STAND. COM. REP. NO. 947

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 917

       S.D. 1

Honorable Colleen Hanabusa

President of the Senate

Twenty-Fourth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2007

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 917 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PUBLIC SAFETY,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose of this measure is to direct the Department of Public Safety to develop a plan by January 1, 2008, to return to the State by July 1, 2009, all female prisoners incarcerated out-of-state and who are residents of this State.

     Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Hawaii State Commission on the Status of Women, Community Alliance on Prisons, Hawaii Youth Services Network, and two individuals, all in support of this measure.

     Your Committee is informed that one hundred seventy-four women who are residents of the State are incarcerated in prisons on the mainland due to the lack of adequate facilities in the State.  This relocation not only affects the prisoners but, equally if not more importantly, it can have an adverse effect on any minor children of these women prisoners who are left behind in the State.  Accordingly, because of this concern, the Department of Public Safety is directed to immediately develop a plan to return all female prisoners who are residents of the State of Hawaii to the State by July 1, 2009.

     Your Committee has amended this measure by:

     (1)  Requiring that the Department of Public Safety report to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2008 on its plan to return to the State by July 1, 2009, all female prisoners who are residents of the State of Hawaii;

     (2)  Incorporating into this measure the contents of Senate Bill No. 911, requiring that the Department of Public Safety undertake a study to identify three potential sites, two on the island of Oahu and one on a neighbor island, for the development of a new minimum security prison to hold a minimum of five hundred inmates and to include an intensive mandatory substance abuse treatment program;

     (3)  Incorporating into this measure the contents of Senate Bill No. 916, S.D. 1, directing the Department of Public Safety to consider the feasibility of selling or leasing the Oahu Community Correctional Center site and using the proceeds of the sale or lease for the development of a new facility;

     (4)  Incorporating into this measure the contents of Senate Bill No. 919, S.D. 1, requiring the mainland branch of the Department of Public Safety, Corrections Division, to submit quarterly reports about the conditions of each resident of the State of Hawaii who is incarcerated in a prison on the mainland under the Interstate Corrections Compact; and

     (5)  Making technical nonsubstantive changes for purposes of clarity and consistency.

     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. 917, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 917, S.D. 1.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Ways and Means,

____________________________

ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair