001good morning and welcome to the Hawaii state senate committee on Commerce and consumer protection it's Tuesday March 18th 2025 and we are on our 9:30 a.m. Joint Committee hearing agenda between our colleagues from the Senate Public Safety and Military Affairs committee uh and CPN uh as PSM is the lead on this measure I'll yield to chair elepante okay thank you so much uh chair kle um just a few housekeeping announcements limit for testifiers is one minute in the event of a technical failure we will reconvene in conference room 225 on Friday March 20th at 3 o'clock pm uh with that being said we do have a one minute limit on testifiers we just have one item on our agenda and this meeting is being streamed live on the Hawaii state Senate's YouTube channel our only
002item on our agenda today is House Bill 472 house draft one this is relating to digital identification this requires digitalized identification card to be accepted as a valid form of identification under certain conditions authorize State and county law enforcement agencies to accept a digitalized identification card as proof of a person's identity and first on our list of testifiers director Ed sniffin from the Department of Transportation on Zoom not available online chair okay and then we have Jak up wine individual in support that completes our list of registered testifiers anyone else that wishes to testify on House Bill 472 house draft one hey members there's no one to ask questions with um ready to roll into decision making if you're okay with that co-chair yes okay thank you so much okay so recommendation is to pass
003with amendments on page one line S we're going to change the word shall to May on page two line1 we're going to insert a date of July 1st 2027 and then we're going to add a different defective date of July 1st 2077 any further discussion if not acting Vice chair roads for the vote chair votes I uh on hp472 recommendations passed with amendments uh shair elant votes I chair Vice chair Kai is excused Senator fukunaga I I'll vote Yes Senator Dort I recommendations adopted thank you CPN same recommendation any discussion okay if not passing with amendments chair votes I thank you Vice chair also votes I Senator melie yes Senator Richards is excused Senator a is also excused measure is adopted this concludes our joint hearing where J good morning and welcome to the Hawaii
004State uh senate committee on Commerce and consumer protection it's Tuesday March 18th 2025 this is our 9:30 a.m. Joint Committee hearing agenda with our colleagues from the Senate housing committee to consider two measures the first is House Bill 1097 HD1 uh just to note this meeting is being streamed live on YouTube and in the unlikely event that we need to ex uh abruptly end this hearing due to technical difficulties we will reconvene to address any outstanding business on Wednesday March 19th at 10:01 a.m. in this room conference room 229 and a notice will be posted on the legislature's website uh this is a 90minut hearing slot uh as such we need uh our committee observes a two-minute testimony time limit if you've submitted written testimony we have reviewed it and you are free uh during
005your time to clarify or emphasize your written remarks within your time but we' encourage you not to read your testimony in its entirety verbatim because we've already reviewed and Reddit okay again first measure is HB 1097 HD1 relating to public housing evictions uh this measure reduces the time the the Hawai public housing authority is required to store unclaimed personal effects of a tenant evicted from public housing uh first up we have the Hawaii public housing authority in support thank you very much Kevin Carney in support railen tenno in support Kayla Marie in opposition Jennifer Lum in opposition and late testimony from Natalie Graham wood in opposition is there anyone else who would like to testify on this measure members any questions senator flla I understand um you know you're supporting this bill but um my
006my concern with this bill is that given on 14 days um when they get evicted or whatever the circumstances come for leaving their home um is only going to add to the problem that we have on the streets right now you force them to move out but not you don't take it person but then we're not going to be able to I mean understand the storage thing is is an issue because there's a lot of my question is that is that the reason why you supporting it because of the um holding the things for 30 days instead of um 30 days you put 14 days thank you Senator that's one of the reasons uh the other is we we have to keep that unit uh not touched for 30 days while other people are in
007weightless waiting for us to go fix it up so you can have housing and also from past experience what's being left uh is usually what they don't want and it stays there or you found garbage and other things if you leave it for an extended period of time you creat some other health and all that we're okay with whatever the decision is we just feel that when somebody's before they even evicted they're allowed actually few months of going uh to through the eviction by the eviction board not the quote by the eviction board the eviction board has one tenant as requirements and before that they have right to grieve uh so there is a process that takes long it's actually the process is more than 30 days yeah the process takes long before much longer
008before the get evicted uh the the exception uh that we expedite is if it's a crime like like violence or something like that but for rent uh we very first we take a long time before we even send that uh notice and then they have right as I said to grieve and have an informal meeting then a formal meeting then the eviction process process and then after that they are evicted so what is the time what is the timeline to a regular nonviolent procedure what what would what would what would be the timeline for n rant will probably take at least six months before they are evicted because we we don't just because he pay the first month we don't just go ahead we'll send them a violation and wait again and then wait again
009then you go through the process but once the evicted uh from experience we have there's nothing of value that they leave a just the unit stays untouch while other people are sitting there so you guys don't remove the items and store them like how you guys do it yeah the houseless community yeah we don't have storage yes we don't have storage where we can take that and and also to take all of that for example a lot of it is reely garbage that we can throw away but other stuff we don't have facility and then we have to incur cost and these are most of our properties are federally funded properties we don't have to funing for that that's the only reason an average how much uh evictions you guys uh I do in a
010in a quarter uh I I can provide that information for you uh it's not many yeah it's not the only reason why I'm saying I mean I understand he's saying that a lot of that is rubbish or whatever but sometimes even though they had six months or whatever months to find a relocation most of our families going to end up and then this is just my my input um they're going to end up on the beach and then we're going to have more situations with that understand the situation that you guys have somebody need to be in the home um and that's a priority for you guys but then the circumstances of having them scramble whatever time you give them to be uh to vacate the property and to find someplace that they can live
011having some issues with the rent to finding a new location to live um that's going to be an issue um right I think and and I'm not blaming you for how homeless crisis I'm blaming the the vendors but the bottom line is that this is just going to add to the burden of our families being on a street I mean that's just my no I we I understand Senator the only motivation we have is that we can get that unit at least two weeks earlier for somebody also sleeping on the street uh that's been waiting for that place to call home so that's our only motivation nothing else thank you thank you chair I have a followup question what is the what's the size of the weight list at this point uh we we stop
012taking names anytime we open the weight list there's about 10,000 families or so that apply you stop you stop taking names because we don't have how long do you I mean how many names do you hold on it before you stop so what we've been doing now uh initially we used to keep it open and we had over 30,000 families and every family average about three and a half so over 100,000 people wait in so instead of having wait for 10 15 years now we open the weight list about 10,000 then we do a lottery and from the lottery we do about 1,500 to 2,000 families that we keep on weight lless in hope that we can serve them within 3 years four years before we reopen it at any given year we have four
013to 500 units that become available so you hold the the weight list at two two to 3,000 yeah we 3,000 yes and you do about 500 a year correct okay thank you okay um we'll move on to our next measure which is HB 1325 hb3 relating to housing requires developers developing an affordable housing project under hhfdc to assist certain tenants who are subject to displacement or eviction by the proposed project by granting those tenants the right of first refusal of a comparable unit in the housing project at an affordable rate or establishing a fund to provide relocation benefits and offer assistance providing information either directly or through a contracted service how to obtain assistance and exercise the right of first refusal and establishing procedures to track and maintain communication with those tenants establishes consequences for
014developer non-compliance in the interest of time I'll just be uh reading out those who have signed up to testify if your name is not called you can just sign up uh you can indicate your willingness to testify afterwards um first we have hhfdc and support yes uh chair Vice chairs members demon economy white Housing Finance Dev Corporation we s our testimony and support but also want to note that we would support an amendment that would require um both relocation assistance and WR of first refusal in the new project so long as no requirement that the rate uh must be the same as the prior unit and that's because there's no way that we can we would know what the rate was based on for the previous unit might have been a smaller unit older unit
015a special arrangement with the tenant thank you tagawa for Maui in support medical legal partnership for children in Hawaiian support chair my name is Dei I'm an attorney with the medical legal partnership and we've provided direct legal services to tenants at the K Park kuio Park teros as well as just general um folks in our community who are facing evictions and housing challenges um we're in strong support of this bill along with amendments that hhfd discussed and I'm going to try to talk about my testimony because it's very complex to talk about how does this apply to public housing projects and how does this apply to all of them so we've seen how the public housing Redevelopment at KP it's layers of financing it's a federal demolition of public housing as well as hhfdc 201h
016as well as low-income housing tax credits for litech each of those programs has its own rules about what you have to provide for tenants because it's a federal demolition of public housing turning into public uh to there is relocation assistance that's required however if that relocation assistance goes wrong which I think you're going to hear about there has not been enforcement mechanisms this bill plugs that whole it creates enforcement mechanisms at a state level it also creates the right to return which is most important so we're asking for amendment to have both to give the tenants a preference to return to the community that you've moved them from um I'm available for any questions to talk about the complex layers but I will just keep my things short to say it's really complex please look
017at how this applies to projects that use layers of funding thank you thank you next we have Hawaii apple seed Center for Law and economic Justice and support thank you kokua khi Valley CFS in support hello hotair am I on Zoom please go ahead aloh my name is Jesse liman I'm with kok KH valy thank you for taking my testimony chair and committee members on strong support of the bill I've been working with the community here for several years through the Redevelopment process and we know this is the first of several uh large redevelopments of public housing throughout aahu and perhaps the state and seen a lot of our neighbors our co-workers our friends displaced um stressed out having a really hard time with what's happening so we just want to make sure that this
018bill provides the maximum amount of support for people from the community so they can return so communities can stay resilient and unified um and people aren't displaced to create affordable housing that brings other people into the community um and contributes to the homeless crisis so uh thank you for this bill we stand in strong support thank you um Hawaii workers Center in support morning chair Vice chair Sergio alilo I'm executive director of the Hawaii Worker Center we stand in support of this bill uh mainly for two reasons uh first you know our office is located at kpt or as if they rebranded the towers of cahil Park um and you know some of our staff members some of their families are there and uh you know they're still trying to figure out what to do
