Alaska Legislature: House State Affairs, 4/23/26, 3:15pm

I'd like to call this meeting of the House State Affairs Committee to order. The time is 3:18 on Thursday, April 23rd. We're here in Room 120. Please remember to silence cell phones today. Members present include Representative St. Clair, Representative McCabe, Representative Holland, uh, Representative Himschute is excused today, uh, and myself, Chair Carrick.

Let the record reflect we have a quorum. Our record secretary is Andy Magnuson, and our moderator from the Juneau LIO is Renzo Moises. Our committee aide for today is my staff, Stuart Relay. Thank you all for staffing us today. We have 3 items on today's agenda.

We will start with an introductory hearing on House Bill 379, which is coming from this committee, House State Affairs, but is being carried by my office on road service areas. After that, we have an introductory hearing on Representative Hannan's HB 300 relating to state employee per diem, and a second hearing on House Bill 235 from Representative Hall regarding PFAS. And we're going to start with the first item on the agenda today, which is HB 379. Um, this came at the request originally of the Fairbanks North Star Borough. And has moved through the House Community and Regional Affairs Committee.

This is our first hearing on the bill, so today my staff is going to briefly introduce the bill with a slideshow, and then we'll turn to invited testimony from Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Greer Hopkins, and then, uh, take public testimony, which will probably be pretty limited today. Mr. Relay, please go ahead and put yourself on the record and present the bill. Thank you, Madam Chair. For the record, Stewart Relay staff, Representative Carrick. Um, House Bill 379 is a targeted, common-sense update to Alaska law governing borough service areas.

It is designed to address real-world challenges that prevent local governments from effectively delivering essential services, particularly road maintenance, to residents who need them. Under current law, AS 2935-450 changes it changes the service areas, including annexation and boundary adjustments, often require multiple layers of voter approval even in situations where the change is administrative, necessary for public safety, or clearly supported by the affected community. While voter input is critical, these requirements can create unintended barriers that leave some Alaskans without access to basic services. In large boroughs like Fairbanks, these barriers have resulted in roads and subdivisions that cannot be incorporated into existing service areas. Even when those roads rely on service areas for access.

As a result, some residents receive no road maintenance or construction services at all. House Bill 379 helps correct this by allowing boroughs to align service area boundaries with practical realities of infrastructure and access. Importantly, House Bill 379 preserves voter approval as the default rule for major changes to service areas. House Bill 379 also provides— prospective flexibility for service areas created after July 1, 2026, the effective date of the bill. This ensures that future growth is not constrained by outdated statutory requirements while avoiding disruption to existing service areas.

This forward-looking approach respects the current arrangements while giving boroughs the tools they need to plan effectively for the future. At its core, this legislation reinforces the principle of maximum local self-government embedded in the Constitution. Locally elected assemblies are best positioned to understand community needs and design service areas that work for their residents. House Bill 379 empowers these local decision makers to act responsibly and transparently while still maintaining appropriate public safeguards. House Bill 379 is a balanced and pragmatic reform.

It protects voter rights where they matter most, it removes barriers where they're unnecessary, and it ensures Alaskans can receive basic services they depend on. Madam Chair, if it's, uh, if it's your desire, happy to go through the sectional. Um, it's two sections, it's pretty quick, um, but also can turn to the presentation. Why don't you just read the sectional, Mr. Relay, and then we'll go to, uh, Mayor Hopkins is actually doing the presentation today, so we'll do the sectional and then we'll go to Mayor Hopkins and then we'll take questions. Uh, thank you, Madam Chair.

For the record, Stuart Relay, staff representative Carrick. Section 1 of House Bill 379 adds a new subsection to 2935.450, which relates to the abolishment or consolidation of service areas. It specifically gives second-class boroughs the power to abolish, replace, or alter service areas that are created after the effective date, so after July 1— July 1, 2016. And it allows for consolidation of two or more service areas created after July 1, 2026. And it sets the effective date of July 1, 2026.

Madam Chair, those are— that's the sectional. Happy to be on standby for the slides. Okay. Thank you. So let's go to the presentation, which is also fairly brief.

Uh, Greer Hopkins from Fairbanks North Star Borough, Mayor, if you could please put yourself on the record. And as you say next slide, Stuart, we'll go ahead and advance those in the room here, and then we will take questions after that. I do also just want to note before we get to that, we are joined online by a person from Division of Community and Regional Affairs, DCCD, in Anchorage, Jedediah Smith, who's available for questions on this bill as well. Thank you, Mayor Hopkins. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, members of the committee. Great to appear back here. I'm on a bus overseas on a day off. Are you guys able to hear me okay? We, we can't hear you that well.

I wonder if you're If you're in transit, would it be better to hold off for a few minutes? I'm going to be in transit for quite a while. There's a person talking in the back behind me. Let me see if I can ask them to be quiet real fast. Thank you.

One second. Okay. We'll take a brief at ease for like 3 minutes to see if you can get to a spot. At ease.

House State Affairs is back on the record. Mayor Hopkins, can we try that audio again?

Yes. Uh, is this any better by any chance? That's actually a lot better. We can go forward with that. All right.

Representative McCabe wanted you to know—. Ironically enough, I disconnected from the Wi-Fi. Thank you, Madam Chair. Oh, good. Representative McCabe wanted you to know that you sounded like you were on a hovercraft previously.

Well, it's a good thing I have my driver's license with me, so I would have theoretically been able to drive that hovercraft. Uh, thank you very much. I appreciate your patience. Um, some jokes are evergreen, Representative McCabe. Thank you.

Um, so I appreciate the introduction to this bill by the House State Affairs Committee and allowing me to be there testifying today virtually. Um, this, uh, road service area bill is an attempt to, first of all, to not have to come back to the legislature again to look for a specific fix. This bill does also does not impact any current road service areas in existence in the state and service areas in general and would need to only be addressing future road service areas that could be created. Currently, the conundrum, as the first slide says, is that our road service areas in Fairbanks We're struggling to get new people serviced when they want to be taxed. This maintains all local control and would not be impacting any road service area, any neighborhood, unless they vote to take an action.

So I'll go into why we need this piece of legislation and the conundrum that we're running into. So second slide, please, Mr. Stewart, or Mr. Yulick.

Second slide, why do road service areas exist? Well, they were created— this is how we in Fairbanks and many of the second-class boroughs across the community, across the state, maintain their roads. We as second-class boroughs do not have road service powers, road powers. I as a borough mayor cannot say I want to go build this road or even maintain this road without that road service area Commission deciding they want to do it and having the funds available within their own account raised by the taxpayers of that road— of that service area wanting to do that. We have 103 road service areas in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.

