STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2073

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 2841

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2014

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committee on Human Services, to which was referred S.B. No. 2841 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INTERIM ASSISTANCE REIMBURSEMENT SPECIAL FUND,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish the interim assistance reimbursement special fund into which interim assistance reimbursements received from the Social Security Administration will be deposited for repayment of state-funded financial assistance programs so that the Department of Human Services can expend the interim assistance reimbursement funds for state-funded financial assistance programs.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Human Services.

     Your Committee finds that, as a result of the length of time it takes for a determination of Supplemental Security Income to be made, the Department of Human Services does not receive interim assistance reimbursements from the Social Security Administration for state-funded benefits paid to social security income applicants during the same fiscal year in which the benefits are paid.  As a result, each year a significant amount of the interim assistance reimbursements received by the Department lapse into the general fund, and the Department is unable to use the funds for its state-funded financial assistance programs, which have been underfunded for many years.  When the state-funded assistance programs are underfunded, monthly benefits to families already living far below poverty levels are reduced, families are threatened with homelessness, and the Department is forced to request emergency appropriations.  This measure allows the state-funded financial assistance programs to remain more adequately funded with money that otherwise lapses into the general fund due to the timing of the Department's receipt of interim assistance reimbursements from the prior fiscal year.  The reimbursements will be deposited into the interim assistance reimbursement special fund and used by the Department for its state-funded financial assistance programs.

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Human Services that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2841 and recommends that it pass Second Reading and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Human Services,

____________________________

SUZANNE CHUN OAKLAND, Chair