House Standing Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs

Welcome everyone to the hearing of the House Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs. My name is David Tarnas. I am the chair of the Committee. Very fortunate to have Vice Chair Poepoe here and our Member, Mr. Garner Shimizu. Other Members will join us presently. It is Wednesday, February 18, 2pm in Conference Room 325.

Thank you to everyone for being here today. We have a lot of testimony, so I request that people limit their testimony to two minutes per testifier. I'll ask you to summarize at that point if you're not already wrapped up. We have a new microphone system in the room here. You can see the green lights up here.

Those are the mics. They pick up everything, including side conversations and nervous clicking of pens and all that. So if you could just keep that in mind. But when you're testifying, just use your outside voice, project, articulate, and everyone should be able to hear you just fine.

If you're on Zoom and you're testifying, please keep yourself muted and your video off until you testify, at which point, turn it on, give your testimony and then turn it off when you're complete.

If you have technical issues, you can use the Zoom chat function to communicate with our excellent technical staff here who will do their best to help you out. If you are disconnected and you're zooming in, don't panic.

Try to rejoin us as soon as you can and then our technical staff will let me know that you're back and I'll try to fit you in to finish your testimony.

If there's a power outage in the building here and we have to reschedule the test, the hearing, I'll make sure to post appropriate notice so you all know when we're meeting and about what. When on Zoom, if you're testifying, please avoid using any trademarked or copyrighted images.

And everyone who's testifying, I would just request that you refrain from profanity and uncivil behavior. It's okay to disagree, but let's not be disagreeable. This is already a hard enough process we go through here. Let's respect each other and move through all the bills on the agenda today. Okay?

First up, we have House Bill 1790, House draft one relating to policing. This measure requires law enforcement agencies and law enforcement oversight agencies to collect and report certain data regarding law enforcement, stops, uses of force and complaints to the White Crime Lab, affiliated with the University of Hawaii.

It requires the Hawaii Crime Lab to collect and publish incident level information, and an annual report on the data collected requires the Department of Attorney General to adopt rules in coordination with the Hawaii Crime Lab. So first up, we have the Office of the Public Defender, Hayley Cheng. Welcome, Ms. Cheng.

Good afternoon. Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe. Members of the Committee, I am Hayley Cheng. I am the First Deputy of the Office of the Public Defender. And we have submitted testimony, testimony in support of this measure, I believe last session we also supported a similar measure.

And it is because as the agency that represents most criminal defendants throughout the state of Hawaii, we cannot emphasize enough to this Committee how important data collection is.

We believe it is necessary for public transparency for the criminal legal system as well as for law enforcement generally, helping to identify trends, disparities and things such as use of force, mental health crises, reasons for detainment, and all of the things that the Bill takes into consideration is important and critical to help us improve our existing system.

So thank you for the opportunity to comment and I will be available for questions.

Thank you very much. Appreciate your testimony. Next we have University of Hawaii Denise Conan, not present in support. Next we have Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Ms. Woodward, welcome. Floor is yours.

Aloha, Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee. OHA is in strong support of this Bill and appreciates the intent to strengthen accountability and public trust in law enforcement agencies. We feel this is especially important for our beneficiaries who are disproportionately represented at multiple points within the criminal legal system.

And we are offering some amendments which add to the definition section Hawaiian as defined in Section 102 of the Hawaii Revised Statutes and Amendments to require data disaggregation with a distinct category for Hawaiians both alone and in combination with other racial or ethnic identities.

This is because existing data sets often lump Native Hawaiians together with Pacific Island, Pacific Islanders and or Asian Americans, which makes it extremely difficult to determine the true impact on the community and for OHA to advocate accordingly. So appreciate your time and I'm available for questions.

Thank you very much. Mr. Mike Lambert, Department of Law Enforcement. Welcome, sir.

Good afternoon, sir. Mike Lambert, Director of the Department of Law Enforcement. Chair, Vice Chairman of the community. So we do support the intent. We do acknowledge that implicit studies are important to ensure public safety and the trust that goes with that. Being in law enforcement for 20 plus years.

