Telescope Construction to Begin Next Week
Tourism Activists Find New Way to Push Agriculture out of Hawaii
Who is Running for Prosecutor?
CB: … Candidates who have already announced include Peter Carlisle, a former city prosecutor who also served as mayor, and RJ Brown, a former deputy prosecuting attorney who once worked for Civil Beat….
Steve Alm, a former Oahu 1st Circuit Court judge has been encouraged to run. And Loretta Sheehan, another former deputy prosecuting attorney who now chairs the Honolulu Police Commission, has received similar entreaties….
Alm, who will move back to Hawaii from the mainland later this month, told me this week, “A number of people have raised the idea with me, and I am giving it serious consideration.”
Sheehan said via email that she is considering it, too, “as I care very much for that office and for its work.”…
Kaneshiro is a former deputy prosecutor who held the top job from 1988 to 1996. He was elected again in 2010. The position has no term limits.
Others mentioned as possible candidates for the nonpartisan election include Dwight Nadamoto, the acting prosecutor, and senior deputy prosecuting attorney Christopher Van Marter.
Should Kaneshiro not be indicted, it’s possible he could try to keep the gig. He crushed his only opponent in 2016, the unknown Anosh Yaqoob, 69% to 18%.
As of December, Kaneshiro reported having $41,000 in his campaign coffers.
But he’s also the target of an impeachment drive.
read … Campaign Begins
Big Island Bus System: Hydrogen and Electric Buses Litter Baseyard, Don’t Work
HTH: … Puna Councilman Matt Kanealii-Kleinfelder, the sponsor of the measure, pointed to a 2006 council resolution asking the Department of Finance to study the procurement of high energy-efficient alternative fuel vehicles as part of its annual vehicle acquisition plans. He also noted a goal in state law to implement a plan, starting in 2010 and ending in 2020, to transition Hawaii Island to a hydrogen-fueled economy and extend the application of the plan throughout the state.
“To me its a very viable alternative,” Kanealii-Kleinfelder said. “Let’s not wait to become another island to do it, but be the first island to do it. … Let’s make the shift now. … It’s coming; like it or not it’s coming.”
Mass Transit Administrator Brenda Carreira remains dubious. She pointed to hydrogen buses, electric buses and double-decker buses, all received with great excitement but none yet successful where the rubber meets the road.
The double-decker buses, including one purchased new by the county for almost $1 million and another donated by Maui County, were failures. Carreira, who started Nov. 1, said one of the buses worked for five days and the other for three hours in the time she’s been administrator.
An electric demonstration bus loaned to the county sits at the Mass Transit baseyard because of concerns about liability, since the county doesn’t own it…
The county was supposed to get three hydrogen buses, but so far, there’s only one. And “it’s not in any condition to go on the road as far as Hele-On,” Carreira said. A second bus that was supposed to come from Hawaii Volcanoes National Park instead was donated to someone else, she said. And the third has yet to be dedicated to the county.
“I’m going to be held responsible. … I’m still continuing to fix things,” Carreira told the council. “If that’s where you guys want to go as a council … it’s not on me.”
With the system woefully low on working buses, the county’s been leasing Polynesian Adventure Tour vehicles at a high daily rate. Four new diesel buses should arrive in January or February, paid for with federal grants. The county also applied for a grant to purchase 10 40-foot buses. Those don’t specify that they have to be diesel, so they could be used for alternative energy transportation, Carreira said.
Diesel and electric buses cost from $300,000-$600,000 each, compared to hydrogen buses that cost about $1 million, she said.
Currently, there are five broken-down buses that need new engines. Putting in diesel engines would cost about $50,000 compared to $400,000 for hydrogen retrofits because the entire drive train must also be removed, said Riley Saito, energy specialist with the county Department of Research and Development.
As far as infrastructure for the alternative energy vehicles, there’s a hydrogen production facility at the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority at Keahole Point. Building an electric fueling station at the county baseyard will run $2 million-$2.5 million, Carreira said. The bus currently uses a portable charging unit.
Carreira said once the hydrogen bus gets working, she plans to use it as the afternoon Waimea shuttle in order to test it on steep Kawaihae Road….
read … Pie in Sky
Diversity? Hirono Hires 23 White People for every Black Person
CB: U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz has one of the most racially diverse staffs among Democrats in the Senate.
He’s second only to U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, of California, who’s running for president in 2020….
Newly released data from Senate Democrats show that 69 percent of Schatz’s staff identifies as non-white (ie 31% white). For Harris that number is 70 percent.
