Hawaii GOP Ballot Recommendations
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PBS: Hawaii Absentee Ballot Data Problems
Mazie asks Amy Coney Barrett if she has ever sexually assaulted someone
Prosecutor Poll: Alm 43% – Kau 31%
CB: … Alm, a former judge, prosecutor and U.S. attorney, leads Kau, a defense attorney and former deputy prosecutor, 43% to 31% in the latest Civil Beat/HNN poll. More than one-fifth of those surveyed (21%) have not decided who to vote for, while 5% don’t care for either candidate.
A clear majority of voters also want term limits for prosecuting attorney — 71%. Just 11% said they will vote no on that idea….
Alm does better than Kau among most voter demographics — age, ancestry, income and education. He is also more popular among female voters.
But one of the biggest differences is political ideology: Alm holds a 2-to-1 advantage among Democrats, liberals and progressives, while Republicans and conservatives along with moderates and independents prefer Kau by double digits….
Alm finished first in the Aug. 8 primary with 35% of the vote, forcing him and second-place finisher Kau (21%) into a Nov. 3 runoff….
Alm, according to the Civil Beat/HNN poll, has attracted more than twice as many supporters (45%) of third-place finisher Jacquie Esser, as compared to Kau (20%)….
SA Editorial: Steve Alm is best choice for Honolulu prosecutor
read … Poll: For Prosecutor, More Voters Prefer Alm Over Kau
Oahu election turnout already at 16%
SA: … City election officials reported they have already collected 76,520 general election ballot envelopes from Oahu voters as of Tuesday afternoon, or more than 16% of those on the city’s voter rolls.
Crews picked up 42,844 envelopes in about 80 trays from the airport branch of the U.S. Postal Service on Tuesday, the largest haul since 549,935 mail-in ballot packets were mailed out to registered voters last week ahead of the Nov. 3 general election, city Clerk Glen Takahashi said….
Takahashi told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that the large amount of ballots collected Tuesday may be due in part to the fact there there was no postal delivery on Monday, a federal holiday.
“It probably doubled up from what we normally might be receiving around this time,” Takahashi said. The city collected 23,008 envelopes Saturday.
Ballots must be received by the city and counties by 7 p.m. Nov. 3. Voters who want to mail in their ballots are advised by the state Office of Elections to drop their signed return envelopes in mailboxes by Oct. 27. After that it’s advised that ballot envelopes be dropped off at a designated place of deposit or voter service center. For locations, go to elections.hawaii.gov.
Traditional precinct voting locations will no longer be open on Election Day….
Although the official voter registration deadline has passed, election laws require that citizens be allowed to do same-day registration and voting; folks can do that at voter service centers….
read … Oahu election turnout already at 16%
Coverup? 11 new COVID-19 cases are tallied from August at Roselani Place
MN: … Maui County recorded 11 new COVID-19 cases Tuesday with Maui County Mayor Michael Victorino saying that they are from tests in August tied to the cluster at the Roselani Place assisted living facility.
During his news conference Tuesday afternoon, Victorino said PCR tests needed to be done to confirm positive antigen tests done at the facility, so it took some time to confirm the results. …
(IQ Test: Do you believe this is why the results are reported two months late?)
Although Roselani Place increased the county’s total cases by 11 Tuesday, the facility reported no new cases from its last update Friday. As of Saturday, there have been 71 cases — 32 staff and 39 residents.
Of those cases, 12 are active with all but one being residents. All 12 active cases are asymptomatic, according to the update from the facility Tuesday.
Staff and residents, who have been negative, continue to be tested every four days, with the next test scheduled today.
A woman whose parents are living at the Kahului facility is concerned about the treatment and care of the residents. Last Wednesday, her 86-year-old mother tested positive for the virus.
“She and my dad are (living) in the same room. My dad is negative,” said the woman, who requested anonymity fearing her parents could be singled out.
It took several days before the couple was separated, the woman said. A room was found for her mother across the hall from her regular residence, but because her mother has dementia she wandered back into her old room to be with her 90-year-old husband….
HTH: Life Care Center reports additional COVID cases
KHON: Fourth death reported at Life Care Center
read … 11 new COVID-19 cases are tallied from August at Roselani Place
BoE Decision to let Teachers ‘Work’ from Home is Backwards
SA: … The Board of Education in its Oct. 1 meeting threw the decision-making back on the school principals. As one board member stated, “The ultimate decision is at the discretion of the principal.”