The reason why I want this study to occur is because I'm confident that we're not going to see the type of trends that we see in the mainland now. Acknowledging that implicit bias exists in all human beings and it needs to be acknowledged within law enforcement.

We also have to acknowledge the fact that implicit bias is a subconscious thought, meaning that, you know, it may not be known to us, which is something that we need to overcome.

Some of the only concerns I really have with this Bill is the aggressive timeline and the fact that it would hold us accountable to penalty under lawsuit. I really hope that we can kind of push back the timelines actually. This is the first time I've actually spoken to Ashley.

But I would really like to understand the methodology used on the mainland and making sure that when it translates here it's culturally appropriate. The reason why I bring that up is that I'm Native Hawaiian, you know, law enforcement, 20 plus years and I do see that Native Hawaiians are over represented in many categories.

I can tell you that right now that every Native Hawaiian I arrested broke the law. Right. And it's unfair if I am a non Native Hawaiian officer to potentially be viewed as having an explicit bias against Native Hawaiians simply because I'm different.

So I would really like to work at Hawaii Crime App to understand and to make sure that the methodology acknowledges the fact that sometimes it's the officer just looks different from the person that they enforced upon and it's more important that they did their job versus worry about.

Well, I gave too many Native Hawaiians tickets today, so I don't want to be accused of something. So I just really want to have further discussions. But again, I do want the study to be conducted but with maybe less aggressive timelines. Open here for questions.

Thank you, Director Lambert. Next we have Honolulu Police Department.

Good afternoon. Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe, Members of the Committee. I'm Lieutenant Joseph O'Neill. I'm the acting captain of the Honolulu Police Department's Information Technology Division here testifying in opposition to House Bill 1790. I would like to briefly just explain that opposition. We submitted written testimony, but the opposition is not to the intent of the Bill.

In fact, reading the first two paragraphs of the Bill, it talks about accurate data. So accurate data is one thing. The opposition is that this Bill asks for over 20 data sets that we do not collect right now on traffic stops or interactions with the public.

Creating a system to record these data sets would increase the amount of time the officers have to actually sit at a traffic stop or remember after the traffic stop and put into some unknown system or survey. Now if you with the volume, the operational volume we have of traffic stops and interactions which could be around 100,000.

Even if this survey could be filled out in one to three minutes, you're talking about thousands of Hours of officers typing into a survey. Now I deal with that all day in information technology. I love sharing data, I love working with organizations to get data.

But the way it's designed, this is going to have a very negative impact on the officers who are doing traffic enforcement. Mostly I can tell you that when you're on the side of the road and you have a car pulled over, trying to remember all data points that are in this Bill is going to be very difficult.

The perceived categories alone, if we had paper in this room and we all wrote on the paper what we perceived each other's ethnicities to be, it would all be different, all be all over the place. So the data is going to be skewed.

And not only that, all of the other data points that they have to remember, how many people are in the vehicle, the disabilities, the mental health, the, the ethnicities, all the races of the other officers that showed up at the traffic stop.

Now, a lot of times when you're on a traffic stop and you're short staffed, there's priority one calls, we call them, that happen during the traffic stop. You have to break away or you have to issue the citation.

If that officer doesn't stop and fill out that survey now, they're going to have to remember, go back and put all of that in accurately and that's going to be difficult. I think a better approach would be to work with organizations that want this type of data and not have it framed the way it is.

It's going to be very difficult to do. It's not about opposing it because we don't want to be transparent. It's about that. This is going to be difficult to implement and I'm here for questions. Thank you.

Okay, thank you very much. Next. Kobe Chalk, Alzheimer's association of Hawaii on zoom. Not present with comments. Next. Liam Chin, Hawaii Justice Rising on zoom. Yep. Right.

Thank you. Yeah. I'm testifying today in strong support of this Bill. Many states already collect this data with minimal burden. There's federal grants available to support staffing, technology and training. Officers in other states typically spend under one minute entering stop data.

And it's important to note that a lot of the 20 categories will not be present during many of the stops. So you're not obligated to fill out non-relevant categories. For example, if there's no weapon present, and so forth.

