STAND. COM. REP. NO. 625

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2025

RE: H.B. No. 304

H.D. 1

Honorable Nadine K. Nakamura

Speaker, House of Representatives

Thirty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2025

State of Hawaii

Madame:

Your Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 304 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE HAWAIIAN LANGUAGE,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to require that the Hawaiian version of a law be held binding if the law in question was originally drafted in Hawaiian and then translated into English.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Judiciary and two 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 the Attorney General.

Your Committee finds that in 2007, the United Nations adopted the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and this measure would contribute to the growing international movement for the protection of the rights of the world's indigenous peoples.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Specifying that the Hawaiian version of a law shall be binding if the law has not been later amended, codified, recodified, or reenacted in English;

(2) Changing the effective date to July 1, 3000, to encourage further discussion; and

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

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 304, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 304, H.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Finance.

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

____________________________

DAVID A. TARNAS, Chair