Historic Homes--$2M Tax Exemption Gift to 342 Households
Ray L’Heureux and Randy Roth: Schools’ problem is dysfunctional DOE
SA: …we strongly oppose the proposed constitutional amendment that purportedly would increase DOE funding.
First, there is no reason to believe a new dedicated tax would increase education funding by even one penny. Virtually all of Hawaii’s dedicated taxes and special funds have turned out to be bait-and-switch ploys. Using the state’s transient accommodations tax to fund rail on Oahu is just the latest example.
Second, there is no reason to believe DOE shortcomings are due to inadequate funding. Per-pupil spending in Hawaii — $13,748 for operations alone as of two years ago — is 17 percent above the national average, placing Hawaii 15th in the nation. If our public-school teachers are not making 17 percent more than the national average, on what is the DOE spending that money?
Third, there is no reason to believe higher teacher pay would make existing teachers more effective. While some of our teachers are outstanding and deserve pay raises, there are others who are overpaid and overprotected. The teachers’ union demands that the DOE’s very best teachers make no more than its very worst. And it goes to extraordinary lengths protecting every teacher’s job, even those no principal wants to hire or retain but must do so anyway because of the union contract.
Fourth, the perennial teacher shortage could be reduced significantly simply by removing artificial roadblocks. For example, the DOE should welcome the many military spouses, and others, who have taught successfully outside of Hawaii but do not satisfy Hawaii’s protectionist rules and mentality.
Fifth, today’s DOE is an overly centralized, top-down bureaucracy in which non-school administrators make numerous instructional decisions that teachers are told to implement, and school principals are told to enforce. The guiding star is standardization. Until that changes dramatically, there is no reason to trust this DOE with more tax dollars….
Ray L’Heureux is a former assistant superintendent in the Hawaii Department of Education; Randall Roth is a professor emeritus of law at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and co-founder of the Education Institute of Hawaii….
read … Schools’ problem, fundamentally, is dysfunctional DOE
Passive-aggressive ‘school tax’ proposal could turn out more aggressive than it seems
Borreca: If it is possible to have a passive-aggressive tax bill, the proposed state constitutional amendment aimed at funding public education may be it.
Passive aggression is defined as “indirect resistance to the demands of others and an avoidance of direct confrontation.”
That definition ties in neatly with the Legislature asking voters to decide if they want to allow the state to start grabbing an unspecified part of an undefined type of real estate to be used to do something to “support public education,” with the caveat that the Legislature will fill in all the blanks….
Also, there is a real fear it will bankrupt the counties.
Big Island journalist Nancy Cook Lauer wrote in West Hawaii Today that “Hawaii Island property owners could end up paying an extra $75 million annually if a constitutional amendment passes.”
Lisa Miura, Big Island real property tax administrator, told the paper, “We can’t afford to open the door and let the state start taking county funds for state departments.”
The Tax Foundation of Hawaii warns: “Once the amendment passes, the genie is out of the bottle. It may not even be under control of the members now in the Legislature, because future legislators … may have different ideas from current members.”
On second thought, this tax idea may just be plain old aggressive….
read … Passive-aggressive ‘school tax’ proposal could turn out more aggressive than it seems
HSTA Tax Hike: Rosenlee Schooled, Readers Not Fooled
SA: (just skip to the comments on HSTA President Corey Rosenlee’s Op-Ed)
This pits a big union against property owners. Not teachers. Not rich. It's a power grab and the arguments underlying it are bad for the rest of us. Good goal, bad path, horrible consequences. Ignorant logic. Worthy of Trump - grab people by the gut and get them to do something stupid. You sir undermine the credibility of those you represent, weaken other public agencies, and tear away the social safety network they work so hard to preserve….
Oh c'mon Corey. Who do you think you're kidding.
The amendment has no requirement that all of the taxes raised be 100% *incremental* to the existing budgeted amount, and you know it.
The amendment doesn't define the bounds of the amorphous so-called "investment property", and you know it.
The amendment doesn't prohibit the new tax from being passed on to local renters, and you know it will….
Rosenlee's description of the proposed tax is beyond misleading. The proposal is to tax investment real property with no threshold amount to protect owners of low-end property. The legislature gets to define what is investment real property, so the tax could end up applying to all kinds of property since even home ownership is an investment in real property….
Rosenlee slyly cloaks raising taxes for Hawaii taxpayers with manipulative xenophobia and exploitative claims of Hawaii's children as the only beneficiaries of the proposed constitutional amendment.
the reality is the proposed constitutional amendment is a tax raising scheme that is earmarked to fund higher teacher salaries and enrich the Hawaii state teachers association by raising union dues collections.
