Report Title:

Substance Abuse Treatment Facility; CIP

Description:

Authorizes the issuance of GO bonds for a capital improvement project for a substance abuse facility

THE SENATE

S.B. NO.

2445

TWENTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2004

 

STATE OF HAWAII

 


 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

Authorizing the issuance of general obligation bonds and making an appropriation for a new substance abuse treatment facility.

 

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

SECTION 1. The legislature finds that the types of drugs abused have changed significantly since 1991. In 1991, seventy-five per cent of a sample of inmates admitted drug use and that the most widely used drugs were thirty-nine per cent alcohol, thirteen per cent marijuana, and eleven per cent cocaine. Today, designer and synthetic drugs have become popular because of its relatively low cost and availability. One of the most well-known drugs is crystal methamphetamines (ice).

Ice use has increased to epidemic proportions here in Hawaii, and the number of inmate addictions is proportionate. Reportedly, ice use can cause significant reversible brain damage, but in a very small number of cases, the damage cannot be healed or reversed resulting in permanent mental disabilities, making ice a very dangerous drug.

As of October 2003, approximately two thousand six hundred ninety male inmates (fifty-four per cent) and three hundred forty-seven female inmates (fifty-two per cent) were identified as being in need of substance abuse treatment. Currently, there are two hundred thirty level three male beds and fifty female beds dedicated for treatment. There are no treatment beds dedicated for level two facilities, but one hundred six male slots and thirty-eight female slots have been made available. Thus the system's total treatment capacity at any time is for four hundred twenty-four inmates, which is fourteen per cent of the three thousand thirty-seven inmates were identified in 2003 as needing substance abuse treatment.

The purpose of this Act is to authorize general obligation bonds for the designing, constructing, and equipping a new substance abuse treatment facility.

SECTION 2. The director of finance is authorized to issue general obligation bonds in the sum of $          , and the same sum, or so much thereof as may be necessary, is appropriated for fiscal year 2004-2005, for the planning, designing, and constructing of a substance abuse treatment facility.

SECTION 3. The appropriation made for the capital improvement project authorized by this Act shall not lapse at the end of the fiscal biennium for which the appropriation is made; provided that all moneys from the appropriation unencumbered as of June 30, 2006, shall lapse as of that date.

SECTION 4. The sum appropriated for the capital improvement projects set forth in section 1 shall be expended by the department of accounting and general services for the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2004.

INTRODUCED BY:

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