To: The Hawaii State House and The Hawaii State Senate

Ban Gut and Replace and Frankenstein Practices

The public condemns tactics and strongly oppose these misleading practices which keep the public in the dark. I join my fellow citizens and ask the Senate and the House for two things:

1) DO NOT pass the gut-and-replace bills and Frankenstein bills generated in the 2013 legislative session, due to the way the bills have moved forward.
2) BAN the “gut-and-replace” and “Frankenstein” practices from occurring again in the future.

Why is this important?

We, the public, are affronted that some state legislators think that ambiguous bill titles and last-minute amendments are an appropriate way to evade basic, procedural safeguards established by our State Constitution.

We are calling on the current Hawaii State Legislature to REJECT all bills which were substantively amended in a manner which evades the Constitutional public right to testify on proposed legislation.

We are petitioning the legislative bodies to defeat the following bills that were subject to “gut and replace” procedures, and we are petitioning that the following “Frankenstein” bills, that had non-germane material added to them after the opportunity for review in a publicly-noticed hearing, be defeated or be amended to remove the non-germane material prior to a final vote.

See filed petition, including bill numbers: http://bit.ly/FrankenSteinPetition

We condemn these tactics and strongly oppose these misleading practices which keep the public in the dark.