Akina For OHA: Stop Nation-Building Effort
Former Execs of Honolulu Rail Supplier Parent Company Get Two Year Prison Term
What Will It Take to Grow GDP? (Part 2)
UPDATE: Hurricane Ana Takes Aim at Kauai
Star-Adv: Ige Can Lead Inouye Gang After Hanabusa Defeat
SA Ige Endorsement Editorial, detourned: Hawaii elections have been seen as an unchanging landscape, but even the most cynical may find that an ill-fitting stereotype, now that political alignments are shifting. (Translation: Dan is dead and his gang does not have a leader.) At the very least, the 2014 gubernatorial race should be viewed through the lens of the state's current challenges, (thru the lens of the Inouye gang's leaderlessness) and which candidate is best positioned to meet them (and since Hanabusa failed, that leaves Ige).
Looking to Nov. 4, Democrat David Ige has emerged as the best choice to fill the state's (Inouye gang's) needs as its next governor.
Hawaii (The Inouye gang) needs a leader who is capable of building consensus (receiving contributions), following through on pledges (patronage) to see that they're carried out properly (at least til 2016 when Hanabusa will try for Senate again).
read ... Thru the Lens of Factional Needs
Shapiro: Ige Campaign Devolves into Shabby Battle of Guilt by Association
Shapiro: The 2014 governor's election, which could shape public policy in Hawaii for the next eight years, has devolved into a shabby battle of guilt by association between the two major-party candidates.
Democrat David Ige and his allies in the party and the Democratic Governors Association have sought at every turn to associate Republican James "Duke" Aiona with Furlough Fridays and other unpopular policies of former Gov. Linda Lingle, to whom Aiona served as lieutenant governor.
Their attacks are peppered with references to the Lingle-Aiona administration, as if the two were equal partners in formulating policy....
When Democrats attack Aiona on Furlough Fridays, they neglect to mention that the public worker unions backing Ige bore as much responsibility as Lingle for the furlough days that disrupted state government and public schools.
The unions pushed for the furloughs over the straight pay cuts Lingle initially sought to balance the state budget during the Great Recession....
read ... Small Ball
Their voters are out there, but will they go to polls?
Borreca: Republicans and Democrats appear to be marching into the closing days of the race for governor with much of the same game plans that have brought Democrats success and Republicans defeat in past years.
The difference is that Democrats must campaign without their go-to motivator: a sitting governor to rally the troops and raise the money.
The absence shows because both former Govs. George Ariyoshi and Ben Cayetano are out campaigning -- but the unpopular and defeated Gov. Neil Abercrombie is ruled out of the equation....
Instead of relying on help from Abercrombie, the Ige campaign is getting major help from the Democratic Governors Association and now the Hawaii State Teachers Association.
The independent expenditure committees are using their television time to hit Aiona's stance on abortion and the arrest of parents staging a sit-in in former Gov. Linda Lingle's office to protest state teacher furloughs.
The tactic is intended to keep women voters engaged in the race and keep them from going over to the Aiona camp....
In a general election that has failed to ignite much passion or even voter interest, expecting fire when there is not even smoke may be too much to ask.
read ... Their voters are out there, but will they go to polls?
Did UPW Hope for Hannemann?
ILind: The immediate question is why (UPW's) endorsement (of Ige) is so late, with the election now just two weeks away.
I would love to know what happened in the union discussion that led to this late endorsement.
For the record, UPW endorsed Mufi Hannemann in both 2010 (for governor) and 2012 (for Congress).
Perhaps Hannemann was the union’s first choice, but they finally came to grips with polls that show he has no chance this time around.
read ... Wondering why the UPW endorsement was made so late
Close Half of Hospitals? HHSC Hospitals Socked with $69M Bill for Retiree Health Insurance
SA: Already on unstable financial footing, Hawaii's public hospitals recently learned they must add millions to their contribution for retired workers' health benefits.
The Hawaii Health Systems Corp.'s network of 12 hospitals must come up with another $69.2 million to fund retiree health insurance costs in fiscal 2016 and 2017.
That brings HHSC's projected deficit to $197.4 million after state appropriations in those two years. In addition to the newly discovered retiree costs, HHSC was already expecting a budget shortfall of $128.2 million in the two years due in part to the state Legislature not appropriating enough to the hospitals to cover expenses, which exceed income.
"To understand the gravity of this, you could probably close half of the HHSC hospitals and you would not erase the deficit," Edward Chu, HHSC's chief financial officer, said in a statement. "To focus on cutting our way to solvency will not only require cuts of unrealistic magnitude, but also hurt the people we are charged to serve, and position us for closure within the next few years."
