Hula Halau to be banned from Yale?
Voluntary Additional Tax?
Borreca: Hawaii Democrats Can and Should Eliminate all 5 Republicans from Legislature in 2018
Borreca: …Richard Nixon the year before (impeachment) became the only GOP presidential candidate to win Hawaii’s electoral votes. Later, Ronald Reagan would become just the second.
There is no chance the current GOP president even comes close to winning the vote in Hawaii; in fact, there is an argument to be made that a Trump presidency is damaging Hawaii’s Republican Party even more.
The Pew Research Center poll released Thursday sets a new low for Trump….
For Trump, however, his tax bill has created an economic landscape so poisonous that, if passed into law, will create deficits so deep that Congress will be forced for decades to make cuts to balance the budget. …
The hope is to backtrack on staples of American life since the days of Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson and take money away from Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare….
Defending that scheme will be how the Hawaii GOP goes from five to none….
read … Eliminate
HGEA will Make Hanabusa Governor if Tech Projects are not cancelled
SA: Twice this fall the state’s largest union has issued dire warnings about efforts by Gov. David Ige’s administration to upgrade critically important state computer systems, and that pushback is taking on political implications as Ige prepares for a tough Democratic primary next year….
A contract worth more than $37 million was awarded last year to overhaul the state’s payroll and worker attendance systems, but the Hawaii Government Employees Association last week sent state Comptroller Rod Becker a letter warning the payroll project is being rushed and is understaffed.
(Translation: HGEA is sabotaging this project because if payroll and attendance were properly tracked, their members would be less able to scam the system.)
HGEA Executive Director Randy Perreira also alleged that contractor CherryRoad Technologies Inc. is “delivering poor-quality work.” (Translation: “Good-quality work.”)
When state workers point out problems with the project, (demonstrate their incompetence) “those who identify the challenges are harassed, scolded or even threatened” by the contractor, by Ige’s Chief Information Officer Todd Nacapuy, or by his staff, Perreira wrote. (So sad.)
Perreira’s letter to Becker echoes another warning he sent to Ige on Oct. 31 warning of “turmoil” (created by HGEA) in the $60 million overhaul of the computers in the state Department of Taxation. Known as the Tax System Modernization or TSM, that project is another effort to replace an obsolete computer system that state officials say is on the verge of failing….
(Another tech project, another case of HGEA sabotage.)
“Here is the biggest union saying things aren’t being managed properly, and someone’s (Hanabusa is) going to jump on that,” Burris said….
“This is all about the employees being concerned about what the end product is going to be. They want it to work,” Perreira said.
(Translation: My members are incompetent. They want the new tech interface to present itself exactly the same way as the existing interface so they won’t have to change anything. This issue will determine who the next governor is.)
“If they make it work, then the governor looks better, so from their perspective, there’s nothing political about this. It’s all about making sure that, at the end of the day, we (limited as we are by our incompetence) can collect taxes and (most importantly) that the (existing manual, abacus-based) payroll system is going to pay them (on their bogus inflated time sheets).”…
“For us, this is all about the employees feeling (feelings!) that this is adversely affecting what they do (by exposing their incompetence). This (milking the payroll) is their profession. This is their passion, and they’ve been looking for a voice because internally, people who speak out are chastised,” Perreira said. “There have been people who have been called in at different levels and threatened; they have been removed from the project input process.”…. (So we will remove the Governor.)
Dumbest lines in article: “HGEA has not been the only source of criticism of the project, which is being implemented by a contractor called Fast Enterprises. Earlier this year, state lawmakers rejected a request from Ige for an additional $18 million in funding for the tax modernization project…”
(HGEA is different from Legislator as Master is different from Slave.)
Typical Comment: “Perreira wants to play political kingmaker, and was one of the first to go looking for a candidate to run against Ige (whom he felt did not treat the union with enough deference early on). Now he's using the union to smear Ige because the state faces challenges on an extremely difficult project. But we never voted Randy Perreira to be the boss of anything. If he and his members can vote for anyone they want, but shouldn't be trying to mislead the public into doing their bidding.”
read … Union warning over IT projects pose political threat for Ige
State’s Tech Failures Caused 100% by HGEA Sabotage
Shapiro: ….Two years ago, Ige scrapped a useless new financial software system in the Department of Transportation and sued the now-bankrupt contractor in a likely doomed attempt to recover nearly $14 million the state paid….
The $60 million price tag isn’t the half of it — literally. This project is to replace a previous $87.5 million tax department computer modernization that was declared outdated before it was finished.
The latest doubts about the tax computer upgrade started in the 2017 Legislature, which withheld $18 million Ige requested for the next phase after complaints from frustrated taxpayers using the new system to pay excise taxes….
