This meeting of the House Judiciary Committee will now come to order.
The time is now 1.01 PM on Wednesday, February 4th, 2026.
We are meeting in the Grunberg room, Capitol room 120.
The following members are present.
Representative Underwood, Representative Aishide,
Representative Vance, representative Mina, and Vice Chair Cup,
and my self-representative gray chair.
Let the record reflect that we have a quorum to conduct business.
I would like to recognize the staff supporting this meeting.
Sophia Tenney from House Records, Kyla Tupoe from the Juno-LIO,
and my staff Dylan Hitchcock Lopez.
We have three items of business on today's agenda.
The first will be the consideration of nominees to the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics,
Deborah Fancher, public member, and Chase Berenson,
We will also hear the introduction of House Bill 262,
number of Superior Court Judges,
presented by Nancy Mead,
counsel to the judiciary of the court system, thank you.
And then we will hear our second hearing
of house bill 20, prohibit fees for paper documents,
presented with Representative Sadler
and his staff, Kai Elkins.
We will now begin our consideration of nominees
to the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics.
We'll begin with Deborah Fancher.
At this time, I invite her to take herself off mute,
state her name for the record,
and provide a brief introduction.
Deborah, if you're there.
Unavailable. We are moving to Chase Berenson. Mr. Barenson, if you could take yourself off mute,
state your name for the record and provide a brief introduction and any remarks you would
like to share with the committee, you can do so now. Good afternoon, Chair Gray. Thank you for
the opportunity. This is Chase Barron speaking to you today from Anchorage. I have always felt
I live in Durdenwood, and I serve on multiple methods in
Durdwood.
And I think it's an incredible opportunity to try to
serve the state at large.
And, I believe, this is a great opportunity
to work with the legislator and the ethics committee to allow
us to maintain public trust in the legislature and make sure
things continue rolling smoothly.
Thank you very much.
Thank so much, Mr. Berenson.
Are there any questions from the committee?
Representative Mina. Thank you chair gray through the chair. Uh, thank you for putting your fourth year
Name for this committee. What is your interest on the ethics committee?
Thank You through to representative MINA
Um, I think it's important for
You know the the state the population of the State to be able to have
a faith and trust in the
faith and trust in the system.
So I think it's just an important committee.
I don't get on with a specific angle or specific drive
for the committee, but I believe it is important to serve.
Thank you.
Any other questions from the Committee for Mr. Berenson?
Mr. Berenson, could you speak to any specific qualifications that you might have that
you'd bring to the table while serving on the ethics committee?
Yes, thank you to
the chair.
I have been working for years in business leadership roles, mostly in the Alaska Native
And, you know, when you're working in that environment,
you are working, in an area where people are looking up to you
and what you trust and you have to make ethical decisions.
You know you've got a variety of stakeholders,
and everyone has different views, different needs,
and your trying to work through and manage all of those tasks
and do them impartially while also serving a
variety stakeholders in the business.
So I think that
You know, it helps me to come in and approach this to say, you know we need ethical clarity.
You need the transparency,
you need to sound judgment, and you
need be impartial in what you're doing.
Thank you. Any other questions?
Seeing no other
questions, we will now open up public testimony on the appointment of Chase Berenson.
Public testimony is now
open. Is there anyone in the room that would like to testify on
the Appointment of Chase Beringson?
Seeing no one in the room, we will look online.
Is there anyone online?
Seeing No one online,
public testimony on the appointment of Chase Berenson
is now closed.
Mr. Barenson, thank you so much for your time
and your willingness to serve.
We are going to move back to Deborah Fancher.
I believe she is available now.
Ms.
Fancher, I hope I'm saying your name correctly.
Can you please take yourself off mute,
put yourself on the record,
and offer any opening comments that you would like to give?
Hello, Representative Gray and members of the committee
from a 80 degree Mexico.
My name is Deb Fanchher.
I have a bound to committee.
This will be my second year appointment,
if that's what's happened.
I grew up in rural Alaska other than five years at the university.
I have lived in Alaska my whole life.
I was a teacher in Anchorage for almost 25 years and I continued to teach in
Anchorage on a part-time basis.
I am absolutely not qualified for the role on the ethics committee.
I don't have any legal training but when I
One of the things that he said is being a science teacher,
he tried to look at things analytically,
and I believe that I tried do that.
So that is, you know, pretty much my background.
