Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2004

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Commerce, Consumer Protection and Housing, to which was referred S.B. No. 2528 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to appropriate funds for the loss mitigation grant program and to modify program criteria relating to matching fund percentages and reimbursable costs.

The State Department of Defense, Oahu Civil Defense Agency, Hurricane Risk Mitigation Task Force, and Hawaii Association of Realtors testified in support of the measure. The Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs testified in opposition to the measure.

The State's loss mitigation grant program was established to encourage the installation of wind resistive devices in residential property. The program reimburses homeowners for fifty per cent of their costs to purchase, install, and inspect wind resistive devices, up to a maximum amount of $2,100.

This measure reduces the State's match from fifty per cent to thirty-five per cent of the homeowner's cost, consistent with the thirty-five per cent solar energy system tax credit, repeals the authorization for reimbursement of inspection costs, and appropriates $1,000,000 in general revenues for the program. Your Committee finds this measure will reduce the program's administrative costs and enable the award of a greater number of grants.

Your Committee has amended this measure to clarify that the expending agency for the appropriation is the department of commerce and consumer affairs, and not the insurance commissioner.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Commerce, Consumer Protection and Housing that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2528, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2528, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.