Latest news with #Bill46
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Texas likely to expand medical marijuana program eligibility amid looming hemp ban
The Texas Senate advanced a bill Tuesday that will expand the conditions eligible for the state's medical marijuana program, including chronic pain and Crohn's disease, and allow for smokable products to be sold by prescription. House Bill 46 by Rep. Ken King, R-Canadian, which had seven amendments, will allow patients in the state's medical marijuana program to use products like cannabis patches, lotions, and prescribed inhalers and vaping devices. The House already approved the bill 122-21 earlier this month, and the Senate gave it unanimous approval Tuesday. If it becomes law, the list of qualifying conditions would also expand to include chronic pain and terminal or hospice care. The next step for this bill is for Gov. Greg Abbott to sign it before it becomes law. Sen. Charles Perry, R-Lubbock, clarified that those who will be eligible under the chronic pain designation are most likely those who are already prescribed an opiate for it. 'When you get an opiate, that is the highest level of pain you can get in our bodies, right? The medical board threaded that needle and we are using that definition,' he said. 'There wasn't a legislative definition, but there was a medical one, and we tied it to that.' The bill would also allow licensed dispensers to open more satellite locations, which supporters say is necessary to prevent the industry from collapsing, and adds nine dispensers, pushing the total to 12. Perry said the first three dispensers will be picked from the previously submitted list, and then it will be opened up to the public. In Texas, licensed medical cannabis providers must house all operations — including cannabis cultivation, processing, extracting, manufacturing, testing, and dispensing — under one roof. State regulations also prohibit inventory storage of medical cannabis products in multiple locations, so products must be distributed from the central dispensary. Any prescriptions scheduled for pickup outside the central dispensary must be driven daily to and from the pickup location — sometimes thousands of miles round-trip. This has made their products more expensive and limited where the medical marijuana program can reach, hampering the small medical cannabis market in Texas. House Bill 46 is meant to correct some of this problem by allowing medical marijuana distributors to store their products in various satellite locations instead of having to drive across the state to return the product to the original dispensary every day. 'This should help alleviate some of the costs because they will be able to store it in those distribution centers,' said Perry. However, the most significant potential change would be allowing smokable marijuana products, such as vapes, into the program, helping to match the popularity of products found in the hemp industry. The Texas medical program can currently only sell gummies, lozenges, topicals, beverages, and tinctures, as smoking or vaping products have not been approved. Many hemp products, which are unregulated and sold more freely in smoke shops, also give the same high as medical marijuana, but are cheaper for consumers, and don't require a visit to a medical professional for pre-approval to purchase. This ease of access has pretty much made the medical marijuana program irrelevant, according to the medical marijuana industry. Texas lawmakers recently passed a bill that will essentially wipe out the hemp market, and the blowback has been noticed. 'What we have done this session, members, is eradicate bad actors who are poisoning our community, children and adults, and making a massive profit off people,' said Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, during the hearing for HB 46. 'We have wiped them out and are now building one of the biggest Compassionate Use Programs in the country.' Some of the most vigorous opposition to the all-out ban on hemp products has come from those who use it for medical purposes. Veterans, parents of children with mental health or physical disabilities, and the elderly spoke to lawmakers this year about the importance of having easy access to hemp products, not the medical marijuana program. 'I want to reiterate since we got so many calls. This body has always made a commitment to our veterans. But we also have a commitment to our kids, and it's to keep them safe from narcotics that they shouldn't be doing until they are 25 and under a medical setting,' said Sen. Roland Gutierrez, D-San Antonio, during the hearing Tuesday night. 'Never under any terms did we intend for a child to go to the convenience store and get a vape pen. We had to grab the reins of a pretty strong horse. We all had to do that, and we all got grief for it, but we never authorized it in the first place.' First round of TribFest speakers announced! Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Maureen Dowd; U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio; Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker; U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff, D-California; and U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas are taking the stage Nov. 13–15 in Austin. Get your tickets today!