I won't encourage my students to be involved.
I never thought I'd see myself on the ethics committee,
but I would always like to think
that would be involve in practice what I've preached.
And so here I am volunteering on the ethics committee so far.
I've learned a ton, kind of like drinking from a fire hydrant.
And I really feel like, you know,
you're just kind getting up and started because there's a lot to the code and time.
So really changed. So there you are.
Thank you so much. And thanks for calling in from Mexico.
Are there any questions from the committee for Ms. Fancher?
Representative.
And through the chair, Ms. Franscher, thank you for putting your name in.
I listened quite closely to you saying you're a former science teacher and you'd be analytical.
I also am a former science, teacher, and so I'm sure we both have some knowledge of how you evaluate data in the science realm.
Do you have any kind of guiding rubric or
or a thing in mind that you would use to evaluate ethics in this role.
You know, it's interesting. My classroom, I always said we need to be firm and we
need be fair. And I think in ethics it is no different. You need
to defer and I would add you need consistent. So the same things that
you use when you're running a good classroom you
firm, fair, consistent.
How would I want my kid to be treated?
How will I wanna be treat it?
I don't think it matters whether you have an R, D, an I
or anything else by your name.
What has guided me in my classroom reasonably successfully
is the firm fair consistent?
Thank you.
Any other questions from the committee?
Representative Mina.
Thank you, Chair Gray.
Through the Chair, thank you Ms. Fancher for putting your name in again, and
for your honesty about coming into the ethics committee with not much background in the law.
But I think there's so much value in having public members and
everyday Alaskan serving on these committees.
So since this is a reappointment, what have you learned during your time on the Ethics Committee?
that don't behave much like high school students.
I'm probably not supposed to say that I've learned a ton.
I learned about the ethics app.
I also think that our times have changed
and that we really needed to,
I think having an ethics committee is very important.
And I also, why do I think it's important?
I thing is important because what I've learned is there are a lot of things that are out there that
are not covered.
Social media, AI, those kind of thing are huge and that's why the role of the play on the
ethics committee is always changing.
But going back to earlier not to be the bad horse but the firm fair consistent, that doesn't
change.
Basically, we need to have some modifications to the ethics act to kind of sit with the
time, but I think everybody knows what good, honest government looks like, and we all
want that.
And one thing I will say, something I have learned, I've learned how much I admire some
I mean, Senator Stevens is just, I never knew him before I was in this role.
Please, senator Stevens loves Alaska with everything that's inside it.
And I really, really appreciate people that I've served with on the committee.
Especially the representative, senators are representative.
They really love Alaska, and I appreciate that.
As an Alaskan, somebody that loves the Alaska and lives there my whole life,
and i'll dive here.
I love Alaska.
And I want good people representing me and I've appreciated that.
Thank you. Any other questions from Ms.
Fanshire seeing no more questions
from the committee at this time.
We will now open it for public testimony.
Public testimony on the appointment of Deb
Fansher is now opened.
Is there anyone in the room who would like to testify?
Seeing no one in
theroom will look online.
No one online?
Seeing no one online, public testimony on Deb Fancher is now closed.
Ms. Fanchher, thank you so much for your time and willingness to serve.
At this time...
Mr. Chair.
Yes.
Do you take committee comments?
Sure.
Committee comments.
We are open.
Yeah.
I'd just like to say I've known Ms Fanther and her brothers since high school.
And she's a solid person.
Amazing fact.
Yeah, originally Deb Berge and I came out of the Bergy family out at Glen Island and they're yeah, just amazing
Family very ethical very sound people and incredibly hard working. She's absolutely brilliant
You know, I just wanted to say as a committee member, i'm proud to support
Thank you vice chair cop
In accordance with AS24.60.131, the judiciary held a hearing on the following appointees
to the Select Committee on Legislative Ethics.
Deborah Fancher, public member, Chase Berenson, Public Member, alternate.
We will distribute the paperwork at this time.
Signature on this report does not reflect an intent by any of the members to vote for
or against ratification of individuals or individuals during any further session.
back on the record. Our second item of business will be to take up House Bill 262, number of
Superior Court Justice, numbers of Superior court judges for its first hearing in our
committee. At this time, I would like to invite Nancy Me, General Counsel for the Alaska Court
Thank you very much chair Gray and members of the committee. My name is Nancy me general counsel for the Alaska court system
House bill 262 would add an additional superior court judge that judge would sit in the third judicial district and specifically we're seeking this judge
Because we have a need in Palmer. So that is where this new judge
Would be serving
For procedural context, House Bill 262 was introduced by rules at request and the request
was made by the Supreme Court.
