HB 131-FOREST RESOURCES & PRACTICES STANDARDS  CHAIRMAN TORGERSON announced HB 131 to be up for consideration and said it was introduced by the House Rules Committee at the request of the Governor. MS. CAROL CARROLL, Director, Support Services, Department of Natural Resources (DNR), said: What the bill does, it identifies the riparian standards for Region 3. The Board of Forestry requested the science and technical subgroup to get together and identify all of the best science. They got together with an implementation group and with all of the affected parties to make sure what we were looking at in the scientific and technical group really would work on the ground. After that process was completed, we brought the bill back to the Board of Forestry for their review and that bill is what you see before you today. MS. CARROLL said the committee has a "consensus bill" before it. CHAIRMAN TORGERSON asked what the difference was between this and Areas 1 and 2. MS. CARROLL replied that Area 1 is coastal Alaska, Area 3 is Interior Alaska and Area 2 is next. MS. MARTY FREEMAN, Division of Forestry, DNR, said she was co- chair of the Science and Technical Committee in the group of stakeholders. She said that the difference between this and Region 1 is that they have a different stream classification system in the Interior that is tailored to the different stream types there. In Region 1 there are four different stream types including anadromous streams and tributaries. In the Interior the streams are both anadromous and high value resident fish streams and those are subdivided between non-glacial and glacial waters. MR. BOB ZACHEL said he was the Interior timber industry representative on the Science and Technical Committee when they worked on this. He said, "I wanted to make it clear that what I thought I was getting from this agreement was that Fish and Game must present clear scientific data to justify any objections to sales beyond the 100 ft. setback." CHAIRMAN TORGERSON asked if he wanted to see something in statute rather than just have a promise from ADF&G. MR. ZACHEL said he did. MR. JAMES DURST, Division of Habitat and Restoration, DNR, supported HB 131. He commented, "I think it's been a pretty impressive, consensus based development and nobody got absolutely everything we wanted, but I think we all got enough of what we needed to get…" He said it was a good balanced bill and clarified that it wasn't their intention to deal with issues beyond 100 ft. The existing statute calls for a 100 ft. special management area along high value resident and [indisc.]. The bill maintains that idea and narrows it down to 66 ft. on private land. CHAIRMAN TORGERSON said he hoped Mr. Durst could get together with Mr. Zachel to work the differences out. MR. DURST said they had been talking about it. CHAIRMAN TORGERSON said the industry needed to be on board and if it wasn't, he wasn't either. MS. BETH CAISSIE, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, supported HB 131. She stated, "We support this bill because not only would it provide a higher level of protection for riparian habitats and the fish that depend on it here in the Interior, but also because we support the process by which this bill is drafted…" CHAIRMAN TORGERSON said that concluded the committee's agenda for the day and adjourned the meeting at 5:07 p.m.