Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-First State Legislature

Third Special Session of 2001

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Finance, to which was referred S.B. No. 3 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this bill is to create a temporary program that provides up to 13 additional weeks of unemployment insurance benefits to persons who became unemployed on or after September 11, 2001.

Your Committee notes that S.B. No. 3 is a companion measure to H.B. No. 3, which your Committee reported out earlier in an unamended form, and that the contents of these bills are identical. On October 23, 2001, both the Senate and the House held an extensive public hearing on S.B. No. 3 and H.B. No. 3, at which time many citizens and organizations testified on these measures.

This measure will provide immediate and needed support to families whose wage earners were displaced from their jobs by the slowdown in tourism, and whose attempts to seek suitable work are frustrated by the depressed economy.

However, your Committee would like to emphasize that should this measure cause a conflict between state and federal law that would result in the loss of federal aid or assistance for Hawaii's unemployed, federal law shall supercede state law.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Finance that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 3 and recommends that it pass Second Reading and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.