Argentine Jorge Bergoglio Elected Pope—Will be Pope Francis
WAC: Legislature Endangers UH Accreditation
UH Mānoa Law School leaps 26 points in rankings
Kauai County Smacks Down Hype: "No Atrazine in Water Supply"
SB286: Solomon Decision Allows Legislature to Define 'Permanent Resident'
Schatz Proposes $180 Billion Carbon Tax
Hawaii Gun Registration Bill to be Heard this Thursday
Hawaii Meth Project Foundation Joins The Partnership at Drugfree.org
Hawaii Had Lowest Election Turnout in Nation – 44.1%
HR29: Gambling tries to Slip in Via Resolution
CB: Consider House Resolution 29, the raffles proposal.
According to the measure, "current state law prohibits raffles if money is charged for the raffle tickets, similar to a lottery, but does not prohibit raffles if the tickets are distributed at no charge after participants pay an entrance fee or ticket fee to a fundraising event."
Recognizing that raffles by charitable organizations "provide important social services and valuable resources to persons in need," HR 29 says that fundraising raffles should be permitted. HR 29 asks the Attorney General to make recommendations for possible legislation or administrative rules.
Harmless and well-intended, no? Maybe not.
The AG's office opposes the idea — "the Department has grave concerns about creating any broad exceptions to the current gambling laws," according to testimony.
Tom Kay of the Hawaii Coalition Against Legalized Gambling calls the idea "a lottery scheme. ... Targeted groups would include youth and the poor. Those who could least afford to spend money on gambling would buy the most tickets."
House Consumer Protection and Commerce will vote on HB 29 Wednesday.
Totally Related: Akaka Tribe: “may not conduct gaming activities unless the State of Hawaii permits such an activity for any purpose by an individual, organization, or entity”
read … Resolution
Hawaii's state revenues 12% higher than last year
PBN: The state collected a total of $3.56 billion through the end of February, compared to $3.18 billion for the same period last year.
General excise and use taxes … grew by 9.5 percent from last year to $1.94 billion, from $1.77 ….
…transient accommodations tax, generated $236 million, which was 12.9 percent more than the $209 million collected last year….
The state Council on Revenues' most recent forecast predicted state tax revenues would rise by 5 percent….
LINK: CoR Meets Today
read … 12% Higher
Thousands of Hawaii Teachers Expected to Rally at Capitol Tomorrow
CB: Campbell High School-based teachers group Hawaii Teachers Work to the Rules is scheduled to host a mass rally at the state Capitol tomorrow afternoon. Teachers will be protesting Gov. Neil Abercrombie, who they say illegally imposed a “last, best, final” contract offer in 2011, forcing teachers to work without a negotiated contract for nearly two years.
The Hawaii State Teachers Association is pitching in by supplying buses to the after-school event.
PR: Stand up
read … Thousands of Hawaii Teachers Expected to Rally at Capitol Tomorrow
University of Hawaii Procurement Under Fire for Wasting Millions of Dollars on Fraud and Corruption
HR: When the University of Hawaii hired architect Bryce Uyehara to design a stadium for the women’s softball team, the project completed in 1998 didn’t turn out quite how the fans or the players expected.
The architect designed the “line of sight” too high, so spectators sitting in the stands could not see home plate or much of the batter’s body. The mistake, which made news headlines, cost the University more than $500,000. Most people believed the University administration would avoid hiring that architect for future jobs, but Uyehara was hired again in 2011 to perform major renovations on the Gateway House student dormitory – a $12 million project completed in August 2012.
These are the kinds of decisions local construction industry leaders are questioning as the University doles out a total of $622 million in contracts including $206 million for major contracts now underway, $229 million of major projects being procured and $187 million in health, safety, code and repairs and maintenance projects.
Background: Mitsunaga Names Names, Slams UH for Favoritism Towards Kobayashi
read … Procurement
Shapiro: Souki-led House majority has delivered solid agenda
Shapiro: Calvin Say was respected for fiscal conservatism that kept the budget tight and taxes in check, but new Finance Chairwoman Sylvia Luke hardly went wild with taxing and spending.
The House took a general excise tax increase off the table and ended a 2009 income tax increase a year earlier than planned. Abercrombie administration requests for a soda tax and higher conveyance taxes were rejected.