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Weather modification bills, fueled by ‘magic' and conspiracy theories, advance in Louisiana
Bills banning weather modification in Louisiana are making their way through the State Legislature. Cloud seeding is a real field of scientific study, but can be rife with misinformation. (Elise Plunk/Louisiana Illuminator) Two bills to ban weather modification in Louisiana have quietly moved their way through the state legislature this session, as a cohort of other states have moved to do the same with technology that purports to encourage rain or alter temperature. Senate Bill 46, sponsored by Sen. 'Big Mike' Fesi, R-Houma, and House Bill 608, by Rep. Kim Coates, R-Ponchatoula, would ban the intentional release of chemicals into the atmosphere to alter the weather or climate. Coates' measure includes a $200,000 fine for any violation. Weather modification is a wide-reaching term and often marbled with deep veins of misinformation. Human efforts and theories that attempt to alter precipitation or temperature are real but largely new areas of scientific study. The concept of weather modification has produced solid science along with skepticism and conspiracy theories in the decades since studies began. The Louisiana bills specifically reference cloud seeding, or attempts to encourage rainfall with aerosols sprayed into the air. They also cover solar radiation modification, which tries to deflect sunlight away from Earth to curb increasing temperatures and associated climate change. Cloud seeding experiments are exceedingly rare along the Gulf Coast, and solar radiation modification exists only as a theoretical concept. Robert Rauber, an atmospheric scientist and professor emeritus at the University of Illinois, said cloud seeding simply doesn't have widespread use in Louisiana, where rain is relatively abundant. 'The Gulf Coast doesn't need rain,' Rauber said, unlike the mountainous or desert states where cloud seeding is a more attractive option. 'The reason why they cloud seed out west is to increase water supplies.' Rauber has participated in a variety of cloud seeding experiments in mountainous regions of the western United States and said the types of clouds along the Gulf Coast aren't really conducive for seeding. 'It's never been proven to work' at scale with the puffy, cumulus clouds more common in the South, said Rauber. 'These clouds form wherever the heck they want … you can't target an area very effectively.' Cloud seeding can't alter the paths or intensity of hurricanes either, said Rauber. He cited failed experiments in the 1940s when scientists seeded hurricanes with dry ice to see if they could weaken their intensity. Although researchers learned valuable information on how hurricanes formed and traveled, they were not able to change their path or intensity. One business has conducted cloud seeding experiments along the Gulf Coast, according to Rauber, who stressed that the science is shaky. Rainmaker Technology Corp., a geoengineering company based in El Segundo, California, has conducted experiments along the Gulf Coast as recently as March, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration records. The company claims to use charged water particles to promote rain instead of aerosols. 'It's magic as far as I'm concerned because I have not seen any scientific research done in a proper way that shows that any of that is effective,' Rauber said. Misinformation and unproven methods that Rainmaker Technology and other companies promote adds to public fear and conspiracy theories surrounding weather modification, the professor said. Rainmaker Technology did not respond to calls for comment. Cloud seeding with silver iodide has been practiced for more than 70 years, and the scientific consensus is that the amount used is relatively effective, with the right clouds, and environmentally safe. Sprayed into clouds as an aerosol, silver iodide freezes and gives moisture-heavy clouds something to grab onto, coaxing its water molecules to condense and fall from the sky as rain. James Diaz, a medical toxicologist and professor emeritus at the LSU Health Sciences Center School of Public Health in New Orleans, said silver can prompt reactions when ingested in large doses and lab experiments suggest the heavy metal could be harmful to aquatic life in large amounts over time, but he said the amounts used for cloud seeding do not alarm him. 'These toxicities are unlikely after cloud seeding,' Diaz said. It's a similar story with iodide. Large amounts over long periods of time can do environmental and health harm, but Diaz said the amounts needed for cloud seeding aren't worrying. 