019for um their family members one of the big issues that that we've seen is some of the folks that do require ADA accommodations they're being sent to places and you'll probably you'll hear from a lot of attendants themselves they're being sent to places that's on the second floor um whereas here at KBT they're on the first first floor because they have you know ADA requirements so I feel like that's a lawsuit waiting to happen itself and second we also organize tenants at with the Maui tenants and workers Association so this is something that's an important issue to them considering kind of just the limited housing Supply they are Maui in itself so for for those two reasons those are the primary reasons we want to support and we want to support of course the tenants
020here um that are going to be sharing their stories and for the organizing work that IAL legal partnership is doing thank you very much thank you Rona mangay mangay in support hello chers and member of the committee my name is Rona mangam the youth services director of kakua Khali Valley we work directly with youth and children some of them are living at lowrise kpt and some of them are already affected by the Redevelopment plan um we ask the I mean I'm bringing some of the voices of our youth some have to move to other places already in halava and have to take a bus at 5:00 in the morning just to be able to attend the school on time in KH one said I don't even know where I come from now am I from
021halava or am I from khi I lost a sense of identity others one I don't know why we need to leave this is our home for us so it's not just a space or a building to live but it is a home for love and safety and laughter and cries are being uh shared in their families um our youth are experiencing so much uncertainty and being able to have this bill to help them give them an assurance that they will be able to return to their home where they found safety is a great Assurance for them and help them in this time of uncertainty also the questions is that are we coming back this is the question that they've kept asking so I believe that passing this bill will help answer that question and I
022hope that you will listen to their voices and answer their questions by passing this Bill thank you very much thank you na Hawaii chapter in opposition chair thank you Dina Sheek in support good morning chairs um my name is Dina Sheek and I want to thank you for hearing um HB 1325 um I'll read this really quickly this bill is about enforcement and accountability to hoi residents to prevent the displacement of families facing Redevelopment in the name of affordable housing um you need to only scroll through and listen today testimony for this bill from people impacted by the devastating naui wildfires and also residents impacted by the kpt Lise Redevelopment that's going on right now um pleading for adequate relocation services and a meaningful right to return um this bill provides enforcement measures that that's
023what's different about this bill right it provides the enforcement measures for when tenants are as we've seen sent to uninhabitable units um when families caring for disabled Elders are sent to um inaccessible walk-ups repeatedly as we've seen and when families with children with serious disabilities are offered units that are far outside of their home school districts and their medical home providers um we it's especially glaring in a place like k and and um the residence that's happening in the current Redevelopment primarily this bill seeks to ensure a meaningful right to return and as such I urge you to change the or to an end which I'm very pleased has a lot of support today so that residents and especially our public housing residents facing displacement are not simply bought out of their right to return
024because that's what I fear could happen if we keep it as an or instead they should be given robust moving and relocation assistance and offered the right to return not everyone will come back but it it's a right that needs to be preserved um the governor is currently planning to demolish I was going to say 1,200 1,187 public housing um units to build 10,000 units is a very important project for the state um and it also includes things like Marite housing is going to turn into 18 to 28 story housing um the least we can do is to ensure the right to return for all of these residents um thank you for your consideration and um um and and this bill that hopefully will prevent further displacement of local families thank you very much for
025your time thank you that's everyone that we have signed up to testify is there anyone else wishing to testify in person so if there are several of you why don't you come up together what so as people come up just fill the seats so you guys can take turns and that way you're not up by yourself yeah I hope I time is correctly uh good morning senate committee members my name is donene Willis I'm attendant and longtime resident of Coho homes in the span of five months I have witnessed families struggle as they search for clarity um the plans we thought would have taken place turned out to be confusing unorganized and careless our own house buing office was not aware of the Redevelopment Only By Word of Mouth the 90-day notice was far from
026promising none of what the letter entailed were ever offered instead we received options that were far from our district units that were dilapidated or decent units only it was smaller than what we currently have so I'm just one voice are part of the phase one project during our peaceful protest I've spoken to a lot of our tenants and they came up to us like with their concerns and they shared with us um some said they were being moved to Towers to the towers in kpt but they don't trust TMO one of them said they're battling cancer and that the project added to their depleting Health a neighbor of mine recently passed before she was able to see her new place and in her last words she wanted comfort knowing that her grandchildren will be well
027looked after um this is destroying families we look out for each other we respect each other and we Thrive as one I just hope there would be more meetings for the community than individual family meetings where there are things that were kept in the dark this is what's destroying our community but thank you for this opportunity for allowing me to share my testimony so be before you get started whoever is next you can just come up and take the seat so that we always have two people in the chair like call okay good morning good morning everyone um my name is Le Lulu I have been attended at C Park terrorist homes for many years uh over about 30 years with my parents being there and we've been there since until this relocation re Redevelopment
