UHERO: Despite Kakaako, Residential building permits fell last year
PEW: Filipinos Nearly Half of Hawaii Unauthorized Immigrants
Amendments Made to Sex Education and Marijuana Dispensary Bills
April Fools: Council Last Ditch Effort to Sucker Legislators into Raising GE Tax
SA: ...The Honolulu City Council has scheduled a special session for April Fools' Day to consider measures that would signal its support for extending the rail tax, if that's what's needed to complete the island's 20-mile public transit project.
On Wednesday the Council will consider approving on first reading Bill 23, a measure that would remove the Dec. 31, 2022, sunset of Oahu's 0.5 percent surcharge funding most of the project. The bill doesn't specify a new sunset date, but city officials say that detail can be added before the measure gains final approval.
Council Chairman Ernie Martin said he "purposely selected April 1st for the special session as an indication that members will not be fooled again by misrepresentations or insufficient information in our deliberations on these very important issues." (And yet, he is doing exactly that--and asking all of us to pay higher taxes based on HART's 'misrepresentations or insufficient information.')
The Council's special session will take place about two weeks before an April 16 deadline in the state Legislature, when the House and Senate send bills still in consideration back to each other for further review. (Translation: This April Fool's joke won't be finalized unless legislators raise taxes--no political risk for Councilmembers.)
Each of those chambers has a bill in play that would extend the rail tax to help the project climb out of its deep financial hole. However, in their deliberations over such a controversial and politically risky move, state lawmakers have repeatedly questioned why they haven't heard formal support from the Council....
During recent meetings and hearings, lawmakers have pressed rail leaders for more answers on how, in just a matter of months, those officials went from reporting that the project was on budget to facing as much as a $1 billion budget gap.... (Uhhh ... because they are trying to sucker legislators into raising taxes.)
Martin is also recommending a forensic audit of the rail project. (Great idea. Lets do that instead of a tax hike.)
During Wednesday's session the Council will also weigh Resolution 15-7, which would create a deal for rail to eventually borrow hundreds of millions of dollars leveraged against the city's general fund. (Which means no urgency to do the GE Tax hike this year. We can do the audit and push back against HART's overspending.)
read ... Council will weigh rail funding measures Wednesday
Maui state hospitals to cut $28M in jobs, services starting in July
PBN: The Maui Region board of the Hawaii Health Systems Corp. will cut $28 million in services and jobs for the fiscal year beginning July 2015, officials announced Friday.
The region will make cuts to current “non-clinical and non-essential contracts,” and will cut as many as 75 non-clinical administrative positions.
Maui Region CEO Wesley Lo says the cuts will set the hospitals back by 20 years....
The state Legislature is considering a bill this session that would allow the Maui region to enter in an a partnership with a private business, likely to be HPH.
Lo says while there are talks underway, the state Legislature's current budget proposal will not accommodate the system's shortfall.
"If there was legislation passed that allows us a good opportunity to do a private partnership, we’d certainly reevaluate our situation, and if the state could cover some of the costs that have been imposed on us, we’d consider it," Lo said, noting that the public-private partnership has been discussed for three years. "Based on the information we have now, it’s clear the state is saying you don’t have any more money to keep funding this."
read ... Thanks to Randy Perreira
After Ignoring 2009 Report, Sudden Call for HHSC Audit is Union's Latest Trick to Block Hospital Partnership
SA: ...The Hawaii Government Employees Association, the state's largest union, has opposed the creation of a new nonprofit to run those hospitals. The union has about 800 union members working at Maui Memorial, and about 50 more at Kula.
The union supports the audit and told lawmakers they should not consider privatizing state-run hospitals until the audit is complete.
In testimony submitted to lawmakers on the audit proposal, the union argued that "the Legislature must ensure that the HHSC is prudently spending its appropriated funds and must accurately assess the entire system's current financial state."
The House Health Committee approved House Concurrent Resolution 161 on Friday, and the measure now advances to the House Finance Committee for further consideration.
The resolution ordering the audit was co-sponsored by seven of nine House Democrats who voted against the Maui privatization bill on the House floor earlier this month, suggesting opponents of privatization are advancing the audit in lieu of any privatization proposal.
The lawmakers who sponsored the audit resolution — and also voted against the privatization bill — are Reps. Richard Onishi, Ty Cullen, Aaron Johanson, Derek Kawakami, Nicole Lowen, Dee Morikawa and Takashi Ohno.
Dr. Linda Rosen, chief executive officer of Hawaii Health Systems Corp., said HHSC is not objecting to an audit, but she doesn't believe it should delay the Maui initiative.
Rosen cited a Comprehensive Independent Review and Evaluation of HHSC done by Stroudwater Associates in 2009 that was requested by the Legislature, and recommended the system transition to a nonprofit model similar to what is being proposed on Maui.
