MEDIA RELEASE

Mayor Billy Kenoi today announced the County is developing a new service modeled on the popular Summer Fun program to provide supervised activities for school-age children during the 17 days that public schools will be closed because of teacher furloughs.

“We understand the teacher furloughs triggered by the state’s budget problems present a severe hardship for working parents, and our Parks & Recreation staff has been at work all week developing a child care alternative,” Mayor Kenoi said. “We will provide parents with safe places where they can leave their children during the work day, and parents will know their kids will be engaged in fun, supervised activities.”

“Our working families are already under stress during these difficult times, and scrambling to find safe child care on furlough days will only add to the worry,” Mayor Kenoi said. “This low-cost, island-wide program will be good for our youth, and will offer relief to their parents.”

County Parks officials are in discussions with community organizations and churches that are willing to partner with the county to provide supervised activities for students on the furlough days. The County will also recruit volunteers from school A-Plus programs to help staff the County program because those volunteers have already completed background checks and other screening. Other volunteers are also being sought for the new program.

Plans call for the County to open and staff gyms, community centers and other recreational facilities to operate the new program from 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on teacher furlough days. Parents would pay a fee of $5 to $10 per child per furlough day to cover some of the cost of the program.

The County plans to adhere to the Summer Fun guideline of one adult supervisor for 20 children, which means staffing shortages could limit enrollment in the County program at some facilities. Parks officials are polling public school officials to try to obtain estimates of how many children are likely to participate.

The County is also investigating what adjustments in the County’s free Hele-On Bus service may be appropriate to accommodate the new program, Mayor Kenoi said.

More details about the program will be released late next week after the County has gathered more data on how many participants are likely to enroll, and which community and church groups will join with the county to provide services, Mayor Kenoi said.

“We want working parents to know they will have an alternative on teacher furlough days, and know their children will have a place to go where they will be busy, safe and supervised,” Mayor Kenoi said.

Letter to the Editor

Reaction to public school teachers ratifying the Hawaii State Teachers Association (HSTA) contract is understandably focused on the impact to our students.

However, comments blaming Governor Lingle for furloughing teachers are misdirected.

Governor Lingle does not have the legal authority to furlough or layoff teachers or other DOE employees, nor is she able to determine when schools will be closed.

The Department (DOE) and Board of Education (BOE) took the lead in negotiating the new contract with the HSTA. These three parties made the difficult choice to furlough teachers as part of the DOE’s share of helping to close the state’s growing budget shortfall. Once the tentative contract was agreed to by the DOE, BOE and HSTA, Governor Lingle then gave her approval, and the contract was overwhelmingly ratified by teachers by a vote of 81 percent.

The decision to furlough teachers and close schools on furlough days was not something anyone wanted. However, the DOE, BOE and HSTA felt it was the fairest way to address the budget shortfall.

They could have laid off employees or implemented pay cuts and required teachers to work. They could have had teachers take furloughs on non-instructional days or on state holidays.

The bottom line is the DOE, BOE and HSTA were faced with making decisions that inevitably would not please everyone.

I applaud Superintendent Pat Hamamoto, the BOE members and HSTA leaders for demonstrating leadership and making difficult decisions that in the end will keep our teachers employed so they can focus on educating our students.

Marie Laderta
State Chief Negotiator

MEDIA  RELEASE

Gov. Linda Lingle announced Friday she will hold an emergency meeting with her cabinet directors over the weekend to identify additional spending reductions needed to close the growing budget shortfall.  

The reductions will likely include additional layoffs in order to realize labor savings. 

“In light of the additional $98 million revenue shortfall projected by the Council on Revenues yesterday and the unacceptable and unrealistic position taken by the Hawaii Government Employees Association on our Administration’s latest offer, we must take the difficult step of identifying additional spending cuts, including a possible further reduction in force,” Lingle said.  ”This is not something we want to do.”

The move, however, is necessary to meet the constitutional responsibility to balance the budget, she said.

“I continue to believe that furloughs would be preferable for both the state employees and the public,” Lingle said. “After discussions between our negotiating team and the HGEA and providing them with what we considered to be a very fair plan, I truly believed that we were very close to reaching an agreement that would have avoided layoffs.  However, we cannot accept the response we received from the union leadership yesterday.” 

The state had made a similar offer to the United Public Workers (UPW) prior to the Council on Revenues meeting and received no response. 

Given the size of the budget shortfall, the governor indicated the additional reductions would be substantial and focus on a major restructuring of departments and state government, including the possible elimination of some programs and services. 

Lingle also announced the three-day furlough for roughly 900 non-union employees will start Sept. 16. Initially it had been hoped that the furlough of non-union employees could be aligned with the furlough of union employees.  

Since the HGEA’s offer is not acceptable, the furlough of non-union employees will move forward.

MEDIA RELEASE

Commissioner Astrue Thanks the Vice President for His Call to Exempt DDS Employees from Furloughs and Hiring Restrictions

Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security, expressed his appreciation that Vice President Joseph R. Biden also has urged Governor Edward G. Rendell, Chairman of the National Governor’s Association, to exempt federally-funded state Disability Determination Service (DDS) employees from any furloughs, hiring restrictions, and other budget cuts. Earlier this year, Commissioner Astrue wrote his own letter to Gov. Rendell expressing his grave concerns that including DDSs in state-wide reductions saves no money and, in fact, hurts the most vulnerable residents.

“I thank the Vice President for helping us make the case to Governors across the country,” Commissioner Astrue said. “Social Security funds 100 percent of DDS employees’ salaries as well as overhead — that’s about $2 billion nationwide this year. These funds cannot be used by the states for any other purpose, so states do not save money by cutting employees in DDSs – they only slow getting benefits to the disabled, which runs counter to what the President and the Congress were trying to do with the $500 million in the Recovery Act dedicated to accelerating disability decisions. Nevertheless, many governors are imposing across-the-board hiring freezes or furloughs that also affect DDS employees. For the good of the country, this has to end.”

Vice-President Biden’s letter in PDF format

Commissioner Astrue’s letter in PDF format