Full Text: After Two Months, OHA Coughs up Check Register
Hawaiian Activists Reject OHA Telescope Protests
ILind: State land board member Chris Yuen made the motion during Friday’s extended meeting to approve a set of emergency rules that will at least temporarily restrict activities on Mauna Kea, according to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.
According to the Star-Advertiser:
“We need the tools to keep order on the mountain,” said board member Chris Yuen, who made the motion to approve the rule. “It’s sad that it has come to this point.”
So Yuen, an attorney and a Big Island resident, was the one who made the motion.
Yuen, who has served as Hawaii County planning director, has a long history of activism, and in recent years had added farming to his resume.
I can attest to the activism. I think that I may have first met Yuen when we were both among a group of supporters arrested during a 1974 protest by Sonny Kaniho against lease policies of the Department of Hawaiian Homes that appeared to favor large private landholders over individual Hawaiians in the award of ranch leases.
Given his personal history, I would expect that Yuen is quite sympathetic to the protests. But that sympathy has limits, it appears.
Following the land board vote, the Hawaii Tribune-Herald reported additional evidence of a division among Hawaiians:
The leader of the state’s Aha Moku Advisory Committee — which promotes traditional Hawaiian land stewardship — referred to the Thirty Meter Telescope protesters on Mauna Kea as “unreasonable” and consisting of “hordes of outsiders” in an email to a Department of Land and Natural Resources administrator.
Leimana DaMate’s internal correspondence obtained by the Tribune-Herald, dated June 23, was in response to reports of protesters building ahu, or stone altars, at the TMT construction site.
“Unfortunate and sad!” she wrote to Sam Lemmo, DLNR’s Conservation and Coastal Lands administrator.
DeMate is the executive director of the advisory council.
Referring to the Mauna Kea protesters, Demate wrote in her email: “They are mahaoi!” The term translates as “impertinent, insolent, rude, presumptuous.” ...
VIDEO: Kahu Ku Mauna Not Consulted, Member Says
read ... Divisions
Woman arrested for allegedly crashing car into Office of Mauna Kea Management vehicle
HNN: A woman is under arrest for allegedly crashing her car into a vehicle owned by the Office of Mauna Kea Management (OMKM).
The incident occurred at 2:30 a.m. after the woman allegedly got into an argument with a ranger and two sheriffs who would not let her ascend the mountain.
read ... 230AM
Pimp Escapes Justice Thanks to Bumbling Honolulu Prosecutor
SA: In 2013 Duncan was arrested for solicitation at a Waikiki hotel after agreeing to have sex with an undercover officer for money. Police used legal leverage to get her to implicate her alleged pimp but then took almost a month to arrest him. The case dragged on even after she provided grand jury testimony and he was charged.
"I wasn't allowed to leave Hawaii. They wouldn't let me go with my parents to Alaska," Duncan said. "They delayed the case a lot. I remember wanting so badly for it to be over. They were using me to put someone else away. I was scared."
Ultimately, the case of the second man accused of trafficking Duncan was dismissed this year because prosecutors failed to try the case within the time allotted for a fair trial.
"They lost evidence, and one of their collaborating witnesses disappeared," said Kathy Xian, executive director of the Pacific Alliance to Stop Slavery, which helped hide Duncan and paid for her rent and food....
read ... Prosecutorial Delay
The Care Act of 2015 Marks the Return of ‘Death Panels’
CB: Doctors familiar with the expense of extreme efforts to save terminal patients should encourage their patients to express their will before it’s too late so that insurance companies can save money.... And because we mocked you for exposing 'Death Panels' we can now speak of this openly with impunity. See how that works? ....
read ... The Care Act of 2015 Marks the Return of ‘Death Panels’
MMMC Cardiac Center Falls Far Short of projections
SA: ...In 2007, arguing that high-end surgical procedures would generate more income as well as improve the likelihood of a healthier recovery for stroke patients, Maui Memorial received a state certificate of need allowing it to offer expanded cardiac services, including angioplasty and open-heart surgery.
(This was a key part of MMMC's campaign to block construction of a second hospital on Maui.)
The hospital, hoping to attract patients who went to Oahu for cardiac services, projected that by the third year of its new operation, it would have completed an estimated 194 open-heart surgeries and 450 intervention procedures.
Hospital officials planned to hire more than 20 additional employees, including surgeons and nurses, and it projected making a $9.5 million profit from the cardiac surgeries alone.
In the certificate of need proposal in 2006 for expanding cardiac services, the hospital said it needed $1.5 million in equipment and that it did not expect to incur any capital costs.
Since 2009, when its first cardiac surgeries and procedures began, it has never met its projections, hospital figures show.
Maui Memorial projected that in 2009 it would conduct 194 cardiac surgeries. It had nine that year.
Cardiac surgeries increased to 122 in 2013 but waned to 75 in 2014.
The hospital also projected it would carry out 450 intervention procedures, including angioplasty, by 2009. It had none in 2009.
Interventions eventually reached a peak of 163 in 2012 and slid to 139 in 2013 and 116 in 2014....
