STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3399

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: H.B. No. 1415

H.D. 2

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2022

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 1415, H.D. 2, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THREAT ASSESSMENT,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to address violence and threats of violence by:

(1) Assisting organizations in developing threat assessment teams by providing them with available training and assistance with establishing threat teams;

(2) Enabling threat assessment teams to obtain and share information from different sources in order to assess threats of violence; and

(3) Protecting privacy by vetting threat assessment team members that may receive certain sensitive information and providing that the information may not be used for any purpose beyond what is necessary for assessment of a threat.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawaii State Fusion Center, Department of Education, and one individual. Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Department of Budget and Finance.

Your Committee finds that incidents of violence or threats of violence on the basis of race, ethnicity, or ancestry have increased at an alarming rate during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Recently, Asian Americans have often been the target of these hate crimes. This violence against Asians has been driven in part by the use of anti-Asian terminology and rhetoric that perpetuate anti-Asian stigma, such as the terms "Chinese virus", "Wuhan virus", and "kung-flu". Your Committee believes that a multidisciplinary threat assessment team consisting of individuals with diverse training and experience can help prevent violence. This measure will prevent targeted violence and produce solutions to manage threats by establishing a program within the Hawaii State Fusion Center to train, establish, and operate threat assessment teams, including for educational institutions.

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. 1415, H.D. 2, and recommends that it pass Second Reading and be referred to your Committees on Judiciary and Ways and Means.

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

________________________________

CLARENCE K. NISHIHARA, Chair