STAND. COM. REP. NO. 317

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 1318

       S.D. 1

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committees on Human Services and Housing and Commerce and Consumer Protection, to which was referred S.B. No. 1318 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to amend the definition of "qualified community rehabilitation program" so that it no longer requires qualified community rehabilitation centers to pay employees who are persons with disabilities less than minimum wage.

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from one individual.

     Your Committees find that currently a qualified community rehabilitation center wanting to employ persons with disabilities must pay the employees less than minimum wage in order to obtain the required United States Department of Labor certificate.  Your Committees further find that there are organizations that want to pay workers with disabilities more than minimum wage but would be precluded from or lose designation as a qualified community rehabilitation program if they did so.

     Your Committees have amended this measure by inserting an effective date of July 1, 2050, to encourage further discussion.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Human Services and Housing and Commerce and Consumer Protection that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1318, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1318, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Judiciary and Labor.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Human Services and Housing and Commerce and Consumer Protection,

____________________________ ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair

____________________________ SUZANNE CHUN OAKLAND, Chair