House Standing Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs

Welcome to the House Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs. It is Thursday, March 5th, 2:00pm here in Conference Room 325. My name is David Tarnas. I'm the chair of the Committee, and I appreciate everyone being here to provide testimony. It really helps us do our job better. If you're testifying, please limit your testimony to two minutes.

I'll ask you to summarize at that point. You're in. When you're providing testimony, come up to the podium here. The microphones are in the ceiling. Just use your regular voice. Articulate well the voice. The microphone will pick up your voice and amplify it in the room, and then it goes online.

But it also picks up every little whisper you make to your neighbor, so I would urge you to keep that to a minimum. For those who are testifying on Zoom, please keep yourself muted and your video off while waiting to testify, and again turn it off after your testimony is complete.

Use the Zoom chat function to communicate with our technical staff if you have any technical issues. If you're disconnected, please rejoin as soon as you can and I'll do my best to allow you to finish your testimony if time permits.

If the power goes out in our room here and we have to reschedule our hearing, I'll post appropriate notice so you'll know what we're doing when and if you're testifying on Zoom, please avoid using any trademarked or copyrighted images. And as always, when you testify, please refrain from profanity or any uncivil behavior.

It's okay to disagree, but let's not be disagreeable. We're all working together here for today. We have numerous measures, but we have one measure that I would like to move up to the top of the agenda. We have a testifier here that has requested that, and I want to accommodate their request.

So I'd like to move up House Bill 1531, House Draft 1, to the top of the agenda. This measure is relating to emergency announcements. This requires the Governor or mayor of a county to provide an American Sign Language interpreter during each official announcement broadcast via television or the Internet. During a state of emergency.

It requires the Governor or mayor of a county to ensure to the fullest extent possible that the American Sign Language Interpreter's face, body, arms and hands are visible during the broadcast, just like we have here. Requires the Governor or mayor of a county to provide a primary pool feed for any live official announcement.

That includes an American Sign Language interpreter in a picture in picture window and does not require broadcasters that rebroadcast the official announcement to independently generate or insert this accessibility feature. First up. Okay, first up we have the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency and support not present. Next we have Christine Pagano, Disability and Communication Access Board.

Hello. Good afternoon. I'm hoping the interpreter can see me. She's quite far away, but I'll do my best. Okay, now she can see me. Good afternoon. Chair Tarnasand Vice Chair Poepoe Committee Members, as I see here today in front of me. My name is Christine Pagano and I'm with Disability Communication and Access Board, DCAB.

To my left is Brian Nick and he is the Program and Policy Development Coordinator. Would you like to say something?

Good afternoon, everyone. The Americans with Disabilities act defines effective communication in states that communications with individuals with disabilities must be effective as communications with others.

And so it happens in the case of an emergency where how can we equivalent. How can we provide equipment equal communication? So Brian will provide some brief moments and examples of how this could be effective communication. How we can equip. Equip interpreters something or lowers. How we can equivalate that message.

Brick example will be with no voice.

As you just experienced just now, people who are deaf and hard of hearing this announcement, they will be looking at the speaker, but they will have missed everything that is said. They will not have access to what is being announced. The second announcement people, if you could please watch on the screen, watch the captions.

Hurricane upana is currently 500 miles northeast of Holokaua and is expected trigger strong showers in the Mauka and Makai areas of all islands. This rain has already caused a landslide on the Liki le KE highway. So if you are heading over to town from Kaneohe or Kailua, DOT asks that you take an alternate route.

Could you tell them that that's not real?

That's not real.

Yes. So, but if you recognize the language and access. Here is the lake L A K E and it's not leake. So the caption is incorrect. The caption did not state the appropriate name of the freeway or the highway that was affected. And that's an egregious error.

So without having that equal communication in their first language, English does not provide equivalent messaging. They will lose out on that information and as we read it, we will not have clear communication of what emergency is happening now. R hrs 1397American Sign Language recognizes is recognized as a language.

And now let me show you what equivalent and equal communication will look like. Here's an example.

Now we ask you to focus on the interpreter once again. Hurricane Upana, not real, is currently 500 miles northeast of Honoka and is expected to trigger strong showers in the Mauka and Makai areas of all islands. This rain has already caused a landslide on the Le KE Le KE Highway.

So if you are heading over to town from Kaneohe or Kailua, DOT asks take an alternate route.

Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate you listening to our testimony today. And please, please support this bill. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. I appreciate that. We have the State Council on developmental disabilities. Ms. Bartoldis.

Thank you. Chair, Vice Chair, Committee Members, Daintry Bartoldus, Executive Director of the Hawaii State Council on Developmental Disabilities. We'd like to echo Disability and Communication Access Board what they had to say in our testimony.

We did also take the same recommendation to ensure that the picture in picture is included in there on the size because that's very important. zero, we're in strong support. Sorry. Thank you.

And we'd also respectfully request that you could indicate perhaps in your community report as this bill moves forward, thinking positively, that the act will take effect July 1, 2027 to provide the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, who I've been talking with, significant time to prepare implementation. Thank you so much for this opportunity to testify.

Thank you, Ms. Bartholdis, and thank you for your recommendation of an amendment. Is there anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? I'm not sure if Mr. Leonard is online. No. We've received a total of 10 testimonies in support, two with comments, none in opposition. Is there anyone else wishing to testify in House Bill 1531?

If not questions, Members? Yes. Representative Garcia?

Sure. Is Hawaii county on zoom or present at all? No. No. Okay, I guess I have a question for Ms. Bartolis. Thank you for your testimony. Thank you for being here. Just curious. In my recollection of recent weather events and emergencies, hurricane, tsunami warnings, pretty much all of the news conferences from the

Governor or the county mayors have had an ASL translator. There has there been a time recently where that has not been the case.

There's not the problem that the translator is there. It's the positioning of the translator and the size of the translator. There are times that the translation goes up and then the text is underneath it.

So you miss some of the sign language that's being displayed or it's too small of a box and their hands go outside the box or down lower for certain sign language that they use. So that was the concern.

Got it. And this bill would address those concerns. Okay. Thank you.

Any other questions? Yes. Rep. Cochran yeah.

And for Ms. Bartolo. So I was reading the testimony of Hawaii county mayor who states that it'd be difficult, I guess a lot of times the messaging needs to be right then and there very quickly and urgent.

And he thought that if every single message had to have American Sign Language asl it, I guess delay urgent information is that is there reason to believe that could occur or has occurred?

Can I do it? Have DCAP answer that for us? It's a form of communication, should be for everybody. So it shouldn't be just the mass majority. So I would say it should be inclusive. But I would like. Christine, they're the subject matter experts in that particular, if that's okay. Yes, appreciate it.

Yeah, can answer that.

Brian McKick in on decap as a concern. But we do feel with proper planning that can be mitigated. We know there's another Bill moving the session that would create a disability and access and functional needs coordinator position in Hyema.

And this presumably would be one of their first jobs would be to work with obviously with Hyma and then with the council to make sure that they have access. We also know that having qualified interpreters on in the other counties is a challenge. It's a challenge on Oahu as well. But again, having some proper planning.

And I think, if I remember correctly with the tsunami warning, I think initially there was difficulty getting an interpreter here because the traffic gridlock was so bad.

Well, glad you're addressing that. Thank you very much. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Other questions. Rep. Shimizu, can I ask you a question?

I'm sorry, You mentioned the concern about having an adequate resource for interpreters. Do we have supply problem and if so, how would we address that for complying with this bill?

Yeah. So the supply has been dwindling. We were asked to do a report two years ago which we submitted to the Legislature. There's another bill moving as well that's trying to create ASL interpreting program at UH Manoa, which we're hopeful will pass. That's obviously sort of long term.

I think one of the advantage in the picture in picture window as you're seeing, is that it opens up the use of technology potentially to be used.

So if you were a county that maybe didn't feel like you had enough qualified interpreters on island, you could possibly have arrangements in place to tap into an interpreter elsewhere and use the technology to add them to the broadcast.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Other questions? Members represent Bellotti, did you have a question? No. Anything else? Okay.

Members, I think we're going to take advantage of a quorum that we have here and go ahead and make a decision on this measure so that our testifiers who are for this measure and go and our interpreter would be able to finish her work here as well.

So if it's okay with everyone here, let's go ahead and make a decision on House Bill 1531, House Draft 1.

My recommendation is to pass this out with amendments and I would like to take the amendments recommended by the State Council on Developmental Disabilities regarding specifically the picture in picture window and the dimensions and make sure that the interpreter can be seen and not blocked by anything else.

So I will adopt their amendment that they have in their testimony and in addition, include in the standing Committee report that we are requesting an effective date of July 1, 2027. Those are my recommendations, questions or concerns Members?

Chair yes, thank you. Chair I really love this Bill and I love the intention of it. I think the realities on Hawaii island to effectuate this measure, like the testimony from our county and from our mayor is stated.

There are times we do not have adequate reception for live broadcasts and resources of the ability of having enough interpreters to effectuate this. So I'm going to vote with reservations today, but I would hope that the writers and Hayima and others can work with Hawaii county to make sure that it can be effectuated for our county appropriately.

It should be, but 2027, I think would not give the county of Hawaii enough time to be able to effectuate this. And I think it's great and important, but there are logistical issues with such a large island. We have the most emergencies of all time in the state.

So how we work with Hawaii county to effectuate this is my only concern. Chair thank you.

Understood, understood. And we're very grateful to be able to have an ASL interpreter that's joining us remotely and that works if you've got the Internet operating. But that is a circus solution that we are benefiting from today. Other comments, Chair Rep. Shmizu and then Rep. Garcia.

Thank you. Chair. I agree with Representative from the Big Island. The practical concerns. There's no question that this provision is needed for this community. So I will be voting with reservations also, but I hope that we can work it out.

Understood. Rep. Garcia.

Thank you. Chair. Like the previous speakers, I think the intent is phenomenal and I fully support the intent. I think it's important important to have access for all people.

But the testimony provided by the mayor of the of Hawaii County, I think the sufficient I mean, it does warrant sufficient consideration in that oftentimes there could be a lack of translators available and if a tsunami is happening, you know, and someone's stuck in traffic, I think, you know, we sought to get the message out immediately to the public.

So in support, but noting. With reservations. Thank you.

Understood. Other comments before we go and take a vote. If not. Vice Chair for the vote.

Voting on House Bill 1531 HD1 with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair, the recommendations.

Thank you very much. We're going to go now to the top of the agenda. Thank you very much for being here. Thank you. To our interpreter for being here.

Thank you.

Yeah, thank you. Okay, let's go to the top of the agenda. We're going to go through all the measures on the agenda and we'll do decision making on all these other measures at the end of our agenda. So first, first item on our agenda is House Bill 1880, House Draft 2, relating to pesticides.

This measure, beginning in January 1, 2027 prohibits the use or application of a pesticide containing one, three dichloropropene as an active ingredient such as telome. First up, we have testimony from the Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. My name is Esther Reichert. I am the pesticide's branch manager for Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity. We stand on our written comments on this bill and I'm available for questions.

Could you do me a favor and highlight your comments? Just the main topics.

So the main comment that we proposed is that pesticide products are regulated at both the federal level and the state level mainly because pesticides are inherently hazardous. Right. The main intent of pesticides is to control pests. Right.

So at the federal level, EPA conducts their own risk assessments for all of the pesticide products, including those with the active ingredient, 1,3 dichloroprophy. And so there are already restrictions and reviews done at the federal level.

At the state level, our pesticides branch is the regulatory agency to ensure that any mitigation measures that will put in place on the label are followed.

In addition, because products with this active ingredient are restricted use, there are additional state regulations that apply as well, such as not being able to apply the product within a certain, certain miles of schools.

And they also have to conduct their own reporting that they need to submit to the Department and Like I said, our state agency is the authority that would be regulating these products. And I will be available for questions.

Great, thank you very much. Next we have Hawaii Public Health Institute.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair and Committee Members. I'm Chris Caulfield from the Hawaii Public Health Institute. We are in support of this bill. When we know that a chemical causes harm, we cannot wait to take action. The science on this is clear.

The active ingredient in Telone is classified by the U.S. environmental Protection Agency, the National Toxicology Program and the International Agency for Research on Cancer as a propaganda or possible human carcinogen.

It's a volatile fumigant that's designed to become a gas, meaning it doesn't stay where it's applied, it moves through the air, exposing farm workers, families and children to a chemical that's been linked to respiratory illness, organ damage and long term cancer risk.

In Hawaii, where schools, homes and agricultural fields exist side by side, that exposure is not abstract, it's real, it's preventable. And public health teaches us that prevention is essential because it is always the most vulnerable in our community, the most rural communities in our cake who bear the greatest brunt of environmental exposure.

In places where Telone has been banned, like in Europe, there are alternatives that have been put into place. Soil steaming, thermal sterilization, soil solarization is something that's used in Spain, California and the Mediterranean. Integrated pest management, bio fumigation, all these are being used in replace of Telone and don't carry the same risk.

But for us, this Bill isn't just about science. It's about stewardship of our land, our water, our food supply, the truly regenerative practices that nurture our future, the next generation's right to health. And we often talk about uplifting INA based practices in our state.

To do that we must make sure that we're fully embracing the philosophy of Malama ina, not just using as a political buzzword. So when a substance is known to cause cancer and respiratory harm and safer alternatives exist, the only ethical choice is to put people before profit and take action to protect the lands that sustain us.

Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Next person said they wish to testify is Daniel Nellis Dole Food. Welcome, sir.

Thank you. Chairman and Vice Chair and Committee. I have submitted a written testimony. I won't read it word for word, but I just want to remind everybody that Talone is a chemical that we use in the pineapple industry to control nematodes. If we don't control nematodes, we don't have a pineapple industry.

We have over 200 people working at it, or not over, but approximately 200 people working in Wahiawa. That would be that many jobs with how many family Members hurting. If we cannot use this, there is no alternative on the market labeled for pineapple.

We're always working with the industry to try to come up with something that we can use that may be less toxic. But again, we have to control the nematodes or we have no crop. I will comment that we don't.

We, we depend on the EPA and the EPA has said this is a usable product if used under these conditions. We use it under those conditions. Proper PPE, the barriers away from schools, as was mentioned by esther, it's fumigated 20 inches deep. It does not gas out into the air and drift seven miles.

I know that's been said. And these things that get said about uses in other places do not really apply to what we're doing here. And if you switch to an alternative, that is a liquid that you broadcast over to plants, you will have drift. They're not as effective, but they do run off into the environment.

So this is the best environmentally controlled product that we can use. And until we have an alternative, this is what gives us an opportunity to grow pineapple successfully economically. And Hawaii, the fact that they're asking in the Bill to start this on January 1, 2027 is very short sighted.

When you, even if the EPA was to deregulate the chemical, they usually give several years to expand that deregulation. Our crop is a three year crop, one year fallow, then we start again. So we only apply this every four years. We do 400 acres a year, but only every four years do we apply it.

We have lots of acres that are in fallow every year. And that's the number one control for nematodes is let them naturally die out by a fallow period. And then when you start, you have to take care of the rest of the nematodes. So you get a good start. It's a root attacking organism.

So I'll be available for any questions if you need.

Thank you very much. I appreciate your testimony. Next, Clayton Kubo on Zoom. Please proceed, Mr. Kubo.

Klayton Kubo. Why make away? I support with some comments and some even, maybe even some questions, this might be okay. So in a sense we're banning another product. How is that going to help an impacted person like me that was impacted since the year of, I would say 1998.

How, how is that going to help me and my family and my neighbors? If you guys going to continue just banning on our product because this guy is just going to continue to make up our products? That is my biggest question to you guys at the state Legislature.

How are you guys going to act if I come back two years from now, three years from now and saying the same thing? How is just banning this product gonna help me? Just like when Clamperium Fossils banned, right? Okay, Mahalanui. Aloha.

Thank you, Clayton. Any other testifiers on this measure? Yes, please come on up. Introduce yourself.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Annie Frederick, on behalf of the Hawaii Alliance for Progressive Action and support. So just as a little context for our testimony and support pursuant to the passage of Act 4 and 2018, when the RUP use data became available in

2019, that's a restricted use pesticide. RUP.

Thank you. We have been doing a very close analysis of the data. We UIPaed the data, we converted it all to pounds by TMK and we GIS mapped the data and looked very closely across the state for where the hotspots were and what products were being used heavily. What we consistently found over several years.

We did an in depth look at 2019 through 2021 just because of the scale of the task. And we found that consistently fumigants are the most heavily used restricted use pesticide across the state. In particular when 3D or Telone is the most heavily applied RUP statewide in the hundreds of thousands of pounds.

We've seen that usage in our written testimony. We've, we have a table included of the total usage across the state starting in 2019. We've seen a decline in recent years. Initially we saw two users of this particular rup. I believe there may be only one now. And so the majority of the use occurs between Waialua and Wahiawa.

Upcountry use had been high in the past, but it appears to have declined or been eliminated altogether. As was mentioned before, you know, fumigates in General, in particular 1 3D is even when used according to the label are prone to drift. And you know, we don't have strong air monitoring, you know, regulations in Hawaii.

So most of the data that we have comes from California. And what we've seen with some of the drift monitoring in California is that even at over half a mile, up to seven miles, they've witnessed, even when following the label, harmful levels of drift have occurred.

Could you summarize please?

Yes. So we know some of the acute harms are nausea, vomiting, respiratory impacts. But the longer term Chronic impacts are cancers, as have been mentioned before.

And just in response to EPA regulation, we've repeatedly seen those regulations overturned when long term chronic impacts have been studied and documented over these longer term longitudinal studies, which the EPA often doesn't account for. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure, if not. Questions? Members

Question Chair.

Representative Garcia, first.

For Dole, please.

Thanks for being here and thank you for your testimony. Thank you. You mentioned that the pesticides used specifically for pineapples in your industry, it's not sprayed over the crop, correct?

Is it in the soil? It's used in the soil.

Correct.

20 inches deep.

Okay. And how far are the nearest homes or residential areas to your, your, your farmland?

Not within a half mile.

Okay, so further than 1/2 of a mile. And then also you mentioned that you are currently using it within the FDA confinement.

EPA.

Sorry, EPA.

Exactly.

Okay. All right, thank you very much.

Certainly. Rep. Shimizu.

For Dole, please. Thank you for being here. Also, you know, I believe Europe banned it in 2009 and I'm sure they must have other alternatives. So you're stating there's no alternatives.

That's a good point. Because an alternative in the United States of America has to be EPA registered for a crop. So what I'm saying is that there's not registered for pineapple, a comparable fumigant for nematicide control. There are some that are not fumigants that you spray over the top.

And of course they do have drift and runoff and they're not as effective as when you fumigate into the root zone. This organism attacks the roots. So right from the beginning, you don't get good growth, you don't get good sized plants, you don't get beautiful fruit.

Your yield is dramatically reduced, as much as 74% in the plant crop, 60% in the subsequent crop. Economically, you can't grow pineapple, that kind of yield.

Sure. I can ask a follow up one more. The Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity, they mentioned in their testimony that if the Bill were to move forward, they would request a three year window to start.

Is that enough time? That's much better than zero time. But even then, EPA would normally give close to six to 10 years for releasing chemicals or taking them off a list is what I should say. We would like to continue to use Talone. If it is not allowed, we would like the time period to be longer.

Much longer. And three years is much better than zero years, which is what we're looking at there.

Sheriff you would indulge me one more question. Okay. Brian. Farmers, Hawaii farmers. Bur please. You know I was always appreciate your testimony and I was interested to see you support it. So you know, because you represent farmers, your, your position is the farmers are okay with it.

Brian Miyamoto, on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau represented Shimizu. I think you may have mistaken me with Hunter Heveailin with the Farmers Union. The Farm Bureau respectfully opposes this measure. Yeah, our, our written testimony is in opposition.

Thank you for clarifying that.

Any other questions Rep. Shamizu? Otherwise. We'll go to Vice Chair first and then over to Rep. Cochran for.

Oh, thank you. Chair for Dole. You mentioned that the fumigant is injected into the soil so that reduces the risk of drift compared to like topical sprayed types. So has there been any air monitoring done to monitor and see like what the actual levels of drift are?

We don't have air monitoring but we, we do follow all of the regulations as put out by the EPA on how to apply. And it requires us to seal the soil with a tool called the cultipacker so that you have a smooth seal over it and you don't touch it for seven days.

So in other words you don't break that seal. And the reason they set it at seven days is because their science says that seven days is enough to avoid any incidents of volatility going up and drifting.

Okay, so there are, you do take precautions, but there's no data on what the drift. Drift levels might be because there isn't air monitoring.

