STAND. COM. REP. NO. 33-24

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2024

RE: H.B. No. 2402

H.D. 1

Honorable Scott K. Saiki

Speaker, House of Representatives

Thirty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2024

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Education, to which was referred H.B. No. 2402 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT MAKING AN EMERGENCY APPROPRIATION TO THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION FOR FOOD SERVICES,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to make an emergency appropriation to the Department of Education to cover the Department's food service operations.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Education; Hawaiʻi Primary Care Association; Hawaiʻi Children's Action Network Speaks!; and Hawaii Food Industry Association.

Your Committee finds that the Department of Education is required to provide meal service for its students and staff, with over twenty thousand school breakfasts and eighty thousand school lunches provided on a daily basis to students and staff across Hawaii. Your Committee further finds that the Department of Education has accumulated a deficit of over $20,000,000 for its food service operations, which is largely due to inflationary cost increases. Although students and staff must pay for their meals, Title I students are provided meals free of charge. Students are also not denied a meal due to a lack of payment, all of which has contributed to this accumulated deficit. Your Committee believes that making an emergency appropriation to the Department of Education will provide the resources needed to ensure continued school food service operations.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

(1) Changing the appropriation to an unspecified amount;

(2) Changing the effective date to July 1, 3000; and

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

Your Committee respectfully requests your Committee on Finance, should it deliberate on this measure, to consider an appropriation amount of $20,000,000.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Education that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2402, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2402, H.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Finance.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Education,

____________________________

JUSTIN H. WOODSON, Chair