Hawaii: One Third of Young Adults Live With Mom
Matson to Hike Container Fees $225
Health Insurance: Hawaii 2nd Most Monopolized
Governor Releases $3.7 Million for Hilo Medical Center
HSTA ‘Work to Rule’ Protests Statewide
State expects reapportionment lawsuit to end in U.S. Supreme Court
ILind: The State Attorney General expects that any ruling in a lawsuit challenging the state’s 2012 reapportionment plan will be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, and has received approval from the state procurement office to hire a law firm with experience in relevant constitutional law.
The lawsuit, Kostick v Nago, is pending in U.S. District Court.
The AG’s office failed to anticipate and prepare for a case of this kind in advance, according to a request for exemption from normal procurement procedures.
Jenner & Block, a national law firm with some 450 attorneys working in offices across the country, has been selected, with fees capped at $50,000 through the end of the year.
Link: Defense and Plaintiff Motions
read … Supreme Court
Star-Adv Admits Romy Cachola is a Problem for Mail-In Voting Scheme
SA Editorial: The state Elections Commission rightly will investigate what needs to be done to prevent such problems from recurring. The public needs clearer answers from state elections chief Scott Nago as to why the ballot-supply formula failed to anticipate demand, and why it took so long to respond to requests for more ballots. So far the answers have been vague and unsatisfying.
Absent a rational explanation, the possibility of major change becomes more attractive. Gov. Neil Abercrombie has urged that Hawaii conduct its elections entirely by mail, as Washington and Oregon already do….
… mail-in voting isn't perfect. First, not all votes are counted. Of the 127,528 packets mailed out on Oahu for the 2012 general election, more than 1,800 packets were returned because the voter no longer resided at that address. For security reasons, they were not forwardable. Another 183 signatures were deemed invalid, and other ballots were spoiled through voter error. Unlike voting at a traditional polling booth, where problems can be spotted and corrected before the polls close, it's likely that absentee ballots with problems will simply be discarded. Unfortunately, the state has little information about how and why these mail-in ballots fail.
There's also the security problem. One of the crucial tenets of a free electorate is the right to vote in secret and free of coercion. Without bright-line restrictions, it will be tempting for candidates and their supporters to go door-to-door — a time-honored tradition in Hawaii — and, in effect, put themselves in the voting booth with the voter. This is not a hypothetical concern. Romy Cachola, who won a seat in the state House with a preponderance of absentee votes, walked his district carrying absentee ballot applications and offering advice and instructions on the process….
read … This is the argument FOR Mail-in voting
Borreca Admits Pat Nakamoto is Dwayne Yoshina’s GF and they Were Working on Campaign
Borreca: And the state Elections Commission, which hires the chief elections officer, this week announced its own investigation into the problems with both the primary election and the general elections foul-ups.
As it stands, the state's 2012 election cost $3.5 million. Half was paid for by the four counties, with the state picking up the other half.
Many agree things did not go well.
To be fair, things did not go well all the way back to 2008.
Then, much of the blame was heaped on Kevin Cronin, the newly selected chief elections officer. Cronin had some experience as a Wisconsin state bureaucrat, but very little in running elections. As Hawaii chief elections officer, he was soon discovered to not be a registered Hawaii voter, which besides being obvious, was a job requirement.
Cronin resigned in 2009 and Scott Nago, an assistant, was selected as chief elections officer. Nago may have been too quiet and shy to say what he should have said, which was, "No, please, please let me stay in second place."
Before Cronin and Nago, there was Dwayne Yoshina, the career election bureaucrat made famous for unilaterally doing away with the punch ballot voting system and then made infamous for quarreling with so many politicians that it forced a recount of the 1998 election.
As a side note, West Hawaii Today reported in July that Yoshina was the boyfriend of the former Big Island county elections administrator, Pat Nakamoto, who after being dismissed was criticized when the pair appeared in a campaign ad for a county council candidate.
What he didn’t mention: Nago Sent Letter to Billy Kenoi on Behalf of Nakamoto
read … Some Admissions they Haven’t seen fit to Make into Front Page News
Is The City Being Transparent About The Rail Project Archeological Survey?
