STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2526

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 814

       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 Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 814 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EDUCATION,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to require the Board of Education to name the new high school in Kihei, Maui, in honor of the late United States Representative Patsy Takemoto Mink.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawaii State Commission on the Status of Women, Patsy T. Mink Political Action Committee, YWCA O‘ahu, United Public Workers, Hawai‘i Friends of Civil Rights, and five individuals.  Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from two individuals.

     Your Committee finds that the late United States Representative Patsy Takemoto Mink was a strong and unwavering supporter of women's rights.  She was born and raised on Maui, and went on to serve the people of Hawaii in various capacities over a political career that spanned more than three decades.  The legacy of her leadership includes the Title IX amendment to the Higher Education Act, which prohibits gender discrimination in federally funded institutions.  Your Committee finds that, in light of Representative Mink's profound impact on the educational futures of countless young women, naming a school in her honor is an especially appropriate monument to her legacy.

     Your Committee has amended this measure by changing the proposed name of the school to the "Patsy Takemoto Mink Kihei High School".

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Education that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 814, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 814, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

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

________________________________

MICHELLE N. KIDANI, Chair