HFIN-260506-0900

Okay, I'll go ahead and call this meeting of the House Finance Committee to order. Let the record reflect that the time is currently 9:11 AM on Wednesday, May 11th, 2026. And present today we have got Representative Allard, Representative Stapp, Representative Bynum, Representative Co-chair Schraggi, Representative Co-chair Josephson presenting, Representative Galvin, Representative Tomaszewski, Representative Hannon, myself, Co-chair Foster, and let's see, just a reminder, folks can mute their cell phones. And we have 2 items on the agenda today. That is an introduction for HB 260.

That is the Construction Project Wages and Liability Bill. And then also an introduction for Senate Bill 140. That's the Fire Station Grant Program. And so Representative Josephson, as well as Mr. Ken Alper, if you could both maybe just put yourselves on the record. We also have with us Representative Nelly.

And go ahead and introduce the bill. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Happy May and good morning to my fellow committee members. I'm Andy Josephson. I represent House District 13 in South Midtown Anchorage.

Before us today is a Labor and Commerce amended version of House Bill 260. This bill does two things in one bill, and of course it does more than two things, but two principal things for ease of understanding it. The first is— can be seen at pages 1 and 2, it's Section 1 and 2. And the focus here is— the overall focus, first of all, is on contractor liability.

So everything falls under the umbrella of contractor liability. The first subset of that is seen in Section 1 and 2. And the concern here, or what's sought for reform, is the way that electricians and plumbers principally are receiving certificates of fitness and sometimes working without them. So, um, you can imagine someone with a certificate of fitness has trained for years, uh, they've been an apprentice, uh, they have had hundreds of hours per year of further training. They are very, very skilled professionals who know their craft well.

And there are examples where, uh, someone is hired by a project owner, um, or a developer who simply doesn't have a certificate of fitness. And those are sometimes called COFs. And under current law, if you don't have a certificate of fitness, the Department of Labor can sanction you. And that should come as no surprise. But number one, the department is understaffed and has been for years.

Number two, the current law— and that's changed in the bill— is that you have to weirdly go to criminal court and seek a conviction of somebody for working in plumbing or electrical work without a certificate of fitness. And you literally get a conviction of a B-mistometer subject to— I believe— I know currently it's a $500 fine. So what this would do is it would move the penalty for working in those two trades without a certificate of fitness to an administrative fine, which is faster, and increase the fine to $1,000 without requirement of going to, weirdly, criminal court. We think that this is critical in terms of health and safety, in terms of getting the work done right, and having a fair playing field. And also for the ultimate owner of projects requiring a certificate of fitness, right?

So that when they pass those properties on to another individual, they can attest that they were done correctly. So that's part one, is a reform of compliance with the requirement to have a certificate of fit— Part 2 is related to— it's related in that it's part of, as I said, the bigger umbrella of contractor liability. But you'll see here on the screen, it says.

Unpaid construction wages— that is sometimes called wage theft. And what's happening in not a small part of the vertical relationship between the project owner and developer and contractors downstream to subcontractors, further downstream to the individual employees of subcontractors, is that people aren't getting paid And what the reason they're not getting paid is that sometimes the subcontractor comes from out of state, um, and the general contractor, uh, who's hired the subcontractor can play this sort of, um, I don't want to be too pejorative, but they can, they can opine that they are ignorant of what's happening downstream from them, um, with their subcontractors and further downstream the employees of the subcontractors. In other words, under current law, if a person is not paid their wage by a subcontractor, they must go to the subcontractor and demand their wages. But the subcontractor sometimes could dissolve. They could be a sort of temporary subcontractor, even from another state, and the employee may throw up their hands and say, "This isn't worth my time." Now, you might find this sort of shocking, right?

If you worked in retail or at a restaurant, these sorts of things simply can't happen in this way and with this informality. So what this does is it says, we're going to say that up and down this vertical system from the project owner/general contractor to the subcontractor and employee, there is going to be a sharing of information on payroll, receipts, and the like, so that the general contractor can go to the subcontractor and be jointly and severally liable with the subcontractor for payment of those employees. Now, you know, this can be called as a means of self-policing. So what we're— what the industry is doing here, at least those who support the bill, is saying we don't want to rely on state government the way we have been because that's not working. It's not working in that it's— these folks are in Department of Labor understaffed.