CB: We are hearing from the city that the required rail AIS (Archeological Inventory Survey) is almost complete. However, here’s what the city is not telling us. The city does not know the exact location of each rail column, and the city does not know the size of the underground foundations required for each rail column from Aloha Stadium to Ala Moana Center. Therefore, the AIS could be in the wrong place and/or it could fail to inspect the total construction area required to build each rail column.
read … Transparency?
Council Votes 8-1 to Accept Rail Money
KITV: The Honolulu City Council's Legislative Matters Committee moved a resolution forward Thursday that allows the mayor to sign a $1.55 billion full-funding grant agreement for the rail transit project. The tally was 8-1, with outgoing Councilman Tom Berg the only no vote.
The next step is for the council to approve the resolution during its Dec. 5 meeting, which will give city officials the authority to enter into an FFGA contract with the Federal Transit Administration.
HART Executive Director Dan Grabauskas expects the FFGA to be signed anywhere from Dec. 19 to the end of the year, although a location has not yet been decided.
For supporters of the elevated rail line, approval of the FFGA is one of the last remaining obstacles standing in the way of the $5.3 billion project.
Although the Hawaii Supreme Court halted construction Aug. 24 until an archeological inventory survey is finished, only 10 test trenches remain to be dug. Once the AIS process is finished, the State Historic Preservation Division and the Oahu Island Burial Council will review a report to determine what should be done with native Hawaiian burials that have been discovered.
Just last month, a lawsuit that challenged the awarding of the rail line's $1.4 billion core systems contract to Ansaldo Honolulu JV was rejected by the Hawaii Intermediate Court of Appeals.
More recently, anti-rail candidate Ben Cayetano lost to Kirk Caldwell by nearly eight points in the election for Honolulu mayor, which was widely considered a referendum on the project.
Read … Rail Roaded
With Rail Won, Reporter Returns to Kenoi Administration
PBN: Kevin Dayton, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reporter who has been covering the city’s $5.16 billion rail project for more than a year, is leaving the newspaper to return to a job in Hawaii County Mayor Billy Kenoi’s office in Hilo.
PBN learned of Dayton’s plans during a Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation Board meeting on Thursday, and a source in Kenoi’s office said Dayton will be returning to the Big Island in the near future, but did not say what position he is taking.
Dayton, who was the executive assistant to the Hawaii County mayor for about two-and-a-half years prior to joining the Star-Advertiser’s staff in October 2011, said he is returning to that job, although the title could be changed. His last day at the Star-Advertiser is Friday and he starts his new job on Monday.
As Explained: “From Hack to Flack”: the Big Island newspaper-Democrat revolving door
read … Dayton to leave Honolulu Star-Advertiser for Big Island mayor’s office
Hawaii Gas CEO Outlines Three-Step Plan to Save $2B
CB: "If we can build customer loyalty, build community support and hopefully build some industry and legislative support, which is the thing that we're doing here in Washington, D.C., we can cost justify the infrastructure necessary in our state to gradually on a low-risk basis build out this project and take Hawaii's energy costs down by about $2 billion a year," Kissel told a few dozen people at the Natural Gas Roundtable's monthly lunch at the University Club a few blocks north of the White House.
Kissel outlined what he said was a three-phase approach.
The first phase is shipping in LNG on Matson or Horizon ships as an emergency backup fuel.
"That'll help us because the refineries and the rest of the infrastructure is weak in Hawaii," Kissel told Civil Beat after his speech. "You need to have redundant capabilities."
The second phase is using LNG to displace synthetic natural gas. Kissel said the hope is that the first two phases can be done within three years, and they will benefit Hawaii Gas' 70,000 customers.
The third phase is "industrial, commercial power" available to the entire population, according to Kissel.
"We're not actively trying to solicit HECO's customers away from them," he told Civil Beat. "We want HECO as one of our customers for our gas for their power generation."
Kissel said LNG could provide about 400 megawatts of HECO's load, with the rest being made up by renewables. LNG could also be used for transportation and marine purposes.
He told the luncheon crowd that the plan is to collaborate with a shipping company to dedicate a boat solely to regular transport between the West Coast and Hawaii.
