Who’s Running: Candidates Pulling Papers as of April 1, 2016
DLNR Finally Gets Around to Appointing Mauna Kea Hearing Officer
For California Teacher Taking on Unions, Supreme Court Ruling Isn’t the End of Her Case
SB 2618: Ferry Feasibility Study
HB2707: Last Chance to Testify on Marijuana Omnibus Package
Economist: GE Taxes Favor Big Business
Valuing the Jones Act Fleet
Hawaii Family Advocates Legislative Week in Review
Republican Appointments to Hawaii State Boards and Commissions
Dubanoski Appointed to Judicial Selection Commission
Northern Mariana Judge Strikes Down Last Handgun Ban in USA
Hawaii Urged to Prepare for Zika at CDC Summit
‘Evidence of Corruption’ -- Federal grand jury looking at HPD chief, wife
SA: A federal grand jury is investigating Honolulu Police Chief Louis Kealoha and his wife, city Deputy Prosecutor Katherine Kealoha, Federal Public Defender Alexander Silvert said Friday….
Silvert said he found evidence of corruption, and based on his request, Michael Wheat, a special prosecutor, was appointed by the U.S. attorney general to investigate this case.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office dismissed the mailbox theft case against Puana after a mistrial was declared in December 2014 when Louis Kealoha made an unsolicited statement regarding Puana having been charged and convicted of breaking into a neighbor’s home.
Silvert said the chief’s remarks about Puana breaking into a neighbor’s home referred to a June 27, 2011, incident when a neighbor called police after Puana stepped into the neighbor’s screened-in porch and yelled about parking in his stall. Police arrested him on suspicion of unauthorized entry into a dwelling….
While Puana was at the police station, Silvert said, two civilian witnesses saw Katherine Kealoha, accompanied by police officers, enter Puana’s locked home. Puana lived there with his mother, Florence Puana, who is Katherine Kealoha’s grandmother.
Gerard Puana alleged items, including documents and cash, were missing from his home when he returned, Silvert said.
“Many of the people who were there (before the grand jury) yesterday were directly related to that incident,” including police officers and Wheat, Silvert said Friday.
In the civil case, Katherine Kealoha’s 95-year-old grandmother, Florence Puana, sued Kealoha for $1 million over a reverse mortgage on the grandmother’s house. Gerard Puana also sued Kealoha for $70,000 for money he claimed to have given her to invest and for safekeeping….
Flashback:
read … The End is Near
Embattled police department spending $100K to improve image
HNN: …The contract comes HPD Chief Louis Kealoha and his wife, a deputy city prosecutor, face an expanding federal criminal probe.
The department says the PR contract is aimed at helping it communicate more clearly and effectively.
But critics say it’s too little and too late.
Meanwhile, several police officers who asked not be identified for fear of retribution say the contract is a waste of money, since the department has two, full-time employees in its public information office and the chief and his top brass should be handling these duties.
HPD signed a contract with Bennet Group Strategic Communications two weeks ago that calls for the firm to provide a number of services, including research, branding advice, strategic planning and lots of training for leadership, public relations staff and officers.
The contract says HPD will pay the public relations firm about $125,000. HPD also has the option of using the firm’s services for short-term, special instances, such as for crisis communications, which costs $230 an hour….
State Sen. Will Espero, who's been critical of HPD leadership, says bringing on a PR firm won’t fix the bigger problems at HPD.
"You could spend $1 million on publicity and PR, but it's not going to change the way the public feels or the perception that they have as long as the status quo is not changed or improved,” he said.
City Council Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi also questioned whether the money couldn’t be better spent elsewhere in the department….
read … Buy the Chief a Shiny New Mailbox
Rally for Marsy’s Law
SA: A week before an important legislative deadline, proponents of a Hawaii “Victims’ Bill of Rights” gathered at the state Capitol on Friday to encourage lawmakers to pass a measure that would spell out the rights of crime victims in the state Constitution.
More than 60 supporters of Senate Bill 3034 were on hand to wave signs on Beretania Street for the measure, which has already been passed by the Senate and the House Judiciary Committee. To survive the current legislative session, the bill must be approved by the House Finance Committee by Friday.
The measure, also known as Marsy’s Law, is based on the California Victims’ Bill of Rights Act of 2008. The bill is named after Marsy Nicholas, a University of California, Santa Barbara, student who was stalked and murdered by her ex-boyfriend in 1983.
“We’re here today to give a little bit of encouragement to the House Finance Committee and others to hear the bill and pass the bill along,” said Stacy Evensen, director of Marsy’s Law for Hawaii.
Hawaii is one of 18 states that do not have a constitutional provision that protects victims’ rights….
read … Marsy’s Law
Big Island judges won’t hear Kenoi case
WHT: It appears no Big Island judge will hear the pending theft trial of Hawaii County Mayor Billy Kenoi.
Court records indicate certificates of recusal were filed Thursday by Hilo Circuit judges Greg Nakamura and Glenn Hara, 3rd Circuit Chief Judge Ronald Ibarra, Kona Circuit Judge Melvin Fujino, Hilo Family judges Lloyd Van De Car and Henry Nakamoto, Hilo District Judge Harry Freitas and Kona District Judge Margaret Masunaga.