It's not working in that There's no communication, there's no required communication up and down this vertical line. And this bill would say you're going to— subcontractors be required to tell the general contractors and prove to the general contractors that you've paid the hours required of your employees. And in return, it's this sort of symbiotic relationship. You general contractors are going to be required to make those payments if the subcontractors haven't. And you might say, well, wait a minute, they're not the general contractor's employees.

Why would they pay? Well, first of all, obviously they're not going to pay that part that's been paid. So if they were paid $0.50 on the dollar, they're not getting that $0.50 again. They're getting the other $0.50. But secondly, the general contractor can subrogate.

The general contractor can say, Boy, you were a bad payer of your employees, Mr. Subcontractor, and I'm going to fix that for you because I'm required to under Andy's bill. But now you're going to pay me because that's how this is going to work. And in fact, you're going to, under the bill, attest formally that you've not been sanctioned in the past 5 years for being a bad actor when it comes to paying your own employees. And part of the reason, by the way, this sort of reform is necessary is that there are a lot of people who are told by subcontractors and contractors that they are on their own, free-floating on their own as, quote, independent contractors, when in fact they're not independent contractors. By rights, and by— when I say by rights, I mean the facts on the ground support that they're really employees.

They work routinely for the same employer. They don't— may not even have a business license. There's nothing that distinguishes them as an independent contractor. And the employer may want to say, in effect, I like to gesture when I do this, you're on your own, you're an independent contractor. Godspeed to you, because they don't have to pay unemployment insurance, they don't have to pay workers' comp, they don't have to pay Social Security or Medicare.

The problem is that there are lots of good actors that are doing all those things and saying, "No, I recognize you're my employee. Of course you're my employee, and yes, I'm going to pay you." And so you've got— I hate to say it, but you have some sort of fly-by-night versions of contractors and subcontractors, and you have law-abiding versions. So that was long-winded, but that's what this is designed to do. And so there's— it's a self-policing mechanism where we're all in this together, and we're gonna communicate better, and we're gonna prove to one another that folks are paid, paid timely, etc. The The other thing that's important, I think very important, and I didn't highlight it, Labor and Commerce, is that before anyone can sue anyone, there's a 21-day opportunity window to provide the information I've just described.

So, we're going to try and do this like grown-ups and exchange information with one another so everyone is satisfied. That's an important part of this. And then just briefly back to the first part, just to reemphasize the first part involves certificate of fitness, a separate issue, but part of the overall sort of contractor liability theme. In the first part, we've ratcheted up the penalty to $1,000. In the second offense, where someone is working without a certificate of fitness.

So this is not a wage theft issue. I'm bringing us back to Part 1, um, and it can be done administratively. You might be happy to know that the Labor and Commerce Committee ratcheted back the penalty. You see it right in Section 1 on page 1 and said, we're not going to pull someone's, um, registered contract license immediately. For lacking a certificate of fitness.

We're going to get there gradually, right? So we're not going to jump to felony land. That's just illustrative. It's just illustrative. We're going to say you've been warned, you've been warned a second time, etc.

So, um, if there's anything I can answer, I would be happy to try. Okay, I think we've got two folks who are invited testifiers, and I think you did a Good job of covering the slide deck PowerPoint. I think all the points were probably covered in the slide deck. Even though we didn't advance through there, I think you covered all the items. I like to.

And Mr. Alperose hates it when I do that, but the slide deck, if you gave them a minute with it, it might have some value. I think what I would like to do maybe is jump right into invited testifiers just to make sure that we have got time for them so they don't have to come back. And then we can come back to the slide deck. But I looked through it and it looked like you covered all the points in the slide deck. But we'll go through that just to be sure.

So if we could first have, in terms of invited testifiers, Mr. Alden Zellhuber, business manager for UA Local 262 Plumbers and Pipefitters. If you could please come to the table and put yourself on the record and give us your testimony. And thanks for Thanks for being here. Thank you, Chairman. My name is Alden Zellhuber.

I'm the business manager for Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 262. I had 30 years in the plumbing industry, and 2 of those were spent as the state plumbing inspector in Southeast Alaska. One of the most— and I'm just going to speak to the first 2 provisions of the bill, those dealing with certificate Good of fitness is. One of the most frustrating things as the state inspector was that if I caught somebody violating the law, I could give them a piece of paper that was a cease and desist saying you've been bad, you violated the law, this is what the law is, and if I caught them again, I could give them another piece of paper. It was a total paper tiger because there's— I was pretty well told that the state was not going to take up the Department of Law's time and resources to prosecute these kind of cases for a $500 fine.

