STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2664

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 2782

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2018

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred S.B. No. 2782 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PERSONAL PRIVACY,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to specify that certain government records that are maintained by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands are not required to be disclosed to the public or open for inspection pursuant to public records requests.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands; Ho‘omanapono Political Action Committee; and Ho‘omana Pono, LLC. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Office of Information Practices.

Your Committee finds that section 10-1-3(d), Hawaii Administrative Rules, requires that all "[p]ersonal data received or recorded by the department [of Hawaiian home lands] shall be held in absolute confidence and no release of information shall be made without written approval of the individual concerned". Despite this, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands has received Uniform Information Practices Act requests for specific homestead application files and homestead lease files that include personal contact information, genealogies, finance and loan documents, successorship forms, permission forms regarding the use of records in the file, and other correspondence. This measure ensures the privacy of personal data and records maintained by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands and authorizes the Department to discuss those data and records in executive meetings.

Your Committee notes that this measure creates a new chapter of the Hawaii Revised Statutes that consists of a single section of new statutory language. Given the substantive provisions in this measure, it would be preferable to insert the new statutory language into part III of chapter 92F, Hawaii Revised Statutes, instead.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Inserting an effective date of July 1, 2050, to encourage further discussion; and

(2) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2782, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2782, S.D. 1.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Judiciary,

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BRIAN T. TANIGUCHI, Chair