STAND. COM. REP. NO. 3264

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE: H.B. No. 1946

H.D. 2

S.D. 1

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Thirty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2024

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Government Operations, to which was referred H.B. No. 1946, H.D. 2, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO PROCESS IMPROVEMENT,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose and intent of this measure is to:

(1) Establish a three-year pilot program within the Office of the Governor for an Office of Process Improvement to conduct process and efficiency evaluations of various state offices and agencies and make recommendations for process improvement, beginning with the hiring practices of the Department of Human Services;

(2) Require the Office of the Governor to submit a report to the Legislature no later than twenty days before the Regular Session of 2027; and

(3) Appropriate an unspecified amount of funds to the Office of the Governor for the establishment and operation of the Office of Process Improvement Pilot Program, including the hiring of an unspecified number of full-time equivalent positions.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Health.

Your Committee finds that there is a significant number of public positions that are vacant within the State. Your Committee believes that evaluating existing processes, including hiring practices, of state offices and agencies is the first step to improving the efficiency of these offices and agencies to better serve the public. According to testimony received by your Committee, allowing departments to pilot innovative hiring practices while adhering to merit principles can help create a learning organization culture and may augment a centralized process improvement effort. This measure will allow the Legislature to make an informed decision on implementing policies to improve the efficiency of existing processes to better serve the public.

Accordingly, your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Placing the three-year pilot program within the Department of Health, instead of the Office of the Governor;

(2) Narrowing the scope of the pilot program to focus on hiring process improvement that innovates with efficiencies intended to streamline and shorten the hiring process and to make recommendations; and

(3) Adding provisions that require the hiring process improvement pilot program to:

(A) Recruit, both internally and externally, for classifications within the Department, including external recruitment postings;

(B) Conduct interviews and rank-order the applicants; and

(C) Send the selected candidates to the Department of Health's Human Resources Office for further review;

(4) Requiring the Department of Health, rather than the Office of the Governor, to submit a report to the Legislature before the Regular Session of 2027;

(5) Inserting an effective date of July 1, 2491, to encourage further discussion; and

(6) 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 Government Operations that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1946, H.D. 2, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1946, H.D. 2, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Government Operations,

________________________________

ANGUS L.K. MCKELVEY, Chair