According to the meeting, the decisions to be made by the principal are around whether teachers should be allowed to work from home, as opposed to having to work from campus. The principals are also authorized to determine whether and which students may return to the classroom.
Why not provide resources to the schools for large fans, tents for open-air classrooms, and other ways to make our schools safer so students and teachers can return? Let’s use some of the CARES Act money for our classrooms to make them safer. Let’s see if we can improve online learning and bring more resources to our classrooms at home. How about more training for teachers and parent-teachers and more technical support for students? This pandemic will be with us for the foreseeable future.
Perhaps our children are not losing ground with online education. I have not seen any measurement. My observation is that my grandkids are mostly filling the squares. Anecdotal feedback from friends is similar.
My message is that if we truly focus on the classroom and the student — as we always say we do — then we should strive to improve our children’s learning even during this unprecedented situation.
HSTA Oct 9, 2020: HIDOE publishes new online process for telework applications
HSTA Oct 9, 2020: State plans to revise school reopening thresholds, skewing toward more stringent federal guidelines
read … Long-term changes needed in schools
Honolulu consumer prices rise amid coronavirus pandemic
SA: … Honolulu’s consumer price index is up 1.9% over 12 months through September compared with 1.4% nationally….
The increase locally was driven largely by the cost of food and beverages, which was up 7.8%, the BLS report said.
Honolulu’s food cost increase included a 9.6% hike for food at home and 5.2% more for food away from home.
Other things that cost more included housing, up 1.9%; education and communication, up 4.1%; and recreation, up 4.9%.
Partially offsetting more expensive items were three major necessities where prices decreased in the 12-month period. The price for electricity fell 11.3%, the price for gas fell 14.8% and the price for apparel fell 5.0%.
A price change for medical care was not calculated….
In the broadest measure of the state’s economy, the value of all Hawaii goods and services produced for sale, also known as gross domestic product, plummeted 42.2% during the April-June period, which was tied for the lowest in the nation with Nevada. However, factoring Hawaii’s 9% first-quarter GDP decline put the Aloha State at the bottom of the national barrel.
“We now have the distinction of having the weakest economy in the country,” Carl Bonham, executive director of the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, said Monday.
In terms of unemployment, BLS last month reported that Hawaii tied with New York for the third-worst rate in August at 12.5%, behind Nevada and Rhode Island at about 13%….
SA: State to issue restaurant debit cards with $500 prepaid to qualified recipients starting Friday
read … Honolulu consumer prices rise amid coronavirus pandemic
State says extra security measures in place when tourism reopens
KHON: … The state says it’s testing and contact tracing abilities have increased dramatically. Also, officials say the healthcare system is in much better shape now than it was just a few weeks ago.
Come Oct. 15, officials say they expect about 2,000 to 3,000 visitor arrivals per day. The governor says the state is adding up to 200 contact tracers to deal with travel-related infections, raising the total to 500 tracers. The state is also using $30 million in CARES Act funds for tests and testing equipment.
“This means we will have hundreds of thousands of additional tests that we can use to manage the virus in our community as we resume economic activity and school reopenings,” said Gov. David Ige.
Mayor Kirk Caldwell also plans to increase testing capacity on Oahu by bringing in a mobile testing lab that is capable of doing 10,000 tests a day. The governor adds that hospitals can handle more COVID patients now with the addition of 230 healthcare professionals.
“It really was access to healthcare professionals and we have plugged that gap and we are a lot better prepared for any increase in COVID-19 cases today than we were even a month or six weeks ago,” said Ige.
Officials add that if there is a surge in cases from travelers, they will likely see it coming.
“I don’t expect a surge at all of consequence until we see big surges first in the East Coast in the winter,” said Lt. Gov. Josh Green….
HTH: Post-arrival antigen tests for out-of-state travelers to be available at all 3 Big Island commercial airports
SA: Hawaii steps up spending for coronavirus tests and tracing ahead of tourism’s return
read … State says extra security measures in place when tourism reopens
Hawaii using protective equipment for coronavirus at ‘scary’ rate
SA: … Hawaii has 28 hospitals and 44 nursing facilities. Raethel said they’re using PPE at a rate of five to 10 times pre-COVID-19 levels….
House Minority Leader state Rep. Gene Ward (R, Hawaii Kai-Kalama Valley) grew visibly agitated when he pressed Raethel on why the state was not using a so-called “spit-in-cup test” called ASSURE-19 which was developed by Honolulu’s Oceanit Laboratories in partnership with The Queen’s Medical Center and the University of Hawaii’s John A. Burns School of Medicine.
The test is currently estimated to cost $20.
