Bill Text: HI HCR87 | 2016 | Regular Session | Amended

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Bill Title: Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; Energy Cooperative

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 8-0)

Status: (Engrossed - Dead) 2016-04-08 - Referred to EET/TRE, WAM. [HCR87 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2016-HCR87-Amended.html

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HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.C.R. NO.	87
TWENTY-EIGHTH LEGISLATURE, 2016		H.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII

HOUSE CONCURRENT

RESOLUTION

 

 

REQUESTING THE DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESS, ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, AND TOURISM TO ASSESS THE FEASIBILITY AND THE POTENTIAL MERITS AND BENEFITS OF THE ENERGY COOPERATIVE MODEL FOR THE ISLAND OF HAWAII.

 

 

 

     WHEREAS, Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative is a nonprofit consumer cooperative association that is incorporated pursuant to chapter 421C, Hawaii Revised Statutes, for the following purposes:

 

     (1)  To supply, produce, generate, purchase, market, sell, transmit or distribute, and to promote the use of, electric energy and other forms of energy;

 

     (2)  To provide services relating or incidental to the purposes set forth in paragraph (1); and

 

     (3)  For any other lawful purposes; and

 

     WHEREAS, as a nonprofit consumer cooperative association managed by leaders on the island of Hawaii, Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative is pursuing the potential merits of a cooperative ownership structure for electric utility service on the island of Hawaii; and

 

     WHEREAS, the Legislature passed and the Governor signed Act 57, Session Laws of Hawaii 2013, which states in part that "[a]n electric cooperative . . . is a customer-owned organization operating on a not-for-profit basis under the governance of a board of directors democratically elected by the very same customers who receive the cooperative's services and who act in their role as owners and members of the cooperative”; and

 

     WHEREAS, Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative would represent the goals and benefits of this cooperative form of utility ownership, which include local, democratic control over one of the most critical infrastructures and public institutions on the island of Hawaii; community-based and community-chosen priorities; potentially lower electricity costs by virtue of its nonprofit status; improved and greater overall energy independence and sustainability; and the development of and emphasis on island-produced fuels to provide an energy source for both electric generation and transportation sectors; and

 

     WHEREAS, Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative's organizational efforts and its desire to bring the benefits of the cooperative form of ownership to the critical electric utility infrastructure of the island of Hawaii should inspire the State to explore the merits of the energy cooperative model for the island of Hawaii; now, therefore,

 

     BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-eighth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2016, the Senate concurring, that the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism is requested to assess the feasibility and the potential merits and benefits of the energy cooperative model for the island of Hawaii; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism is requested to report its findings and recommendations to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2017; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the Director of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism and the President of Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative.

 

 

 

Report Title: 

Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; Energy Cooperative