STAND. COM. REP. NO. 156

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2005

RE: S.B. No. 411

S.D. 1

 

 

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Intergovernmental Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 411 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE COUNTIES' EMINENT DOMAIN POWERS,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to limit the eminent domain powers of the counties to specific public purposes.

Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Kamehameha Schools and Small Landowners of Oahu and Small Landowners Association of Hawaii.

Your Committee finds that this measure is intended to address the public outrage on a proposal by the Honolulu City Council to condemn certain parcels of privately-owned prime location land in Waikiki, and then selling or leasing the condemned land to a certain hotel for private commercial development. Your Committee believes that any such condemnation is patently unjustified, and would be blatantly illegal as being inconsistent with the exercise of eminent domain for a public purpose.

Your Committee has amended this measure by prohibiting a county from condemning private property and subsequently selling or leasing that same property to a private entity who expressed an interest in purchasing that same property for development purpose or private use before the condemnation, and by deleting the other statutory sections.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Intergovernmental Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 411, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 411, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Intergovernmental Affairs,

____________________________

DAVID Y. IGE, Chair