This covers about two-thirds of the total road mileage of the borough outside of the city of Fairbanks, the city of North Pole, and state roads. So of that about 600 miles of roads, about 400 of it, give or take, is covered by road service areas. So we have many what we call orphaned roads that do not have the ability to get a contractor and maintain their roads. It is all done on a volunteer basis, if at all. The important part about this bill, this legislation, HB 279, is that it keeps the decision at the residence within a neighborhood.

And that is our goal. We do not want any action being taken on a service area or a neighborhood unless they vote to tax themselves because they want to have the authority to maintain their roads, plow their snow, make sure the drainage and the roads are created up to a certain standard. The—. In the past, the state of Alaska back in the '60s, '70s, and '80s used to give grants to service areas based on the mileage of that service area. They get a certain amount of dollars per mile of the— of the roads within a service area.

As you can see in this graph on slide 2, in the 1980s, this peaked with 74 new road service areas created within the Fairbanks North Star Borough. Since then, it has dropped off as those grants have gone away as well. But we still have 103 of them. The— now we are no longer receiving those grants, so road service areas, no matter how small or large they are, have to maintain their own roads with their own dollars, which is okay. But sometimes the service areas within our borough have to tax themselves up to 13, 14, 15 mills, the assessed value of those properties, in order to maintain their service areas.

And the biggest conundrum that we're running into is that we are struggling to create new service areas because we don't want to add on to the 103 that we have. And we are also struggling to expand current service areas to include new neighborhoods because by state law created in the early 2000s, the Alaska statute says in order to expand or change the boundaries of a service area, you have to hold two concurrent elections. At the same time. You have to have an election of the neighborhood wanting to join the existing service area saying, "Yes, we want to be joined." And at the same time, you have to hold another election that says— of the existing service area saying, "We want to accept these new properties." Both of those have to pass in order for that new expansion of that service area. It does not have to even be a connected service area.

They can be discontiguous. Of each other. But we've been struggling to have those— both elections successful simultaneously. And as we'll show in a slide later, only about 40% of those elections have actually been successful. Next slide, please.

On to slide 3.

As you can see here, looking at the fail and pass rates in the chart on the right-hand side, existing service areas, you've had 22 vote no. That's the ones that would be accepting the new neighborhood. And 12 have voted yes. And at the same time, you've had the ones that— you've had passages of the service areas. 27 Of these 60 or so elections have passed of the existing service area saying yes, you want to accept it.

And the annexing area, 37, have passed. So even sometimes the neighborhood wanting to join the service area and get service votes no. But for the most part, those have voted yes. And any new structure going forward would, of course, require that neighborhood wanting to tax itself to pass an election and say, yes, we want to have service and maintain our roads and plow the snow. So from 1972 to 2004, the state shared in that revenue that I was talking about with that per-mileage rate.

So new service areas were created very easily, quickly, and often, even in opposition to the state constitution, which says you should not create a new service area if existing service areas can supply that service to an area. So basically, The Constitution frowns on just creating more service areas because you can. It recommends and urges through its language of the state constitution saying you should join the— sorry, you should first try to have a service area join another one instead of creating a new one. And that's what we've been trying to do. And sometimes these elections fail 2 or 3 times before the neighborhood trying to tax itself gives up and doesn't go forward.

Since 2004, 49 road service area elections have been held, and 60% of those times they have failed. So we've been struggling to get new service areas the service they need, and this is happening right up until just a few months ago when by borough code here you have to, like I said, state law, sorry, you have to hold those two elections. And sometimes the assembly says we don't even want to hold the election because one of the road service areas comes and says, please don't include this, we don't want this to happen. Next slide, please.

As you can see from this map of the Fairbanks North Star Borough, we have a total patchwork of road service areas. There are more road service areas in existence right now than in any other borough in In fact, there's about in the neighborhood of 120 total service areas of different types in the state. 103 Of those are Fairbanks Road Service Areas. 5 Of those are Fairbanks North Starboro Fire Service Areas. And we have 2 or 3 other types of service areas, one for street lighting and two for utilities.

The important part of this bill, as you look at this map, is not a single one of these highlighted neighborhoods that are the current existing service area would directly be impacted by this legislation. This is only looking at creating new service areas in the future, saying we can create a local code and solve our own problem at the local level by holding elections in new ways that would not be bringing service to areas that don't want it, but would also not require existing service areas to be impacted. Many of these service areas that we have day in the Fairbanks North Star Borough do not want to change their boundaries, even if it would make their financial gain— be to their financial gain. For example, a few months ago, we had a service area wanting to get services. Tried— and this would have been the second election.

It was called Campus Acres, I believe. The— it was looking to join a discontiguous service area but nearby. Called Our Service Area, O-U-R, Our Service Area. The campus acres with a dense neighborhood with decent roads and a lot of small property. So it would have brought a high value per mile to Our Service Area, which was more spread out and had a lower value per mile.

So it would have actually brought more money per mile and assisted in snowplow efforts of Our Service Area. But Our Service Area came to the assembly and said, We don't want to change what we have. We like our neighborhood service area. We like the way we've operated for decades now. We do not want to make any changes.

So that election did not even occur because it would have been clear that our service area would have voted no. The Campus Acres, as I was talking about, had already tried to join another discontinuous one a few years earlier, I believe 5 years or so. In the Yak Road service area off of Yak Road off of Cheetah Ridge. And that both the Yak Road had voted no in that case and the campus acres had voted yes. So again, that did not happen.

That was also a discontiguous service area because there are no other currently existing service areas that would touch campus acres. This is not the only place this has happened and is a problem that disincentivizes the ability for, Residents to make their own decisions about how they can maintain their own roads.

Next slide, please. So, benefits to this proposed law change: get service to people who want to tax themselves to provide it but are currently struggling to join existing service areas, similar to that Campus Acres discussion I was talking about. These people— we would need to create— we would need to go against the wishes of the Alaska State Constitution institution and start creating more service areas on top of the 103 that we already have, which if you look at all the areas that want to start creating service areas, we would quickly have 206 and double the number of them, which is unwieldy and inefficient for the— both the operation administration of these service areas, also— in the existing service areas. Which is what has caused problems in the Fairbanks North Star Borough in the past of trying to change laws or work with the state or borough code to make it easier for new service areas to join existing ones. Those existing ones don't want to be changed, and so they vote no pretty consistently to changing their boundaries.