So the structure of that, this statute being changed more in line with the contractor licensing statute, which has an administrative fine for $1,000, and that, as an inspector, I could issue right on the spot.

To somebody violating that statute. But the certificate of fitness statute really was not being— had no effective way to enforce.

As kind of was said by Representative Josephson, you know, the people going in for a plumbing or electrical Certificate of Fitness is a 4-year and 8,000-hour program that they've gone through. They're paying annually for a license. They're required— or paying biannually for a license and required every 2 years to have continuing education so that they know that things are being done properly. They take pride in their work. They understand how things need to be done.

The reasons why and any code changes that come into effect. The statute does not— this change would not do anything to the state has a within statute where you can work on your own home or that of an immediate family member without a license.

If, if a contractor is sending somebody out that is doing work that requires a license and does not have one, then they would be subject to, to a fine and potentially, if continued violations occurred, to a loss of a contractor license. Great. I think we might have a question. Representative Hannon. Yes, thank you, Co-Chair Foster.

Good morning. Good to see you.

You started to explain, or you did explain, what a certificate of fitness entails. When you're— when you were an inspector and encountering people who did not have certificates of fitness, sometimes we hear pushback and say, oh, it's just a paperwork shuffle. I just didn't file my, my hours. I didn't put my license person there. But could you describe as an inspector what is drawing your attention and your concern to issue a cease and desist order when you have encountered a workplace with someone who didn't have a certificate in fitness?

Mr. Zellhooper? Yes, thank you. Through the Chair, a person working without a cease and desist— without a certificate of fitness, excuse me, Generally, in those cases, we are also finding code violations. It's— you know, there's a lot of people out there that think they know how to plumb or wire, but there's a lot of codes and things that they may or may not know.

And codes go through cycles where they change. The construction codes are not the same as they were when I came into the field 30 years ago. A lot of it's the same, but there have been changes to address new construction techniques, new materials that are used, and other things that have been issues where to better guard against public health issues and what have you. So the— I mean, the object of having these licenses is to protect the public health and to ensure that the people doing the work are professionals that know how it should be done. Follow-up?

One follow-up. Thank you, Chair Foster. Because again, sometimes people say code and they think, oh, this is just bureaucracy putting things in the way of being able to do what I want. And one of the examples— I'm a homeowner, never worked in the trades. We hear a lot about buildings in Alaska having rampant black mold problems.

And I've heard some people say, well, that's just because people don't keep it tidy. But then I've heard other people say, codes have changed to reflect that we make sure that we understand plumbing interaction with vapor barriers, with HVAC systems to make sure that you've got healthy air circulation so you don't end up with high levels of black mold and leading to— so any elaboration on that to help make sure that we understand the point of the significance of code being adhered to for long-term habitability and use of buildings? Sure. Yeah, there have been numerous changes in code. Some of them I understood immediately as to why.

I remember one that happened a number of years ago that requires water heaters to be strapped up on the top and down on the bottom.

And in seismic areas where earthquakes can occur such as Southeast Alaska. And I looked at that for years as being kind of ridiculous and saying, you know, if there's an earthquake big enough that's going to knock your water heater over, you've probably got a lot bigger problems.

It wasn't until I was the inspector and talked with the people from IAPMO— that's the people that put out the plumbing code— and realized that this code change came from FEMA, and that that was the idea being that in a situation where there were earthquakes and things, that people probably aren't going to have running water after a large quake, and that your water heater is a large source of drinkable water. And all of a sudden, that code change made a lot of sense. So there are things in the code that even as a— Plumber, I did not understand. But they are there for a reason and they are there to protect the public health. And we— some of them are more apparent than others.

There's backflow prevention codes where I remember taking a a backflow class to get certified in it within— so to do installation and repairs of backflow preventers in addition to your plumber certificate of fitness that requires an additional license. So I was taking a class for that additional license. And it struck me that one of their examples in the book happened in Southeast Alaska. Where a soda fountain machine, it was in a fishing lodge, was installed without the proper backflow preventer. It failed and a number of people got sick from the chemicals and what have you getting back into what they were drinking.

