STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2481

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 2841

       S.D. 1

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2014

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 2841 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INTERIM ASSISTANCE REIMBURSEMENT SPECIAL FUND,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish an Interim Assistance Reimbursement Special Fund, into which interim assistance reimbursements from the federal Social Security Administration shall be deposited for reimbursements for state-funded financial assistance payments for recipients who are retroactively approved for federal Supplemental Security Income.  

     Your Committee received written comments in support of this measure from the Department of Human Services.

     Your Committee finds that section 346-57, Hawaii Revised Statutes, authorizes the Department of Human Services to make loans to applicants of federal Supplemental Security Income.  If Supplemental Security Income is approved, the federal Social Security Administration retroactively reimburses the Department for the state-funded assistance provided.  Your Committee also finds that it may take several months or years before a determination of Supplemental Security Income may be made.  As a result, the Department often does not receive interim assistance reimbursements from the Social Security Administration for state-funded benefits paid to social security income applicants during the same fiscal year in which the benefits are paid.  Because the Department is not allowed to retain interim assistance reimbursements received for a prior fiscal year, a significant amount of the interim assistance reimbursements received by the Department lapses into the general fund.  The lapsing of these reimbursements has led to an underfunding of state-funded financial assistance programs.  Your Committee further finds that this measure would ensure state-funded financial assistance programs remain more adequately funded, by utilizing moneys that would otherwise lapse into the general fund.

     Your Committee has amended this measure by:

     (1)  Changing the effective date to July 1, 2050, to facilitate further discussion on the measure; and

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

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Ways and Means that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2841, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2841, S.D. 1.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Ways and Means,

____________________________

DAVID Y. IGE, Chair