AK:  Update to alcohol laws passes House with rider

News Miner

By Matt Buxton

April 18, 2016 

JUNEAU — The bill to update the state’s alcohol laws passed the House, but not before it picked up an unexpected passenger.

Senate Bill 165 lessens the penalties for minor consuming alcohol charges and reworks the membership requirements for the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, and as of Sunday night, it also updates the Board of Barbers and Hairdressers.

That’s the product of some last-minute maneuvering by Anchorage Republican Rep. Gabrielle LeDoux. With an amendment on the House floor, she added House Bill 289, which changes the makeup of the Board of Barbers and Hairdressers, to the alcohol bill in an attempt to avoid a bitter battle in the eye care world.

“I had a very simple bill relating to the Board of Barbers and Hairdressers that went to Senate Finance this morning and a couple of minutes before my bill was up the co-chair, Sen. (Anna) MacKinnon asked me if the optometrist bill could be added.”

That bill, Senate Bill 55, would reform the Board of Examiners in Optometry, a move that is strongly opposed by ophthalmologists — eye doctors who perform surgery — who see it as an encroachment by optometrists — medical professionals you’re more likely to see when you get your glasses.

That legislation never made it out of the Senate. Instead, the process of piggybacking onto a bill that already passed the House would bypass the House’s hearing process entirely.

LeDoux said that was unacceptable.

“I didn’t think it was a really good idea because it would kill the bill,” she said. “I would kill the bill not because I know that it’s a bad bill, I don’t. I don’t know anything about the bill. But I don’t want to be in the position of the 90th day of the Legislature to be deciding all by myself whether this terribly contentious bill is a good policy or a bad policy.”

She said she felt it acceptable to add her bill, which deals with one board, to Senate Bill 165, which deals with another board because the House had already passed it unanimously. House Bill 289 had also made it through the Senate and was scheduled for a vote on the Senate floor Sunday night.

“This is a non-controversial bill, this barber and hairdressers bill,” she said. “It’s totally and completely non-controversial.”  

However, the move raises questions about the fate of the bill, even if the Senate agrees to the changes, because it could run into the Alaska Constitution’s single-subject rule for bills. As of Sunday night, legislative aides working on the bill were trying to get that worked out, though there was nothing definitive.

Rep. Cathy Muñoz, R-Juneau, opposed the move on the floor for that very reason.

But the amendment passed 35-4.

As for the bill itself, it faced some opposition from members of the House who were concerned lessening penalties for underage drinking would simply make the problem worse. The bill replaces the misdemeanor penalty for repeat underage drinking with a $500 fine for any minor caught drinking. The penalty could be reduced to $50 for the first penalty upon completion of an approved alcohol awareness program and to $250 on repeat offenses.

Rep. Shelley Hughes, R-Palmer, defended the change.

“Right now, officers tend to show up to a party and people are not being charged,” she said. “The idea of this is to do something that may really connect with them. When they have to pay money hopefully it will connect with them.”

The bill now heads back to the Senate.