'We should be more concerned about petrochemicals and pesticides,' he said. Fesi's bill doesn't apply to firefighting aerosols or pesticides used for agriculture. Coates said in an interview she intends to amend her bill so that it would not apply to pollutants emitted from the burning of fossil fuels. Fesi mentioned in his floor speech that sulfur dioxide is among the chemicals he believes are being sprayed into the atmosphere. There is no evidence that cloud seeding uses sulfur dioxide. The burning of fossil fuels, namely coal and oil at power plants and industrial facilities, is one of the largest sources of sulfur dioxide, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Coates and Fesi clarified in interviews their bills will not regulate industrial emissions. Coates said she considers her bill to be part of the wider push in Republican-led states to ban weather modification, adding she believes the issue to have bipartisan appeal. Florida recently approved legislation similar to what's under consideration in Louisiana, and Tennessee approved a ban on weather modification in 2024. 'I just decided that I wanted to bring the bill because I don't feel like anyone in Louisiana gave someone the right to do research in the air above us,' Coates said. 'That's our air above us, and we haven't given anybody permission, anybody the right to spray or do any modification above us.' When asked about the lack of widespread weather modification experiments in Louisiana, Coates said her bill is more precautionary. 'Why mess with Mother Nature?' she added. Coates' bill advanced from the House Committee on Natural Resources and Environment with unanimous support and awaits debate in the full House. Fesi testified on the Senate floor April 28 during debate over his bill that he believes 'certain agencies within the federal government are doing cloud seeding and geoengineering.' In an interview Friday, the senator was asked what evidence he had to support his claims. 'Look up in our sky,' Fesi answered. In an interview, Fesi later said he sees 'just tons and tons of cloud seeding' above his backyard and described it as 'all of the stripes across the skies.' Neither bill specifically discusses banning contrails, short for condensation trails. The thin, white cloud streaks that stretch behind airplanes are created as warm exhaust from jet engines meet the icy cold atmosphere, similarly to how warm breath briefly creates a fog in cold air. Unsubstantiated contrail theories attempt to connect weather modification and contrails, alleging jets are spraying chemicals for reasons ranging from weather alterations to population control. Sen. Regina Barrow, D-Baton Rouge, was the only lawmaker to question Fesi's claims on the Senate floor. He responded that '32 different agencies collect money for geoengineering of our weather.' Pressed by Barrow for details, Fesi shared a widely debunked conspiracy theory that the federal government is spraying aerosols to block sunlight, and that the materials – namely aluminum oxide – have been found in agricultural fields from contrail chemical spraying. No evidence exists of a government program that conducts or collects money for cloud seeding or solar radiation modification experiments. With no one else challenging his statements, Fesi's bill advanced from the Senate on a 27-12 party line vote, with Republicans prevailing. The measure awaits committee consideration in the House of Representatives.
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Texas House signals expanding state's medical marijuana program
The Texas House advanced a bill Monday that would expand the conditions eligible for the state's medical marijuana program, including chronic pain and Crohn's disease, and allow for prescribed smokable products to be sold by prescription. House Bill 46 by Rep. Ken King, R-Canadian, would allow patients in the state's medical marijuana program to use products like cannabis patches, lotions, and prescribed inhalers and vaping devices. The House preliminarily approved the bill 118 to 16 on Monday and will need a final round of approval before it heads to the Senate. If it becomes law, the list of qualifying conditions would also expand to include chronic pain, traumatic brain injury, Crohn's disease, and degenerative disc disease. The bill would also let licensed dispensers open more satellite locations, which supporters say is necessary to prevent the industry from crumbling. 'There are too many Texans who are still struggling to get access to the medicine they legally have a right to receive,' King said, pointing out his bill would allow for additional dispensing locations outside of Central Texas, where all dispensaries are currently concentrated. Rep. Penny Morales Shaw, D-Houston, said rural Texans would have more access. 