STAND. COM. REP. NO. 542

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 1701

       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 Energy and Environment and Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 1701 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO RECYCLING,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose of this measure is to require counties with a population of over seven hundred fifty thousand residents to establish a residential curbside recycling program. 

 

     This measure also appropriates, through grants-in-aid, funds to the counties for the purpose of establishing a curbside recycling program.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Health, the Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter, the Sierra Club Oahu Group, Retail Merchants of Hawaii, the Hawaii Food Industry Association, a member of the City Council of the City and County of Honolulu, and six individuals.  The Department of Environmental Services of the City and County of Honolulu submitted testimony in opposition to this measure.

 

     Your Committees find that Hawaii is currently facing a solid waste crisis, with conflicts arising over landfills on all the islands and with the permit for Oahu's main landfill, Waimanalo Gulch, set to expire in 2008.  Your Committees find that curbside recycling will help ease the burden on Hawaii's landfills by making recycling more convenient so that materials that can be recycled do not end up in Hawaii's landfills. 

 

     The intent of this measure is to address the solid waste problem the State is facing by requiring counties with a population of over seven hundred fifty thousand residents to establish a residential curbside recycling program and by providing the counties with grants-in-aid for that purpose.

 

     Your Committees note that the Chair of the Committee on Intergovernmental and Military Affairs does not support having the State mandate how the counties handle recycling.

 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Adding language to amend section 342G-104, Hawaii Revised Statutes (HRS), to authorize that any grant-in-aid to a county with a population of seven hundred fifty thousand or more residents, made for the purposes of section 342G-104(b), HRS, shall be disbursed with a requirement that the county utilize a portion of the moneys to establish or maintain a curbside residential recycling program; and

 

     (2)  Broadening the scope of the appropriation to include appropriations for grants-in-aid to each county, with the proviso that, of the moneys appropriated to the City and County of Honolulu, the City and County shall expend a portion thereof to establish and maintain a residential curbside recycling program.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Energy and Environment and Intergovernmental and Military Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1701, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1701, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

 


Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Energy and Environment and Intergovernmental and Military Affairs,

 

____________________________

LORRAINE R. INOUYE, Chair

 

____________________________

RON MENOR, Chair