028that happened with Michaels and the housing um my main concern is uh I do support this bill first of all is comparable because it is stated on the letters many many many times that where they will place us will be comparable to what unit that we were living at at the time I had moved out I had one one of those tenants that had moved out I think I was one of the first few families that had moved out but I'm still here to be a voice for our community and our elders our disabled our youth our children um I am not a person smart enough to speak in front of you but I do believe that our voices hopefully you folks will hear us all we're asking for is somewhere comparable to our elders
029and our uh disabled especially because they're the ones who are really affected with this there is a unit that I know that they had sent someone to and they said that the paint there's lead on the paint but this family has a child and when we went to see the the our office in KBT the First Choice was you take that unit or sectionate or evicted and that was it and I even bought it but there's lead there how is that possible I'm sure you have a family too you wouldn't want that to happen to your own child too thank you very much for hearing our voices thank you thank you good morning good morning everybody my name is Salu I live in k for so long like 40 years all my kids are born
030there and I they all grown but I know like move out I'm scared I usually live where I stay I love my neighbors and I love where I live please just come and fix what is strong the building are so strong thank you so much for you my voice thank you good morning hi good morning um Senator and chair and vice chair and um all those who are willing to hear so I'm goingon to sing a song and I wrote this song your name please for the oh my name is Landa tomino is [Music] are watch our children grow that are surrounding you would you take a look at all the faces that are surrounding you because we our King [Music] thank you and God bless thank you good morning hello good morning my name
031is JIA I'm also a longtime resident of KB um you know I went to a meeting this past Saturday and I know time is of the essence and it was a beautiful meeting very local kind meeting you know so comfortable speak your mind out but when I look at all the plans that they got going for our Island it's kind of hot broking you cannot stop progress but you can kind of help on how high they trying to build these things in the heart of K that don't makes sense to me trying to save save water and they got these luxurious pools these amenities and half of them they're not even letting the residents used that's kind of brokenhearted to me if anybody knows the wahini from Maui that did a commercial that said it's
032not so much what you do but it's with the heart that you do it please introduce me to her I love her she instilled that so much in me to say that even though our country America has all these flaw in the situation I am so glad that I am under America but there's one thing I want us all to remember that even though we're a state we are still an island within a state please all these things that are taking place on our Island take it into consideration on how they're doing things a lot of the taxpayers don't even know in the in the area of KH they're going to be losing parking we get enough beefs going on in khur we don't need no more problems so these are kind of things that
033I pray that all of you would take into consideration as even though I may be older or same age as some of you young like we say over and over you're like our parents our AA or Ohana so please continue looking out for our best interest too because maybe everybody who not from Hawaii great grandfather mother sister brother born raised here go back wherever I'm going be here till the day I die this is my evening [Music] thank you very much is there anyone else wishing to testify on HB 1325 if not any discussion or questions members who canot I guess I would um ask for Dina Sheek and maybe hakeim uh want Safi to kind of come up and answer some questions okay thank you good morning um you know with respect to this
034legislation you know I know there has been a lot of coverage of um a lot of the concerns being raised and some of the um ongoing rallies that set um I guess on hpa's part and you know with the uh supporters what have you done uh with respect to Michaels because this seems like you know something that could be rectified if we got everyone working together um I I think I'll defer to the chair I know for us we have talked to Michael since the very beginning starting in August and we told them we offered our us to be there we said we work with tenants we went to every single meeting that they had with tenants and kind of talk to them how the communication was not going well that your contracted agency that
035you contracted to do this was not going well and I feel like we were kind of saying this we work with these folks and I felt we were portrayed as kind of Rowdy people trying to stir up things instead of us saying we're we're talking to so many tenants we're providing them advice it's not going well you're not communicating things correctly I was at meetings where Michael straight told folks we don't have to offer you the right to return and we're not going to that narrative quickly changed maybe around November um where they said okay we'll do it because it's the Pono thing even though it's it's in the hhfdc low-income housing tax credit financing the federal program doesn't require that right to return but it is in the low-income housing tax credit financing that's
036why we need this bill to make it clear now I can see people saying it's already there why are you putting this in a bill well maybe it's not in a low-income housing tax credit financing for another project that's in your your District if we're offering preferences for everyone why can't we have that when it's not when we've seen them say it over and over we don't have to provide this so I know it's you know that's it's it's the contractors agencies um representatives from hpha were at a meeting in November that went really bad I think it's just hard for us to say we're bringing up the concerns what more can we do to put enforcement that's why this bill is important because it says you can pull funding if you hear that things
