What the US Military Spends in Hawaii
Study: If Hawaii Tourism is Called 'Regenerative' Locals will Like Tourists
Poll: 2-1 Support Telescope, Rail Remains Unpopular
CB: … Three years after mass protests on Mauna Kea over the Thirty Meter Telescope project, supporters still outnumber opponents by a 2-to-1 margin….
A total of 58% of voters statewide who were surveyed last month said they strongly or somewhat support the project, while 25% said they somewhat or strongly oppose the project. That compares with a Civil Beat poll done in 2019 that found 64% of voters supported the project at that time, while 31% opposed it.
But support for the Thirty Meter Telescope has declined among Hawaiians. Today, 57% now say they somewhat or strongly oppose the project, while in 2019, only 48% of the people who identified themselves as Native Hawaiian opposed the TMT project.
Now, the city estimates a shortened version of the troubled project will end up costing $9.93 billion, and a new Civil Beat/HNN poll shows 52% of Honolulu voters oppose rail today. The percentage difference between the 2012 survey and the new poll is within the 4% margin of error, suggesting there has been little shift in public opinion.
Support for the rail project among Honolulu voters stood at just 34% in 2012, and today is 36%, according to the new Civil Beat/HNN poll….
read … Poll: Rail Remains Unpopular But Support For TMT Is Solid
75% of Incumbents Flee Honolulu Council
SA: … With only one incumbent seeking reelection in the four Honolulu City Council races in this year’s election, ballots for the Aug. 13 primary will be crowded with newcomers to the political scene.
Oahu voters will elect Council members in Districts 2, 4, 6 and 8. Candidates can win outright in the primary if they collect 50% of the votes plus one. If that doesn’t happen, the two candidates with the highest vote totals in each race will advance to the general election on Nov. 8. If there are only two candidates running for a Council seat, which is the case in District 4, they will square off only during the general election….
Some District 2 candidates come with baggage, as Chad Tsuneyoshi was convicted in 1999 for his involvement in a cocaine trafficking ring. Rothman’s father, Eddie Rothman, came to prominence as leader of Da Hui, a North Shore group of surfers and others that had a reputation for hostile and sometimes violent tactics aimed at intimidating outsiders….
Background: Cocaine News Update: Is Council District 2 Reserved for Crime Families?
read … Open City Council races see many newcomers seeking office
Let’s Not Wait Another Year To Fix Emergency Statute
CB: … The legacy of Gov. David Ige and the current Hawaii Legislature will be forever shaped by the handling of the Covid-19 crisis and subsequent lockdowns. With the worst of the danger behind us and rebuilding ahead, one major question remains: Will Hawaii’s leaders respond to what we learned during the crisis? …
Consider, for example, the governor’s intent to veto Senate Bill 3089, the bill that would reform the executive’s emergency powers.
One of the greatest sources of confusion and frustration during the period came in the endless extensions of the emergency period, along with the seemingly arbitrary new rules and suspension of laws. For two years, the governor acted as a kind of super-legislator, as the emergency-management statute offered no check on his power.
A review of the statute made it obvious that our lawmakers never envisioned the kind of continuing health emergency that we were experiencing. The law includes a 60-day automatic termination provision that the governor bypassed by redeclaring the emergency through supplemental proclamations….
More to the point, the statute lacked any meaningful check on the governor’s power during an emergency. This may not be a concern when an emergency is limited to two months. But in an emergency that stretches for years, with orders that touch on constitutional rights and the long-term prosperity of the state, the lack of a mechanism to rein in the governor’s actions becomes a serious problem….
read … Let’s Not Wait Another Year To Fix Emergency Statute
Help Wanted: Honolulu Needs 3,000 Workers For City Jobs
CB: … The Department of Facility Management, which maintains city roads, oversees flood control systems and repairs city buildings and equipment, has 268 openings, which translates to one-third of the workforce.
The Department of Environmental Services, which picks up the city’s trash and handles its wastewater, is also down by one-third, with some 416 open slots, Miyasaki said….
The city had typically hired 600 people each year but lost more than that number each year to attrition and retirement…
“No organization would consider itself healthy if it has 15% of its workforce at the age of retirement, all of which are eligible to walk out the door tomorrow,” Blangiardi said. “A lot of those people, when they walk out the door, it won’t be about head count, it’s about institutional knowledge.”…
HTH: Nearly 200 teachers needed: High cost of Big Island housing makes it hard to recruit
read … Help Wanted: Honolulu Needs 3,000 Workers For City Jobs
Agribusiness Development Corp. splits from state Agriculture Department
SA: … It’s not entirely clear what the consequences of moving the ADC to DBEDT will be, but that’s part of the concern.
read … Agribusiness Development Corp. splits from state Agriculture Department
Rolling Blackouts Will Be Replacing the AES Coal Plant
IM: …The AES Coal-to-electricity generation facility in Campbell Industrial Park will go offline on August 31, 2022. Hawaii will have no coal plants in just 51 days….
In olden days one might have replaced the 208-megawatt firm power plant with a newer version. That approach is not what is needed (happening) today….
HECO planned to have several commercial scale solar and solar/storage facilities operational to absorb the loss. The covid-19 pandemic global supply chain disruptions caused significant delays in procuring new renewable energy systems. The lack of adequate HECO contingency planning compounded the problem….
The Governor created the Powering Past Coal Task Force. The Hawaii State Energy Office`s newly created community-friendly web site describes the role of the task force.
(A website! That's the solution!)
The Hawaii Public Utilities Commission opened a regulatory “proceeding to review Hawaiian Electric's interconnection process and transition plans for retirement of fossil fuel power plants,” docket no. 2021-0024.
The Public Utilities Commission greatly expanded and centralized data detailing the nature of each approved but not operational power purchase agreement and planned community-based renewable energy (CBRE). The HECO Update for June 2022 is over 100 pages….
(IQ Test: Are you laughing?)
HECO regularly takes firm fossil fuel generators offline for routine maintenance. HECO created a two-month window of no maintenance in September and October 2022 by moving some planned maintenance forward while delaying other maintenance….
The three largest individual generators are the AES coal facility at 208 MW and Kahe 5 and 6 at 142 MW each. When AES goes offline, the combined output of the two largest units will decrease from 350MW to 284MW….
(Translation: Oil will replace coal. The slightest glitch will lead to a blackout. Then the maintenance will begin again….)
read … Replacing the AES Coal Plant Requires a Portfolio of Options
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