And that's why I am in the role of providing information as the sponsor, more or less of
this bill.
This is unusual.
The court system does not seek statutory changes very often because statutes are generally
But the statutes do set the number of judges.
So instead of adding a judge through a budgetary request,
as one might expect when you want to add a position
to your entity agency or department or branch,
we need to have authorization from this body
in order to change that statute.
So it is not a budget request.
It is a bill with a fiscal note.
that this bill would do specifically is amend Alaska Statute 2210120 which does set the number of superior court judges.
And as you can see, it currently says there are 45 judges, we would seek to make that 46, and then very simply on line seven.
It says 28 are in the third district and we hope to change that to 29.
the way that this would be effectuated for the court system.
And I'm going to talk a little bit about why the Supreme Court made the decision.
to ask you for this and address some of the alternative ways we've been trying to address the issues in the Palmer Courthouse.
One bit of background in members of this committee may be very familiar with that though,
but the Superior Court is the Court of General Jurisdiction. It's the Trial Court
of general jurisdiction. They have authority to handle anything, and then a subset of their jurisdiction is
delegated to district court judges, but this
your court can do all trial court matters, what they work on, and so this is the judge
that you would be providing.
is felonies, domestic relations, which
is child custody, divorce, dissolution, fraternity,
probate matters, mental commitments,
protective proceedings like guardianships and conservatorships,
and wills, of course.
Child in need of aid cases are neglected child cases,
civil cases with an amount in controversy,
over 100,000 juvenile delinquency cases.
Lesser cases, for example, misdemeanors,
as opposed to felonies, go to the district court.
So we are not directly affecting those cases.
Though as you'll see from my descriptions later
indirectly in some ways.
So minor offenses, evictions, small claims,
they go into district courts.
But we're talking here about the superior court cases
to give you a little bit more context. So you can picture what we're looking at.
There are currently four Superior Court judges in Palmer. The filings in the Palmer Superior
Court fluctuate over the years, as one might expect. It just depends on what people,
you know, what their issues are and what they need to bring to court. But over
the past five years they've been between
2650 and 2950. In my mind, I think about 2800 cases a year on average. So they're important
cases and they are affecting, well, maybe about 2,800 Alaskans per year and actually
One more bit of context. The Palmer Court has, you know, close to the the same
Division of case filings as the rest of the state, but interestingly, their biggest
Superior Court, the biggest case type is probate cases. They have about 30 percent of their filings are probates cases
And off a lot of those are mental commitments not too long ago
somewhere in the Matsu, a new mental health facility opened up, and that led to an increase
in that the filings in THAT court for those Alaskans experiencing mental
health issues that require judicial intervention. So 30% of their cases are probate cases,
and about 25% are felonies. And I know people think that's mostly what the court does, but
We, they have a little somewhat fewer than the case average of felonies and they
have about a, a
little higher than
the
case
average for domestic relations. Another 20, 20% of their case load. The rest are
those child in need of aid, civil and other case types.
So, this judge that we're seeking would do all the Superior Court case types in Palmer.
The judges generally, with a few exceptions, handle all of the case type that come in the
door.
They just get divided up up there.
So why do we need another judge in Palmer the the very short answer though by no means the whole story is that they
Just carry the largest case loads in the state and they are struggling with those large case
Loads so what I mean is if you take those case filings and divide them by four to get the per judge number
What they had in fiscal year 25 was six hundred and eighty three cases per Judge
The statewide average is four hundred fifty eight. So they exceeded it by another
third or so. They exceeded the average by that much. The next busiest court is Anchorage. Anchorage
has 544 cases per judge, so they are extremely busy themselves. And by the way, if you authorize
this fifth judge for Palmer, they would still have the highest or second highest case load in the
and would be well above the state average.
And this isn't new, Palmer has had the highest case load
for at least the last six fiscal years.
So this is something that the court has been dealing with
and struggling with, a couple of years there,
they had over 700 cases per judge, 741 year.
And of course, they've always had
the same four judges, but that's due to the fluctuation
in the case filings.