Ward said the Oceanit test is “days away from getting FDA approval” by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration….
read … Hawaii using protective equipment for coronavirus at ‘scary’ rate
Kauai Residents Flee: Homes Sell Quickly to Mainlanders
TGI: … “I had to work two or three jobs to be able to afford a home here,” Furderer said. “That was a choice that we made as a family. But now we’re in a tough spot. It’s almost like the choice is either sell your house or move off Kauai.”
On his own street, a rural road with eight house lots, two families have sold their residences since March in response to the pandemic recession, Furderer said.
Families from Oklahoma and Texas bought the homes sight unseen and moved in, spending their first two weeks on the island in mandatory quarantine, Furderer said ….
read … This Kauai Businessman Can Scrape By For A Few Months, But Then Something Has To Change
Hawaii "Has Committed Suicide" --"Hardly Anyone Is Sick, But We're All Broke"
ZH: … Hawaii has committed suicide.
We may legit have to move. This is ridiculous ….
Hardly anyone is sick here.
But we are all broke.
there were only like 50 people on our plane to Oahu from Seattle, and one of them [a surgeon] ended up yelling at airport security to go ahead and arrest him.
The state of Hawaii is trying to detain him - even though he has surgeries to give in the morning.
This man comes to Hawaii once a month to perform surgeries.
Every month.
They keep changing the regulations for entry.
The state or Hawaii is denying their citizens ACCESS TO MEDICAL TREATMENT via their constant changing of their rules.
This doesn’t even surprise me.
Many of us here in Hawaii use medical services that come from other islands, or even from the mainland.
Hawaii’s ridiculously overzealous travel restrictions are going to make it so that even FEWER doctors are available to serve the citizens
The veterinarian who sees my horse normally flies in from Oahu.
Until recently, he was the ONLY equine vet serving the island.
Our only pediatric psychiatrist on island works 1/2 time on another island.
These travel restrictions are not only cumbersome, but risk lives….
read … Hawaii "Has Committed Suicide"
Ex-Honolulu police officer gets 14 days in jail for sex assault of minor during traffic stop
SA: Former Honolulu police officer Kramer Aoki was sentenced today to 14 days in jail for sexually assaulting a teenage girl he stopped for speeding while on duty in 2014.
Circuit Judge Kevin Souza sentenced the 41-year-old this morning in the fourth-degree sexual assault case, and granted him a deferral of a no contest plea. If Aoki complies with the terms of the deferral, the conviction will be wiped off his record and he will stay off the sex offender registry.
Prosecutors had asked for a year in jail.….
read … Former HPD officer sentenced for sex assault
Will 9th Circuit Shut Dubin Down?
ILind: … The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has issued a temporary stay that puts further reciprocal disciplinary proceedings against Honolulu attorney Gary Dubin on hold.
The Hawaii Supreme Court issued an order of disbarment against Dubin on September 9, 2020, and the 9th Circuit was notified immediately. 9th Circuit rules require that the court initiate its own reciprocal proceedings when notified that an attorney has been disciplined in another jurisdiction….
Accordingly, on October 9, 2020, the court issued an order that Dubin resign within 30 days, “or shall show cause, in writing, why respondent should not be ineligible to practice law in this court….”
Dubin submitted his response to the show cause order on October 9. It included a 10 page memo, and 986 pages of exhibits from the disciplinary proceedings of the Hawaii Office of the Disciplinary Counsel and, later, the Hawaii Supreme Court.
On the same day, without reviewing the substance of Dubin’s response, the court issued a new order: “Reciprocal disciplinary proceedings are stayed pending the outcome of: (1) his pending request to Justice Elena Kagan for a stay of his Hawaii disbarment; and (2) his contemplated petition for a writ of certiorari to the United States Supreme Court.”
Almost immediately, Dubin sent out an email saying the court agreed “to review the merits of my defenses to disbarment” as well as issuing a stay on its reciprocal disciplinary proceedings.
Although the court did issue a stay, its order did not appear to include agreement to “review the merits” of Dubin’s defense.
Further, Dubin did not request a hearing and, according to the rules cited above, appears to have waived any right to a hearing at the 9th Circuit.
Dubin’s email said his law firm will have to be restructured as a result of staff and client departures following the Hawaii Supreme Court’s Order of Disbarment….
Sept 30, 2020: ‘Ragged clothing and a staged homeless look’–Foreclosure for Fun and Profit with Gary V Dubin
read … Dubin wins temporary delay in 9th Circuit reciprocal discipline
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