MN: Cardiac unit started off slow, but profitable now
HFP, 2009: "After blocking Malulani, MMMC is now going to privatize itself"
read ... Lack of sick tickers saps hospital
Only 348 Illegal Alien Children in Hawaii Apply for Protection from Deportation
CB: The DACA program allows people to apply for temporary protection from deportation, receive a social security number, and obtain a work permit. To be eligible, a person must have been brought to the country before the age of 16; have lived in the U.S before June 15, 2007; have been under 31 as of June 15, 2012; and have graduated high school, earned a GED, or currently be taking classes.
Certain kinds of criminal or gang problems may disqualify a person from DACA. In Hawaii, over 3,000 people are immediately eligible, with 2,000 eligible in the future (currently under 15). According to the most recent figures available, only 348 have applied....
(Clue: Maybe there really aren't that many illegals here.)
read ... Terrifying Shortage of Illegals
Thanks to UPW, 175 Public Housing Units Sitting Vacant While Homeless Live in Tents
CB: The Hawaii Public Housing Authority was severely shortchanged by the governor and the Legislature for money to repair vacant units. Unions also blocked continuation of a civil service exemption for maintenance crews, a program that was helping reduce the backlog....
“Special Teams” were used to conduct comprehensive maintenance through a temporary civil service exemption, Act 159, enacted in 2012....
SB1101 would have extended the civil service exemption for two more years to give the agency enough time to reorganize its construction units and continue to train the rest of the staff.
But the bill died in the last days of session after facing opposition from unions, including the United Public Workers, which argued it was unnecessary.
read ... Vacant
Emergency Services Cuts Overtime $700K--UPW Working to Kill Project
SA: Let's all agree that efficiency in government is a good thing. Thus, we heartily applaud the city Emergency Services Department for its successful pilot project: converting to 12-hour work shifts that yielded a $700,000 drop in overtime costs last fiscal year....
With the test due to end Aug. 1, city negotiations underway with the United Public Workers aim to make the 12-hour shifts the EMS norm. Hear, hear. Then, let's work to pilot that concept at the OT-rife state prisons....
read ... Thanks, UPW
Police investigate stabbing at Kalihi homeless camp
KHON: Elena Mielke said “I was sitting in the tent and I saw him coming from that direction, walking this way, and he was just covered in blood. He ended up over here on the picnic table.”
Police are investigating the case as attempted murder in the second degree.
read ... Homeless
Star-Adv: Bag Ban Must Become Even More Oppressive
SA: The City Council and mayor should act swiftly to tighten the ordinance, and not leave Oahu — the biggest polluter in the island chain — with the weakest law in the state.
Retailers who are following the letter of the law by offering customers thicker plastic bags at checkout should think better of this tactic. The spirit of the law is to reduce the use of single-use plastic bags altogether, not to replace them with longer-lasting plastic bags on the claim that the new ones will be used more than once.
Neither is the spirit of the law to encourage retailers to simply substitute paper for plastic. Although paper is recyclable and not a threat to marine life in the same way as lightweight plastic bags, (which also are not a threat to marine life, but hey....) the goal is to reduce the number of disposable bags consumers use to carry out their purchases (propaganda of the deed).
The best approach encourages (forces) customers to bring their own sturdy totes for groceries and other purchases, not for retailers to substitute one throw-away for another. (We will make everybody participate in the eco religion.)
read ... Loopholes hurt plastic bag ban
Kauai: "People should be forced to work with feral cats"
KGI: As a new member of the community I’ve been following the controversy about the Kauai Humane Society and I’m a little surprised by the number of animals that have to be put to sleep....
I would make the following recommendations that I think will address all sides of the issues:
Protesters may not have any kind of voice before the board unless they have spent at least one month fostering animals or volunteering in taking care of animals at the shelter.
Anyone wishing to have a voice in this matter should be forced to work with feral cats and see the reality of the situation....
There’s a huge difference between empathy and compassion. Empathy is just a feeling while compassion motivates me to do something to help. Some people want to protest and never actually do anything to help. The people who are protesting should form advocacy groups to foster pets in their own home and then find homes for them....
read ... Kauai: "People should be forced to work with feral cats"
HB1273 Will Allow Small Hydro Plants on Ag Land
PBN: Hawaii Gov. David Ige will sign a bill into law on Monday that aims to expand the development of hydroelectric energy-generating projects in the state, the governor’s office said Friday.
Sponsored by several lawmakers, including state Rep. James Tokioka, D-Lihue-Koloa, House Bill 1273 allows the development of hydroelectric facilities generating up to 500 kilowatts of electricity on agricultural land if the projects are combined with agricultural activities.
Although various types of renewable energy projects may already be built on agricultural lands, hydroelectric facilities are not currently a permissible use. The new law reverses that, as agricultural lands are being considered as sites for hydroelectric projects.
read ... Hydroelectric
Obama Forcing Pentagon to Allow Trannies to Serve
SA: The officials said (that after a couple of weeks of media hype in which butch lesbians were repackaged as trannies) Defense Secretary Ash Carter has asked his personnel undersecretary, Brad Carson, to set up a working group of senior military and civilian leaders to take an objective look at the issue impose the gay agenda, identify any problems and develop uniform guidelines.
read ... Trannies in Military
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