Senate Standing Committee on Government Operations

Aloha, everybody. Welcome. This is it. I know you've been waiting the whole year for GBO. Committee first hearing is Tuesday, January 28, 2025. 3:00pm we are now in Conference Room 225. Meeting is being streamed live on YouTube.

In the unlikely event we have to abruptly end this hearing due to technical difficulties or acts of nature, the Committee will convene to discuss any outstanding business at 3:30pm on Thursday, January 302025 in room 225, this room. And we will also issue a public notice which will be posted on the Ledge website.

In order to facilitate a brisk and timely hearing, we're asking everybody to please, please adhere to our 2-minute time limit testimony. Less is better. We'd like to really encourage everybody. We got the written, believe it or not, we learn how to read somewhere along the line.

So use the time to expound on the written and maybe make some points that you didn't or have or like us to know. And also the practice for this Committee is to defer decision-making on all measures that are heard today to the next Committee hearing. Okay?

So we'll be deferring all measures on today's agenda for decision-making on the next agenda. Just so everybody knows that in advance they can kind of get on with their day after they're done testifying. Okay? And then we will be reconvening for that decision-making Thursday, January 30, 2025 at 3:30pm in Conference Room 2 to 5.

And that is it. With that, we'll get the ball rolling with Senate Bill 254 relating to procurement. This increases the procurement thresholds for small purchases. First up, we have SPO Bonnie Kahakui.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee Administrator, State Procurement Office. We will stand on our written testimony in opposition to this Bill. We believe that raising the threshold is contrary to the one of the principles of procurement which is to ensure that all persons are afforded and okay, if.

You'ree going to, you're going have to come up, you're going to actually read it. So you can stand or come up. Stand. I'll stand. Good. You know you're not a fan of the Bill. We've done this several times, but we believe in this. The counties believe it anyway. Next up, Addison Bullason, Council Member, Kauai County Council.

Written in support, Michael from Managing Director, City and County of Honolulu. Written in support, Timothy Lyons, subcontractors, CM E2 is in support. Written we have late from Director, Sniffin Department of Transportation thank you so much. We greatly appreciate that. And then we the newest Member of our Committee. We also have a late from Mr.

Elgin Arquero, a major finance division for the Honolulu Police Department. Thank you for being here. Appreciate it. That's all we have on 254. Anybody in the audience wishes to testify who I did not call. Seeing none. Members, are there any questions on this repeat Bill? Seeing none.

Seeing none, let's move on to the next one on the agenda which is Senate Bill 383 relating to small purchases. This increases the small purchase procurements from 25 to 50,000 with a report to the Legislature. First up, we have, again, SBO.

Testimony in opposition.

Okay. Thank you so much. Next up, we have our State Librarian, Mr. Aldrich, testimony in support. Mr. Sniffen, Director Sniffen again, DOT?

Hello, Chair, Vice Chair, and members. DOT, and we're in support.

Thank you so much. And of course, Mayor Richard Bissen, County of Maui. The head of this administration have submitted written testimony in support. That's all we have on 383. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to testify on this measure who I may not have called? Seeing none. I don't have any questions.

Any questions. Members, do you? Nope. Okay. We'll move on to the next one which is Senate Bill 462--no, sorry--382--my bad--relating to procurement. This is, this is for--prohibit a procurement officer from disclosing a competing offeror's proposal or evaluation score. First up we have SBO.

Strong support.

Okay. Got one you like. We also have--and it's good to see some, I guess alignment instead of agreement--but we also have Director Sniffen, Department of Transportation.

Testimony in strong support.

Okay, thank you. We really appreciate that. That's all we have on 382. Is there anybody in the audience who wishes to testify who have not been called? Okay, seeing none.

We're going to go to 462 procurement contracts. This is requires all performance incentive contracts to specify a pricing basis, performance goals and a formula. Let's see. First up, we have spoiled. Thank you so much for the comments. We appreciate it. Director Hayashi, Department of Education. We have written testimony with comments as well.

That's all we have on 462. Is there anybody else in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none. Members questions. Seeing none would go on to 131. And we have one testifier spo. It's like joining a gym, isn't it? We appreciate your comments, Director. Thank you for them.

Anybody else who wishes to testify or weigh in on 131 seeing none. Members, are there questions on this bill? Seeing none. We'll move on to the next bill which is 615. This would require any procurement change order that increases the contract cost by more than 50% to be considered a new contract for procurement purposes.

First up, we have SPO. Okay, thank you so much. You say that would probably drag you for questions or bill you're not even here for. Keith Regan, comptroller.

Good afternoon Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. Keith Regan, Comptroller for the Department of Accounting and General Services. We stand on our written testimony providing comments on spirit.

Okay, thank you so much. And then we have late from Shannon Holman, President of the American Council Engineering Companies of Hawaii. We have written in opposition from them. That's all we have on 615. Is there anybody else in the audience wishing to testify?

Seeing none, we will move on to the next bill on our agenda, which is Senate Bill 5. And this one would, basically provides for state legislation, legislative vacancies. And so we only have one testimony from Mr. Jacob Wiencek, an individual in support. Is there anybody in the audience who wishes to testify on this measure? Seeing none.

Members questions. Seeing none, we will move on to Senate Bill 300. And this one is establishes this is relating to state legislative vacancies. And this establishes an unspecified deadline for the Governor to appoint and for political parties to nominate individuals that fill certain state senatorial vacancies. First up on 300 we have all individuals.