'Too many of our fellow Texans are forced to either suffer or self medicate because they don't have sufficient access, and this is an amazing alternative to addictive, harmful opioids, which we know is a huge problem,' she said. In Texas, licensed medical cannabis providers must house all operations, including cannabis cultivation, processing, extracting, manufacturing, testing, and dispensing, under one roof. State regulations also prohibit inventory storage of medical cannabis products in multiple locations, so products must be distributed from the central dispensary. Any prescriptions scheduled for pickup outside the central dispensary must be driven daily to and from the pickup location—sometimes thousands of miles round-trip. 'This method puts wear and tear on our vehicles. Limits the amount of time we can spend with patients and can compromise product integrity,' said Terrence Baugh, marketing manager for goodblend, Austin-based medical marijuana producer. 'We might drive 200 miles, and the person we are delivering to might not even be there at the moment.' This has made their products more expensive and limited where the medical marijuana program can reach, hampering the small medical cannabis market in Texas. 'We also don't have enough doctors in the program, and not enough people prescribing for it, and most patients find us through a doctor. We are dealing with several different challenges, but we are hopeful these bills might help,' said Baugh. House Bill 46 is meant to correct some of this problem by allowing medical marijuana distributors to store their products in various satellite locations instead of having to drive across the state to return the product every day. However, the most significant potential change would be allowing smokable marijuana products, such as vapes, to be introduced into the program, helping to match the popularity of products found in the hemp industry. The Texas medical program can currently only sell gummies, lozenges, topicals, beverages, and tinctures, as smoking or vaping products have not been approved. Many hemp products, which are unregulated and sold more freely in smoke shops, also give the same high as medical marijuana, but are cheaper for consumers, and don't require a visit to a medical professional for pre-approval to purchase. This ease of access has pretty much made the medical marijuana program irrelevant, according to the medical marijuana industry. Dillan Dabelsutt, senior manager of cultivation at goodblend, said the only difference between hemp and medical marijuana is that hemp is harvested earlier. 'Hemp is just a little more flexible while marijuana is produced for high THC alone,' he said. By allowing smokeables and expanding the conditions, the medical marijuana producers are hoping this will open the market up to more patients and increase the demand for products. Texas lawmakers are also determining the future of hemp this session, as a House panel approved last month a bill, also authored by King, to tighten regulations on Texas' consumable hemp industry, setting up a potential clash with Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and the Senate, who are pursuing a total ban on THC products. 'I think we can co-exist with hemp. We just want an even playing field,' said Baugh. 'I believe additional regulations are needed on hemp, and we need to loosen some on medical marijuana.' King noted on Monday that HB 46 would have no effect on hemp and that the future of that industry will be decided another day. 'The other bill will be coming to a House floor near you,' he told lawmakers. Texans seeking help for substance use can call the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's free help line at 800-662-4357. They can also access services in their region through the Texas Health and Human Services website. First round of TribFest speakers announced! Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Maureen Dowd; U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio; Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker; U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff, D-California; and U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas are taking the stage Nov. 13–15 in Austin. Get your tickets today!
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Honolulu City Council scrutinizes empty-homes tax