"So, it's not a new idea and audits have been done, and we're not against an audit, but we believe that the financial situation that HHSC is in today is not something that would be remedied by changes that would be discovered by an audit," Rosen said.
Real Audit Already Done: Legislative Report: Convert HHSC to non-profit, dump civil service (full text)
read ... Obstructionism
Star-Adv: State IT Plan Bogs Down in State Employment Structure
SA: The campaign to bring Hawaii into the 21st century, swapping its clunky computer mainframes for more resilient systems capable of better efficiency and public access, began in 2010. Then-Gov. Neil Abercrombie made a high-profile commitment to modernization, starting with the creation of a new post, the state's first chief information officer (CIO).
But the comprehensive plan that emerged soon ran up against budgetary constraints, and progress slowed. Ige also insisted during the campaign that the plan was superimposed on a state employment structure that didn't accommodate the new job requirements, which meant adoption of the overhauled IT processes would bog down.
It may be that implementing changes one by one will be the more manageable transitional path. The overseeing Office of Information Management & Technology seems to be on board with the approach, too.
Keith DeMello, OIMT's communications manager, said the "legwork" done for the larger transformation plan, which would have consolidated more than 750 old systems into more nimble networks, can inform the new strategic plan being developed.
Comptroller Doug Murdock and the CIO, Keone Kali, are now under orders to extract the pieces of the transformation that can happen sooner rather than later. If they expect to convince the taxpayer that $11 million hasn't gone down the tubes, they'll need to go public with the particulars, and soon.
read ... Unions Keep Us in Middle Ages
Generations of Alleged Thieves Stole from Waianae Homeless Shelter
SA: ...The former program director accused of stealing more than $500,000 from a nonprofit organization that runs a Kalaeloa transitional shelter for homeless people pleaded not guilty to six counts of felony theft in state court Friday.
Laura Pitolo, 37, is scheduled to stand trial in June. She remains free on $50,000 bail.
The state Office of the Public Defender represented Pitolo at Friday's arraignment.
Pitolo was the first person charged with stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from Waianae Community Outreach.
The second is the organization's former executive director, Sophina Placencia. The state attorney general's office filed felony theft charges Monday against the 32-year-old Placencia for allegedly stealing about $200,000 from the group.
Placencia, 32, is scheduled to appear in state court for her arraignment Monday. She also remains free after posting $50,000 bail.
According to state court records, others, including at least one other former employee, could also face theft charges.
On Tuesday the organization, which changed its name last year to Kealahou West Oahu, filed a lawsuit in state court against its former accountant Back Office Solutions for allegedly stealing $192,500. The lawsuit accuses one company employee of pocketing cash from the sale of organization furniture and another employee of drafting and forging a check to herself and using the group's money to purchase tickets on Air New Zealand. The group also filed a lawsuit against Placencia this week....
During the investigation Placencia provided records alleging thefts by Pitolo, including checks Pitolo wrote to her father, her sister and a co-worker. According to court records, the Department of Human Services special investigator said when he examined bank, business and financial records, he discovered that Placencia and her mother, Kanani Bulawan, who preceded her daughter as executive director and founder, may have stolen thousands of dollars from the organization.
According to state court records, the administrative investigation revealed that Pitolo made about $300,000 in ATM cash withdrawals from the group's accounts from December 2007 through May 2010 and wrote checks totaling $160,000 to her father, Pulouoleola Salausa.
Bulawan died in October and Salausa died in 2011.
The investigation also revealed that Placencia used her company debit card to purchase trips to the mainland and neighbor islands in 2009 to 2013, meals at restaurants and nightclubs and to buy a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, court records said. Authorities seized the motorcycle from Placencia's Waianae home in February 2014.
The special investigator also said Placencia transferred into her personal credit union accounts $107,000 from a fundraising account and $34,000 from a payroll account, according to court records. He said Bulawan transferred $12,000 of fundraising money into her personal credit union account in 2010.
During the period when Placencia and Pitolo are alleged to have stolen money from the organization, organization attorney Christy Ho said services to clients continued uninterrupted, even though employees sometimes didn't get their paychecks.
read ... Cross Generational Theft
Four Types of Benefits from NextEra Merger
IM: Consumer Advocate Jeffrey Ono provided a Framework for how one might analyze the proposed acquisition of Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO) by NextEra.
He asserted that there are four types of benefits.
First there are benefits that offer the Status Quo.
Last fall the HECO Companies filed their Power Supply Improvement Plans (“PSIP”). NextEra stated they will support these plans. NextEra will also support the HECO Companies Distributed Generation Interconnection Plan (DGIP) and the HECO Companies Integrated Demand Response Portfolio Plan (IDRPP).....