Lynn Matsuo written in opposition. Jacob Weirnick, individual in opposition. Brent Kobus, individual in opposition. And finally we have a late from Mr. Michael Honda. He is in support. That's all we've received on 300. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to testify on this measure? Seeing none, no Members, nobody asked questions of.

So we'll move on to the next bill, and that would be Senate Bill 1081, legislative budget office. This would establish a legislative budget office to produce fiscal analysis and reports on bills. First up we have Ted Kefalas, strategic campaign director for Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. Written in support.

Doug Meller, League of Women Voters of Hawaii, in support. Ben Creps, Public First Law Center, in support. Jacob Wiencek, again, individual written in support. We have late from Pam Tumpap, Maui Chamber of Commerce, in support. And then Nicole Wu, director of research for HCAN, Hawaii Children's Action Network Speaks. They are in support.

That's all we have for submitted written on 1081. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none. Members, are there any questions on 1081? Pretty self explanatory. With that, we'll move on to the next one. Senate Bill 711, this would also gubernatorial appointments.

This requires a person appointed to serve an Executive branch to obtain the advice and consent of the Senate. The person's salary is greater equal to several positions including that of the Governor. First up we have Mr. Will Kane from the office of the Governor not here they are written in opposition and we have late from Mr.

Mr. Michael Honda, individual in support. That's all we have on--anybody else wishing to speak on 711? If not, there's nobody here to ask questions of so we will move right on to 375 which is relating to government, establishes and appropriates monies for a select commission on government restructuring. Let's see...375, and I see we have Mr.--only one testimony is an individual, Jacob Wiencek, written in support. That's all we have for that measure.

Anybody wishing to testify. Seeing, I can see why not. Think big. Text century. Okay well with that we'll go on to Senate Bill 418 which is relating to sunset regulatory sunset review in Hawaii we require the AG's office to do an admin review of 20% of the rules every year. First up we have Attorney General's Office.

Good afternoon Chair Mr. Chair Members of the Committee still academy at the reasons stated in my testimony we proposed.

Okay next up Jay Butai DLIR. Okay sounds good and Nadine Nondo DCCA. Okay thank you so much. Next up we had Ted Kafalas from the Grassroots Institute of Hawaii. They are in support. We have Jacob Weirnick individual in support. We have late from Don Chang DLNR.

Good afternoon Chair, Vice Chair. Bindi on. Behalf of Dong Cheng thank you so much.

To the point next up is Pam Tunpap President of Maui Chamber of Commerce late testimony in support that's all we have on 418. Is there anybody else in the audience who wishes to testify? Seeing none Members questions I have a quick one of the AG's office.

This this will be an anomaly trustee this this bill I just taken from other states and so this idea has been vetted and established actually in another state. The idea being you have all of these admin rules that are promulgated yet the statutes that gave them that ability are either gone or off something.

Don't you think there's a need to do some kind of review to see what rules are being promulgated on things that don't exist because that's a basic legal fundamental principle, right?

Correct. I think part of the problem is the complications in the admin rule process to amend or repeal the rules it takes a lot of effort And a lot of money to repeal an admin rule.

But don't you think they should have thought of that before they were promulgating more rules? It seems like to me you're saying, well, it's going to take too much time and effort so we cannot do it. But it takes the same amount of time and effort to add more rules.

I think maybe this could be another factor is that the rules are promulgated by chapters. So if they are doing they're adopting another chapter, perhaps they don't have the time, the money to go through the additional chapters that they have.

But couldn't exemptions be made? Obviously working on a case by case basis, Other states have done this. They're moving the ball forward on this idea. So must be something that can harmonize with what's being done elsewhere.

I'm not sure what the other states have as far as their procedure for repeal. It could be that they have.

It's a recommendation. We're not telling you to repeal it. We're telling you to identify things that.

Should be potentially and I think, you know, the agencies probably can identify them, but it's to actually go through the steps to repeal or amend. That's really difficult.

Yeah, go for it. So if the agencies believe that there are some archaic rules and they really shouldn't be wrong, so isn't there a way that the agencies at least could do a self evaluation of what rules they administer and then come to the AG for support in terms of maybe making it easier to repeal archaic laws?

They already do run their rules through the AG's office, but it's just the procedure, the steps that need to be taken to amend or repeal is very complicated.

Is it possible for the AG to look at the process for amending rules and revise that so it's more streamlined and easier for them to change rules?

I don't want to answer on behalf of the AG, but I'm sure that. It could be done. All of us deputy AGs would be really happy if the procedure was shortened.

Is it in rule or is it in law?

It's in rule. No, actually no, it's in law. It's under 91-3. It's a quite extensive requirements.

Because it seems that not only are rules archaic, but the procedures might be. Yes. And ways in which we are evolving and want to, you know, improve and be more innovative in state government that it hinders us from doing the jobs we need to do.

I just want to note that when I saw the AG on open day, I mentioned this and she was seeming to be supportive of the idea. So quite a change around.

And again, where this thing is about you identifying rules that again, the statutes were either appealed among which these rules, because like you said, they're just making rules upon rules upon rules to which there's no statutory authority. And now you have a body of law that is agency driven and the Legislature is kind of in the backseat.

I think some agencies have a few rules and some have a lot of rules. And I know like for the procurement rules, just Chapter one chapter is enormous. It's like got hundreds of rules within it and it's really quite a task to. To have to identify all of the rules within there.

I mean, I don't think any of them need to be repealed. But just to make an amendment, we have to do the entire chapter all at once. And that's many subchapters. So you're talking about hundreds of sections. So that could be changed if it's in rule.

