STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2366

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 2688

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2026

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Public Safety and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 2688 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO COMPASSIONATE RELEASE,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish a protocol for compassionate release for certain ill or seriously debilitated incarcerated persons.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Office of the Public Defender; Hawaii Correctional System Oversight Commission; Office of the Prosecuting Attorney of the County of Kauaʻi; Hawaii Disability Rights Center; Hoʻomana Pono, LLC; Community Alliance on Prisons; ʻEkolu Mea Nui; Ohana Hoʻopakele; FAMM; ACLU Hawaiʻi; Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation; Hawaiʻi Friends of Restorative Justice; First Unitarian Church of Honolulu; Hawaiʻi Health and Harm Reduction Center; and seventeen individuals.

Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Hawaii Paroling Authority, Crime Victim Compensation Commission, Department of the Prosecuting Attorney of the City and County of Honolulu, Kapiʻolani Sex Abuse Treatment Center, and one individual.

Your Committee finds that many elderly, seriously ill, and dying individuals pose little threat to public safety, yet remain incarcerated. These incarcerated individuals are often held under conditions that are medically complex, emotionally painful, and inhumane. Compassionate release would allow these individuals to spend their final months with family, preserving dignity at the end of life while ensuring careful review standards, eligibility requirements, and public safety.

Additionally, compassionate release would reduce costs incurred through the incarceration of elderly, seriously ill, and dying individuals. For example, the costs to provide care for critically ill incarcerated individuals can exceed $900,000 in a single year. In extreme cases involving emergency medical evacuation and hospitalization, these costs can rise dramatically, leading to expenses exceeding $2,000,000. Compassionate release as established by this measure would substantially reduce these costs.

Your Committee notes that the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation requires more funding and staff to implement a compassionate release program and to find adequate health care facility placements for incarcerated individuals.

Therefore, your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Limiting consideration for compassionate release to individuals with a terminal illness or who are too ill or cognitively impaired to participate in rehabilitation;

(2) Requiring the Hawaii Paroling Authority to notify the victim and prosecuting attorney when an incarcerated person is granted compassionate release;

(3) Excluding individuals who have been sentenced to life without possibility of parole from eligibility for compassionate release;

(4) Inserting a blank appropriation for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to implement the compassionate release program and for adequate health care facility placements;

(5) Inserting an effective date of July 1, 2050, to encourage further discussion; and

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

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Public Safety and Military Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2688, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2688, S.D. 1, 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 and Military Affairs,

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CAROL FUKUNAGA, Chair