Uh members, any discussion? retail. They got the be company to use that money for fix their roads. I'm not going to tell them what for do. Hopefully they can figure it out. Any other question? Just checking here. Okay. I guess they heard what you guys said. So, any other discussion? Okay. Uh so, uh vice chair for the vote, please. Chair Dory, I I vote yes. Senator Fukunaga, I. Senator Kim. Hi. Senator Fabella. Hi. Chair, your recommendation is adopted. For PSM, same recommendation.
Any discussion? Chair. Uh, I'll be voting in support. However, with reservations, uh, with the reduction to the county. Um, I didn't see any OA county testimony, so I'd be curious to see what their position is, but to support the discussion going forward, I'll be in support with reservations. Thank you. Thank you. Similar concerns. I also like to more comfortable legislators weigh in. I know they're not on the panel. So right now yes. Okay. Chair's recommendations to pass SB 458 with amendments. Chair votes I. Vice chair votes I with reservation. Senator Fukunaga I. Senator Mckelby. Okay. Senator Awa. No. Mr. the chair. The measure passes with amendments for the committee on higher education. Same recommendation to pass Senate Bill 458 with amendments.
Any discussion members? Vice Chair resator. [Music] Thank you. Thanks. and meeting. Thank you. Uh thank you for your patience. We're finally convening the committee on public safety, intergovernmental, military affairs and our friends from the committee on education for one for a 302 agenda on this February 15th. We have one measure on this agenda that is Senate Bill 124 relating to the prohibition of firearms on school property. Our testifiers this we have Kurt Ouro with Department of Education. Hello, Chair Okai, Chair Kani, Vice Chair Leonte, and Vice Chair Kim, members of the committee. Keith Aayashi, superintendent, testifying on behalf of the Department of Education. The department stands on its written testimony in support of this measure. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. Thank you for saying all this time to say that. Todd Yukotake might be joining us via Zoom. Todd, there isn't on Zoom chair.
Okay, members, that's all I have for those indicating they'd like to testify. Is there anyone else in the room or in Zoom? Oh, yes. Did you turn it back? Good afternoon, chairs, committee. Again, I'm um Major Joseph Trindad of the Records and ID division of the home police department. Again, I'm responsible for firearms obction. The home police department supports Senate Bill 124 um relating to prohibition of firearms on school property and we stand by submitted written testimony. Thank you, Mr. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on Senate Bill 124? Members questions. Okay, we're going to take a very brief recess prior to taking Thank you for your patience. We're reconvening the committee on public safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs and our friends from the Committee on Education to discuss and actually take the vote on Senate Bill 124. The two chairs have conferred and we'd like to pass this measure out as is.
Members, any discussion? not senator vote yes. Okay. Chair's recommendation is to pass SB124 as is. Chair votes I. Vice chair votes I. Senator Fukunaga I. Senator McKelie. Senator Alwalk. No. Mr. Chair, the measure passes as is. Thank you. And for the committee on education, the chair has the same recommendation to pass out Senate Bill 124 relating to prohibition of firearms on school property. Senate Bill 124. Chair votes I to pass as is. Senate bill 124 pass as is. Chair votes eye. Vice chair votes eye. Senator I senator Richards. Hi. Senator for four recommendation. Okay. Uh thank you for everyone's patience. We are convening the joint committees on public safety, intergovernmental and military affairs and our really good friends from the committee on labor and technology. It is almost 4:00 and we have two bills on this agenda. The first being Senate Bill 1158 uh relating to employees retirement system.
We have Louis Salivia from budget and finance. We'd like to ask everyone to keep their testimonies under a minute please. Okay. Hi chair, vice chair, members of the committee. Sabrina Nasser, deputy director for Department of Budget and Finance.
We stand on our written testimony in opposition and we're here to answer any questions you may have. Thank you very much. Thank you, Sabrina. Diane Wong from the AG's office. Chairs and vice chairs, we've have submitted written comments. We're concerned that the bill as written would violate uh article 3 section 14 of the Hawaii Constitution um or the one subject requirement. The title of the bill is relating to the employees retirement system. Section one of the bill does not relate to the ERS. Section one relates to the EUTF. We recommend that the section be removed from the bill. Thank you. I'm available for questions. Thank you, Diane. Thomas Williams from the Employees Retirement System. Good afternoon, chairs, vice chairs, members of the committee. I'm Tom Williams of the Employees Retirement System. Appreciate the opportunity to testify. We stand on our testimony and strong opposition to Senate Bill 1158.
