HB971

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.B. NO.	971
TWENTY-FOURTH LEGISLATURE, 2007
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

SECTION 1. The legislature finds that according to the 2004 National Center for Education Statistics Indicators of School Crime and Safety Report, high school students were victims of approximately eighty-eight thousand violent crimes on their campuses. According to a 2001 Hawaii department of education report, approximately one hundred ninety students were victims of serious crimes at school or on their way to school. A peer counseling program employs conflict management and peer mediation to reduce campus violence.

The purpose of this Act is to provide peer counseling programs in each high school in the State.

SECTION 2. Chapter 302A, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by adding a new section to be appropriately designated and to read as follows:

"§302A- Peer counseling services; establishment in high schools. There shall be created a peer counseling program that shall offer peer counseling services in all high schools statewide. The program shall be designed to reduce campus violence by the use of conflict management and peer mediation. The board of education shall adopt rules in accordance with chapter 91 to implement the purposes of this section."

SECTION 3. There is appropriated out of the general revenues of the State of Hawaii the sum of $ , or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2007-2008, and the same sum, or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2008-2009, for the creation of a peer counseling program that provides peer counseling services in all high schools in the State.

The sums appropriated shall be expended by the department of education for the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 4. New statutory material is underscored.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect upon its approval except that section 3 shall take effect on July 1, 2007.

INTRODUCED BY:	_____________________________