And it might be obvious, but the problem with having the highest caseload in the state is that
the justice that is served is not what we would like to see. We want to be able to meet people's needs and
The level of service can fall below what we find acceptable when the court is that swamped.
So that's what that we're trying to address.
As the committee is also aware from other bill presentations and other things,
the Matt Nuska Susitna Valley is the biggest, the fastest growing population in the state.
The last time the Palmer Court got new superior court judges was in 2007.
So, if you compare case filings in 2006, which is the year that they had data that authorized
that bill, to the filings, in 2025, they've increased about 56% since that time.
So they have been doing with those same resources with 56 percent more cases.
And the Department of Labor estimated the population for Palmer, the Matsu Valley, I
Now, well, that has increased by about 58%.
So quite in line with the increase in filing.
So it stands to reason that that increase
in population leads to increased use of state resources,
including the judicial resources.
And as you know, the population of the map
soo is predicted to grow.
The Department of Labor estimate I saw on the website
was that it would grow another 20% in the next 20 years,
sources that I just found on the internet said that that was low and it
could be more but in any case if you go with 20% you can see that the need is
there to address this population. So having those highest case loads is a
key aspect of the problem with
with dispensing justice and Palmer, and those are the numbers that are really driving this
request. But it's not even the whole picture. Not only have those case filings grown, but
cases have changed in the 20 years since we last received superior court judges. Cases
have become far more complex. That's due to technology. And when you have evidence that is
phone dumps or computer hard drive reads or you have DNA or if you
have other scientific evidence, it leads to cases just taking longer
to process. And it might be because expert witnesses in these
areas might have litigation as to their qualifications. It might
be that the level of detail that needs to be discussed in the
court or through through discovery motions or something else is
is just take longer to analyze.
Another way cases have become more complex
is because victims' rights in felony cases
have been expanded, and that's a wonderful thing.
It does take long for a court to deal
with another bit of information that they need to weigh
in their decision-making.
Victims have a right to speak,
so that is something that has to occur.
Sometimes hearings have to be put off
or was not able to be contacted about a hearing.
So it's just more to balance and consider
for the judge and their decision making.
In child in need of aid cases,
The practice of using one family, one judge,
was codified in 2017.
It's the best practice
of having a family who might be involved in, for example,
a custody case, and somebody in that family also
is filing a domestic violence protective order.
There might children in need of aid.
There may be a delinquency.
All of that now goes to the same judge.
This is better so that the family
that judge might gain knowledge of the dynamics of
the family that might aid in decision making.
It's a great practice, but it means that pieces of cases
cannot be delegated to, for example, the district court
can't handle the domestic violence protective order.
It all conglomerated the same, and that leads to more work
for superior court judges.
There are more VCRs.
Those are violating conditions of release in felony cases.
This body authorized a new state entity within the Department of Corrections to supervise
people who are out on bail pending trial.
told that they're one of their bail conditions is to be supervised. When you're supervised,
you might get caught a little bit more than you were previously. That has led to an increase in
those VCOR charges. that's not reflected in case filings because they are not a new case.
They're an additional charge in a case, but they do create additional workload for the judge.
the growing number of self-represented litigants. This is not only in Palmer, statewide certainly,
in the most, the way it affects Superior Court cases the
most is in domestic relations cases. Over 70% of those cases have at least one party
that is representing themselves, and this is great so people can have access to justice even
when they may not have the means to to pay an attorney or there are not enough pro bono attorney.
user or to assist, but it's very impactful on the court's
case workload.
And that's because when people represent themselves,
they may file more frequent motions.
They might want to present arguments that are actually
unrelated to the relevant legal issues.
They may not know to submit the necessary information
for calculating child support or property division.
And they might not fully explain the legal basis
that they want to present. They're important and we are committed to, you know, providing
everybody access to justice, but the judge needs to work harder to
figure out what is really going on with those cases
in many situations.
And in those case, there's often a lack of communication
between the parties, so they're unable to say,
stipulate to something or come to agreement
when because they are the people involved
in the emotional issues.
I want to let you know of the steps we've taken to try to address the problem short of coming to
you and asking for an additional judge. The main thing we have tried is temporary reassignments of
judges to cover part of caseload in Palmer. Naturally those temporary assignments would be coming from
we've had success with that. Anchorage, as I mentioned, is the second busiest
court and they really do not have a lot of capacity to do this, but
If an Anchorage judge decides to help out Palmer for a month or for one three-week trial or something,
well, their cases keep coming and it languishes back in Anchorage.