This allows, like I said, second-class boroughs across the state to solve their own problems going forward by— when they're looking at creating new service areas. Because coming back and back and back to the state legislature asking for minimal fixes, a little nip and a little tuck here, we would prefer to find a way that just works well for us and not have to come back and ask them for help. So that's the end of my slideshow. And happy to answer any questions as well as it's to explain the path that I have in mind for going forward, um, resolving this problem and getting service areas if this legislation passes. Uh, thank you very much to the committee, and happy to answer any questions.

Okay, thank you, Mayor Hopkins. Do we have questions for, for the mayor, for our invited testimony?

I don't see any, and I know that you're in transit, so I'm going to let Mayor Hopkins, hop off the line. Uh, as a last action item on this bill today, we're just going to take public testimony, and then we will set the bill aside for another hearing early next week. So at this time, I'm going to open public testimony on House Bill 379. Is there anyone in the room who would like to testify? Seeing none, I don't see anyone online, so we will close public testimony on House Bill 379.

The bill is back before us again, and, uh, at this time we are just going to set the bill aside for a later hearing, uh, likely early next week. Okay, uh, that brings us in a timely fashion here to House Bill 300 from Representative Hammond's office. This is our first hearing on this bill, and today we'll just have an introduction from the bill sponsor. And/or staff and take public testimony, um, and I'm just going to take a very brief tease.

Okay, House State Affairs is back on the record, and, um, we now have House Bill 300 before us. Welcome to Representative Hannon and her staff, Tim Clark, and I'll turn it over to you to present the bill. Thank you, members of the House State Affairs. I'm Representative Sarah Hannon, House District 4, which you're sitting in. House Bill 300 is pretty straightforward.

Um, it's not a complicated policy bill. It is a bill that addresses the issue of inadequate per diem for state employees while they are traveling. The current meals and incidental per diem rates for state employees for traveling in-state for work has not changed since 2010. Over time, inflation has caused a large gap between what those rates cover and what the actual costs to workers are, and workers largely make up the difference out of their own pockets, essentially subsidizing state operations. If we take into account years of inflation, House Bill 300 raises the current $60 per day for short-term travel to $82 and the current $33 for long-term per diem to $45.

This bill also includes a simple mechanism to prevent these rates from becoming insufficient again, and it requires that every 3 years the rates be adjusted adjusted for inflation using the Alaska Urban Consumer Price Index compiled by the US Department— Bureau of Labor Statistics. And this will maintain just treatment for employees going forward, preventing a need for a legislature in the future to have to revisit it. House Bill 300 is good governance, good practice, and basic fairness. It helps support the recruitment and retention of a skilled workforce promotes consistent travel policies across agencies and ensures that state employees are treated responsibly when carrying out the work that Alaska asks them to do.

Thank you, Representative Hannon. I will also note we have public testimony noticed for today, so if it's all right with the committee, I might go straight to public testimony, and then once that's concluded, then open it up for questions. So this time we're going to open public testimony on House Bill 300. I do see one person online, and then I'll ask if there's anyone in the room as well. I'll go first to Scott Lay in Ketchikan.

Welcome, and if you could please put yourself on the record and proceed with your testimony. Hi. Hi. Yes, my name is Scott Lay, pronounced Lee, and I am a A 29-year employee with the Department of Transportation. I'm calling on a break right now.

I have spent 20 years in Fairbanks, and the last 10 years I've spent out of the Nome District. And so I've traveled from up and down the Yukon River and out to Kotzebue and lived in minor small villages where even if I had wanted to live on $33 a day, for my food and for my personal needs. It's virtually impossible when a sandwich in a cooler at the tribal store costs $12.

Even here right now, I'm working at a catch can. I don't believe that I could even come close to eating at McDonald's for $33 a day, which is what I currently get on a long-term per diem situation. And I still have to be mindful of finding my own lodging and buying cleaning supplies and all kinds of things every time I move that things have to be reset up. An example of some of the things, I can buy boxed milk in most of my villages for around $17 a gallon. I can get cheese for, a few pounds of cheese for $10 to $20 a pound.

And fruit is virtually non-existent. So, I have to make up my level of protein and fresh veggies and things like that if they're even available at all. I have to pay quite a pretty penny for some kind of a food drop or things like that if they're available in the village. I've spent time in Nunamiqua, Selowik, Barrow, Prudhoe Bay, And, you know, all those places are very hard to survive on $33 a day. The Department of Defense for Anchorage, they give $118.

They give $106 in Fairbanks. GSA, the rate for Seattle is $92. And, you know, so certainly that's for, you know, a shorter-term per diem, which we're in the $60 range. But even if you were expected to eat out every day, even on a short-term per diem at $60, that's very difficult in most of our Alaska locations, specifically remote, like I have worked for the last 29 years. So I'm certainly in favor of raising the per diem and getting it inflation-proofed.

So I thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Lee. Appreciate you calling in today. And thank you for your work with the state. I will just check if there's anyone in the room who would like to testify on House Bill 300.

Awesome. Please go ahead and come forward.

Thank you for joining us. And if you just want to put yourself on the record and provide your testimony.

Good afternoon. Good evening. For the record, my name is Flynn Casey. I am a Juneau resident and new homeowner in House District 3. Is this loud enough?

It is. Great. Thank you. Okay. I am a Juneau resident and new homeowner in House District 3.

I'm here to express strong support for House Bill 300. And I also just checked to bring with me currently 43 additional digital signatures collected over just the the past couple days. So thank you for hearing us today. I have been employed by the state of Alaska for the past 5 years, which has included work with the Department of Fish and Game and the Department of Environmental Conservation. Much of the work we do in those agencies cannot be accomplished from a desk, making in-state travel absolutely essential.

This is a point that I've watched my managers make time and time again defending budgets and applying for grants. As the cost of flights, hotels, goods, and services continue to rise. And some of the most important work we do happens in remote, expensive locations. Please consider the recent mobilization efforts to Western Alaska communities facing the impacts of Typhoon Halong. In the lower 48, the Federal General Services Administration sets a standard base rate for meal and incidental expenses.

It also designates nearly 300 nonstandard areas with individual rates to acknowledge the higher cost of living in those places. For example, the adjusted rates in the city and surrounding suburbs of Seattle are $92 a day. Throughout Alaska, prices are typically comparable or higher than in many of those nonstandard areas. However, the current rate paid to most state employees, as you heard, is only only $60 a day for short-term travel. This rate is determined by appropriations of $12 for breakfast, $16 for lunch, and $32 for dinner.

If you're counting, that leaves zero remaining for incidentals.

This rate has been in effect since 2010. It has not changed in 16 years. Since that time, the CPI for urban Alaskan consumers has risen 40% The specific figure for food items has risen 46%.

