STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2758

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 3158

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirtieth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2020

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Transportation and Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 3158 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO MOTOR VEHICLES,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to increase highway safety by making it a violation of Hawaii's highway safety law to intentionally or knowingly manufacture, import, distribute, sell, and install nonfunctional or counterfeit airbags, or to intentionally or knowingly sell or install a device that causes the diagnostic system of a motor vehicle to fail to warn of the counterfeit, nonfunctional, or of the absence of an airbag in the motor vehicle.

Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Transportation; National Insurance Crime Bureau; Alliance for Automotive Innovation; Automotive Anti-Counterfeiting Council, Inc.; Honda North America, Inc.; and one individual. Your Committees received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Hawaii Auto Dealers Association.

Your Committees find that airbags that meet federal safety requirements that are properly installed are an important safety device and vehicle owners who have them repaired expect that the repaired airbag to also meet the same federal safety requirements and are properly installed in the motor vehicle. Your Committees find that counterfeit airbags present a serious public safety risk to consumers. Counterfeit airbags are known to malfunction by either failing to inflate or by inflating but expelling dangerous shrapnel. This measure provides recourse for motor vehicle owners who have the misfortune of having an airbag replaced with a worthless counterfeit. Your Committees note that the measure as written could have the unintended consequence of exposing a person who sells a used vehicle not knowing that the used vehicle has a nonfunctioning or counterfeit airbag to felony prosecution. Therefore, your Committees have amended this measure by adding language to clarify that the penalty only applies to a person who has the intent that the counterfeit airbag replace the original automaker airbag.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Transportation and Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 3158, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 3158, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Judiciary.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Transportation and Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs,

________________________________ CLARENCE K. NISHIHARA, Chair

________________________________ LORRAINE R. INOUYE, Chair