STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3656

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: H.B. No. 2089

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2026

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred H.B. No. 2089 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO CERTIORARI REVIEW BY THE HAWAII SUPREME COURT,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to:

(1) Establish a fixed disposition deadline requiring the Hawaii Supreme Court to decide an application for certiorari within sixty days after the application is filed; and

(2) Apply prospectively to cases in which the judgment or dismissal order of the Intermediate Court of Appeals was filed on or after the effective date of this Act.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Judiciary, Department of the Attorney General, Office of the Public Defender, and Hawaii State Bar Association.

Your Committee finds that applications for writs of certiorari regularly present important, difficult, or novel questions of state or federal law or involve cases of significant public interest. However, under existing law, the time in which the Hawaii Supreme Court must consider these applications can vary from as few as thirty days to forty-five or sixty days, depending on whether a response is filed or not, and whether a timely request for an extension to file a response is received by the clerk. This measure, with a firm deadline of sixty days after the filing of an application, will provide more certainty to parties and their counsel while also saving the Hawaii Supreme Court from having to review an application within an initially variable time period by ensuring that all applications can receive a full sixty‑day period of consideration.

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 H.B. No. 2089, and recommends that it pass Second Reading and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

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

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KARL RHOADS, Chair