So you can say that you can do whatever needs.

I don't think that like the repeal procedures are not in rules. That's by statute.

But I guess we're asking you to identify them. And I don't. Hopefully you guys can work with us on this bill to create something that other states are doing that would comport with the role of Attorney General's Office to ensure legality in our processes.

Amendment to this bill.

We're deferring everything till next hearing anyway. I'll carry back that information. Thank you. Longest discussion we've had on any of them. All right. Speaking of rules and admin rules, we have another one, Senate Bill 55.

And this has ELG put up the text of the rules of agencies available on their website and is digitally accessible and in a format that people can obtain readily. And with that we have lieutenant governor's office, Sylvia Luke.

Thank you. Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Michelle, on behalf of office. So the Lieutenant Governor will stand on our written testimony. Comments.

Okay, thank you for that. And Ted Kefelis for Grassroots. We got written in support. Doug Mellor, League of Women Voters of Hawaii. They are in support. Ben Kreps, Public First Law Center in support, and Peter Fritz individual in sub written support. We have Ulani Naipo, individual written in support, and Jenny Yagodich individual in support. That's all we have.

55 posting of rules. Anybody in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none. Members, any questions on this repeat Bill? Seeing Seeing none. We'll move on to the next one. Is Senate Bill 870. This is relating to telecommunication.

This requires a comptroller to identify state office buildings that can provide equitable telecom access to allow certain residents, including residents with disabilities, to promote--participate remotely in ledge hearings. And so, first up, we have the comptroller.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, members of the committee. Keith Regan, Comptroller for the Department of Accounting and General Services. Stand on our written testimony providing comments on this measure.

Okay, thank you so much. First we have a Daintry Bartoldus--sorry if I butchered your name--Hawaii State Council on Developmental Disabilities. They have written in support. We have Stacy Aldrich, librarian. Written in support. We have Erik Abe, Hawaii Primary Care Association. They are written in support. We have Michael Marsh, Responsive Caregivers of Hawaii, in support.

Annette Tashiro, individual, writing in support, and then finally, Kirby Shaw, DCAB Director. He too has written in support. That's all the testimony we received on this measure. Members, are there any questions?

Yes. I'm way back here, but I have a question.

Go ahead.

So the only person who testified is Keith Regan, so could you come on up? While everybody else did written testimony, you're the only one who stood up.

Come on down.

So here's--I generally agree with your testimony, Mr. Regan, that the library is already providing these type of resources. The problem is, have you ever gone to library and tried to go online?

I, I personally have not, but according to the conversations that we've had with the Hawaii State Public Library System, they claim that they have the infrastructure to be able to support these types of activities.

Okay. But they don't have the numerosity probably needed. So as a library patron who sees the, who sees the sign-up sheets, if somebody else has signed up for your time, you're not going to be able to go on. So unless we have dedicated or prioritizing testimony over general use, then those resources are actually not available, even if they may have the infrastructure. So I think we still need to build, don't you?

I don't disagree, but I think there's an opportunity to leverage the existing facilities and the infrastructure and to require that they make those facilities available during the time that these committee hearings are scheduled, right? So they certainly have--as we know, libraries have changed, right, over the last couple of decades in terms of how they're being utilized.

And you know, now they're offering all kinds of services to people, right, that weren't available two decades ago, and I think this is in alignment directly with the kind of services they could provide with the community.

The building is there, the infrastructure is--maybe they need to build out some of, you know, additional bandwidth, right, so that they can allow for better telecommunications, right, to be able to connect to these committee hearings. But rather, I'm just thinking about DAGS and DAGS managed buildings that we have out there, right, throughout the State of Hawaii.

And of all the buildings that are sort of in our inventory, the libraries are probably--and they're not in our inventory, but we support them on the neighbor islands-- they're designed to allow for people to be able to come in and use their services. We just need to improve them, right, and require that the libraries make the facility available to the public specifically for purposes of testifying, right?

I think if we clarify that and we make it clear, to your point, that people that come in and want to testify because they want to join a committee hearing can't be turned away. I think it solves the problem, right?

So prioritization or possibly would you consider amending this to include, like, partnerships with the county?

Sure.

Because like, on Hawaii Island, we allow for remote testimony, so maybe we could use their facilities. So that's my request, is an amendment to not only DAGS's facilities, but to consider county facilities as well.

Yeah, and the other part too, that--if I can just mention really quick--is that what's great about the libraries is you have staff that are dedicated and are there, right? So in terms of if any questions come up or if there's any technical issues or, you know, anything like that, now you've got--you sort of have a dedicated resource, right, that's present versus if we were to--I'm just trying to think of, like, if we did it at the State Office Building in Hilo as an example, in a room.

Well, who's going to be there to manage that, right? Like, are we going to have a staff member? Do we need now more people, right? We kind of already have those people in place, right, at the libraries.

So I'm going to--having used the State Building in Hilo, you folks do have a facility in the basement of the State Building, yeah?

Well, that's our DAGS facility.

Yeah. And it's, it is a DAGS facility? So it can be possibly, I guess--you're right. It's not open 24 hours or--but that's in a report that may be possible.

Sure. And we're happy to explore all those alternatives, right? But I'll tell you that the DAGS staff that's actually in the basement at that building, their public works and central services function, right, they're not IT folks, right. So in terms of being able to provide those type of, like, technical services, like, if there's an issue connecting, right, to these hearings, I just caution that they may not be the right resources to do that.

But they have done that because I have had a hearing there, even pre-Internet. I mean, even pre--even before I was in the Legislature.

