REPORT TITLE: 
Government


DESCRIPTION:
Establishes the types of programs or projects, and the procedure
by which the programs or projects, may be privatized by the
state or county government, including services, by grants,
subsidies, and purchases of services pursuant to chapters 42D,
42F, and 103F, and incidental to purchases of goods and
construction of facilities awarded under chapters 103 and 103D,
which have been customarily allowed in the past and currently
existing.  Provides that services previously contracted under
law, charter or ordinance, or under chapters 42D, 42F, and 103F,
and chapters 103 and 103D may be certified if the contract were
executed in good faith and would have been qualified and
authorized under this Act.  Specifies that nothing shall be
construed as limiting the authority of the State to contract
with private providers to obtain services historically performed
by persons or positions in the civil service, or functionally
attributed to a government agency or program, including
contracts.


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                        2323
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES                H.B. NO.           
TWENTIETH LEGISLATURE, 2000                                
STATE OF HAWAII                                            
                                                             
________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________


                     A BILL FOR AN ACT

RELATING TO GOVERNMENT.



BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

 1      SECTION 1.  The State and its counties have looked to the
 
 2 private sector to ensure that public services are available to
 
 3 meet the needs of Hawaii's citizens.
 
 4      The culture of the State is one of cooperation, with a long-
 
 5 standing history of reliance on public-private partnerships to
 
 6 provide public services.  The State has appreciated the benefits
 
 7 of economies of scale, and has used resources that are owned, or
 
 8 that have been developed by the private sector, to achieve
 
 9 savings and the long-term good.  When time and need suggested
 
10 that opportunities would be missed or that expenses that might be
 
11 avoided or minimized would be incurred, the State has used
 
12 services and expertise already available in the private sector
 
13 rather than "begin from scratch."  When expertise or technology
 
14 was already available in the private sector, the State has taken
 
15 a hard look at whether it was more economical to "reinvent" or
 
16 "duplicate the wheel" or to use "theirs" instead.  When the
 
17 private sector was willing to "experiment" at their risk,
 
18 particularly for new capital intense services, the State asked
 
19 whether existing dollars might be more effectively spent on
 
20 making basic services available to more citizens.  Finally,
 

 
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 1 because most of the State's contracts are competitively let, the
 
 2 State has enjoyed the benefit of lower prices or costs that
 
 3 competition engendered.
 
 4      For more than a quarter of a century, through laws like
 
 5 chapter 42D (grants, subsidies, and purchases of services),
 
 6 chapter 42F (grants and subsidies), and chapter 103F (purchases
 
 7 of health and human services), Hawaii Revised Statutes, the State
 
 8 and the counties have looked to private profit and non-profit
 
 9 organizations and their respective staffs to deliver culture and
 
10 arts, and educational, health, recreational, nutritional,
 
11 transportation, and social services, on the State's behalf, to
 
12 members of the general public.
 
13      State and county public works, including repairs and
 
14 maintenance, have always been designed and constructed through
 
15 contracts with private professionals, artisans, and craftsmen,
 
16 pursuant to the procurement laws.
 
17      The legislature has authorized contracts for services from
 
18 the private sector.  The State's school transportation law
 
19 (sections 302A-406 and 302A-407, Hawaii Revised Statutes), takes
 
20 as a given that school bus transportation will be arranged and
 
21 provided by the department of education through contracts with
 
22 private providers.  Similarly, without reference to the civil
 
23 service laws, the legislature has provided that the counties may
 

 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1 establish and maintain volunteer fire stations, subject to the
 
 2 full authority and control of each county's fire chief but
 
 3 staffed by uncompensated volunteers.  In like fashion, the
 
 4 State's corrections system is authorized by statute to contract
 
 5 with public or private correctional facilities in other states to
 
 6 alleviate overcrowding by housing and delivering appropriate
 
 7 correctional services to Hawaii's inmate population.  Other
 
 8 examples of statutes enacted by the legislature that directly or
 
 9 indirectly rely upon these public-private partnerships to respond
 
10 to the needs of the State's citizenry include:
 
11      (1)  Concession for services at the airports;
 
12      (2)  Contracts for minor repairs and maintenance of school
 
13           facilities;
 
14      (3)  Contracts to acquire school facilities on terms deemed
 
15           appropriate by the department of education and
 
16           department of accounting and general services;
 
17      (4)  Authorization for school/community-based management
 
18           schools to clean classrooms;
 
19      (5)  The State's affordable housing projects;
 
20      (6)  Federally assisted rental housing projects;
 
21      (7)  Business and economic development programs;
 
22      (8)  Developer constructed schools; and
 
23      (9)  Commercial developments like the Aloha Tower
 
24           Marketplace.
 

 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1      This historical backdrop of reliance on public-private
 
 2 partnerships to provide needed services to the public,
 
 3 notwithstanding the State's long-standing and continuous policy
 
 4 to provide public services through a strong and viable civil
 
 5 service complemented by a vigilant collective bargaining system,
 
 6 must also be reaffirmed.
 
