STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2201

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 234

       S.D. 1

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2014

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Technology and the Arts, to which was referred S.B. No. 234 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO BURIAL SITES,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish a task force to develop additional procedures and protocols in the event a lineal or cultural descendant of Native Hawaiian skeletal remains that are interred at a burial site cannot be established.

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

     Your Committees find that island burial councils are responsible for identifying the cultural and lineal descendants of Native Hawaiian remains, or iwi, and must execute burial treatment plans to best preserve the iwi.  Often times, however, the burial councils cannot establish the iwi's lineal or cultural descendants and must defer a decision on the treatment of the iwi, causing significant delays to the development project, and also the preservation of the iwi.  This measure seeks to ultimately establish additional procedures for the burial councils to follow when the lineal or cultural descendants are unknown so that a burial treatment plan can be completed as soon as possible.

Your Committees have amended this measure by:

     (1)  Removing language suggesting that Kaho‘olawe be considered as an alternate burial site for Native Hawaiian remains with no lineal or cultural descendants;

     (2)  Clarifying that the task force shall consider options, in alignment with Native Hawaiian burial practices, for preservation in place and reburial when necessary;

     (3)  Requiring the task force to submit a report of its findings and recommendations to the Legislature and the Governor no later than twenty days prior to the Regular Session of 2015, rather than 2014;

     (4)  Clarifying that the task force will cease to exist on June 30, 2015, rather than June 30, 2014; and

     (5)  Changing the effective date to July 1, 2014.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Technology and the Arts that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 234, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 234, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Technology and the Arts,

____________________________ GLENN WAKAI, Chair

____________________________ MAILE S.L. SHIMABUKURO, Chair