STAND. COM. REP. NO.545

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2001

RE: S.B. No. 957

S.D. 1

 

 

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2001

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Health and Human Services and Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 957 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO STUDENT SUPPORT SERVICES,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure, as received, is to transfer responsibility for all planning, programming, and budgeting decisions concerning members of the plaintiff class in the Felix vs. Cayetano from the Department of Health and the Department of Education, beginning July 1, 2001.

Testimony in opposition to this measure was submitted by the Department of the Attorney General and the Hawaii Government Employees Association.

Your Committees find that there was no support for the current measure as drafted. However, your Committees are using this measure as a vehicle to focus on a venue of services to various age groups. Your Committees find that the Comprehensive Student Support System is a vital component to the early identification of special needs students and the delivery of appropriate services. Prevention is key and intervention is the tool that should be used.

Your Committees have amended this measure by replacing its contents and inserting language to require the Department of Education to develop the Comprehensive Student Support System to include:

(1) Strategies to increase prevention and intervention at levels one, two, and three;

(2) A full matrix of services which identity all available community and state resources;

(3) A full matrix of providers;

(4) The Hawaii Child and Adolescent System Service Principles;

(5) Mental health services for students not deemed eligible for the Felix Class; and

(6) Interventions to correct present systemic problems that interfere with the smooth delivery of comprehensive student support services.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Human Services and Education that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 957, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 957, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

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

____________________________

NORMAN SAKAMOTO, Chair

____________________________

DAVID MATSUURA, Chair