Rosenlee and h.s.t.a. represent teachers, not students nor the education system. to paraphrase Rosenlee's own words: make no mistake: h.s.t.a.'s only goal is not to improve our schools, but to pad its own wealth.
vote NO on h.s.t.a.'s deceptive tax scheme….
read … Corey Rosenlee Schooled
Rail: Ansaldo Holds P3 Solution Hostage?
SA: …The latest bad news is that Ansaldo Honolulu JV, which has a $1.4 billion contract to supply cars and operate the 20-mile rail system, has filed a big claim over project delays that have pushed back completion from 2019 to 2026.
The Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation won’t say the amount of the claims under negotiation, but HART director Ember Shim called it “mega-substantial.”…
HART is hoping to avoid further construction cost overruns by recruiting private partners to help pay for the final four miles of guideway from Middle Street to Ala Moana Center.
The sweetener in a public-private partnership would be including lucrative rights to operate the system, which means Ansaldo would have to be in the deal since its contract already includes the right to operate and maintain Honolulu rail for 14 years.
Ansaldo is evidently refusing to play in any such partnership until it gets a favorable settlement in its delay claim.….
read … Dispute about rail delays puts HART over a barrel
Rail board reaches critical point for public-private partnership plan
SA: …The idea — described by one board member as a worthwhile “gamble” — is being advanced by HART Executive Director Andrew Robbins, who contends the “public-private partnership” initiative could be key to finishing the rail line within the current budget and without further delays.
Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell told the HART board he supports the plan to hire a developer to construct the last five miles of the rail line and also operate and maintain the rail system for decades into the future so long as it won’t cause the city to absorb any more cost overruns.
While Caldwell said he still has questions about the so-called “P3” idea, he is urging the board to publicly support the plan. The board took no action on the issue at a Sept. 6 meeting but is scheduled to consider it again Sept. 27….
Robbins said the P3 plan would provide one of the last pieces of that puzzle by spelling out for the FTA the method the city will use to finish construction. Once the public-private partnership solicitation is launched, Robbins said HART will immediately begin to update its recovery and financial plans to persuade the federal government that rail is back on track.
Until now, HART has generally used a straightforward “design-build” approach in which contractors bid to design and build a segment of the project. But that has resulted in expensive change orders and claims from contractors that contributed to the cost overruns….
Using a public-private partnership for the rest of the rail construction would require HART and the city to work together to negotiate with a new private-sector partner and investors who would finance, design and build the last segment of the rail line and operate and maintain the entire rail line for 30 years.
The process will be complex, in part because HART is responsible for constructing the rail line, while the city is responsible for maintaining and operating the system in the years ahead using city funds.
HART estimates construction of the last segment of rail guideway between Middle Street and Ala Moana Center, along with eight stations and the Pearl Highlands Transit Center and garage, will cost about $1.4 billion, Robbins said….
A “white paper” prepared by HART that compared a conventional design-build project to the P3 concept concluded a public-private partnership could save an estimated $46 million in construction costs and $300 million in maintenance and operating costs…
read … Rail board reaches critical point for public-private partnership plan
SMS Study: Barriers to Affordable Housing
MN: …SMS Hawaii also identified three overarching themes as major barriers to affordable housing development: rate of return, timing and certainty…
…simply appropriating money for affordable housing is not a comprehensive long-term solution to solving complex housing issues….
I plan to introduce Maui Council legislation that will provide a strategic plan for affordable housing and a process for streamlining county permitting….
I also plan on introducing legislation that will expedite the workforce housing permitting process, underscoring the importance of public-private partnerships to make affordable housing a priority for both current and future administrations….
LINK: SMS Report
read … Planning strategic solutions critical for affordable housing
Campaign Spending Commission fines Maui Council Anti-GMO Nut Alika Atay $2,700
MN: The state Campaign Spending Commission levied a $2,700 fine Wednesday on Maui County Council Member Alika Atay, his campaign and its treasurer for violating Hawaii campaign finance laws, commission General Counsel Gary Kam reported.
Atay’s fine was the largest of nine Maui County politicians hit by commission fines. Other fines ranged from $83.33 to $916.67 for late filing of campaign spending reports or of a “statement of information for electioneering communications.” The latter infraction involves not submitting reports within 24 hours of signing a contract for an advertisement, TV commercial or social media promotion.
Atay did not immediately respond Friday to messages left at his council office.
According to a report in the online Honolulu Civil Beat, commission member Gregory Shoda proposed doubling the fines against Atay for ignoring the commission’s requests to correct false reports in 2016 and work out a conciliation agreement.
