Efforts to divide Hawaiians from non-Hawaiians
Tribe Bribe: OHA Payoffs to Sovereignty Activists
Veterans Affairs audit exposes Hawaii’s ‘infuriating’ wait list
Paychecks Hawaii Ratings of the 2014 Legislature
Ernie Martin Thrilled as Council Vote Returns City to Ewa Villages Days
SA: Because the $32 million infusion will come from general obligation bonds, Caldwell told reporters at a news conference Wednesday, the city will be borrowing money for projects it must purchase in whole or develop itself...."That's about $54 million that we're all going to be paying to get $32 million worth of CIP money to spend"....
"CIP (capital improvement project) money can only be used for rehabbing of existing units, purchasing of buildings or units, or building units," the mayor said. "While we appreciate the money, it's going to take a little bit longer to do."
What's more, Caldwell said, "Twenty years ago the City and County of Honolulu was in the housing business — remember Ewa Villages and those kinds of programs? And we got out of the business. We have now been put smack-dab into the business with this $32 million."
The mayor was referring to the Ewa Villages scandal, in which a former city housing official was imprisoned after being found guilty of stealing $5.8 million from a relocation fund to help displaced residents of the subdivision. Oahu voters eliminated the city housing agency in 1998, but in 2010 approved a charter amendment that created a new, smaller Office of Housing....
"If I was the mayor, sitting in his chair, I would be walking downstairs to shake the hand of every Council member and thanking them for giving him more than he had asked for," Council Chairman Ernie Martin said Tuesday.
2011: Resignation call after Audit reveals “ward heeler’s slush fund” overseen by Honolulu Councilman Ernie Martin
read ... Martin Thrilled with Opportunity
Abercrombie Campaign: "Sen. Ige can't add"
KITV: "The budget bill has a column, you add it up," said a clearly annoyed Abercrombie. (You know how he sounds when he is annoyed.) "The bond authorization bill has a column, you add it up. They're supposed to match. They didn't." ...
On Tuesday, Abercrombie's campaign manager Bill Kaneko issued a statement saying the legislature's budget gaffe falls directly on Ige.
"Sen. Ige can't add," said Kaneko. "As chair of the Senate money committee, he was responsible for the $46 million budget discrepancy. This is a significant error that could jeopardize the State's operations and expenditures." ....
Sen. Sam Slom, the only Republican in the Senate, said lawmakers in both chambers were well aware of the need to reauthorize $399 million in DOE construction funds. Slom holds no allegiances to either Abercrombie or Ige and plans on voting for fellow Republican Duke Aiona in the governor's race.
"We were all aware," Slom said of issues with the budget. "I was the only one in the legislature that spoke out and voted against it, and what I said at the time was there are unconstitutional provisions here."
read ... Abercrombie and Ige spar over budget blunder
Perreira: Dump EUTF, Bring Back Corrupt Union Health Plans
CB: “In my view, the EUTF is something of a failed experiment,” said Randy Perreira, the head of the state’s largest public-worker union, the 44,000-member Hawaii Government Employees Association.
Pre-2000, the unions were allowed to offer health plans that effectively competed with the plans the state was offering, he said.
“We felt that was a good thing because that competition … was intended to ensure that there would be some balance and really some sanity to the cost of healthcare for the employers, i.e. for the taxpayers,” Perreira said.
But legislators felt the state could control cost more if they eliminated the union plans and forced everyone that was interested into a state-sponsored plan....
Another factor that will affect future OPEB costs is the outcome of two pending class-action lawsuits working their way slowly through the courts — one filed by government retirees eight years ago and the other by teachers in 2010. Both challenged the disparity between the types and cost of insurance coverage offered to retirees and active employees.
Reality: Act 268 Hawaii Unfunded Liabilities Plan: Pot of Gold for Corrupt Union Leaders
read ... The Health Fund’s Quest for Solvency
No Eco-Lawyers in Sight as Cooke, Kamehameha, Hughes Divvy up Kakaako
CB: The Hawaii Community Development Authority has approved two more mid-rise developments by Kamehameha Schools and Castle and Cooke Homes Hawaii in Kakaako that would add 183 more residential units....