Hilo District Judge Barbara Takase is retiring April 29, so she won’t be presiding over the case, which is scheduled for 9 a.m. July 18.
That leaves vacationing Kona Family Judge Aley Auna Jr. as the only full-time Big Island judge available to hear the case. A clerk for Ibarra said Friday afternoon Auna is expected to disqualify himself when he returns Tuesday.
Asked why the judges have recused themselves from hearing the case, Ibarra replied, “It’s an individual thing under the (judicial) rules of conduct.”
“Their impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” the judge said….
read … Recused
What really happened at the ʻAha, part IV
HI: The international committee struggles to have its alternative documents to the federal-recognition constitution put before the participants for consideration….
Video: Lahui Locked out of DoI
read … What really happened at the ʻAha, part IV
HECO Pipedream: 21% of Renewables from Rusting Offshore Wind Junk
SA: Hawaiian Electric Co. laid out its 30-year plan Friday to get the state to 100 percent renewable energy.
The electric utility said it would do this by installing a $340 million smart-grid infrastructure, building utility-scale wind and solar projects, increasing rooftop solar, using liquefied natural gas (LNG) as a bridge fuel, pursuing energy storage, building offshore wind, retiring old fossil fuel plants and possibly building a transmission line that would connect the renewable energy resources of neighbor islands.
In its 668-page filing, HECO made its third try to submit renewable-energy plans that the Public Utilities Commission would approve. The state agency rejected two previous drafts….
“21.4 percent coming from offshore wind.” ….
Reality: Rusting Windfarm Junk off Waikiki: Europe's Disaster Coming to Hawaiian Waters
read … Doomed Plan
Wahiawa Hospital hard-Hit by Medicare Pay Cuts, MD Shortage
SA: …Numerous factors have caused declining revenues, including the 2014 opening of Queen’s Medical Center West in Ewa; lower reimbursements from Medicare and Medicaid (85 percent of WGH patients are covered by those programs); and an increase in indigent care.
In addition, a shortage of doctors has forced the hospital to spend $1.7 million a year to acquire specialist in-patient hospitalists and on-call surgeons to treat patients.
WGH has tried to stem the financial bleeding by cutting operating costs by $9 million a year and laying off 75 employees.
Rep. Marcus Oshiro (D, Wahiawa-Whitmore-Poa- moho) said the $3 million is needed “for the hospital to survive so that we can even begin to discuss repurposing or partnering or a new business model. … We cannot allow Wahiawa General Hospital to fold.”
He pointed to the 2012 closures of Hawaii Medical Centers (formerly St. Francis Medical Centers), describing the shutdown as “catastrophic for the entire system.” …
Cataluna: Wahiawa General Hospital faces life-or-death struggle
read … Obamacare
Anti-GMO Activists Exploit Parents of Autistic Children
KE: Is the Hawaii Center for Food Safety suffering an attack of conscience? Or is it just worried about being sued?
Yesterday, it sent out an email breathlessly — and brazenly — claiming:
Did you know that in the 1980’s autism prevalence in the US was reported as 1 in 10,000 but as of 2014 it is 1 in 45? Here in Hawaiʻi, this could be due to the heavy commercial pesticide use near schools and other sensitive areas.
Dr. Ryan Lee, a Pediatrician and Director of the Neurodevelopmental Clinic at Shriners Hospital, testified in strong support of buffer zones around schools after he read the overwhelming literature linking autism and pesticides exposure in children.
A few hours later, they sent out another email, this one supposedly “corrected by our staff scientist,” that contained none of the alarmist, inflammatory language — and no reference to Dr. Lee. Perhaps he wisely recoiled at the prospect of his good name being associated with that blatant fear-mongering.
As I noted in an email that I sent to CFS director Ashley Lukens, the issue of autism causation is not nearly so cut and dried as she is trying to pretend. But then, why let facts get in the way of good fear-fest?
Meanwhile, I'm hearing NBC's Dateline is on-island to do a story — at the behest of anti-GMO activists — about the “poisoning of paradise.” If Dateline is anything like the other media that have come here at the invitation of the antis, it will include only the perspectives of the true believers….
read … Autism Exploitation
Will Hawaii’s Tuna Fleet be Shut Down Again?
EH: The more than 140 vessels in Hawai‘i’s longline fleet have been setting more hooks for bigeye tuna than ever recently, catching large volumes of fish at a record pace. And the industry is eager to keep the trend going.
Problem is, international fishery management organizations have established strict catch limits …. In recent years, those limits have resulted in boats having to halt fishing, return to Honolulu, and sit idle for months.
This year, that could happen again, even earlier than last year, if the National Marine Fisheries Service is unable to line up quota transfers from U.S. Pacific Island Territories in time.
read … Tuna
Road extension could bring historical Ewa train rides to an end
HNN: The group that preserves Hawaii's railroading history says state plans to extend the North-South Road could bring their train rides to a halt.
"There's no other way, short of them building an overpass, that we'll be able to function," Hawaiian Railway Society operations manager Steve Vendt said.
The state Department of Transportation wants to extend North-South Road -- also known as Kualakaii Parkway -- to connect Kapolei Parkway and Roosevelt Avenue. A point-to-point line goes right over the tracks….
read … Ewa Train Rides
QUICK HITS: