STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2531
Honolulu, Hawaii
S.D. 1
President of the Senate
State of Hawaii
Sir:
Your Committees on Housing and Human Services, to which was referred S.B. No. 2952 entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO HOUSING,"
beg leave to report as follows:
The purpose and intent of this measure is to assist low-income housing renters in the state by appropriating funds for the state rent supplement program.
Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Governor's Coordinator on Homelessness, Hawaii Public Housing Authority, Partners in Care, Catholic Charities Hawai‘i, and two individuals.
Your Committees find that Hawaii has the highest per capita rate of homelessness of any state in the nation and the highest rate of chronically unsheltered homeless per capita of any state. Your Committees further find that the state rent supplement for homeless families and individuals is critically necessary to address homelessness. Your Committees further find that the state rent supplement program provides a "shallow", but sustained subsidy to struggling households. Unlike the "deep" subsidy housing choice voucher program, better known as the section 8 program, which helps families at the lowest ends of the income scale by bridging a wide affordability gap between income and housing costs, the state rent supplement program helps households who are closer to financial self-sufficiency but still have a narrow affordability gap to fill. The state rent supplement program provides an ongoing subsidy, enabling homeless households or those at imminent risk of homelessness to close the affordability gap, maintain housing, and achieve self—sufficiency. This measure appropriates funds to support the state rent supplement program. Your Committees note the testimony from both Partners in Care and Catholic Charities Hawai‘i, who both testified that given the expansion of this program, part of the appropriations should be spent on additional staffing. Your Committees further note the recommendation of Catholic Charities Hawaii, who notes that given the increasing number of homeless in Hawaii, that this appropriation be made a permanent increase in the base budget of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority for the state rent supplement program.
Therefore, your Committees have amended this measure by setting the appropriation amount of $5 million.
As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Housing and Human Services that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2952, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2952, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Housing and Human Services,
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________________________________ RUSSELL E. RUDERMAN, Chair |
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________________________________ STANLEY CHANG, Chair |
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