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Tuesday, September 3, 2013
September 3, 2013 News Read
By Andrew Walden @ 4:40 PM :: 4156 Views

Hawaii Unfunded Pension Liability Nears $27B, Your Share: $19,357

Back on track? HI public works project to restart after year-long delay

State Paying Xerox $54M to Check Obamacare EHR Fraud

Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Reserve seeks council applicants

Privacy? State DoH to "Monitor Public Health" with Electronic Health Records

SA: Castle Medical Center and Hawaii Pacific Health — parent company for Kapiolani Medical Center for Women & Children, Pali Momi Medical Center, Straub Clinic & Hospital and Wilcox Health — have signed on to share patient clinical records through Hawaii Health Information Exchange's secure online system known as Health eNet....

"The next 12 months is a very critical year for us," Sakuda said, adding that the organization also plans to connect the major laboratories as well as Hilo Medical Center, the first public hospital. "The technology is the easy part. The challenging part is building trust among stakeholders to share that information and to govern the data appropriately."

The system will "go live" in November, allowing providers to share patient data and physicians to access basic health information such as medical histories, lab results and prescribed medications. The initiative also will help the state Department of Health to better monitor public health issues, including infectious diseases that could affect the population.

"The quality of care will improve and costs will be reduced because doctors won't need to reorder diagnostic tests to get information that would be otherwise sitting, inaccessible, at another location," said Steve Robertson, HPH executive vice president and chief information officer.

read ... EHRs

Geothemal Co Confident in OHA Deal with Convicted Fraudster 

ILind: The cash-for-equity swap was noted in a letter received yesterday from Eastland’s CEO, Matt Todd.

Regarding the secured loan from Eastland Group to IDG alluded to in your blog: you are probably not aware that we have formalized our partnership with IDG and that the secured loan has been converted into equity in our geothermal partnership with IDG in Hawaii.

Todd touts the significant role of geothermal in New Zealand’s energy landscape, and expresses confidence in his company’s working relationship with IDG.

Todd also says the company was fully informed of IDG founder Roberta Cabral’s prior convictions on tax and wire fraud charges.

“They do not in any way diminish our confidence in her or in the IDG team,” Todd wrote.

Background: After Receiving Campaign Cash, OHA Trustees Give $1.25M to Insolvent Geothermal Company

read ... About Why your Electric Bill is so High

ABC: Hawaii is #2 in Gas Taxes

ABC: 2. Hawaii -- Gas in America's island paradise is taxed at the state level of 17 cents per gallon. Hawaii also collects sales taxes and an environmental response tax on the fuel (totaling 69 cents per gallon).

read ... We're #2 we try harder

Hawaii is #2 in Solar Credits

NW: Hawaii almost has it all. As one would expect, the sun shines brightly over the islands given their proximity to the equator. It also has the most expensive electricity costs (36 cents per kilowatt hour). The combination of these factors suggests Hawaiians could save a great deal by switching to solar. Currently, Hawaiians installing PV solar panels can receive a 35% state tax credit (35% of the installation costs or a $5,000 credit) in addition to the national 30% personal tax credit, but no rebates or grants are in place to offset immediate installation costs. Solar leasing is available in Hawaii.

read ... Taxpayer giveaway

CBS: Hawaii Ranks 6th in Pension Debt

CBS: What may come as a surprise to many municipal bond investors is that California is not the state with the biggest problems. If you thought Greece had problems with its debt to GDP ratio of well over 100 percent, Illinois is in another league entirely with its ratio of 241 percent -- even worse than Puerto Rico's 234 percent. Looking at other financial indicators presents a similar picture. When ranking: by ANPL to personal income, Illinois is the second worst state (23.6 percent); by ANPL to GNP it's also second worst (19.8 percent); and by ANPL per capita it's third worst ($10,340). Note: Alaska was the worst in all three of those categories though its ANPL to revenue ratio is about 55 percent, putting it just 10 percent above the median.

California isn't far behind Illinois with an ANPL ratio of 190 percent. Seven more states had ratios above 100 percent -- Kentucky (141), New Jersey (137 percent), Hawaii (132 percent), Louisiana (130 percent), Colorado (118 percent), Pennsylvania (105 percent) and Massachusetts (100 percent). Three more states, Maryland, Texas and Rhode Island, were above 90 percent.

On the other end of the spectrum was Nebraska, with a ratio of less than 7 percent. Eight states had ratios below 20 percent (Wisconsin, Idaho, Iowa, New York, North Carolina, Florida, Tennessee, and Ohio).

read ... The world of state pension obligations

Spend Billions to Hook Up a Few More Solar Panels

Borreca:  Morita said that in Hawaii, "the whole energy system is undergoing a huge transformation."

She explained that for the last 10 years, the concern has been on making clean energy: solar or wind energy. Now that is changing.

"We are in Clean Energy 2.0, and instead of looking at it on a project-by-project basis, we are talking about the entire system and how the entire system is integrated," Morita said.

Henry Curtis, Life of the Land executive director, said the Public Utilities Commission "currently has more on its plate than ever before, and some of the issues are vastly complex, with the potential of very significant unintended side effects."

Lorraine Akiba, a PUC commissioner, said the search now is for "a different type of electrical system."

"Transmission and distribution may not be like the 1950s," said Akiba, an attorney and former member of Gov. Ben Cayetano's Cabinet. "It may not be the lines- and-plant model. There are micro-grids, distributed generation.

"There is change to the system as a whole; it is almost like this is an ecosystem of energy," Akiba added.

All those solar panels on rooftops are "distributed energy."

