SB 305 REGULATION OF ACCOUNTANTS  CHAIRMAN KELLY called the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee meeting to order at 1:32 p.m. and announced SB 305 to be up for consideration. CHUCK GRIFFIN, Chairman of the State Board of Public Accountancy, said SB 305 makes three changes in the Accountancy Act. One is to defer and provide transition for the 150 hour education requirement. This is mostly on behalf of the University community whose students will be graduating in the next year or two and hope to become licensed. The second change would give the Board the statutory authority to recognize for permit purposes limited liability companies which are now permitted under AS10.50. There is now no provision to recognize that entity for licensing. The third change would provide a limited form of permissive reciprocity for licensing CPA's who come from other states in the form of a five in 10 rule reflecting examination and experience. This will streamline the licensing process when these people move to Alaska or are transferred by their firms. He noted that two amendments are needed. In section one, dealing with the reciprocity provision, currently reads "an applicant passes a public accounting examination" and it should read "the applicant has passed the uniform certified public accountants examination." This conforms the title to the examination that is referred to nationally and in our statutes, he said. The other change is on page 10, the educational experience requirement, where "in public accounting" needs to be deleted because there is no requirement for a public accounting degree which would not be uniformly awarded anyway. Number 181 SENATOR KELLY asked why he wanted section 6 to take effect January 1, 2001 which is a ways from now. MR. GRIFFIN replied that they are currently the 1991 Act which has an effective date of September 1, 1997 and they have received a number of requests from primarily University students who feel that 1997 puts us ahead of the national curve and, secondly, the 1991 Act didn't allow for any transition whereby a person, if they had a degree prior to 1997, could still qualify. He said the Department of Law said that only the legislature can enact that provision; the Board couldn't adopt any regulation to provide any transition or grandfathering. SENATOR TORGERSON asked on page 9, line 25 regarding the definition of a foreign limited liability company and he wanted to know why we would identify them. MR. GRIFFIN replied that foreign under the limit liability law does not mean outside the U.S.; it means an LLC which is not directly domiciled in Alaska. They have had to deal with the same provision with respect to professional corporations. It is basically a form of interstate reciprocity. SENATOR SALO moved on page 1, line 9 to change the term to the uniform certified public accountant examination and on page 10, lines 14 and 15 to delete the words "in public accounting." CATHERINE REARDON, Division of Occupational Licensing, said that the administration they supported the bill with the changing of the wording. There were no objections to the amendments and they were adopted. SENATOR TORGERSON moved to pass CSSB 305 from committee with individual recommendations. There were no objections and it was so ordered.