Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Higher Education, to which was referred H.B. No. 1749 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this bill is to establish a criminal offense review committee in the William S. Richardson school of law.

The bill provides that the committee would be composed of representatives of the Judiciary, the Legislative Reference Bureau, the Attorney General, the county police and prosecutors, the county corporation counsels, the Public Defender, and the law school. The committee would examine criminal offenses established by state statutes (other than the Hawaii Penal Code) and state rules and by county codes and rules to identify offenses expressly denominated or classified as petty misdemeanors or misdemeanors or for which imprisonment and fines of less than $1,000 are provided and which are considered non-serious in the plain meaning of that term.

The bill also directs the review committee to recommend changes to the identified offenses that would make the penalties more consistent with the penalties imposed for decriminalized traffic infractions and to prepare legislation accordingly for the 2006 session. Finally, the bill contains an appropriation to support the work of the committee and provides that the committee cease to exist upon adjournment sine die of the 2006 legislative session.

Your Committee finds that much of this work has already been accomplished by the Legislative Reference Bureau in its report "Decriminalization of Nonserious Offenses: A Plan of Action," Report No. 3, 2005, which was prepared in response to H.C.R. No. 261, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, adopted in 2004. Accordingly, your Committee has amended this measure to require the review committee periodically to provide the Judiciary with a list of offenses that meet the criteria set forth in the bill. The Judiciary will then identify any offenses that, typically, are punished only by a fine and those offenses that appear before the courts most frequently. The review committee will then work with the departments and agencies responsible for administering the identified statutes and rules to see if those offenses can be decriminalized in whole or in part and recommend changes accordingly. Thereafter, the Legislative Reference Bureau will draft legislation implementing those recommendations for consideration at the next regular legislative session.

Your Committee has further amended the bill by deleting references to county statutes and rules and the county corporation counsels and by deleting the appropriation language.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Higher Education that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1749, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1749, H.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Judiciary.