STAND. COM. REP. NO. 27-06

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2006

RE: H.B. No. 2375

 

 

 

Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2006

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Health and Human Services, to which was referred H.B. No. 2375 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT MAKING AN EMERGENCY APPROPRIATION TO THE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH FOR THE DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITIES DIVISION,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this bill is to appropriate additional funds to the State's Medicaid home- and community-based services for the developmentally disabled or mentally retarded program within the Department of Health (DOH) to meet an existing critical funding emergency.

The Department of the Attorney General, DOH, State Council on Developmental Disabilities, Arc of Kona, and Hawaii Disability Rights Center submitted testimony in support of this bill.

DOH reported that additional funds are necessary to support current clients and to reasonably admit individuals into the program to comply with previous court settlement agreements, the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Olmstead v. Zimring, and the mandate of Chapter 333F, Hawaii Revised Statutes, to support people with developmental disabilities by providing community-based services.

 

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Human Services that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2375 and recommend that it pass Second Reading and be referred to the Committee on Finance.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Health and Human Services,

 

____________________________

ALEX M. SONSON, Chair

____________________________

DENNIS A. ARAKAKI, Chair