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 Staying PHOCUSED
Protecting Hawaii's Ohana, Children, UnderServed,
Elderly and Disabled
TO KEEP OUR SECTOR
AWARE OF AND "PHOCUSED" ON THE ISSUES FACING OUR STATE AND ITS MOST
VULNERABLE CITIZENS
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The PHOCUSED Voice: News
Links
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Contact Us |
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Alex or
Nicole
p:
808.521.7462
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Board
& Staff
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Board of Directors
Joanne
Lundstrom, Chair
Howard Garval, Vice
Chair
Victor Geminiani, Vice
Chair
Debbie Shimizu, Secretary
Alan Shinn, Treasurer
Susan Chandler
Jan Dill
Marya Grambs
Kathi Hasegawa
Nanci Kreidman
Ruthann Quitiquit
Jerry Rauckhorst
Sandra Yoro
Staff
Alex Santiago, Executive
Director
Nicole Brodie, Office
Manager
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| Message to the Members | THE BUDGET
The
final budget conference committee meetings were completed late
Friday night. Overall the Health and Human Services sector fared
well
this year, considering how bad things could have been given the budget
shortfall. In HB 2200 the Budget bill, the anticipated cuts were
minimal with only about one million in cuts to POS being agreed
to. No
changes to TANF provisos were done and positions were added back to
the DHS and the DOH. Everyone has had to bear the burden of
balancing the budget, and we took our share of cuts; however, the budget
does indeed show that a great deal of effort and attention was paid to
fund needed services.
MAHALO
LEGISLATURE
Many people worked hard to advocate for the
needs of our vulnerable
residents and many deserve thanks for this effort. We must
recognize
Sen. Suzanne Chun Oakland, who has for years worked
tirelessly on these issues. When any of you have a chance, please
take
the time out to thank her, this could not have happened without her
efforts. Others who deserve recognition are the Ways and Means
Chair
Donna Mercado Kim, the Finance
Committee Chair Marcus Oshiro
and both
the Senate President, the House Speaker
and the members of each House.
They all did their best to make sure that in this time of need the
vulnerable were not forgotten.
MORE TO DO...
Our work, however, has only just
started. We must make sure that these
funds are released and get to the programs they have been set aside
for. Over the next few weeks we will be going over the details of
this
Legislative Session and making sure we have not overlooked
anything. Given the complexities of the Legislative process there
may have been
some things that have gone under the radar. After all of our
assumptions are confirmed, we will begin the process of advocating that
these funds get released in a timely manner so that many of you will be
able to do your jobs.
This has been a challenging and rewarding
experience for PHOCUSED. Your
input about our efforts is welcomed.
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PHOCUSED Work
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MEMBER
MAHALO
The success of this session and our
efforts would not have been possible without the generous contributions
of time and money from our members. Thank you so much!
Thank
you also to the Swayne Foundation,
and Hawaii People's Fund for their faith in and support of our work!
Let's
keep this momentum going by getting more organizations to join so they
too can own the results that we can only achieve together!
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Action Steps | | What you can do:
- Thank your legislators
- Email us with your thoughts, questions, and concerns
- Recruit more organizations to join our efforts--PHOCUSED cannot
exist without membership support
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We hope to send out emails like this one to keep
our members informed about the process and issues of this year's
legislature. Because the work we are doing is in the political
arena and the landscape is often uncertain and changes with very short
notice, we request a bit of understanding of our perceptions as conveyed
here. |
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