It is unacceptable to put the burden of 16 years of inflation on the shoulders of employees. As I prepared these statements, I couldn't ignore one obvious disparity. Alaska state legislators traveling to Juneau for session receive a different elevated per diem rate compared to executive branch employees. I would simply ask you to consider what that has meant for you. The conversations you've had, the change you've affected, and even the loved ones back home that you're able to support.

Imagine what might be different if you were always considering the price of your next meal.

While you reflect on this, I'd also like to challenge you during your remaining time here Find a $12 breakfast that sets you up for a day of doing your best work. Let me know where I can get that. Thank you so much. Thank you very much for testifying today. Uh, we— it looks like we have another person in the room.

Welcome.

Members of the committee, thank you for hearing this bill. For the record, I'm Jesse Sloan, president of the supervisory unit representing about 2,500 state supervisors across the state. When a state employee travels to Seattle or D.C., Alaska already reimburses them at the federal GSA rate, up to $92 a day. When the same employee travels to Juneau or Bethel, they get $60, $45 on travel days. Those rates have not moved, as has been mentioned, since July 1st, 2010.

Meanwhile, the BLS says food away from home prices in urban Alaska are up roughly 30% in just the last 4 years. Our members have absorbed an ever-increasing gap for 15 years because they want to serve Alaskans. Bridge inspectors keeping commerce and Alaskans moving, relief workers when a community needs them, trainers trying to bring new employees up to speed speed as we experience unprecedented turnover across the state. They're willing to take a hit out of their own paychecks to do that work, but that doesn't mean they should have to. HB 300 does 3 things that our members need.

It raises the short-term rate from 60 to 82. It puts the rate into statute so it's accountable to the legislature and the people, and it builds a CPI adjustment starting in 2029 so we don't have frozen rates in the future. To be fair, this bill isn't parity with federal rates, which is what my members would prefer, but it is the most significant improvement to state employee per diem in a generation, and it addresses the structural problem that got us frozen at 2010 rates. The supervisory unit strongly supports HB 300 and urges the committee to move it forward. Thank you.

Thank you very much for your testimony and for joining us today. Seeing no one else in the room to testify and seeing no one else online to testify today, thank you to our testifiers. We are now going to close public testimony on House Bill 300, and that brings the legislation back before us. We'll go to questions for the sponsor, starting with Representative McCabe.

Thanks, Chair Carrick. And I'm curious, Representative Hannan, why we didn't just use the MIE rate from the IRS or from— I think it's IRS for lower 48 and it's the DOD for Alaska. Why don't we just go to that instead of having to inflation adjust it? Is that a decision or was that alleged legal thing?

Representative McCabe. Through the chair, Representative Carrick to Representative McCabe. Guess I didn't even think about that bit. It's a more generous rate, and I'd certainly be willing to entertain that.

Yeah, and tie it to federal rates for travel in Alaska. Follow-up? Follow-up? Yeah, thanks. So I think both Representative St. Clair and I have done that all our careers in the military and of course in the airline industry as well.

So I mean, that's a pretty standard way of doing it. You just— it's the table's already set out. They, they adjusted yearly, I think, or actually I think it's adjusted quarterly based on the cost of living, like in Juneau or Anchorage, or— and it is certainly more, but I mean, it's, it's— they generally go there and look at things and figure out what they're costing. So I'm sure. And one more follow-up, if you don't mind.

Are there more fiscal notes forthcoming? Did you say that? Through the chair, I did not say that. And as you might know, fiscal notes are not generated by departments until you have your first hearing. So I would expect that we're going to see 19 fiscal notes that 17 from agencies, and then the university and the courts, but they haven't been generated yet.

Yay. The court one is in here actually, but that's why I asked. But thanks. Did she get her court one here? We got—.

Yeah, we just have that one. Okay. Yeah. And I imagine we will see an incoming tide. We'll certainly share those when we get them.

Representative St. Clair, I believe you're next. Thank you, Madam Chair. Rhett McCabe took my questions, especially when it came to fiscal notes, and I'll just wait. I'll just wait until we get those fiscal notes at a later hearing. Thank you.

Representative Holland. Great, thanks. Just briefly, Chair Carrick and I guess this is maybe a question for the sponsor or maybe just a continuation of the previous comment because I think the alignment with the federal per diem rates makes a whole lot of sense in terms of the time and energy they put into trying to do that. My experience working at the University was that we were doing a lot of that on the DOD rates and it was segmented even by city, so it depended on where we went in the State of Alaska what rate we got. My God, if I went to Juneau, it was a rate that was different than if I went to Nome and so on.

So I think there's something to be looked at there. And also just, I think for the moment, I'm just curious to the sponsor of the amendment, are there other state employee groups that are already on different per diem rates? Because I think from my own experience as a university worker, I was a state employee through the university, but I was getting one per diem rate that sounds like it's different than this set of rates. I'm just wondering, are there other carve-outs for different state employees that have different per diem rates, and maybe the university was just a unique outlier to that, but perhaps there's others that, if we're looking at this issue, might understand the umbrella of other state groups and per diem rates. [Speaker:DR. BAXTER] I'll go to Mr.

Clark. Thank you, Madam Chair, Representative Holland. We are not— Tim Clark for the record. Thank you. We are not aware of any specific groups that have these—.

Except for legislators. —Back and forth rates assigned to them. The part of the backup documents in the in your bill packet include a table that's from the Alaska Administrative Manual, and it does sort of run down most of the bargaining groups and what meals and incidental per diem pertains to those groups listed in the table. And it looks pretty close to across the board in terms of them using what's published in the administrative manual as opposed to any alternative amounts. Can I follow up?

Follow up? Thanks for that. And I guess just as we take a look at this, we might look at the university, perhaps some of the other state corporations and other entities that may be working outside of this manual. To understand the scope of this and hopefully creating a fairly level playing field for state employees. Thanks.

And I don't think this is necessarily what you just meant, Representative Hallen, but the University is not a state corporation, but entity outside of the regular system. Thank you for the clarification. Yes, of course. I appreciate that. I didn't mean to connect those dots.

But I see what you mean. It would be worth looking into. I think the rate is the same for the university, but we can triple-check that for sure. And for the record, through Chair Carrick, uh, Representative Holland, as far as we researched, we were told that all state entities except for the legislature have this shared per diem rate. But it could be that if you're working on certain grants through the university that were federally funded.

Maybe they were tied to federal rates, and there's certainly federal employees embedded in some state agencies that I assume were getting their federal pay and federal differentials.

