Lying, Cheating, Stealing, Bribery—Na’i Aupuni Makes it all Legal
Full Text: State, Feds Defend Nai Aupuni Election Before 9th Circuit Court
Political Correctness Jumps Shark? -- “Hey Hey Ho Ho Reporters Have Got to Go!”
Congress asks Hawaii Health Exchange where the money went
NextEra ‘Clean’ Energy: $30 Billion in Rate Hikes Coming
SA: …NextEra Energy Inc.’s recent statement that it would take $30 billion for Hawaii to achieve the goal of 100 percent renewable energy by 2045 was criticized Tuesday as an extreme estimate that would place a heavy burden on ratepayers.
Eric Gleason, president of NextEra Energy Hawaii LLC, said at a Waikiki business luncheon Monday that getting the state off its dependence on oil would cost $30 billion over the next three decades.
“There is no utility in the country that has as much on its shoulders as Hawaiian Electric does right now,” Gleason said. “Hawaii needs a financially very strong utility to either make or backstop something like $30 billion of investments over the next few decades. … There is a big need for capital to make all of this happen.” ….
read … $30 Billion
Hawaii businessman Duane Kurisu plans homeless village in Honolulu
PBN: Hawaii businessman Duane Kurisu plans to develop a homeless village project in Honolulu on state-owned land between Sand island and Keehi Lagoon that would include multiple single-family and duplex housing units, recreation area, shared kitchen, restroom facilities, gardens and fish ponds, according to public records.
The privately-funded project, which would house 200-plus individuals and be done in phases, would utilize annual gross revenues to cover cost of services, maintenance and repairs and utilities, according to an application submitted by Kurisu’s Aio Foundation to the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. A drive-by convenience store that would provide basic needs for those living in the village also is in the plans.
In September, the state Board of Land and Natural Resources gave permission to Kurisu to do due diligence on the same site for a future broadcast antenna tower site as part of a separate application.
The DLNR’s Land Division recommends that Aio Foundation be given access to the site to do its due diligence pertaining to environmental assessment compliance for the homeless village project. The BLNR is scheduled to vote on the matter on Friday.
Aio Foundation old the state that it intends to either keep its interest in the development, partner with another entity or turn the development over to a third-party nonprofit so that its vision for a long-term provider for homeless people is realized….
PBN: Honolulu architect the inspiration behind Duane Kurisu's homeless village project
MN: Maybe some of the homeless felons hiding on Maui would actually get caught and sent back to the Mainland!
read … Homeless Village
“We want to end homelessness for our veterans by Dec. 31”
SA: On this Veterans Day, outreach workers are still trying to get the last 55 homeless military veterans on Oahu into a system that’s designed to take them from the streets and into a shelter within 30 days and find them a permanent place to live within 90 days….
“We want to end homelessness for our veterans by Dec. 31,” said Jun Yang, executive director of the city’s office of housing. “We are going to connect and shelter as many homeless vets as possible andmove them from the street to a shelter and into housing.”
While next year some veterans will continue to be homeless for short stretches in Honolulu and across the country, the goal is to reach a point of what’s called “functional zero,” which means different thingsin different cities all searching for answers.
In Honolulu, with a tight and expensive housing market, functional zero means that every homeless veteran will be identified, matched with services and put into a shelter within 30 days and placed inpermanent housing within 90 days.
On Oahu the year began with 149 homeless veterans who were not being served. As of last week 55 remained unconnected to social service programs and without homes, Yang said….
The remaining 55 who have been identified on Oahu “are not ready yet,” said Erin Rutherford, Catholic Charities Hawaii’s program director of the Supportive Services for Veteran Families program. “It’s a matter of continuing to have people engage with them and persuade them that this (getting help) is probably the better option.” ….
SA: Caldwell in Washington for rail, homeless talks
read … Shelter
Hawaii’s Veterans Are Among Top Earners
CB: The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that Hawaii’s veterans earn a median household income of about $85,000; that’s nearly $23,500 more than a national median.
read … Top Earners
Veterans Day
Sierra Club: We Will Destroy Lanes, Create More Traffic Jams
SA: Sorry to burst the bubble of so many here, but we no longer live in the glorious past when Honolulu streets were reserved for single-occupant cars and everyone else, including pedestrians and cyclists, could beat it.
As recently as 2011, developers who asked the city Department of Planning and Permitting for permission to build “complete streets” with wider sidewalks and bike lanes were told to get lost.
In the prior two generations, Honolulu was in the grip of an auto-centric mindset that damaged not only the urban experience, but the beauty of the entire island.
Most residential development was pushed into sterile suburbs….
Precisely as Explained: WaPo: How transportation became the latest victim of America’s culture wars
read … Protected bike lanes are key to a more livable city
Astronomer is Top Honolulu STEM Job
HB: There are 22,430 STEM jobs in metro Honolulu, 5.0 percent of the total workforce. Median STEM pay: $73,930 a year; median non-STEM pay: $37,160, one of the smaller gaps in the country.
