STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3167

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 3089

S.D. 2

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2022

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred S.B. No. 3089, S.D. 1, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to:

(1) Clarify state and county emergency management authority;

(2) Ensure effective and adaptable emergency responses; and

(3) Further the goals of transparency and democratic accountability inherent within the Hawaii State Constitution.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Defense; Hawai‘i Emergency Management Agency; State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers; United Public Workers, AFSCME Local 646, AFL-CIO; and Hawaii Government Employees Association, AFSCME Local 152, AFL-CIO. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, Common Cause Hawaii, and one individual.

Your Committee finds that the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic has highlighted the importance of clear legal frameworks for state and county emergency management to ensure the State and counties are ready for any type of emergency. Your Committee further finds that chapter 127A, Hawaii Revised Statutes, should clearly specify and articulate the bases for emergency actions. This measure will benefit the Department of Defense, state and county agencies, and the public by clarifying state and county emergency management authority, ensuring effective and adaptable emergency responses, and furthering the goals of transparency and democratic accountability inherent within the Hawaii State Constitution.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Prohibiting the Governor or a mayor from suspending requests for public records or vital statistics during a declared state of emergency and allowing for a reasonable delay in an agency's response to a request as a result of extenuated circumstances;

(2) Changing "severe weather warning" to "severe warning" and broadening the definition to include severe warnings by other entities;

(3) Eliminating the need for most supplementary proclamations for permits, authorizations, or approvals to allow for repair work to continue beyond the emergency period;

(4) Clarifying that the Governor's authority to be the sole judge of an emergency is subject to the Legislature's termination of a state of emergency;

(5) Allowing a county council, by an affirmative vote of two-thirds, to terminate emergency proclamations made by a mayor; and

(6) 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. 3089, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 3089, S.D. 2.

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

________________________________

KARL RHOADS, Chair