STAND. COM. REP. NO. 168

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 996

       S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2017

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 996 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EMPLOYMENT PRACTICES,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to create an exception for corrections agencies to subject employees or prospective employees to a lie detector test.

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Public Safety and one individual.

Your Committee finds that the hiring of high-quality employees by the Department of Public Safety, particularly in corrections agencies, is vital to protecting the health, safety, and welfare of the public.  One way to increase the quality of employees is through the administration of lie detector tests to employees or prospective employees.  Accordingly, this measure creates an exception for corrections agencies, thereby allowing them to, among other things, require employees or prospective employees to submit to a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment and to further allow corrections agencies to terminate or discriminate against employees or prospective employees who refuse to submit to a lie detector test.

     Your Committee has amended this measure by making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 996, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 996, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committees on Judiciary and Labor and Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs,

________________________________

CLARENCE K. NISHIHARA, Chair