037are not going well thank you yeah thank you and thank you for the question and thank you for everyone uh so there's a lot of things I can't specifically address because of tenant confidentiality at the advice of the AG but I can tell you uh certain things whenever we hear an issue we do contact the developer and work with them and to correct it and most part uh it was corrected as of today about 58% selected the Section 8 and others uh just backing up uh for all of the the tenant and that's 60 families phase one that affected by the relocation they were given three different choices depending on availability one that they can take at any given time is tenant production vouer so nobody's sent to a unit but they have the right
038to choose any unit in fact in the country not just in here and the the company that's been hired to facilitate this and meet uh they've done this relocations many many times and that's that's all they do for living um uh uh on that so uh no one for example that we have documented as a disability will go to a place that it's not it's just it doesn't happen if we don't have a record of it that is a possibility uh the the the the rate of return uh as as eloquently said the federal government and we the PPT is a federal property does not require it however day one we made it requirement on on the developer in writing to to do that and something that would stick with we want it we want
039to do this but the the I think one of the biggest issues relocation is difficult for everyone and it is really difficult and nobody wants to live to leave where they've been living for for years uh but we also look at our Ohana family at kpt but we all as the state of Hawaii as Ohana as well those people that have to leave Hawaii because they don't have a place that's why we have to do three developments uh the backlog that we have uh if we were to fix this keep 1180 units into 1100 instead of 10,000 uh it's close to $700 million so we have to do this private uh private Public Partnerships we I'm not disputing that I'm more interested I mean we we're working on the Marite project for many years and
040that you know was a really important Tod project which somehow you know never quite materialized but I think one of the concerns I would have is that this particular developer has been um in the middle of a number of other problematic uh housing uh issues in other locations and so you know it seems that uh hph would be um really aware that maybe additional assistance needs to be provided because in this particular instance you're dealing with really long established you know family networks you have kkv right there right next to kpt it's it's kind of like we would know in advance that this is going to be a a very very difficult you know set of relocations so I don't know if hph has sought to obtain additional assistance for the Development Group because um
041this is not new yes we have okay and uh I'll update uh this party right after the board meeting on Thursday okay thank you question followed by Richards yeah just not as a preview to the development just listening to the community been there uh lifetime um they doing swimming pools what are they doing over there there are no swimming pools at KP okay so so what is the purpose of the Reconstruction for you because you just came a little bit in the end so is that for Revenue stream to go high what what's you saying about the he to to no just see it can increase density uh this this property is federal properties so we choose them because of the subsidies that stay with the property we also choose them because of the tenant
042protection voucher that the federal government gives to the people so when they are displaced they have place to go anywhere they want with that voucher so we doing it not what we building is still affordable housing we're replacing one for one one the existing housing let's say we demolish 60 we replace 60 then we add additional affordable housing this is not a uh it's all 60% Emi or less everything that's going to be built at the end of the day so the 34 units the first hour for example it's all uh 60% Emi or less and anyone from the tenants who would like to return they return at the renovated brand new unit and they still only pay 30% of their income Senator Richards yeah woman I was going to call up I think she
043just took off so if she comes back I'll I'll ask to speak to her Senator Mel oh [Music] yeah picked the heck of a day just everybody knows know he's a good brother but this is business oh yeah and so um I'm looking your testimony and I'm noticing other groups that are for affordable housing yes in my backyard Chamber of Commerce of for the bill you guys do not your testimony is based all on affordable housing I looked at na opi's mission statement you're a commercial real estate development so what is a commercial real estate development entity that is focused on Commercial Real Estate doing testifying an opposition to affordable housing measure this isn't your space is it no so thank you for the question Senator and just to clarify so NAA poai is a
044commercial real estate development uh Association but we include um our members include developers that are in the affordable housing space as well as many lenders in the affordable housing space um majority of the the major Banks here in Hawai uh are a part of our membership so uh we do typically weigh on an affordable housing um you know measures and we just did want to provide uh the clarification in regards to how this may impact um financing for affordable housing um because of due to the right of first refusal being capped at um you know the current uh a return of a current rate existing rate and rent um that may impact a a Project's viability moving forward on the financing point because it creates additional risk I think these entities should step out from
045behind you and be testifying here themselves not Nai because it creates a very interesting picture for the public when a commercial real estate umbrella entity is testifying against affordable what is obviously a needed thing given the testimony I especially point to yes in my backyard and to the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii to show that this is about housing affordable housing as such so that's the reason why I wanted to ask these questions of you but thank you thank Senator okay Senator Richards yeah thank you thanks for coming back up did I understand correctly that you have moved um no I have I'm personally still a part of the phase one project there still well over um 20 families there you're the one that has moved okay all right actually stay there because um by
