STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3159
Honolulu, Hawaii
RE: H.B. No. 1938
S.D. 1
Honorable Donna Mercado Kim
President of the Senate
Twenty-Seventh State Legislature
Regular Session of 2014
State of Hawaii
Madam:
Your Committees on Agriculture and Commerce and Consumer Protection, to which was referred H.B. No. 1938 entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO MEASUREMENT STANDARDS,"
beg leave to report as follows:
The purpose and intent of this measure is to clarify that the current standards published by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) and the Society of Automotive Engineers are adopted for use by the Measurement and Standards Branch of the Department of Agriculture, except as may be amended by rules of the Board of Agriculture.
Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; Department of Agriculture; Chevron Products Company; MidPac Petroleum; and Aloha Petroleum, Ltd.
Your Committees find that this housekeeping measure is necessary because the Department of Agriculture's fuel specification rules have not been updated to reflect current and accurate ASTM standards regarding ethanol blending and are not consistent with federal law and other state laws and administrative rules.
The Department of Agriculture expressed concern that this measure addresses standards that are properly addressed in administrative rules, rather than by statute. Your Committees assured the Department that this measure does not preclude the Department of Agriculture from updating its administrative rules relating to measurement standards as it deems necessary.
Your Committees have amended this measure by:
(1) Removing language clarifying that the current standards published by the ASTM and the Society of Automotive Engineers are adopted;
(2) Inserting language to clarify that the rules adopted by the Board of Agriculture referring to ASTM D4814, relating to standard specification for automotive spark-ignition engine fuel, shall be deemed to refer to version ASTM D4814-13b adopted in 2013, as modified by the National Institute of Standards and Technology Handbook 130, part IV, subpart G, section 2.1 adopted in 2013; and
(3) 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 Agriculture and Commerce and Consumer Protection that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1938, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1938, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Agriculture and Commerce and Consumer Protection,
____________________________ ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair |
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____________________________ CLARENCE K. NISHIHARA, Chair |
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