STAR-ADVERTISER / 2021 The City and County of Honolulu invested $500, 000 to conduct a study to determine whether imposing a tax on vacant houses and condo units would add to county coffers. Apartments buildings, condominiums, homes and hotels shape the Honolulu skyline. STAR-ADVERTISER / 2021 The City and County of Honolulu invested $500, 000 to conduct a study to determine whether imposing a tax on vacant houses and condo units would add to county coffers. Apartments buildings, condominiums, homes and hotels shape the Honolulu skyline. The City and County of Hono lulu's $500, 000 Ernst &Young LLP study over a proposed empty-homes tax measure asserts the city could garner tens of millions of dollars annually in new revenues. But Mayor Rick Blangiardi's administration appears lukewarm to the idea of an EHT program, one it says could become a huge administrative burden to oversee. Conversely, City Council Chair Tommy Waters—who has co-sponsored Bill 46 to penalize real-property owners who leave their Oahu residences vacant for extended periods of time—claims his bill would largely exempt roughly 80 % of households on the island from having to pay an EHT. If enacted, the measure would ensure residential properties are used as actual homes instead of investments. During the Council's Budget Committee meeting Tuesday, Mohammed Bhamani, a Canadian-based Ernst &Young partner, presented an information-only briefing regarding his city-hired firm's first-phase findings of a two-part study related to the feasibility of implementing Bill 46. The study's findings, he claimed, were based on similar EHT programs used by two of Canada's largest cities : Vancouver and Toronto. 'In order to do so, we estimated the potential revenues from the tax, and the costs associated with implementing and administering the tax, ' he added. Don 't miss out on what 's happening ! Stay in touch with breaking news, as it happens, conveniently in your email inbox. It 's FREE ! Email 28141 Sign Up By clicking to sign up, you agree to Star-Advertiser 's and Google 's and. This form is protected by reCAPTCHA. Bill 46, if adopted, would create a new Residential E tax classification in Honolulu 'in place of a more conventional, supplementary tax on empty homes, ' he said. 'The bill has two key aspects that impact revenue estimates, ' he explained. 'First is the tax rate and structure.' Previous versions of Bill 46 used a tax rate of 1 % to 3 % of assessed value, 'which is consistent with other jurisdictions, ' he said. 'But it is important to note that a 3 % rate is significantly higher than existing property tax rates in Honolulu, ' he said, adding that exemptions were another aspect of Bill 46. 'Exemptions are an important part of an empty-home tax policy because they allow for legitimate reasons for a home to be empty and thus not be subject to the tax.' EHT exemptions seen in other jurisdictions include :—Properties that are temporarily vacant due to the owner's temporary relocation for work, education or medical treatment.—Homes undergoing significant renovations or repairs that make them uninhabitable.—Homes that are vacant due to the death of an owner and are being settled legally through an estate. 'As currently drafted, Bill 46 has 16 exemptions, most of which are aligned with other jurisdictions, ' Bhamani said. As proposed, at least 20 % of the revenues from the Residential E classification tax will be directed to affordable-housing programs overseen by the city's Office of Housing. 'We have seen in other jurisdictions that it is common to have the costs of the program to be recovered first, and then all remaining funds go to affordable-housing programs, ' he said. Based on tax year 2027-2028—the first year of implementation of the proposed new law—the study determined between 287, 000 to 292, 000 taxable properties on Oahu are split between condominiums and noncondos, which include single-family homes and apartments, that are not exempt from the EHT on Oahu. 'We do this to reflect that condos typically have a higher vacancy rate than noncondo properties, ' he said. Condos on the island average about $726, 000 in value, while noncondos like single-family homes average about $1.4 million, the study states. To determine vacant homes on Oahu, the study relied upon water consumption data as well as electricity use to flag homes which may be empty. 'In this case 300 gallons per month in the conservative scenario, or 1, 000 gallons a month in the optimistic scenario, ' he said. 'This showed a vacancy rate of between 2.4 % and 4.2 %, equating to approximately 7, 300 and 11, 200 empty properties.' Of those, the study determined there was an exemption rate of 81 % to 87 %. 'This means that between 13 % and 19 % of the estimated number of empty homes would be subject to the tax, ' he said. 'This equaled between about 950 and 2, 100 properties as the tax base.' 'We would expect that this tax would likely result in some owners of these properties releasing their homes to the market, either for sale or rent, so that they are not empty and not subject to the tax, ' he added. Based on a so-called Annual Behavioral Response Rate, or ABRR, Ernst &Young estimated that at a 1 % tax rate, about 4 % of properties—or 38 to 86 units—would return to the market annually on Oahu. 'As the tax rate increases, this rate is also likely to increase, ' Bhamani said. 