The state Legislature is considering several measures to crack down on illegal fireworks. Lawmakers are exploring different tactics from more inspections at the harbors to increasing penalties for violators.
The Senate Public Safety and Military Affairs Committee considered several different bills on Wednesday that would target illegal fireworks.
The Legislature’s focus on preventing the use of illegal fireworks follows the devastating New Year’s Eve explosion that killed six people – including a 3-year-old.
“My thoughts and prayers go out to the people that have lost loved ones. What I will say is that the time to act for us is now,” said Sen. Brandon Elefante, who chairs the Public Safety and Military Affairs Committee. He explained that it will be important to focus on issues like enforcement and improving laws to make it easier to prosecute cases.
Honolulu Police Department Narcotics Division Lt. Ernest Robello emphasized that one of the main issues is the current definition of an illegal firework.
“Definitions are killing us. From what I'm being told by attorneys, prosecutors, public defenders, attorneys in private practice, is the definitions are very vague or they're too generic,” he said.
“And so what happens is when the burden of proof is on the state or the city, it becomes very challenging in court to proceed with prosecution of these cases. So many of these cases, even though we make an arrest, say we issue a citation, they get dropped by the prosecutor's office for various reasons, I'm being told majority of them are for the purposes of the definitions.”
Higher fines and penalties
Fixing that definition is part of Gov. Josh Green’s bill to crack down on illegal fireworks.
The measure would enhance penalties for repeat offenders and elevate it to a Class A felony if an illegal firework kills someone. It also makes it possible for police officers to write $300 citations to those shooting illegal fireworks in the street.
Citations require a lower burden of proof, so instead of proving that the person had illegal fireworks without a reasonable doubt, prosecutors just have to prove that it is more likely than not — similar to a traffic ticket.
The measure also makes it a Class C felony to transport illegal fireworks on airplanes.
However, the Office of Public Defender opposes the measure. The office’s legislative liaison, Sonny Ganaden, explained that because it imposes both a civil and criminal trial at the same time for offenses, it could be considered unconstitutional.
“In criminal cases, you're going to be offered a public defender if you are an indigent client, like many people of Hawaiʻi are. And in the civil cases, you are not,” he said. “However, arising from the same facts and circumstances, this is going to create a real problem.”
Inspections at the ports of entry
Lawmakers are also considering a bill that would create a shipping container inspection program within the Department of Law Enforcement.
The department would have to develop a program to randomly inspect shipping containers by October.
DLE was concerned about the cost of the program. Two additional dogs needed to do the inspections would cost $600,000. It is also not clear how many containers the department would need to inspect as about 250,000 come in each year.
Elefante explained that it would be up to DLE to coordinate with the harbors on how exactly the program would work.
“They would have to coordinate with the different harbor group users, the shipping and cargo containers on how that goes about,” he said.
“So I think it's important that we continue the dialogue and collaborate with them so that we ensure that, if we were to go forward with a shipping inspector or cargo inspection container program, that we do it in a way that doesn't impact logistics at our harbors.”
The Retail Merchants of Hawaii was concerned about the delays in moving the containers for inspection to a secure location. They wanted the inspections to happen away from the harbor.
“Commercial harbor operations run 24 hours a day, seven days a week and Honolulu Harbor is at full capacity,” said Retail Merchants of Hawaii President Tina Yamaki, in a written statement.
“Any random inspection that takes place within the already congested commercial harbors on each of the major islands could cause significant delays in offloading and out-gating of cargo and unsafe traffic congestion.”
Another measure being considered would ban fireworks completely in the state, with the exception of a cultural use permit.
These three measures all passed out of committee and will be next heard by the full Senate.
A separate measure that would outright ban fireworks in the state was deferred for decision-making until Monday.
