VIDEO: Lingle Campaign Releases New TV Ad Focusing on Economy
Mufi to go Negative vs Tulsi?
SA: Both Hannemann and Gabbard have earned a fair share of campaign cash. As of the last federal reporting deadline at the end of March, Hannemann led all candidates with $789,000 raised overall and $631,000 in cash on hand. Gabbard was next with $571,000 overall and $465,000 in reserve.
Milner said he expects the dynamics of the race to change as both draw on their campaign funds with a focus on the Aug. 11 primary.
"What (Hannemann) has done in the past is essentially say, ‘There's a juggernaut going, it's for me and I'm going to win and there really isn't any serious competition in the race,'" Milner said. "He's not going to be able to treat this as kind of aloof and ‘Remember me, I'm a good kind of person.'
"I think he's likely to spend more money in the media. It's more likely to be critical of her and he's going to try to do things that will frame her in ways that are not so positive."
read … The Old Mufi to Reemerge?
More Than 80 PACs Jump Into 2012 Election
CB: Here’s the full list of the noncandidate political committees that have registered with the state so far for the 2012 election cycle….
read … The List
Pay to Play: Pacific Resource Partnership registered as Super Pac
ILind: John White, director of the Pacific Resource Partnership, primary sponsor of a website bashing mayoral candidate Ben Cayetano for having been on the receiving end of illegal campaign contributions in his last campaign more than a decade ago, sidesteps an important point in his discussion of campaign finance ills….
John White and PRP are right there at the front of the line in taking advantage of this new campaign landscape.
PRP was one of the first “Super Pacs” to registered with the Campaign Spending Commission, allowing it to accept unlimited contributions from other corporations, individuals or organizations, and spend unlimited amounts attacking candidates of choice, in his case Ben Cayetano. It registered as an “independent expenditure committee” on June 1, a month after launching its “Imua Rail” campaign.
PRP and other corporate interests no longer have to use those clumsy old techniques of false names and accidental overages. Now they’re free to spend what they want to spread their propaganda and attack ads.
read … Pacific Resource Partnership registered as independent expenditure group (Super Pac)
Big PEOs: We Were Just Trying to Get Positions Staffed at DLIR, Really
SA: Although Act 129 has been state law since 2010, the state Labor Department has had difficulty enforcing the current law due to staffing reductions. To our understanding, the department was advocating the passage of a new bill this year, SB 2424, primarily so that it can fund three part-time positions to do so.
While ProService advocates registration and oversight, SB 2424 has raised some concerns. The high fees could pose a hardship to some companies. We also would have preferred Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs oversight and changes in some technical aspects of the bonding requirement.
So while SB 2424 is not perfect, we do not recommend a veto if it means the Labor Department will not be able to fully enforce the current law because of lack of funding. We would support a veto only if Act 129 could be fully enforced.
read … Veto the PEO Bill, if …
SA: Letting Lots of Criminals out Early is OK Because We Will Spend More on Victim Services
SA: Honolulu Prosecutor Keith Kaneshiro, a former director of public safety, has criticized the changes, saying that "public safety must be paramount" instead of reduction of correctional costs.
He did not attend Abercrombie's signing of the bill into law on Wednesday.
However, the prison reform need not result in reduction of public safety. The new law directs $2 million for victim services and increases restitution to victims from 10 percent to 25 percent of any deposit made to an inmate's account. It also adds 15 staff for victim services, including in county prosecutor offices.
The increase in personnel also includes expanding the state Hawaii Paroling Authority from three to five members to quicker and better assess the potential risk of inmates upon release.
A monumental shift is now starting to right-size Hawaii's prisons system, and to use newly gathered inmate characteristics and data to mete out smarter justice. The changes are intended to reduce the inmate populations, but not at the expense of public safety — and if the game plan sticks, their effectiveness should be measurable within a few years.
read … Makes sense, there will be a lot more victims
Letter to Larry: How About Letting Lanai Businesses Buy Their Buildings?
CB: You need to know that Uncle David was all about control: just ask the business owners who have tried for decades to purchase the buildings they are required to pay property taxes on, make capital improvements on, but cannot own. Think maybe you could consider letting go, Larry?
Finally, Larry, I have to tell you the State of Hawaii does not own the remaining 2 percent of Lanai that you don’t (or won’t) own, no matter how many times the press says it does. We do. That would be the over 1,000 private landowners, many of whom are just now succeeding to their grandparents’ and parents’ interests in the many solid, well-built (by master craftsman Kikuichi Honda in the 1920’s and 1930’s) plantation homes scattered about town. They are paradigms of perfect siting, construction, and natural use of sun and wind. I’ve read that you care about such things, Larry, so I’m hoping you visit some of the old places and see for yourself.
read … Private Property Brings Prosperity
$80M on Water Main Repairs in 5 years
CB: A water main breaks almost every day in Honolulu, and all those repairs have cost ratepayers more than $80 million over the last five years.
