Military Personnel 14% of Oahu Rental Market -- but nearly 0% of Sister Isle Rental Market
Climate Resiliency
Hawaii Congressional Delegation--How they Voted January 17, 2025
Celebrities Come Home!
Gabbard brought in over $1.2M as a MAGA celebrity, filings show
P: … Tulsi Gabbard, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence, brought in over $1.2 million last year as a MAGA surrogate, according to a financial disclosure released Saturday.
The former Democrat turned conservative superstar made just under $300,000 in an advance for her book For Love of Country: Leave the Democrat Party Behind, nearly $200,000 as a Fox News contributor, nearly $120,000 as a media contributor for the right-wing American Center for Law and Justice and more than $170,000 for over a dozen speaking engagements, including at the Heritage Foundation.
That’s in addition to the nearly $415,000 the former Hawaii congressmember pulled in from her businesses, Tulsi Media LLC and TOA Studios LLC, and her podcast, “The Tulsi Gabbard Show.”….
And Gabbard is also financially invested in the cause, the filings show — with $100,001 to $250,000 in stock each in the MAGA streaming site Rumble and Tesla, the car company run by Trump’s biggest donor and top adviser Elon Musk. She also declared $1,001 to $15,000 in Apple stock, $15,001 to $50,000 in Nvidia stock and $50,001 to $100,000 in a Texas real estate fund.
Gabbard holds $18,004 to $95,000 in crypto, with most of that in Bitcoin and smaller amounts of Cronos, Solana and Ethereum.
The DNI nominee, whose Senate confirmation hearing has been delayed, took out a $250,001 to $500,000 mortgage on a personal residence last year….
read … Gabbard brought in over $1.2M as a MAGA celebrity, filings show
Pandering to Antivaxxers
Shapiro: … Vaccination rates for the common childhood diseases dropped to 93% nationally in 2024, with much lower rates in red states where vaccines have become part of the political divide.
Even blue Hawaii reported that 39,583 public, charter and private school students in 2023-2024 were not current on required immunizations, up 25% from the year before.
Skeptical parents avoid vaccinating their kids with often dubious religious, medical and philosophical exemptions.
Diseases once nearly eradicated such as polio and measles are clawing their way back; public health officials warn that a deadly measles emergency, such as the 2019 Samoan outbreak that infected 5,700 and killed 83 after a steep drop in vaccinations, is waiting to happen in the U.S.
Vaccine hesitancy was on the rise before COVID-19, and the pandemic supercharged it.
Then-President Donald Trump hailed the COVID-19 vaccines rapidly produced by his “Operation Warp Speed” as a miracle — and they were — but as he prepares to lead again, he’s joined the anti-vaccine mood of his base and nominated leading vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his health secretary, with a mandate to “go wild.”…
read … David Shapiro: Our loss of mutual trust is greatest emergency | Honolulu Star-Advertiser
Legislature Opens With Annual Ritual: Empty Talk About Housing
Borreca: … “We need to get through the permitting process and build the units faster because this housing affects everything we’re trying to do in this economy, everything in what we’re trying to do in creating a better life for all of us here in Hawaii,” Kouchi said in his speech before opening-ceremony crowds at the Capitol.
The housing problem is part of living in Hawaii, and there has not been an elected Hawaii governor who didn’t have a plan for housing Hawaii citizens. From the days of Republican Gov. William Quinn and his successful opponent John A. Burns, Hawaii politicians have talked housing.
Just last week, newly- elected House Speaker Nadine Nakamura sounded the same notes: housing that local families can afford would be the biggest worry for Hawaii’s middle-income residents. ….
read … Column: Talking about housing is easy, building is hard part | Honolulu Star-Advertiser
Homeless ‘taxpayer-funded service fees’ -- $36,500 each
KHON: … John Mizuno was appointed as the state’s homelessness coordinator in January 2024 and said he has gotten over 100 homeless individuals to go back to their mainland families.
“To date, we have sent 137 people from the mainland who are houseless back to their families on the mainland, saving taxpayer costs,” Mizuno said. “We make sure their families, their support group will accept them, first of all. Second, they pay for half of the airfare. So, you’re not going to get a one-way ticket to Vegas and just enjoy yourself and buy another ticket back.”
Mizuno and the chair of the House Human Services and Homelessness Committee both said programs from other states send homeless to the Islands, especially in the winter.
“But more needs to be done,” Rep. Diamond Garcia said. “There’s too many non-local homeless here that that’s using up our resources, which could be used for local families. We need to pass laws and make sure that that we are protecting our own borders from other states. They can’t be shipping us their problems and expecting our taxpayers to fund the bill.”
Mizuno said every single one of the 137 is a victory and will save about $5 million in taxpayer-funded service fees.