'However, as with any tax, we must assume there will be some portion of homeowners who do not comply and that some noncompliant properties will remain unidentified through audits.' At a 1 % tax rate, there'd be a nearly 71 % compliance rate, the study noted. 'Of noncompliant homes, we estimated that 65 % would be identified and pay both the tax and penalty, ' he said. 'The remaining 35 % of noncompliant homes would not be taxed and therefore not count toward revenue.' As far as revenues from an EHT, the study determined under a 1 % tax rate, which includes a 3 % boost in the program's third year, the city could gain $29.1 million in average annual net revenue over a 10-year period. Over a decade, a 1 %-only tax rate would glean $3.2 million in revenue ; at a 2 %-only tax rate, $19.2 million ; and at a 3 %-only tax rate, $34.5 million, the study indicates. The study also noted it would cost Honolulu about $4.39 million annually to operate the EHT program, with a $2.34 million implementation cost. During public comment Tuesday, those who testified had mixed reviews of Bill 46. 'Happy to see some signs of life on this (measure ), ' said Ross Isokane, part of a grassroots coa lition of residents in support of Bill 46. He'd cite a Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism report that says since 2021, 20, 000 units have been purchased 'by outsiders.' Hawaii Kai resident Natalie Iwasa opposed Bill 46, saying the stated purpose of the EHT was 'to incentivize people to rent or sell, but this is via a punitive tax that is almost three times the residential (tax ) rate.' 'Why not use a carrot, why not give them a credit in their real property taxes if they convert their home ?' she asked. 'Bottom line, you folks are saying, 'We don't like the way you legally use your property, and therefore we are going to tax you, '' she said. 'This is fundamentally wrong. It's a bad bill and I do not support it.' The legality of a new EHT was of concern, too. Those concerns centered on a lawsuit that arose over the City and County of San Francisco's Proposition M, a November 2022 initiative presented to voters in that city over a vacant-homes tax. Notably, San Francisco voters passed the proposition—by 54.5 % of the vote—which was set to take effect in 2025. As a new law, Proposition M meant property owners would be charged an escalating amount for each 'residential unit ' that is 'vacant ' during the preceding calendar year. However, in 2023 several plaintiffs—including the San Francisco Apartment Association, the Small Property Owners of San Francisco Institute and the San Francisco Association of Realtors—filed suit in the Superior Court of California over the pending city tax. In November 2024 a final judgment in the case was rendered. California Superior Court Judge Ronald E. Quidachay ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, finding San Francisco's vacant-homes tax violated the 'Takings Clause, ' also known as the Just Compensation Clause, of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But at Tuesday's meeting Waters, a lawyer, said San Francisco's legal case involving its vacancy tax does not relate to Hawaii's Constitution. At the meeting, too, Deputy Corporation Counsel Reid Yamashiro declined to offer legal advice to the Council in public on the EHT. Instead, he suggested the matter should be discussed in closed-door executive session, though that nonpublic meeting did not occur. Questions over how the city would gain compliance over empty homes also surfaced. 'What did you guys find in your other studies on how you would actually get people to comply ?' Council member Andria Tupola asked. 'Is that like a human person going there and talking to them ? Is it like legal paperwork ? And then how successful has that been to get people to comply through either of the two of those means ?' Bhamani replied, 'So, typically the question asked, 'Is your home vacant or not ?'' 'And if you say, 'It is vacant, ' then you are assessed a tax, ' he added. 'If you say, 'It's vacant, but I should be eligible for an exemption, ' the expectation is that you provide proof of that exemption.' As far as actually implementing the EHT program, city Budget and Fiscal Services Director Andy Kawano suggested the city was not impressed with the findings of the study, particularly over revenues. And he'd note the study indicated only 1, 000 units would be converted, 'after all of the heavy lifting that we have to do.' 'If we evaluate what's important to us as (a city ) administration, in terms of addressing empty homes, we just don't see it, ' he added, 'based on the effort that we have to put in and the fact that taxes will go up. 'And because of our laws, we cannot select and tax only people that are nonresidents, ' Kawano asserted. 'The tax will have to be applied fairly to all people who own property on this island.'