Hawaii Sen. Mazie Hirono’s office, meanwhile, is 54 percent non-white (ie 46% white)….
(Hirono’s staff is 2% black, Schatz staff is 5% black.)
CB: Hirono says something about the border or something
read … Hirono, Schatz hire very few Black People
Is Hawaii’s Racial Harmony a Myth?
NYT: … Moises Velasquez-Manoff responds to people from the state who commented on the contradictory nature of race relations there…..
NYT: “Want to Be Less Racist? Move to Hawaii”
read … Is Hawaii’s Racial Harmony a Myth?
State says Weapons won’t be used against protesters on Mauna Kea, but agencies still preparing
HNN: … “We have DOCARE that is participating, Public Safety is participating. We have the Department of Attorney General’s investigation division that’s participating," said Attorney General Clare Connors.
She said Big Island Police will handle safety and security for county street that lead to the main access road.
“The law enforcement individuals have been coordinating for periods of months. The officers are trained and they are going to be prepared to respond to whatever activity takes place," she said.
Gov. David Ige said the National Guard will also be involved. But he said they will be used to transport workers and supplies and will not be armed.
“No weapons. They are much like their disaster response responsibilities. They are there to provide support," the governor said.
TMT opponents said the closure will not stop them from practicing their cultural and religious beliefs….
read … State says Weapons won’t be used against protesters on Mauna Kea, but agencies still preparing
DLNR Land Lease Audit: How Hard Should we Screw Small Businesses?
SA: … A recent SLDF “performance audit” outlined several areas for improvement, all focused on opportunities to increase revenues. We agree these are important priorities. (See the audit at http://files.hawaii.gov/auditor/Reports/2019/19-12.pdf; DLNR’s response is on page 62.)
What’s puzzling is the tone of the criticisms leveled at DLNR notwithstanding our recent efforts. Foremost, the audit did not identify any financial mismanagement or violation of any statute or administrative rule. Some of the audit’s findings are conjectural and subjective.
Much attention has been paid of late to the need for DLNR to bring market rents current for revocable permits (RPs). The audit describes, at length, the fact that some rents had not been raised in decades. Yet DLNR reviewed RPs in 2016 with a special task force, appraised many RPs statewide in 2017, and obtained Land Board approval to raise RP rents in 2018. The audit criticizes DLNR’s phase-in of rent increases for existing tenants; the Land Board approved it as an equity measure.
RPs are now analyzed annually by the Land Board separately by county. The RP list is posted online in advance, and is discussed in open, sunshine board meetings. Total and complete transparency.
The audit criticizes DLNR for “lost annual revenue opportunities totaling $1.6 million” for Kanoelehua Industrial Area (KIA) leases in Hilo, because DLNR extended existing ground leases, rather than allowing the leases to expire and auctioning new leases at substantially higher amounts. DLNR believes that the $1.6 million figure is highly speculative, as it is not supported by an appraisal or other market study. Lease rents by law are determined by independent appraisal. Furthermore, the Legislature specifically authorized these extensions, notwithstanding DLNR testimony on potential lost revenue opportunity. DLNR is following the new extension laws.
Overall, through the DLNR Land Division’s planning, implementation and accounting efforts, the annual revenues derived from lease rents in the Land Fund increased significantly in eight years, from $6.3 million in 2010 to over $17 million in 2018….
Related: Auditor Rips DLNR Leasehold Management
read … DLNR’s public lands revenue efforts are prudent, follow law
Wayfair: Hawaii’s New Business Income Tax Law
Law360: … Hawaii will become the first state to impose nexus thresholds for its corporate income tax that match the widely adopted sales tax thresholds stemming from the U.S. Supreme Court's Wayfair decision ….
SB495: Text Status
read … Wayfair
Dysfunctional Maui Liquor Commission Demands NRA Leave Guns at Home
MN: … The Maui County Liquor Commission on Wednesday approved a permit for the King Kamehameha Golf Club in Waikapu to hold a live and silent auction for a Maui Friends of the NRA event featuring only photos of guns that will be up for bid.
Liquor licensee, MMK Maui L.P. doing business as The King Kamehameha Golf Club, requested the approval and said that a Maui police officer will be on duty during the event, which the Friends of the NRA website says is scheduled for Aug. 24.
For the same event last year, commissioners ordered organizers to replace real weapons with pictures after expressing concerns over the possibility of the public getting ahold of the firearms at the auction or while in transit.
At the meeting Wednesday, event chairman Mark Redeker asked that the firearms be allowed on-site. He said that the guns all would be disabled with parts removed to make them inoperable. The group also would work with police to ensure safety. Redeker is a member of the Maui Police Commission, which sets policy for the Maui Police Department.