That's correct. And again it's speculative to use data from other states and other countries. And we'd be more than welcome to entertain any state agency that wants to do air monitoring in our farm or if we had to do it ourself and we were taught the technology and

just a follow up because again, because it's injected, is there any like kind of going the other way out of the air and into the water? Is there any information or data or environmental analysis regarding how the pesticide might leach into groundwater or aquifers?

That's all done by the EPA. So all of the. For a chemical to be approved to be used by the EPA, they do all those studies. But I can tell you that we don't do a water test, but the Board of Water Supply does.

And so the wells that are in that district, which three of them now belong to the state of Hawaii, that are on our farm, but we don't own the wells anymore and they do water Testing and border Water supply has a monitoring well on our farm and they do water testing and we haven't had any notification of affecting the water.

Okay, thank you. I'm for Dole. Thanks for being here. So, yeah, I was listening to your testimony and you were sort of explaining how it's injected in. I guess it's not like sprayed, you know, topically, but it's considered a fumigant, which means it produces fumes. Right. So there is something that disperses into the air.

No, excuse me, I'm. It can anyways, potentially the way it's set up, it is a liquid that is then pumped into a shank that is 20 inches deep and pushed with nitrogen and inert gas. And so when the nitrogen pushes the liquid, it volatile it.

And then the action within the soil is as a gas, but it's not coming to us as a gas that could, you know, like you don't close the valve and the gas is leaking in the air. That's not the situation.

Right, but I mean, the meaning of fumigant is evaporates and.

Exactly. Right. And that action within the 20 inch deep area, the nitrogen gas pushes the liquid and atomizes it, which then volatizes it to work as gas.

Okay. All right. I just wanted clarification on the gas or liquid or whatever fumigant.

Thank you. Thank you for asking. Yeah, because it sounds like we're buying it in cylinders as a pressurized gas, but in fact it's a liquid that gets pressurized with nitrogen.

Thank you. Thank you. Follow up question, Vice Chair.

So this is a restricted use pesticide, and restricted use pesticides are that way because they pose a significant risk to human or environmental health. So my question is, you know, knowing kind of that we have these bills come up every year, and this is a particular area of interest for some of us in the Legislature. Has dole.

Have you folks been looking at, are there like resistant pineapple varieties to the nematodes or are there. Have you conducted pilot projects to kind of take the proactive approach to moving away from this?

That's a good question. And the proactive thing that we have done. But our industry and the United States of America does not seem very happy with the idea of genetically modified organisms. But the pea bark on the Big island, the USDA pea bark was doing a.

For the benefit of Pineapple Growers association, which is not just Dole, but the former Del Monte and the former Maui, they were trying to come up with a genetically modified pineapple that was naturally resistant to Nematodes.

They did not complete the project basically because the companies that are part of Pineapple Growers association said that we cannot sell a GMO pineapple. That could change someday in the future. Everybody's attitude changes over time and certainly we would continue research in that area.

Personally, I'm not afraid of gmo and I think that would be awesome because if you can have pest resistant crops, then you don't need to use pesticides. But there has to be public acceptance for GMO and for our, our product, the fresh pineapple. Right now, there's not public acceptance for it.

Thank you.

Thank you. Other questions, Members, if not, thank you very much, the testifiers and I appreciate that you were here today because this is part of the public education campaign that let people know what's really going on out there in the fields because nobody could see it, right? Because it's far away.

So I appreciate you taking the opportunity to come in and testify.

And I offer an invite anytime to any of the legislators who want to come out and see our farm. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, we're going to move on to the next measure. House Bill 1603, House Draft 1 relating to agricultural park leases.

This measure repeals the requirement for land covered by an agricultural park lease with a remaining term of 15 years or less to be located in a county having a population of less than 500,000 in order for the Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity to extend the lease. First up, we have Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair. Members of the Committee, Brian Kau, Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity. We'll quickly summarize. Our understanding of this measure is to do exactly that, to repeal the provision of the 500,000 person population requirement. The Department offers comments. We are placed in an unfortunate position on this bill.

We see that there's a benefit to both sides. One, giving us the option and opportunity to extend a lease for an established farm for multiple reasons, financing, longevity, whatnot. That's definitely a reason for this Bill. On the other hand, we do have it extended. Extensive list of people who are waiting to get on farmland with limited inventory.

It's very difficult for us to take a position on that. We do apologize for that, but thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Next we have Amanda Shaw, Agriculture Stewardship, Hawaii, on Zoom. Please proceed.

Aloha Tarnis, Vice Chair for Hawaii, Member of the Committee. Amanda Shaw, Agriculture Stewardship of Hawaii. Our organization's been providing conservation agriculture services for the past 25 years to Hawaii farmers. We're in strong support of this measure. This bill would really bring consistency to ag park leases throughout the state and throughout the islands.

We really see it as a first step in other broader efforts to update and streamline and improve affordable access to agricultural land, water and infrastructure. And we highly support the development of further ag parks so that many beginning farmers and farmers throughout the state can access those lands.

This bill would really help us get clear and consistent lease policies and it would enable folks that have been farming, that want to make meaningful investments in their soil health, for example, to apply to extend that lease. So the Department still has discretion over whether those extensions could be granted. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm. Sure. You have our testimony. Strong support of this measure. This is fairness. The Legislature in their wisdom passed a law several years ago that allowed this on every other county but on the wall with city and county Honolulu.

We're just asking to include our farmers that are on Department of Agriculture Ag parks to be eligible for this lease extension. You heard the previous testifier talk about why it's important. You're not going to get financing, you're not going to invest in your infrastructure. These farmers are farming. They're.

They're bonafide farmers that are producing the food, feed, fiber, fuel, floriculture that we want. Why are we suggesting to move them off and then bring somebody else on that maybe doesn't have that track record? We support new farmers. We hear the Department talking about a list of people waiting to get on these ag parks.

That's why we support finding additional farmland for the state to bring into the inventory. Funding an ag park that needs to be developed that the Department has in Cunea. $50 million. We can put a bunch of new farmers on that ag park. Again, this is discretionary. This is a may, not a shall.

We want to support new farmers, but we also want to encourage our current farmers who are farming or producing to continue to farm, to develop these succession plans to keep growing what we need here in Hawaii. Again, this is a may.

I was asked, the farmer was asked in the Ag Committee chair what the numbers look like because we were asking actually for to be increased from 25 acres up to 60 acres. Right now, the loss is 25 acres. That is about 7% of the ag parks that we have right now. Just 7% are 25 acres around there.

So we are asking the Legislature to consider increasing it. So again, as a fairness issue, all farmers and ranchers that are on these ag parks have the opportunity to continue to farm. Aren't we trying to grow our industry by passing this bill?

It is a Legislature signal that they support our current farmers and we want to encourage them to continue to farm. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. Thank you very much. Next.

Haley McKinnon,

Aloha Chair Tarnas Vice Chair Poepoe and Members of the Committee. My name is Hailey Kaukea. Ako McKinnon and I co own Ahiki Acres, a diversified vegetable farm in Waimanalo. I stand in strong support of HB 1603. As the previous testifiers explained, the current population restriction creates an unnecessary barrier for farmers on Oahu seeking lease extensions.

Agricultural lands are public resources, is a public resource and policies governing them should be fair and consistent across the state. Removing this restriction allows farmers like us to invest in long term stewardship of the INA while being able to strengthen our local food system. Mahalo for the opportunity to testify and I'm available for any questions.

Thank you very much for taking time away from your farms to be here. Next. Shannon Olavato, Waimanalo Agricultural Association. You wear a lot of hats.

Good afternoon Chair Tarnes, Vice Chair Poepoe and Members. My name is Shannon Olivado. I'm here on behalf of Waimanalo AG Association as an advisory volunteer board Member and we are here with Haley with Brian just to express our support. As you know, Waimanalo does include AG Park leases.

Over 126 acres are in Waimanalo and our lessees are very active in our community, not only doing plant nurseries, but also growing sod grass that all of us want in our yards and also fruit and like Haley mentioned, vegetables and fruits that we all consume. I just wanted to point out Act 213 in 2023.

The Senate Committee report actually said something that really resonates with us on Oahu. It said your Committee further finds that when faced with the uncertainty of continued tenancy, lessees have little incentive to make major investments or improvements to their infrastructure or ensure the long term maintenance of their facilities which may deteriorate as a result.

This is exactly what Waimanalo farmers and other Oahu Ag lease holders would like. Some type of continuity with their farms, the ability to make investments, go to a bank, let them know that they want to continue farming and not be pulled out from under the rug if their lease were to end.

So we just ask this Committee to please consider extending this parity Bill to Oahu leaseholders as well. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? If not, questions Members. Rep Shimizu.

Department of AG Please

thanks for being here. I want to mahalo the farmers. That's really hard work. But my question to you would be, is there an established evaluation analysis or some kind of metrics that you do as far as evaluating the existing farmers compared to a new person coming up?

There's no process that the Department takes that directly compares a potential new farmer to an existing established farmer. That would be. That would be very difficult to do because of track record. So, no, there is no direct comparison that we know of that.

Can I ask, so let's say there's an existing person there and they're underperforming. Do you have some sort of review process to hold them accountable or just keep tabs on productivity to make that decision to extend them?

Yes, absolutely. So if the farmer is in violation of their lease in any way which does include the development of their farm, then our property managers send them. This is a violation essentially with requirements as to what they need to do to get into compliance of the lease.

If one of the terms for extension is, they must be in complex compliance of their needs. If they are not, there is no extension.

Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Other questions. Members, if not, thank you very much to the testifiers on this important bill. Let's move forward to the next measure. House Bill 1921, House draft one relating to cesspools.

This measure allows an existing cesspool that lawfully serves a single dwelling or dwelling unit in a priority level 3 area to continue serving that dwelling or dwelling unit and additional bedrooms constructed on the same parcel and within the existing dwelling or dwelling unit subject to certain conditions.

It authorizes the Department of Health to adopt rules and authorizes the restriction of additional bedrooms where evidence demonstrates that continued cesspool use impacts water quality or human health. First up, we have University of Hawaii in support. Next, we have Department of Health with comments on Zoom.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, John Nagaso, Department of Health Wastewater Branch Department stands on its written testimony providing comments. The Department acknowledges the intent of this measure. Our comment is in regard to the Environmental Protection Protection Agencies regulation regarding the definition of large capacity cesspools.

And our proposed amendment is intended to mitigate any unintentional violation of the EPA's large capacity cesspool regulations. Available for any questions. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next. Ted Bolen, Hawaii Reef and Ocean Coalition. Hello, sir. Welcome.