046the way thanks for coming in today really appreciate it so you have moved yes and you the accommodations you've been moved to are they Equitable are they acceptable actually I moved out out of the housing okay and I didn't I I didn't get the Section A voucher okay yeah I actually if I can just say a little thing about it I actually moved out because my children helped me get a place off the market because um I have a heart condition and I and they know it was really stressing me out I was admitted at Oregon when I went to go visit my son and from there he just said you know mom we'll just take you out of the housing itself and from section 8 because even though you do Section 8 there's not
047too many units that accept Section 8 and we all know that in Hawaii and there is a waiting list you know we've been because before um moving out I did go to senica trro with Michaels and did the uh everything for moving into another housing and um even the section8 you know and so I did all that with them and um I'll be honest I was one of those tenants who ow who did ow and I did have a balance I'll be honest with that and um but I guess my children seeing how stressed out I was they just felt like just to take me out so the only reason why I'm able to still afford is because of my children who helped it's not because of me and my husband's in come no I
048will either be living with family or basically living at the beach or somewhere homeless honestly just being honestly you know because we wouldn't be able to afford that the rent that my children are paying for us off the market okay all right thank you and I mean you're here Tes because this isn't front you because of the importance of what we're talking about here yes I'm here for voice for everyone that is still affected in Kio Park Terrace honestly there is more than 13 families left at the property you know I think so I I'm not sure but somebody was saying that it was 13 families left no it's more than 13 families when you walk around and you knock on everybody's door we to um update them with the meetings and what's being going
049on you know know because I know there's families who are also working you know and have young children or especially the the disabled and the elders so we're here to be a voice if it's just one or two but we'll be here to voice our concerns for everyone okay thank you and for clarification do you support or do you oppose we support this bill okay thank you thank you thank you chair members any other questions okay okay that brings us to the end of our agenda today um we move directly to decision Mak yeah okay so we'll move into decision- making the recommendation on the first measure House Bill 1097 HD1 is to uh pass with a defective effective date of July 1 20150 any discussion chair Senator mckel thank you um I'll support the
050recommendation with reservations I feel more comfortable if it was a default 30 with um special conditions it could be moved to 14 but I think the way it is now I have some concerns so reservations for now so noted any other discussion not seeing none Vice chair passing with amendments chair votes ey thank you Vice chair also votes ey Senator movi uh reservation please Senator Richards I Senator a I measure is adopted thank you very much and for the committee on housing will make the same recommendation but will defer decision- making until this afternoon 1 p.m. in room 225 thank you for HB 1325 HD3 relating to housing for the committee on housing having conferred the chair will recommend passing this measure with amendments with technical non-substantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency
051further defective date and also we'll take HH fdc's amendment to require projects to provide relocation assistance and the right of first refusal and the same in the new project as long as there is no requirement unit be offered at the same rate as the prior unit Additionally the committee report will also note noops concerns any questions or discussion or well I guess for the committee on housing we'll make that recommendation and I'll also note that for the committee on housing will be deferring decision making until this afternoon at 1M in room 225 and it over to the committee CPN same recommendations uh Vice chair comment um could you specify whether you are taking up the um the Amendments proposed by The Advocates I think that's a complicated question that do you have a specific oh
052Amendment your the one that um the organization medicalert was testifying on um in part in part okay thank you yeah I think specifically the the right to return or first preference but uh not the fun okay okay okay any other discussion seeing none passing with amendments chair votes I for the CPN members present are there any voting with reservations or objections hearing none measure is adopted thank you very much where J so good morning and welcome to the senate committee on Commerce and consumer protection it's our 9:45 am agenda on Tuesday March 18 2025 in conference room 229 uh to hear HB 427 HD2 relating to biocurity I will yield to the lead chair on this the chair of the agriculture committee thank you chair and ALU and good morning for joining us for today's
053joint hearing with the a environment committee Transportation culture and the Arts and also Commerce and consumer protection committee it's Tuesday March 18 2025 we're convene in room 229 and we video conferencing which includes the audio and video of remote participants that's being being streamed live on YouTube in the like the event that the hearing is cut short for any reason the Committees will reconvene to discuss any outstanding business and the public notice will be posted on the ledge's uh website and because of our 90-minute time limit for hearings there'll be a two-minute time limit for all testifiers will have a virtual countdown timer on the zoom screen and we have as chair mentioned one item on today's agenda HP 427 ht2 relating to biocurity part one renames the department of a to the Department of
054Agriculture and biocurity renames the board of a to the board of Agriculture and biocurity part two and establishes and appropriates funds for a deputy director of bioc security part three changes references to the plant and animal declaration form to the biocurity form part four authorizes and specifies conditions under which the department of a and biocurity may declare a biocurity emergency during which the department and the governor may take certain actions to prevent The Establishment or of pests and prohibited or restricted organisms and okay so we'll start off testify testifiers with the Department of a good morning CH thank you chelse AR not from the Hawaii invasive species Council loha chair Vice chairs committee members Chelsea Arnot on behalf of the Hawaiian basis species Council uh we stand on our written testimony and support we did
