FBI joins investigation into OHA spending, contracts back to Beginning of Crabbe Administration
HNN: The FBI has joined the state's criminal investigation into the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Hawaii News Now has learned.
Multiple sources say the state and federal authorities have broadened their probe, requesting copies of OHA contracts, trustee emails and financial records of OHA’s nonprofit subsidiaries.
OHA declined comment during a board meeting Thursday, and its attorney declined to provide details of the investigation to a beneficiary.
"I think there's something they're trying to hide,” said Healani Sonoda-Pale, chair of Ka Lahui Hawaii’s political action committee, who asked the board to disclose details of the investigation….
Sources said that the state Attorney General’s office recently sent OHA a letter, disclosing the FBI’s role in the investigation.
During a meeting behind closed doors, multiple sources said that OHA’s attorney Robert Klein advised board members to hire their own attorneys….
Link--HNN Video Report -- “The AG’s probe previously centered on a contract given to Hawaiian scholar Kaumana Beamer…. (which) cost OHA more than $400K…. Sources told us the AG’s office and the FBI have broadened their probe seeking financial documents dating back to 2012. They say investigators have asked for copies of contracts with other vendors, trustee emails, as well as financial records of OHA’s nonprofit subsidiaries….”
Akina: “Although I am not at liberty at this time to comment upon any possible criminal investigation, I welcome efforts to ensure that OHA Trustees fulfill their fiduciary duties. This is a time for transparency and honesty. While the recent State audit is a good start, OHA’s upcoming independent audit will dig deeper into the possibility of fraud, waste and abuse.” – Media Statement by OHA Trustee Keli’i Akina, PhD, March 9, 2018
CLUE: Crabbe became OHA CEO in January, 2012.
Totally Related: A Month Later Crabbe Still Hasn't Released LLC Records to Trustees
read … FBI joins investigation into OHA spending, contracts
Trask: Coco Palms Occupiers Duped by White Supremacist ‘Sovereign Citizens’
KGI: County Attorney Mauna Kea Trask on Thursday cautioned activists who occupied the grounds of the former Coco Palms resort and continue attempting to win title to the property that they are basing their arguments on the authority of a fake court whose “chief justice” is a registered sex offender.
The individual identified as chief justice was convicted of three felony counts of sexual assault in 1998 and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment, according to a letter signed by Trask Thursday morning….
Trask added that the non-existent “Court of the Sovereign” also does not have the same name as any actual court that existed during the tenure of the Hawaiian Kingdom….
The letter speculated that the Coco Palms occupiers had been unwittingly misled by Mainland organizations “with ties to white supremacy.” Trask contended that some Hawaiian independence groups have advocated for “sovereign citizens” unbound by laws of a specific country. (Editor's Note: See 2011 article.)
The observations came in a letter signed by Trask and sent Thursday to Noa Mau-Espirito and Charles Hepa, the two chief organizers of the Coco Palms occupation. A day before, the two men sent Trask and Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. a document headed “Notice to quit or pay rent” that cited the alleged Court of the Sovereign in a wide array of demands of county and state officials, two lawyers and a title company in Honolulu that they pay back rent for the property that, Mau-Espirito and Hepa said, amounts to $200 million….
Their earlier filing and the document received by the mayor and county attorney’s office this week asserted authority of “The Hawaiian Judiciary, Court of the Sovereign” which, according to these documents, is presided over by “Chief Justice” Moses Enoka Heanu.
For several weeks, rumors had circulated (Hawai'i Free Press Feb 13 reported) that Heanu is a registered sex offender who resides on Hawaii Island. Trask said his office, working with state legal authorities, had verified that the supposed chief justice is the same person listed on the sex offender registry….
Trask said the description of the activities of the “Court of the Sovereign” recycle terminology of white supremacist groups and contended that made up “common law courts” have no authority and exist “to intimidate both private citizens and governmental officials.” Such courts, and the fictional Court of the Sovereign, “have no authority to compel any action by anyone at all.”
Trask cited materials on racist groups maintained by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist organizations as mirroring wording commonly used during the Coco Palms occupation….
Trask also sent a memorandum to a variety of state officials “regarding legal information on general Native Hawaiian sovereignty claims.” The memo emphasized it was not a legal document in and of itself but had been prepared to try to respond to numerous questions about the Coco Palms occupation that have flooded the mayor’s and other county offices….