The plan was initially opposed by some residents of neighboring One Waterfront Towers who were upset about the inclusion of a 65-foot, 164-stall parking structure, which exceeds the 45-foot limit and will block some of their views....
Sharon Moriwaki from Kakaako United said she initially filed as an intervener to oppose the project on behalf of residents of One Waterfront Towers but later withdrew because the process was “overwhelming and you have to hire an attorney.”
She said she’s not surprised the project passed with the height exemption.
“They pick and choose their rules,” Moriwaki said.
read ... Where are all the Usual Eco-Lawyers? They are all supporting this scheme!
Galuteria: OHA Roll Signers Need to Vote for me Because I am Toast After Opposing the Community on Kakaako Makai
SA: Recent public discussion on the issue of nation building has missed the bigger picture of how creating "one voice" for Native Hawaiians will affect Hawaii politics.
Let's put it into perspective: More than 125,000 Native Hawaiians are listed on the Native Hawaiian Roll, and out of this number, more than 100,000 live in Hawaii. Many suggest that 65 percent of them are registered voters. What does this mean?
This means that a movement toward greater political influence by Native Hawaiians is imminent. This means that Native Hawaiians will have an impact of political consequence, affecting all aspects of life in Hawaii.
By conservative estimates, even if only half of the Roll engages as "one voice," it outnumbers some of the largest political entities currently in play. As a sitting state senator, it is clear to me that the sheer numbers of civically engaged Hawaiians will impact state policy, not only for Hawaiians, but for all people of Hawaii. To realize this substantial political sway, we must stand together and seize the moment. He waiwai nui ka lokahi … unity is our most precious possession.
Suggestions have been made to extend the process by six to nine months for more education. To be fair and factual, the Kana‘iolowalu campaign was launched on July 20, 2012 — that's almost two years of active list enrollment, public education and awareness initiatives. There is more than enough information out there for people to learn and understand.
For too many years, we have been a people divided by varying visions of self-governance.
Reality: Sovereignty = OHA Can Build Anything it wants on Kakaako Makai
read ... Brickwood hopes they will save him this November
Yukimura: Keep Kauai Jammed
SA: On Kauai, we have clearly outgrown the state highway system of mainly two-lane roads. We need to expand its capacity. Widening existing highways and building bypasses — the conventional wisdom — will not work ....
(The rest of the column is a bunch of excuses for not building more lanes. Who is dumb enough to be fooled?)
read ... Keep Kauai Jammed
Rep. Bob McDermott Says ‘Pono Choices’ Is Dead
CB: Initially, the program was targeted at all middle school students — unless their parents took action to get them excused. But changes announced last week by the state Department of Education mean that parents will now have to opt their children into the program....
“I think Pono Choices is dead,” McDermott said at a Sept. 10 press conference at the State Capitol. “We have effectively stinkified it where no parent will want to sign their kids up for it.”
Though the medical inaccuracy was corrected, he remains dissatisfied with Pono Choices. He contends that the program remains inappropriate for middle school children and that the curriculum does not teach students to respond to potential sexual abuse from adults.
He said that the program is still not fit for preteens, noting that the DOE “didn’t include a predator protection module.”
McDermott plans to write his own report, inspired by the findings of the working group — a “rebuttal” of sorts — that he expects to make public by the end of the summer.
SA: Pono Choices opt-in considered 'victory for parents'
read ... Rep. Bob McDermott Says ‘Pono Choices’ Is Dead
Students Flee Tranny's School, Teachers Stiffed on Pay
KHON: The Hawaii State Teachers Association says teachers at Halau Lokahi Charter School (employer of tranny hula teacher & OHA candidate) did not get paid last payday, and were only paid about half their salary in the previous paycheck. When the teachers’ union asked the school why, the principal said the school has run out of money.
Now, there’s a possibility that the school will shut down.