It's something that, you know, We in the industry take seriously that codes are followed and that people are kept safe. Thank you. Okay. Before I go to the next question for Representative Tomaszewski, we do have a hard stop today at 10 o'clock because we have floor. And so what I'm thinking we'll do is in terms of the slide deck, what we usually like to do at the beginning of each of our meetings is just have a brief recap, and I think that would be a great way to start our next meeting is just start with a slide deck.

So I'll save us a little bit of time here. And then also we've got 2 testifiers on the next bill. And so hoping to allow them to be able to testify before we have to adjourn out today. So with that, Representative Tomaszewski. Thank you, Co-Chair Foster.

Through the chair, thank you for being here. So your, your example on Somebody getting sick from a soda fountain. I mean, that's why codes are changed every periodically over the years. We see something that has happened in the past and we make the changes accordingly. That's why the NEC is changed every 3 years, because there's always updates and things going on.

So, I mean, that's just seems like a normal part of the process. But still, we don't want people getting sick. But my question is, you testified about the stop work orders. Okay, and/or cease and desist. And so can you explain to me that process?

I haven't gone through it. Just for the record, I'm— I've had my electrical license for 30 years, and so I've gone through this process of contracting and all the things that we're talking about here today. Haven't gone through the stop and desist because I always had my license, but talk to me about the process you testified on, you find a contractor, they're not— they don't have proper licensing, you give them a cease and desist. What are those steps after that currently? Currently, that's about it.

And if I've— in the statute, it says that each day is a separate violation. So if I go back the following day and I find the contractor doing that again, I give them another cease and desist. But unless the Department of Law were to take it up and pursue the Class B misdemeanor, that, and.

—Then the $500 fine could be issued. But as it is currently, it's really just a paper tiger. It's a give you a piece of paper telling you you can no longer do that, that what you're doing is wrong, and what you're doing is a Class B misdemeanor. And that's where it ends.

So— follow-up, follow-up. Okay. So I guess I'm not— It— maybe this is a loophole, I don't know. It sounds like it could be. So you give them a cease and desist, you tell them to stop work, they continue, you give them another, and then it becomes a $500 fine and Class B misdemeanor only if the Department of Law decides to pursue a case against them.

Is that, is that kind of what you're saying? So the violation itself is a Class B misdemeanor, but a law doesn't really have any effect unless it's enforced.

So if the Department of Law won't take up the case because they can't be bothered by a case like this for a $500 fine, and the expense to go after that, then essentially the law is kind of null and void because of lack of enforcement.

As an inspector, I could issue a cease and desist, and that's as much as I could do. Okay. And just a quick follow-up. Representative Tomaszewski. And so the changes in this bill, can you articulate what that process will be and how that's going to be better, more enforceable so we stop bad actors from doing this?

Mr. Zellerhuber. Yes, thank you. Through the chair, the— in this bill, the— it's modeled kind of after the, the statute for contractor licensing, which has a $1,000 administrative fine that as an inspector I was able to issue right on the spot if I found, found a person doing contracting work without a contractor license. So I don't— the person would not have to then go through the court system before a fine could be issued. So it would be a $1,000 administrative fine on first offense that could be issued right there on the spot.

The fine would go to the— if it's a self-employed individual, they would get the fine, or if it would go to the employer rather than the the person that's been sent out there to do the work, uh, would— so the employer that sent them out to do work requiring a certificate of fitness but without one would then be given a $1,000 fine. Okay. And just a quick follow-up, Representative Tomczewski. So technically now today you can do this with a general contractor. You can give them that $1,000 fine initially.

So this system is kind of already in place. We're just extending it to the subcontractors and, and the— those electricians and plumbers who are maybe not working under a current up-to-date certificate of fitness. Yes, through the chair, that we are— this is modeled after that. The current statute through the Department of Commerce for the contractor license is a separate license. This is taking that, that concept and applying it to a certificate of fitness, a plumbing or electrical license, that the fine, rather than having to go through, through the court system, could be issued on the spot by the inspector that, that found a person in violation of the law.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you for that. Representative Stout. Yeah, I think you could share, Foster.

So just to be clear through the chair, there's a lot of things in this bill, but I want to say we're basically just talking about the first section right now, which is certificate of fitness. I don't think I have much of an issue of the updates on certificate of fitness. I read the— we're just repealing 1862.080 and replacing it with a more defined definition. Most of my questions are going to be on the second portion of the bill, which I think is a lot of problematic. So I guess, I mean, if you want to wait for that, that's fine with me.

