Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2003

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred H.B. No. 735, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to make an appropriation for sexual assault services.

Your Committee finds that sexual assault is a crime of violence and that its incidence has risen since 2000. An average of 1.4 victims report a sexual assault each day, and, as the Attorney General estimates that less than thirty per cent of sexual assaults are reported, the real number of assaults is closer to 4.5 per day, or over thirty-one per week, one hundred and thirty-five per month, and sixteen hundred per year. These are sobering statistics.

The community and the government have banded together to provide a spectrum of sexual assault services, which include crisis intervention, medical and legal examinations, clinical and legal systems advocacy, targeted prevention and education efforts in schools, research, and training. Your Committee finds that over half of the funding for these services comes from the Department of Health, and that this funding dropped thirty-two per cent between 1992 and 1996 and has remained the same since then, while the cost of and demand for these services has increased substantially. Your Committee also finds that an additional appropriation for sexual assault services is necessary to protect the health and welfare of our citizens.

Your Committee has made the amount of the appropriation blank and has changed the effective date to July 1, 2050, for the purpose of continued discussion.

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 H.B. No. 735, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 735, H.D. 1, S.D. 2.