Guest Post: A doppelgänger for corporate water theft.

Just when you think things can’t get worse, they do.  Welcome to “Gut and Replace”. Corporate water theft and HB1326 – and now HB1171.

Senator Donovan Dela Cruz Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee as if by magic, has created a second corporate water theft bill (SB1171 proposed SD2). Apparently Senator Dela Cruz is concerned that HB1326 might be killed or weakened by Senator Kai Kahele, Chair of the Water Land Committee. 

As insurance, the “Gut and Replace” technique is now in play.  This occurs when a Committee Chair (Senator Dela Cruz) takes a bill that previously had nothing to do with water diversion, then schedules a hearing (with only his committee), and “inserts the contents” of a new bill.  In this case, the inserted contents are essentially a new corporate water theft bill, much like the existing corporate water theft bill.