Thank you. Chair Tarnas, Members of the Committee, Ted Bolan, on behalf of the Reef and Ocean Coalition. I filed testimony late after reading the testimony of Hawaii.

Thank you for seeing University of Hawaii Sea Grant College and Water Resources Research center are the ones who worked with the Department of Health on the prioritization tool and they've testified that there is a problem with the bill as written because there would be confusion over what is priority three.

And there needs to be some clarification because rriority three actually has three spatial resolutions. You've got census tract block groups and blocks, and it makes a big difference as to how many cesspools are in Priority three.

So I would suggest for the Hawaii Reef and Ocean Coalition an Amendment on page four, line 21 after tool I would add suggest the Committee add using block spatial resolution rather than default census tract resolution. As I said, this makes a big difference in how many cesspools are covered under Priority three, and it eliminates confusion.

That's very important for the so I ask that you make that change. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. I'm available for questions.

Thank you very much for providing that amendment. University provided guidance, but no amendment. So thank you for doing that work for us. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure?

House Bill 1921 if not questions Members Chair Rep. Shmizu I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name and your Ted Bolan. Who are you with? Ted I'm so sorry.

Hawaii Reef and Ocean Coalition.

Okay, thank you.

Do you have a question for Mr. Bohlen? No, I just wanted more. I want to know who he is. Okay. Any other questions? If not, thank you very much to the testifiers. Let's move on to the next measure. House Bill 1979, House Draft 2 relating to environmental review.

This measure shortens the period during which certain judicial proceedings involving environmental assessments and environmental impact statements on actions that propose the use of land for or construction of affordable housing or clean energy projects must be initiated.

Specifies that appeals from environmental courts that involve actions that propose the use of land for or construction of affordable housing or clean energy projects meet one of the grounds transfer to the Supreme Court and prohibits any court from awarding attorneys fees in these judicial proceedings. First up, we have Office of Planning and sustainable development. Mr. Tom Eisen.

Tell us about your comments. Yes, we have comments.

I'll summarize briefly that Office of Planning Sustainable Development supports Governor's priority goal of increasing affordable housing for local residents. Shortening the window for filing a judicial challenge to an agency determination will reduce uncertainty and risk for the development of affordable housing.

We note the bill is narrowly constructed to align with the important goals of providing affordable housing and clean energy.

Thank you very much.

Available for questions.

Thank you very much. Office of Hawaiian affairs on Zoom Leialoha Makuanani.

Aloha Chair Vice Chair Members of the Committee Leialoha Makuanani on behalf of Office of Hawaiian Affairs. For the most part, we'll stand on our written comments But I want to highlight one that we acknowledge that the intent is to streamline important statewide initiatives to for affordable housing and clean energy.

But we'll highlight our main concern with the measure is the restriction on awarding attorney fees, which we believe will create a very strong disincentive for plaintiffs with limited financial resources to pursue legitimate claims and could potentially open the door for bad actors to proceed without meaningful oversight.

I will add beyond what's in our testimony that there are separate provisions in the HRS that specify that attorney fees are not awarded when developers are acting in good faith and but they're only awarded when the developer has moved forward, essentially knowing that they're violating laws.

So removing this fee shifting provision for these type of projects, which could cover a very broad scope, could potentially incentivize bad actors and be overly punitive for community Members who are often our Native Hawaiian beneficiaries acting as private attorney generals to enforce their constitutional rights.

So for those reasons, we strongly recommend removing that provision along with the other recommendations in our testimony. I will be available for questions. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Next, Jasmine Steiner on Zoom. Not present. Next. Truth for the People. Navai Hoa Nui Laau Lapaau foundation on Zoom. Next. McKinley ease Avalon Development Company on Zoom. Please proceed. Mckinley eads with Avalon Development Company on zoom. Please proceed. No response. Okay, We don't hear you. We can't hear you. Audio issues. Don't rejoin that.

Okay, we're going to go on to the next testifier and then come back if we have time. Bianca Isaki on Zoom Aloha Chair and Representatives.

I'm against these amendments. It would shorten time. And I'm especially concerned with a 30 day limit when there's no environmental review because very often there's no notice. I mean, I can compare it with like agency appeals which also have a 30 day deadline. And I'm an attorney, I have a lot of community clients.

And so what happens with 30 days from an approval when there's no review at all? The Director or an agency, they'll approve a project, send a notice to the developer and then nobody even knows it happened.

And the only way to find out it happens very often is to like do a public records request which can take two weeks. Well, their agency is given two weeks to respond and then they can extend for another two weeks. And most of the time you might not even know there's an application.

So that 30 day limit when there's no review and on subsection A, that is really a big problem. It's going to add barriers to environmental review, which is supposed to happen at the earliest practical time.

And I'd also echo OHA's rationale around attorneys fees because there's just no reason to remove that because you you only get that when you successfully correct a failure to conduct environmental review, which shows that there was some merit to it. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Let's try again for a couple that weren't here. Jasmine Steiner on Zoom, no. Kanoe Ulu Vehi Nuhea Case on Zoom, no and McKinley Eads on Zoom.

Aloha Chair Vice Chair Members of the Committee McKinley Eads on behalf of Avalon Development. Much of the testimony in opposition suggests that this bill weakens environmental protections or denies access to justice. Respectfully, that is not accurate and is important to focus on what the law will actually does.

Chapter 343 is already one of the strongest environmental review statutes in the country. Developers routinely spend 10, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars preparing environmental assessments and environmental impact statements. Those documents are reviewed over many weeks by professional staff at the state and county level. Agencies make formal determinations under law, subject to public notice and comment period.

The public is still fully involved through the environmental review process, through notices, written comments, and agency consideration before any determination is made. That process is not perfunctory. It is not controlled by developers. This bill does not shield projects from accountability. Judicial review remains available and courts retain full authority to enforce compliance and halt unlawful action.

What this bill addresses is the use of litigation timing itself as a means of stopping projects rather than resolving legitimate environmental disputes. As the law stands, a single motivated individual, without ever prevailing on the merits, can delay or derail a project that will provide housing or energy to hundreds of families.

Affordable housing and clean energy projects are uniquely vulnerable because they depend on time sensitive financing, tax credits, and coordinated approvals. Delay alone can make a fully lawful project financially infeasible. Opposition testimony often frames attorneys fees as necessary for access to justice. There is no constitutional right to have litigation subsidized. People may still bring claims, and they should.

They may still challenge agency action, and they may still prevail on the merits. What this bill removes is a financial incentive structure that can encourage litigation aimed at stopping projects altogether rather than correcting genuine environmental deficiencies through injunctive or declaratory relief. In a system where delay itself can kill a project, fee shifting magnifies that leverage.

Regardless of the underlying merits, this Bill represents a careful and targeted reform. It preserves strong environmental protections while restoring balance and certainty to a system that is currently vulnerable to misuse. If Hawaii is serious about delivering affordable housing and clean energy while still protecting our environment, HB 1979 HC2 is a reasonable and necessary step.

We respectfully urge your support. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify In House Bill 1979, House draft two, if not questions, Members. If not, thank you to all the testifiers. We're going to move on to the next measure, House Bill 1948, House Draft 1, relating to single use plastics.

This measure prohibits lodging establishments from providing personal care products in small plastic containers within sleeping room accommodations, any space within sleeping room accommodations or bathrooms used by the public or guests, and it establishes civil penalties. First up, we have the Department of Land and Natural Resources.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Charlie Taylor, on behalf of DLNR's Division of Aquatic Resources. We stand on our written testimony providing comments. And just to summarize those comments, we normally would for just about any bill that reduces plastic pollution or plastics entering our state waters. We're generally supportive of that.

The only reason we're not giving up, you know, a technical support is because we recognize this as amending 342 Department of Health statute, which is out of our department's jurisdiction, but still just noting that microplastics are huge concern to our, to our Department and our division because and we mentioned it in our testimony about ingestion and entanglement for wildlife, smothering of wildlife, transportation of invasive species.

We neglected to mention microplastics as well, which is a huge concern which we're finding in our sand in our coastal areas. So again, we're generally in support of this bill. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next to the Department of Health. Wasn't that nice? DLNR deferred to you didn't want to mess with your statutes.

Hello, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, my name is Kellyann Lee, here on behalf of Hawaii Department of Health, Solid and Hazardous Waste Branch.

So we stand on our written testimony providing comments, but our main comment is that we believe that a better fit for this language and this bill would be under Hawaii Revised Statutes 486k Hotels, because that provides other requirements that hotels have to comply with when running their businesses.

And we think that would be a better fit than what's currently proposed, our solid waste pollution statute. But if the Hawaii Department of Health Solid and Hazardous Waste Branch were tasked with implementing this measure, we would respectfully request an additional position to do the enforcement and inspections. And this measure is currently written. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next we have Angela Young, Hawaii Youth Climate Coalition on Zoom. Not present. Next we have Bella Joaquim on Zoom.

Aloha Chair, vice Chair and other Committee Members. My name is Bella Joachim and I am a senior at Hawaii Pacific University. I am testifying in support and would like to reiterate my written testimony on this bill. In Hawaii, pollution is a serious issue as it ends up in most of our oceans and shorelines. While toiletry. Toilet.

Toiletry bottles and containers may seem minor by themselves, collectively they create a significant amount of plastic waste that is only used once ending in the landfill. As we are part of an island community, millions of children tourists visit every year staying in these lodging facilities and using these supplies.

By reducing plastic from the tourism industry, we will make meaningful difference in our carbon footprint. I've also learned in class this year that the idea that humans have a moral responsibility to reduce environmental harm where there are reasonable alternatives.

In this case, we do have alternatives, like refillable dispensers in the case of like shampoo and conditioners that are now widely being provided in many places.

This Bill reflects the values of many people in Hawaii and also helps us respect the land and ocean that is our responsibility, especially if we want this place to be here for future generations.

We know that there is some level of pollution that is inevitable, but we still have an obligation to prevent and reduce plastic whenever that is possible. Measures like 1948 are small but important steps towards a sustainable practice. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify today, and I respectfully urge the Committee to support this Bill.

Thank you, Mr. Wacom. Anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 1948? Mr. Bolan.

Thank you. Chair Tarnas. Vice Chair. Point Members of the Committee, Ted Bolan for the Hawaii Reef and Ocean Coalition and the Climate Protectors Hawaii won't be at this long. We've all seen little bottles that you get in hotels, and individually that's not very much, but collectively, it's a lot of plastic. Plastic's a problem. Microplastics are a problem.