055add a few comments and suggestions in there just to broaden the uh representatives of the board of Agriculture with the addition of the term biocurity and also just saying um we appreciate this bill and also in the last Committee hearing not um removing language that would move the Hawaiian Bas of species count not lville sb100 that would move the Hawaiian BAS species Council to Department of Agriculture and this bill does not have that language so appreciate that I'm available for any questions Mahalo thank you Robert Hof from DNR thank you Robert uh Stephanie Easley from seaps coordinating group on alien pest species good morning chairs members of the committee Vice chairs my name is Stephanie Easley with the coordinating group on alien pest species which is SE gaps purpose of our organization is to try
056to see gaps in Hawaii's biocurity and we see a couple in this bill that we uh submitted in our written testimony I just wanted to highlight um that we are hoping that the name change of the Department of a to Department of a and biocurity and the board to a and biocurity also has like a substantive change underneath it so that the department has more biocurity expertise we're asking that two um members of that board of Ag and biocurity have biocurity expertise not adding new members but just adding some new qualifications because you know if you look at the statute the duties of the Department of AG to promote agriculture make the land more productive animal husbandry there's really nothing in 2616 about biocurity and then the second thing I wanted to highlight is originally
057this Bill had a quarantine Authority which would be like a biocurity Authority if in one of your districts like little red fire ant or whatever nightmare pest shows up hdab could come and say you can't move anything out of here we're going to treat this and get it under control before it can spread HOA asked that be removed they said it was duplicative of an authority they had in their administrative rules the administrative rules only apply to locations that sell directly to the public um so this Authority would be like if it was at a resort or apartment complex they could do a quarantine they don't have that Authority in law or Bo so we're hoping that you'll put it back in the bill on page 42 and I'm here if you have any questions
058thank you thank you Stephanie next is Brian mamoto from Hawaii Farm chairs Vice chairs members of the Committees thank you Brian we had pen in support one opposed and three comments anyone else wishing to testify on this measure in person or online members any questions um all right Senator Deco Department of a so so you know under this biocurity um you know I noticed that um we've had much challenges with invasive species um would you say that dlnr has been Cooperative in transferring those leases that were to address ranchers that have already been helping with the invasive species in this case the acceptance of those lands because we trying to address invasive species and they have been great stewards have you guys looked at that option so that as we start to look towards funding
059this that we use people that are already doing it versus asking for Budget to do it for you guys yeah uh thank you Senator so um Jonathan plant quarantine branch manager um not a super expert I guess as it relates to the transfer of lands but um the uh proper range land range Land Management um is uh crucial for managing a host of issues um not to mention you know Fire Control and things like that and um my understanding is you know um the department has been working with DNR to transfer lens um I'm not sure as to the speed of the transfer um that's I guess outside of Melana unfortunately um but I know that some have been done um my understandings I think there have been some hiccups here and there um but
060I'm not necessarily uh sure as to I guess the scope as at which that that's occurring thank you is D ARG you members I would note we have one more agenda in this hearing and we have a caucus at 10:30 thank you so so Dyan what have you folks done you know you folks have been asking for funds for biocurity when you guys have perfectly good leases that have been controlling your invasive species from albesia to all these other um fire ants and so forth what's the hold up on the transfer with those leases when these guys have been great stewards of those lands okay thank you for that question Senator um I am not actively uh uh involved in the transfer of lands I'd be happy to have somebody from our department Pi it
061back to you I'm not sure I've seen where it intersects exactly with invasive species but you bring up a great point and um we'll we'll get in touch with you and give you an answer to that question because I would I would hope that basically the obesia trees fire ANS and everything else that they have um helped prevent it as well as Wildfire uh risk mitigation has been huge you know in a time when we're struggling for Budget here so if you can get back to us I think that would be super appreciative thank you chair uh Department please Senator what this is this um in the commit report it's asking and I know we're swapping out or it's we're looking at s sp100 to swap into this but both ask for 12.7 million for
06244 full-time positions the last time is this is this an extension of the last time we did this or is this 44 my understanding is that these are the positions that were um uh provided by the legislature through act 231 it's the same 44 positions um we had a problem with that we weren't able to hire right because people couldn't qualify they didn't have the specific degree needed to to get those positions as of them tell about that so um so for the um I guess the the specific as it relates to um or I guess the the the technical um minimum qualifications as it relates to the the positions at least for the plant quarantine inspector positions we don't necessarily really have that challenge um most of the positions are for line inspectors um
063the challenge is that the funding doesn't so the positions the funding for the positions doesn't pass um September or June 30th so um getting people in a position where the funding doesn't pass that is a little bit of a challenge um our line inspector positions um Statewide with the exception of um Maui and Kona which we've had um u a hard time um over the years getting in line inspectors just the cost of living is pretty difficult um but the rest of the position were like for example on aahu um I have only a single position that's vacant that position is because the person retired um December but the most of the other position I'm I'm able to get new recruits pretty quickly I we're not happy inspectors of of the 44 positions how many
