Alaska Employment Law

In 1992, Congress enacted the Community Health Aide Program to address dental problems of Alaska Natives; as part of CHAP, Congress also created a Community Health Aide Certification Board to license dental aides.   Five years later, Congress created the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium (ANTHC) to contract with the Indian Health Service to implement CHAP.  Starting in 2000, ANTHC employed DHATs, unlicensed by the State of Alaska, to provide dental services in rural Alaska.  All these federal acts furthered a primary purpose of the 1976 Indian Health Care Improvement Act (IHCIA) - to increase the number of Indians entering the health professions.

In January of 2006, the Alaska and American Dental Associations sued ANTHC and eight DHATs for practicing dentristry without any Alaska license, in violation of the licensing rules for dentists (AS 08.36) and dental hygienists (AS 08.32).   

ANTHC removed to federal court (Case No. 3:06-cv-00039-JWS), but Judge John Sedwick, in June of 2006, remanded to state court.   The dental associations then added the State of Alaska as a defendant.   The parties cross-moved for summary judgment in December of 2006, and argued the motions on June 15th before Superior Court Judge Mark Rindner.  Judge Rindner issued his 21-page opinion on June 27th.   He held:

Stated simply, under the federal statutory scheme, federally certified DHATs are today performing dental procedures in rural Alaska in order to help accomplish the specific dental health care objectives identified by Congress.  Under state law the DHATs could not lawfully perform such work and indeed would be subject to possible criminal prosecution for doing so.  AS 08.32.180; AS 08.36.340.  State law thus clearly obstructs the execution of the purpose of federal law.  Federal regulation of Indian health care is comprehensive and pervasive; requiring DHATs to obtain state dental licenses before providing certain dental procedures to Alaska Natives would frustrate the accomplishment of the federal objective and obstruct the execution of the IHCIA’s purpose.

Rindner, thus, held that Alaska dental licensing rules were in actual conflict with federal law, and therefore pre-empted.

Tom Van Flein of Clapp Peterson represents the Alaska Dental Society; Douglas Serdahely of Patton Boggs represents the American Dental Association; Aaron Schutt, Myra Munson, and Richard Monkman of Sonosky Chambers represents ANTHC; and Michael Hotchkin and Paul Lyle of the AG’s office represent the State.

The Alaska Dental Society v. State of Alaska, Case No. 3AN-06-04797CI (Order of June 27, 2007).