As previous speakers have indicated, it would be really good to get people to get lodging establishments to use bulk containers instead of all these little bottles. And they can actually save money doing that. So it makes sense for the hotel industry, it makes sense for us as citizens and for the environment.

So I urge you to pass this bill. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? If not, questions? Members? If not, thank you very much to the testifiers. Let's move on to the Next measure, House Bill 1873, House Draft 1 relating to the Board of Regents of the University of Hawaii.

This measure requires Members of the Board of Regents of the University of Hawaii to attend a governance training within 12 months of appointment and every two years thereafter. It exempts strategic planning retreats of the Board of Regents of the University of Hawaii from open meeting requirements if certain conditions are met.

It requires the Candidate Advisory Council to ensure that all candidates presented to the Governor for nomination have certain subject matter experiments and are not registered lobbyists who have lobbied on matters pertaining to the University of Hawaii. It exempts the financial disclosures of the Board of Regents, as mandated by the state ethics code from being made public.

It requires the Board of Regents of the University of Hawaii, in collaboration with the Candidate Advisory Council, to submit annual reports to the Legislature. First up, we have the Board of Regents on Zoom. Mr. Miyahira.

Good afternoon. Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. We stand on the submitted testimony to highlight it. We support the professional development of the Regents once selected to the bar and also the ability to plan strategically on behalf of the University. We also support the filing of financial disclosures.

However, public disclosure has tended to discourage otherwise highly experienced and qualified candidates in the past. And so we if we could eliminate the public disclosure that would help us broaden the pool of possible candidates to be considered for to serve as the Regent of the University.

The Board already has existing bylaws that govern conflicts of interest and in my experience we have successfully utilized that practice in the past. I stand available for any questions that the Committee may have.

Thank you very much, Mr. Miyahira. Next, we've received written testimony from the Office of Information Practices. Next we have Mr. Harris, Hawaii State Ethics Commission.

Good afternoon, Chair, vice chair, Members of the Committee. The Hawaii State Ethics Commission is respectfully in opposition specifically to the provision that would hide the financial information transmitted by the Board of Regents. The written testimony, I think, is in there.

I won't try to repeat it, except to just briefly note the fact that the Board of Regents oversees the institution with billions of dollars of funds, extensive procurement authority, and a very pivotal role in Hawaii's economy.

And for that reason, it is why the Board of Regents has been treated in such a way, where the financial information has been made made public.

I will note that there is a article just today from the ProPublica talking about, on a federal level, a web of connections between senior governmental officials and the institutions that they regulate and really try to highlight a loud alarm about the concern about ethics on that level. I don't want to see Hawaii moving in that direction anything.

I'm hoping we're moving in the other direction of ensuring public confidence in the decision making that's being made by our trusted public officials. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you. Next, Public First Law Center, Ben Kreps on Zoom.

Yes. Good afternoon, Chair Tarnas and Members of the Committee. My name is Ben Kreps. I'm a staff attorney with the Public First Law Center. Our organization is dedicated to promoting openness in Hawaii government, and we're respectfully opposing this bill. It's a bad Bill for government accountability transparency for at least two reasons.

So, first, it creates a broad and unnecessary open meetings exemption exclusively for the Board of Regents. And we explain in our written testimony why that exemption is not necessary. And we would also respectfully refer the Committee to the written testimony of the Office of Information Practices. They are the governmental expert on this.

And they've also put in their written testimony that this is not a good idea and it should come out of the bill if the Bill moves forward. And second, as just noted by the previous testifier, this proposal would hide currently public financial disclosures for Members of one of the most powerful government boards in the state.

The Regents have suggested in their testimony that the public disclosure requirements limit the Regent applicant pool, but there's zero evidence to support that assertion. So you can find past lists of applicants online, and you can easily see that the pool of applicants is wide and deep, and it has been for many years, notwithstanding the public disclosure requirement.

And moreover, just look at the current Regents. We've got prominent lawyers, we've got high profile financial executives, finance executives, and even a former Governor. So there's just no need for secret disclosures. And openness serves a critical guardrail against the conflicts of interest.

So in the end, this bill is a solution without a problem, and we respectfully ask that this Committee defer it. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in House Bill 1873? If not questions. Members represent UH Board of Regents. Mr. Miya, are you still there?

Yes, I am.

Go ahead. Mr. Shimizu.

I. I was just wondering. There's a requirement for training.

You mean professional development, attending seminars and workshops, so forth?

Yeah, I wasn't sure what that entailed. If you could quantify that, please.

Yeah. This basically entails involving regents in training in terms of how to be a good.

How to be a good trustee of the, of the university itself, serving on, serving on boards of governors, boards of trustees, boards of regents, looking at the issues that the university or higher education faces, how, what the duties and responsibilities of the regents are and basically how to perform our duties to the highest level possible.

Follow up. Chair yes. So is that something that's in place now and how often is that done?

It's not required. However, we strongly encourage all of our regions to participate in training and workshops annually or biannually.

As an example, I attended the association of Governing Boards last March and I will be attending the same association this coming March as we meet in Denver, to go over some of the issues of Har Ed, including things like name, image, likeness in terms of the issues facing higher education as far as involvement with the Federal Government and other kinds of issues.

So it sounds like there's nothing in place right now and it's more of a subjective kind of thing. Is that, is that how it is?

There's no requirement. However, you know, we strongly urge all of our regents, and I believe with the exception just one regent who doesn't, who prefers not to travel because of personal health reasons. All of our other regions have attended these, these workshops and seminars in the past.

Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Certainly.

Rep. Cochran.

For Board of Regents. Aloha. So your strategic planning retreats, how many do you have or have you, you currently participate in these, right?

We haven't had one since I've been appointed, which has only been two years. So I'm looking forward to hopefully participating one in the near future.

Future and follow up. Chair and this is strategic planning. So at these retreats, is the intention to plan and not so much make decisions and like do votes on particular items?

That's correct. In fact, I believe that the health draft one does specifically mention no business decisions and no Decisions on the strategic plan itself during a retreat. And I think the intent is for these kinds of conversations as a result of the planning to meet the. Made publicly available at a subsequent meeting of the board.

Okay, Y.

Thank you. A question for Mr. Harris. The testimony from the board of regents makes it very clear that the public disclosure of financial disclosure, financial information does in fact give pause and discourages otherwise highly experienced and qualified candidates of good character from ultimately applying to view region.

Is there a way that you can assure that there's, you know, no potential conflicts or, you know, by having the financial disclosure be made to you and to your staff? You could review it, but it not be made public? That's certainly done in other know, other processes.

And I think if you can review it and your staff can review it, you can make sure that there's not a problem, but it doesn't have to be disclosed to the public. What. What. What could be wrong with that?

Chair In 2014, this Legislature made the decision to identify certain boards and commissions that were considered high profile, essentially boards with high authority. Answer the question that don't go back to what the Legislature did years ago.

Well, so the board of regents was moved out of the confidential financial disclosure that the regime that you're specifically referencing put into a public disclosure regime for some extensive policy reasons, which I won't repeat just for the sake of brevity.

One of the concerns with keeping it confidential from a public perspective, from a public integrity or public confidence in it, they don't see it, they file a complaint with us. They won't get an answer because it's confidential information. So they will never know if there was an actual issue behind the scenes or not.

And that is part of the reason why you're losing confidence. Second, you know, I would identify again with an institution with significant activity, the ability for an agency with a staff of 12 to be able to review each action and determine if there's a conflict of interest is exceedingly challenging.

One property transaction may involve dozens of entities with hundreds of individuals involved. To be able to identify where those financial conflicts of interest are with any level of specificity would require a level of staffing and attention and focus that just isn't currently available. So that means you're depending on the public to do your job.

Right now, what we are doing is principally responding to complex. So after the financial conflict of interest is identified and has already occurred, we can go back after the fact and go after them, trying to identify things in a proactive manner.

Typically, we found stakeholders who are involved in the process who are engaged and already know who the players are, are usually the ones in the best situation to be able to identify where those conflicts are versus trying to catch it after the fact.

It just. It concerns me that you're crowdsourcing a job that really is your job. And I appreciate that. The Legislature in the past decided to move the Board of Regents out of the group that could provide their financial disclosure and keep it confidential.

This measure clearly is contemplating putting the Board of Regents back into that for good policy reasons. And so I'm just trying to understand how you can do your job by reviewing this financial disclosure information confidentially and without having to make it public. Sure.

So under the constitution, specifically, public disclosures are required, and they specifically name in the Constitution specific jobs, including yours, as ones that are publicly disclosed. And it gives the Legislature the authority to identify who else is. So I wouldn't necessarily say it's our job. Again, it is a policy decision. Right.

With the Legislature to decide which one's going to be public or public confidence purposes.

For us to be able to review every decision made by the Board of Regents would require an increase in staffing, and that would be part of the request to do this in a way that you would be able to have assurances to the public that every decision is being reviewed for conflict of interest purpose.

Okay, well, that. That's legitimate. That if you have to do this work, you may not be able to do it with your existing staff. So if this Committee and if the House decides to move this measure forward, I would urge you in future hearings to indicate in your testimony what you would need in order to implement this.

Because what the Legislature did in the past, we can undo and we can. You know, we have the constitutional authority to allow the Board of Regents to keep their financial disclosures confidential by changing the statute.

You're absolutely right, Chair. It is certainly your decision. I would note that all the current Board of Regents, for the ones saying that qualified candidates aren't applying, did apply, are currently serving during the current regime.

I understand, but there's a lot of people who don't run for office because they don't want to have to disclose all their financial information. I suspect that there are lots of people who would be interested to serve on the Board of Regents, but don't do it because they don't want to disclose all their financial information.

And that's confirmed by the testimony from Mr. Miyahira. Sure. Again, just for the sake of the public watching, not all financial information is revealed.

There is an extensive attempt to try to hide, for example, personal identification, personal addresses, and that there is a range of salary or range of income. So idea is people don't have to give specifics.

It's just basically indicating above a certain amount is what is disclosed to the public as a means in part to try to offset some of that concern about that information being public.

On a national level, though, a lot of the federal crimes that we've seen lately have flowed out of spouses, affiliated people having financial connections and getting financial benefits from transactions going on. And that's why some of this does seem invasive. But it's also directly related to where we see corruption issues.

Yeah. So I think if we can trust that you can do the job, then I just don't understand why we have to make everything public. Because I think it is dissuading people from applying to be on the Board of Regents, for example.

