Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs and Labor, to which was referred S.B. No. 825 entitled:

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to make deputy sheriffs and the Sheriff Division Administrator eligible for similar retirement benefits afforded to other law enforcement and safety personnel upon reaching twenty-five years of credited service, regardless of age.

Testimony in support of the measure was submitted by the Department of Public Safety and the Hawaii Government Employees Association.

Your Committees find that deputy sheriffs perform the same law enforcement and public safety functions that are assigned to police officers, firefighters, and other safety personnel, but are not afforded the same retirement benefits as these individuals. This measure seeks to establish parity among law enforcement personnel with respect to retirement benefits by applying the same retirement criteria to deputy sheriffs that is presently being used by other law enforcement personnel which would enable deputy sheriffs to retire after twenty-five years of credited service, regardless of age.

Your Committees have amended this measure by making technical, non-substantive amendments for purposes of clarity.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs and Labor that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 825, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 825, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.