(DO THE MATH: $5M / 137 = $36,500 per bum just for ‘taxpayer-funded service fees’. And these fees only keep the homeless, homeless.)
“Next year, three years from now, that number may multiply to three, four or 500 people,” Mizuno said. “We’re going to end up saving millions of dollars for the state of Hawaii and protecting our finite resources for our local homeless.” …
RELATED: Thielen: Homelessness is a Money-Spinner, Creates Thousands of ‘Positions’ in Hawaii
read … Over 100 Hawaii homeless sent back to mainland families
How The Pandemic Shutdown Opened Up Public Access To The Legislature
CB: … If you pay close attention to the Hawaiʻi Legislature, you know lawmakers have rejected a lot of major proposals to make state government more transparent and accessible.
But the fact that you can pay such close attention to the Legislature is the result of a dramatic reform that the Senate and House finally did adopt four years ago.
In 2021, both chambers began livestreaming all committee hearings and floor sessions and allowing remote testimony online.
It took a pandemic to finally make it happen. And it has turned out to be less costly and burdensome than many lawmakers who had resisted the idea had argued.
“It’s one of the biggest deals around,” said Sen. Les Ihara, the longest-serving legislator and an often-lonely crusader for reform since his arrival in 1986. “It’s been my dream from the beginning.”
Last year, the Legislature recorded 2,375 floor hearings and committee meetings, about the same number as every year since 2021. Before that, only a few hundred hearings were recorded, and those were from cable TV broadcasts.
No one has tracked how many people testify online, but having the option available for all hearings sets Hawaiʻi apart from many other states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures….
read … How The Pandemic Shutdown Opened Up Public Access To The Legislature - Honolulu Civil Beat
Hawaii National Guard Job Challenge Academy unveiled
HTH: … Military pomp and circumstance, a maile lei untying, messages from Hawaii dignitaries and a Hawaiian blessing by Kahu Moses Crabbe marked the unveiling Friday of the Hawaii National Guard Job Challenge Academy at Keaukaha Military Reservation in Hilo.
The program has already graduated a cohort of 12 — eight men and four women, all graduates of Hawaii National Guard Youth Challenge Academy. It’s set to welcome its second class on Tuesday, with 23 associates — nine women and 14 men.
Associates in the 5-month-long academy can earn professional certification in construction, forklift operation, real estate, certified nurse assistant, medical assistant, dental assistant or completion of HiSET — Hawaii’s high school diploma equivalency program.
The program is open to Youth Challenge Academy graduates — known in the program as “at promise” youth — between the ages of 17 and 20. Associates eat, sleep and train in the same complex on KMR that used to house YCA, which now has just one location, Kalaeloa in Leeward Oahu….
read … Hawaii National Guard Job Challenge Academy unveiled
Plotting Banyan’s course: As razing of Uncle Billy’s finishes, officials mull future of area
HTH: … The derelict building was a black mark for Banyan Drive, becoming a magnet for squatters, crime and health hazards before the site was finally walled off. A 2023 County Council resolution urging state action to label the building a health and public safety hazard estimated the county has spent more than $122,000 responding to more than 1,000 fire calls alone at the site since May 2018….
“What I would like to see is action,” said James McCully, member of the Banyan Drive Hawaii Redevelopment Agency. “Demolishing Uncle Billy’s was a necessity. Now that we’re done cleaning up the sins of the past, so to speak, the question is how do we proceed proactively?”
McCully said legislation will be introduced during the current session of the Legislature to transfer land at the Waiakea Peninsula from DLNR to the Hawaii Community Development Authority, which is in the state Department of Business, Economic Development &Tourism.
The bill has not yet been introduced, but McCully said he understands it has strong support in both chambers of the Legislature.
The proposed bill, he said, would allow for better long-term planning for the region, “instead of Land Division being focused on solving today’s problems, which means rent collection.” ….
read … Plotting Banyan’s course: As razing of Uncle Billy’s finishes, officials mull future of area
Parasitic wasps to help combat CBB; officials look to release them this spring
HTH: … Swarms of parasitic wasps will descend upon Kona coffee farms this spring as a long-gestating plan to control an invasive pest finally goes forward.
The coffee berry borer is a destructive invasive beetle that has been devastating to coffee farms worldwide. First discovered on the Big Island in 2010, it gets its name by boring into coffee berries to lay eggs, ruining farmers’ yields.
The Hawaii Department of Agriculture in 2023 announced a plan to import a species of parasitic wasp — Phymastichus coffea — that would naturally target and infest the beetle in order to reduce its population. Nearly two years later, those wasps finally are here.
“I believe they only just arrived in the state in the last month,” said Jonathan Ho, plant quarantine manager at the state DOA, who added that complications in the federal import permitting process delayed the bugs’ arrival….
read … Parasitic wasps to help combat CBB; officials look to release them this spring -
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