, the Board would like to increase the continuing education
requirements to 40 hours for each biannual renewal period.
Currently the number of hours required is in regulation, but under
AS 08.87.020 (3) there is a requirement that we not exceed the
federal minimums in education and training experience. So we are
capped at whatever the federal minimum is.
MR. WOLF said that currently there are 174 certified appraisers -
83 of them are general appraisers who appraise commercial
properties and 84 residential appraisers. There are five trainees
and two courtesy licenses issued to out-of-state appraisers.
SENATOR KELLY asked if a general appraiser could appraise
residential property.
MR. WOLF answered yes, but a residential appraiser can appraise
anything up to 10 units as long as the income is not required in
the appraisal.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if there was consensus on these issues within
the profession.
MR. WOLF replied that all of these things were approved by the
Board unanimously, but there are probably differing opinions within
the industry. He hasn't found anyone against the licensing of
trainees.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN commented he couldn't see why anyone would care
about being licensed if they were already doing work under a
certified appraiser.
MR. WOLF replied there is a quality issue in terms of the report
that is completed by someone who is not certified competing with a
report by someone who is fully certified.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if they had a professional society that
discussed this issue like engineers have. He would never think of
signing off on someone else's work unless he was integrally
involved in preparing it.
MR. WOLF responded that they both work to higher standards than
some other people.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if charges had ever been brought against
anyone who is operating this way. MS. REARDON resounded from the
audience negatively.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked the committee if they had any problems with
amending the bill to include these changes if they had support from
within the profession.
SENATOR KELLY replied that one of his concerns is not if they have
support in the profession, but from people who are trying to join
the profession. In his experience, these types of boards tend to
try to raise the gates on new entries creating monopolies for a
small group of people.
SENATOR MACKIE agreed with Senator Kelly and suggested leaving the
bill as it is and dealing with the other issues in separate
legislation. He moved SB 235 from committee with individual
recommendations.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN objected for purposes of discussion.
MR. WOLF responded that the Board had no problem with the bill
going through in its current form. He was merely expressing three
items that they recently adopted. He explained that the mandatory
licensing would affect some people who are doing appraisals and are
not involved in a federally related transaction, but it wouldn't
change any current standard or requirements for becoming an
appraiser. It's just that during that period of time when you're
gaining experience, the required 1,500 hours in a 24-month period,
you would be a trainee rather than unlicensed appraiser.
SENATOR KELLY asked what the advantage was if you are putting in
the same amount of time.
MR. WOLF answered that there are people functioning as an assistant
who have absolutely no intention of ever becoming an appraiser and
have never taken any training or education.
SENATOR KELLY asked if they want to license trainees, were they
talking about adding some kind of educational requirement.
MR. WOLF responded that there is now a 75-hour requirement in
place. They are not adding a trainee classification.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if a trainee could not engage in the practice
of real estate appraisal under the direct supervision of a
certified real estate appraiser unless they were a registered
trainee. MR. WOLF said that is correct.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN said he would like to see these ideas written down
before they pass the bill from committee.
SENATOR KELLY requested that Ms. Reardon look at the proposed
amendments also and submit a position paper on what the Division
thinks at that stage.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN affirmed that request and said they would hold the
bill.
SENATOR MACKIE withdrew his motion.
Number 409
SB 195 - COMMON LAW LIENS
CHAIRMAN LEMAN announced SB 195 to be up for consideration and that
it was introduced by request through the Rules Committee.
MR. TIM BENINTENDI, Staff to the Senate Rules Committee, explained
that SB 195 addresses the emerging problem of filing of nuisance
liens in this State with the intention of retribution. Such liens
have been filed against property owned by public officials and
others who have fallen in disfavor with certain groups or
individuals who embrace an opposing philosophical or political
view. The liens rarely have true commercial foundation, but are
used as a harassment tactic. The practice has now surfaced in
Alaska as several municipal officials can attest from the
Municipality of Anchorage.
SB 195 makes it a misdemeanor to record a non-consensual common law
lien without court approval. It would ease the process of
releasing a lien and would provide for filing a notice of invalid
lien by attorneys of public officials. It would also set out
penalties against those who file such nuisance liens. It has two
$0 fiscal notes and has a wide variety of support in the public
sector.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if the Department of Law would represent
someone in the legislative branch of government.
MR. BENINTENDI said that the Legislative Legal Department would
represent them. He understands that municipal attorneys would
represent their people.
MR. WOOLIVER, Alaska Court System, testified that the court system
asked for this bill to be introduced to address this growing
problem of recording common law liens against real and personal
property in Alaska which is an enormous problem in some other
states. Although these liens are meaningless, they still cloud
title that is typically discovered when someone goes to sell or
borrow against their property. Typically these liens are for
several hundred thousand, if not millions, of dollars. No action
can be taken on a property until this lien is cleared up.
In the past generally one has to file a lawsuit to get these
resolved. Suing someone for a common law lien can be frustrating
experience because they don't believe they are subject to the
jurisdiction of the court and you end up in a paper war in addition
to trying to get a lien removed, Mr. Wooliver said.
Under current law there are several ways people can legitimately
file liens and this bill doesn't seek to frustrate those. For
example there are material liens, mechanics liens, fishermen liens,
etc. and all of these liens are typically tied to a specific piece
of property for work done on the property. There is an actual tie
between the lien and what the person has done.
Common law liens are not accompanied by any kind of valid court
judgement and aren't tied to work done or goods or services
provided. They are typically filed against public officials who
have run afoul of someone who has recorded the lien.
SB 195 seeks to address this problem in three ways. First there
are expedited procedures to have a lien removed or declared invalid
if one is filed against a person. There are two aspects to that.
An attorney representing an official could record a notice of
invalid lien and it would become invalid and not have to go to
court. The second option is for someone who is not an official who
can petition the court and attach an affidavit explaining the
predicament. The the court can have a hearing within 20 days. If
the person doesn't show up, the court enters a notice of invalid
lien and records that. If a person does show up and the court
finds this is an invalid lien, then court records a notice of
invalid lien and the person who is the lien claimant would pay
costs and actual and reasonable attorney fees.
The second prong is that it provides for civil damages and third,
it makes the filing of a bogus common law lien a class A
misdemeanor.
Number 525
MR. CLIFF JOHN GROH, Municipality of Anchorage, strongly supported
this bill. He explained there have been 43 false liens filed
against municipal officials in Anchorage. These filings are
getting to be more common. He explained some of the financing
problems one can run into with liens filed on their properties.
MS. SHARON YOUNG, State Recorder, testified in addition to Mr.
Groh's testimony that these types of liens are definitely becoming
more frequent in Alaska as everywhere else in the United States.
They are definitely becoming a tool with which people are using the
public record to get at people they are discontent with.
She definitely supports this bill from the standpoint of the
recording system in general.
TAPE 98-2, SIDE B
MS. YOUNG said she did not want recorders placed in the role of
having to review documents for substantive content or validity.
That concern is resolved with this bill.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN asked if her office sends a notice to an owner when
a lien is filed.
MS. YOUNG replied that there is no notice provision by her office.
SENATOR MACKIE moved to pass SB 195 out of committee with
individual recommendations. There were no objections and it was so
ordered.
CHAIRMAN LEMAN adjourned the meeting at 2:25 p.m.
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