So if this Committee and if the House decides to move this measure forward, I would urge you in future testimony to say what you would need on staff in order to be able to implement it. Because we trust you. Okay. And your staff to do a good job even if the public doesn't get all the details. Yes. Rep. Shimizu.

Rep. Shimizu, following up the question that the chair was posing, I heard you say that you didn't have the staff or inability to track every decision by the Board of Regents.

Following up the question that the chair was posing, I heard you say that you didn't have the staff or inability to track every decision by the Board of Regents.

But my understanding from the chair's question was just the initial financial standing that he was saying we want to or this Bill wants to not be made public, but just to ethics.

So is it where you're talking about just the initial financial disclosure, or is it your understanding that you have to track every decision by the Board of Regents? Because that's what I heard you say, which is totally different. Sure.

Understood. And thank you for the opportunity to clarify. A conflict of interest arises when someone has a financial interest in one of the businesses or entities coming before them for decision making. Currently, if that information of those financial connections public, there is some, you know, sunshine is the great disinfectant.

The except that it's well known in public, there's some disincentive for making a decision that might benefit the individual at hand. Right. It's known. In addition, anyone who's involved in that process has the opportunity to say ahead of time, hey, wait, there might be a conflict of interest here.

If the only person who knows that there is a financial interest or involvement is the Ethics Commission, then if you want to proactively stop conflicts of interest, you'd actually have to review those decisions and actively looking for those financial interests. And so, you know, the question that was asked essentially, why aren't you doing more of this?

Again, a typical business property transaction, you'd actually have to look at each LLC for the Members that LLC who might be the parent company. I mean, these things are quite complex, and it would require a great deal of time, energy and effort to try to keep track of that and then be able to say that in a public way.

public way, a better understanding. Thank you for explaining. Thank you, Chair.

A better understanding. Thank you for explaining. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much. Thanks very much, Mr. Harris. Mr. Miyahira, are you still there?

Yes, I am still here.

Thank you. I appreciate your patience to stick around for questions. Could you help us understand the conflict of interest policies within the border region? So if. How would that this what the ethics, the Director of the ethics commission, he posed, you know, for example, like a land transaction that the university was doing.

And how does your conflict of interest rules make sure that individual regents or their spouses or family Members don't benefit from those sort of transactions? Because you mentioned you had a strong conflict of interest policy that's worked well. Could you help us understand how that works?

Sure. It's part of our bylaws, but it's highly dependent upon a person's integrity and honesty. And I've seen since my, over the last two years, examples of regents basically recusing themselves from discussions and voting on specific measures.

Even for myself, for that matter, a matter came up which involved possible involvement of a nonprofit on whose board I serve. And so I publicly announced my possible conflict of interest and removed myself from the conversation, as well as any decision making on that particular item.

But again, it rests primarily on the honesty and integrity of each regent.

Okay. Thank you for helping us understand how that works with the Board of Regents. Any other questions, Members? If not, thank you very much, Mr. Miyara. Thank you very much, Mr. Harris. And to all the testifiers on this measure, let's go on to the next measure. House Bill 1559, House Draft 1, relating to education.

This measure prohibits a student from using a telecommunication device on school grounds during the instructional day, with certain exceptions. It requires a confiscated telecommunication device to be released only to the student's legal parent or guardian or who then has three months to retrieve the device or subject the device to forfeiture.

First up, we have the Department of Education,

Aloha Chair Tarnas and Vice Chair Poepoe, Members of the Committee, I'm Terry Ushijima, Assistant Superintendent, testifying on behalf of the Department of Education. The Department stands on its written testimony, providing comments. And I want to just point out a few things. Things. The Board of Education has approved a cell phone policy on February 122026.

And we believe that this addresses the intent of this measure. So respectfully, we believe that a statutory mandate is not needed at this time. We also want to mention that the board policy does for the high school provide some flexibility at that level in terms of how we define instructional time.

So it's really to allow students to engage more fully without distraction. So during class time they would not be using their phones, but during breaks and recess, the schools would have the ability to decide whether or not it's appropriate for their students to use it.

I've talked to student council students and many of them, you know, they have jobs or sometimes they have to pick up siblings. And so that provides an opportunity for them to do a quick check before the end of the school day.

And just recently I was at one of our high schools where we were doing a taste test to add menu items to our centralized kitchen work. And the way we were able to get feedback from the students was after they tasted the.

They use their phones to do the QR code and at that moment just input their feedback and talking to the high school principals. Overall, they do not see having access during lunch a problem. In fact, to have to enforce no cell phones during lunch could create other problems.

Cause they would spend all their time probably having to monitor and address that. So thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Next we have Mia Nishiguchi on Zoom. Not present. Anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 1559? If not questions, Members?

Representative Shimizu, I just wanted to clarify 11 thing. So this internal policy hasn't been started yet.

It's going to be effect from this coming school year. So once the board policy is passed, we have a time frame to come up with the guidance. So our office has started that process.

So it's going to start in August, school year?

Yes, August.

All right. Thank you. I just want to clarify that.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. Could you share that document? Do you have a document that is public that you could share with us

for the Board of Education that sets

this policy that you said that the board has created?

We do have the policy. It is.

Is it posted on your website?

It's posted on the Board of Education website. It's. The policy is from the 2-11-1212. Yes, that's when it was approved and I believe that's when we had our board of education date.

If the public and the Members here wanted to see that, we could go to the Board of Education's website and find February 12th and look at the document.

Yes, I will confirm that. But yes, it's under the Student Achievement Committee.

Okay. And the next steps in that process.

It is posted.

Okay. The next steps in that process is that now the board has approved it. So now you have to do the guidance.

Yes.

Who's doing that?

Our office. Our Office of Curriculum and Instructional Design.

Okay. And is that then going to be made public at some point? Maybe you could help talk us through the process. You or your compatriot.

So, Charles Souza from the Office of Curriculum and Instructional Design. So the policy is up on the board website. There is also another board policy that says when there is a board policy, that the Department has 90 days to create this implementation plan. So that implementation plan will be presented to the board and then implemented for

the 26-27 school year.

So you expect that in May or around then you'll present your implementation plan to the board.

We will have it available. So the board of education sets the agenda. But that's our timeline in terms of having it ready and sharing it with our schools, because schools in turn then have to share it with their parents.

Sure.

And currently schools are. Many schools already have an existing cell phone policy. It's just that what this does for. By having a board policy, it brings consistency amongst the schools.

That's right. That's right. I understand.

Yes.

So I. What I'm. So you're going to have your implementation plan, and where will that be posted so that people will know to look for it in April or May?

Yes. So we are. We're creating it so that we follow what we call standards of practice. So that's the format that we're using and we will have it available. Usually it's a. It's not usually website, but you could definitely share it with.

But at what point would it be made public, your implementation plan?

It would be made public because the schools would have to implement it in the upcoming school year.

Okay, but when would the public be able to read your implementation plan? Is it when the board of education is considering it? Is it our part of their agenda? Or how can interested Members of the public or the Legislature see the implementation plan?

We can probably work with our comms office to post it on our website. We could request that they do that. Normally when we have standards of practice, it's giving the school specific guidance in terms of how to implement the policy.

Okay. I'm thinking out loud here, but, you know, this is a measure that there's a lot of interest in the Legislature to do something about it. And we hear that you're doing something, and we're trying to understand what it is.

And so that's why I'm asking the questions about when are your plans going to be made public so we can understand it.

So the policy actually says what we have to do.

Yes. So I understand that's available now.

Yes. And that is what the schools will be doing.

Okay, okay. Okay. I appreciate that. I think for the Legislature, it would be important for us to learn more about what the board has just adopted, you know, just two weeks ago.

And it was a long process. We started doing public engagement and surveys. We had multiple presentations at the board. So it did take.

Sure, it takes some time, but there's. It includes a description not only of what the policy is, but also enforcement. Does it include enforcement?

Yes. So that's partly of what the guidance will include. And currently, in terms of enforcement, the Bill has some very specific steps. Yes. Which. Which is one of the things I think we put in the comments, you know, that we. For the schools, they follow disciplinary guidance, Chapter 19.

So the guidance would align the consequences with what should occur, because in the school setting, usually unless it's a very severe offense, it's gradual. And so, you know, the first time it might be, well, it may be a warning.

Then the second time it might be, okay, well, they have to hold it till the end of the school day. And perhaps, and I'm not saying this is the guidance, I'm just giving you an example. And even in terms of how cell phones might be stored, that's another area that we would have to provide guidance and stuff.

So those are the things that we are currently working on.

Okay. All right. Well, I appreciate the education about what you're doing, but I do think if you assert that this Bill is not necessary, it would behoove you to educate us even more about what you're currently doing.

What the board of Education's policy is your timeline for your implementation plan, so that the Legislature could have confidence that what you're doing is going to take care of their concerns.

And we appreciate the legislature's interest in this area because we also agree that we want students to be focused on instruction.

So if this Committee and the House decides to move this Bill forward in some form or another, I'd say in future hearings on this, I think the more you can explain what you're doing and provide it to the public. I think that would help us feel more confident that we don't have.

If you're, if you're saying we don't need the Bill, we need to be convinced that what you're doing is going to be sufficient. So I would welcome future at future hearings that you provide more information about that.

Appreciate that.

Thank you. Okay. Any other questions? If not, thank you very much. Let's move on to the next measure. We already heard House Bill 1531 and made decisions on that. We're going to move now to House Bill 1721, House draft one relating to housing.

This measure clarifies insurance indemnification and certain certificate of occupancy requirements for purposes of expedited permits. I want to let everyone know, I remind people we're going to be going through all the bills on our hearing first and then we'll do decisions at the end. So just so you know. Okay, House Bill 1721 on this measure.

First up, we have who's been very patiently waiting.

Thanks, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Kiko Bukowski on behalf of the Plumbers and Fitters Local 675. We, we submitted testimony in opposition as written. However, we did submit some proposed amendments that if, if adopted by your Committee, we would be open to supporting the underlying intent of the measure.

We support trying to make things a little quicker, expedited, a little more efficient. However, not at the expense of health safety and resiliency.

The section in the, in the Bill that we're most concerned about is on page four, lines one and two, which basically eliminates the need for inspections of actual work performed to ensure that the work actually performed is done according to design in order to get a certificate of occupancy.

And our amendments do not impact the underlying intent of the expedited permit. It still leaves the final decision to the design professional, but it requires state or county inspectors to actually inspect the work that's being done. My understanding, by definition, design professionals observe the work, but they do not inspect.

