STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2530

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 3338

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2022

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Labor, Culture and the Arts, to which was referred S.B. No. 3338 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE KALAUPAPA MEMORIAL,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate funds for the design, plans, and construction of the Kalaupapa Memorial, to be expended by the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations' Office of Community Services.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from one member of the Maui County Council, Ka Ohana O Kalaupapa, ‘Ahahui o nā Kauka, IDEA Center for the Voices of Humanity, and thirty-four individuals. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Department of Budget and Finance and Department of Labor and Industrial Relations' Office of Community Services.

Your Committee finds that the purpose of the Kalaupapa Memorial is to commemorate nearly eight thousand individuals who were isolated on the peninsula of Kalaupapa, Molokai, due to government policies on Hansen's disease starting in 1866. Your Committee further finds that many of these individuals are left out of the history of Kalaupapa because only about one thousand of their graves can now be identified. The Kalaupapa Memorial will return these names to the history of Kalaupapa that they helped to create, to their family histories, and to the history of Hawaii.

Your Committee notes the testimony of the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations' Office of Community Services stating that it does not have the institutional background in Hawaiian cultural issues, nor has it been a participant in the planning process, unlike the National Park Service and the Department of Land and Natural Resources.

Your Committee further notes that the property where the Memorial will be constructed is owned by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands and leased to the National Park Service. According to the Office of Community Services, the Kalaupapa area is currently being administered, in one way or another, by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, Department of Health, and the National Park Service.

Accordingly, your Committee has amended this measure by changing the expending agency of the appropriated funds to the Department of Health.

Your Committee finds, however, that the issue of the department under which the construction and management of the Kalaupapa Memorial falls merits further consideration and requests that your Committee on Ways and Means examine the matter.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Labor, Culture and the Arts that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 3338, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 3338, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Labor, Culture and the Arts,

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BRIAN T. TANIGUCHI, Chair