STAND. COM. REP. NO. 242

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 494

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2017

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committee on Transportation and Energy, to which was referred S.B. No. 494 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO CONTINUOUS ALCOHOL MONITORING FOR REPEAT OFFENDERS,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to require persons arrested for operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant or habitually operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant to be fitted with a continuous alcohol monitoring device under certain circumstances.

 

            Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Transportation, Department of the Prosecuting Attorney of the City and County of Honolulu, Office of the Prosecuting Attorney of the County of Kauai, SCRAM Systems, and one individual.  Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Honolulu Police Department.

 

     Your Committee finds that in 2012, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported that forty-one percent of all traffic fatalities in Hawaii were alcohol related, versus the national average of thirty-one percent.  Moreover, between 2008 and 2012, eleven percent of all alcohol-related fatalities in Hawaii involved a driver who was previously convicted of operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant.

 

     This measure seeks to decrease alcohol-related fatalities and accidents by requiring repeat offenders to be fitted with a continuous alcohol monitoring device.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure on the recommendation of the Department of the Prosecuting Attorney of the City and County of Honolulu by:

 

     (1)  Further clarifying the process and procedures when a person charged with operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant or habitually operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant is required to wear a continuous alcohol monitoring device; and

 

     (4)  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 Transportation and Energy that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 494, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 494, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committees on Judiciary and Labor and Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Transportation and Energy,

 

 

 

________________________________

LORRAINE R. INOUYE, Chair