STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2202

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: S.B. No. 2746

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Ninth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2018

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Labor and Judiciary, to which was referred S.B. No. 2746 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO INCOME WITHHOLDING FOR CHILD SUPPORT,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to impose a fine against any employer who discharges from employment, refuses to employ, or takes disciplinary action against any noncustodial parent subject to income withholding, or who fails to comply with an order of assignment of future income.

Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of the Attorney General.

Your Committees find that under federal law, each state must have laws in effect that require the imposition of a fine against any employer who:

(1) Discharges from employment, refuses to employ, or takes disciplinary action against any noncustodial parent subject to income withholding; or

(2) Fails to withhold support from income or pay the amounts to a child support agency.

Your Committees further find that compliance with this requirement is necessary to maintain the Department of Human Services' eligibility for federal welfare funding and federal funding of child support enforcement programs. Your Committees also find that amending the income withholding requirements increases the effectiveness of the income withholding process and protects the obligor parent from employment discrimination due to the income withholding order.

Your Committees have amended this measure by:

(1) Inserting missing statutory language; and

(2) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Labor and Judiciary that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2746, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2746, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Labor and Judiciary,

________________________________ BRIAN T. TANIGUCHI, Chair

________________________________ JILL N. TOKUDA, Chair