Background: Act 268 Hawaii Unfunded Liabilities Plan: Pot of Gold for Corrupt Union Leaders
More background: Hospital Reform? Randy Perriera Says "F*** You"
read ... Hawaii Health Systems Corp. must fully fund retiree costs by 2019
Mafia Windfarm Developer in Last Desperate Push for Big Cable
SA: Where wind energy will go in the coming years still remains an open question.
There are about a dozen small-scale wind projects still on dockets before the state Public Utilities Commission, but the essential component that is still lacking is the approval of an undersea cable link between Oahu and neighbor islands....
Paul Gaynor, the Boston-based company's chief executive officer, was in town recently. The First Wind portfolio includes solar projects and plans, such as a 20-MW solar farm proposed on Castle & Cooke Hawaii Inc. land near Mililani. Gaynor acknowledged concerns that approvals by the Public Utilities Commission and other delays may pose problems with financing, given that federal tax credits are due to lapse in 2016....
Federal authorities decided to start over with a new, broader process to analyze energy-efficiency measures and the full spectrum of potential green energy technologies. The result was renamed the Hawaii Clean Energy Programmatic EIS, a draft of which was published in April.
The change in direction includes a reworking of the interisland cable concept, no longer envisioned as a one-way conduit to Oahu but as a connection of the grids....
There are still about a dozen small wind projects that are still in the pipeline, Glick said, but it would take movement on the proposed "grid tie" to enable the development of larger projects in Maui and elsewhere.
Among the entities pushing for utility-scale wind projects is Castle & Cooke, which owns the site on Lanai where such a project has been proposed. In comments filed last month before the PUC about the HECO Power Supply Improvement Plans, Castle & Cooke Hawaii President Harry Saunders said the company was "disappointed that renewable energy from abundant wind resources from neighbor islands was not included."
SA: Smaller wind projects, including a giant kite
Reality: Hawaii Wind Developer tied to Largest-ever asset seizure by anti-Mafia police
read ... Mafia Wind
Maui News: Vote ‘No’ on GMO ban
MN: If GMOs are as potentially harmful as proponents of the Maui County moratorium say, why hasn't the federal government stepped in and banned them? Do the feds expect each of the 3,007 counties in the United States to discover these dangers on their own and act individually against GMOs?
We'd suspect the reason the federal government hasn't acted against GMOs is because it hasn't found any evidence they harm humans. It is irrational to believe the feds have damning proof and simply refuse to act.
So a group of people in Maui County have decided they know better than the feds and have decided a GMO ban is in order. Make no mistake, it may be called a moratorium but the effects of Section 6 of the proposed ordinance make it clear no individual or company can successfully get an amendment or repeal. That makes it a de facto ban.
read ... Vote 'No'
Dude Moves to Maui, Begins Protesting GMOs
HP: Our family moved from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Maui on April 8th of this year (2014). I've written about that move here on the Huffington Post....
I have done the research and haven't been able to find anything like this introduced before here in Maui, so it seems disingenuous to say that this measure, introduced by the voters, is flawed. (That statement demonstrates a complete failure of logic.)
HFD: Slander, Lies, Rants: Are you Proud to Be A SHAKA Anti-GMO Activist?
read ... Politicized Existence
Anti-GMO graffiti being cleaned up by seniors
MN: As the president of the Lahaina-Honolua Senior Citizens' Club, I, along with members of our club and many Lahaina residents, were saddened and distressed to wake up recently to find anti-GMO (genetically modified organism) graffiti spray-painted on trees, telephone poles and stores - even on a tree in Banyan Tree Park.
On Oct. 5, under the hot Lahaina sun, a group of our seniors with wire brushes in hand removed these anti-GMO graffiti signs. Visitors were impressed to see us old folks working so hard to keep our historic town free from graffiti. One New York tourist even took one of our brushes and helped us scrape off the graffiti from one of the utility poles.
Until the SHAKA Movement campaign issued a back-door and weak acknowledgment (Letters, Oct. 5) that its followers had been the guilty parties, we were being called to task in social media as the real perpetrators trying to make SHAKA look bad. Seventy-, 80-, 90-year-old-plus seniors - imagine that.
This is not the only negative activity we have experienced in Lahaina and elsewhere. In addition to vandalizing public and private property, large numbers of campaign signs of "Vote No on the Maui Initiative" and supportive council candidates signs have been vandalized.
We hope the people who continue to deface our historic town of Lahaina will cease this type of negative activity.
read ... Anti-GMO Graffiti
Mainland Eco-Hypesters Push for More Restrictions on Hawaii Fishermen
SA: "Drowning and injuring this many turtles, whales and seabirds month after month is unacceptable," Todd Steiner, a biologist and executive director of the California-based Turtle Island Restoration Network, said in a statement Thursday. The marine conservation group says it has more than 150,000 members and "online activists" around the world.
"If the fishery cannot do a better job of reducing harm to sea turtles and whales, we will push for new limitations on (its) fishing effort," Steiner said.
read ... Eco-Hype
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