You mean, like open up a conference room, you know, to be able to--yeah, sure.

They've done that?

Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Thank you.

Well, first of all, there is a conflict. I mean, the librarians--I can't speak for them--but they've got to help other people. To drop everything and say, 'oh, I got to take care of you because there's a ledge hearing going on.'

You're welcome.

And we also ran into this when we had the metal plans thing of trying--people needed access on the computers and they were coming in to fill out their forms and stuff, and they're being told, 'no, the priority is for users.' So you're going to have to tell everybody, 'hey, we got to kick you off because there's a legislative hearing going on. These people get to use this stuff.' I mean, that's--I think it's not going to work out in reality.

Or they may be able to repurpose area within their facility, right, specifically for these types of hearings. I'm thinking about, like the Kahului Civic Center as an example, right, where hopefully we'll build a new facility there. But there is tremendous opportunity, I think, to really utilize that relationship with the libraries to use some of that space specifically for this purpose.

Have you sat with a librarian about--okay, because they're going to want, they're going to need more equipment, they're going to need more people, they're going to need more space. I mean, has there been any conversation with them about how to--

I haven't recently, but I think when this came up, I think this may have been a, something repeat. Yeah. So there had been some preliminary discussions with Stacy and the library system.

I would also reach out to University of Hawaii System because--

Yeah, I think that's a great opportunity.

But I think, again, Maui is a state office tower, so maybe as this bill moves forward, there can be some kind of cooperative effort to identify, to create more opportunity, as Senator was saying, for neighbor islanders, in particular kupuna, to participate in these areas.

Yeah, I'm happy to explore that.

Cool. Well, we'll have a chance because it's probably going to keep going. Okay, thanks. Thanks, Chair. Any other questions? Members at this point might have elicited okay. If not, we're going to go on back to the Sunshine Law again. Senate Bill 270. This would authorize any Member, let's see.

Of a board to attend an informational meeting or presentation on matters relating to board businesses, provided the meeting of presentation is not specifically exclusively organized for directed towards Members of the board. First up, we haveCarlotta Amerino, Director for the new Director for OIP.

Good afternoon. Chair, Vice Chair.

Okay. Chair Alice Lee, County of Maui Council, written in support. Addison Bulosan, Council Member for Kauai, in support. Fern Holland, Council Member from Kauai, is too in support. Let's see, we have Doug Meller, League of Women Voters of Hawaii, written in opposition. Ben Creps, Public First Law Center. You're there. Go ahead, sir.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Member of the Committee. My name is Ben Creps. I'm with the Public First Law Center. We respectfully oppose this measure. You've got our written testimony. But the highlights are basically that this measure, as drafted, would blast a huge hole in the Sunshine Law.

It would allow every board in the state to attend secret meetings and not have to report anything about it. In 2016, the Legislature enacted Section 92-3.1B, and that is specifically for county councils and allows the full council to attend community meetings with reasonable guardrails to ensure that the public's informed.

And so the proponents of this bill haven't explained why that previously enacted section isn't working for them or why they shouldn't have to abide by the guardrails that the Legislature imposed in that section. And it also, frankly, doesn't appear that they're aware of it.

So there may be, you know, more targeted ways to provide any flexibilities that the councils need. But this is not that bill. It's broad, it applies to all boards, and it would gut the Sunshine Law if enacted. So please defer this bill, and I'm available for any questions.

Sounds good. That's all we have. Anybody in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none. Members, questions? Okay, seeing none. We'll move on to Senate Bill4.05 and this one relating to neighborhood Board Meetings. This would allow neighborhood boards to discuss and receive information from third party reports by any government official not included in a publicly noticed agenda.

And first up, we have the Director of oip. Thank you so much. Next up, Natalie Awasa, individual, written in opposition. Jacob Weirnick, individual, he is in support. And Mr. Bob Finley, who I believe is on the Waikiki Neighborhood Board. He too is in support. Funny, I would know that. So that's all we have on 405.

Is there anybody in the audience who wishes testifying on neighborhood boards? Seeing none. Members, are there any questions on this? Since I'm not from here. You two, any questions?

So, OIP Director answer. So you have comments on this bill, and I haven't read totally your comments, but the problem is that the neighborhood boards are totally voluntary and they're having problems with having to Go by the Sunshine Law with noticing because they meet just once a month.

So is this bill, with your comments, can it be amended so that it addresses that concern where they ask third party elected officials go to the meetings and they can't be asked questions because they think Sunshine Law prohibits that?

But is it clear in this Bill now or can it be clarified so that those kinds of informational exchanges.

Senator, I believe there is another Senate Bill that would address the neighborhood board's concerns regarding notice and ability of third parties and government officials to make presentations. I apologize, I don't recall the Bill number offhand, but I can get that for you. That might be a better measure to. For the neighborhood boards to pursue that avenue.

So you believe that this Bill doesn't do that to correct that problem that they're seeing in terms of the Sunshine Law and how they deal with informational presentations by legislators or council Members or the mayor?

I don't think this is the right Bill for that. This Bill applies to when a board attends another body's present, another body's meeting or a conference, a seminar, things of that nature. It's not meant to apply to a neighborhood board or any other board and their own meetings.

So you believe that this, this, the amendments in this Bill does not address the problems that have been raised about having third party reports, third party officials coming to the neighborhood board and reporting and having information?