064were filled the last time it was over 40 uh the 44 I think I can't it's a handful perhaps you could uh take that back and provide the Committees with an updated report on the status of the 44 yeah we we can provide that for you I'm sorry about that well that it's a good question thank for meeting so we cans we're yeah we're gonna vote right we're voting okay all right let's just take a brief recess for uh decision making okay reconvening the uh chairs have heardred and we've come up with the following recommendations uh number one we're going to replace all the contents in HP 427 HD2 and insert s sp100 sd2 into HP 427 number two we're going to insert the following blank general fund Appropriations uh blank appropriation for construction at
065the halava animal quarantine station a blank appropriation for construction at the halava animal industry facility and number three we're going to adopt the language that's proposed by the coordinating group on alien pest species or SE gaps to the house committee on agriculture and Food Systems during their hearing of sp100 and2 those are the uh recommendations any discussion discussion yes chair I I would like to make note of the testimony from H invasive species Council on the on moving it back to the Department of a as well as incorporating in your committee report that in order to help us um prevent invasion species or address the situation that dlnr focused on transferring those lands right away so that the department of egg can continue to work on long-term leases for these ranchers that have been doing
066a good job on stewardship environmental issues and the prevention and attack of invasive species as so thank you thank you chair quick discussion sure um I think we've seen a evolution of the concerns for biocurity coming forth and this is elevating the concern I would ask maybe included in the report that though this is a step we may need to elevate biocurity to a higher level and I'm talking like even a a cabinet position so just as a include the report that in the committee report all right all right so uh for a chair's recommendation is to pass with amendments chair votes I Senor thank you um on passing with amendments chair votes I Vice chair votes I Senator decoy I Senator rhods is excused and Senator a charity of four in favor motion is
067adopted thank you members committee on Transportation culture and arts same recommendation if there's no discussion chair for the vote thank you chair the committee on transportation and culture and the Arts chair's recommendation to pass HB 427 house draft two with amendments Senator Lee chair Lee Vice chair goes I Senator alanti Senator kuha Senator Dort hi okay measures adopted Mr chair thank you uh CPN members same recommendation on the measure any discussion seeing none Vice chair passing with amendments chair votes I thank you of the CPN members present any voting with reservations or objections hearing none measure is adopted thank you thank you and that concludes the 945 good morning welcome to the Joint Committee of on education and commerce and consumer protection we have a hearing one one bill House Bill 624 HD1 relating to
068school psychologist testimony list sorry to testify superintendent chair kidani Vice chair Kim chair Koh Vice chair fukunaka and members of this committee Rox senro Carol testifying on behalf of the Department of Education the department stands on its written testimony in support of this measure thank you for the opportunity to testify thank you Christopher Fernandez morning Sher kidani morning Sher and members of the Committees uh my name is Christopher Fernandez I'm here to stand on the board of psychology testimony supporting and offering comments thank you thank you Christopher lesie Berard on Zoom Le there yeah I'm here apologies it's not letting me start my video um I'm trying to there we go aloa uh chairs and Senators uh thank you for the opportunity to testify my name is lesie bonck I am the current legislative chair
069for the Hawaii Association of school psychologist um School psychology has only existed in Hawaii since 1999 despite being a field since 1897 about 100 years late to the party we Remain the last state in the Union to not have credentialing for school School psychologists we also are the only mental health providers in the state to not have a credential and this poses a serious consumer protection risk to the Ki of Hawaii uh marriage and family therapists licensed Mental Health Counselors social workers clinical psychologists Etc all have a pathway to credentialing while School psychologists do not this work group is the first step in the right direction towards getting the consumer protection that our Kei and our schools uh need and I'm available for any questions as I wrote the first draft of the Bill uh
070in 2014 thank you so much thank you lesie next to testify Alec marentic good morning thank you for this opportunity to testify my name is Alec Mork I'm a school psychologist on the big island uh I stand on my written testimony and I just would like to underscore two key pieces of information one that credential School psychologists are um explicitly named as eligible for uh reimbursement under school-based Medicaid claiming which can provide extra funding support towards mental health initiatives for the doe second uh I noticed some testimonies stated that Texas is the only state that credential School psychologists under their Boards of psychology um and I just want to highlight that um Louisiana New Hampshire Virginia Ohio and West Virginia also regulates specialist level School psychologists under their Boards of psychology thank you is there
071anyone else here wishing to testify on this measure if not numbers questions resis reconvening The Joint Committee on education and and commerce and consumer protection uh on House Bill 624 the recommendation of the chair will be to pass with amendments defecting the date to July 1 2050 members discussions if not for the vote chair vots I for House Bill 624 house draft one recommendation is to pass with amendments chair votes I Vice chair votes Senator hasimoto excuse Senator kuha I Senator Dort four members voting i1 excuse recommendations adopted CPN member same recommendation any discussion Senator Meli U no thank you for moving the bill I just hope in the future that the Hawaii Psychological associ Association can be added as a member of the working group because of the experience and the licenser issues that
072have been risen so but thank you chair I'll be V so Vice chair for the vote chair votes I thank you uh the CPN memb is present are there any voting with reservations or objections hearing none measure is adopted that concludes this hearing thank you