So this problem in Palmer is actually causing a ripple effect throughout the system.
We have had the Valdez judge handle some of the child in need of aid cases.
Well, now we're talking travel time, a day on either end, to get to Palmer.
was handled remotely. The remote child in need of aid proceedings can be difficult. There are a
lot of parties involved. So we did that for a while. But then again, that judge also handles
Cordova and Glen Allen. She just had a four week homicide case in Glen allen. And basically,
that causes a ripple there. Um, so we didn't where we could.
The presiding judge himself, who sits in Anchorage, went to Palmer for two very big cases to try to
fact help out, and my understanding is that at every judge meeting in Anchorage, the presiding
judge says who can help in Palmer, who had maybe a cancellation of something or something
come off their calendar and can give a week or a month or fill in for one trial.
not terribly sustainable as a way to fix this problem.
One of the issues with doing that is that the Palmer Courthouse doesn't have an extra courtroom
so when somebody goes up.
you, there's juggling that needs to happen and they can't always be as efficient. They
need a courtroom to get some of this work done. And there aren't any extra offices. So that
Anchorage judge might, you know, be sitting in a library with his or her own computer.
So it's, it is, we've managed with some
of these fixes, but it
is not the best way to do it. Some of those Anchorage judges who don't want to drive
the venue changed to Anchorage.
And that's a good way to handle it.
And we're trying to do that more.
But the parties, especially if there's
a jury trial, they have a right to have their case heard
in their home court.
And so they would have to consent.
Some of them are consenting, but not always.
And you have ask whether they should have
to,
but that is what we are trying.
So it's little bit like robbing Peter to pay Paul.
covering, but not very well. Another thing we've tried is to take the sitting
district court judges in Palmer, so there are three of those, and what we call
pro tem them up, give them a temporary assignment, authorizing them to have
jurisdiction over the superior sum of the Superior Court cases. That is
authorized by court rule if the Chief Justice makes the appointment through
Palmer District Court also is busy.
They have about the average number
as the rest of the state of cases per judge.
And if you take one away.
the other two then have way above the average because these because there's only the few judges
left. So they've done that for a time period and then we took a district judge from Anchorage and
sent them to Palmer to cover that. But as you can see it's been a patchwork. Our main goal with all
the patch work is to address the cases that have definite timelines, the criminal cases and the
We've sent the judges up to cover those and it's worked all right. The rest of
the cases though are really languishing and that's not a good way to do business.
The third way we've addressed this is through the use of pro tem judges. You've
heard me talk about that before. Retired judges can volunteer to be on a list to
come back and help in certain cases. They have a choice. This is also
So they'll get a call, will you sit for a month in Palmer or will
you come up just for this two week sex assault trial so that the assigned judge can continue
his other work and there are different arrangements and yes sometimes that works and again we've
done it, we continue to do it but it is just not the best solution and those judges do
pro-tem judge up in Palmer. So we're trying and you can see that it has a
domino effect on the other courts and Anchorage isn't feeling the effects, the
enthusiasm to volunteer for these temporary assignments is waning and we
are hoping to have a better solution. And so I also want to stress because of
This is not a regional issue.
The Palmer Court is called the Palmer Courts,
but it's really the Matt Sioux Court.
It serves a Wasilla, of course, and Houston,
Kanek, Talkeet, now the entire Matt Nuska,
Sitna Valley.
And then, as you can see, that's not all.
That happens when you're short a judge.
You're affecting the Anchorage Court House as well,
the Valdez Courthouse and others.
Palmer, that means that individual is not available to take a case in Bethel or a
case and Fairbanks. So this is what we're trying to address. That's the the main
points that I was hoping to make and I'm happy to answer any questions that the
committee may have.
Representative Vance. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a series of questions, so
permission to dialogue with Ms. Mead.
Permission granted.
Thank You.
Good afternoon. It's the first that we've seen each other this year. Nice to see you. And I am
so pleased to
see this piece of legislation because we know the need has been talked about for many years.
So to help us better understand, you know, the difference between the district judges the superior court judges, judges.
Have you, first of all, do you need statutory authority to increase the number of district
judges and will that
help with the overall caseload, because I'm looking at these numbers and you mentioned
that there's a projection of a 20% increase in the area, you know, why not get an, have
an additional judge at this request.