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
City Council scrutinizes empty-homes tax
STAR-ADVERTISER / 2021 The City and County of Honolulu invested $500, 000 to conduct a study to determine whether imposing a tax on vacant houses and condo units would add to county coffers. Apartments buildings, condominiums, homes and hotels shape the Honolulu skyline. STAR-ADVERTISER / 2021 The City and County of Honolulu invested $500, 000 to conduct a study to determine whether imposing a tax on vacant houses and condo units would add to county coffers. Apartments buildings, condominiums, homes and hotels shape the Honolulu skyline. The City and County of Hono lulu's $500, 000 Ernst &Young LLP study over a proposed empty-homes tax measure asserts the city could garner tens of millions of dollars annually in new revenues. But Mayor Rick Blangiardi's administration appears lukewarm to the idea of an EHT program, one it says could become a huge administrative burden to oversee. Conversely, City Council Chair Tommy Waters—who has co-sponsored Bill 46 to penalize real-property owners who leave their Oahu residences vacant for extended periods of time—claims his bill would largely exempt roughly 80 % of households on the island from having to pay an EHT. If enacted, the measure would ensure residential properties are used as actual homes instead of investments. During the Council's Budget Committee meeting Tuesday, Mohammed Bhamani, a Canadian-based Ernst &Young partner, presented an information-only briefing regarding his city-hired firm's first-phase findings of a two-part study related to the feasibility of implementing Bill 46. The study's findings, he claimed, were based on similar EHT programs used by two of Canada's largest cities : Vancouver and Toronto. 'In order to do so, we estimated the potential revenues from the tax, and the costs associated with implementing and administering the tax, ' he added. Don 't miss out on what 's happening ! Stay in touch with breaking news, as it happens, conveniently in your email inbox. It 's FREE ! Email 28141 Sign Up By clicking to sign up, you agree to Star-Advertiser 's and Google 's and. This form is protected by reCAPTCHA. Bill 46, if adopted, would create a new Residential E tax classification in Honolulu 'in place of a more conventional, supplementary tax on empty homes, ' he said. 'The bill has two key aspects that impact revenue estimates, ' he explained. 'First is the tax rate and structure.' Previous versions of Bill 46 used a tax rate of 1 % to 3 % of assessed value, 'which is consistent with other jurisdictions, ' he said. 'But it is important to note that a 3 % rate is significantly higher than existing property tax rates in Honolulu, ' he said, adding that exemptions were another aspect of Bill 46. 'Exemptions are an important part of an empty-home tax policy because they allow for legitimate reasons for a home to be empty and thus not be subject to the tax.' EHT exemptions seen in other jurisdictions include :—Properties that are temporarily vacant due to the owner's temporary relocation for work, education or medical treatment.—Homes undergoing significant renovations or repairs that make them uninhabitable.—Homes that are vacant due to the death of an owner and are being settled legally through an estate. 'As currently drafted, Bill 46 has 16 exemptions, most of which are aligned with other jurisdictions, ' Bhamani said. As proposed, at least 20 % of the revenues from the Residential E classification tax will be directed to affordable-housing programs overseen by the city's Office of Housing. 'We have seen in other jurisdictions that it is common to have the costs of the program to be recovered first, and then all remaining funds go to affordable-housing programs, ' he said. Based on tax year 2027-2028—the first year of implementation of the proposed new law—the study determined between 287, 000 to 292, 000 taxable properties on Oahu are split between condominiums and noncondos, which include single-family homes and apartments, that are not exempt from the EHT on Oahu. 'We do this to reflect that condos typically have a higher vacancy rate than noncondo properties, ' he said. Condos on the island average about $726, 000 in value, while noncondos like single-family homes average about $1.4 million, the study states. To determine vacant homes on Oahu, the study relied upon water consumption data as well as electricity use to flag homes which may be empty. 'In this case 300 gallons per month in the conservative scenario, or 1, 000 gallons a month in the optimistic scenario, ' he said. 'This showed a vacancy rate of between 2.4 % and 4.2 %, equating to approximately 7, 300 and 11, 200 empty properties.' Of those, the study determined there was an exemption rate of 81 % to 87 %. 'This means that between 13 % and 19 % of the estimated number of empty homes would be subject to the tax, ' he said. 'This equaled between about 950 and 2, 100 properties as the tax base.' 