In addition to withholding funds, legislators transferred key tax department staff involved in the project to the Office of Enterprise Technology Services, saying it’s not a tax issue but an information technology issue.
Ige seemed to agree; in July, he assigned chief state tech officer Todd Nacapuy to oversee the project.
This drew the ire of tax department employees, and in October, Randy Perreira of the Hawaii Government Employees Association declared a “complete lack of confidence” in Nacapuy and said employees don’t want to be held responsible “for the system’s inevitable failure.”
You never know if such union butt-covering is about substance or turf, but either way, disgruntled employees can cause “inevitable failure” to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Before this tussle fully played out, Tax Director Maria Zielinski abruptly resigned after it was reported her department had inappropriately interfered with an independent consultant hired to flag problems in the computer upgrade….
read … 100% Caused by HGEA Sabotage
How Sweeps Forced One Homeless Man to Accept Shelter
SA: …Retired Air Force Sgt. “Skip” Wheeler stood among the chaos of angry and confused homeless people being swept by state sheriff’s deputies on Monday and offered a blunt assessment of himself and his situation as a homeless military veteran.
“Basically, I’m a lazy bum,” Wheeler, 70, told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser as 69 other homeless people poured out of a Mapunapuna bike path on Department of Transportation property. “I need adult supervision. I say that truthfully. I’m not motivated.” ….
But Wheeler did take an important first step.
On Friday, for the first time, Wheeler woke up in the city’s Hale Mauliola homeless “navigation center” on Sand Island after moving in the day before. He had new, clean clothes and a safe place of his own where he could sleep behind a locked door.
After his first 24 hours at Hale Mauliola, however, it was too soon to know whether Wheeler will finally decide for good to move away from the same streets where he was being attacked and robbed….
With 100 percent disability and Social Security payments, Wheeler has enough money to rent a place of his own on Oahu, but isn’t interested. (He asked that the exact amount of his payments not be disclosed.)
He also could be eligible for housing in 50 new studio apartments aimed at military veterans that opened Friday in Kapolei….
Outreach workers from the Kalihi-Palama Health Center first met Wheeler in May under the H-1 freeway viaduct but he “did not want any assistance,” wrote Darrin Sato, Kalihi- Palama Health Center’s CEO.
Minor had been looking for another veteran around the bike path last month when some homeless people pointed out Wheeler and “said they were worried about him getting taken advantage of,” Minor said. “I had offered emergency housing the first time I met him. He was not interested in that.”
Minor maintains the DOT’s Oct. 23 sweep of the H-1 freeway viaduct that cleared 120 people — and Monday’s follow-up sweep of the adjacent bike path — helped drive a change in Wheeler’s attitude.
“I think that played a role,” Minor said. “It does bring some people out of the woods.”
Then on Tuesday, IHS had a vacancy at Hale Mauliola.
So when Minor saw Wheeler outside the Keehi Lagoon Memorial on Thursday, Minor picked him up and took Wheeler directly to Hale Mauliola….
read … Vietnam vet’s indecision highlights the challenges of being homeless
Soft on Crime: Criminal History of Alleged N Shore Killer Well-Documented, but out on Streets
KHON: Brown’s criminal past is well-documented.
Piles of paperwork reveal Brown racked up a criminal history since 2015.
When Brown was picked up at Town Center of Mililani, police discovered he was wanted on a $20,000 bench warrant for failing to report to his probation officer in October.
Brown was supposed to report for drug testing.
In June, the 23-year-old was arrested for physically abusing his then-girlfriend in her Waikiki apartment….
read … Soft on Crime
Hawaii Co Council questions scrutiny of contingency funds
HTH: Hawaii County Council members often use their contingency funds as grants to nonprofits, which they say allows them to provide quick aid to their district (reelection campaign.)
So, when use of the funds get delayed or denied, it doesn’t always sit well.
That was shown last week during a Finance Committee meeting when council members criticized Corporation Counsel Joe Kamelamela for what they saw as too much meddling in the process after the council authorizes the expenditures.
“What concerns me about this is the corporation counsel is the gatekeeper for use of council contingency funds,” said Hilo Councilman Aaron Chung.
Kamelamela said he’s trying to ensure they comply with the county code and that the grants meet a public purpose.
“The threshold issue is that it has to relate to a service or activity,” he said during the Monday meeting in Hilo….
Each council member received $75,000 in contingency funds for this fiscal year….
read … Council questions scrutiny of contingency funds
No hurricanes during hurricane season
KGI: Obviously this is caused by Global Cooling.
read … No Hurricanes
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