RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, Verizon Hawaii, Inc., formerly GTE Hawaiian Telephone Company Inc., is the largest telecommunications service provider in Hawaii, providing vital telephone, cellular phone, internet, facsimile, and digital as well as broadband-related services to Hawaii consumers and businesses on a daily basis; and

WHEREAS, Verizon Hawaii, Inc. is also one of the largest employers in Hawaii, employing over one thousand five hundred employees and generating millions of dollars in revenue annually; and

WHEREAS, Verizon Hawaii, Inc.’s parent company Verizon Communications, Inc. has agreed to sell Verizon Hawaii to The Carlyle Group, a Washington, D.C. based private equity firm; and

WHEREAS, the Verizon employees’ pension fund has been over-funded by $280,000,000 in excess of the amount the company is required by law to maintain; and

WHEREAS, Verizon Communications, Inc. has taken the position that the surplus funding of the pension plan will become the property of Verizon Communications, Inc. upon the completion of the sale of Verizon Hawaii, Inc. to The Carlyle Group; and

WHEREAS, the employees of Verizon Hawaii, Inc. will become employees of Hawaiian Telecommunications upon the completion of the sale of Verizon Hawaii, Inc. to The Carlyle Group; and

WHEREAS, these employees may suffer economic hardship from the removal of the $280,000,000 from the Verizon Hawaii, Inc. employees’ pension plan; and

WHEREAS, this removal of the surplus funds in the Verizon Hawaii, Inc. employees’ pension plan by Verizon Communications, Inc. may cause undue hardship for future pensioners; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-third Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2005, the Senate concurring, that the Legislature supports the transfer to Verizon Communications, Inc. of no more than fifty per cent of the total amount of the over-funding in the Verizon Hawaii, Inc. employees’ pension fund; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the President of Verizon Hawaii, Inc., the Chair of the Public Utilities Commission, the Chairs of the County Councils, and to each member of Hawaii’s Congressional Delegation.

Report Title:

Verizon Hawaii; Pension Plan Overfunding