STAND. COM. REP. NO. 330-24

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2024

RE: H.B. No. 2261

H.D. 1

Honorable Scott K. Saiki

Speaker, House of Representatives

Thirty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2024

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Housing and Water & Land, to which was referred H.B. No. 2261 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO HISTORIC PRESERVATION,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to:

(1) Amend the definition of "historic property" to remove the qualification that the property must be over fifty years old and instead require the property to be listed on the Hawaii or National Register of Historic Places or built before August 21, 1959; and

(2) Broaden exclusions from historic review for certain types of proposed projects on existing privately-owned single-family detached dwelling units or townhouses.

Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawai‘i Association of REALTORS; NAIOP; Housing Hawai‘i's Future; Building Industry Association of Hawaii; Hawai‘i YIMBY; and one individual. Your Committees received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Historic Hawai‘i Foundation and one individual. Your Committees received comments on this measure from one individual.

Your Committees find that despite the State's housing crisis, existing law requires that any building, object, district, area, or site that is over fifty years old go through a historic preservation review, which has created a backlog for the development of housing. Your Committees acknowledge that a historic preservation review is intended to protect places of historical, architectural, archaeological, and cultural significance; however, your Committees believe that the fifty-year threshold is overly broad and applies to too many buildings that are not historically significant but are deemed historic based on age alone. This measure will streamline the development of certain single-family detached dwelling units or townhouses by reducing the burden of historic preservation review requirements while still protecting the State's truly historic properties.

Your Committees have amended this measure by:

(1) Changing the effective date to July 1, 3000, to encourage further discussion; and

(2) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity, consistency, and style.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Housing and Water & Land that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2261, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2261, H.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Housing and Water & Land,

____________________________ LINDA ICHIYAMA, Chair

____________________________ LUKE A. EVSLIN, Chair