I think it's important to point out the basics here, that Hawaii is one of very few states that doesn't collect consistent statewide data on basic police activity. So we have a lot. While this may seem burdensome at the front end, we do have the vast majority of other states and their track record to look at.

And of course, we should calibrate it to the local conditions here. But it absolutely can be done. And we don't even collect uniform data at the moment on police stops, use of force, misconduct complaints, or the outcomes. And the result of this is that lawmakers lack evidence to evaluate policing policy.

This isn't just about, you know, racial disparities and data for the sake of it. It's also just about evaluating police performance generally. And ultimately, it's going to help the public view policing as more fair and effective if it's implemented correctly.

This matters because traffic stops are the most common way that Americans interact with police, and that includes here in Hawaii. But yet we collect very little data on this, despite, again, it being the most common form of interaction with police for the public.

And prior HPD use of force data showed significant not only racial but socioeconomic disparities, including towards houseless individuals and so forth. But that reporting has been inconsistent and hasn't always been taking place, and it needs to take place. And then lastly, complaint data helps identify patterns and reduce costly misconduct litigation.

Just over the last 10 years, the city and County Honolulu has paid between 30 to 45 million in misconduct lawsuits related to policing. So this is all around a win. And again, we're not reinventing the wheel here or doing anything radical. This is something that should have been done a long time ago.

Appreciate your time and appreciate working with HPD to make sure they can. They can implement it in a way that works.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chinn. Next. Abby Seitz, Hawaii Appleseed center, in support. Next. Josh Frost, ACLU, in support. Welcome, Mr. Frost, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Chair, Vice Chair, Committee Members, My name is Josh Frost. I'm a policy advocate at ACLU Hawaii. You have our testimony. I just wanted to comment on a couple of things.

You know, at a time when, rightly or wrongly, skepticism towards law enforcement is on the rise, maybe now more than ever, transparency is important. Also, we know that good data breeds good decision making and good policy, which is also something a lot of the other testifiers have commented on.

So for all those reasons, we support the Bill and hope that you'll move it out. It's not in our testimony, but I wanted to state that we would support the amendments offered by OHA as well.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Shelby Davis, Measures for Justice in support. Josh Parker in support on Zoom. Mr. Parker, floor is yours. Please proceed.

Aloha, Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe and Members of the Committee. My testimony in support of HB 1790 HD1 draws on our work with different states across the country on enacting and implementing policing data collection laws. Data is essential for identifying the policies that further public safety and those that don't.

But currently, Hawaii doesn't require its police departments to collect some of the most basic data that many other states have collected for years and years. For instance, over 20 states, big and small already require all their police departments to collect stop data, including Alabama, California and Montana. Hawaii is not among them.

Inputting the data required following a stop would not meaningfully prolong the encounter. Importantly, as was said in prior testimony, nearly all the data points can be completed after the officer terminates the encounter, including the reason for the stop, whether there was a search, etc. And many of the data points, as Liam Chinn testified, are conditional.

If no search is conducted or no weapon is drawn, the data points in those categories need not be addressed.

It is unsurprising then that in Connecticut, if you look at Ken Barone's testimony, who runs out of a university like at an entity like the Crime Lab data Collection in Connecticut, he says in his testimony before the Higher Education Committee that inputting this information typically takes less than 90 seconds with much of the information auto populated.

And if you look at even Mike Lambert's testimony that he submitted to the Committee, he says that he has, you know, spoke with Ken Barone and learned about that information in Connecticut.

And I'm sure an Ashley Rubin at the University of Hawaii is also working very closely with folks in other states, including Ken Barone to ensure that when this is implemented, there is a meaningful delay before it's implemented to ensure rulemaking and working with kind of other states that have already done this, that Hawaii is not reinventing the wheel and taking advantage of learning lessons from other states and how to ensure that this can be filled out quickly and efficiently without prolonging.

Thank you for your testimony. Thank you for hearing my testimony and happy to answer any questions.

