State lawmakers scrambled to move dozens of bills ahead of a Thursday night deadline for gaining approval from key House and Senate negotiators on measures that don’t carry a price tag.
Successfully emerging from the negotiations was a bill requiring repeat drunken drivers to wear continuous alcohol monitoring bracelets and a bill that would limit aquatic fish collecting.
Lawmakers also killed or are on the verge of killing dozens of bills either by deferring them for the year or never scheduling a House-Senate conference committee hearing on them. This includes a bill that would have opened the Hawaii insurance market to high-deductible health plans that was opposed by labor unions.
Senate lawmakers also agreed at the 11th hour to a House proposal that would strip county lifeguards working at public beaches of liability protection.
A number of this year’s high-profile bills were rolled over to today, when lawmakers will once again convene throughout the day in conference committees ahead of an end-of-the-day deadline for fiscal bills. Up for debate is a bill that would extend the Honolulu rail tax, a measure that would regulate religious-based clinics that counsel women against abortion, and a hotly contested bill that would allow Airbnb to collect taxes from vacation rental operators on behalf of the state.
For the bills that make it out of conference committee, many will face a full House or Senate floor vote next week, or both, before they can be sent to Gov. David Ige for decision making. This year’s legislative session is slated to conclude Thursday.
Drunken drivers
Key negotiators for the House and Senate agreed on a bill that would require Hawaii drivers arrested on a repeat DUI offense to agree to stop drinking alcohol for 90 days and wear an ankle bracelet that would alert a private company if they have a drink, as a condition of being released from jail on bail.
Unless they meet certain poverty requirements, offenders would also have to pay for the device, which could cost about $360 a month. The ankle monitor periodically checks the skin for alcohol excretions and sends the readings back to a private company that monitors the results.
The Honolulu prosecutor and a Denver-based company called SCRAM Systems, which makes the ankle bracelets, backed the bill.
The measure aims to help crack down on drunken driving, which in 2015 was a factor in about 50 motor vehicle deaths in Hawaii. However, the measure has stirred opposition from Mothers Against Drunk Driving because of its cost and its potential to edge out ignition interlock devices that require repeat offenders to do a blow test for their vehicle to start.
The state Public Defender has also opposed the bill, arguing that the devices could strain the budgets of low- and middle-income residents who don’t qualify for a cost waiver.
County lifeguards
Late on Thursday, Senate members also agreed to a House version of a bill that would affect liability coverage for county lifeguards.
State law currently provides limited protection from lawsuits when lifeguards undertake rescues, which shields the counties, the state and the lifeguards from lawsuits except in cases where there is “gross negligence or wanton acts or omissions” on the part of the lifeguards.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Scott Nishimoto said no other first responders, including police or paramedics, enjoy that level of liability immunity, and he advanced a draft of Senate Bill 562 that would end the liability shield for lifeguards on June 30.
“I think all (emergency) workers are important — police fire, EMT — they are all important, and they all should be treated the same,” Nishimoto said. “Right now one group has a protection nobody else has, and to me it’s a fairness issue.”
Kauai County Council Chairman Mel Rapozo said the bill “actually punishes the counties. It does nothing for our beach safety, and it only benefits the personal-injury lawyers.” He said the counties will have to purchase additional liability insurance to protect themselves.
Rapozo said lawmakers might see the provision that requires the state Attorney General to defend the counties on state beaches as a compromise, but “I don’t see it that way. I see it as really patronizing the personal-injury attorney lobby and really putting our counties in a very tough, tough situation.”
Stacy Crivello, a Maui County Council member and president of the Hawaii State Association of Counties, said in a written statement that the lawmakers’ decision “is devastating to the counties and the morale of lifeguards, who risk their lives everyday in keeping our residents and visitors safe at our Hawaii beaches.”
“This decision by state lawmakers puts beachgoers’ safety at risk, subjects the lifeguards to being sued personally and translates to burdensome lawsuit costs footed by local taxpayers,” said Crivello.
Aquarium fish
Aquariums may become more difficult to fill with fish from the wild with lawmakers voting Thursday to move forward a bill that would halt the issuance of new aquarium fishing permits.
If Senate Bill 1240 becomes law, it would also assign the Department of Land and Natural Resources the task of defining what practices are sustainable for the collection of near-shore aquatic life.
DLNR testified against the measure, arguing there is no biological basis to limiting more permits for aquarium sourcing. The department also highlighted the steep costs associated with conducting in-depth surveys of wild fish populations, which could reach into the tens of millions of dollars for boats, dive gear and other equipment.
The bill would push DLNR to submit proposed legislation regarding sustainable fish collection by 2019.
High-deductible insurance
On the losing end, lawmakers killed a bill backed by University Health Alliance that would have allowed employers to offer high-deductible health insurance plans that are paired with a health savings account.
UHA emphasized that under the bill employees and their employers could put money into a tax-free account, similar to a 401(k) plan, to cover medical expenses. They said the money could be rolled over annually to help save for future health care needs, while encouraging workers to maintain a healthy lifestyle, which could help drive down health care costs.
But the bill was opposed by labor unions worried that employees would forgo needed health care. Employees could end up paying hundreds of dollars in health care costs annually before the insurance coverage kicked in.
Rep. Della Au Belatti, chairwoman of the House Health Committee, moved that the bill be shelved for the year, saying that it was “getting tied up with our broader conversations about health care reform on the national level.”
Star-Advertiser reporters Kevin Dayton and Taylor Polson contributed to this story.