The second type of benefits are those not yet quantified. That is to say, there are “quantifiable benefits that NextEra ought to be able to put a dollar sign to.”
NextEra asserts that they can buy in bulk and that they have access to lower cost capital. Take the Power Supply Improvement Plans. Suppose that HECO says they can do it for $2 billion. NextEra ought to be able to say we can do it for $2 billion minus X.
The third type of benefits are those that are subject to contingencies beyond the contingency of having the merger approved.
The two most obvious examples are the pledge by NextEra to forego $60 million in the operations and maintenance Rate Adjustment Mechanism (O&M RAM)....
The last type of benefits are those that are not subject to contingencies. There are a number of different types. There can be a one-time payment to ratepayers. There can be money set aside for low income households. There can be Contributions in Aid of Construction (CIAC) made by the parent company....
SA: Battery touted as aid for electricity generation (Because it hasn't caught fire yet.)
read ... The Most Unexpected Energy Conversation
Hawaii Gas reviewing proposals for $300M LNG project
PBN: Hawaii Gas has received proposals from companies to supply the state’s only gas utility with bulk shipments of liquefied natural gas for a project that could cost up to $300 million to develop, a spokesman for the Honolulu-based company told PBN Friday....
Hawaii Gas, a subsidiary of Macquarie Infrastructure Co. (NYSE: MIC), has said that it hopes to begin LNG bulk shipments to the state by 2019 if they receive regulatory approval. It estimates that the use of LNG could save about $110 million annually compared to the cost of oil.
Hawaii Gas’ plan involves having a tanker ship carrying liquefied natural gas cooled to minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit moored off the coast of Oahu, either near Kalaeloa or Pearl Harbor. The gas would be transferred, as a gas, through a pipeline to its plant in West Oahu and then sent through the company’s 1,000 miles of pipeline to customers.
Hawaii Gas officials estimate the cost of the project at between $150 million and $300 million.
The tanker would be owned and operated by another company and would be refilled by supply ships....
read ... $300M
HECO ‘reviewing’ solar applications on Molokai, approvals in question
KHON: For the past five months, the utility has cleared the queue for Maui and the Big Island, and will do the same for Oahu next month, achieving its goal.
But concerns on Molokai increased after utility officials addressed residents in a meeting.
Some customers claimed they were told their applications would not be approved, even after HECO and the Public Utilities Commission agreed approvals would continue.
“Under the rules, Kristine, and the letter that Mr. Oshima and I signed, HECO has an affirmative duty to interconnect unless there are reliability, technical or safety factors,” said PUC chairman Randy Iwase.
“Have you heard of any of those factors yet on Molokai?” KHON2 asked.
“I haven’t heard one way or the other,” he replied.
Iwase and other solar experts say the size of the grid on Molokai is different.
“Molokai is one of the smallest grids on the island, which has an even smaller threshold. That’s why the technical issues are coming up the fastest,” said Chris DeBone of Hawaii Energy Connection.
PBN: 59% Against NextEra merger
read ... Molokai?
Kauai Cracks Down on 319 Illegal B&B Operations -- $10K/Day Fines
KGI: That all changed on March 9 when they received a letter from the County of Kauai, ordering they cease all B&B operations within two weeks and close down their online website. Not doing so, the notice read, would result in up to a $10,000 a day fine.
“We were told in 14 days to shut down our doors and turn all of these people away with nowhere to go except another island — it’s impossible if they can find something at this point during spring break — and how do we pay our bills to continue to exist?” Boilini said. “How would you feel if you lost your job in 14 days? You’d be scrambling, right?”
It’s a similar message that was sent out to 319 other visitor accommodation providers throughout Kauai, who are operating transient vacation rental (TVR), B&B and homestay businesses without the proper permits, county officials said.
These properties, county Planning Director Michael Dahilig said, were identified by county planning and real property division staff from a list of 4,000 vacation rentals on Kauai.
Some of them, he said, were also found on popular online TVR, B&B and homestay websites like Airbnb and VRBO (Vacation Rentals By Owner).
“The department began sending out zoning compliance notices to the owners of illegal short-term rentals last year and are going down the list,” Dahilig wrote in an email.
Though homestay and B&B operators may not need a TVR permit to operate, they do need to have a use permit to operate legally, Dahilig explained.
“I think what is really the issue here is that there are some people who have vacation rentals and are trying to become bed and breakfast (operations) and they’re illegal — by doing that, they’re trying to convert themselves into homestays, and you still need a permit to operate a homestay,” Dahilig said. “And then there are other people on the island who still have homestays, who never got a permit in the first place. So during the process of getting people into compliance, both of them, essentially, get pulled into each other.”
But the common message, he said, is the same in either circumstance.