No, Senator, I don't think it was meant to address that. Respectfully. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you so much for the question. Any other questions on neighborhood boards? Thank you. If not, we will move on to the next one, which is Sentville 406. And these are copying fees. Again, this is a repeat special. This prohibits the cost of reproducing government records from exceeding $0.05 per page sheet or fraction thereof, with exceptions. First up, we have OIP.

Thank you, Chair. We stand under written testimony from writer comments. And I just would like to make that this Bill clarify the maximum.

Thank you for that pointing that out. Next up, we have ERs, Thomas Williams. He has testimony comments. We have Grassroots Institute written in support. Doug Mellor, League of Women Voters in support. Not too many times to see LWV and the grassroots supporting the same Bill. Nancy Cook Lauer, Publisher, All Hawaii News. That is written testimony in support.

Tiffany Edwards, Hunt for Big Island Press Club. Written in support. Ben Kreps. Are you on zoom still no. Oh, he is. Fire away. Sir, you're up.

Hi again. Ben Krebs, Public First Law Center. We'll stand on our written testimony and support.

All right, next up, we finally have late from DAGS.

Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the community, Comptroller, Political Department of Accounting and General Services. We stand on our written testimony opposition.

All right, thank you so much. All right, that's all we have on copying fees. 406. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none Members are there any questions?

Yes, I do.

Fire away.

Keith Reagan, come on up. Yeah, you're. You know it. So. So I. I agree that $0.05 per page is not a realistic for trail. So how much is the cost?

Well, you see, in our testimony, we've provided information in terms of what we estimate our cost to be. Actually, sorry, it's about 10.4 cents per pages just for the lease of the photocopier itself. So it's probably around 15 to 20 cents per page for us if you included the labor. Right. That's associated as well as the materials.

Okay. Okay. Thank you.

You're welcome. And Chair, if I can, I just want to. Our opposition is purely related to the cost.

It's not about, you know, providing us. I'm looking at your.

So on the archives, they average 10.4 cents, but this is. Each office will be limited.

That's only for the photocopier. For the lease of the photocopier per page.

So not if I ask for a thousand pages. I'd have to pay 10 cents per page.

No, no, no, that's. We're estimating what our cost is per page just for the photocopy or lease per page.

Has any studies been done in the past?

I think there has been some analysis in terms of what the actual cost is. We can go back and take a look and try to pull that up and get that over to you.

Get that to the Committee before Thursday. Yeah, I'm sure. Can you go ahead.

Okay. So, you know, lawyer, I asked for a whole bunch of copies and. And I understand the need. That's why I know that 5 cents was maybe valid back in the 70s. Right. But not really. But not really now.

However, and this a big, however, costs have gone down if you put these pages on a CD or a DVD So can we pass this measure? But basically, say that if you want a physical copy, then it's going to cost more. However, an electronic copy may be limited to 5 cents.

I think so, Yeah. I think that's a good compromise because to scan a document and email it or drop it in some sort of. Some sort of a box, like scanned already.

Okay. Frankly, if it's just a question. It's already been digitized.

Some of our documents are in archives. Right. That haven't been scanned yet. So there are, there are, there are some documents that haven't been scanned. But I don't, I don't disagree with you. I agree that they should all be scanned.

Yes. By 21st century. We're only in the midst of 21st century, but. Okay, thank you.

Not to prolong the discussion, but I thought that we had digitization.

That's my understanding on a data office. Okay. So thank you.

You're welcome. But real, real quick, before you go there, there are situations, you know, there are, there are requesters who are able to pay and have access to resources and stuff. That's a profession. And there are others, like especially in my neck of the woods, who desperately need documents for assent, for justice, for benefits, for.

Is there a way for somebody who's indigent or can show that they can't afford it, they could get an exemption to the fees.

Yeah, I thought there was something they could apply for that would give them a certain number of documents or pages that could be. The cost could be waived. I want to say.

Is that in UIPA or maybe I can't remember, there's some sort of follow. Up and then issue quick communication.

Yeah, I'm sorry, it's not my forte. I don't deal with that kind of stuff on a regular basis. But I know that there was something.

Because otherwise we're just going to pass, pass it away. We appreciate you getting that information. Absolutely. Thanks.

Chair. Well, they're here. Dr. Adam Jansen is here

Thank you for. We appreciate you getting us that information. Thank you so much. Appreciate you guys in that. That's a good way for us to head on this. All right. Okay. With that, we're going to move on to Senate Bill 380 non general funds.

This would classifies certain non-General Funds and DAGS pursuant to recommendations made by the auditor in the auditor's report number 2317. One testimony only. It's Mr. Comptroller, Mr. Regan. DAGS.

Look at me. Chair, Vice Chair, Members. Keith Regan, comptroller for the State of Hawaii Department of Accounting and General Services. We stand on our written testimony providing comments on this measure.

We appreciate your comments. Thank you, sir. Okay. That nothing with... Any questions on 380? And I believe we share what you said in the comments after further research on the issue. So next up we have 372, And this is a state naming commission. This would establish advisory commission in DAGS to propose name changes. Sorry, to propose names or change of names for state building, parks, and facilities and events, including the Sharon Moriwaki Drag Race March. We only have one testifier, the comptroller.

Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. Keith Regan, comptroller for the State of Hawaii, Department of Accounting and General Services. We stand on our written testimony providing comments.

Okay, thank you so much. That's all we have on the 372. Anybody else wishing to testify? Please, come on up, sir.

Yes. Aloha, Senators. My name is Winston Welch. I'm executive director of The Outdoor Circle. And we'd just like to give our general support for this measure. But we would like to suggest that, as DAGS offered some commentary on that, that this be restricted to naming, for example, a standardization by plants or aliʻi in the case of what they recommended.