But our goal would be to be comprehensive to all of the state employees, whether they're working for a quasi-state corporation we should be tied to it. And to the Department of Defense federal ranges, it is interesting their analysis in geographic differential, which is very different than the state differential. The example that was presented is Anchorage is a higher differential than Juneau, and many of you could testify that you're probably finding prices in Juneau higher than Anchorage, but the State Administrative Code does not reflect that, nor does it— was it Bethel? We had an outlying Rule 1 where we went, that certainly has to be more expensive than Anchorage, but it wasn't reflecting that in their geographic differential for per diem rates.

I have a couple folks in the queue as well, but I had a clarifying question on this bill. Are we— we're talking about travel both in-state and out-of-state for state employees, or is it just travel in the state for state employees? For the record, Tim Clark, staff to Representative Hannon. This addresses in-state travel only. Okay.

So the rates you'll see according to the table provided from the Alaska Administrative Manual do differ for out-of-state travel. And just as a follow-up, is there any need for adjustment or change in out-of-state travel rates?

Madam Chair, the stakeholders who brought this to us did not see the need for the change so far as we understood their issues. The out-of-state travel rates are, you know, significantly higher and perhaps, you know, cover their costs adequately. Okay. I will go to Vice Chair Story, and then I have Representative McCabe, and I think Representative Holland after that. Thank you, Chair Carrick.

Through the chair, I— to the committee, and I I do have one question, but I see so much when I look at the cost of keeping state employees, and we have had high vacancy rates, some departments higher than others. I see this as an opportunity to keep more employees here, but more importantly, it's a lot— it's a high cost to retrain employees. To recruit them, and this can be a tool, giving adequate compensation for when they're traveling in our vast state. So I wanted to just say that. And then I was, I was wondering, and maybe you said this, but how did you come up with the amount that you are moving to?

Madam Chair, Representative Story, This was the amount originally brought to us when we began exploring this legislation with stakeholders.

I have to own up to something like an error in that I did not double-check the figure of $82 against the proportion to which it has risen due to inflation since 2010, and The $82 currently in the bill is about $8 short of the actual figures. So it's closer to $90. Madam Chair, I'd also like to clarify or add slightly to my earlier statement on out-of-state travel meals and incidentals per diem. Those out-of-state travel rates are, in fact, based on the federal per diem rates. [Speaker:COMMISSIONER ARKOOSH] Ah, okay.

[Speaker:MR. BRYANT] So they're— In terms of sort of keeping up with actual costs, as Representative McCabe described, it's well taken care of. And just, again, just as a clarifying question, so the federal rates are tied to an inflation adjustment mechanism as well as a locality mechanism so that your rates are differential? And so that's why we don't necessarily see any issue with out-of-state travel per diem for our state employees, because those are the two kind of issues that get covered by the federal rates.

Chair Carrick, Representative Hannon, yes, that's our understanding, that those federal adjustments are done based on current hotel rates, etc. And so they have kept up because they adjust quite regularly. Excellent, thank you. Um, I have Representative McCabe. Yeah, thanks.

So, uh, for instance, Juno is 114 a day for M&IE, Anchorage is 145, Bethel's only 101, Seattle, Washington 92, Washington, D.C. is 92. I thought that would be way more. So, um, one of the things, and, and I don't know if this only applies to transportation workers But there's a way, I think, if your per diem is less than the IRS, that you can claim it as a loss when you're traveling. At least transportation employees could. Um, but if you get paid more, so in this case, if it's $82 and you go to somewhere in Texas, that's only, um, $42 on the IRS, then you have to actually claim it as income.

So tying it to the IRS and the DOD eliminates that. You just— you get what you get and you don't show it as an increase or loss based on what city you're going to. To me, it makes a whole lot more sense. I'd be happy to offer that amendment if you think it would be a friendly amendment.

Chair Carrick, Representative McCabe, I would have no objection to increasing it. I was trying not to be overly too far out of my skis. You know, I wanted to make sure that we articulated the concern for our employees that they've been frozen in time. But instead of unfreezing them, keeping up with the competition of other workers that they may be working side by side on a project, I think is a very good thing. Um, yeah, thanks.

I'd be very open to seeing that either as an amendment, or I'm sensing a potential committee substitute here, so that's definitely worth looking into. Um, I have Representative Holland, and then we're going to wrap up discussion on this bill so that we can go to the last item today. Thank you, Chair Carrick. We've taken care of my question with the last discussion we just had. Okay.

Thank you very much, Representative Hannan and Mr. Clark, for joining us today. And to our public testimony who were able to join us, really appreciate your words and your work. And we are going to just set this bill aside. I just— Representative Hannan? I just want to thank the committee for the very supportive response to the issue.

I did not have to convince you very hard that it's an issue for for us to keep our employees and that we all have a shared goal of making sure that they're being paid for the cost that they incur doing our work when we send them around Alaska. Thank you. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] So having spent $7,000 of my own money last year traveling around my huge district, I can empathize with our employees. So thank you. Thank you again.

Uh, we're going to bring House Bill 300 back before the committee early next week, so just be advised that we will be hearing this bill again. And we will, we will, um, likely just, just for committee members' information, we will likely set an amendment deadline on Tuesday next week so that we can take action on the bill on Thursday. So if you do have amendments, maybe start preparing them now. I will work with a couple offices here because I think there's a— sounds like a pretty easy committee substitute change we can make. What was the deadline for amendments?

I'll probably set it on Tuesday for Wednesday, but just, just as a heads up, it'll be my intention to take action on this bill next week.

Let's go ahead and move to our last item on the agenda today, which is House Bill 235 relating to PFAS from Representative Hall. This is our second hearing on the bill. Today the intention is to have some continued discussion and then set the bill aside, and I just really appreciate all the folks that are available today. If Representative Hall and staff would like to come back up to the table. I'll just— as they're doing so, just let folks know who is available today for questions.

We have Shawndi Perry, who's the Division Director of Environmental Health in Anchorage at DEC. We have Teresa Melville, the Division Director of Spill Prevention and Response in Wasilla. Jason Olds, the Director of Air Quality at DEC in Juneau. Jean McCabe, again no relation to Rep. McCabe, who's the Division of Water Director at DEC in Wasilla. And we have a Natural Resources Defense Council scientist, Dr. Anna Reed, calling from California today, as well as the Director of the Pacific Northwest Center for Environmental Health Research calling from Corvallis, Oregon, Jamie DeWitt. As well as the bill sponsor and staff.

So we have a full suite of folks available for potential questions and discussion. I'm going to go ahead and start with Rep. Hall, just doing a brief reintroduction of this bill. Thank you very much, Chair Carrick. Good afternoon, members of the committee. I'm appreciative of being here for the second hearing for HB 235.