On Thursday afternoon, no people were visible in the former encampment off Kuamoo Road in Wailua. Several tents and a portable toilet were still in place and two small pickup trucks were parked in the area the occupiers had used….
PDF: Protesters $200M Demand Letter
PDF: Full Text of County Att'y Response
As Explained:
read … Trask: No such court
Billion Dollar Danger: HB2709 Would Create New Power Center for High Tech Tax Credit Scammers
PBN: …The functions and duties of two state agencies tasked with growing Hawaii’s commercial technology industry could be transferred to a newly created entity called the Hawaii Innovation and Technology Authority, if a House bill is signed into law this session.
House Bill 2709, which crossed over to the Senate on Tuesday, would transfer the rights, powers, functions, duties and employees of the Hawaii Technology Development Corp. and the Hawaii Strategic Development Corp. to the yet-to-be created agency called the Hawaii Innovation and Technology Authority.
The bill was introduced by State Rep. Sylvia Luke and is backed by several local research and technology companies, including (the usual suspects) Oceanit and Ibis Networks, and is also supported by the Chamber of Commerce Hawaii.
In submitted testimony, Oceanit President and CEO Patrick Sullivan said the new entity would be responsible for developing strategic policy around three major areas— supporting startups (with your tax dollars), sustaining existing enterprises (with your tax dollars) and attracting companies that could establish an office in Hawaii with (non-existent) high-quality jobs (funded by very real tax dollars).
Sullivan called for a “fresh approach” to growing the state’s innovation and tech sector…..
(Translation: He is dreaming of a return to the bad old days of Act 215/221 tax credits. It is all these people ever do.)
SA: Innovation in a government-issue sandbox
Related:
read … Hawaii bill would create new state innovation authority
HB 1665 on TAT revenues would hurt Counties
KGI: The Hawaii Council of Mayors proposed a bill in their 2018 Legislative Package, which was numbered H.B. No. 1665, to amend the amount of transient accommodations tax (TAT) revenue from a specified amount each year to a percentage of the revenues collected.
However, the House Tourism Committee, during its February 6, 2018 hearing, substantially amended the bill to change the method of allocating TAT revenues to the counties to a county reimbursement process that would be used for specified public services rendered by the county and also capping the amount that would be reimbursed to the counties. The bill also proposes to create a tax credit program for primary residential property owners who do not provide transient accommodations, i.e., residents who do not utilize their home as a vacation rental.
On February 16, 2018, the House Finance Committee recommended that H.B. No. 1665, H.D. 1, be passed on third reading with no amendments and referred the measure to the Senate….
HB1665: Text, Status
read … Hurt
Big Island Mayor Can’t Seem To Stop Raising Taxes
CB:…Kim raised property taxes during his first stint in elected office from 2000 to 2008. He also hiked various other government fees, like vehicle registration charges that rose three consecutive years.
He returned to the mayor’s post in December 2016 and told the Legislature that not raising taxes was a top priority.
“This is no time to consider – even remotely consider – tax increases to the people of this island,” Kim said to the Hawaii-Tribune Herald in January 2017.
Yet within six months Kim had increased property taxes, nearly doubled the gasoline tax and imposed a 27 percent jump in the commercial tipping fee businesses pay to dump their rubbish….
he became the first Hawaii County mayor to propose adding one-half percent to Hawaii’s 4 percent GET. (Honolulu and Kauai County have exercised that authority, which the Legislature granted the counties as a means of funding only transportation-related costs.)…
On March 1, Kim gave the council a $515.7 million spending request that’s $24.9 million or 5.1 percent higher than this year’s. Without a GET increase, it’s an “ugly” budget that has no funding to address homelessness or improve municipal bus service, he said.
There’s money for employee raises, however. On the same day he submitted his record-level spending plan, Kim received a 23 percent pay hike. That’s a $30,581 raise, bringing his second-year salary to $162,581….
read … Stop Raising Taxes
Government Transparency An Early Loser In Legislative Session
CB: …Thursday marked the deadline for bills to pass from one chamber to the other. A bill to conceal the financial information of unpaid state officials from the public is moving forward, and so is a measure to hide the exact compensation of legislative employees, showing salary ranges instead.
