HB 152-2009 REVISOR'S BILL  6:15:21 PM CHAIR FRENCH announced the consideration of CS for HB 152. [CSHB 152(JUD).] KATHRYN KURTZ, Assistant Revisor of Statutes, Legislative Legal and Research Services Division, Legislative Affairs Agency, said the revisors are statutorily required every two years to review Alaska statutes and prepare legislation to correct deficiencies, remove obsolete provisions, and fix errors in the statutes. This bill does that; it improves the statutes. The Department of Law (DOL) has reviewed the changes and discussed the relevant provisions with the different departments. A letter of support from DOL should be included in the bill packet, she said. CHAIR FRENCH acknowledged that the letter is in the packet. MS. KURTZ said there is an explanation of each change in each sectional summary. CHAIR FRENCH said he usually reviews a revisor bill by stress- testing it in a place or two. He targeted bill section 82 and asked why this part of law requires so much revising. MS. KURTZ replied that section is full of repealers. The sectional summary has the text of each section that is being repealed as well as the explanations. 6:17:04 PM AS 08.362.46(a)(4)(B) is a reference to the specialty examinations given by the Central Regional Examining Board, but that board doesn't offer specialty examinations so it makes no sense. The solution is to take it out. AS 31.05.080(b) was impliedly repealed by the enactment of AS 22.10.020(d). CHAIR FRENCH said this appears to have come to your attention in the course of some litigation. MS. KURTZ replied it did indeed. It is referred to in Allen v. Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. This makes express that repeal so it's not in the statutes where it could cause confusion. 6:18:04 PM CHAIR FRENCH observed that this collection of repealers isn't related to any particular part of the statutes. There is no thematic link. MS. KURTZ replied that's correct and there's a special constitutional provision for that. The single subject rule applies to everything but appropriation bills and bills revising the statutes. That provision enables the revisors to solve a lot of small technical issues at once. CHAIR FRENCH expressed satisfaction and asked Senator McGuire if she had any test questions on the revisor's bill. SENATOR MCGUIRE said no, but the changes can be comical. For example, bill section 9 corrects an apparent error by changing "adopted parent" to "adoptive parent" because Alaska law does not provide for the adoption of parents by children. CHAIR FRENCH noted that bill section 39 replaces "newsboys" and "salesman" to avoid the use of gender specific terms. That same bill section deletes a grammatically incorrect use of the word "some," which appeals to the grammarian in him. Similarly, bill section 41 substitutes "that" for "which" and semi-colons for commas to conform to the current drafting style. Senator French said he will bring that to the attention of a staffer with whom he has a long-standing running debate. 6:20:21 PM SENATOR MCGUIRE referenced bill section 1 and asked what a generic reference to the division of agriculture would look like. MS. KURTZ explained that the generic reference would be to the division that has responsibility for agriculture. Within a department names can be changed administratively and things can be rearranged such that a specific reference would be out of style and wouldn't make sense in the statute. "We're anticipating that in some places, and in some places things have already been rearranged and we're playing catch up," she said. CHAIR FRENCH found no further questions, no amendments and no public testimony. He thanked Ms. Kurtz for doing this exacting difficult work and added, "We could not do it without people with rigorous minds." He asked for a motion. SENATOR MCGUIRE moved to report CS for HB 152 from committee with individual recommendations and attached fiscal note(s). There being no objection, CSHB 152(JUD) was reported from the Senate Judiciary Standing Committee.