HSTA push for union-run
health plan fails by 1 vote

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By Pat Omandam
pomandam@starbulletin.com

The Hawaii State Teachers Association said it will continue to push for a union-run health plan in the Legislature despite falling short this session.

"We'll try again next year," said Karen Ginoza, president of the Hawaii State Teachers Association. "We'll keep coming back."

The union hoped a majority of the 51-member state House would agree yesterday to discuss the Senate's voluntary employee beneficiary association after senators sent it to the House earlier this month.

The union says it can run its own health plan better and more efficiently than a joint state-union health plan that legislators mandated last year.

But when the voting took place yesterday, the vote to suspend the rules so Senate Bill 2861 could be properly heard failed by a vote of 25-24, with two House members excused.

In retrospect, the HSTA did have the support of a majority of the House. It's just that the 26th swing vote was not in the House chambers yesterday, but in Orlando, Fla., on a private business trip.

"I would have voted to move the VEBA trust forward," said state Rep. David Pendleton (R, Maunawili) during a telephone interview yesterday from Florida.

Pendleton and Rep. Bob Nakasone (D, Kahului) were the two who were recorded absent when the vote took place.

Pendleton explained he opposed the health fund reforms passed last year that forced public worker unions to form a single state-run health fund. In discussing it with teachers, he said a union-run health plan would give teachers more options.

State officials say the move toward a single plan was needed to control the rising costs of premiums paid to the employee health fund.

Meanwhile, House Speaker Calvin Say (D, Palolo) had insisted the House would not set a precedent by suspending its rules to hear bills that have stalled after legislative deadlines have passed. In yesterday's vote, 17 Republicans and 8 Democrats favored suspending the rules.

The Democrats were Reps. Lei Ahu Isa (Liliha), Joe Souki (Lihue), K. Mark Takai (Pearl City), Roy Takumi (Waipahu), Nobu Yonamine (Pearl City), Terry Yoshinaga (Moiliili), Willie Espero (Ewa Beach) and Ben Cabreros (Kalihi).

Espero and Cabreros are members of the House's Filipino caucus, which the teachers union strongly lobbied this week.