Among the ideas that have already died, meanwhile, was a measure that would have required the state to respond to complaints about open records and meetings within six months. The Office of Information Practices currently takes more than twice that long, on average.
The only bill moving forward that advances government transparency is Senate Bill 2257, said Brian Black, executive director of the Civil Beat Law Center for the Public Interest. That measure requires the state tax department to make publicly available the formulas it uses to calculate the revenue impact of proposed legislation….
The bill to replace exact pay for legislative employees with salary ranges was drafted in response to Civil Beat’s public salary database, Black said….
Common Cause supported a bill that aimed to ensure Republicans are better represented on the Reapportionment Commission, which sets boundaries for congressional and legislative elections. It died in the Senate Ways and Means Committee, chaired by Sen. Donovan Dela Cruz….
read … Transparency
Airports authority bill clears Senate
HTH: A bill that would shift authority over the state’s airports from the Department of Transportation to an airport corporation was successfully passed Thursday by the state Senate.
Senators voted 30-2 to pass Senate Bill 2996 after a third reading. The bill now goes to the state House.
The bill would establish an airport corporation, led by a governor-appointed board of directors, to take over all aspects of state airport management from the Department of Transportation by 2021. The airport corporation is intended to be a much more efficient means of managing Hawaii’s airports, particularly when it comes to construction and renovation projects….
The only organization on record to oppose the most recent draft of the bill is the Office of Hawaiian Affairs….
read … Airports authority bill clears Senate
Republicans, Unable to Elect a Single Senator, Will Now Lose Influence on Reapportionment
CB: …Regarding the reapportionment commission, Article IV, Section 2 of the Hawaii State Constitution states, “The president of the senate and the speaker of the house of representatives shall each select two members. Members of each house belonging to the party or parties different from that of the president or the speaker shall designate one of their number for each house and the two so designated shall each select two members of the commission.”
This assures that four members of the commission be appointed by the majority party in the House and Senate and four be appointed by the minority party. The eight appointees then select a ninth member to serve as chairperson.
As can be seen, redrawing the map is by law a bipartisan mandate. However, with the defeat of Sen. Sam Slom in the 2016 election, Republicans have no one in the Senate to appoint members to the reapportionment commission.
As it stands, the likely result is a reapportionment commission that would consist of six members selected by Democrats and two by Republicans. The chairperson would be chosen by Democrats, making it a 7-2 advantage of Democrats over Republicans. Not much bipartisanship there, and the maps will decimate Republican-leaning districts.
This should be cause for great concern because Hawaii is already on the road to becoming a one-party state even without unfairly drawn electoral maps.
House Bills 2446 and 2707 were introduced in the 2018 legislative session to assure a bipartisan reapportionment commission and avert the race to one-party rule. They specifically would have required that in the absence of a minority member in, say, the Senate, a minority member of the House be appointed to choose members to a reapportionment commission. This way the upcoming reapportionment commission becomes bipartisan, but the bills were never heard in the House Judicial Committee and are now dead….
read … Weak
HECO Negotiating Strategy Loots Rail Budget for $20M
CB: …Under the agreement approved on an 8-0 vote in last month, the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation will pay more than $20 million for 15 new specialized Hawaiian Electric Co. trucks. Those Altec and Versalift vehicle models should give HECO crews the safe access they need to work on most of the power lines that run along rail’s western guideway, both parties say.
HART still faces an estimated $70 million price tag to relocate west side power lines where those trucks won’t solve clearance problems. But without the vehicles, transit officials say the city would have to pay $200 million in utility-relocation between Kapolei and Halawa….
(Next time ask for $2B so HART can give you $200M and call it a $1.8B savings.)
read … Negotiating Strategy
Honolulu 3rd Least Affordable Housing Market
AP: HONOLULU, HAWAII
>> Median home price: $760,600
>> Median household income: $80,513
>> Principal and interest payment: $2,933 (43.7 percent of monthly income)
Honolulu is one of the hottest housing markets for international buyers, with Canada, Australia, Germany, Japan and the United Kingdom leading the pack….
Some Empty Talk:
read … We’re #3
HI-EMA say the state does not have enough shelters if a category 3 or above hurricane hits the island
KITV: …It's a situation some lawmakers are calling extremely disturbing….
read … HI-EMA say the state does not have enough shelters if a category 3 or above hurricane hits the island
Chief looking to fill 190 vacancies in Honolulu Police Department
KHON: …many applicants can't pass the background check.