I know that the courts are always very prudent in their fiscal request, which I appreciate,
We know that one of the main concerns is the timeliness of justice in the system.
So, can you help us understand how the courts came to the decision of, at this time, asking for one superior court judge, excuse me,
an impact that has on the district judges?
Through the chair to Representative Vance, the number of district court judges is...
In statutes yet, there is a subsection C that says the Supreme Court can increase or change these numbers by rule.
And so, no, we do not need to go to the legislature to change the number of district court judges.
And there's a rule that sets those.
So we would be able to add one by-rule and then have a normal budget request for the money.
Your second part is why requests sort of just one judge
when there could be evidence of more need.
The reason is twofold.
First is the reluctance, I guess,
to ask for too much in times of fiscal austerity.
We're hoping that this will help address the problem
and it will be a big improvement for the court.
But another reason is we don't have space for our judges.
As you know, this is a big.
ask from the court over the last couple of years for capital money to build out
that Palmer Courthouse to add three more courtrooms and in addition a shell so
we could add yet more courtroom's in the future. That request was not
successful and the thinking there was we would get those court rooms and then
be able to to fill them with judges that was
not successful but we did get two years ago phase one and we received some
all been expended. That is the money for this that we can create one courtroom out of. So that's
why we're asking for that now. Our plan for facilities is to use some of that money that
to take some space that was recently vacated
in the basement of the Palmer Courthouse,
which houses the agencies as well.
It was vacated by one of
the executive branch agencies,
and we would take that and do some remodeling and moving,
and turn that into a grand jury courtroom,
thus freeing up space upstairs
where we could build a courtroom for this judge,
judge and a judge comes with three staff
and build those accompanying offices.
capital funding. We can only accommodate one additional judge in Palmer. I will also say, though,
in recognition of your point that it's growing and growing, that I suspect I'll be back here in
future years, not too far in the future, asking for resources, whether in Palmer or Anchorage or
Well, thank you. You answered several follow-up questions all in one, which I greatly appreciate.
With the last statement of coming back, you know, requesting for more, do the courts have a
time to review
looking at the caseload and the need for judges that say every five years, ten years that you just automatically look at that,
or is it kind of, oh my goodness, we're
we're feeling overwhelmed. Is there any process that is on a timed regular basis that the court
looks at this? Through the chair to representative Vance, yes and no, they look at it all the time.
So there isn't, it's not a periodic review, but there are meetings between administrators and
the Supreme Court justices.
you know, the Supreme Court ultimately makes the decisions.
Explaining trends, case filing trends work load trends.
You know the atmosphere in different court houses
that the Chief Justice is, of course,
the chief administrator of the whole court systems branch.
But the all of The Supreme court is made aware of
budget issues, case issues who might be experiencing difficulties.
So it's on an ongoing basis that they look at these things.
I have one more follow up, Mr. Chair, and then I'll hand it over to someone else.
Would love to help you out with the facility, but I will leave that for a separate discussion.
the judges versus the cost to the corrections because we have you know so many cases where
people are awaiting trial and that is kind of a lack of justice on their part and therefore
the costs to house them in the court system in in corrections is is implied and you continually
make those extensions and make space.
Has there ever been within the state or within
the courts a look at the cost benefit ratio of the timeliness
of a number of judges?
through the chair to representative Vance.
It's a quite complex question,
and I'll try to give a simple answer
that is satisfactory,
but stop me if I'm not addressing your issue.
I completely understand that the cost
of housing people pre-trial is partially at least
due to cases taking longer than they might otherwise.
the cases take longer than they might otherwise for lots of reasons other than
not having a judge. Cases take long because largely because parties, the
agencies, ask for more time and the judge needs to grant it or determines
that it's warranted. So it is a whole system-wide issue that causes people to
the cost of pretrial versus the price of a judge would would not be the appropriate comparison
without the costs of attorneys and the public defenders and at the prosecutor's office. So
there would be a lot that played into it. The cost moving cases faster would, would
providing additional resources to many people besides the court in order to
make an impact on the speed of those cases. I would also add and this is no
solace to certain individuals who are being held pre-trial that
when and if they get sentenced, the time they spent,
and therefore the money spent on them in pretrial status,
is credited against their sentence.
