STAND. COM. REP. NO.140

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2003

RE: S.B. No. 516

S.D. 1

 

 

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2003

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Water, Land, and Agriculture, to which was referred S.B. No. 516 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO KANEOHE BAY PIERS,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to require the board of land and natural resources to calculate the lease rents for private, noncommercial piers in Kaneohe Bay by using a maximum multiplier of ten per cent, instead of the current fifty per cent.

Testimony in support of this measure was submitted by the Protect Our Shoreline Ohana. The State Representative from the 47th House District submitted testimony in support of the measure, with suggested amendments. The Board of Land and Natural Resources submitted comments on the measure.

Your Committee finds that the Department of Land and Natural Resources based its 2001 leases of submerged lands for noncommercial use on the same percentage of fast land value that it used to determine the leases for commercial use of submerged lands. The Department's decision was made with little to no public input, and raised the multiplier from approximately ten per cent to an average of fifty per cent of the value of attached fast land.

This measure assures that the calculation of leases for private noncommercial piers is not the same as that used for commercial piers, bringing the leases for submerged land under private noncommercial piers in step with the rest of the nation. Your Committee has amended the measure to incorporate the amending language offered by the Representative from the 47th House District to further clarify the intent of the measure. The measure has also been amended to apply the measure retroactively to June 20, 2000, when the original law, Act 261, Session Laws of Hawaii 2000, took effect.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Water, Land, and Agriculture that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 516, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 516, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Water, Land, and Agriculture,

____________________________

LORRAINE R. INOUYE, Chair