We think if implemented, this would uh reverse about a decade worth of progress that we've made in reducing our unfunded liability and and decreasing the period to full funding. We respectfully ask that the bill be deferred. Thank you. And I'm available to answer questions. Thank you, Mr. Williams. Nicholas Krauss from Chopo might be joining us via Zoom. It is Nicholas there. Um, he's here, but he's hasn't started his video or audio yet. Okay. Is there anyone in this audience that would like to testify on 11:58? Yes. While we wait for Nicholas, I will welcome you. Good afternoon, Chair Wai, Vice Chair Elephante, Chair Morawaki, and Vice Chair Lee. My name is Robert Kavako, president of Chopo uh State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers. I'm here to testify in strong support of Senate Bill 1158. This bill will restore retirement benefits that were taken away from police officers in 2012 to those who become police officers after June 30th of 2023.
We respectfully ask that the bill be amended to go one step further and restore retirement benefits for all police officers who became members between July 1st of 2012 and June 30th of 2023. The passage of this bill will provide a muchneeded incentive to recruit and retain more police officers. As you probably already know, each of the four county police departments statewide are suffering from a critical off officer shortages and are struggling to fill vacancies which is compromising public safety. As it currently stands, the reduced retirement benefits do not attract a sufficient number of qualified police officer recruits. Turnover is constant. New recruits enlist and soon leave for other jurisdictions that offer higher compensation and take our training with them. The ERS has submitted testimony in opposition. While we respect their duty to protect the assets of the fund and to reduce the unfunded liability, we look at this bill as investing in our police officers and the safety of our communities.
The ERS is not projected to be fully funded until 20 years from now, and we can't wait in order to take action. On behalf of the 2600 police officers statewide, I urge and respectfully ask that you amend and pass Senate Bill 1158. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. KCO. Is Nicholas Cra ready to Oh, hi, Nicholas. Welcome. Welcome. Hi. Good afternoon. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Okay. Uh Nicholas Carlson, the Maui chapter chairman for the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers. Uh the Maui Police Department currently has 106 police officer vacancies out of our 400 positions. We are currently in a staffing crisis and this crisis will not solve itself. Uh staffing shortages mean longer shifts for our police officers and increased overtime pay for taxpayers, slower response times to 911 calls, mental health crisis, and our communities could ultimately be underserved by their police.
We need to take major steps to retain the qualified police officers we already have and stop the mainland police departments from hiring them away from us by enticing them with cheaper cost of living, higher pay, and better benefits. Reinstating the retirement benefits once afforded to police officers will stop the exodus of police officers and will help us attract new police officer candidates that we are currently losing to other jobs that that do not require overnight shifts and mandatory overtime. uh we must invest in our police officers if we expect uh them officers to invest their lives in a career serving our communities. I understand this creates a burden to the state ERS, but we're talking about public safety and that impacts everyone. I'm sure there's a way to reinstate the police officer retirement system that was afforded to police officers prior to 2012 and 2001 without bankrupting the ERS system.
Thank you very much. Thank you, Nicholas. Is there anyone else on Zoom or in person that would like to testify on Senate Bill 1158? Members questions? Questions for Mr. Williams from ERS. [Music] Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for sticking with us. Um, you heard Chopo's testimony. So, what would be the projected cost if we were to backfill and fund what they're requesting going back to 2012? uh if we were to um amend a plan to provide uh benefits for police and fire because police and fire are the same program and they've not been separated. It would either result in uh an increase in contributions if we're going to cont retain the current funding period. There are 23 years to full funding at present. Uh if we don't keep the current funding period, it goes to 30 years. So the annual contributions we make would have to be continued for an additional seven years.
In the alternative, we would increase the contribution rates from 41% I believe to about 45% uh per year for each police officer. So it would be substantial. And the unfunded liability I believe increases by about hund00 million from 2.2 2 billion for just the police and fire units to about 2.3 billion. The total unfunded liability is now at 13.5 billion for the IRS. Thank you, Mr. Williams. Thank you, Chair Senator. Perhaps um could I also ask um the representative from Department of Budget and Finance to come up because I I would really appreciate you know if your um agencies could provide the committees with kind of a breakdown you know on your calculations and how you arrived at your um um conclions in your testimony. I think, you know, having served on the city end, I think for, you know, all of the police departments that are experiencing severe recruitment and retention issues.
