2025 Good Governance Policy Agenda Crossover Update: as of 3/6/25
2025 Good Governance Policy Agenda
Crossover Update: as of 3/6/25
What is Crossover?
We are halfway through the legislative session! This is the point in session when bills that have moved through the chamber (House or Senate) that they originated in “cross over” to the other chamber. Inevitably, many of our priority bills don’t make it (RIP good bills) past this halfway mark. We have an update for you below on all of the bills in our Fair & Sustainable Food Systems and Good Governance policy agendas. All the greyed out bills were deferred (died), everything else is still moving! Stay tuned for alerts and updates.
HAPA’s Good Governance Priorities:
Civics Education - HB763
Will create a Civics Education Trust Fund and expand civic education in Public Schools. This bill passed both the Education and Finance committees with no opposition. There was no comparable bill introduced in the Senate this year.
Crossover Update (3/6):
HB763: Crossed over the Senate; Referred to EDU, WAM
Partial Public Funding - HB370 | SB 345
Both the House and Senate have bills that improve the partial public funding programs. HB370 was included in the Campaign Spending Commission Package. It increases funds available in the program for all offices. SB 345, a stronger version of the bill sponsored by Senator Rhoads, will increase the amount of matching funds and raise expenditure limits for candidates. Several Republican House members voted against both measures.
Crossover Update (3/6):
HB370: Crossed over the Senate; Referred to JDC, WAM
SB 345: Crossed over the House; Referred to JHA, FIN
Contactor Loophole - HB371 | SB809
HB371, closing the contractor loophole ban, is another bill from the Campaign Spending Commission package that moved over from the House. It addresses the contractor donation loophole that was exposed in the NY Times expose on corruption at the state legislature.
SB809, the senate’s bill addressing the issue, was passed out of judiciary but didn’t get a hearing in Ways and Means. This bill was sponsored by Senator Rhoads and was a robust version of SB 257, the companion to HB 371, which was never heard in the judiciary committee.
Crossover Update (3/6):
HB371: Crossed over the Senate; Referred to JDC, WAM
SB809: Never schedule in WAM/Deferred
Fully Funded Public Elections - SB51 | HB766
SB51, a comprehensive publicly funded elections bill passed out of the Senate. Senator Awa voted against in Judiciary and Senators Kim, Favella and DeCoite voted with reservations in Ways and Means. The House version, HB 766 never got a hearing in the judiciary committee.
Crossover Update (3/6):
SB51: Crossed over to the House; Referred to JHA, FIN
HB766: No hearing in JDC/Deferred
Campaign Spending - SB 1032 | SB 311
SB 1032 prohibits foreign entities and foreign-influenced business entities from making contributions, expenditures, electioneering communications, or donations for election purposes.
SB 311 is a constitutional amendment that says freedom of speech does not include money spent on elections. Neither measure had a companion bill in the house.
Crossover Update (3/6):
SB 1032: Crossed over to the House; Referred to JHA, FIN
SB 311: Crossed over to the House; Referred to JHA, FIN
Support SB345: Campaign Spending Partial Public Funding Increase
The Curse of the Crossover Will Caron/Civil Beat
These bills failed to make it out of their finance committees before the crossover deadline. Because we are in the first year of the biennial legislative session, all of these bills are still able to be heard in their assigned committees next year.
HB1425 - Continuous Legislative Session Working Group
HB772 - Ban Candidate to Candidate Contributions
HB322 - Automatic Voter Registration
SB1173 - PAC Expendicute Fee
SB809 - Contractor Loophole Ban
SB118 - CSC Inspector Position
Join us this session in supporting a broad array of bills designed to support local farmers, food producers, increase local food production, address inequities in our food system such as food insecurity, and support regenerative and indigenous farming/food production practices.
Learn more information below about HAPA’s 2024 FSFS policy agenda and take action in support of these Fair & Sustainable Food System policy priorities!
New to Legislative Engagement? Learn more about how to engage in the Legislative Session!
Make sure you have set up your account on the Hawaii State Legislature website. If you are new to the process, see this helpful page on legislative engagement 101 from the Public Access Room including a link on how to submit testimony!
Mahalo for taking action!