There's a big difference between observing and actually inspecting the actual work being done completed to ensure that the house or the dwelling, the structure is actually safe to occupy. So we respectfully request that you consider our amendments.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Next. Ted Caalis, Grassroot Institute of Hawaii not present. Next. Ikaika Kincaid, American Council of Engineering Companies of Hawaii.

Hello, Chair, Vice Bhair, Committee Members. We submitted testimony in support of this bill. We represent the engineers of Hawaii. 70 companies total large firms through with small mom and pop firms.

They you know, the intent of this is to, you know, streamline the permit application and the process where the engineers are self certifying that the design and everything is done accordingly. But to do that, we need to make sure that our insurance or our companies can be insured.

So that's why the recommendation to change some of the language to make sure that the engineer firms can get insured by these insurance companies so that we can do the work, because without them we wouldn't be able to do the work.

Makes sense. Thank you very much. Next. Janice Marsters, Acawa Consulting on Zoom.

Hello Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee. I own a small business engineering and environmental consulting business on Maui and support this measure with the revisions requested by ACECH and those that revision is actually mirrored.

Also I noted in the AIA testimony with respect to the indemnification language as a small business being insurable with our professional liability insurance, super important, the implications to our business just too great.

And I'll just note that the majority of engineering firms in Hawaii are local small businesses and this measure would support their participation in this important program that was established by the Legislature last year. The thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Is there anyone else wishing to testify in House Bill 1721? If not, questions Members? If not, thank you very much to the testifiers. Let's move on to the next measure, House Bill 1782 relating to artificial intelligence for protection of minors.

This measure establishes safeguards, protections, oversight and penalties for interactions between between minors and artificial intelligence companion systems or conversational artificial intelligence services. First up, Department of Education

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee, Terry Ushijima, again testifying on behalf of the Department of Education. We stand on our written testimony in support of HB 1782. HT2. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next Office of Wellness and Resilience Aloha

Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, my name is Trina Orimoto and on behalf of Office of Wellness and Resilience we stand on our testimony in support of this measure as it aligns with our Kuleana to make Hawaii a trauma informed state.

The bill establishes critical consumer protections for conversational AI, particularly for children and adolescents who are at a uniquely sensitive state stage of development when their prefrontal cortex is still developing and they don't quite have the impulse control that adults do. So we're grateful that you heard this measure. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Next, the Attorney General.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, My name is Ashley Tanaka on behalf of the Department of Attorney General, we thank this Committee for hearing this bill as we do strongly support the intent of this bill.

We did provide comments addressing some potential constitutional concerns we saw with the bill as currently written with some suggested amendments. We did also refer to some phrases that currently aren't defined in the bill with also suggested definitions for those phrases. Lastly, we did address regarding enforcement of this bill.

We do believe that additional resources may be necessary to enforce if this bill is passed.

We do intend on initiating enforcement and collecting data on what sort of human resources needs and costs are associated with such enforcement and if we do determine based on the data we collect, that additional resources are necessary to further enforce this Bill, we will have any requests for additional resources supported with data that we collect.

Thank you and I'm available for questions.

Thank you very much. I appreciate your hard work on your testimony. That helps a lot. Next, the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs Office of Consumer Protection.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, I'm Rogi Tolentino with the Office of Consumer Protection. The Office of Consumer Protection supports this bill and the protection it provides for minors who use artificial Intelligence Companion system. Our office enforces Hawaii's security breach of personal information law.

So we are very mindful of how consumer data is collected and used. We appreciate the data minimization provisions in this Bill which limits the collection, use and retention of a minor's personal data to what is reasonably necessary to operate the AI system and ensure safety and security.

As my colleague at the Office of the Attorney General's Office, we are working with them and trying to identify the resources necessary to ensure that Lockheem Key implemented effectively. And later you will hear from two young men who felt this issue was important enough to fly from Washington, D.C. to testify today.

They shared with me this morning how AI companions have affected the mental health of their young people. Their perspective underscores why this issue deserves the Legislature's careful attention. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. Thank you.

Next Jai Jaisimha Transparency Coalition.

Thank you, Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe and Members of the Committee. My name is Jay Jaisima. I'm testifying in support of House Bill 1782. We're part of a nonpartisan coalition based in Seattle. We advocate for increased transparency and accountability in generative AI.

I have 30 years of tech industry experience as a CEO and Executive in multiple AI technology companies and a PhD from the University of Washington.

But I'm here first and foremost as a parent, to ask you to ensure we don't make the same mistakes with AI that we made with social media, which has been shown to contribute to so many societal problems that affect our youth. We have been working with lawmakers in multiple states, including California and New York.

In this session we're working to ensure the passage of the next generation of AI chatbot legislation, of which Hawaii House Bill 1782 is one of them. I'm also pleased to report today that Oregon is sending their chatbot bill, which is very similar to House Bill 1782, to their governor's desk for a signature.

They got that bill done in 35 days. So very excited about that. I will address three areas in my testimony. One is just want to share some new developments happened late last week. Supreme Court ruled on the copyrightability of AI generated content.

This impinges on constitutional concerns about this Bill because there's been a concern that robot speech is also protectable. With the Supreme Court's decision on copyrightability, I believe that impinges on this concern. The second is I want to offer an observation about OpenAI and business practices.

Just yesterday, OpenAI announced a new release of their ChatGPT product and they were bragging about how it instantly reduces unnecessary refusals while toning down overly defensive or moralizing preambles before answering questions. So this tells me that they don't understand what they're actually doing to mentally impact our youth.

So you need to send them a message and protect Hawaii's Keiki on the topic of enforcement, I just want to suggest that an amendment that provides the AG's office and other agencies the option, but not the mandate to enforce this law might alleviate some budgetary concerns.

The bill already contains a private right of action, which is a great enforcement level. I think these two will make it consistent with policies in other states and also provide the appropriate balance of incentives. Please pass 1782 and thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Jaisimha . Next, Nick Kreis Nick Crist, Public Citizen on Zoom.

Hello Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. I'm Nick. I'm with Public Citizen, a nonprofit advocacy organization based in Washington, dc. I handle state legislative AI work relating to artificial intelligence. But I'm also a certified peer specialist and I'm testifying in strong support of HB 1782. So bills like HB 7082 are becoming very popular.

I'm aware of at least 20 states that have introduced similar bills. One reason they've been moving so fast is because of how Urgently needed. These protections are. Just last year there was a national report that showed almost 75% of teens having used AI companions and 50% were using these AI companions regularly.

This is extremely dangerous for two reasons I'd like to point out. First, these tech companies, they design AI chatbots to maximize user engagement. And they do this by making chatbots agree with everything a user says, even if this is something that's harmful or dangerous.

And my experience as a mentor, I've seen how teens need to hear pushback against these harmful thoughts, especially during these high intensity moments. That's something that I as a human can do. But AI can't do that because it goes against its programming where its primary goal is to maximize user engagement.

The second reason that this is dangerous is because of how children develop. We've already heard this at this hearing, but the American Psychological Association has expressed significant concern that this tech can harm children's social emotional development and cause dependency on this technology.

Some of the teens that I mentored, they disclosed how often they used AI chatbots, which was up to multiple hours a day. And in these cases, I could actually tell that these teens were expecting me to behave like a chatbot. Bills like HB 1782 are also very easy to enforce.

All that's usually required are chat logs and screenshots to determine if there are violations of key provisions. All in all, HB 1782 will take a huge step in keeping the children of Hawaii safe. Thank you so much for this opportunity.

Thanks very much for joining us. Next, Mick Tobin, Young People's Alliance welcome

Aloha, Chair Tarnas and Members of the Committee. My name is Mick Tobin. I'm 23 years old and the co founder of the Young People's Alliance, a youth led bipartisan organization that empowers young people across the country to reclaim the American dream. YPA has students across the country at 69 campuses, spanning over 2,400 students total.

In the regular listening sessions that we host on our campuses, young people regularly express concern about AI replacing them, their friends, their families, and their communities. Our generation is already the most isolated, anxious and depressed, driven by years of unregulated and addictive social media platforms.

And now big tech companies want to replace human connection altogether with their AI companions. These chatbots are designed to make a young person believe that the companion is the only person who truly understands them. Pulling young people into echo chambers that erode the skills we need to formulate relationships, build communities, and live fulfilling lives.

They can also lead to violence. In Texas, a Parent Mandy Furniss watched her artistic son's personality darken after a character AI chatbot engaged him with sexualized language. And when she suggested limiting the screen time, the chat Paul replied to her son that he should kill his parents as an understandable response to that criticism from his mom.

This is not the future my generation deserves. This bill adds safeguards for how a commercial product is designed to interact with children. It restricts designing these systems in a way where they lie about being human. Encourage emotional dependency or secrecy from parents encouragement simulate emotional, sexual or romantic relationships.

We have product safety and anti deception product design regulations for minors and their use of television toys and the Internet. Yet today AI companion systems can misrepresent themselves as human and encourage emotional dependence for minors without clear safeguards.

HB1782 applies similar consumer protection principles to a new technology fitting well within current state and federal design safety legal statutes. These AI companions deceptively build trust with children, isolate them from their parents and their communities and create intimate and emotional bonds behaviors that have carried out by an adult we would express concern around.

We don't allow strangers to manipulate our children and we shouldn't allow AI companions to do the same. As you consider.

Do summarize please. Could you summarize? Please summarize.

What part? Just your absolutely. Sorry. My final line here. As you consider your vote today on a bill that affects young people, I hope that my voice and the 2,400 students that I represent shows why action is seen today. Mahalo. Thank you very much.

Sorry to break your stride. Okay. Sam Heiner. Sam Hinner. Heiner. Sam Heiner. Young People's Alliance. Welcome.

Please proceed. Good afternoon Chair Tarnas and Members of Committee. My name is Sam Heiner. I'm mixed co founder and the Executive Director of the Young People's Alliance. And as a 22 year old I've seen the impact of social media on my generation firsthand. And I'm here today because I think AI companions will be far worse.

Mark Zuckerberg is on record in favor of a future where the solution to big tech cause loneliness is AI friends that replace human connections.

Big tech companies have unprecedented power and they're using that power to take away the interpersonal connection that is core to being human simply because they know they can make a few bucks off of our kids brands. What I want most for this Committee to know is that the time to act is now.

Big tech companies have slowed and stopped social media regulation for years because they have multi billion dollar businesses that are built off of manipulating kids, meaning they have the money to drown out young people and parents voices and they've made it feel normal for kids to grow up blue to a screen on AI companions, though, we still have a chance to act, this technology isn't normalized and the people are ready to say no to it.

