HB 206: ELECTIONS AND ELECTRIC COOP ELECTIONS Number 414 REPRESENTATIVE ELDON MULDER, PRIME SPONSOR OF HB 206, testified on the two new work drafts he supplied the committee. He said, "(The CS with) the last letter K does not include the amendment as proposed by Representative Davies. It does, however, include the amendment by APOC (Alaska Public Offices Commission). (The CS with) the letter O includes both the APOC amendment as well as Representative Davies' amendment. The APOC amendment requires that APOC be notified by the appropriate clerk, to let them know who the list of candidates are. I consider that to be a friendly amendment." REPRESENTATIVE MULDER continued, "The Davies' amendment, includes the stipulation that these cooperatives could opt out of APOC regulation by a vote of their membership. After deliberation, with the individual that actually wrote the amendment, I concluded that for the spirit and the intent of the legislation as I drafted it, I would not consider that to be friendly, in that it should be uniformly addressed and put to every organization." He then recommended the committee adopt the CS for HB 206 numbered 8-LS0686\K. Number 443 REPRESENTATIVE TOOHEY made the MOTION to ADOPT the 8- LS0686\K CS as the committee's working draft. REPRESENTATIVE JOHN DAVIES OBJECTED and said, "There are many different kinds of communities around this state. This would make it mandatory for every community around the state to be under the APOC regulations. Some of these problems in the smaller areas of the state where this might still apply, however, more than 10,000 customers, have relatively informal elections. There aren't large power groups out there manipulating to control things. So I think by having the option to opt out, we would allow the communities to tailor according to their own likes, what kind of public process they want." REPRESENTATIVE MULDER said, "We do make an allowance with the 10,000 customer threshold which, coincidentally, is probably larger than any of our house districts, in terms of voting populations... There are only five rural electric cooperatives that are included and one municipal telephone cooperative that is included in that membership." REPRESENTATIVE TOOHEY gave an example where HB 206 would have alleviated some problems and been beneficial. A roll call vote was taken. Representatives Williams, Toohey, Olberg and Sanders voted to ADOPT the 8-LS0686\K CS. Representative Davies voted NO. The MOTION CARRIED. Number 510 REPRESENTATIVE DAVIES said, "It's not my experience that this is a problem and it seems to me this just adds an unnecessary level of bureaucracy and control. There's no problem to be solved here in other areas of the state." He then MOVED that "everywhere the figure 10,000 appears in this bill, as it applies to the number of customers, that it be amended to 50,000." CHAIRMAN OLBERG said, "I've made some inquiries about, thinking along those very same lines, and it turns out...the problem that we're attempting to address is, in fact, Homer. And Homer is unfortunately, 18,173 (members)." He then OBJECTED to Representative Davies' PROPOSED AMENDMENT. A roll call vote was taken on whether to adopt Representative Davies most current amendment. Representatives Williams, Toohey, Olberg, Sanders and Bunde voted NO. Representative Davies voted YES. The MOTION FAILED. Number 556 REPRESENTATIVE WILLIAMS MOVED that the 8-LS0686\K CS for HB 206 be moved out of committee with individual recommendations. There were no objections, and the MOTION CARRIED. CHAIRMAN OLBERG called a brief at ease between 2:15 and 2:17 p.m.