April 3, 2026 News Read > Hawaii Free Press

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April 3, 2026 News Read
By Andrew Walden @ 12:48 PM :: 120 Views

Hawaii's Good Friday Holiday - What's Up With That?

Green Names Andy Winer's Law Partner Chief Justice

Honolulu DMV Recalls '4-MAGA' License Plate

Hawaii bill to ban commercial reef fishing stalls

Election 2026: 251 Candidates Pull Papers to Run

City Office of Economic Revitalization was just a Scam to Burn up COVID Money

SA: … The city Office of Economic Revitalization (OER) was created — or reorganized from the erstwhile Office of Economic Development — through a City Council resolution in 2020 and tasked with the high-minded goal of building a resilient economy post-COVID-19. Aside from programs funded through dwindling federal money — OER’s most lucrative source of funds, by far — progress on mandates to “guide long-term strategy and economic development,” among other difficult-to-quantify objectives, has been largely unimpressive. As it moves into its seventh fiscal year, the agency, imagined as the entity to wean Honolulu off tourism and onto more diverse revenue streams, is at risk of becoming a drag on the economy it was built to bolster.

(CLUE: Federal COVID money almost gone.)

Following its establishment as a component of the Managing Director’s Office, OER has largely flown under the radar, gathering and dispersing funds from a variety of sources to fulfill its stated mission of building a strong economy that improves the quality of life for every community, small business and family on the island. But in January, a comprehensive report from the Office of the City Auditor laid out a bevy of shortcomings, including a worrying number of unrealized initiatives and, seemingly, no externally verifiable budgeting details for an initial four-year period. OER attributed the latter fault to ongoing reorganization efforts but, as the scathing audit notes, the long gap subverts transparency and accountability.

The audit determined OER placed an emphasis on staffing capacity over a dictate to quickly identify, disburse and manage funding from federal, state and private sources. As of fiscal 2025, OER enlarged staffing by 20 full-time equivalent positions at a cost of $4.5 million. That will likely eat into the city’s bottom line, as the agency was established primarily using temporary State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF) from the COVID-era American Rescue Plan Act that are expected to run dry at the end of 2026, with no outside replacement identified….

(TRANSLATION: Burn COVID money on 20 make-work jobs. Now the money is gone so the OER must go to.)

read … Editorial: Embattled agency must prove worth | Honolulu Star-Advertiser

HB2049: Another Massive Tax Increase on Housing

HPR: … The state Legislature is considering significant changes (increases) to the conveyance taxes that are levied on a property when it's sold. HPR's Ashley Mizuo reports that lawmakers aim to use the increased revenue to fund transit-oriented housing and to provide the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands with its first permanent stream of state funding.

(TRANSLATION: ‘Affordable’ housing plan? Tax housing.)

Rep. Luke Evslin introduced a measure that would restructure conveyance taxes with the intention of not impacting average home sellers in the state, but (and) charge high-value property sales significantly more….

SA: State bills would raise tax on pricey Hawaii home sales | Honolulu Star-Advertiser

HB2049: Text, Status

read … Lawmakers could restructure conveyance tax to give DHHL a new funding stream | Hawai'i Public Radio

Honolulu City Council considers COVID-era hazard pay for bus workers

SA: … The Honolulu City Council’s Budget Committee on Tuesday approved Resolution 74, which would give the 2,078-member Hawaii Teamsters and Allied Workers Local 996 $7,500 per worker in temporary hazard pay, or THP, plus applicable payroll taxes of 7.65%.

The full Council, scheduled to meet on April 15, is scheduled to consider final approval of Resolution 74’s requested THP payout, which is estimated at $16.77 million….

read … Honolulu City Council considers COVID-era hazard pay for bus workers | Honolulu Star-Advertiser

Hawaiʻi School Contract Failures Triggered Holdup Of $30M+ For Meals

CB: … One software company, called Nutrislice, was hired around 2022 to help schools communicate nutrition and allergy information about meals in different languages to families. Another program, Titan, was brought on around the same time to help cafeteria managers track inventory and plan menus. Titan was also supposed to allow managers to track local ingredient purchases — a key component of the DOE’s push to source 30% of its food locally by the end of the decade.

The modernization initiative began crumbling as the nutrition agency started raising questions about the validity of the department’s contracts with the companies.

The education department failed to publish a competitive bid for Nutrislice, which cost $72,285 in the 2023-24 academic year, and instead relied on options offered through a pre-set vendor list, according to the report. Nutrislice was also not one of the software companies approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to analyze meals and determine if they meet federal nutrition standards, a requirement to receive federal funding.

Hawaiʻi Child Nutrition Programs also found the department failed to properly procure Titan, the menu planning and inventory software that cost the education department more than $2 million. As a result, the nutrition agency withheld more than $20 million from the meal program starting in November 2024, according to a recent report from the state auditor.

Randy Tanaka, who oversaw school meals and facilities when DOE was purchasing the software, said he recalls the department issuing a bid for the menu planning software before awarding the contract to Titan. But, Tanaka said, he wasn’t involved in the process of bidding for the software and awarding the bid.

Tanaka was fired from DOE in late 2023 after his office proposed forfeiting nearly half a billion in state funds for school construction.

Civil Beat filed a public records request for DOE’s contracts and bid solicitations for its nutrition software on March 27 but has not yet received the documents. …

read … Hawaiʻi School Contract Failures Triggered Holdup Of $30M+ For Meals - Honolulu Civil Beat

Trump polled advisers about replacing Tulsi Gabbard as intelligence chief

TG: … Pressure intensifies for Gabbard after president’s displeasure with Iran war testimony ….

read … Trump polled advisers about replacing Tulsi Gabbard as intelligence chief | US politics | The Guardian

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