If you have questions for Mr. Zellhuber while he's here, that would be fine. I don't know if Mr. Zellhuber, through the chair, wants to talk about the employer liability portion. I imagine you're just here for the certificate of fitness portion. I don't know that I would be the qualified person to speak on that second section of the bill. So I'm good.

Okay. And any questions for Mr. Zellhuber before we come to— we might have to take that question up at the next meeting maybe.

And so, Representative Bynum. Thank you, Co-Chair Foster. Just a quick request of the bill sponsor. Maybe it would be very helpful when we talk about some of these things if we could show side-by-side of what we currently do in law versus what's being recommended. That might be helpful.

But I'll save the rest of my questions for a later time. Okay. Okay. Mr. Zellhuber, thank you very much for being here today. Thank you.

Our next invited testifier is Mr. Boris Greasley, Policy Director at the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters And, uh, Mr. Grizzly, it looks like you're calling in from Costa Mesa, California. If you could put yourself on the record.

Good morning, co-chairs and committee members. Let me first start off by thanking Representative Josephson for sponsoring this important piece of legislation. My name is Boris Grizzly, and I am the policy director for the Western States Carpenters. And for more than a decade, I've been working on legislation similar to Section 3 of HB 260. Across multiple states and have seen 3 clear results.

Number 1, cheated workers get paid faster. Number 2, a culture of compliance and self-policing is established, leveling the playing field for responsible contractors. And states recover lost revenue from lawbreaking contractors, helping to fund vital public services. It, it's important to be clear about what we are trying to address today. Wage theft is not accidental.

It is a business model. Contractors who steal wages can underbid honest contractors by as much as 30% or more, creating a powerful incentive to continue cheating when enforcement is weak. Opponents will argue that this bill could hurt contractors, increase construction costs, fail to solve the problem, but the facts show Quite the opposite is true. In other states that have enacted similar, similar, similar laws, contractors have not been harmed. They have benefited from a fair, more competitive marketplace, and there is no evidence that holding owners or upstream contractors accountable increases construction costs.

No studies have identified that as a significant cost driver. We also have real-world data showing that up-the-chain liability works. Denver, Colorado, District of Columbia, places in California— we've seen the positive outcomes in those locations. These outcomes are not theoretical. They demonstrate that accountability works.

Workers get paid and responsible contractors are protected. For these reasons, we strongly urge you to support this bill. Thank you. Great, thank you very much, Mr. Easley. We've got a question, Representative Stapp.

Yeah, thank you, Chair Foster, to the chair, to Mr. Easley. I appreciate you being here and testifying.

Um, actually, it'd be really helpful for me if you could submit, uh, the— those studies you talked about to this committee with the permission of the bill sponsor, of course, and the chair. Um, I have a lot of those questions. I mean, when I read this bill, we're basically saying all the bad actions of a subcontractor are going to be the responsibility of the general contractor, including all of the wages. So to me, It's hard to really understand why I would hold someone else liable for somebody else's mistake or problem, but I'd be interested if you could submit the stuff you talked about in Colorado so I could look at it through the chair. Mr. Mr. Griesley.

Sure thing. I will definitely, uh, with, with the permission of the, of the bill sponsor, I would definitely do that. Great. Okay, Representative Josephson. Mr. Chairman, perhaps I know we have a second bill and we're going to the floor, but perhaps Mr. Griesley could explain the thesis or concept behind this sort of self-policing that I mentioned in answer to Representative Stack.

Mr. Griesley? Definitely, through the chair. The, the, the reason why this piece of legislation has been so successful in other states is because it's not a reactionary piece of legislation. It's a proactive piece of legislation, meaning that you have to commit the crime in order for you to actually have any sort of legal exposure. And the beauty of the bill is that it also provides an opportunity to cure.

So, if you're a general contractor or.

You're an owner and you are now accountable for the violations, the labor violations, essentially the wage and overtime wage violations of a subcontractor, you do have the ability to rectify the issue within a certain period of time, 21 days in this bill. That allows for the workers to actually get the money back, recoup the money back a lot quicker, which is what we're trying to get accomplished here. It's when a worker goes through the administrative process or through the legal process, it usually takes a very long time. Doing something similar to what workers' comp does right now, which is also holding up the chain actors accountable, has shown to be very productive and actually timely for the worker. And so that's what we're trying to accomplish here.