He noted that having firearms on-site during these types of auctions are common across the nation and that 22,000 of these dinners have been held in the last 30 years.
“There has never been one problem,” he said, adding that Hawaii has had 60 of these events as well….
Meanwhile: Liquor panel finally approves rules changes
read … Friends of NRA event to go on without guns
Soft on Crime: Alleged Burglar Feels Anxiety Because Police Took to Long to Arrest Him—Case Dismissed
TGI: … Charges against Libre-Palacio, 23, stem from an incident on Sept. 14, 2017, when he was arrested for “unauthorized entry into a dwelling,” according to Kauai Police Department arrest logs.
Libre-Palacio was released pending investigation, and court documents do not show any record of his detention or pretrial proceedings in the case until three months later, in December of that year, when prosecutors filed charges in court….
… It had been 19 months since the alleged break-in, a period of time Mendes successfully argued was unreasonable and prejudicial toward Libre-Palacio, causing him to suffer “high anxiety and concern over this case” and depriving him of the right to an adequate legal defense because the charges were based on an incident he could no longer remember the details of….
“There were absolutely no verified attempts to serve the bench warrant,” Mendes wrote in a motion to dismiss the months-old case. “The state’s interests in prosecuting a case in which it took about 16 months to serve a bench warrant are far outweighed by fundamental fairness to the defendant and the orderly functioning of our courts.”
Fifth Circuit Court Judge Kathleen Watanabe ordered the case dismissed with prejudice, meaning prosecutors are barred from filing new charges related to the allegations….
read … Anxiety
Soft on Crime: 64 Time Loser out on Street—Does it Again
TGI: … Kaikane Sherman, 40, of Koloa, was indicted on charges of assaulting a police officer — a class C felony worth up to five years in jail — on May 13. He also faces a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge. Since 1997, 64 cases involving Sherman have worked their way through Kauai’s court system…. (that’s about three per year)
read … Soft on Crime
Get tough, don’t enable panhandlers
WHT: …We listened for the first hour or so about the amazing amount of time, money and effort that goes into bathing, feeding, cleaning up after, and categorizing the homeless. Then we heard about their needs in order to have a place to live the way they want, including putting a village just below one of our two high schools, where they can live without roofs, (they don’t like roofs), live in their cars, and shoplift from their very own mini-mart, all of this without having to make behavioral or conduct changes.
We then heard from a Parks and Recreation manager who explained that 80 percent of his employees’ time is spent cleaning up drug paraphernalia, blood and feces from the parks our kids use. It is disgusting that the parents are asked to walk the fields in order to ensure that there are no needles or human/animal feces that could make the children sick. We were told that there are no vagrancy laws, no public intoxication enforcement or testing, and it is up to law-abiding taxpaying citizens and business owners to monitor, photograph, and document trespassing for over a year and three offenses in order to turn it into a jailable situation, otherwise it remains a misdemeanor.
We were told that drug abusing, alcohol abusing, offensive criminals are citizens, therefore they have rights. What about ours? Do you think this is being ignored because it’s not revenue generating? Like tickets and fines on visitors and residents? Maybe. All I know is if we let this continue there will be no revenue, visitors will not want to come here. Residents will not want to stay here….
read … Get tough, don’t enable panhandlers
Homeless Drug Addicts Digging up Diamond Head
SA: … For several years illegal campers have been disfiguring Diamond Head by digging into its hillside to create large encampments littered with piles of trash and junk. At night, cooking fires appear, which, on one occasion, metastasized into a dangerous brush fire that required containment by the Honolulu Fire Department.
The waste products from the illegal campers pollute the hillside, beaches and surf sites. Parents are afraid to bring their children to Diamond Head for weekend outings. When complaints are made to city officials at neighborhood board meetings, we are told that “sweeps of illegal campers” are made every six months. This is not a solution. Campers who are “swept” out of Diamond Head and other parts of Oahu return after a few days.
Park rangers should be hired who have the power to arrest illegal campers. Nighttime access to the illegal camping areas must be prohibited. City and state officials, Honolulu Police Department, state Department of Land and Natural Resources, the Honolulu Prosecutor’s Office, the courts and the entire community must cooperate and work together. The situation is a major crisis and must be solved through imagination, creativity, hard work and discipline.
We are equipped with the skills, intelligence and determination to accomplish this; we just need political will and leadership. The same issues are occurring in communities and in public places across Oahu….
read … Poor decisions by city put Diamond Head in mortal danger
QUICK HITS: