STAND. COM. REP. NO. 947

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    H.B. No. 952

       H.D. 2

       S.D. 1

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committee on Judiciary and Labor, to which was referred H.B. No. 952, H.D. 2, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO WAGES AND HOURS ON PUBLIC WORKS LAW,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to provide that the name of a complainant in a prevailing wage claim be withheld from the employer unless prior permission to release the name is given by the complainant.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations and Hawaii Building and Construction Trades Council, AFL-CIO.  Your Committee received comments on this measure from the General Contractors Association of Hawaii.

     Your Committee finds that extending confidentiality to the complainant in a prevailing wage claim would encourage the timely reporting of alleged violations by lessening concerns over employer retribution.

     Your Committee further finds that a prevailing wage investigation generally requires a review of up to three years of payroll records.  Accordingly, your Committee has amended this measure by:

     (1)  Inserting language providing that a request by a laborer or mechanic to the Director of Labor and Industrial Relations to initiate a prevailing wage claim must be made within three years from the date the wages or overtime compensation was due and payable and by limiting the scope of the investigation to the three‑year period preceding the filing of the claim; and

     (2)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary and Labor that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 952, H.D. 2, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 952, H.D. 2, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Judiciary and Labor,

________________________________

GILBERT S.C. KEITH-AGARAN, Chair