We would also recommend that, in light of our state's stringent 110 year history against commercialization of public spaces, that we also prohibit the naming of entities after corporations or sponsoring entities, whether that unofficial or official. So the Sharon Moriwaki, you know, Memorial Stadium is fine, but we don't want to have, you know, ExxonMobil Stadium. Not to pick on Exxon or anybody else, but something to that effect, just to protect and preserve our unique environment. Our brand is no brand. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I will pause for one second. Anybody else wishing to testify? I think part of the genesis behind this is really the focus on what would be a new stadium. Because I know other areas, they have naming rights. If it was limited to just that, would that provide more assurances to the Members insofar as the concerns?

I think once you open that door, then the door is permanently open. The camel's own noes under the tent. There are ways that our good corporate citizens can indeed sponsor our public venues and do. In fact, The Outdoor Circle sponsors many parks without having its name emblazoned over things.

And other corporate sponsors, for example, our adoptive parks and those sorts of things. So we do want to protect our environment because, in essence, it's an advertisement that is emblazoned across the state. And if I have it for this one, then I want it for something else because that would naturally follow suit.

Thank you for sharing your concerns. Any questions? Yeah, go ahead, Fire away, Oahu guys.

Yes, for Keith Regan. Yeah. What kind of public involvement consultation process would be involved in this?

Well, that would depend on what the legislation requires. But, you know, as it exists here, as it's written, I guess it would go through some sort of review process by the advisory council that's created or commissioned. Yeah. Right.

Yes. Thank you. So how would this operate? It's in Public Works. Is that where it should be? Is it? And then how did you come up with a figure of 100,000?

You know, I'm just trying to think. Yeah. So first of all, your first question is, does it belong in Public Works. And I think the answer is if it's an attached agency or, you know, it's created in that sort of vein that it would, I think, be suited to be sort of tagged.

Well, it should be at DAGS. It should just be within DAGS. Right. If it's an attached agency or board or commission and not necessarily placed into Public Works Division. They could help to support it because that's sort of what they do in terms of building facilities. They don't name, technically name facilities, but they're part of that process. So they would certainly lend and be a resource. Right. To the advisory commission.

So there's that question. In terms of the support, you know, really, I'm just thinking about my past history in terms of being involved in boards and commissions, you know, whether it be, you know, being on the Board of Public Accountancy, like a DCCCA, and what sort of needs that they had as a board. Right. And certainly having a dedicated resource. Right. That could help to support the board. I don't know how many applications are going to come in, and that's going to really, I think, drive sort of the need for resources.

And so I just kind of thought, you know, if I needed to put resources pen to paper to help the committee understand what could help us be successful, it would be having sort of like an office OA, you know, position or a secretary that could help, you know, write. Make sure the agendas are properly, you know, drafted and posted and minutes are taken and that members are communicated with so they have their packets in advance. Scheduling.

If there's any Neighbor Island Members that are part of this commission, scheduling their flights. If the committee needs to, or the advisory commission needs to go to the Neighbor Island to visit or hold meetings, I was thinking about the cost of that. Right. So the airfare that's maybe associated, if there's any per diem that needs to be paid to the members for that type of experience. Those were the things that were kind of going around in my mind as I crafted that number.

So the university has naming. It's in their rules. And I'm just wondering whether something like that. And they don't have a commission, but they do have an office and they receive and they have criteria. And I'm just wondering, this doesn't seem like a full time board that you would have but somewhere where somebody wants to name new buildings. How does DAGS do that now? They just leave the building sort of... How do you name your buildings?

It's... I don't have the exact details on how we go about naming, but our planning branch chief is here and he can kind of describe that for us if you want to get more details in terms of like step by step process.

Where does somebody go and say I want to name that building?

Well, let's bring up Joe Earing since he's here. I believe he's still in the audience. Thank you. Outdoor Circle. This is, this is Joe Earing. He is our planning branch chief. Been with the state for many, many years and so an excellent resource. And maybe you can kind of describe the naming process for facilities as it stands now.

Right. Within... Good afternoon. Within DAGS, I guess a policy was established I think in the early 90s. we have it, can provide a copy of that. Basically it's when a request comes in for a state office building, and right now it's only for two districts, the state capitol district and Kapolei because Kapolei was coming up at that time. Request comes in, we ask the comptroller to establish an advisory committee.

I forget the details of various members I think from the archives division and other public members are brought together into a commission. Various names are proposed and with... In our particular case it was decided that would be named after ali'i in the, that was tied to the area of the building. That's basically...

And when was the last time we did something like that?

I can't remember the last time we did it. Maybe it was Kapolei State Office Building, Kakuhihewa maybe. I know we did it for the state office tower, Leiopapa a Kamehameha Building.

But I mean all of these were. I mean this bill, the bill seeks to expand that. Right. So all sorts of different things. So given that would there be now more of a need or something a little more.

It's possible, right.

If we get an office named, you can fill it. That seems to be a common thread.

I'm sorry, I didn't hear.

If you get that office named, can you fill it?

I would hope so, yeah. I mean I think we're having more luck in terms of being able to fill these support positions. So yeah, I mean I think we could.

This is, proposes names on state buildings, parks, facilities, and events.