Civil Beat reported that Shoda said: “We need to fire a shot across the bow. . . . I don’t see how transparency and the integrity of the elections can be upheld this way.”….
Those include two counts of unauthorized handling of campaign funds….
The complaint listed five counts of alleged making false reports….
Commission fines against other … Maui County politicians…
$250 against mayoral candidate Elle Cochran and the Friends of Elle Cochran for the late filing of information for electioneering communications.
$250 against state House candidate Tiare Lawrence (12th District seat) and the Tiare Lawrence for Maui campaign for late filing of a statement of information for electioneering communications.
$166.67 against state Senate candidate Terez Amato (6th District seat) and the Friends of Terez Amato for late filing of the statement of information for electioneering communications….
read … Campaign Spending Commission fines Atay $2,700
Hawaii Sex Trade Mostly Locals, not Tourists
SA: …Researchers also found that nearly three-fourths of those who responded to decoy ads on a popular adult-oriented website were from Hawaii’s 808 area code, refuting claims that tourists and the military are driving the demand for sex trafficking.
“I have never seen a response like Honolulu,” said Dominique Roe- Sepowitz, director of the Office of Sex Trafficking Intervention Research at Arizona State University, which conducted the study. She said the “robust response” to the ads far outpaced results from similar surveys done in 15 major cities….
The report on online sex buyers is the first part of a “Sex Trafficking in Hawaii” study whose future installments will explore victim experiences and how sex trafficking is conducted, law enforcement efforts and the availability of preventive and support services for victims….
“The numbers show just how pervasive it is,” said Khara Jabola- Carolus, executive director of the Hawaii State Commission on the Status of Women,(and the solid proletarian wife of Kaniela Ing) a partner in the study….
“There’s a knee-jerk reaction that tourists and the military are main drivers of the sex trade,” she said. “They’ve always augmented the demand but at the end of the day, it’s our men and the values that we espouse or say we espouse that aren’t reflected in the behavior of our men….
read … Hawaii residents dominate in buying sex online, study says
‘Overtourism’ Complaints All About TVRs
KGI: …Probably for the first time ever — but at least since 2006 — Kauai’s official visitor industry has formally acknowledged that the island has reached its capacity in terms of tourist numbers, and that those numbers must be held to current visitor counts.
While the fundamental assertion that the island has reached or likely exceeded its tourism carrying capacity will not be a surprise to most Kauai residents, the fact that the new plan reflects the official position of the island’s visitor industry is a new development.….
“Kauai visitors have changed in recent years,” the new plan concludes. “In the past, when visitors mostly traveled in tour groups, stayed in hotels and got around on tour buses with a set itinerary, the impacts did not feel as great as they do now.
“Today, most visitors are free independent travelers, often staying in vacation rentals within communities, traveling in cars they rent for their entire stay and searching for special, ‘undiscovered’ places, including places they should not be.”…
the number of annual tourist arrivals on Kauai is actually still slightly less than it was in 1990, when 1,228,850 tourists landed here. In 2017, the total was 1,276,803, according to the Kauai Visitors Bureau…
…because visitor behavior has changed and lengths of stay increased, the number of tourists on Kauai on the average day has grown exponentially — from 17,378 in 1990 to 26,275 in 2017, according to the Kauai Visitors Bureau. Officials said that, in 2018, so far, there have been a handful of days when visitor counts have hit as much as nearly 35,000….
read … ‘Overtourism’ on Kauai
TVR Owners Iced out by Proposed Hawaii County Vacation Rental Law
WHT: … Some longtime vacation rental condos, by a quirk of zoning, are being swept up into a vacation rental bill while those just across Alii Drive are not, an issue that has a crowd ready to speak out at the Leeward Planning Commission meeting.
The meeting is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Thursday at the West Hawaii Civic Center.
Some longtime vacation rental condos, by a quirk of zoning, are being swept up into a vacation rental bill while those just across Alii Drive are not, an issue that has a crowd ready to speak out at the Leeward Planning Commission meeting.
The meeting is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Thursday at the West Hawaii Civic Center….
read … Condos and hotels caught up in proposed vacation rental rules
Jones Act waivers aren't a solution; they're a symptom of the problem
TH: … The sad irony is that we can take all the proper steps to prepare for a hurricane, but our ability to recover is heavily dependent on a decision made thousands of miles away in Washington, DC. And like all decisions made in Washington, it’s subject to politics.
I’m speaking of requesting a Jones Act waiver in the aftermath of a disaster. And the inherent absurdity of a hurricane-ravaged area having to beg for a reprieve from a law that hampers rebuilding efforts….
read … Jones Act waivers aren't a solution; they're a symptom of the problem
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