SB698

THE SENATE	S.B. NO.	698
TWENTY-FOURTH LEGISLATURE, 2007
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

RELATING TO STATE EMPLOYEES.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. The legislature finds that the State of Hawaii has explored ways to offer its employees flexibility in their work schedules. In 1988, the State conducted the staggered work hours demonstration project, which was directed at reducing rush hour traffic by having employees report to work as late as 8:30 a.m. instead of 7:45 a.m. Approximately four thousand seven hundred state workers, 1,430 city workers, and eighteen private businesses participated in this successful demonstration project. Currently, some state agencies allow workers to report to work as early as 6:45 a.m. or as late as 9:00 a.m.

In 1989, the Hawaii state department of transportation served as the lead agency in the telework center demonstration project, a successful public private partnership designed to reduce traffic congestion by encouraging state, county, and private sector workers to work at a telework center located at the Mililani technology park. Workplace flexibility continues to be an attractive work schedule option, particularly since traffic congestion, especially on the island of Oahu, continues to increase every year. Accordingly, the legislature considers workplace flexibility a viable, low-cost option to mitigate traffic congestion.

Workplace flexibility includes telework, compressed work weeks, and adjusted work schedules, known as flextime. At the federal level, the prevalence of telework continues to grow, with over one hundred forty thousand eligible federal employees, nearly twenty per cent of the federal workforce, taking advantage of the opportunity to work from alternative worksites. States such as Arizona, Virginia, California, and Oregon have been successful at implementing policies to encourage workplace flexibility for their state employees. Additionally, studies have shown that workplace flexibility increases employee productivity and motivation, increases employee efficiency, reduces vehicular pollution, improves work-life balance, and reduces energy consumption.

The purpose of this Act is to establish a one year pilot workplace flexibility program for state employees.

SECTION 2. There is established the workplace flexibility program within the department of transportation, which shall serve as the lead agency in coordinating and implementing the program. The one-year pilot program shall offer state employees workplace flexibility options such as:

(1) Telework, where an employee works from home or another off site location closer to home;

(2) Compressed work weeks, which allow an employee to work a forty-hour week in four, ten-hour days or an eighty-hour week in nine days; and

(3) Flextime, which provides workers flexible start and end work times.

The department of transportation shall require at least four state agencies or departments participating in the program to have, at a minimum, ten per cent of its workforce participating in a workplace flexibility option during the course of the pilot program.

SECTION 3. The director of transportation shall submit a report to the legislature on the status of the workplace flexibility program, no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the regular session of 2009, which shall include but not be limited to the following information:

(1) Data on the agencies, departments, and employees that participate in the program;

(2) Data on the workplace flexibility options chosen by participating employees;

(3) Effect on employee productivity levels and employee morale;

(4) Estimates on the amount and cost of gasoline saved and transportation time saved by employees due to participation in the program; and

(5) Other findings, recommendations, including proposed legislation, if any, and pertinent information about the pilot program and its impact, consequences, or benefits on participating departments or agencies.

SECTION 4. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

INTRODUCED BY:	_____________________________