STAND. COM. REP. NO. 529
Honolulu, Hawaii
, 2005
RE: S.B. No. 1593
S.D. 1
Honorable Robert Bunda
President of the Senate
Twenty-Third State Legislature
Regular Session of 2005
State of Hawaii
Sir:
Your Committees on Water, Land, and Agriculture and Intergovernmental Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 1593 entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO LAND USE,"
beg leave to report as follows:
The purpose of this measure is to expand and enhance the use of rural districts in Hawaii.
Testimony in support of this measure was submitted by the Department of Agriculture, Land Use Commission, C&H Farms, and Land Use Research Foundation of Hawaii. Testimony in opposition to this measure was submitted by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, the City and County of Honolulu Department of Planning and Permitting, Hawaii Association of Realtors, Hawaii's Thousand Friends, Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation, and Sierra Club. Comments were also submitted by the Department of Land and Natural Resources, Office of Planning, and Office of Information Practices.
Your Committees find that rural districts are a special resource within our State, and by creating more opportunities to utilize the rural designation, citizens will look at their land not just as real estate but as the means to build communities. Thus, this measure will:
(1) Allow counties to work with the Office of Planning to develop policy and recommend statutory amendments to the land use law and petition for district boundary amendments which would expand and enhance the use of rural districts;
(2) Convene an advisory group for redefining rural districts;
(3) Allow counties an opportunity to reclassify areas of land into rural land use districts; and
(4) Appropriate the necessary funds to accomplish these tasks.
Your Committees have amended this measure by:
(1) Clarifying the language within this measure to enable rather than mandate the counties to perform the study, convene advisory groups, develop work plans, develop criteria for mapping lands, and develop procedures for amending rural district boundaries;
(2) Clarifying requirements for the study to review boundaries;
(3) Clarifying the scope of the advisory group;
(4) Providing that the advisory group may conduct public hearings in accordance with Chapter 92, Hawaii Revised Statutes;
(5) Providing that the one-time reclassifications to rural districts shall be limited to lands that were classified as agricultural and subdivided prior to June 4, 1976; and
(6) Making technical, nonsubstantive stylistic changes.
As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Water, Land, and Agriculture and Intergovernmental Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1593, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1593, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Water, Land, and Agriculture and Intergovernmental Affairs,
|
____________________________ DAVID Y. IGE, Chair |
____________________________ RUSSELL S. KOKUBUN, Chair |
|