STAND. COM. REP. NO. 848

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 1175

       S.D. 2

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 1175, S.D. 1, entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE HAWAII STATE HOSPITAL,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to improve workplace safety and human resources management at the Hawaii State Hospital.

 

     Specifically, this measure:

 

(1)  Requires the Department of Health and the Hawaii State Hospital to consider the recommendations of the Senate Special Investigative Committee established pursuant to S.R. No. 3 (Regular Session of 2014);

 

(2)  Require the Department of Health and the Hawaii State Hospital to submit written reports to the Legislature on the implementation of those recommendations; and

 

(3)  Appropriates funds to the Department of Health for the planning and design of a state forensic mental health hospital.

 

     Your Committee received written comments in support of this measure from the Department of Health.  Written comments in opposition to this measure were received from one individual.  Written comments on this measure were received from the Hawaii Disability Rights Center.

 

     Your Committee finds that the Hawaii State Hospital, which was intended to be a treatment hospital for individuals with mental illnesses has instead become a de facto forensic facility that is not equipped to serve as a forensic facility and lacks the capacity to serve as a treatment hospital.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by:

 

(1)  Clarifying the purpose section to accurately reflect the operative provisions in the measure regarding the reports to the Legislature; and

 

(2)  Deleting the provisions authorizing the issuance of general obligation bonds for a forensic mental health hospital, with the intent that funding for the capital improvement projects to the Hawaii State Hospital be considered for inclusion in the General Appropriations Act of 2015.

 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Ways and Means that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1175, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1175, S.D. 2.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Ways and Means,

 

 

 

________________________________

JILL N. TOKUDA, Chair