STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2930

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    H.B. No. 2363

       H.D. 2

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2014

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 2363, H.D. 2, entitled:

 

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

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to:

 

     (1)  Require the Department of Public Safety to establish a two-year reentry pilot project with no more than one hundred offenders who are nonviolent, low-risk drug offenders and eligible for early release or parole;

 

     (2)  Require the service providers to collect data from the pilot project and submit a status report to the Department of Public Safety every six months for evaluation of the project's effectiveness; and

 

     (3)  Make an appropriation to support and establish the reentry pilot project.

 

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of the Prosecuting Attorney of the City and County of Honolulu, Community Alliance on Prisons, Hawaii Substance Abuse Coalition, Kokua Council, Witt Counseling Service, The CHOW Project, Drug Policy Action Group, American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii, and twenty-four individuals.  Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Department of Public Safety and two individuals.

 

     Your Committee finds that nonviolent, low-risk drug offenders can be effectively and safely transitioned from jail or prison back into the community through a system of community-based treatment programs.  A comprehensive and coordinated range of evidence-based treatment services facilitates positive outcomes when working with nonviolent, low-risk drug offenders.  The reentry pilot project will establish an alternative to incarceration by diverting nonviolent, low-risk drug offenders who are eligible for early release or parole, from incarceration into a coordinated system of community-based treatment programs, resulting in long-term savings, a reduction in the prison population, and reduction in recidivism among nonviolent drug offenders.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2363, H.D. 2, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2363, H.D. 2, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs,

 

 

 

____________________________

WILL ESPERO, Chair