The admission of guilt by two former state legislators to taking bribes — and the resulting public outcry over it — have driven the Legislature to consider improving transparency to regain public trust. Some positive steps have been made, and the Legislature can move even further by making a good-faith effort to comply with Hawaii’s Sunshine Law.

The Sunshine Law requires meetings where public policy decisions are made to be open to the public. When the Sunshine Law was passed in 1975, the Legislature declared that “it is the policy of this State that the formation and conduct of public policy — the discussions, deliberations, decisions, and action of governmental agencies — shall be conducted as openly as possible.”

All state and county agencies that are required to have meetings and to take official actions are subject to the Sunshine Law — except for the state Legislature. The Sunshine Law allows the House and Senate to adopt rules and procedures that take precedence, overriding the Sunshine Law; they have done so.

One of these overrides affects how committees operate. Currently, when a House or Senate committee holds a public hearing on bills, most of the hearing is public. However, the committee discusses the bills in a closed meeting prior to taking the votes on whether to pass or hold the bills. The votes are made in public, but the discussion is not. People have a right to know the reasoning behind decisions on bills, but we are being kept in the dark.

As an example, closed meetings were held during three public hearings by House and Senate committees on Senate Bill 3334. The original version of the bill appropriated $350 million for a new Aloha Stadium and a surrounding entertainment district.

A few agencies testified in support of the bill in each of the hearings. However, the sentiment of the people — and not government agencies — should be the driving force behind a new stadium.

If people liked the idea of a new stadium, many individuals would have testified in support of SB 3334. However, not a single individual from the general public did. A few individuals testified, but they opposed the bill. Yet, the three committees passed the bill, although the last committee reduced the appropriation significantly.

Since their meetings to discuss the bill were closed, the public doesn’t know their reasoning for ignoring the lack of public support.

The House and Senate also override the Sunshine Law provision that prohibits more than two members of any policymaking body to discuss any matter being considered by that body. The House and Senate are known to have closed meetings with many legislators in attendance where bills are discussed. Votes are subsequently held in public, but the reasoning behind the decisions is hidden. Public trust is diminished.

The Legislature passed the Sunshine Law to help ensure public trust in our democracy by making deliberations on public policy decisions transparent. At that time the Legislature declared the following:

“In a democracy, the people are vested with the ultimate decision-making power. Governmental agencies exist to aid the people in the formation and conduct of public policy. Opening up the governmental processes to public scrutiny and participation is the only viable and reasonable method of protecting the public’s interest.”

The House and Senate should embrace the democratic principle of government agencies opening up their processes to protect the public’s interest. They should commit to transparency, end their overrides of the Sunshine Law, and comply with its provisions.

John Kawamoto is a former legislative analyst and an advocate for good government.