Twenty-one new recruits are graduating from the Honolulu Police Academy tonight.
Chief Susan Ballard wants more.
She told commissioners HPD needs 164 new patrol officers in order to be staffed at 100 percent.
When asked what the biggest hurdle is to fill positions, Ballard said
"Mostly the background check. We get a lot of people that apply but by the time we get through the background checks, psychological all the other things we do ... it narrows down the recruitment pool," said Chief Susan Ballard, Honolulu Police Department.
Starting pay for officers is $64,000…..
read … Chief looking to fill 190 vacancies in Honolulu Police Department
Hawaii Walmart Employees Get ANOTHER $2M in Bonuses Thanks to Republican Tax Cuts
KITV: …Walmart employees in Hawaii are receiving approximately $2 million in bonuses. Across the U.S., 890,000 Walmart associates are receiving part of a share of over $560 million based on Q4 performance and recent changes in tax law.
“It’s a great day for our Walmart stores in Hawaii,” said Lance McAlister, Hawaii Market Manager for Walmart. “All 10 of our Hawaii stores qualified for MyShare performance bonuses this quarter and I’m so proud of our more than 4,000 associates in the islands for coming together to make this happen"
The bonuses will be included in paychecks given March 8th.
Walmart in Hawaii has spent $219 million with local suppliers, and paid more than $17.7 million in taxes.
February 1st, a new adoption assistance benefit of $5,000 per child was implemented. In January, Walmart announced plans to expand maternity and parental leave benefits, and one time cash bonuses for those eligible. …
read … It pays to be a Walmart employee; $2 million
Scrap Metal Mining is Big Business in Hawaii
CB: …Every month, the 60-employee firm in Kapolei ships off 200 containers full of recycled goods, including iron and aluminum scrap metal, to places like Taiwan, Malaysia and China, where smelters process the metals for resale as raw material….
So much value, in fact, that scrap metals were among Hawaii’s most valuable exports in 2017—worth more than cash crops like coffee, cocoa, mac nuts and papaya combined.
Iron, aluminum and copper scraps raked in $47 million last year, compared with $37 million for Hawaii’s top agriculture exports, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. For 2014-17, scrap metal exports totaled $186 million, the Census Bureau says….
read … Scrap
Anti-Agriculture Activists Wrong Assumptions
CB:My dad said to always think about the assumptions one operates upon. If one operates on the wrong assumption, there will be unintended consequences. Such is the premise of Klayton Kubo’s Community Voices article, “Are Chemical Companies More Important Than Voters?”
As much as the data and testing has shown, the pesticide detections are well below the standards of even California’s levels. To think that farmers are wantonly spraying people is an example of a false assumption…
read … Wrong Assumptions
How Today’s students have been Brainwashed to prepare for this moment their whole lives
Cataluna: …In some ways, today’s students have been preparing for this moment their whole lives. Their educational experiences have been shaped by concepts like collaborative work, project-based learning, real-world scenarios, finding innovative solutions, and the underlying mantra that they can save the world.
In lower elementary, perhaps they’re taken out to a weedy, forgotten corner of campus and asked to imagine a verdant garden thriving in that very spot. And then maybe they’re given tools and seeds and time in their day to make that garden happen.
In middle school they might break into groups and build little cars that run on solar panels or draw designs for water filtration systems to solve the drinking water crisis in faraway countries.
In high school they write position papers on current political issues and practice debating both sides of an argument. They’re encouraged to form their own club if what they’re interested in isn’t represented on campus. They organize food drives for the hungry, slipper drives for the homeless, projects that have impact beyond their campus.
So much of what used to be taught in school was facts and formulas — information that is now easily searchable on a smartphone. New models of teaching encourage students to use this readily available information to come up with new ways of seeing the world, new solutions to old problems.
On Wednesday students in schools around the state will join with students across the country in a peaceful demonstration, a 17-minute walkout to remember the 17 people killed in the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last month….
As Explained: Hawaii DoE Organizing Students to Walk out March 14
Star-Adv: Advance stricter gun-control bills
read … Today’s students have been preparing for this moment their whole lives
Legislative News:
QUICK HITS: