House committee holds bill directing DOT to prioritize state facilities that support single-egress communities

A committee substitute for House Bill 317, which would direct the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT) to develop long-term plans to keep state-owned facilities functional during natural disasters and longer-term environmental change, was discussed at length and held for further work by the Alaska House Transportation Committee on May 5.

The CS (version g) directs DOT to develop a prioritization framework that covers “areas of wildland fire risk,” replaces the narrower “wildland urban interface” term, and explicitly includes off-road facilities necessary for egress — such as certain state-owned airports — while requiring DOT to consult tribal entities as part of its planning process. “This version directs the department to develop long term plans to ensure that its facilities remain functional both in cases of natural disasters and longer term environmental changes,” staff Aidan Nickel said as he walked the committee through the four changes in the new draft.

Committee members pressed sponsors and DOT officials on the bill’s scope, likely costs and which agency should lead the work. Representative McCabe said she remained “concerned” the matter might be a Division of Natural Resources responsibility rather than a DOT responsibility and said she would provide a DNR memo on the question. “I continue to believe that this is a DNR responsibility, not a DOT responsibility,” McCabe said during the discussion.

DOT legislative liaison Andy Mills told the committee DOT’s primary role during active wildfires is supportive — communications, road closures and rerouting — but that the bill’s sponsor seeks pre-event planning to prioritize egress and facility resilience. Mills warned that expanding the bill’s scope would raise costs and complexity. “For our part, we would be working with [DNR] datasets to overlay them and understand where the overlap is and where the information would lead to prioritization under the requested report and priority list,” Mills said.

On cost, staff read DOT’s planning-phase estimate of $73,000 into the record; Mills cautioned that a broader CS would almost certainly increase the fiscal note. Mills also gave a concrete example to illustrate scale: an Old Glenn Highway right-of-way clearing effort cost about $1,000,000 to clear a few miles. “It would be easy to contemplate … this would be probably not tens of millions, but a 100 or more million in time if you were doing all of the work,” Mills said, adding that work would be phased and prioritized rather than completed statewide at once.

Members raised operational questions: would DOT reassign existing maintenance crews or need to purchase equipment, and would volunteer or local road service area efforts be hampered by permits and liability? Mills acknowledged permitting can be onerous but said it exists to protect safety, traffic control and private-property interests; he recommended exploring “designated community action corridors” — larger preapproved swaths where vetted work could proceed under agreed conditions — and suggested possible legislative fixes on indemnification to reduce liability barriers.

Sponsor Representative Kai Holland said the intent is for the state to take the lead on assessment and prioritization so local road service areas and private roads could then use the planning standards to qualify for grants and perform work consistently. “By working with the state, we’re hoping the planners and the approach there would give us some definition to what roads should look like that go to isolated communities that will function adequately for getting emergency apparatus in and supporting evacuations,” Holland said.

The committee adopted the CS as its working document for discussion but ultimately announced it would hold the bill to allow further legal refinement on ownership language, fiscal updates and interagency coordination. Next steps were not scheduled in the hearing record.

The exchange highlighted three concrete items the committee asked DOT and the sponsor to address before further action: clarify statutory language about which airports/facilities are included (state-owned only or broader), produce an updated fiscal note reflecting the CS’s expanded scope, and coordinate with DNR and tribal entities to clarify roles and datasets used in the prioritization framework.

The discussion concluded with the chair thanking staff and DOT and the committee moving on to closing remarks before adjourning.