 7      The Supreme Court's recent decision in the consolidated
 
 8 cases Konno v. County of Hawaii, S. Ct. No. 18203, and UPW v.
 
 9 Yamashiro, S. Ct. No. 18236 (2/28/97), has "emphasize(d) that
 
10 nothing in this opinion should be interpreted as passing
 
11 judgment, one way or the other, on the wisdom of privatization,"
 
12 and acknowledged that "(w)hether or not, as a policy matter,
 
13 private entities should be allowed to provide public services
 
14 entails a judgment ordinarily consigned to the legislature(,)".
 
15 Noting that "the civil service encompasses those services that
 
16 have been customarily and historically provided by civil
 
17 servants," the court concluded absent legislative authority to
 
18 obtain services from other sources, civil servants must provide
 
19 these services.
 
20      The scope of "public service" in the context of the civil
 
21 service laws that the State is required to provide is now in
 
22 question because of the Konno decision.  On one hand, proponents
 

 
 
 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1 for privatization of public services argue that if privatization
 
 2 improves efficiency and reduces the cost of government for the
 
 3 public good, then public service should not be a restraint on
 
 4 privatization.
 
 5      On the other hand, opponents of privatization of public
 
 6 services argue that privatization is nothing more than a
 
 7 management strategy designed to cut labor costs by circumventing
 
 8 the rights of public employees, and that a consequence of
 
 9 privatization is that it substitutes private employees for public
 
10 employees when it is cheaper to use private employees.
 
11      This Act recognizes that the legislature has specifically
 
12 established programs or projects that can be privatized, and that
 
13 many services, by grants, subsidies, and purchases of services
 
14 pursuant to chapters 42D, 42F, and 103F, and incidental to
 
15 purchases of goods, real property, and construction of facilities
 
16 awarded pursuant to chapters 103 and 103D or any other law,
 
17 charter, or ordinance  have been customarily allowed in the past
 
18 and are currently existing.  This Act specifically provides that
 
19 those services that are found to have been contracted out
 
20 pursuant to law, charter, or ordinance, or previously by custom
 
21 and practice pursuant to chapters 42D, 42F, and 103F, or
 
22 temporary and incidental to the purchase of goods and
 
23 construction of facilities pursuant to chapters 103 and 103D, may
 

 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1 be certified if the contract was executed in good faith and would
 
 2 have been qualified and authorized pursuant to this Act.
 
 3      The purpose of this Act is to establish a reasonable balance
 
 4 to accommodate the purposes of privatization without undermining
 
 5 basic merit principles and the policies of civil service.
 
 6      SECTION 2.  Chapter 103, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended
 
 7 by adding a new section to be appropriately designated and to
 
 8 read as follows:
 
 9      "§103-    Contract with private provider for services.
 
10 (a)  Nothing in chapters 76 and 77, and section 46-33, including
 
11 the merit principles, the classification system, or historical
 
12 past practices, shall be deemed to prevent, restrict, diminish,
 
13 condition, limit, or otherwise qualify the authority of a
 
14 department or agency of the State or a county to enter into a
 
15 contract with a private provider to obtain services historically
 
16 performed by persons or positions in the civil service, or
 
17 functionally attributed to a government agency or program,
 
18 including contracts:
 
19      (1)  To disburse appropriations for grants, subsidies, or
 
20           purchases of service as those terms are defined in
 
21           chapters 42D, 42F, and 103F, pursuant to chapters 42D,
 
22           42F, or 103F or any other law, charter, or ordinance
 
23           authorizing grants, subsidies, or purchases of service,
 

 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1           as those terms are defined in chapters 42D, 42F, and
 
 2           103F;
 
 3      (2)  For goods and real property or for construction entered
 
 4           into pursuant to this chapter or chapters 103D or 107,
 
 5           or any other law, charter, or ordinance where services
 
 6           are provided incidentally to the acquisition of the
 
 7           goods or real property, or for construction;
 
 8      (3)  For services which the department or agency is
 
 9           otherwise authorized by statute, charter, or ordinance
 
10           to obtain or provide without regard to the provisions
 
11           of chapter 76 or 77, or section 46-33.
 
12      (b)  Nothing in this section shall be construed as limiting
 
13 the authority of the State to contract with private providers to
 
14 obtain services historically performed by persons or positions in
 
15 the civil service, or functionally attributed to a government
 
16 agency or program, including contracts."
 
17      SECTION 3.  A department or agency of the State or a county
 
18 may certify that the services obtained from a current or prior
 
19 contract were obtained in good faith, prior to the effective date
 
20 of this Act, under one or more of the circumstances specified in
 
21 the amendment to chapter 103, Hawaii Revised Statutes, made in
 
22 section 2 of this Act.
 
23      SECTION 4.  New statutory material is underscored.
 

 
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                                     H.B. NO.           
                                                        
                                                        

 
 1      SECTION 5.  This Act shall take effect upon its approval.
 
 2 
 
 3                           INTRODUCED BY:_________________________