STAND. COM. REP. NO. 275-26

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2026

RE: H.B. No. 2273

H.D. 1

Honorable Nadine K. Nakamura

Speaker, House of Representatives

Thirty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2026

State of Hawaii

Madame:

Your Committee on Labor, to which was referred H.B. No. 2273 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT MAKING EMERGENCY APPROPRIATIONS FOR PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT COST ITEMS,"

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to make emergency appropriations for collective bargaining cost items for bargaining unit 14 and their excluded counterparts, including the cost of salary adjustments negotiated for fiscal biennium 2025–2027.

Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Budget and Finance and Hawaii Government Employees Association, AFSCME Local 152, AFL-CIO.

Your Committee finds that the State must provide additional funding to implement the collective bargaining agreement for bargaining unit 14 as negotiations concluded too late for all associated cost items to be incorporated into the 2025–2027 biennium budget. Certain executive departments do not currently have sufficient operating resources to absorb these salary adjustments and other negotiated public employment costs. This measure supplies the necessary appropriations to fulfill the State's obligations under the agreement and ensure continuity in public employment operations.

Your Committee has amended this measure by changing the effective date to July 1, 3000, to encourage further discussion.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Labor that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 2273, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 2273, H.D. 1, and be referred to your Committee on Finance.

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

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JACKSON D. SAYAMA, Chair