Bill Text: HI HB1388 | 2024 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Relating To The Transient Accommodations Tax.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 17-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2023-12-11 - Carried over to 2024 Regular Session. [HB1388 Detail]
Download: Hawaii-2024-HB1388-Introduced.html
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HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES |
H.B. NO. |
1388 |
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THIRTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2023 |
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STATE OF HAWAII |
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A BILL FOR AN ACT
relating to the transient accommodations tax.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:
SECTION 1. The legislature finds that Hawaii's natural resources, including reefs, beaches, oceans, forests, streams, estuaries, and shorelines, provide irreplaceable and invaluable benefits to residents, visitors, and the global community at large. These ecosystems are vital to the State's visitor industry and the resident community's identity.
The legislature further finds that the State's vital ecosystems and resources continue to decline due to the lack of adequate implementation of proven and effective conservation approaches and rising pressures of climate change.
Hawaii residents already contribute to the protection and management of the State's natural resources through taxes, environmental care and management, subsistence and cultural practices, and civic responsibility driven by values and practices embodied in the state constitution. However, with escalating impacts, there is an immediate need for additional resources to protect, restore, and manage natural and open space resources. It is reasonable and timely to create a permanent fund to protect, restore, and care for these resources.
The legislature believes that it is necessary and appropriate to allocate transient accommodations tax revenues to help offset the impacts and ensure that a positive environmental legacy is left for future generations. A natural resource management special fund with commission oversight will ensure disbursements are targeted to address the purposes of the fund.
The purpose of this Act is to:
(1) Establish a natural resource management commission to guide and approve the disbursement of moneys deposited into the natural resource management special fund;
(2) Establish a natural resource management special fund to address impacts to natural resources and management of natural and open space resources that are important to residents and the visitor industry;
(3) Repeal the transient
accommodations tax allocation of $3,000,000 to the special land and development
fund; and
(4) Annually allocate $30,000,000 in transient accommodations tax revenues to the natural resource management special fund.
SECTION 2. The Hawaii Revised Statutes is amended by adding a new chapter to title XII to be appropriately designated and to read as follows:
"Chapter
natural resource management commission
§ -1 Natural resource management commission;
establishment; powers; duties. (a) There is established the natural resource
management commission, which shall be placed within the department of land and
natural resources for administrative purposes only. The natural resource management commission
shall be composed of:
(1) The following ex officio, voting members:
(A) The chairperson of the board of land and natural resources or the chairperson's designee;
(B) The director of business, economic development, and tourism or the director's designee; and
(C) The head of each county's visitors bureau or, if none, a representative of each county's visitor industry, to be selected by the respective mayor; and
(2) The following voting members, who shall be appointed by the governor in the manner prescribed in section 26-34:
(A) One representative of a nonprofit organization having expertise in impacts to natural resources and the management of natural and open space resources that are important to residents and the visitor industry;
(B) One representative of a nonprofit organization having expertise in the protection, restoration, and care of marine and coastal natural resources;
(C) One representative of a nonprofit organization having expertise in climate change mitigation and resiliency;
(D) One representative from the Native Hawaiian community who has expertise in the protection, restoration, care, and interpretation of native Hawaiian cultural resources;
(E) One representative between the age of eighteen and twenty-five years, inclusive, who works or has worked in the field of environmental sustainability or restoration, or both; and
(F) One representative from the visitor sector and tourism industry.
(b) A simple majority of the members shall establish a quorum. The members shall elect a chairperson of the natural resource management commission from amongst those appointed by the governor pursuant to subsection (a)(2).
(c) The members shall serve without compensation but shall be reimbursed for expenses, including travel expenses, necessary for the performance of their duties.
(d) The natural resource management commission may hire staff necessary to effectuate the purposes of this section. The staff, at a minimum, shall include one full-time equivalent permanent manager position and one full-time equivalent permanent clerical position.
(e) The natural resource management commission shall:
(1) Expend no more than three per cent of the annual allocation of transient accommodations tax revenues to the natural resource management special fund for administrative, office, and staffing expenses;
(2) Expend revenues deposited into the natural resource management special fund through the provision of grants to state agencies, the counties, and non-profit organizations for the purposes of the fund; provided that no more than three per cent of the moneys disbursed for the grants from the fund shall be used for personnel and other administrative costs; and
(3) Promote transparency and accountability in determining the specific uses for and disbursements from the fund, subject to the uses authorized under section -2.