Yeah. So it's much more extensive, right. In terms of what it would cover, right. So I think, you know, in terms of workload load, we just don't know what that would be. Right. Yet at this point in time. So. Yeah. And then the other thing too is, and I think I put it, I did put it in my testimony, but that was just, you know, clarifying, you know, the reach. Right. Of this advisory commission, you know, in terms of, you know, would now all state facilities need to go through this process. Right. So regardless of whether it's, you know, DAGS managed or DAGS controlled, if it, you know, any state facility, even, UH potentially. Right. Facilities, would they need to go through this process?

It's good because my Vice Chair's appointed public. Anybody else on this? Yes, of course.

So sorry. So my concern is what's happening in the federal level being played out here. Is there any safeguard, and I don't see it here, that would prevent an autocratic governor into renaming a facility? So like in the federal level, President Trump wants to rename Denali as back to Mount McKinley despite the population and the Gulf of Mexico into Gulf of America. So is there, do we have any safeguards that were... Because, I mean we're already in the midst of renaming a number of facilities into Hawaiian names and into the ali'i. But if we have an autocratic governor who is... Do you suggest any kind of safeguards that would prevent renaming back?

Yeah, I appreciate that comment or that question, Senator. And I think it just the way you do that is you write it into the statute. Right.

Okay.

That would require any name changes to go through this process.

That would be my request is an amendment.

So you don't like the idea of the... Channel?

No. Well, Google's only going to change a number, but let's not start with Hawaii.

Yeah, sounds good. Well, we'll definitely put that, you know, to give the committee. Thanks.

Thank you. Thanks, Chair. Thanks. Vice Chair.

Okay, now to pivot Senate Bill 1132 relating to child care. DAGs would identify all state owned buildings that have space and capability to establish a child care center on its premises and establish and administer child care centers with the identified state owned buildings and procure a provider with a report back to us.

So first off, we have the comptroller Popular Committee for you.

Is it? Members Keith Regan, Comptroller for the State of White Foreman County General Services. We stand on our testimony providing comments on the spec.

I understand. Thank you so much. We have Yoko Arakawa, Cross Director for the Executive Office on Early Learning.

Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, I'm.

Yuko Aiko Cross, Director of the Executive.

Office on Early Learning. We stand on a written testimony.

Thank you so much. Thank you for clarifying that because we have it as comments only. And then finally we have Kamakana Taimuloa, upw. They have written testimony in comments. That's all we have on 1132. Is there anybody in the audience wishing to testify? Seeing none. Members, other questions? Okay, seeing none. And we have seen this one before.

This is where the LG's office probably can come in on this thing. Next up, we have, let's see a small Bill, Senate Bill 78 relating to voter registration. This makes an application for voter registration part of certain state agency application processes. First up, we have Ryan Yamani from dhs, State of Hawaii. Written testimony with comments noted.

He's not here. Next up, we have seven, Bill 70, Chief Elections Officer, written testimony and support. Ann Frederick, Executive Director of Hawaii alliance for Progressive Action. They are in support, Beatrice De Rigo, Democratic Party, Hawaii Education Caucus, who are in support late from Jamie Detwiler, President for the Hawaiian Islands Republican Women. Is that. Yep.

Go ahead, ma'am, you're on aloha.

Chair McKelvey, Vice Chair Gabbard and Members of the Committee, thank you for this opportunity to testify. I'm submitting my testimony in strong opposition for the following reasons. Number one, SB78 will create more work for state agencies who are already burdened with heavy workloads, and especially DHS and DLIR programs where employees have heavy caseloads.

Number two, voter registration is already easy and accessible through many different options, online registration and in person registration, as well as even in our high schools. For an agency to serve this voter registration application, they must collect and cross reference citizen status. I mean, are the platforms prepared for this?

You know, I know that the systems are already burdened and to create that and added responsibility to our workforce is going to be a challenge. Who's going to be responsible for screening, you know, in addition to all their work duties? How will the state and county elections offices prevent duplication of voter registrations?

According to our Chief Elections Officer, Mr. Scott Nago, he has previously said that our voter rolls need to be cleaned. We need to clean our voter rolls before we embark on this type of voter registration effort. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much for being here for your testimony. We appreciate it. Okay, we have 78. We have numerous individuals, all have submitted written testimony and support. Are there any of them there looks like to testify? Not you, not yet. Individuals.

We also have late testimony from DLIR, thank you so much.

We appreciate you being here and for reflecting that. Anybody else? Members questions of the testifiers? Seeing none. Let's move on to. zero, wait, there are a couple more. I apologize my everybody. There was a second page here of late testimony.

None of them are here, but there was testimony of support from Common Cause and also numerous other individuals, all in support. That should wrap it up. With that, we will go to Senate Bill 381.

Public agency meetings requires appointments and selection of heads of the state, divisions and agencies that require a board approval to be made through a publicly established process and timeline. First up, we have oip. Thank you so much. Doug Melner, Voters, Hawaii, they too have comments. And then we have Ben Kreps again from Public First Law Center.

Go ahead, sir. You're up.

Good afternoon again, Ben Krebs, Public First Law Center. We offer our written testimony with comments. You know, this Bill represents a good idea, but it does not go far enough. It only requires boards to openly decide and discuss the hiring process for top officials, but it doesn't say anything about the actual hiring itself.

So we've cited in our testimony to some law that says more than that is supposed to be open and public under existing law. So we ask that this Committee either expand the Bill to cover the entire hiring process and not just the discussion of what the process will be, but to actually have the hiring process open.

And yeah, we thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you. And if you could ask a favor of you, is it possible you could shoot the Committee an email to the language that you think would serve that clarification you just talked about?

Definitely.