So if you are in pre-trial,
and you're incarcerated pretrial for one year,
and at your trial, at, your
trial, the ultimate sentence is two years in jail, you get credit for that year. So fiscally
only, it's not wasted money if you see what I'm saying. Otherwise, they would,
you'd be paying after the sentence. And again, that is
Totally discounting the human cost but and then of course many people who go to trial or have their cases resolved are not
Held in jail pretrial so that would not play into it
But I hope that was a bit of a picture that responded it was okay, and it reminded me of
Many other variables, but I appreciate that. Thank you. Mr. Chairman. Thanks representative cop
Thank You chair. thank you miss me
I'm sure you wouldn't be here unless you needed another judge.
I remember in 2018, I think we did that for Juneau here.
We actually reclassified a position.
Question I have, you mentioned the austere fiscal times
and you are correct.
So we have a fully loaded cost of over $1 million
here for this position, which is not inconsequential.
because we're not just hiring the judge,
we are hiring a whole support staff.
I see there's three more positions.
Is there, and I don't know about the room
for all this in the Palmer Courthouse either,
if we can just put four more people
in there full time or not.
Is their room, first question,
and second, is there any possibility?
for a judge to share a judicial assistant, a
judicial law clerk or an in court clerk.
I know that's written up in a way that permanently
assigns those three to the one judge.
And so those are my initial thoughts.
And can we expect a fiscal note from the Department of
Law? I saw the public defender jumped on there with a
You know, with a fiscal note reflecting, if we have more capacity to move cases,
there's going to be more representation.
So they have a fully loaded attorney cost thrown in there.
And I didn't know if it hurt any rumblings that law is going
to put another prosecutor in their knot.
Through the chair to representative cop, I heard a couple of questions.
So first of all, our fiscal note does include four positions because a judge does come with
a judicial assistant, a law clerk to do research and an in court clerk, to handle recordings
and paperwork inside the courtroom.
Every superior court judge has that staff.
not just unusual, but difficult for a judge to function without that staff.
It might be like saying to you guys to share staff,
you develop a relationship, there are needs,
the judicial assistance are very busy, and the law clerk is very...
I mean, they're all busy positions.
Sharing an in court doesn't work if two people have a hearing at the same time,
and that happens constantly, really.
a Juneau District Court Judge into a Superior Court judge, which is what you're
recalling representative. We...
thought that that could be done without a law clerk and we did not ask for funding
for a Law Clerk thinking that they could share. That did
not succeed. We ultimately had to get a
Law clerk for that judge because that one Law
Clerk could not fulfill the needs of of both judges so it didn't work out and
it's something that we would be not.
not too pleased to try again having the experience that it just doesn't work.
So every superior court judge does need to have those resources in order to be effective.
I cannot speak at all to the executive branch's plans for fiscal note, so I won't touch that.
And then your third issue had to do with the room for it, but yes.
basement that became vacant that will take over does allow us to move and reconfigure things upstairs
to have the courtroom with the three adjoining offices for the law clerk, the judicial assistant
and the judge in court sit separately. And so, yes, that part of our plan is to ensure that this
Practice for house finance. I understand. Yeah, I
Have a question
So I know that there's a ton of cases is there anything else happening in the palm record house that slows down
cases
The things I mentioned, like the self-represented people,
the especially in domestic relations cases,
the complexity of cases.
A lot of that is also true of other courthouses.
In Palmer in particular, there seems
to be anecdotally issues with the attorneys
being a little less collegial than they were in 2007
when we got new judges.
And people then used to work things out
outside the courtroom or be able to stipulate to matters
and come to agreement without involving a judge.
And over the last 20 years, things in that regard
have changed.
And again, anecdotally, it seems that in in
ways able to reach settlements or agreements
without judicial intervention,
and whereas in other courts, they might be able
to, that's not data.
That is just one of the things that I've heard.
Thank you.
Any other questions from committee members at this time?
I just have a statement.
Sure.
I'll just.
You know, I I hope that the finance committee does take a hard look at this and in and prioritize because we've had
the conversations home so many times about what justice looks like and we have a constitutional mandate and
I think that's been one of our concerns for a very long time and
It was a number of years ago that increased pay in the courts and you know
so, many people are
feeling like we don't give as much attention to the issue of of justice in the courts and so
this one to me seems like a no-brainer that we have to figure out the fiscal and and that means
we're gonna have prioritize but this ones seems pretty clear cut because of all the pressures of
this region on on the court and just looking at these number of cases is mind-boggling to
And like you said, the domino effect, and seeing that in the budget,
you know, when we're impacting so many lives with this, it seems straightforward.
