STAND. COM. REP. NO. 1353

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    H.B. No. 1358

       H.D. 1

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Colleen Hanabusa

President of the Senate

Twenty-Fourth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2007

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committees on Public Safety and Human Services and Public Housing, to which was referred H.B. No. 1358, H.D. 1, entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE PURPOSE OF THE HAWAII YOUTH CORRECTIONAL FACILITY,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose of this measure is to clarify the purpose of the Hawaii Youth Correctional Facilities.

 

     Specifically, the measure changes the purpose of the Hawaii Youth Correctional Facility from a place where a youth is punished to one where the youth is rehabilitated.

 

     The Attorney General, the Department of Human Services Office of Youth Services, the Community Alliance on Prisons, the American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii, and the Hawaii Youth Services Network submitted testimony in support of this measure.

 

     According to the testimony, this measure is consistent with best practices in juvenile corrections and will assist staff to carry out the modern purposes of a youth correctional facility, which is to rehabilitate and prepare youth for reentry into the community.

 

     Your Committees find that the change in language marks a change in philosophy that will help guide the protocols that are applied at the Hawaii Youth Correctional Facilities.

 

     It is your Committees' intent to help ensure that youth receive the services they need for successful and productive reentry into the community.  According to the Attorney General, a technical, corresponding amendment is necessary to section 571‑48(1)(A), Hawaii Revised Statutes.  Therefore, your Committees have amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Amending section 571‑48(1)(A), Hawaii Revised Statutes, to replace the term "incarceration" with the term "custody"; and

 

     (2)  Making technical, nonsubstantive changes for the purposes of clarity, consistency, and style.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Public Safety and Human Services and Public Housing that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1358, H.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1358, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Public Safety and Human Services and Public Housing,

 

____________________________

SUZANNE CHUN OAKLAND, Chair

 

____________________________

WILL ESPERO, Chair