My name is Carolyn Hall and I represent the West Anchorage neighborhoods of Turnagain, Spinnaker, Lenard, and Sand Lake. That is House District 16. To review, HB 235 proposes to do 4 things. It would establish annual testing for PFAS, also known as forever chemicals, in all public water systems. It would provide safety limits for PFAS levels that align with the 2024 EPA guidelines.

It would impose liability on parties responsible for PFAS contamination and allows manufacturers to be held liable even when responsible parties comply with all applicable laws, regulations, and manufacturer instructions. Finally, it requires the Department of Environmental Conservation to permit facilities that use thermal remediation treatment processes. At the first hearing, we heard about the severe health effects that PFAS have on people. We know of communities across Alaska that have PFAS contamination. PFAS is pervasive in the environment and can easily spread from its point point of origin, it is critical that we begin by identifying the full scope of the problem by testing all public drinking water systems, including transient systems such as campgrounds.

I would argue that even if Alaskans are not drinking that water every day, they may visit it throughout the summer, year after year, and remain susceptible to serious health effects. As proposed, the bill requires that DEC immediately provide safe drinking water to affected communities once contamination is found. And if the water is unsafe, it is critical that we provide Alaskans access to safe water without delay. The bill places the burden of testing the water and providing safe drinking water on the person responsible or the manufacturer before that cost would fall on the state. And while I recognize that addressing this issue is expensive, the longer we may wait, the more those costs will grow.

Addressing the upstream problem will ultimately lead to lower healthcare costs for the state and for Alaskans. So we see HB 235 as a, an important step towards addressing PFAS. Following the last hearing, we submitted some questions to DEC, and their responses, I believe, have been provided to the committee. And Chair Carrick, as you mentioned, we have, um, Dr. Jamie DeWitt online to help answer questions regarding the negative health impacts due to PFAS, and there may even be a Dr. Ann Reed Popping on, she is on. Okay, excellent.

And she's the director of PFAS advocacy with the Natural Resources Defense Council, and she has expertise concerning PFAS health effects and regulation. Thank you, Chair Carrick. Excellent. Thank you very much, Rep. Hall. And I'll just, I guess, open it up for committee discussion and questions.

Who wants to go first? Representative Holland and then St. Clair. Great, thanks. Um, through the chair to the bill sponsor, I'm just trying to go through my notes from when we talked about this back, it looks like in late March.

I think there was an issue that I was curious about. I'm not sure the current response has fully addressed it, but I'm wanting to go back to the question of Based upon the testing process, which I think is outlined including some responsibilities for the costs of drinking water and testing, it seemed like there was a gap in who's responsible for actually cleaning up the contamination once it's identified. And it— perhaps it's covered by different regulations or maybe it's triggered in a different way, but I wonder if you could just catch me up on, beyond the costs that are outlined here for providing water, providing testing, who's responsible to actually— has a liability to clean up the contamination when it's been found? For the record, my name is Staff Representative Hall, through the chair to Representative Holland. So our bill doesn't, as you are noting, address the actual Um, it— our HB 235 currently looks at providing the scope of the problem, but it isn't addressing the full removal of the PFAS in this bill.

Uh, we currently— DEC is doing great work at finding sites and doing— there are thermal remediation places throughout the state, and they are looking at other solutions. They talked about a bit in the last hearing on different processes for removing PFAS, and we are not looking in this legislation to change the efforts they're already making and doing as technology is continuing to evolve and change in how we are able to address this problem.

Great. Follow-up? Follow-up? Great, thank you for that. The second question through the chair related to Page 3, the section on thermal remediation permits.

And I think we had some partial discussion at the last meeting, but I wanted to just touch on the notion that there's kind of two different approaches to PFAS remediation. One is the thermal remediation and the permits that require air quality monitoring that generally are associated with soil contamination that essentially reduces the PFAS but doesn't necessarily capture and actually destroy it. It concentrates it in some cases, versus permits for processes that are actually designed to completely destroy the PFAS. And I know in Alaska, I was involved in helping one of the startups that actually did destruction versus just concentration. Filtration.

And I'm wondering if you've got any more thoughts in terms of this permitting issue that might recognize that there are some methods of remediation that are actually destroying the chemicals as opposed to cooking them and having air quality contamination issues need to be monitored.

Uh, through the chair, Representative Holland, um, I think one of the reasons we are addressing thermal remediation in this bill and the need for permitting it is because, as you have stated, it doesn't always fully destroy PFAS and sometimes is creating airborne, microscopic airborne chemicals that are traveling further afield. Um, and in fact, in the process of trying to deal with this harmful substance is actually spreading it. So we think permitting in this case is really important to ensure that we are thoughtfully trying to deal with those issues and make— try our best to ensure that we aren't spreading it. In processes that are fully destructive and are removing PFAS, I'm not sure we have the same concerns, but would be open to letting DEC make their choices and regulations and permitting and whatnot for those facilities. Great, thank you.

Just a quick follow-up. Follow-up? Yeah, thank you for that. I I think it just would be perhaps helpful to look at whether or not there is any way to give preference to actual destruction methods, because I think there is certainly going to be a desire to use some of the concentration partial cleanup methods that then have an air quality issue. But I think that if we are going to be trying to make some progress in this area, we might want to put our thumb on the scale that says when possible we want to employ methods that are going to destroy the PFAS as opposed to spread them around further.

So it may be just something for us to look into, but this is probably a significant improvement by itself, so I appreciate what you're doing with this. Thank you. Representative Holland. Thank you, Chair Carrick. Through the chair, Representative Holland noted and absolutely whatever we can do to truly tackle this, this problem.

I am very open to strengthening, to strengthening the bill and ensuring that we are doing all that we can to destroy those particles without accidentally spreading them further.

And I'll just note too that in the responses from DEC from our last hearing, they— somebody had asked a question about What is DEC's remediation plan for contaminated sites? And they say that mostly due to the extremely high cost of, I would guess, disposal or incineration or other methods, that they typically just— it says it can vary depending on the risk posed. Generally, due to these high costs, DEC focuses on mitigating risk by requiring alternative sources of drinking water. So because of the high cost, and I'm not trying to throw DEC under the bus here per se, but we are not necessarily even solving the contaminant even by spreading it around right now. We're, in many cases, we're just providing another water source and we're moving on.