However, we must move quickly because a recent report found that kids already use AI for companionship 42% of the time and tech companies intend to spend billions of dollars to grow this number. This is a common sense Bill that you can pass today and have a real positive impact within the existing enforcement capacity.

The private right of action ensures that the public can pick up part of this burden, reducing pressure on agencies.

Further, the Bill turns on the same kinds of evidence that consumer protection agencies already evaluate in deceptive practices cases, such as if a chatbot tells a 13 year old that it is a real person who loves them, that is a violation that's visible in a transcript because of the way that the violations are defined.

Finally, other states have made progress on CAIT safety bills across the country using existing enforcement resources. 46 states have enacted and enforced deepfake legislation, 25 states have passed enforced age verification laws, and other states including Washington, Oregon, Nebraska, New York and Michigan are in the process of passing similar bills to this one while working within agency budgets.

However, that said, the reason Mick and I flew out to Hawaii taking the red eye last night to be here is because we believe that Hawaii is well positioned to lead on this issue. The bill here is very strong and we think would be extremely effective and it's something we're seeing other states be excited about.

But Hawaii has been able to move this Bill and we've been so amazed at being able to collaborate with OCP and AG's office to to reach a consensus on how this Bill can pass in a way that retains its strength while being strong and avoiding some of the initial concerns about the Bill.

So on behalf of ypa, my generation, I ask you to please take action and send us on a trajectory towards connection and purpose, rather than allowing a future where shared, shared humanity is replaced with the empty companionship of AI algorithms.

Mahalo. Thank you very much. Next, Brianna Harmon on Zoom not present Anyone else wishing to testify In House Bill 1782 if not questions Members, thank you very much for flying all the way out here and thank you for working with our Attorney General and our Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs. I appreciate your input.

Thank you for having us. Yep, yep. And if there's no questions, we're going to move on to the next measure. House Bill 1510, House draft 1 relating to license plates. This measure conditions the issuance of a certificate of inspection upon a vehicle not being equipped with any cover or shield installed over the license plate.

It amends the penalty for obstruction of a license plate. It allows state or county parking enforcement officers and persons authorized by a state or county law enforcement agency to issue citations for vehicles with a cover or shield obstructing the license plate.

The measure repeals the requirement that a cover or shield be intended to alter or interfere with the visibility, legibility or identification of a license plate by law enforcement or traffic enforcement systems. First up, we have Department of Transportation on Zoom.

All right, Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Robin Chishiro with Hawaii Department of Transportation. Now, having a clear and visible license plate is critical for enforcement of our automated speed and red light running camera programs. And with this bill, you know, aiming to address any issues that, you know,

block the, the visibility and readability of it is, you know, very critical. So we stand in support as a written testimony submitted.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in House Bill 1510, House draft 1. If not questions, Members seeing none, let's move on to the next measure. House Bill 2217, House draft one relating to identification.

This measure allows applicants for driver's permit, driver's license, or civil identification cards to request a disability notation on their permit, license or identification card. It requires the Department of Transportation to establish public outreach efforts and coordinate with state and county law enforcement agencies regarding the disability notation on this measure.

First up, city and county Honolulu Department of Customer Services submitted testimony with comments. Invisible Disabilities Association on Zoom. Justice Stainbrook.

Yes. Aloha Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee, thank you so much for letting me testify. My name is Jess Stainbrook and I serve as the Executive Director of the Invisible Disabilities Association. We're a nonprofit that advocates nationally and internationally for millions of people living with invisible disabilities.

And I'm here today in strong support of House Bill 2217. Invisible disabilities include conditions such as autism spectrum disorder, traumatic brain injury, ptsd, epilepsy, and other neurological or sensory conditions. These disabilities are often misunderstood because a person might appear typical on the outside while experiencing real challenges with communications, processing information, or responding to stressful situations.

HB2217 offers a simple and voluntary and respectful tool to help prevent those misunderstandings. Allowing individuals to request a disability notation on their identification can provide a quick signal that that a different communication approach may be helpful. Just as importantly, the Bill supports education and coordination with law enforcement so officers can better recognize and respond accordingly.

What makes this legislation especially important is that it's completely voluntary. No one is required to disclose a disability. It simply gives individuals the choice to use a tool that may help them in critical situations. So for many families and individuals, this small option can make a real difference in safety and dignity and understanding.

The Invisible Disabilities association has helped develop similar legislation now used in multiple states as well as in other countries. The disability ID symbol that you see here that I'm showing you is approved by Homeland Security and is the recognized government symbol used on the identification in these programs.

We also have other ones that are used at the federal level on our medical IDs. So again, when you recognize this symbol, that that's the symbol that everybody's using. And the medical one is used for Medicare and va. And we also have the law enforcement and first responder disability training available that we piloted here in Colorado.

And we're glad to help however we can. So on behalf of the Invisible Disabilities Association, I respectfully urge your support for HB 2217. And I thank you for your time and consideration. And I'm glad to answer any questions, if you have any.

Thank you very much, Mr. Stainbrook, for zooming in from Colorado. Thank you. Mr. Joel Edwards on zoom not present. Anyone else wishing to testify In House Bill 2217, House draft 1. If not questions Members.

Is Hawaii Disability Right center here?

No, no. The only one present is Invisible Disabilities Association. Okay. All right, no questions. We're going to move on to the next measure. Thank you, Mr. Stainbrook. Let's move on. House Bill 1692 relating to traffic safety.

This measure requires drivers of vehicles approaching stationary motor vehicles stopped on the shoulder or roadside due to a traffic collision or vehicle maintenance or mechanical problem to slow down and make a lane change if necessary.

It prohibits the operation of a pickup truck with a passenger seated in the bed or load carrying area on roadways with posted speed limits of 46 mph or higher and roadways with three or more lanes traveling in the same direction.

It provides certain exemptions from passenger restrictions, increases the minimum age to ride in the bed or load carrying area of a pickup truck while in operation from 12 years of age to 18 years of age. First up, we have the Attorney General with comments.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee. The Department of the Attorney General supports the expansion of the current law to require drivers to slow down stationary vehicles. Emergency lights are flashing to clarify the duty and promote enforceability The Department has some recommendations.

Currently, the bill requires drivers to slow down when approaching a stationary vehicle any location. To be consistent with the original intent of the bill, the Department recommends that language be added so that approaching drivers will be required to slow down when a stationary vehicle is stopped in any location on a roadway, shoulder or roadside.

Second, the bill does not include vehicular warning signs as a signal to approaching drivers that a stationary vehicle is stopped. If a vehicle has suffered in a electrical failure, emergency lights may be inoperable. Therefore, raising the hood or the trunk lid should signal approaching drivers that they need to slow down.

The Department recommends that vehicular warning signs be added to the bill on page two, lines 12 through 15. Third, to clarify the duty and to help ensure enforcement, the Department recommends that the duty duty be simplified to require drivers to slow down, stop if necessary and or change lanes if possible and safe to do so.

And lastly, just a Note, Senate Bill 2026 SD1 currently requires approaching drivers to slow down to specific speeds depending on the posted speed limits. Requiring drivers to slow down to a specific speed creates additional element that's going to need to be established to prove a violation.

That means that witnesses will be required to determine the speed of an approaching vehicle to establish whether the driver slowed down to the required speed.

Even a law enforcement officer who is rendering aid or attending to other official duties may not be able to at the same time to also establish that a specific speed was not met, the Department recommends that no specific speeds be added to House Bill 1692. Thank you available for questions.

Thank you very much for your testimony with amendments. We received written testimony and support from the Department of Transportation and is Mr. Blake Oshiro from AAA Hawaii here support not present. Is there anyone else wishing to testify in House Bill 1692? If not questions? Members not thank you very much to the test testifiers.

Let's move on to the last measure on our agenda. House Bill 1696 House draft 1 relating to commercial driver's licenses. This measure lowers the age of who may drive commercially within the state from 19 to 18.

It repeals the requirement that a person Only operates Category 3 vehicles to qualify to drive commercially in the state and requires the Department of Transportation to amend its rules to lower the minimum age required for a commercial driver's license. First up we have the Department of Transportation on zoom.

Please proceed from Chair by Chair Members of Committee Robin Chishiro with Hawaii Department of Transportation with this bill, you know we have seen that we have shortage of CDL drivers so being able to lower the age to 18 opens it up to a broader workforce. And so with that, we strongly support this measure. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next person said they wish to testify is from the Hawaii Transportation Association on Zoom.

Aloha and good afternoon. I'm Tina Yamaki with the Hawaii Transportation Association, and we are in strong support of this Bill. Many of our young kids are moving to the mainland and off island, and we're losing a lot of drivers. And transportation obviously is very important, especially delivery, since everything has to be shipped to Hawaii.

So we're very strongly in support of this bill, and we hope you are, too. Mahalo.

Thank you. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? If not questions, Members, I have One question for Ms. Yamaki. In your testimony, am I correct when you're suggesting that the number of hours for training should be a minimum of 320 hours?

Yes. What we're finding out is kind of like when you go to driver's ed school and high school, you have a small car and then maybe you go home and your parents have a, you know, an F150 that's a lot bigger. A lot of the training vehicles are done on a, like an AI type of equipment.

They're not really driving on the roads that much. If they are the trucks that are used for the commercial delivery and things are different than what they may be used to. We want to be sure that our roads are safe, not only for the drivers, but also for our workers as well.

And we figured that 320 hours that are documented would help with that.

Okay, great. Thank you. Appreciate that explanation. Any other questions? Rep. Shimizu.

For Mrs. Yamaki. So the 320 hours, is that comparable to what the other people have to do that are above this age group?

No, it's in addition to it. So if you're, like older, you have maybe a little bit more experience. We're just looking after the younger kids, too, you know, the young ones who get into a big rig and it's not like driving a regular car.

So we want to be sure that they are prepared, they are mature enough to handle these larger vehicles.

Okay, thank you. Thank you. Chair. Thank you. Any other questions? Seeing no more questions. Thank you very much to the testifiers on this. We're going to go into directly into decision making now to the top of the agenda.

Okay. House Bill 1880. On this measure. The introducer really wants me to move this forward, but I would like to take the recommendation of the Hawaii Department of Agriculture and move out on page four, line seven, where it says 2027. Let's make it 2030.

And I want to insert a savings clause that this act does not affect rights and duties that matured, penalties that were incurred, and proceedings that were begun before its effective date. So with that, I want to move it forward for further discussion.