STAND. COM. REP. NO. 144

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 582

       S.D. 1

Honorable Shan S. Tsutsui

President of the Senate

Twenty-Sixth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2011

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committees on Public Safety, Government Operations, and Military Affairs and Water, Land, and Housing, to which was referred S.B. No. 582 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO COUNTY MUTUAL AID,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish:

(1)  Procedures for an inter-county mutual aid sharing of potable and non-potable water in times of emergency; and

     (2)  The Hawaii Statewide Mutual Aid System in times of a homeland security activity or activities in response to a disaster.

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from one individual.

     Your Committees find that in times of emergency, any county in the State may be vulnerable to shortages of potable and non-potable water.  As an island state, every county in Hawaii is geographically isolated from each of the other counties.  As the most important resource to sustain life is water, your Committees further find that each county should be able to depend on another county as a source of water during times of emergency when the lack of water in sufficient quantity threatens the public health and welfare.

     Your Committees also find that in times of disaster, the counties should render mutual aid to one another pursuant to a written mutual aid agreement executed among each of the counties at the discretion of a particular county.  The response effort to provide mutual aid is in accordance with the National Incident Management System guidelines of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, United States Department of Homeland Security, and includes sharing of personnel, equipment, and resources and medical and fire fighting services.

     Your Committees have amended this measure by making a technical, nonsubstantive amendment for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Public Safety, Government Operations, and Military Affairs and Water, Land, and Housing that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 582, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 582, 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 Water, Land, and Housing,

____________________________ DONOVAN DELA CRUZ, Chair

____________________________ WILL ESPERO, Chair