'We would expect that this tax would likely result in some owners of these properties releasing their homes to the market, either for sale or rent, so that they are not empty and not subject to the tax, ' he added. Based on a so-called Annual Behavioral Response Rate, or ABRR, Ernst &Young estimated that at a 1 % tax rate, about 4 % of properties—or 38 to 86 units—would return to the market annually on Oahu. 'As the tax rate increases, this rate is also likely to increase, ' Bhamani said. 'However, as with any tax, we must assume there will be some portion of homeowners who do not comply and that some noncompliant properties will remain unidentified through audits.' At a 1 % tax rate, there'd be a nearly 71 % compliance rate, the study noted. 'Of noncompliant homes, we estimated that 65 % would be identified and pay both the tax and penalty, ' he said. 'The remaining 35 % of noncompliant homes would not be taxed and therefore not count toward revenue.' As far as revenues from an EHT, the study determined under a 1 % tax rate, which includes a 3 % boost in the program's third year, the city could gain $29.1 million in average annual net revenue over a 10-year period. Over a decade, a 1 %-only tax rate would glean $3.2 million in revenue ; at a 2 %-only tax rate, $19.2 million ; and at a 3 %-only tax rate, $34.5 million, the study indicates. The study also noted it would cost Honolulu about $4.39 million annually to operate the EHT program, with a $2.34 million implementation cost. During public comment Tuesday, those who testified had mixed reviews of Bill 46. 'Happy to see some signs of life on this (measure ), ' said Ross Isokane, part of a grassroots coa lition of residents in support of Bill 46. He'd cite a Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism report that says since 2021, 20, 000 units have been purchased 'by outsiders.' Hawaii Kai resident Natalie Iwasa opposed Bill 46, saying the stated purpose of the EHT was 'to incentivize people to rent or sell, but this is via a punitive tax that is almost three times the residential (tax ) rate.' 'Why not use a carrot, why not give them a credit in their real property taxes if they convert their home ?' she asked. 'Bottom line, you folks are saying, 'We don't like the way you legally use your property, and therefore we are going to tax you, '' she said. 'This is fundamentally wrong. It's a bad bill and I do not support it.' The legality of a new EHT was of concern, too. Those concerns centered on a lawsuit that arose over the City and County of San Francisco's Proposition M, a November 2022 initiative presented to voters in that city over a vacant-homes tax. Notably, San Francisco voters passed the proposition—by 54.5 % of the vote—which was set to take effect in 2025. As a new law, Proposition M meant property owners would be charged an escalating amount for each 'residential unit ' that is 'vacant ' during the preceding calendar year. However, in 2023 several plaintiffs—including the San Francisco Apartment Association, the Small Property Owners of San Francisco Institute and the San Francisco Association of Realtors—filed suit in the Superior Court of California over the pending city tax. In November 2024 a final judgment in the case was rendered. California Superior Court Judge Ronald E. Quidachay ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, finding San Francisco's vacant-homes tax violated the 'Takings Clause, ' also known as the Just Compensation Clause, of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But at Tuesday's meeting Waters, a lawyer, said San Francisco's legal case involving its vacancy tax does not relate to Hawaii's Constitution. At the meeting, too, Deputy Corporation Counsel Reid Yamashiro declined to offer legal advice to the Council in public on the EHT. Instead, he suggested the matter should be discussed in closed-door executive session, though that nonpublic meeting did not occur. Questions over how the city would gain compliance over empty homes also surfaced. 'What did you guys find in your other studies on how you would actually get people to comply ?' Council member Andria Tupola asked. 'Is that like a human person going there and talking to them ? Is it like legal paperwork ? And then how successful has that been to get people to comply through either of the two of those means ?' Bhamani replied, 'So, typically the question asked, 'Is your home vacant or not ?'' 'And if you say, 'It is vacant, ' then you are assessed a tax, ' he added. 'If you say, 'It's vacant, but I should be eligible for an exemption, ' the expectation is that you provide proof of that exemption.' As far as actually implementing the EHT program, city Budget and Fiscal Services Director Andy Kawano suggested the city was not impressed with the findings of the study, particularly over revenues. And he'd note the study indicated only 1, 000 units would be converted, 'after all of the heavy lifting that we have to do.' 'If we evaluate what's important to us as (a city ) administration, in terms of addressing empty homes, we just don't see it, ' he added, 'based on the effort that we have to put in and the fact that taxes will go up. 'And because of our laws, we cannot select and tax only people that are nonresidents, ' Kawano asserted. 'The tax will have to be applied fairly to all people who own property on this island.'
