The Senate Labor and Commerce Committee moved forward on House Bill 116, a measure to allow commercial fishermen to form member‑owned insurance cooperatives in Alaska without being regulated as insurers under Title 21 of state law.

Representative Louise Stutes (House District 5, Kodiak, Cordova, Seward), presenting the bill, said the measure implements Recommendation 10(a) of the Joint Legislative Task Force on evaluating Alaska's seafood industry. "House Bill 116 would allow commercial fishermen to enter into a cooperative insurance agreement to pay claims arising from liability or damage to a vessel without being regulated under Title 21, the state's insurance code," Stutes said.

Witnesses, including Tracy Welch, executive director of United Fishermen of Alaska, Laurie Wing Hyer, director of the Division of Insurance (state), and Bob Kehoe (manager of existing pools that operate under Washington law), told the committee that rising premiums and reduced availability from private underwriters are making insurance costly or unavailable for many vessel owners. Welch said cooperatives can provide a lower‑cost alternative and noted several pools already operate for Alaska vessels from Washington.

Director Wing Hyer explained the bill's operation to the committee: it mirrors language in Washington's insurance code that exempts such cooperatives from insurance‑company regulation while allowing the members to underwrite risks, set underwriting guidelines and make pool determinations. "They would control their own destiny as respects insurance on the vessels," the director said.

Committee members asked practical questions about governance and recourse. Wing Hyer responded that a cooperative could refuse to insure a given applicant but could not, once a vessel was a member, simply refuse to pay claims based on caprice.

Representative Stutes and invited testifiers said the pools currently managed from Washington insure roughly 840 vessels and that Alaska‑based cooperatives could permit underwriting rules tailored to local realities, including coverage for older or wooden vessels and dividends for good loss experience. Stakeholders said the change would come at no cost to the state and could lower operating costs for commercial fisheries hit by high operating expenses and soft markets.

Committee action: Representative Stutes presented the bill and invited testimony; the committee moved to report the bill with individual recommendations and attached fiscal notes (motion adopted "without objection" in the transcript). Next steps include committee recommendations and any fiscal attachments as the bill advances.