STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2785

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 2767

       S.D. 2

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2016

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred S.B. No. 2767, S.D. 1, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII,"

begs leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate funds for the University of Hawaii at Manoa to hire three psychologists and one case manager to improve students' mental health treatment and services.

     Your Committee received written comments in support of this measure from the University of Hawaii at Manoa, the Graduate Student Organization of the University of Hawaii at Manoa, the Office of the President of the Associated Students of the University of Hawaii, and fourteen individuals.

     Your Committee finds that university students often face complex challenges in their personal and academic lives, resulting in increased anxiety, stress, and destructive and harmful thoughts.  This measure will help alleviate the current heavy workload of therapists at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and increase the university's ability to reach out through proactive educational efforts.

     Your Committee requests that the University of Hawaii at Manoa provide subsequent standing committees with a cost estimate for establishing the positions and providing support that would be funded by this measure.

Your Committee has amended this measure by changing the effective date to July 1, 2050, to facilitate further discussion on the measure.

     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. 2767, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2767, S.D. 2.

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

________________________________

JILL N. TOKUDA, Chair