Report Title:

Multi-track funding

Description:

Provides funding to implement multi-tracking at Kapolei Elementary and Middle schools.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

H.B. NO.

2695

TWENTY-FIRST LEGISLATURE, 2002

 

STATE OF HAWAII

 


 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

RELATING TO MAKING AN APPROPRIATION TO FUND CONVERSION TO MULTI-TRACKING AT KAPOLEI ELEMENTARY AND MIDDLE SCHOOLS.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. The legislature finds that from its inception, Kapolei Elementary and Middle schools were envisioned and constructed to be multi-track schools. The legislature also finds that the Department of Education supported and publicized the fact that both Kapolei Elementary and Middle schools were to be multi-track schools. Teachers and staff spent the past three years planning and attending training sessions and coordinating with parents to prepare for the conversion to multitracking. Tracks for students at both schools were assigned for the coming year, allowing families to plan and schedule the rest of their lives. The legislature also finds that the funding to implement the multi-track system at Kapolei Elementary and Middle school was requested by the department of education.

The lack of funding also represents a situation requiring near immediate funding as the multi-track session is set to begin in July. Without funding for multi-track, both schools will need to alleviate their overcrowding through the use of portables. It takes anywhere from one to two years to place a portable at a school and currently costs $110,000 to install and construct a single portable. Together, both schools would require a total of seventeen portables in order to alleviate the overcrowded conditions. Seventeen student filled non-air-conditioned portables on the sweltering Ewa plain, however, would not provide as conducive a learning environment as is already in place if multi-tracking were funded. The cost of the portables would total $1,877,000, or roughly a million dollars more than the appropriation requested.

The situation at Kapolei Middle school is especially dire. Classes are already held in the cafeteria, storerooms, teachers' workrooms, on the stage, and any other available space, according to the administration. The cafeteria cannot hold the current student population and lunch is held in three separate lunch periods in order to accommodate the entire student body. With new enrollment set to swell the student population to 1564 this July, a fourth lunch period would need to be implemented in order to accommodate the student body, which would require extending the school day beyond the time period allowed in current contracts. The school was designed for only 1200 students.

The purpose of this Act is to restore the funding to implement multi-tracking at Kapolei Elementary and Middle schools and avert the numerous problems that would arise from a lack of funding.

SECTION 2. There is appropriated out of the general revenues of the State of Hawaii the sum of $382,513, or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2002-2003, for the purpose of implementing multitracking at Kapolei Elementary School.

SECTION 3. There is appropriated out of the general revenues of the State of Hawaii the sum of $420,089, or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2002-2003, for the purpose of implementing multitracking at Kapolei Middle School.

SECTION 4. The sum appropriated shall be expended by the department of education for the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2002.

 

 

INTRODUCED BY:

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