“The practice of applying for permits has gone on for years,” said Dahilig, who pointed out that there are eight legal bed and breakfast operations on Kauai. “The problem here is that people have an attitude that they don’t want to comply with the law, and that’s what this is.”
Precisely as Explained: Anti-GMO Activism Caused by Illegal TVRs?
read ... Illegal B&B Crackdown
After State Dep't of Agriculture Lets Ag Land go Fallow 7 Years, Family Tries to Farm
KHON: ...A battle is brewing over five acres of land in Waimanalo.
Francine Komomua and her family say they are taking back what belongs to them.
But the state says it will fight them in court, and won the first round Friday. A judge ruled that the state can be allowed on site to see what is going on at the property.
KHON2 first reported the dispute Thursday. One of the concerns is over public health and safety, most importantly the possible accidental spread of the little fire ant, which packs a powerful bite.
But who owns that piece of land?
Heavy machinery is clearing the area of trees and brush for what the family envisions there: a place to farm and raise livestock.
KHON2 asked the family’s spokesman, Austin Lorenzo, how long the family claims the property belongs to them.
“From (King) Kamehameha the first,” said Lorenzo. “So if Kamehameha is my father, then am I entitled to anything of this? That’s the question.”
The family has been on the property for about three weeks. Lorenzo showed KHON2 a deed that says his family has a right to the five acres of land off Waikapunaha Street.
State attorney general Doug Chin says he has seen the deed, which was recorded last June under the name of Francine Komomua. His deputies are reviewing it.
KHON2 asked Lorenzo what the family plans for the property. “Sustainability,” said Lorenzo. “We’re going to grow crops. We’re going to live sustainable.”
KHON2 did some checking and found that the land once belonged to the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. The agency told us it transferred the land to the state Department of Agriculture in 2008....
An infestation was found on the far side of the property.
On Friday, a crew with the state Department of Agriculture went on the property to check on the ant problem, and whether the family had ventured into the area that is still under treatment.
“Frankly, they’ve been cooperative with us,” said Neil Reimer, the plant industry administrator with the Department of Agriculture. “Any of the disturbance, as you can see, is in the front of the property, and that area from all our tests has not been infested. It’s always been in the very back.”
Reimer said he was not familiar with the history of the property.
When asked about the ant infestation in the far side of the property, Lorenzo said, “The ants? Hey, no problem. You can take care of the ants, thank you very much.”
Judge Gary Chang ruled that while the state is to be allowed access to the property this weekend to check on the status of the grubbing and grading of the property, he will call both sides to his courtroom Monday morning.
That’s when he will preside over the state’s request for a temporary restraining order.
Study: Hernando de Soto
read ... Since 2008 No Farming Thanks to DoA
Realities of Bt Cotton in India
KE: We stopped and spoke with a number of farmers, most of them barefoot, who were growing cotton, maize (corn), turmeric and paddy (rice) on five-to-10-acre parcels. We wanted to understand the challenges they're facing, and whether Bt has worked for them.
Like other small farmers in India, they apply pesticides using a backpack sprayer, with no protective clothing or gloves. In the days before Bt cotton, they sometimes sprayed pesticides weekly for the duration of the six-to-eight-month crop, and reported burning eyes, respiratory problems and hospital visits seeking treatment for pesticide exposure.
Since adopting Bt cotton, their spraying has been dramatically reduced, with subsequent improvements in health. Their incomes also have been boosted, due to lower expenditures for pesticides, bigger yields and better quality cotton that fetches a higher price.
A man who has been farming for 30 years said the per-acre value of his production has increased from 2 lakhs (about $3,000) to 30 lakhs (about $48,000) since shifting to Bt cotton, and his health has similarly improved.
Prior to Bt cotton, he was investing $10,000 annually in his cotton crop, for a return of just $7,000. Faced with such ongoing losses, he says he would have shifted out of agriculture and sold his land if Bt cotton had not been introduced....
I couldn't help but contrast the simple existence of these villagers to the comfortable lives enjoyed by anti-GMO activists in Europe and the United States.
And that got me wondering why the activists want to deprive the rural poor of a technology that has greatly reduced their pesticide exposure, improved their quality of life, given them enough money to purchase school uniforms and tuition for their children.
Do they just not know how their anti-GMO activities are playing out in the world's poorest regions? Have they so romanticized subsistence farming that they wish to doom others to endure it forever, while they enjoy every modern convenience and luxury? Are they simply ignorant about the realities of Bt cotton in the field?
Has their demonization of "Monsatan" blinded them to any possible scenario other than the one of pure evil and mass destruction they've envisioned?
Surely, it can't be that their ideology has trumped their decency — or worse, that they just don't care.
read ... Musings: Realities of Bt Cotton
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