Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2002

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Labor, to which was referred S.B. No. 2111 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to amend collective bargaining laws to enable parties to agree that non-cost items may become effective prior to legislative approval of cost items.

Testimony in support of the measure was received from the University of Hawaii Professional Assembly and the Hawaii Government Employees Association. The Office of Collective Bargaining submitted concerns over the fragmenting of a collective bargaining agreement's implementation.

The measure also moves provisions that establish when the provisions of a collective bargaining agreement take precedence over civil service laws and employer policies from section 89-10, Hawaii Revised Statutes (HRS), relating to written agreements, enforceability, and cost items, to section 89-19, HRS, relating to when Chapter 89, HRS, takes precedence.

Your Committee finds that the measure may facilitate the parties' ability to bargain cost and non-cost items more freely and openly.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Labor that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2111 and recommends that it pass Second Reading and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.