STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2997

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    H.B. No. 2872

       H.D. 3

       S.D. 1

Honorable Shan S. Tsutsui

President of the Senate

Twenty-Sixth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2012

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committees on Public Safety, Government Operations, and Military Affairs and Economic Development and Technology and Water, Land, and Housing, to which was referred H.B. No. 2872, H.D. 3, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO AEROSPACE HIGH TECHNOLOGY DISTRICTS,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to allow aerospace high technology parks to be located on lands within agricultural districts.

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism, Office of Planning, and The Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii.  Your Committees received comments on this measure from the Department of the Attorney General.

     Your Committees find that aerospace high technology parks will offer educational and career opportunities to students of the University of Hawaii at Hilo, which will make the University of Hawaii at Hilo more attractive to future students and will provide opportunities for the commercialization of intellectual property developed at the university of Hawaii at Hilo through research dollars invested in the university.  Your Committees also find that an aerospace high technology park will create an additional influx of research dollars through the nexus that such a park and its participants will have with the university.

     Additionally, your Committees believe that places like Hilo should be designed around the concept of "Main Street" as a place of traditional values.  Main Street communities and architecture represent the interests of everyday working-class people and small business owners.  In small towns across the United States, Main Street is not only the major road running through town but also the site of all street life and activities.

     Your Committees have amended this measure by deleting its contents and inserting language to temporarily establish an aerospace high technology district in the County of Hawaii, extending for a distance to three miles out from downtown Hilo, that is eligible for benefits pursuant to this measure, as more particularly designated by the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism.

     Your Committees envision an aerospace high technology district in Hilo to be similar in concept to the ‘Imiloa Astronomy Center in Hilo, which is an economic development project made possible by the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.  The ‘Imiloa Astronomy Center is located above the University of Hawaii Hilo campus.  The center has forty thousand square feet of planetarium and exhibition space, which was funded primarily by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.  ‘Imiloa means "seek and explore" in Hawaiian and the center seeks to merge Hawaiian and Polynesian culture with astronomy through the one hundred or more exhibits and displays presented in English and Hawaiian.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Public Safety, Government Operations, and Military Affairs and Economic Development and Technology and Water, Land, and Housing that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2872, H.D. 3, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2872, H.D. 3, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Public Safety, Government Operations, and Military Affairs and Economic Development and Technology and Water, Land, and Housing,

____________________________ CAROL FUKUNAGA, Chair	____________________________ WILL ESPERO, Chair
	____________________________ DONOVAN M. DELA CRUZ, Chair