Link: HawaiiGas LNG Presentation
read … Scammers Tremble
EPA $2B Demand May force Combined Cycle Turbines
CB … the Environmental Protection Agency is requiring upgrades to oil-based generating units beginning in 2015 to meet stricter environmental controls. Thus, HECO is expected to have to spend significant capital on upgrades anyway.
Adding scrubbers and air control devices to meet the new regulations could cost the utility $1 billion to $3 billion, according to Nasseri, who argues that switching to gas turbines makes more economic sense. By comparison, he said that switching steam-powered generators to gas turbines would cost about $150,000 per 100 megawatts, which in the end would be significantly cheaper.
"It better benefits the state, HECO and customers to switch these old steam turbines into new modern, efficient (combined cycle) gas turbines," he said. "Of course natural gas could be an option. But even if you burn diesel instead of low sulfur fuel oil in those units, you still have higher efficiency, less cost and a cleaner burn."
read … $2B demand for Combined Cycle
Greenhouse Gas Games: Solar, Wind Scammers Enlist DoH to block competition
DN: Yesterday the Hawaii Department of Health held a hearing on its proposal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) from the 24 largest stationary sources in Hawaii. The proposal is that these companies each cut their 2010 emissions by 25% so that the State could achieve its 1990 emissions levels.
About 55 people showed up at the hearing, 40 were male, 15 female. HECO had a large but silent contingent. Maybe a dozen people made comments, including Nicole Ferguson (UH) Dr. Makena Coffman (Economics Professor, Department of Urban and Regional Planning), Sarah Preble, Duane Preble, Robert Harris (Sierra Club), Jeff Mikulina (Blue Planet) and Henry Curtis (Life of the Land). They all praised DOH for taking steps towards regulating greenhouse gases.
DOH proposed to exempt mobile sources, the H-POWER garbage-to-energy facility and biogenic (biofuel) sources until some future date. Most of the testifiers opposed giving free passes to specific industries. (See this isn’t about GHG, this is about picking winners and losers to help the solar scammers.)
Chevron and Tesoro wasted to know why they were being singled out. Tesoro has already achieved lower GHGE levels today than they had in 1990. Thus the DOH policy would penalize them by requiring them to further reduce emissions by 25%, thus giving them a disproportionate obligation, in effect making them shoulder the burden for those who have chosen not to reduce their emissions….
Several speakers spoke of the need to consider life cycle emissions. The growing of biofuels (true) and the extraction of liquefied natural gas (false) can make them worse than fossil fuels. Merely measuring what comes out of a smokestack is the wrong approach (if you want to make sure that these GHG regs block LNG and biofools in order to leae the field only to wind and solar.)
read … Greenhouse Games
Solar Scammers Push to End City Inspections So the can get away with anything
SA: Several city electrical inspectors testified against the bill, saying the real solution is providing more city inspectors and that private, third-party inspectors would not have the training and support network to do the job properly.
Lance Prochnow, a city inspector for 12 years and a licensed electrician for three decades, said electricians do not make good inspectors overnight.
“It takes experience. You have to know where to look and what to look for,” he said. Electricians “go out to install things,” Prochnow said. “To know what to inspect is a little different.”
Colin Lee, another city electrical inspector, said safety has been his priority for 38 years.
Many PV contractors “take a perfectly good installation system and mess it up,” Lee said. “Who’s going to train these third-party guys, and what kind of qualifications are they going to have?”
read … Crooks to Police themselves
VIDEO: Public supports Hu Honua at PUC hearing
BIVN: Speaking in favor of the proposal, the growing forestry industry on the Hamakua Coast, where thousands of acres on the Hamakua Coast are occupied by Eucalyptus trees, ready for harvest.
That includes commercial truckers, whose business will get a boost by hauling the timber once the market is established.
There was also support from the carpenters, who have seen hard times as the economy has slowed. Many of them are local families who see Hu Honua as an opportunity to make ends meet on Hawaii Island.
read … Hu Honua
Taxing the Tax: Hawaii Nonprofits Squeezed by Itemization Caps
QUESTION: There’s been a lot of talk lately about how the federal government is nearing a “fiscal cliff” and how possible sequestration at the federal level might affect government spending in Hawaii. You recently called it a “human cliff” and cited not only possible government spending cuts but tax code changes that might discourage charitable donations.
ANSWER: Right, and already at the state level there has been a cap imposed on the itemized deduction on the state income tax form, and the charitable deductions is part of that. It was enacted as of July 1, 2011. And here in Hawaii, where you have high mortgage interest payments and other types of things, we’re really concerned that at the end of the day, after you make all those other deductions, there really isn’t going to be an incentive to be charitable.
So we’re really worried about the specter of any conversation around the charitable deductions at the federal level. That would just be a double whammy.
Q: What is the limit for the state cap?
A: It’s $25,000 for a single filer or married person filing separately, if the adjusted gross income (AGI) is $100,000 or more. For a head of household with $150,000 or more it’s $37,500. And for a taxpayer filing a joint return or as a surviving spouse of $200,000 or more, it’s $50,000.
These new limits … expire after the 2015 tax year, so they are effective for deductions arising from charitable contributions made beginning 2011….
We helped a legislative task force two years ago that now is still meeting but is just soon to introduce its report of recommendations to the 2013 Legislature, around improvements to the contracting relationship between governments and nonprofits. We’re pretty proud of facilitating or prompting that conversation that hopefully will result in some improvements in that relationship.
Q: Like what, in particular?
A: It started because of anecdotal evidence from many nonprofit executives who contract with government that government contract payments were extremely late.
And then it was confirmed by a big study put out by the Urban Institute, in conjunction with our National Council of Nonprofits, that basically confirmed that Hawaii was notoriously high-ranked in those areas of government of late payment, as well as the complexity of the reporting and applying process.
And also that the government contract many times didn’t pay the full value of the service, forcing nonprofits to have to try to fundraise it elsewhere to be able to deliver their agreed-upon scope of service.
So with those three areas being highly ranked — notoriously ranked — it really did call it to the attention of some legislators, and they were willing to work side by side with HANO to try to get this task force going so that we could investigate and explore these….
2010: Nonprofits Highlights Government Contracting Problems for Nonprofits Across the Country
read … Time Value of Money
Obama Admin: Failure to Extend Bush Tax Cuts Would Siphon $1B out of Hawaii
CB: Allowing tax cuts on middle class families to expire could result in almost a billion-dollar reduction in consumer spending in Hawaii in 2013.
That's according to a new analysis by President Barack Obama's Council of Economic Advisers. The state-by-state breakdown of the impacts of the Bush-era tax cuts was released by the White House late Wednesday as part of Obama's effort to convince Congress to extend the cuts for middle class Americans while allowing them to expire for top earners.
The full report is titled "The Middle-Class Tax Cuts’ Impact on Consumer Spending and Retailers."
Here are some of the other Hawaii-specific findings:
- A median-income Hawaii family of four (earning $83,000) could see its income taxes rise by $2,200.
- 98 percent of Hawaii families make less than $250,000 a year and would not see an income tax increase under Obama's plan.
- The tax increase and decline in consumption could slow the growth of real GDP by 1.4 percentage points in Hawaii.
The tax cuts, first passed under President George W. Bush in 2001 and 2003 and since extended, are set to expire at the end of the year if Congress does not act. That's part of the so-called "fiscal cliff" — the other part being automatic across-the-board spending cuts known as the sequester — dominating discussion in Washington, D.C.
Carl Bonham, professor of economics and executive director of the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization (UHERO), said the White House's estimates made sense to him.
read … White House: Middle Class Tax Hike Could Cut Hawaii Spending By $1B
Lawsuit filed over Jones Act
HTH: John Carroll filed the class-action lawsuit Thursday on behalf of seven plaintiffs, including a Hilo businessman, who allege the maritime law encourages shipping monopolies and unfairly inflates prices for Hawaii consumers.
Carroll had lost a legal challenge of the act in 2009, seeking injunctive relief for his clients. A federal court judge dismissed the case saying he couldn’t prove a direct connection to the financial harm they suffered and the law.
“The main difference is that we do have the particularized basis for showing this,” he said. “And then also, I’m not asking for injunctive relief this time. I’m going to go right to trial.”
