STAND. COM. REP. NO. 1937

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2025

RE: S.B. No. 825

S.D. 2

H.D. 2

Honorable Nadine K. Nakamura

Speaker, House of Representatives

Thirty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2025

State of Hawaii

Madame:

Your Committee on Finance, to which was referred S.B. No. 825, S.D. 2, H.D. 2, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EVICTION MEDIATION,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to:

(1) For a one-year pilot period beginning on February 5, 2026:

(A) Extend the required period for notice of termination for failure to pay rent from five business days to ten calendar days;

(B) Require landlords, or their agents, and tenants to engage in mediation and require landlords or their agents to delay filing an action for summary possession if a tenant schedules mediation;

(C) Require landlords, or their agents, and tenants to be responsible for their own attorneys' fees and costs in prelitigation mediation, unless the tenant defaults on a mediated agreement or fails to attend a scheduled mediation; and

(D) Require landlords or their agents to provide specific information in the ten-calendar-day notice to tenants;

(2) Require the Judiciary to report to the Legislature no later than ninety days after the termination of the pilot program; and

(3) Appropriate funds for the Judiciary to contract for mediation services.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Judiciary; Department of Human Services; Kuʻikahi Mediation Center; The Mediation Center of the Pacific, Inc.; Hawaii Appleseed Center for Law & Economic Justice; and four individuals. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Hawai‘i Association of REALTORS.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Finance that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 825, S.D. 2, H.D. 2, and recommends that it pass Third Reading.

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

____________________________

KYLE T. YAMASHITA, Chair