STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2513

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 2237

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2018

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committees on Education and Water and Land, to which was referred S.B. No. 2237 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PUBLIC SCHOOLS,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to require the City and County of Honolulu to transfer to the Department of Land and Natural Resources all property upon which a public elementary or intermediate school is situated.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawaii State Teachers Association and Building Industry Association of Hawaii.  Your Committees received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Department of Land and Natural Resources and Department of Parks and Recreation of the City and County of Honolulu.  Your Committees received comments on this measure from the Department of the Attorney General.

 

     Your Committees find that the Department of Education has managed county school lands throughout the State since 1965.  Your Committees further find that many public schools in Hawaii require extensive renovation or rebuilding, and that this process is unnecessarily complicated by having state schools on county land, or situated on both county and state land.  Your Committees additionally find that transferring a fee simple interest for county school lands to the State will greatly simplify the process of undertaking much needed repairs and renovations.

 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Adding a purpose section that explains the justification for the measure;

 

     (2)  Requiring the City and County of Honolulu to transfer property on which a school is situated to the Department of Education rather than to the Department of Land and Natural Resources;

 

     (3)  Adding language to give the Department of Education power to acquire and hold title to real, personal, or mixed property for use for public educational purposes;

 

     (4)  Requiring legislative approval prior to the sale or gift of lands to which the Department of Education holds title; and

 

     (5)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Education and Water and Land that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2237, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2237, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Education and Water and Land,

 

________________________________

KARL RHOADS, Chair

 

________________________________

MICHELLE N. KIDANI, Chair