Senate committee hears bill to streamline University of Alaska access to Department of Labor data

Senator Bjorkman convened the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee on March 9 and opened the first hearing on SB 181, a bill described by staff as enabling formal data sharing between the University of Alaska and the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

The bill, presented by Tim Lampkin, staff to Senate President Stevens, seeks statutory authority to streamline collaboration so university researchers and state analysts can produce cross-sector reports and statistical analyses more efficiently. "It supports collaboration between University of Alaska and the Department of Labor and workforce development," Lampkin said, framing the measure as a way to reduce administrative and opportunity costs.

Chad Hutchison, state director for government relations for the University of Alaska system, testified the university supports SB 181. "We support SB 181," Hutchison said, adding that barriers to data collection create operating costs in time and money and constrain evidence-based research to inform state policy. Dr. Brett Watson, an economist at the University of Alaska Anchorage's Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER), told the committee federal datasets often lack the sample size or timeliness needed for Alaska’s communities and that Department of Labor wage and salary records provide more specific, actionable information. "SB 181 provides a solution to this," Watson said, arguing the bill would allow the university and department to collaborate more efficiently while protecting confidentiality.

In questioning, a committee member asked what specific data the bill would cover. Watson said the interest is in wage and salary information collected as part of the Department of Labor's administration of unemployment insurance, which can reveal who is working, where, and what they earn — information that can supplement federal sources for community-level analysis.

Wilma Harbor of the Department of Labor's Division of Employment and Training Services said the department has entered ad hoc agreements with the university in the past and has no programmatic concerns with the concept, but stressed that any formalized process would need to meet federal security requirements. "We have a history of working with them sporadically. This would just formalize the process so that it wouldn't take so much work," Harbor said.

The committee took no final action on SB 181 but set the bill aside for further consideration at a future meeting.

The committee plans to reconvene later this week to continue its agenda.