Thank you very much. Okay, anybody else wishing to testify on this measure? Members? Seeing none. Are there any questions? Okay. Seeing none. We will move on to Senate Bill 2 relating to trees. Requires the state, to the extent practical, to plant fruit trees in newer renovated landscaping. Authorizes persons to harvest fruit from these trees.

Also puts in a liability exemption clause for injuries or illnesses resulting from the harvesting or testing of the. First up, we have the Comptroller Chair.

Keith Regan, comptroller for the State of Hawaii Department of County General Services. We stand on our written testimony providing comments on this.

Okay, thank you so much. Next up, we have Heather Mcmillan testifying for dealing our DofA orders for you guys. Okay, thank you so much. Hunter Hevilin, Hawaii Farmers Union. Naguli's a Maui guy. Written testimony and support. Is he here? No. And Andrew Crossland, individual in support.

And we also have Kaia Medeiros, an individual in support And Cherry Polak, individual in support here, which testify. Seeing none. With that Members, are there any questions of the Comptroller seeing none. So we will go on to.

Senate Bill 546 relating to arborist requires the state to ensure and enforce that all certified arborists in its employee, including contractors, adhere to best management practices. First up, Neil and R. Thank you so much. We also have the Outdoor Circle. Again, Aloha.

Winston Welch, Executive Director of the Outdoor Circle. Yes. Thank you for scheduling this bill. We think it's an important addition that's been overlooked. What we are often called by even Members of the public arborist and with untenable situations where they are asked to bid on contracts that are of widely varying levels of quality.

And so if we just have a standardization and since, you know, dlnr, we had. You had offered this last year as a resolution and so we came back with the comments to DLNR had and incorporated them into this. So we just think it's a common sense resolution that's supported in General, not too controversial.

No. Sorry, we're losing one of our Members for another meeting. But no, I appreciate this. This is a follow up from discussions that occurred last year, Right? Correct.

Correct. Yeah. It's just a. It's a common sense measure. Best practices are just, you know, why would we want our. Our government agencies not to follow best practices in any.

Especially for us in Lahaina where we're redoing everything from scratch. So. So that's why also a lot of. Support from our community.

Yeah. And we would hope that they put the wires underground just as a totally different.

They do too. But obviously it depends on who's getting approved for the rebuild. That's a whole other area. Thank you so much. Okay, thank you. Anybody else wishing to testify on Arborist and Trees? See None. Members, Questions? Seeing none. Okay, I believe that takes us to the last Bill on the agenda. We did it.

One hour, 24 bills. Thank you guys for your support. Appreciation. We will decision make on all these next Thursday and thank you for being involved and mahalo and have a great day. zero, yes. zero, sorry, my bad. We had a testifier on Senate Bill 55. He had tech issues. He'd like to testify.

So with everybody's indulgence, we're just going to flip back to allow him to testify and then we'll close the hearing. Go ahead, Mr. Fritz. You have two minutes.

Been a while. Senator, my name is Peter Fritz. I'm an individual with a disability. I have training on accessible documents. While I support the ability to have more accessible documents around, particularly with rules. This Bill uses the word accessible and searchable, but there's absolutely zero definition under Hawaii law for that.

And the fact is that they have to comply with Title 2 of the Ada, which does have those standards. As an example, you can create a PDF file that is ocr. It is searchable, but it's certainly not as accessible as it could be because it doesn't have any tags in it.

Tags are used by people like me that use beast to text program to navigate through documents. And that's a concern. As I look at the process, I don't think that the person that wrote this Bill actually looked at the lieutenant governor's website. I found Department of Health regulations, I'm sorry, rules 11, hyphen 143 that came from 2024.

The path that they took to get to the lieutenant Governor was they were printed first, had to be signed by the Governor, had to be signed by the Department of Health, also had to include another signature.

And when they reached the Lieutenant Governor, they were put into a scanner and scanned and each page had a hand stamped number at the bottom. Lt. Governor could have made an OCR, but the file wasn't OCR by the Lt. Governor.

But the point is that this particular file took a long path and each one of those signatures is a graphic that would have to be hand entered and the information put back. The process could be changed because Governor Ige adopted E signatures.

And with that, the document could be written on the Department of Health website, it could be sent to the Director, e signed and when you export it from Word, it would become accessible. From a digital standpoint, that would satisfy the Americans with Disabilities act, could go to the Governor that way and e sign the same way.

And then it could also go to have something put at the bottom of each page so that somebody wouldn't have to go and physically identify each one of those stamps at the bottom of the page and insert alt text. I'm out of time.

But I'm just saying that what's digitally accessible without any particular standards may be different for one agency to the other. And for the Governor, for the Lieutenant Governor. So the concern is the vagueness. I support the intent of having more accessible regulations and I support the intent of having a site.

But I don't support something that might have different standards where we get into a disagreement. Other states, such as Florida, where I'm licensed to practice, they've incorporated that law. And as far as Act 172 which met to propose standards, it's not in the law.

And you heard testimony earlier about entities that publish regulations that aren't in the law. So I thank you for your patience by allowing me to go further. I can answer questions if you have them, or if you want, I can send you a copy of the Florida law.

Why don't we work with the Committee and shoot that over to us, and then perhaps we can. Loan me this Bill. Moves on. If it moves on as an SD1.

Okay. Okay. Thank you very much.

You bet. Any other questions, Members? If not, we will conclude the hearing. But just to make sure everybody is aware, the DM on all the measures that were just heard are Thursday in this room, 3:00pm in room 225. Okay. Have a good day. Aloha.