KHON2 spoke with Tom Hutton, executive director of the Charter School Commission, who said that the school was basically operating well beyond its budget and has now dug itself a financial hole of up to $400,000.
While Halau Lokahi on Waiakamilo Rd. has been around for 14 years, in the last few years, Hutton says the school has been unable to pay its bills by the end of the school year, so it uses money for the following year.
“So by paying back the previous year’s funding out of the current year’s funding, this year it caught up to them,” Hutton said.
Hutton said the school is now bankrupt and can’t pay its rent, staff and other bills, so he will recommend to the commission that the school shut down.
“The optimal outcome for everybody would be for the governing board to voluntarily close the school,” he said. “It’s in the best interest for the students and families to know their situations and figure out their options for the coming year.”
Hutton said funding was also cut short because of a drop in enrollment. There were 50 fewer students in the past school year and charter schools get $6,000 in funding per student from the state. That drop in enrollment amounts to a $300,000 cut in the school’s budget.
Both Hutton and the teachers’ union say the school should have done something to offset that. They blame the principal and the governing board, which manages the budget....
The governing board will meet with the Charter School Commission on Thursday to discuss what should be done.
SA: The charter school's academic performance falls well below statewide averages on state assessments.
Tranny to Run for OHA Trustee: The transgender chair of the Oahu Island Burial Council has announced a run for office. Hinaleimoana Wong-Kalu is running for an at-large seat with the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Wong-Kalu is also the director of culture at the Halau Lokahi Public Charter School.
read ... Just like the Elected BoE
Tranny Sues, Demands Right to Use Women's Room
KHON: Mr Kelli Keawe, an office assistant with the Dept. of Public Safety, sued the state alleging discrimination for physically being a man but identifying as a woman....
In her his case, being treated differently meant being allowed to use just one restroom in the building and banned from the others.
“It was difficult, humiliating, retaliating,” she (sic) said.
Keawe filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and sued the state.
“If you don’t want to go in the restroom, then don’t go, but don’t call her (sic) mister when it’s obvious that’s not what her (sic) choice is,” said Keawe’s attorney, Michael Green (bizarrely asserting that gender is a 'choice' rather than an inborn and immutable characteristic. Do law students have to study any biology to get a JD?) “It was important to do this to protect her (sic) rights and protect the rights of other transgender people.”
As for whose side the law is on, in Keawe’s case, Green says “she (sic) can use the women’s restroom and I think the law inferentially suggests, from what the governor has said (women everywhere thank Abercrombie for letting trannies into their restrooms) and what many people say, she (sic) can use the women’s bathroom.”
Best Comment: "So if a man thinks he is a woman, then the rest of society is supposed to believe the delusion?"
read ... Political Correctness gone nuts
MRC Greenwood Retires 'to Remain on the Mainland'
PBN: M.R.C. Greenwood, who stepped down from her post as president of the University of Hawaii system last year to return to a faculty position at the medical school, has told university officials that she will retire at the end of this month, the university said Tuesday.
Greenwood, who stepped down Aug. 31 after four years leading the state university system, was to have returned to a tenured faculty position paying a salary of $293,640 at the John A. Burns School of Medicine after a yearlong unpaid leave of absence. Instead, she will retire from the university, effective June 30.
She said in a statement Tuesday that after “a period of rest and reflection, I have decided that I wish to pursue my writing and policy interests and that I prefer to remain on the Mainland to do so.”
read ... Remain on the Mainland
Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant not in Appropriations Bill
CB: Hanabusa spoke on the House floor to ask the Appropriations Committee to reinstate funding for the Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant.
The grant helps low-income Native Hawaiian families with “down payment assistance, direct loans for first-time home buyers, and infrastructure development,” according to Hanabusa’s office....
“A disruption to the stream of funding for NHHBG would have a dire impact on dozens of on-going development projects, including alternative energy resources for homes, investments in infrastructures, and low-interest rate loans that seek to benefit the thousands of families living on Hawaiian home lands,” she said.
read ... Too Busy trying to create a tribe?
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