We're trying to just level the playing field, create a culture of compliance, and not allow folks to essentially avoid any liability by continuing to sub all this, all the work out to multiple subcontractors. You're talking about, uh, lower-tier subcontractors, third-tier subcontractors. You're talking about labor brokers who ultimately end up also being a part of the subcontracting chain. And it's all in order to avoid paying the worker. And so what we're trying to do is change it and say, no, you owner, you general contractor should have some skin in the game.

Representative Stau. Yeah, thank you, Chair Foster. To the Chair, to Mr. Issa, thanks for the explanation. Quick question: do you know if other states exempt themselves? This bill exempts ourself basically and exempts us from being— saying we're not a project owner if it's basically a public project that has subcontractors.

That's on page 5, line 19. So I'm curious if that's something that other states do, is exempt their own public entities. Through the Chair. Mr. Griesley?

So currently on federal projects, you— up the chain liability exists, but it stops at the general contractor. So federal Davis Bacon, that's currently in existence. In Oregon, public owners, quote unquote, public agencies are also exempted from up the chain liability. And in some states, you don't have project owners liable at all. It stops at the general contractor.

So every state has a different version of how they best want to tackle this issue. This is the version that's being presented in front of you guys in Alaska. Okay. Any further questions for Mr. Griesley? Seeing none, we appreciate your testimony.

Thanks for calling in. And, um, In the interest of time, if we could maybe hold off on questions for the sponsor regarding the bill, we'll come back to that at the next meeting. We'll go ahead and jump into an introduction of the next bill. I know we've got some invited testifiers. Hopefully we can get to them, but if not, we'll reschedule those.

So with that, Representative Josephson, thank you very much. We'll set the bill aside. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And next up we have Senate Bill 140, and I'd like to invite up Senator Steadman as well as his staff, Ms. Margot Youngberg. And if you could go ahead and give us an introduction to the bill.

What we have here is we're going to do the introduction and then also we have two invited testifiers. And just so folks know, I am keeping a list of the folks who are interested in questions. I think the question Representative Staff had on unpaid wages, we'll come back to that. Representative Galvin had a question. Questions.

So when we come back to questions, that's where I'll start with a cue. Welcome, Senator Sidman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and the other two chairmen and the committee members. Senator Bert Steadman, representing all the islands in Southeast Alaska, with the inclusion of Yakutat and Hyder, which are on the mainland. But what I'd like to do today is turn it over to my staff, my trusty staff, to walk through the presentation, and then maybe I'll take a couple minutes when she's done at the end just for a little more background and history of yesteryear and what and why this evolved.

If I— if that's all right, Mr. Chairman. Sounds real good. Ms. Youngberg, please put yourself on the record. Margo Youngberg, staff to Senator Steadman. It is an absolute necessity that firefighters across Alaska have functional facilities to ensure that they can respond to emergencies swiftly and safely.

Regrettably, numerous fire stations in the state are in critical need of repairs and modernization. Investing in these fire stations means supporting the dedicated individuals who consistently stand by our communities during our times of greatest need. Many stations are nearing the end of their useful lives, and each one serves an essential role in protecting their communities. Each new year brings innovations in technology and updates to best station design practices, coupled with regular wear and tear from daily use, and it is inevitable that existing fire stations eventually become outdated. SB 140 establishes a matching grant program that provides funding for up to 50% of the total project cost for constructing or renovating fire stations.

This program would allow the structure of other successful infrastructure investment programs already established in our state. One notable example is the Municipal Harbor Facility Grants Program, which has awarded approximately $118 million to 57 harbor projects over the past two decades. A decade ago, the legislature appropriated substantial funding to construct or replace a dozen fire stations across Alaska These were highly popular capital budget items, and our presentation today includes some of the firehouses that were, um, constructed using that money. The first one is the Nakiski Fire Department Station Number 2. The original structure was intended as a community center for Nakiski and was not designed or constructed to adequately accommodate the equipment and personnel required for medical and fire services.

The second one is Anchorage Fire Station Number 6. The new station was necessary to meet the ever-expanding demands of the greater Muldoon area. The next slide is the City of St. Paul Municipal Fire Station. It was established as a centralized facility to support community operations and equipment storage, ensuring an effective response system. Then we have the Chugiak Volunteer Fire and Rescue Station Number 35, located near Fire Lake in Eagle River.

The previous station was forced to close in February 2012 after heavy snowfall caused irreparable damage to the roof. And finally, the most recent fire station, the Kodiak Fire Station. This multi-million dollar firehouse had its grand opening on February 14th, 2026. This fire station was built with efficiency in mind, from the way the garage bay doors open to the exhaust system that ventilates the building. Allocating funds to this program rather than to individual projects in the capital budget removes politics from the funding process for fire hall construction and is an investment in the safety of all regions of Alaska.

Thank you. Great, thank you very much. Representative— or Senator Steadman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. A little bit more background.

Over a decade and a half ago, I spent 6 years doing the capital budget. And we started with a single fire hall, I think it was a year before he was even chairman, down in Ketchikan, South Tongass. And then when I became chairman, several fire hall needs showed up around the region. So I had some conversations with some of the other Senators and House members. And it turned out that there was quite a few fire halls needed all across the state.

So we put together that year a theme on— one of our subthemes in the capital budget was fire halls. And we built fire halls all across the state, and some of which were just here on the screen, but there's many more. I think we did 4 or 5 in Anchorage alone. And we spread it out, and it was one of the most successful capital projects ventures we've ever done, I think. Not quite as popular as the weatherization program that we did for years all across the state, but it was clearly at the top.

So then, you know, fast forward about a decade and several fire chiefs have come in. As we all know, they come in and talk to us on their needs of their community for fire halls. And I got to thinking that if we just allocate funds for fire halls to whoever happens to be chairing the budgets at the time or sitting in the finance committees at the time, it leaves a lot of the areas of the state out. And that's not quite appropriate and frankly fair. So I talked to the fire chiefs group probably 3 years ago or so.

And ask them to, in their meetings, to have the discussion with their colleagues of who needs fire halls so we can get a general feel. And what do they think about the concept of putting together a program similar to the matching grant program of Harbors? And Representative Bill Thomas and myself put that.

Together many years ago, and it was, it was very successful and still is ongoing. The fire chiefs came back with a list, um, and inclusively around the state, and we had those discussions. And then they came back a year ago or so, and we had put this legislation together and put it on the table. And there is no funding for this, and those watching at home It is not in the capital budget this year. There's no fire halls in the capital budget this year.

But if the program was to be put into statute, that discussion would collectively be undertaken with the House, with both bodies, and particularly the finance committees. And if they decided they were going to do fire halls in the program, you know, it'd be similar to the Harbor Matching Grant where we do an appropriation in and go down the list. And the— and then the fire halls would get constructed. But when you think about a fire hall, it doesn't matter what political party you're in or if you're interested in politics at all or income levels or what have you. When you have a fire, you want trained firemen with top-notch equipment to respond and assist your family.

So that— In essence is the structure of this bill, Mr. Chairman. The fire chiefs do have our list, and if this does go into statute, I would imagine they'll be asked to polish that up, and we'll go forward with the discussion next year if there's any funds available. Okay, thank you very much, Senator Steadman. We are out of time. We're going to go ahead and adjourn out here, but my plan is I know that we have 2 invited testifiers, 2 of them, First, they are Mr. Forrest Quipper, former president of the Alaska Fire Chiefs Association, as well as Steve Radeen, president of the Alaska Fire Chiefs Association and chief of the South Tongass Volunteer Fire Department.

I'm going to have my staff reach out to them, see if it's possible to maybe ask if they can come back to our 1:30 meeting. I can go along if we want to at our 1:30 meeting if we need to extend out that time, and we'll check in with Senator's office as well and see if the early part of that meeting or the later part of that meeting works better and finish that up. And then in the queue for questions, I do have Rupson, Tomaszewski, Stapp, Allard. Was there anybody else? And Bynum.

And actually, I think I saw Hannan, then Bynum.

Okay. And Galvin. So we have got the queue, and with that, Our next meeting is scheduled for today at 1:30, and at that meeting we've got a confirmation hearing for Ms. Jana Wilson, and then we'll take amendments for HB 271, that's the kitchen lights bill, and then House Bill 195, pharmacist prescription authority. We're just going to finish off with questions on that. So Senator Steadman, thank you very much for being here this morning, and hopefully we can squeeze something in this afternoon.

Anytime I'm available. Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you. So at this time, 9:59 AM, we'll be adjourned.

Thank you.