July 7, 1898: Hawaii Republic Annexed by USA
For Act 201 to Work, Replace Office of Youth Services Executive Director
Winer Paid $149K for 2012 Smear Campaign
PR: Winer, who advised PRP on several political campaigns that year, reported $131,258 in consulting fees from the group on his U.S. Senate financial disclosure statement.
Winer also listed $18,000 in consulting fees from the Democratic Party of Hawaii, where he helped with get-out-the-vote strategies.
Winer advised U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono's campaign in 2012...he is now chief-of-staff to U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz
read ... Chief of Schatz
Hawaii Prepaid Act Boosts Part-Time Work 1.4%
BDN: The 2.3 million workers identified as at greatest risk for work hour reduction represent 1.8 percent of the United States workforce. This is consistent with the research on the impact of Hawaii’s health care law on work hours. Hawaii requires firms to provide health insurance to employees working 20 hours a week or more, so the cost to employers for full-time workers are much greater in Hawaii than under the ACA, while the hour threshold is lower. Buchmueller, DiNardo and Valetta (2011) found a 1.4 percentage point increase in the share of employees working less than 20 hours a week as a result of the law. In Massachusetts, where the employer penalty is smaller than in the ACA ($295 per year), there was no evidence of a disproportionate shift towards part-time work compared to the rest of the nation.
read ... Part Time
Hawaii Ranks #5 in Cigarette Taxes
TF: ... at $3.20 a pack ....
SA: State should raise age to buy tobacco
read ... Hawaii Ranks #5 in Cigarette Taxes
Fisheries council: Obama Sanctuary Endangers American Fishing Industry
SA: ...council members, reacting to Obama's June 17 announcement, said the areas proposed for expansion are critical to U.S. fisheries, including waters surrounding Palmyra, where Hawaii longliners sometimes catch 12 percent to 15 percent of their fish, including bigeye tuna.
Researchers say it could also crimp American purse-seine fleet fishing at Howland, Baker and Jarvis islands, reducing the catch brought in to American Samoa's fish processing plants and forcing U.S. fishing ships to pay foreign governments for fishing rights elsewhere.
Council Chairman Arnold Palacios, who also serves as natural resources secretary for the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas, said the United States has failed to live up to promises of supporting enforcement of fishing laws enacted six years ago with the Pacific Remote Islands Monument.
Palacios said his government already struggles to enforce protection of these fishing areas within a 50-mile radius.
Expanding it to 200 miles would be "very disconcerting," said Palacios.
Council member Ruth Matagi Tofiga, American Samoa marine resource director, said expanding the no-fishing zone is going to place a burden on her government.
"It's disheartening," she said. "Our ocean is our livelihood."
read ... Fisheries council members criticize sanctuary growth plan
Elder Abuse Cases Triple
KITV: Fake lottery and sweepstakes top the list of scams targeting Hawaii's seniors.
They are just some of the many designed by criminals to cash in on the vulnerability, trust or loneliness of our elderly.
The scams are nothing new, but what has changed is the number of elder abuse cases.
"They're dramatically going up," stated Spallina.
In the past six years, the prosecutors office has seen a 300 percent increase in reported crimes, including rising numbers for financial, property and violent crimes.
It is believed that many other times, the crimes are not reported.
"The elder is scared to report. For one reason they fear retaliation when it comes to violent crime.
CB: Elder fraud can strike families that least expect it
read ... Elder abuse tarnishes senior's golden years
Is UH Doing Its Part to Combat Sexual Assaults on Campus?
CB: ...One administrator even emailed this note to residence staff, including the victim, shortly after the incident: “I wanted to let you know that (the perpetrator) is doing fine and we appreciate you giving him privacy over the last few weeks.”
The email, a copy of which was included in the reports, then went on to explain that he would transfer to another building but keep his job as a resident advisor: “(The perpetrator) and I ask that you continue to respect his privacy and wish him well as he transitions into a new area/community. You are all friends, so please continue to be friends!”
The school found the perpetrator responsible in an internal decision issued in November 2010, a month after the incident. But the man, according to the counselor’s reports, was still living in the dorms that December. And administrators didn’t give the victim a letter detailing the decision until January 2011 — after her third request for the document, according to the reports.
The case was adjudicated internally by the Housing Department and never brought to the attention of the Honolulu Police Department or another legal authority. University policy requires that UH advise and encourage victims to file charges with law enforcement, but it is ultimately the victim’s choice whether or not to reach out to police or campus security; the university doesn’t automatically do so.
The counselor’s reports suggest that the woman was never apprised of these rights.
read ... Is UH Doing Its Part to Combat Sexual Assaults on Campus?
Hawaii Among 'Loosest' States in USA
MJ: It is obvious to anyone who has traveled around the United States that cultural assumptions, behaviors, and norms vary widely. We all know, for instance, that the South is more politically conservative than the Northeast. And we at least vaguely assume that this is rooted in different outlooks on life.
But why do these different outlooks exist, and correspond so closely to different regions? In a paper recently published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (and discussed more here), psychologists Jesse R. Harrington and Michele J. Gelfand of the University of Maryland propose a sweeping theory to explain this phenomenon. Call it the theory of "tightness-looseness": The researchers show, through analysis of anything from numbers of police per capita to the availability of booze, that some US states are far more "tight"—meaning that they "have many strongly enforced rules and little tolerance for deviance." Others, meanwhile, are more "loose," meaning that they "have few strongly enforced rules and greater tolerance for deviance."
The ten tightest states? Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Louisiana, Kentucky, South Carolina, and North Carolina. The ten loosest, meanwhile, are California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Hawaii, New Hampshire, and Vermont. (Notice a pattern here?)
Harrington and Gelfand measure a state's tightness or looseness based on indicators such as the legality of corporal punishment in schools, the general severity of legal sentences, access to alcohol and availability of civil unions, level of religiosity, and the percent of the population that is foreign. But really, that's just the beginning of their analysis. After identifying which states are "tighter" and which are more "loose," the researchers then trace these different outlooks to a range of ecological or historical factors in the states' pasts (and in many cases, lingering into their presents). For as the authors write, tighter societies generally have had to deal with "a greater number of ecological and historical threats, including fewer natural resources, more natural disasters, a greater incidence of territorial threat, higher population density, and greater pathogen prevalence."
read ... Hang Loose
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