The case will be heard in the U.S. District Court of Hawaii. Carroll estimated a trial would take six to eight months to start….
James O’Keefe, one of the plaintiffs, wrote in an affidavit that rising shipping costs, which he partially attributed to limited shipping competition, helped put his Hilo bakery out of business.
“The Jones Act singles out Hawaii for disparate treatment in relation with other states,” the former owner of O’Keefe & sons, Bread Bakers wrote in the affidavit signed in 2009. The bakery went out of business in 2008.
“It was not the only factor in the demise (of the business) … but at an estimated additional cost of 7.5 percent of income, it was the most significant,” he wrote.
2008: Death of a Bakery
PBN: Jones Act
SA: Lawyer fights what he calls a “duopoly” of firms shipping goods to the islands
read … Lawsuit filed over Jones Act
Public Land Development Corp. the subject at Paia meeting
MN: The founder of an organization opposing the Public Land Development Corp. and an official with the Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter will be discussing the controversial PLDC at a meeting of Upcountry Sustainability at 7 p.m. Monday.
Mahina Martin, founder of PLDC Watch, and Lucienne de Naie, who has served as chairwoman and conservation co-chair of the Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter, will be appearing at the gathering at the Paia Community Center's main hall.
read … PLDC
Norks Prepare Another Missile Launch
WT: The Pentagon is preparing to activate global missile defenses for an expected test launch of another long-range missile by North Korea, U.S. defense officials said.
Intelligence agencies are closely watching a North Korean missile launch site amid signs a test-firing will take place in the next two months, U.S. officials said, echoing reports from South Korea and Japan.
One official said the indicators from the launch site appear to be “a replay of the April launch, hopefully with the same success.”
North Korea’s last Taeopodong-2 missile was test-fired April 13 in what defense officials said was a failure shortly after the first stage lifted off.
Commercial satellite images from Friday and made public by DigitalGlobe revealed increased activity associated with a forthcoming missile launch at the North Korea’s Dongchang-ri launch site in the northwestern part of the country.
Read … Inside the Ring: North Korean missile launch set
Anti-Military Fearmongers May Have Opportunity in Dec 12 DU Hearing
WHT: The U.S. Army maintains that it does not need a license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to possess depleted uranium at its training ranges in Hawaii.
But in the event that the NRC decides a license is needed, the Army wants to avoid the requirement that radiation monitoring be done, on the grounds that the decades-old material poses no risk to human health.
The NRC has scheduled a meeting Dec. 12 in Maryland to discuss a draft license with the U.S. Army Installation Management Command, which has jurisdiction over the two places where spotting rounds were found in Hawaii — Pohakuloa Training Area and Oahu’s Schofield Barracks.
read … Army seeks to skirt depleted uranium rules
Detail-rich film dissects Pearl's day of 'Infamy'
SA: "Pearl Harbor Declassified: 15 Minutes of Infamy," a Military Channel documentary, premieres Saturday at the USS Arizona Memorial Visitor Center as part of the 71st-anniversary observance.
The one-hour film conducts a "forensic dissection" of the world events that swept Hawaii and the United States into the war, including footage from the Japanese aerial squadrons that were equipped with film and still cameras to document battle damage.
Filmmakers analyze frame after frame, revealing the details of the attack as the clock ticks down to the detonation on the Arizona.
A similar examination is made of enhanced film footage of the Pearl Harbor attack taken by a Navy doctor. The film was shot in color, and only a few frames of the color original remain, according to the filmmakers.
The footage shows attacking Japanese "Kate" bombers in a tight V pattern, and images of the explosion on the Arizona from the ground and the air.
"With today's technology the (filmmakers) were able to look at the idea of stabilizing the film and putting it in high definition, and the results are remarkable," said Daniel Martinez, chief historian at the Arizona Memorial.
Seating is available for 300 Saturday at the free 6:30 p.m. screening in the Arizona Memorial Theater. Reservations are on a first-come, first-served basis by calling 423-7300, ext. 7048.
The documentary will make its television debut Dec. 7 on the Military Channel (Oceanic Cable 345).
read … Pearl Harbor
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