Latest news with #LouiseStutes
Yahoo
02-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bill seeks to exempt Alaska commercial fishers' insurance pools from tighter regulation
Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, speaks to the Alaska House of Representatives on Friday, April 25, 2025. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon) To avoid high insurance costs, some groups of commercial fishers in Alaska have formed cooperatives to collectively pay liability and damage claims themselves. A bill passed April 25 by the Alaska House of Representatives would exempt these cooperatives from regulation under the state's insurance laws. The House voted 37-0 to pass House Bill 116, which now goes to the Senate for consideration. The bill was carried on the House floor by Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, but came from the ideas of a legislative task force assigned to study the commercial fishing industry, she told the House. The three insurance cooperatives already operating in the state are organized under Washington state law, she said, and cover about 840 vessels. The legal change would allow Alaska fishers to organize other pools locally. 'This bill comes at no cost to the state and supports our fishing industry by simply allowing Alaska-based commercial fishing insurance cooperatives to form,' she said. 'Rising premiums and availability of insurance serve as a barrier to operating for Alaska's aging commercial fishing fleet. Underwriters have been raising premiums on individual vessels and have become increasingly selective of which vessels they choose to ensure.' Rep. Sarah Vance, R-Homer, said that insurance is now required in order to enter Homer's small boat harbor, and she's heard from fishers in other communities who now wonder whether they can afford to fish. 'I think this is a wonderful opportunity to allow a free market,' she said. 'They take the risk, but it just says, hey, we want to no longer restrict you if this is something that you want to take on and be able to form a group for yourself.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
01-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Alaska Legislature unanimously rejects automatic pay raises for lawmakers, governor and cabinet
Feb. 28—JUNEAU — The Alaska Legislature on Friday unanimously rejected automatic pay raises for legislators, the governor and department heads. The State Officers Compensation Commission recently recommended that pay adjustments go into effect automatically every other year based on the Anchorage consumer price index. The cost-of-living adjustments were set to go into effect in 2027. According to state law, the compensation commission is supposed to recommend pay adjustments — if needed — every other year for the state's top political officials. The recommendations go into effect unless both the House and Senate approve a measure to reject them. The rejection measure approved Friday advanced swiftly through the Legislature this year. The Senate unanimously rejected the cost-of-living adjustments on Feb. 8; the House approved the same measure on Feb. 28. Kodiak Republican Rep. Louise Stutes said before the final vote that the state is struggling to fund basic services with constrained finances. She said the pay raises were estimated to cost over $500,000 in total. "Simply put, it's very poor timing and a very poor idea for us — as well as department heads and lieutenant governor and governor — to receive a pay increase," Stutes said. Two years ago, the salary commission recommended that the Legislature receive a 67% pay raise, along with significant pay bumps for the governor and top political leaders. That followed Gov. Mike Dunleavy abruptly firing a majority of the commission's members and replacing them with new ones. Legislators that year allowed the major salary increases to go into effect, which boosted their base level salaries from just over $50,000 per year to $84,000 annually. The increases came after several years in which pay adjustments were not approved for lawmakers or leading members of the executive branch.
Yahoo
22-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Alaska governor proposes lifting state's longtime ban on fish farms
A state-run fish hatchery is seen in Anchorage. Alaska permits hatcheries for wild fish but has long forbidden fish farms, but that could change if a new bill becomes law. (Alaska Department of Fish and Game photo) Gov. Mike Dunleavy on Friday introduced a bill that would partially reverse Alaska's 35-year-old ban on fish farms. House Bill 111 was referred to the House Fisheries Committee for consideration. If signed into law, HB 111 wouldn't allow salmon farming, but it would allow the farming of 'any bony fish belonging to the osteichthyes class.' That includes things like tilapia, catfish or carp — the world's most widely farmed fish. Any farmed fish would have to be sterile, unable to reproduce if they escape into the wild. They would also have to be contained by an escape-proof barrier. Fish farms would be subject to regulation by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game and subject to oversight by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. Alaska already has a significant and growing number of shellfish farms. In a letter accompanying the bill's introduction, the governor said that 'authorizing finfish farming would introduce a new industry to Alaska, creating jobs, creating food security for residents, and contributing to economic growth.' Fish farming has been outlawed in Alaska since 1990, when lawmakers enacted a law that permanently extended a previous temporary ban. The law followed a legislative investigation that concluded that fish farms posed environmental, social and economic risks to the state. The investigation stated in part that the state's reputation for wild Alaska seafood could be endangered if Alaska were to allow fish farming, and lawmakers concluded that few jobs would be created by a farmed fish industry. 'Avoiding harm to the state's wild finfish, land, and water resources must take precedence over the development of a new speculative and potentially harmful commercial finfish farming industry,' the Legislature concluded at the time, stating, 'the best interests of the state are served by prohibiting commercial finfish farming.' Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, is chair of the House Fisheries Committee and represents one of the state's most prominent seafood-producing regions. She said on Friday that she had not read the governor's bill and was unwilling to rule it out immediately, but that the proposal would have to overcome her skepticism. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
