STAND. COM. REP. NO. 297

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2005

RE: S.B. No. 1787

S.D. 1

 

 

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Higher Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 1787 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT MAKING APPROPRIATIONS TO ESTABLISH UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII WEST OAHU UNIVERSITY CENTER,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to appropriate funds to establish a University of Hawaii-West Oahu university center in Kapolei or Waianae.

Your Committee received testimony in support of the measure from the University of Hawaii-West Oahu.

Your Committee finds that university centers were established to provide access to higher education services in geographic areas without baccalaureate-granting campuses. Any of the ten campuses in the system can provide degree programs using the services provided by the respective center.

There is a good reason to consider an establishment of a University Center in western Oahu. Given the traffic congestion, any services that can be provided without requiring students to drive to the Manoa campus would be advantageous. Currently, Leeward Community College supports an education center in Waianae. The establishment of a university center in Kapolei that would be affiliated with University of Hawaii-West Oahu would be the first step in fulfilling the promise to deliver a full range of educational opportunities to the region.

Your Committee further finds that there is a need to establish university centers in communities that otherwise lack access to programs offered elsewhere in the University of Hawaii system. Your Committee further finds that a university center, either in Kapolei or Waianae, would provide students with educational opportunities that they would not be able to attain because they do not have the means or the transportation to attend the Pearl City or the Manoa campus.

Your Committee has amended this measure by making an appropriation of funds of $1.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Higher Education that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1787, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1787, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Higher Education,

____________________________

CLAYTON HEE, Chair