STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2054

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 204

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2022

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred S.B. No. 204, S.D. 1, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO AQUATIC RESOURCES,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to authorize the Department of Land and Natural Resources to use in-lieu fee mitigation to restore, create, enhance, preserve, or any combination thereof aquatic habitats or resources as compensatory mitigation.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Land and Natural Resources.

Your Committee finds that aquatic in-lieu fee mitigation is an effective mechanism to restore, create, enhance, and preserve aquatic habitats or resources to recover the ecological functions, services, and values of aquatic resources that are lost or anticipated to be lost due to adverse impacts to other similar aquatic habitats. Aquatic in-lieu fee mitigation is widely used across the United States to achieve ecologically valuable conservation. This measure will provide the Department of Land and Natural Resources with an innovative mechanism to improve state stewardship of aquatic public trust resources and habitats, increase accountability for aquatic resource damage, and provide higher quality remediation to make damaged resources whole again.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 204, S.D. 1, and recommends that it pass Third Reading.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Judiciary,

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KARL RHOADS, Chair