STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2156

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 3357

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 Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 3357 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO NATIVE HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate monies for certain departments to provide grants to tax-exempt non-profit organizations that have experience and expertise in supporting and advancing native Hawaiian communities.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, Hawai‘i Tourism Authority, ‘Apoākea Native Hawaiian Innovation Institute, The Friends of Iolani Palace, Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement, Kapolei Chamber of Commerce, and six individuals. Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Center for Hawaiian Sovereignty Studies. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Department of Budget and Finance; Department of Land and Natural Resources; Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; and Department of the Attorney General.

Your Committee finds that various assistance and education programs for improving Native Hawaiian communities are effective and necessary. These programs include Hawaiian historic preservation, development of a mill to process ulu and taro, business and entrepreneurship mentoring, farming, cultural training, and environmental management. Therefore, the purpose of this measure is to appropriate funds for departments to contribute to these non-profit organization efforts.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Reducing the twenty-year experience requirement for qualifying nonprofits to ten years;

(2) Specifying that the grants shall be awarded in conformance with the award granting standards of section 42F-103, Hawaii Revised Statutes;

(3) Replacing the following appropriation amounts with an unspecified amount:

(A) To the Department of Agriculture: $10,790,000;

(B) To the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism: $3,450,000;

(C) To the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations: $920,000; and

(D) To the Department of Land and Natural Resources: $540,000;

(4) Designating the Hawaii Tourism Authority as the agency responsible for community-based tourism management;

(5) Designating the Office of Community Services as the agency responsible for the cultural training program;

(6) Designating the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement as the recipient of repatriation and reburial funds from the Department of Land and Natural Resources; and

(7) 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 Hawaiian Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 3357, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 3357, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Hawaiian Affairs,

________________________________

MAILE S.L. SHIMABUKURO, Chair