So I hope that finance members are listening and we'll see this as something that we can't delay
on anymore. You know I was going to ask you why wait so long to make this request,
but you answered it by capacity. And I'm hoping that
The court building as well because that's just a practical thing. So thank you for
Figuring out all the puzzle pieces to make it work in the meantime
But I think this is this one of those things that needs to go to the top of the the budget pile if you will
Because it's a matter of justice for Alaskans
Thank you representative Vance representative cop. Yeah, I just wanted to highlight that the judges rarely the problem
with the backlog there, they're very hard working
and they are prodigious.
And so we don't need to message
to house finance respectfully representative Vance
to pay attention to this.
What we have is all the support system
that makes the justice system work,
the prosecutors, the public defenders,
the supports staff and their hurting.
And we to address that employee issue too.
The judges are doing a great job.
But to make that whole system work,
you've got to have the public defenders
and you have to the prosecutors.
And that's where we have not dropped the ball.
What are we doing to
make sure we're fell in those positions?
Just want to get that out there.
Thank you, sir.
Thank You Representative Cobb.
Representative Underwood.
Ball just.
speak. Thank you, Chair Gray. Through the Chair, to miss me, thank you for this,
just as a representative for the Manusca, Susitna Valley. A lot of these are my constituents
and friends and family and have a lot friends that work in this arena. And so I've heard the
stress and delayed justice for no, like you're saying, for a lack of not wanting to. It's just
the need is there. it's great. I so wish that we could have gotten that capital project in for
Yeah, just as a representative from out there, I know personally the wait times
and how stressful it is for a myriad of people out
there so appreciate this and I do hope that it gets attention to it
and we can remedy it for now and then hopefully remedy
it in the future so we don't have to come back to this.
Thank you.
Seeing no more questions from committee, we will now take a public testimony.
Public testimony on House Bill 262 is now open through anyone in
the room that would like to testify on house bill 262.
Seeing no one in the room will look online
No one online at this time testimony on house bill 262 is now closed. I
Would now like to set an amendment deadline on House bill 262 for Thursday February 5th. That's tomorrow
2026 at 5 p.m. Please work with my committee aid to ensure that amendments are submitted on time
We will now set this bill aside until Friday
Our third item of business is to bring back house bill 20, prohibit fees for paper documents.
This is our second hearing on this item.
I would like to invite the sponsor, Representative Sadler, and his staff to the table.
I will start by saying that an amendment deadline was set and we received one amendment.
We received that amendment from Representative Gray.
At this time, I move amendment one.
I'll object for purposes of discussion.
Amendment number one sets an effective date of January 1st,
2027.
Rep. Sadler, as the bill's sponsor,
do you have any comment on amendment number 1?
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the record.
Representative Dan Siler, District 24.
I think it's a great amendment,
was properly offered, properly accepted,
and I have no objection that we'll consider it a friendly amendment.
Thank you, Representative Sadlers.
Representative Copp, do maintain your objection.
I do not.
Seeing no further objections, a moment one has been adopted.
Are there any final comments
about House Bill 20 representative Sadler?
And I'll also note that Heather Carpenter,
the director of insurances in the room
and available to answer any questions if needed.
Representative Sadler, do you have any final comments?
No, Mr. Chairman, I do not.
Other than express my appreciation to the prompt
and respectful reception of the bill
and the spirit of discussion.
Look forward to committee's decision and further progress.
Thank you very much.
Thank You.
Do committee members have questions for the sponsor
or for Director Carpenter?
Seeing no further comments or questions,
do we have a motion at this time?
Mr. Chair, at this time, I move that House Bill 20, work order 34-LS0237
backslash N as amended, be reported out of the Judiciary Committee with individual
recommendations and attached fiscal note.
is reported out of Judiciary Committee with individual recommendations and attached
fiscal note. I also give alleged legal authority to make any conforming changes as needed.
We're going to sign the paperwork after we conclude today's meeting. Thank you so much
Before we adjourn, here's a preview of our next meeting on Friday.
We will take up House Bill 81, House bill 4, and House
Bill 262 for their second hearings.
So that would be marijuana conviction records,
presidential write-in and additional superior court judge.
The time is now 1.58 PM and this hearing of the House Judiciary Committee is adjourned.