I think you know if there is a need to revisit the kinds of benefit that are offered it would be very beneficial if your departments could at least provide your uh calculations and how you arrived at your statements and then that would help the legislature perhaps re-examine you know how we might better uh approach this issue. I'm sure there will have to be a lot more discussion among the committee chairs, but I can tell you I think from uh the Honolulu um standpoint, you know, having 200 and 300 vacancies at uh a time when we had severe emergency conditions is just not acceptable. It's, you know, it's we're in a very severe um shortage condition. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. We're happy to provide more information on that. Can I follow up with a question? Senator, if I might also respond that uh our numbers were developed by our actuaries.
We employ a firm Gabriel Motor and they have the entire census of our police and they have developed these numbers. So the numbers that I share with you today were developed by our actuarial. I'm I'm not disputing that. I'm I'm just saying that given the number of vacancies and difficulties that the police departments are experiencing in recruiting new officers, we should be also looking at the numbers of officers that we currently have and what you know the uh costs of overtime and excess kinds of coverage are also costing us because cost not only the counties but also the state as well. So, you know, as a first step in getting more information before the committees. Yes. And additional overtime obviously translates at least for tier one employees into additional retirement benefits. And I'm no expert in recruitment of police or other groups. But my sense is that retirement plan alone is not the solution for the challenges that are being faced.
I think we have a very strong retirement plan compared to others nationwide. But could it be changed? Surely it could be changed but at a cost and that's obviously the discretion of this committee and the legislature to do it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Sure. I think the general testimony from budget finances employer contributions will go up but which employers are we talking about here? I mean generally county firefighters, county police, it would be the counties that would be taking the brunt of the cost, right? That's correct. And so when it comes to health, well, yes, the the cost that we're talking about, it's only that attributable to uh the police and fire. U there is a separate pool for general employees. Uh and those rates are determined separately. Uh they currently in about 24% it's 41% for police at five. We anticipate it would go up to 45.1% for police and five.
So about 4% more 4.1% 4.1 and that's something for and hopefully we'll get some testimony from the counties as we go forward as bill goes forward so that we know whether or not they value being a having a recruiting tool for their police departments is useful. because they're the ones that are going to have to decide whether they need to, you know, whether they're willing to take on the additional cost going forward. Well, Senator, if I might add, one of the concerns that the RS has is that the plans were changed in 2012 applicable to all new hires for the general employees or police and fire. And we're concerned that this reversion to pre202 benefits is something that all of our members would like to see. I mean uh and there's as I said earlier moratorium I understand that and I think that the um retroactive application I don't think it's in the bill.
I think they're requesting as an amendment. That is correct. I I I have one one question to add on to that. So if in fact it's it's a county is it shred out? So when you say the contribution rate increases. Is that for the counties and not the state or how do you calculate that? Well, thank you Senator. We calculated by employer and so the counties are the employers. They we build them or they contribute to us on a county bycounty basis. So I believe the state only has a very few handful of officers. Uh but largely they are employed by the counties to the counties would pay the county contribution rate and not necessarily the states or that's correct. Thank you. Y so um going forward we already was talking about the recruitment how important that is and I I I beg to differ.
I think if we have a very uh comparable package of uh for law enforcement um officers in the field then we wouldn't be getting our officers taken by the mainland the packages that they have and the signing bonuses that they have. If you look at the overtime on firefighters and police and you add up and calculate that and play that into effect in having officers that would come in for uh the retirement um put them back in um and calculate those numbers. I I I kind of pretty sure that it would not be as high in the percent of you talking about because these officers is not just working 12 hours over time. They're working way over 12 12 hours overtime. So this is why I'm I like you guys go back to the drawing board because you guys going on a regular eight hour schedule.
None of our police officers can as little as you say they have, you know, um they work extremely overtime and and that's the reason why they quit. They find new job and I hate to say we have they don't advertise it because it's not advertised. We have the highest in suicide rates because of that divorce, right? Parallel, family, all these kind of place all in effect. you're thinking because this one thing is not playing an effect but having this not having this benefits it does play an effect on so what I like you guys both do go look ask the city whatever the overtime contributions and how much money we spend every day on overtime on our law enforcement officers then you guys come back and tell us that um it's not needed because I think it's really needed and I think you guys got to relook at that or you guys going to take a run around and spend 18 hours of the day riding around an officer in the car, then you can understand why they need these certain things and even more than what we're trying to give now.