STAND. COM. REP. NO.  345

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                , 2011

 

RE:   H.B. No. 169

      H.D. 1

 

 

 

 

Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Sixth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2011

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committees on Labor & Public Employment and Economic Revitalization & Business, to which was referred H.B. No. 169 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EMPLOYMENT SECURITY,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose of this bill is to establish an optional total unemployment rate trigger.

 

     Your Committees recognize the effects of Hawaii's unemployment rate, currently at 6.4 percent, on individuals' lost incomes, their purchasing power, and economic growth.  Your Committees note that the optional total unemployment rate trigger would extend the benefit period if 100 percent federal sharing is available, to those unemployed.

 

     Hawaii State AFL-CIO, ILWU Local 142, and the Hawaii Government Employees Association testified in support of this measure.  The Department of Labor and Industrial Relations testified in support of the intent of this measure.

 

     Your Committees have amended this bill by:

 

     (1)  Appropriating $145,000 for fiscal year 2011-2012 to create an automated extended benefit claims system;

 

(2)  Changing its effective date to January 1, 2012; and

 

     (3)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for clarity   and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Labor & Public Employment and Economic Revitalization & Business that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 169, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 169, H.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Finance.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Labor & Public Employment and Economic Revitalization & Business,

 

 

____________________________

ANGUS L.K. MCKELVEY, Chair

 

____________________________

KARL RHOADS, Chair