And I've seen that in my own community, so I don't know if that's— I don't know if that anecdote is worth adding, but I just would add that as well. Rep. Holland. Can I just follow up? Yeah, thank you. I just— I think you're pointing out why I'm interested in this issue, because to the degree that we let this just become a cost of doing business, provide some water and move on, we, you know, I don't think are setting the stage for what we really want to see happen down the road, which is why I was asking also the earlier question about who's on the hook to actually clean this stuff up.

And if our mode of operating is we're not going to worry about cleaning up. We're just going to make sure that somebody puts a water system in and we move on. I'm not sure that that's the best approach and message to send for how these chemicals or other chemicals in the future are used. Thanks. I agree.

Thank you for going down that line of questioning. I have Representative St. Clair next.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think I forgot my question. I was so engrossed in what my neighbor was doing. Through the chair, to the bill sponsor, what is— I've got a bunch of different fiscal notes in here. Do we have a total number of the total amount for the fiscal notes?

Because I saw like 3 or 4, sometimes I had 5. So do we have a total amount on those fiscal notes? Through the chair, Representative St. Clair.

DEC had a field day and it's approaching, I believe, $19 million. That's roughly where I was going, so thank you. I appreciate it. Yes, I know I— but through the chair, Representative St. Clair, I'm very glad that you asked that question. Thank you.

Yes, and I— we don't have someone Oh no, we do have lots of people from DEC today. I forgot that we had all these folks from DEC.

If you have questions on any specific fiscal note, please feel free to ask them too, because they give some explanations, but I think there's probably a lot that you could dive into on the fiscal notes. I think I have Representative McCabe next in the queue. Thanks. Yeah, I'm just struggling with the pronunciation of the names in the title. Could you probably— could you read those off for me, Representative Hall?

No, the bill sponsor. I'm kidding. Quiz time. Through the chair, Representative McCabe, I've discovered that you also like to have a field day, and that is with joshing me quite regularly on these different topics.

Vice Chair Story. Thank you. I neglected to read our responses that we got back. In fact, I'm looking for mine. But what I am wondering, uh, through the chair, when I look about testing our drinking water from all public water systems, I'm sort of wanting to kind of know the definition of that.

And also, I think about our municipality here. We test our water system. It sounds like it says DEC would test all of our water systems. Anyway, I'm just kind of trying to get a map of where we are collaborating, where DEC would be. Anyway, what you mean by this, because I would think it would be reporting.

You would require DEC to get a report from various areas that they would not having to be going out and doing doing testing because there has been testing in those areas. So if you could help me understand, uh, that, I would— it would— I would be grateful.

Through the chair, um, Vice Chair Story, um, I do not have a technical definition of what public drinking water systems mean, so I would defer to those who are the experts with DEC on the line. But the way that I, I read drinking water, public drinking water supplies, is it could be a bubbler at a campground, or it could be in watersheds. Like, I think about the, all of the many lakes and ponds that are in my district, and not, not necessarily they're going to be drinking that, but just when it comes to PFAS leaching into the groundwater. But really, I'm not I'm not an expert on this, and I really would defer to what DEC has to say about the definition.

Um, Vice Chair Story, do you want to ask that question for our Division of Water Director, possibly? Uh, sure. Uh, thank you, uh, Chair Carrick. Um, my question has to do when we're testing the drinking water from all public water systems, if we have a definition for what that is, just so I'm getting a picture of all the testing we would be doing. And, um, and then what municipalities, depending on what the definition is, where has— is testing going on from municipalities who have the, um, who are doing that?

And is there some overlap? Is there some part of this bill where they would be— we would want to be re— having, uh, municipalities report to DEC? So testing does not have to happen. Or it is happening, which is very important, but I think people are understanding what I'm saying. I'm gonna pass that off to Director McCabe, and if, if you have a person who's better suited to answer that question, feel free to shift it to someone else.

I thank you. This is Director Gene McCabe, Director of Division of Water. I am going to defer to my colleagues colleague, Director Shawndi Perry, from the Division of Environmental Health, who runs the Drinking Water Program. Perfect. All right, Director Perry.

Hello, good afternoon. For the record, this is Shawndi Perry, Department of Environmental Conservation Environmental Health Division Director. Within our division, we house the Drinking Water Program, which oversees the Safe Drinking Water Act, it's a primacy program. And currently, right now, we are in the process of implementing the EPA PFAS rule, and part of that includes testing about half of our public water systems in the state of Alaska for PFAS. And currently, right now, we have 1,300 approximately public water systems in Alaska.

Just over 600 of those are required to be tested under the EPA PFAS rule, and with this bill, it would therefore encompass all public water systems, so it would essentially double that testing mechanism. And so our division, we over— we're going to be looking at Section 1A, and that differs from the EPA PFAS rule in basically two main ways. It encompasses the type of public water system and the testing frequency. So right now, to answer generally a definition we have of what a public water system means, there are three types of public water systems in the state of Alaska, and the first one is the community water system. Those serve more than 24 people year-round.

And then we have non-transient, non-community water systems, and they serve more than 24 people at least 6 months out of the year, and those are schools and workplaces or parks. And then we have transient systems, which are systems like airports and campgrounds and restaurants. And those transient systems are just under 700. Those are the ones that are not required to be tested under the EPA PFAS rule at this time. Does that help clarify?

Thank you. This is Rep. Story through the chair. So in these places that you've outlined, isn't there some municipalities that are required to do testing who then you do not have to do the testing and they report to To you.

Through the chair, Representative Story, for the record, Shawndi Perry. Yes, those, those municipalities would most likely be community water systems, but also within the municipality there can be non-transient, non-community water systems, and those systems are being tested right now under the initial monitoring phase of the EPA PFAS rule.

Through the— yeah, follow-up. Thank you. Through the chair, so are you not including in this fiscal note those water systems that are required to do testing, or are you going to be doing— is this plan to do double testing? Through the chair, Representative Story, this is Shawnti Perry for the record. The fiscal note itself would encompass annual testing.

And so right now, under the EPA PFAS rule, the initial monitoring is setting up these public water systems to understand their future monitoring schedule. And a lot of those systems are expected to move to a 3-year cycle. So with the annual testing requirement under the bill, that would be outside of our primacy work. So, essentially, we would develop a non-privacy branch, per se, and the work associated with that requirement, which is not a requirement of the EPA PFAS rule, with the work, the hours it would take to do that, would not qualify under EPA grants because the EPA grants we have only support outlined under the Safe Drinking Water Act to implement privacy. So anything in addition to those requirements, like annual testing for systems that might otherwise move to a 3-year cycle, would then therefore be funded through general funds.

Thank you. Thank you. I have Representative Holland next. Great, thanks. Um, through the chair, um, Two things I wanted to follow up on, please.

