Joint committees approve working group to study state-controlled warehousing to lower housing costs

The House Committee on Transportation and the House Committee on Housing voted March 27 to advance HCR 126 and HR 118, resolutions that direct the Department of Transportation and the Hawaii Housing Finance and Development Corporation (HHFDC) to convene a working group to evaluate whether state-controlled warehouses or logistics facilities near ports, harbors and airports could lower material costs for public housing projects.

Chair remarks framed the study as an effort to reduce the cost of infrastructure and building materials that affect final home prices, especially on neighbor islands. "If we have the opportunity to procure several thousand different pieces of equipment to help make housing just that much less, I think it could be the final dividends of what the home is being offered," the chair said.

DOT’s Drake Wylie told the committee that many of the working group tasks lie outside DOT’s current purview and suggested co-chairing with HHFDC so responsibilities could be shared. He also said harbor warehouses may be obsolete or in poor condition: DOT has about eight harbor warehouse facilities, "but they're in questionable condition and I wouldn't recommend those for this purpose in the condition they're in." HHFDC’s representative (Mina Kani) said bulk purchases and warehousing "could" reduce construction costs and that HHFDC plans to explore alternative construction methods and run a pilot later in the year.

Construction and trade groups supported the resolution. "We stand in strong support," Sam Kim of the Hawaii Regional Council of Carpenters said, urging the working group to draw on industry expertise. Committee members pressed agencies on land-use constraints, revenue needs for harbor operations and what counts as the "highest and best use" of port lands.

The joint committees adopted HD1 language to require DOT and HHFDC to serve as co-chairs of the working group and added that one member will be appointed from Department of Hawaiian Home Lands or its designee. The joint motion was adopted by voice vote; the chair asked agencies to prepare findings and report recommendations to the legislature.

What happens next: Agencies will convene the working group, collect stakeholder input and prepare a report; committee staff indicated the resolution is expected to produce recommendations for the next legislative session.