STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2178

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 2998

       S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2016

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committee on Housing, to which was referred S.B. No. 2998 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PUBLIC HOUSING,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate funds for the repair and maintenance of existing public housing stock in the State.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawaii Public Housing Authority and United Public Workers, AFSCME, Local 646.  Your Committee received comments on this measure from the Coordinator on Homelessness under the Office of the Governor.

     Your Committee finds that the Hawaii Public Housing Authority is the sole statewide public housing agency of the State.  The Authority's portfolio of eighty-five properties comprises 6,195 units that serve over 6,100 families or more than 20,000 individuals.  The Authority's aging housing stock continues to have an extensive capital need that is underfunded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.  Additional funding is needed to modernize, repair, and maintain many of the State's public housing units.

     Your Committee has amended this measure by specifying that the appropriation to the Hawaii Public Housing Authority be a lump sum appropriation to be used for plans, design, construction, equipment, and development for the renovation, improvement, upgrade, and development of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority's facilities statewide.

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Housing that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2998, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2998, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

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

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BREENE HARIMOTO, Chair