That number includes the cost of personnel, materials and supplies and equipment, and includes both emergency water main breaks and proactive leak repairs undertaken by the Honolulu Board of Water Supply.
read … Leaking Money
Occupy Beats Law by Moving Junk Around when Tagged
SA: Occupy Honolulu protesters are circumventing the law by “swapping tents that have been tagged for removal with different tents that have not yet been tagged,” he said. So crews that return the next day are unable to impound new tents that have not been tagged.
“When crews have posted removal notices on the new tents, the people who erected them have rotated them with other tents within the 24-hour notice period, again preventing removal,” Fulton said.
H. Doug Matsuoka, one of the protest leaders, acknowledges protesters “have figured out a way of persisting through” the raids, more than 20 by his count.
Tents are stored at private residences, he said, then swapped for tagged tents whenever the city decides to enforce the law.
Using the law, Fulton said city crews have been successful in impounding furniture, such as couches, chairs and tables, that have been brought to Thomas Square.
But Occupy Honolulu protesters have been able to find replacements, discarded curbside, especially in the Makiki area
read … Occupy protesters outwit city on stored property law
Will Obama’s DoJ Hang Deedy out to dry in Civil Suit?
CB: The federal government has not yet decided whether it will defend U.S. special agent Christopher Deedy in a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of 23-year-old Kailua resident Kollin Elderts.
Similar to Deedy’s pending murder trial, that determination revolves around a singular question that will no doubt be integral in both cases: Was Deedy acting in his capacity as a federal law enforcement officer when he shot and killed Elderts around 3 a.m. in a Waikiki McDonald’s? ….
"The problem they have, which is an interesting problem to have, is that if the federal government doesn’t take the case then that contradicts his defense in the (criminal) case."
read … Deedy
UH High-Tech Research: $350K to Distill a Few Gallons of Water
SA: RWT's technology uses solar thermal collectors to heat the water and remove the salt through a humidification-dehumidification (HDH) process. The company's pilot project features solar panels similar to those found in home rooftop water heating systems. The company is installing photovoltaic panels that will power the low-wattage pumps needed to move the water through the system.
"It is designed to be modularized and deployable," said John Chock, one of the company's principals. "That's the way the business will grow. Our business model is to produce small-scale, solar-powered desalination systems."
RWT will hold an open house at 11 a.m. Thursday at the Kakaako facility, 40 Ahui St.
RWT placed second in the 2011 UH Business Plan Competition.
The output of the Kakaako pilot project so far has been limited to a few gallons an hour as the water samples are tested to make sure the system is meeting its benchmarks, McGivern said.
(Now take a look at all the big shots who are taken in by this….)
RWT is being funded by the Hawaii Technology Development Venture, a project administered by the Pacific International Center for High Technology Research that receives funding from the Office of Naval Research. The site near the Children's Discovery Center is being provided by the Hawaii Community Development Authority.
Qu received an initial $50,000 grant from the Hawaii Technology Development Venture in 2009 with renewable energy company Sopogy Inc. as his corporate partner. Based on success in the lab, RWT was formed and received $300,000 in funding under a contract with the Hawaii Technology Development Venture to do the Kakaako pilot project. Oceanit Laboratories Inc. is RWT's partner under the contract….
Chock, the former head of the state-run Hawaii Strategic Development Corp., said RWT is an example of what new UH-Manoa Chancellor Tom Apple referred to when he emphasized the need to make a greater effort to maximize the school's income potential….
(And then we discover….)
The University of Hawaii has not fared well in terms of generating licensing revenue from spending on research. UH received $256 million in research money in fiscal 2010 and took in $107,702 in licensing income, according to the latest data from the Association of University Technology Managers.
A 2010 report by the UH Office of Technology Transfer and Economic Development acknowledged the school's shortcomings in generating revenue from its R&D efforts.
The report, prepared for former UH-Manoa Chancellor M.R.C. Greenwood, said "there is much room for improvement" within university's technology transfer office, which was established in 1989 and reorganized in 2000.
Best Comment: “I think this ‘pioneering technology’ has been known for centuries as evaporation or distillation.”
read … The Next Big Thing, LOL!
Slip-Fall Ship Comes in: But Lawyers aren’t at the Airport (yet)
A $2 million floor at Honolulu Airport that was installed for November's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum is a shiny showpiece that might be just a bit too glossy.
By some accounts, passengers arriving at the airport often slip and fall on the more than 15,000 square feet of glossy, sand-colored terrazzo flooring featuring Hawaiian words and a 1,800-square-foot, 35-foot-diameter brass-and-nickel-colored compass….
Watts said he has seen passengers slipping on the floor "but there have been no reports of people getting hurt."
Caroline Sluyter, spokeswoman for the state Department of Transportation, which oversees airport operations, said, "We have zero formal complaints of slip or fall accidents. That doesn't mean people haven't slipped, but we have had no complaints lodged."
She disputed Watts' assertion that airport engineers insisted on installing a floor intended for indoor use in an outdoor breezeway exposed to rain.
But contractors are installing a new anti-slip surface over the new floor — at no additional cost to the DOT….
read … Hurry, quick before they fix it