§ -2 Natural resource management special fund; establishment. (a) There is established within the state treasury the natural resource management special fund, which shall be expended by the natural resource management commission:
(1) To address impacts to natural resources and manage natural and open space resources that are important to residents and the visitor industry, including:
(A) Offsetting adverse environmental impacts caused by resident and visitor use and ensuring that the State's natural and open space resources are maintained for continued use by visitors and future generations, such as projects that directly restore, enhance, and protect, in perpetuity, Hawaii's state-owned natural and open space resources and the State's unique and vulnerable ecosystems;
(B) Protecting, restoring, or enhancing terrestrial or marine natural resources;
(C) Increasing the resilience and adaptation of Hawaii's natural and open space resources with environmentally beneficial strategies to reduce the adverse impacts of climate change, including coastal erosion, sea level rise, ocean acidification, coral bleaching, destruction of reefs, and other impacts;
(D) Removing and controlling invasive species and propagating and planting native species; and
(E) Addressing deterioration and removal of dilapidated, condemned, obsolete, or unused buildings or structures located on state land that could otherwise be used as a public park or open space, particularly when the land is in close proximity to the ocean or coastline and can be revitalized for public use and enjoyment;
(2) Through the provision of grants to state agencies, the counties, and non-profit organizations for the purposes described in paragraph (1); provided that no more than three per cent of the moneys disbursed for the grants from the fund shall be used for personnel and other administrative costs; and
(3) For administrative, office, and staffing expenses for the natural resource management commission.
(b) The following moneys shall be deposited into the natural resource management special fund:
(1) Transient accommodations tax revenues allocated to the natural resource management special fund pursuant to section 237D-6.5(b);
(2) Appropriations made by the legislature; and
(3) Grants and gifts made to the fund.
§ -3 Report to legislature. The natural resource management commission shall submit a report on ways that the natural resource management special fund addressed impacts to natural resources and managed natural and open space resources that are important to residents and the visitor industry during the previous fiscal year and the benefits to the State's natural and open space resources that accrue or will accrue from those expenditure no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the regular session of 2026 and each year thereafter. The natural resource management commission shall publish the annual reports on its website."
SECTION 3. Section 237D-6.5, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending subsection (b) to read as follows:
"(b) Except for the revenues collected pursuant to section 237D-2(e), revenues collected under this chapter shall be distributed in the following priority, with the excess revenues to be deposited into the general fund:
(1) $1,500,000
shall be allocated to the Turtle Bay conservation easement special fund
beginning July 1, 2015, for the reimbursement to the state general fund of debt
service on reimbursable general obligation bonds, including ongoing expenses related to the issuance of the
bonds, the proceeds of which were used to acquire the conservation easement and
other real property interests in Turtle Bay, Oahu, for the protection,
preservation, and enhancement of natural resources important to the State,
until the bonds are fully amortized;
(2) $11,000,000 shall be allocated to the convention center enterprise special fund established under section 201B-8;
(3) An allocation
shall be deposited into the tourism emergency special fund, established in
section 201B-10, in a manner sufficient to maintain a fund balance of
$5,000,000 in the tourism emergency special fund; and
[(4) $3,000,000
shall be allocated to the special land and development fund established under
section 171-19; provided that the allocation shall be expended in accordance
with the Hawaii tourism authority strategic plan for:
(A) The
protection, preservation, maintenance, and enhancement of natural resources,
including beaches, important to the visitor industry;
(B) Planning,
construction, and repair of facilities; and
(C) Operation
and maintenance costs of public lands, including beaches, connected with enhancing the
visitor experience.]
(4) $30,000,000
shall be allocated to the natural resource management special fund established
under section ‑2.
All transient accommodations taxes shall be paid into the state treasury each month within ten days after collection and shall be kept by the state director of finance in special accounts for distribution as provided in this subsection."
SECTION 4. There is appropriated out of the natural resource management special fund under section -2, Hawaii Revised Statutes, established by this Act, the sum of $30,000,000 or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2023-2024 and the same sum or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2024-2025 for:
(1) The purposes of the fund under section -2, Hawaii Revised Statutes, established by this Act; and
(2) Administrative, office, and staffing expenses for the natural resource management commission to include one full-time equivalent (1.0 FTE) permanent manager position and one full-time equivalent (1.0 FTE) permanent clerical position.
The sums appropriated shall be expended by the natural resource management commission for the purposes of this Act.
SECTION 5. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken. New statutory material is underscored.
SECTION 6. This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2023; provided that the amendments made to section 237D-6.5(b), Hawaii Revised Statutes, by section 3 of this Act shall not be repealed when that section is reenacted on June 30, 3023, pursuant to section 9 of Act 229, Session Laws of Hawaii 2021.
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INTRODUCED BY: |
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Report Title:
Transient Accommodations Tax; Natural Resource Management; Special Fund; Natural Resource Management Commission; Appropriation
Description:
Establishes the natural resource management commission and special fund. Repeals the allocation of transient accommodations tax revenues to the special land and development fund. Allocates transient accommodations tax revenues to the natural resource management special fund. Appropriates funds from the natural resource management special fund for the purposes of the fund and administrative, office, and staffing expenses.
The summary description
of legislation appearing on this page is for informational purposes only and is
not legislation or evidence of legislative intent.
