STAND. COM. REP. NO.  459-08

Honolulu, Hawaii

                , 2008

RE:   H.B. No. 2888

      H.D. 1

Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Fourth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2008

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committee on Health, to which was referred H.B. No. 2888 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO MEDICAL SERVICES,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose of this bill is to appropriate funds for a mobile medical van to serve South Kona, Kau, and upper Puna on the island of Hawaii.

     Specifically, this bill appropriates $500,000 for the purchase of a mobile medical van, including necessary planning and equipment to provide medical care services to be expended by Kona Community Hospital; provided that no funds shall be expended until an agreement has been established with an appropriate funding agency to provide additional funding to continue the mobile medical van program for at least two more years.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of the bill from Kona Community Hospital.

     Upon further consideration, your Committee has amended this bill by incorporating the contents of the following bills as parts I and II, and parts IV through VII:

     (1)  Part I:  House Bill No. 2789 (2008), part I, and House Bill No. 2382 (2008):  appropriating $1 for twenty-four-hour advanced life support ambulance service for the Haiku district on the island of Maui;

     (2)  Part II:  House Bill No. 2789 (2008), part II:  appropriating an unspecified amount for twenty-four-hour advanced life support ambulance service for the island of Molokai;

     (3)  Part IV:  House Bill No. 2924 (2008):  appropriating $2,500,000 for the Waianae Coast Comprehensive Health Center for plans, design, and construction for phase II of an expansion and renovation of the Center's facilities;

     (4)  Part V:  House Bill No. 3274 (2008):  appropriating $450,000 for outpatient urgent and extended emergency medical care in West Maui;

     (5)  Part VI:  House Bill No. 3347 (2008):  appropriating $10,000,000 to The Queen's Medical Center to increase its emergency power generator system to ensure continued operation of its hospital and trauma center in event of a disaster; and

     (6)  Part VII:  House Bill No. 2542 (2008):  appropriating an unspecified amount for the first year of a three-year family practice residency program based at Kona Community Hospital.

     Your Committee has further amended this bill by changing the amount appropriated to an unspecified amount in part VII (House Bill No. 2542 (2008)) and by changing the expending agency from Kona Community Hospital to the Hawaii Health Systems Corporation in part III (House Bill No. 2888 (2008)).

     Your Committee wishes to recognize that more than five hundred signatures were submitted in support of House Bill No. 2789 (2008) appropriating funds for ambulance services on the island of Molokai, now incorporated as part II of this amended bill.

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Health that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2888, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2888, H.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Finance.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Health,

____________________________

JOSHUA B. GREEN, M.D., Chair