Highest paying STEM job in Honolulu: astronomer. There are 50 astronomers in Honolulu, with median pay of $150,770.
The concentration of astronomers in Honolulu is higher than anywhere else in the nation: 8.54 times the national average for metro areas.
read … Honolulu STEM Jobs
Hawaii's dairy farms on life support
KITV: Hawaii's first commercial dairy opened in 1869.
There were nearly 90 dairies by the 1950s and competition was fierce.
By 1967, the battle for fair prices between producers and processors had exploded.
Farmers protested by dumping thousands of gallons of milk at Iolani Palace, before The Milk Act later that year set the minimum price.
"It worked for a while," said Kahana.
She said that was until urbanization squeezed back farms, and local feed, such as pineapple tops and other by-products, disappeared along with those industries -- forcing farmers to buy expensive mainland feed.
"We did have a flour mill at one time. When that closed down, that also shut down the feed source," she said.
To make matters worse, by the time Foremost Dairies called it quits in 2004, the nine island processing plants had dwindled to just one.
In June 2015, Meadow Gold, the state's last processor, threatened to stop buying local, if the two remaining dairy farmers refused to sell their milk for less.
In a statement, Meadow Gold said, in part: "Under the old minimum milk price regulations, we were increasingly concerned that purchasing raw milk from Hawaii's milk producers was no longer financially viable for our company."
(Translation: Price supports killed Hawaii dairy farms.)
read … Hawaii's dairy farms on life support
Kauai Complains About High Airfares—Miss the Superferry Yet?
EX: The once promising Hawaii Superferry certainly comes to mind after the recent news reports of some Kauai residents complaining of the high cost of flying to and from their island….
What occurred may have been the biggest display of apparent mass hysteria shown in these islands since Captain Cook was mistaken for the ancient Hawaiian god Lono.
But this time, rather than venerating the approaching vessel’s skipper, certain people with their acts of civil disobedience and anger-filled demonstrations managed instead to chase the frightful apparition from their shores.
Even today there are those still coming up with more questions than answers in trying to find logical explanations for such a public display of anger….
In the final analysis it would seem that the root cause for the crowd’s Superferry hysteria was probably based on a general fear of change and the unknown. As the 19th Century essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “Fear always springs from ignorance.”
read … Hawaii’s Superferry remembered
Anti-Pesticide Activist Dr. Lorrin Pang Dengue Fever Interview
BIVN: Following Monday’s press conference in Captain Cook on the Hawaii Island dengue fever outbreak, the Hawaii Department of Health’s Maui County Health Officer, Dr. Lorrin Pang, shared his experiences with the mosquito-borne illness at home and abroad. Pang was asked to come to Hawaii Island by the health director to take a look at the situation because of his experiences with a dengue outbreak on Maui 15 years ago….
read … Pest
Bill would allow sponsorship of city facilities
KITV: Over the past five fiscal years, the cost of operating city government has grown by more than $430 million, or about 15 percent.
Council members Ann Kobayashi and Kymberly Pine believe the time has come for some out of the box thinking to raise revenue, and that’s why they introduced Bill 78, which would allow companies and organizations to sponsor city facilities for a fee.
"The fact of the matter is that we can no longer rely on the taxpayer alone to do what the public wants in our city," Pine told KITV4.
"Where's the money going to come from?” added Kobayashi. “You know, we do not want to raise property tax."
read … Sponsorship?
Honolulu Parking Spaces for $100K?
KITV: Last week, airports across the state said they are charging more just in time for the holidays. So how much would you pay to park your car? $10 a day? $20 a night? How about $100,000 to own your own stall? That's how much one realtor in Kailua says premium parking in Honolulu could soon be going for.
"It's incredibly expensive to park in Hawaii. With the lack of space that we have in buildings in Waikiki and Honolulu, it makes parking spots more valuable," said John Mauch, Kailua Beach Realty.
On the mainland, one parking spot was just listed for $650,000.
"I was talking to a realtor in Vail yesterday. He told me he just sold a space for $250,000 and another for $275,000," added Mauch.
In Honolulu, Mauch just sold some parking spots for $40,000, $55,000 and $71,000.
"I predict parking in Waikiki, Kakaako, and downtown, if the economy keeps going the way it is, to reach the $100,000 mark," said Mauch….
read … $100,000
Can the Hawaii Republican Party win new seats in 2016?
CDN: The first step to breaking the status quo is intentionally ignoring the traditional campaign "experts."
read … 2016
Takai resting after cancer surgery
SA: U.S. Rep. Mark Takai had surgery to remove a small, cancerous tumor in his pancreas Tuesday and was resting after the operation at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., according to a spokesman. No other details were available.
read … Cancer
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