STAND. COM. REP. NO. 244

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 1107

       S.D. 1

Honorable Colleen Hanabusa

President of the Senate

Twenty-Fifth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2009

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committee on Commerce and Consumer Protection, to which was referred S.B. No. 1107 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO CONDOMINIUMS,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose of this measure is to merge the duplicative educational trust funds inadvertently resulting from the recodification of the condominium laws into a single trust fund for the education of condominium owners, associations, developers, and managers. 

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Real Estate Commission.  Testimony in opposition to this measure was received from the Hawaii Independent Condominium & Cooperative Owners.  Comments on this measure was received from the Hawaii Council of Associations of Apartment Owners.  Written testimony presented to the Committee may be reviewed on the Legislature's website.

     Your Committee finds that the condominium management education fund and the condominium education trust fund that exist under current law already operate as a single fund for practical purposes and that the creation of two separate funds was an inadvertent effect of the recodification of the condominium law. 

     Your Committee heard concerns from Hawaii Independent Condominium & Cooperative Owners that moneys paid into the trust fund by individual homeowners should be used to finance education for owners and not for developers or associations.  Therefore your Committee has amended this measure by:

     (1)  Requiring that the Real Estate Commission include in its annual fund report to the Legislature a separate accounting for moneys paid into the fund by individual homeowners;

     (2)  Requiring that the Real Estate Commission include in its annual fund report to the Legislature a separate accounting for expenditures on education directed at  individual homeowners; and

     (3)  Requiring that the Real Estate Commission make its educational publications about condominium owners' rights and responsibilities available to individual homeowners in both printed and electronic formats. 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Commerce and Consumer Protection that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1107, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1107, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Commerce and Consumer Protection,

____________________________

ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair