by Melissa S. Green

SB 11, the Alaska Hate Crimes Act, passed the Alaska Senate Judiciary Committee on February 25, and was referred to Senate Finance.  Nearly two weeks later, where’s it at?

The answer: it’s nowhere. It’s stalled, and Senate Finance hasn’t even scheduled it for a hearing. But with the legislative session ending on April 17, there’s little time to lose to get action on this bill.

Please call or write to Senate Finance co-chairs Sen. Lyman Hoffman and Sen. Bert Stedman and to other members of the committee and ask them to schedule a hearing as soon as possible. 

• Lyman Hoffman (D), co-chair
  Senator_Lyman_Hoffman@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-4453
• Bert Stedman (R), co-chair
  Senator_Bert_Stedman@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-3873
• Donald Olsen (D)
  Senator_Donny_Olson@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-3707
• Dennis Egan (D)
  Senator_Dennis_Egan@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-4947
• Joe Thomas (D)
  Senator_Joe_Thomas@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-2327
• Johnny Ellis (D)
  (Note: Sen. Ellis is a co-sponsor of SB11)
  Senator_Johnny_Ellis@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-3704
• Lesil McGuire (R)
  Senator_Lesil_McGuire@legis.state.ak.us
  (907) 465-299

About the bill

The bill has been mischaracterized, particularly by its opponents, as “LGBT hate crime legislation.” This is incorrect.  While sexual orientation and gender identity (defined as “actual or perceived gender-related characteristics”) are in the bill, so are a whole lot of other personal characteristics which motivate bigots to commit hate crimes.  The bill’s full title, properly speaking, is:

An Act relating to the commission of a crime when the defendant directed the conduct constituting the crime at the victim based on the victim’s race, sex, color, creed, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, ancestry, or national origin.

It’s important to be aware of this when discussing the bill or writing to legislators about it, particularly as opponents like Jim Minnery of the Alaska Family Council are denouncing it on the grounds of its inclusion of sexual orientation/gender identity alone. Our support of it should be on the basis of its inclusion of sexual orientation and gender identity, yes; but also because it would serve notice that crimes motivated by prejudice or hatred of Alaska Natives, Pacific Islanders, Asians, blacks, or whites; Muslims, or Christians; disabled people, or nondisabled — cannot and should not be tolerated in Alaska.

For complete information about the bill, see my post of February 25 about it.  For more on Jim Minnery’s reality-challenged attack on it, see John Aronno’s excellent analysis, also from February 25.

The vote in Senate Judiciary

In comments on my February 25 post, it was reported that the vote to pass the bill out of the Senate Judiciary Committee and on to Senate Finance was 3 to 1.  Turns out that was wrong.  The actual vote, as recorded in the Senate Journal for February 28, was:

• Senators French and Wielchowski — DO PASS
• Senator Coghill — DO NOT PASS
• Senator Paskvan — NO RECOMMENDATION

That was 2 to 1, with one abstention. So if you wrote a letter of thanks to Senator Paskvan…well.  At least he didn’t vote with Coghill.  (Sen. Lesil McGuire was absent.)

Another thing to note from the Senate Journal for February 28 was that two fiscal notes relating to the costs of enacting the bill were filed.  The Alaska Department of Correction, could not make any determination on what the act, if passed, would cost DOC.  The Department of Law reported that enactment would lead to no further costs to DOL.

So what’s holding Senate Finance up in acting on this?  It surely can’t be the bill’s high costs.