First, just to continue on the line of discussion we just had, I'm just wondering to the bill sponsor if you've given some thought to perhaps aligning the testing frequency under this new bill with the federal EPA testing schedule and the funding that's through there so that we might not have two different testing schedules? Has that been considered, or is that perhaps a change we might look at making down the road so that we don't have a new state level of testing that is duplicative of the EPA testing schedule?

Through the chair, Representative Holland, it is not something that has been under consideration. I am somewhat open to it, but I do think it's really important as environmental conditions change that we do test more regularly, but it may be an area of compromise. Thanks. At whatever point down the road. Follow-up?

Follow-up? Great, thanks. And then the other question I had perhaps goes back to our Division of Water, but the bill discusses the testing process and testing requirements. I'm just curious, is there already clear instruction, whether through regulation or statute, on providing notification to the individuals who are on a water system that testing has been done and what the results were so that they're being notified and kept up to date of whether or not the tests were showing that it did or didn't trigger a test result over the limit? I'm just curious how that's being handled because I don't think it's discussed in the bill in terms of notification of the results.

Let's go back to Director Perry, and feel free to, again, shift that question's answer if you need to. Absolutely. Thank you, Madam Chair. Shawnee Perry for the record, representative. Currently, under our initial monitoring process, systems are required to test to understand and whether or not they have PFAS, and then plan from there.

If they do test above 4 parts per trillion, which is the maximum contaminant level outlined in the EPA PFAS rule, we go ahead and provide them documentation and a notice that they can use and provide to their users, which also includes alternate filter types that, that users can decide to purchase on their own if they would like. And at this time, all systems that have tested over the MCL have provided that information to their users, so they are well informed, yes.

Can I follow up? Follow up? So, thank you for that response. Just to follow up on that, given the discussion we had a moment ago that suggests that the testing that might be done under this bill is different, in terms of at least scheduling schedule of activity and perhaps a different structure, uh, more frequent. Would that notification process still carry over into what would happen based upon this bill, or does this bill need to have some language related to notification in order to ensure that if it's set up in parallel with the existing EPA testing, that the notification is still going to occur?

Through the chair, Representative Shawndi Perry for the record. At this time we would, and in the future if the bill passes, we would absolutely still continue to coach the systems to notify their users. Also, down the road under the EPAP FOPs rule, starting in 2027, it's the start of the compliance monitoring and reporting process. There is a requirement at that time for systems to provide a Tier 3 public notification. And also, in 2029, the compliance deadline, which is the time that systems must provide treatment to— must have their systems updated with treatment, they would also have to start including those reports under the Consumer Confidence Report.

It's an annual report that goes out to users every year. And so there would both be a notification and an annual report would go out as well. That's good. Thank you. Thank you.

Let's see, Vice Chair Story. Thank you. And through the chair, Chair Carrick, to the sponsor, and again, you're educating me on a lot of the issues here, but I'm wondering what's in involved in doing the testing, which might go to DEC. I'm wondering if it's something that is, uh, to our smaller communities, if that can be something that is shared with the local governments there so we can save some money in travel. And just if we do do more frequent testing, it is more easy on-site than see going out.

Um, as testing, I agree, is very important and want to be doing it at a frequent time so you're catching any changes. And I know I appreciate the talking about notification if something has happened that it should be— needs to be checked right away. But I'm just, again, if someone could educate me on how, um, what's involved, and is that something that can— training can be done to local village, um, small site personnel. Through the chair, Vice Chair Storey, I appreciate that you think that I would know answers to questions like that, and, but I really— there is a little bit of testing information in the Q&A that we received back from DEC, but I defer to the expertise of the folks at DEC, as this is really their wheelhouse and not mine. Yeah, we'll see if Director Perry again maybe has a more comprehensive answer there.

Absolutely. Thank you, Madam Chair. Rep. Sinestori, Shaggy Perry for the record. We, we have testing capacity at the Environmental Health Laboratory located here in Anchorage, Alaska. A side note, we would love to invite the committee and your colleagues for a tour anytime.

And at the same time, we post results on our Public Drinking Water Watch webpage, so that is also a public resource that entities can access anytime. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] Follow-up? Yeah, follow-up to that. So I want to make it clear that I'm talking about collection of what you need to do the testing. I realize that anyone would have to send what they— their sample into a testing site because not everyone's going to have one.

I just don't know how complex the testing is. I don't know if it's a matter of taking a sample, running it through. If there could be some elaboration and follow-up on that.

Oh sure, to the chair, uh, vice chair Story, my apologies, I misunderstood. Yes, it is a complex process, and if I could get back to you in writing for that, I would really be able to articulate it much better. Thank you, appreciate that. Excellent. I think Ms. Narang has more too.

For the record, Maya Narang. Uh, thank you, Chair Carrick. Uh, through the chair to Vice Chair Story, I do know, um, that ACAT provides for people's wells and whatnot, like their personal drinking systems, not our public systems. They do have kits that people can do. My understanding is that it is not very difficult from these kits for people to test their own water systems, um, and then send that off to the people who actually do all the science and the testing.

So for smaller communities, there might be different ways or methods where the actual collection of samples is quite simple.

And, uh, just from some personal experience, I'm also aware that when there's a known plume, um, DEC will make an effort to contact the potentially impacted folks that they can, you know, foresee. And sometimes these contaminations end up having far wider margins than DEC initially foresees them having, which I think where like ACAT can step in and help provide kits for homeowners that could be on the fringes of that. But DEC also, at least in our community, has done a bit of outreach when there's been a known contamination in that affected area for testing, and then they do the outreach with the results. So Okay. Are there additional questions or comments on House Bill 235?

Seeing none, I look forward to DEC's response to Vice Chair Story's question in writing, and I just really thank all of our DEC folks and other health and PFAS experts who were able to call in and join us today. Um, we are setting House Bill 235 aside at this time. And again, thank you to the bill sponsor and staff for being available. That will conclude House State Affairs today. We have nothing else on our agenda, but we are meeting on Saturday of this week, April 25th, at 3:15 here in Room 120.

We're gonna try to keep that meeting to an hour, but our agenda has 3 bills on minute. So just please be advised that we're going to try to work through those bills expeditiously and give people their weekend back. We will start with House Bill 371 from Representative McCabe on out-of-state campaign contributions, then go to concluding our amendment process on House Bill 188 from Representative Mina on the Welcoming Alaska office, and have any— continue discussion on House Bill 377 on public records and set an amendment deadline on that bill. So just be advised that that's what we're planning to take up on Saturday. Uh, with nothing else before the committee, we're adjourned at 4:42 PM.