STAND. COM. REP. NO. 877

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    H.B. No. 941

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2013

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committees on Water and Land and Tourism and Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 941 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE NATURAL AREA RESERVES SYSTEM COMMISSION,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to amend the composition of the Natural Area Reserves System Commission by adding a member possessing a background in Native Hawaiian traditional and customary practices and removing the Superintendent of Education as a member.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Land and Natural Resources, Office of Hawaiian Affairs, and Association of Hawaiian Civic Clubs.

 

     The natural area reserves program carries out vital parts of the State's responsibility to conserve, protect, and manage our natural and cultural resources, and specifically works to preserve representative samples of Hawaii's diverse biological systems for study.  The Natural Area Reserves Commission consists of experts in various fields of environmental science, as well as representatives from the hiking and hunting communities, to provide recommendations as to the selection and treatment of areas to be included in the natural area reserves program.

 

Your Committees find that despite its broad representative knowledge from the scientific and outdoor recreational communities, the Commission currently lacks a member specifically qualified to provide insight as to the cultural value and significance of existing and potential future reserves or the many cultural resources they may contain.  This may lead to inefficiencies or oversights, particularly given the responsibilities of all state agencies to protect and enforce the rights of Native Hawaiians and to fulfill the State's interest in perpetuating Native Hawaiian culture and cultural values.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Water and Land and Tourism and Hawaiian Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 941, and recommend that it pass Second Reading and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Water and Land and Tourism and Hawaiian Affairs,

 

____________________________

BRICKWOOD GALUTERIA, Chair

 

____________________________

MALAMA SOLOMON, Chair