Folding distributed energy into the system is becoming a big issue, Morita and Akiba said.

Next up is the smart grid.

read ... PUC must lead the way to Hawaii's energy future

Act221 Scammers Demand we give them Billions for 'Climate Change'

Fidell: Act 286 was enacted last year, calling for climate change adaptation guidelines that would apply to every project in the state, but nobody can tell us that it has yet been applied to any given project, including those in low-lying Kakaako. Are the agencies even aware that such guidelines exist?

Do we have the political will to put this issue at the top of the list and spend the billions to deal with it? .... (And we Act 221 scammers can come up with new scams for you to spend those billions on.)

We need a full-court press in the Capitol and counties. Our leaders must find the funds, with all necessary tax increases, and we must make them do all the things that have to be done.

This is Hawaii's greatest test. If we can't do this, the natural disasters that are in store for us will wreck everything....The 2014 Legislature will be a good time to work on this.

read ... Tax Hikes Coming

Revolving Door between Journalism, Politics

CB: Hawaii has certainly seen many a reporter, editor, anchor or news producer leave journalism for a career in PR. They include Mahealani Richardson, who left KITV last month to handle communications at Shriners Hospital for Children; and Robbie Dingeman, a former print and TV reporter who now works for Ulupono Initiative, a sustainability-focused organization funded by Pierre Omidyar, publisher of Civil Beat.

Many journalists also go into government-related service, and the list includes Peter Boylan, Jesse Broder Van Dyke, Donalyn Dela Cruz, Lynne Waters, Jodi Leong, Jeanne Mariani-Belding, Rod Antone, Scott Ishikawa, Bill Brennan, Tina Shelton, Cedric Yamanaka, Louise Kim McCoy and Dan Meisenthal.

Kelli Abe Trifonovitch, Sean Hao, Greg Wiles and David Choo later worked at the Office of State Auditor. Garett Kamemoto and Harold Nedd went to work for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Jim McCoy and Barbara Tanabe, former journalists, run a PR firm that handles a lot of political clients. Former TV reporter Elisa Yadao, an executive at HMSA, often helps out campaigns at election time.

read ... Journos, Flacks and Hacks

State RN's Are Arbitration Bound — Again!

CB: The Hawaii Government Employees Association (HGEA) informed State RN's that HGEA & the Hawaii State government have reached impasse in negotiations over the collective bargaining agreement for Unit 09 which expired on June 30, 2013....

Back in 2011 the news was not any different and I fear the results will be appallingly the same. The State RN’s attorney, accountant, and economist proved that a 32 percent deficit existed between Private Hospital RN’s and State RN’s pay and benefits.

The arbitration panel, after nearly two years, awarded the State RN’s an 8 percent raise with a warning, “This arbitration decision objectively presents the facts of the situation, and recognizes that wages for registered nurses in the public hospital system are woefully lagging — The neutral arbitrator clearly determined the state couldn’t justify the glaring pay disparity.”...

Abercrombie will allow the State Legislature a 25 percent pay raise in January 2014 without a concern; and State RN's, he will keep them fearful of big cuts in wages and benefits blaming them for “high labor costs.”

Abercrombie will make State RN's endure another 2 years of arbitration, and give them more reasons to leave the State system and seek work elsewhere; then he can pay the newly hired State RN's even less.

Does this sound like a good plan for Healthcare in Hawaii?

(Sounds like an argument for a decertification election: http://www.hawaiinurses.org/)

read ... Inferior HGEA Representation

Student Absenteeism Highest in Poor, Rural Hawaii Schools

CB: ...chronic absenteeism was concentrated in schools on Oahu’s Waianae Coast and the Big Island’s eastern corridor, namely Keaau and Naalehu....

read ... Statewide Absenteeism Map

Teachers, students to rally for air conditioners in public schools

HNN: "Without air-conditioning, classroom temperatures can reach up to 95 degrees," said Brandy Davis, a French teacher at Campbell High School. "The extremely hot environment is debilitating and students have a difficult time concentrating and often perform poorly due to the discomfort of the heat."...

The rally is planned for September 26, 2013.

read ... No AC

What's causing the big stink in Kakaako?

HNN: ...When Hawaii News Now first reported last month about complaints of sewage odors by Kakaako residents, the city blamed the problem on a design flaw at a luxury high rise where many of the complaining residents live.

But since then, we have learned that city contractors have been pumping sewage debris and odors out of an aging sewer line for months, and the residents say that's the reason behind the smells....

The pumping trucks belong to subcontractors working for the city on an $11.4 million sewer rehabilitation project near the corner of Auahi and Keawe Streets.

Contractor Frank Coluccio Construction is replacing nearly 2,000 feet of sewer lines with six-inch pipes. The old sewer line is not a traditional cast-iron sewer pipe but is a six-foot by six-foot underground sewage tunnel that's encased in concrete.

The 57-year-old tunnel carries about 16 million gallons a day of sewage from over 35,000 properties and needed to be replaced because it was in poor structural condition....

Residents at One Waterfront Tower say the pump trucks prove that there's not enough sewage capacity in the neighborhood to handle all of the new construction headed for Kakaako.

Nearly 30 new developments are planned for Kakaako over the next 20 years, which is expected to add more than 10,000 residents to the area.

read ... Big Stink

Creepy Allegations at Prison Nurse's Office

CN: A former inmate claims that a prison guard in Hawaii drugged and molested her and took photos of it....Lana claims that "at least one of the photographs of her and nude photographs of other inmates were recovered from defendant Melchor's telephone by law enforcement authorities."

read ... Creep?

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