Thank you. And just to be clear for the public and the Members, Josh, you want to tell us the organization that you're with?

Yes, I am with the Policing Project. I'm the Deputy Director of Policy at the Policing Project at NYU School of Law.

New York University. For those who didn't recognize the acronym. Thank you, Josh. Next, Ken Barone, Connecticut Racial Profiling Prohibition Project in support. Next. Ashley Rubin, Dr. Rubin, Hawaii Crime Lab, University of Hawaii.

Good afternoon thank you. Good afternoon, Chair, vice chair, Members of the Committee, I'm Dr. Ashley Rubin of the Hawaii Crime Lab. I've submitted written testimony. I'm going to go ahead and stand on that, but I will add that I'm eager to work with law enforcement agencies and officers.

If the Bill is passed, I would plan to do ride alongs or ask permission to do ride alongs, see how the data are currently collected, and basically work on a process to make it as seamless as possible, maximizing officer safety and also keeping an eye to data that's going to be useful for the various law enforcement agencies as well.

So I've submitted my testimony. Thank you very much for the opportunity, and I'm available for questions.

Thank you. Before you go, Just because Dean Conan is not here, Denise Conan, Dean, College Of Social Sciences, in their testimony, it specifically suggests that we, instead of using the name Hawaii Crime Lab in the Bill, that we name the Social Sciences Research Institute, which is a part of the College of Social Sciences.

And you're in line with that recommendation?

I'm in favor of it.

Okay, great. Thank you. Okay, that's all. We received a total of 18 testimonies, 15 in support, one in opposition, two with comments. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on HB 1790? If not, questions? Members, any questions? Representative Shimizu.

Thank you. Chair, HPD, can I ask you a question? I can understand the difficulty that you expressed collecting the data. Do you folks do it all manually, writing things down?

So right now we have a records management system that we call the case reporting system. That's where we input lot of our typed reports. We don't have, if you're asking manually, the judiciary, we still write manual tickets. The department's working on an E Citation program, but we do handwrite our tickets. Yeah.

Have you folks, can I ask, have you looked into, like, technology, as Director Lambert suggested, checking other jurisdictions and what they do and how we might be able to incorporate that into our system to make it better.

So, that's a good question, sir. So E citation usually makes most jurisdictions better. It makes traffic stops faster, and you can have more fields. The judiciary is very strict about what can actually be on the citation. But there's other fields that can be implemented into the system easily with E Citation. Yes.

Are we looking to get that?

Yes, we're. The Information Technology Division where I work has actually built an E Citation program that is being piloted in our Traffic Division right now. So we didn't have funding this year to buy E Citation printers for a greater portion of the Department to more widely roll out the program. Yes.

Okay, last question. Okay, so if you, the pilot program proves to be successful, you're able to implement it. Do you see a problem with collecting data as this Bill is requesting?

So I don't see a problem with collecting data. I do like data. I think more data helps the community and the lawmakers. I just, I think that the, how that system's designed, that's, that's how much time it takes to input this stuff.

So counting, like I said, the data points, looking at other states, I know that some of them don't allow to put unknown or undefined. You have to actually make a selector in some of these similar type programs. So like someone mentioned the weapons.

You select the weapons, maybe the other fields will be if there's no weapon, they would say none and fill out some of them. So it's basically the design of that system. But being the acting captain Information Technology Division, I can tell you that our software programmers are already short staffed. So building that system out would be complicated.

Right. With the data set that's in here. And that's why I mentioned that providing data that would be helpful, but working as a partnership would be what's, you know, doable and what's not doable better than just dictating set data set.

But the E Citation system could be used to help with that. Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you. Other questions. Rep. Garcia.

Thank you. Chair for HPD as well. The Bill requires that all reporting shall be made publicly available. Is the current data that you folks collect on citations, whatever, is that made publicly available currently.

So that Data through information requests 92f we can provide anything regarding that, but we don't publish it on a website right now. So this Bill wouldn't make you folks publish. I think this Bill requires us to provide the data to the White Crime Lab and then they publish it. Right. Okay, got it. Thank you.

I think that's correct, yes. Any other questions, Members? Just one question, sir. I heard an interview with our new police chief in Hawaii county who is planning on rolling out, you know, tablets that they use. That's what you're talking about, that the patrol officers would use?

Well, Cami tablets, our program is device agnostic, so it can be used on tablets or Windows. So patrol officers usually typically have a computer like the one over there. It's a laptop. Some of the solo bike officers have tablets. Yeah. So it'll work on anything.

Because it seems like as we try to modernize our police departments and also to gather data that is relevant to your work and our work. Having that technology would make it so much easier and more efficient. So it's. I'm glad to hear that you're moving forward with it.

I was glad to hear that my own police chief wants to move forward. Seems like it makes sense. Yeah. Thank you very much. Okay. Thanks. Thanks to you. And thanks to the Members for questions. Let's move on to the next Bill. House Bill 1611, House draft one related to taxation.

This measure establishes a yearly reduction in the General excise tax rate on groceries and non-prescription drugs on a tiered schedule until January 1, 2034 when a full General excise tax exemption applies. And it has other provisions as well. First up, we have the Department of Taxation.

Okay. Thanks for that information. Appreciate that. Rep. Cochran, if there's no more questions, let's go on to the next measure. Thank you. To the testifiers. House Bill 2357 relating to artificial intelligence. This measure prohibits music streaming platforms from hosting, distributing or otherwise making available in the state music performed or attributed to an artificial intelligence music artist.

It makes violations an unfair method of competition and an unfair and deceptive act or practice. First up, we have the Attorney General Ashley Tanaka or Chris Leong in person.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, my name is Ashley Tanaka. I'm a Deputy Attorney General. We did submit written testimony in opposition to this Bill.

While we do understand and appreciate the challenges that artificial intelligence and trying to regulate it poses, the reason for our opposition is the significant adverse risk of litigation that this Bill Bill poses, mainly due to the First Amendment as this Bill restricts expressive speech.

So we do respectfully request that this Bill be held and I'm available for questions. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Rick Manayan, Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. Welcome.

Please proceed. Good afternoon, Chair, Congress Vice Chair of POI Point and Members of the Committee. I'm Rick Benign. On behalf of DBEDT and DBEDT supports the intent of House Bill 2357 HD1, which prohibits music streaming platform from hosting, distributing or otherwise making available in the state music perform or attributed to an AI music artist.

We defer to the Department of the Attorney General as to the aspects of their concerns regarding their regarding First Amendment rights and also their required enforcement as identified in the measure. Thank you for the opportunity.

Sure. Thank you for being here. We've received a total of seven testimonies, four in support, three in opposition. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on HB2357 if not questions, Members, see Representative Shimizu

Attorney General, please. So in your testimony, you have concerns about freedom of speech, but if this entity is not a person, does that artificial intelligence still have a right to be having a freedom of speech?

We believe it does.

As we cited to a U.S. Supreme Court case from 2024 in our testimony, Moody v. NetChoice, where the U.S. Supreme Court was evaluating whether social media platforms have a right to free speech, essentially, and they did hold that social media platforms are entities that they exercise editorial discretion in the selection and presentation of content. Excuse me. And.

And thus they are engaging in first amended protected speech activity. So just because they are entities and not natural persons, the US Supreme Court did find that they did have First Amendment protected speech rights. So we do believe that that same analysis would be applicable to music streaming platforms in this case.

And we do believe that courts would likely treat music streaming platforms in a similar manner that they do have this first amended protected right to free speech, as in this case, editors of the selection and presentation of music that we streamed.

So is that what the Supreme Court stated specifically, or is that your interpretation of that movie?

Oh, that's what they held for our social media platforms.

Okay. All right. Thank you.

Sure. Thank you. Any other questions? If not, thank you very much. Thanks to all the testifiers. Let's move on to the next measure, House Bill 2473, House Draft 1, relating to the recognition of a Hawaiian sense of place.

This measure establishes the Hawaiian Sense of Place Recognition act, requiring the Office of Planning and Sustainable Development to develop educational and outreach programs to promote understanding of the Hawaiian sense of place among residents, visitors and public employees. It requires state agencies to incorporate Hawaiian sense of place principles into land planning, management and state construction projects.

First up, we have Mary Alice Evans, State of Hawaii, Office of Planning and Sustainable Development. You got to come up. You can't just stand there and stand on your testimony. Sorry. I want everyone on TV to see you and hear you. So introduce yourself and tell me the highlights of your comments.

Thank you. Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poikoi, Members of the Committee, Scott Allen, on behalf of opsd, we stand on our comments and that we're concerned that this could be redundant with the current review process that we're undergoing for the State Planning Act. And also note that the implementation of the educational outreach activities required would necessitate additional funding.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Next we have Madeline McKeague, Hawaiian Council. Welcome. Please proceed.

Aloha, Tarnas, Vice Chair Poifoy and Members of the Committee. I'm Luana Lindsay on behalf of the Hawaiian Council, and we stand on our written testimony in strong support of this Bill. Here for any questions.

Thank you very much. We have a total of six testimonies, five in support, one with comments. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 2473, if not Mr. Mazakian, I didn't see that you wanted to testify, but please go ahead.

I originally just put in written testimony. I'm here actually for a different Bill today that's coming up. But I do want to say I'm in strong support of this Bill and I do want to use this time so I don't lose my time on the next Bill to just indicate that on HB 2561, my written testimony.

Don't talk about another Bill please

Not show. Okay. It just doesn't show. I just want to give you a heads up in advance. My written testimony doesn't show up. I'm not going to discuss the Bill

when I come to that measure. Which, which measure did you say you want to testify on?

HB 2561. I've already called your office and my written testimony was put in. She could see it, but it doesn't show.

I will make sure to call on you for HB2561. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, anyone else wishing to testify on 2473? If not, questions? Members seeing no questions, we'll move on. Thank you very much to the testifiers. Next measure, House Bill 1579. House Draft 1 related to light pollution. This measure, beginning July 1, 2027 establishes outdoor light fixture requirements throughout the state and provide certain exemptions for Department of Education facilities.

First up, we have Ed Sniffin, Department of Transportation in support. In zoom. Please proceed.

Aloha, Chair Dre Khalili, Deputy Director of Transportation for harbors. You have our testimony. We support the intent. We understand the need to mitigate the effects of light pollution.

However, considering that the Department of Transportation manages thousands of high mass light fixtures that would be subject to these requirements, you know, there are very real costs to either retrofitting, which you'll see in our testimony, and then there are also operational costs that we will see, you know, should the Bill move forward as drafted.

And so, for example, for our ports, the, the curfew period would impact cargo operations, which then affect our supply chain, which then will affect, you know, empty store shelves.

And so we are proposing in our testimony for the Committee to consider an amendment that exempts the Department of Transportation from the requirements for the lighting fixtures in the same way that I think Department of Education requested similar for its facilities. And I'm available for any questions. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Deputy Director Kalili. Next. Department of Education in support. Not present. Next. Katherine Stanaway, Department of Land and Natural Resources, with comments. Welcome.

Good afternoon. Chair, Vice chair, Members of the Committee, Catherine Stanaway, Department of Land and Natural Resources, Division of Forestry and Wildlife. We, we have her comments on this measure. We're in strong support of efforts to reduce light pollution. I hope you can hear me okay. I'm getting over a cold.

Sure. Thanks for keeping the cold germs to yourself.

So we recognize that light pollution impacts native wildlife, disrupts astronomy, stargazing cultural traditions and even impacts human health. So this Bill addresses the many of those concerns. We recommend technical comments on the Bill. These include removing a provision to exclude Kauai.

That's because 90% of the APO, which is the near shear water, excuse me, population lives on that island, and they're very vulnerable to collisions with structures. And then also edits to the turtle lighting. There's a. I think a typo. It says "ero" uplift instead of zero uplift. Also, another turtle lighting section in the bollards.

The glare rating should be G0 instead of B0. And there's a change. We recommend a change to the glare rating.