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Legislative
committees advised
to end secrecy
Last-minute deals should be
By Ian Lind
made with doors open, says the
attorney general, and some
legislators agree
Star-BulletinA tradition of last-minute deals struck between House and Senate negotiators during the waning hours of each legislative session violates a 22-year old provision of the state Constitution and should be ended, according to a legal opinion signed by Attorney General-designate Earl Anzai this week.
The opinion advises that legislative conference committees must do their work only at meetings open to the public.
These changes would be "very, very significant," said Senate Majority Leader Les Ihara Jr., who requested the opinion.
"The conference committee is the 'third house' of the Legislature," Ihara said. "All the secrets, all the unwritten codes, and the unwritten culture resides in the conference, and behind its closed doors is where decisions are made."
Conference committees, made up of both House and Senate members assigned to work out differences between versions of bills adopted by their respective bodies, should take action only when a quorum of committee members is present and makes decisions only by voting during public meetings, the opinion concludes.
The opinion, written by Deputy Attorney General Charleen M. Aina and approved by Anzai, agreed with and reaffirmed a January 1991 opinion prepared for Rep. Tom Okamura, which traced the history and intent of the 1978 Constitutional Convention and concluded a constitutional amendment requiring open meetings and votes applies to conference committees as well as standing committees.
"This strikes at the heart of centralized power," Ihara said. "While members bemoan the confusion at the end of the session, presiding officers love it. They get to step in, claiming we can't solve the problems, and then they call the shots. But if you have to vote in public, it eliminates secret trade-offs."
In response to questions from the Star-Bulletin, Senate President Norman Mizuguchi's office referred to a letter last Saturday addressed to House Speaker Calvin Say, in which Mizuguchi proposes a joint review of conference committee practices.
"Media reports to the contrary, I know we both favor procedural changes that will improve public participation in the legislative process and reaffirm the public's faith in our government. Improving conference committee procedures to further streamline our very open voting process is a worthy initiative that merits consideration," Mizuguchi wrote.
Mizuguchi then cited a series of problems, including making changes in an already hectic schedule to accommodate additional public meetings, and pressures on the two Republican senators, who would have to be at all the conference meetings.
House Majority Leader Ed Case believes such practical problems can be worked out.
"There is a willingness in the House to implement the changes," he said. "But we haven't, so far, come to a meeting of the minds with the Senate."
Ihara said he had rediscovered the 1991 legal opinion after hearing public criticism of the conference committee process during a campaign finance workshop last summer.
Following discussions with leaders of Common Cause and other community organizations, Ihara and Case met in November 1999 to begin drafting new procedures.
A proposal was completed and presented to House members in December, Case said. It was later discussed in the Senate Democratic caucus, most recently on March 1, but Ihara said poor attendance limited debate.
"I asked for a conversation about constitutionality, whether we are currently in compliance," Ihara said. "People didn't want to talk about it."
Instead, Ihara said, discussion focused on practical considerations that appear to prevent adoption of reforms within the previously approved legislative calendar and rules for handling of bills.
The Legislature is currently operating without any approved conference committee procedures because Ihara and Case have so far refused to issue guidelines that do not include the quorum and public-vote requirements.
Ihara says many senators support new conference procedures, which would effectively take further powers away from Mizuguchi, but are afraid the Senate president could "mess them up by not changing the legislative calendar."
"In some committees you have hundreds of bills, and you would actually have to vote on every single one. They're in fear, I think," Ihara said. Legislative leaders have already been warned that failure to act could result in legal challenges to bills approved in an apparently unconstitutional manner.
In a letter Monday, Honolulu attorney Jeff Portnoy asked Mizuguchi and Say to confirm whether quorum and public-voting requirements would be implemented. Portnoy hinted that his client, the Honolulu Advertiser, might pursue legal action if changes are not made.
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