STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2585

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 2240

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2016

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 2240 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT MAKING AN APPROPRIATION TO THE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH TO REESTABLISH A VECTOR CONTROL BRANCH,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate moneys for the Department of Health to reestablish a Vector Control Branch and hire more full-time employees for vector control.

 

     Your Committee received written comments in support of this measure from the Department of Health, State of Hawaii Department of Defense, Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, Kohala Coast Resort Association, and Hawaii Farm Bureau. 

 

     Your Committee finds that, in 2009, cost-cutting measures eliminated the Department of Health's Vector Control Branch and various positions that were responsible for controlling disease vectors such as mosquitoes and rats.  Your Committee further finds that the current outbreak of dengue fever on the Island of Hawaii necessitates an appropriation to the Department of Health to reestablish the Vector Control Branch and hire vector control employees to combat this threat.

 

     In its testimony, the Department of Health has indicated that reestablishing the Department of Health Vector Control Branch would require the hiring of thirty-four full-time employees at a cost of $2,600,000.  Your Committee will consider appropriating funds for these purposes in the state budget.  However, your Committee notes that the hiring of thirty-four full-time employees at one time may prove problematic.  Accordingly, your Committee recommends that the Department of Health consider a more realistic implementation plan that establishes employee positions within the Vector Control Branch in phases.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by providing for the hiring of an unspecified number of full-time equivalent vector control positions.

 

     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. 2240, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2240, S.D. 1.

 

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

 

 

 

________________________________

JILL N. TOKUDA, Chair