Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2004

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 1556, S.D. 1, entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to clarify the determination of shorelines for shoreline certifications and building setbacks.

Specifically, this measure:

Your Committee finds that this measure clarifies the definition of "shoreline" so that the "upper reaches of the wash of the waves" are used to locate the shoreline rather than the vegetation criteria that often does not reflect the upper reach of the wash of the waves. The imprecise use of "vegetation" as the shoreline certification criteria has resulted in the loss of public property to private interests. In some cases, coastal homeowners have encouraged the encroachment of vegetation onto public coastal areas by planting vegetation and allowing its growth onto public property that is then claimed as their private property.

Your Committee has amended this measure by allowing an exception to the shoreline definition for facilities, equipment, or property owned or controlled by a public utility, which provides that "shoreline" means the upper reaches of the wash of the waves, usually evidenced by the edge of vegetation growth or by the upper limit of debris left by the wash of the waves.

Additionally, your Committee has amended this measure by making technical nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and uniformity.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Ways and Means that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1556, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1556, S.D. 2.