Luke's committee knocked $600 million off the Abercrombie budget, eliminated 931 unfilled state jobs and agreed to pay down the massive public worker health care deficit by $100 million a year.
read … Souki-led House majority has delivered solid agenda
Cash Call: Tsutsui, Kidani
$1,000 A Head Fundraiser For Tsutsui
Sen. Kidani Holds Fundraiser During Session
SB51: Sand Island Land Swap
ILind: When the Senate Ways and Means Committee deferred action on Senate Bill 51 late last month, effectively killing the bill for this legislative session, it marked the quiet end to yet another chapter in a classic 25-year power play by a small group of well-connected local business owners who control the Sand Island Business Association.
SIBA is far from a household name. It exists to hold a master lease on 70 acres of state land that make up the Sand Island Industrial Park, a testament to its political clout.
SB51 is just the latest in a long string of SIBA’s forays into the political world as it has sought to convert its lease into fee-simple ownership.
SB51 started life as an appropriation to build the amenities envisioned by the Sand Island ocean recreation park master plan.
Then, in one of those interesting legislative two-steps, the Senate Water and Land Committee, chaired by Big Island Senator Malama Solomon, amended the bill by slipping in an unrelated special interest provision for SIBA. It would require the Department of Land and Natural Resources to negotiate a land swap giving SIBA fee-simple ownership of the 70-acre industrial park in exchange for unspecified properties of supposed equal value elsewhere in the state.
Solomon’s amendment came less than two weeks after the Board of Land and Natural Resources rejected a similar land swap proposal.
read … Sand Island Swap
CBAs an Alternative to PLDC?
SA: The Public Land Development Corp. (PLDC), with all its exemptions, bypasses county land use policies, plans and ordinances and ignores cultural and environmental assessments and labor laws. By allowing unilateral decisions by only an unaccountable few, it has already adversely impacted civic society in Hawaii; fortunately, many groups protested its enactment.
But recent PLDC metamorphoses — such as the the Public-Private Partnership Authority — are not any better and remain flawed for one major reason: Partnerships that shut out the community are inadequate for good planning.
What is needed are procedures that implement three-party contractual agree- ments involving true public-private-community partnerships. The Legislature should enable a process to achieve genuine "community benefit agreements" (CBAs) as the output of any public corporation.
CBAs are enforceable contracts signed by community groups, developers and the pertinent government agencies.
read … CBAs
Question study on gay tourism
Sumner LaCroix's same-sex marriage and tourism study said more than reported ("Isles stand to lose gay tourists,"Star-Advertiser, Feb. 14).
It admits that adoption of same-sex marriage could change visitors' perceptions of Hawaii and reduce the number ofvisitors to Hawaii.This study reports three significant limitations that need to be considered carefully:
Once the pent-up demand is spent, annual U.S. same-sex marriage rates are likely to be much less than 10 percent, and spending by same-sex couples and their guests after 2016 will be substantially lower than projected in this report.
The study presents visitor spending results as illustrative rather than definitive.
A substantial standard error should be attached to the estimates.
Jim Hochberg, President, Hawaii Family Advocates
read … LTE Printed in Honolulu Star Advertiser, February 13, 2013
Star-Adv: Leave GMOs to the Feds
SA: The push for better disclosure hype facilitation about food products containing a genetically modified organism has grown more heated and energetic this year, with the introduction of state legislation to require labeling stating that the product contains GMOs. Unfortunately, the state lacks the power of the federal government to address the non-problem, so legislation now moving through the state Senate is unlikely to succeed.
The debate has raised awareness ignorance of the issue, including the sheer number of imaginary unanswered questions about the foods in general. There are many strategies used in engineering a mob and this is one of them….
Reality: Organic Profiteers: 15% Sales Boost from Anti-GMO Hype
Wisdom: Leading Activist Apologizes For Starting Anti-GMO Movement
Best Comment: “another problem with hb174 is that greedy anti gmo cultists have used it as a vehicle to get rich by allowing anyone to file a lawsuit against farmers, food producers, manufacturers, shippers, wholesalers and retailers who either do not label or do label foods as gmo. if the anti gmo cult were really interested in just knowing what is in the food they eat, then drop the get rich section of this bill and leave enforcement issues to the government agencies responsible for determining the safety of food products.”
read … Feds should tackle GMO labeling
Native Hawaiian Filmmaker Asks Lawmakers to Extend Journalism Shield Bill
HR: A Native Hawaiian film maker who is producing a historical documentary on native Hawaiian history and ancient burials in Haena on Kauai is one of the first non traditional journalists to use the journalism shield law to protect his work.
Keoni Alvarez, president of Hawaiian Island Productions, is an independent filmmaker working on a project that will air on PBS in 2014. After Kauai businessman Joseph Brescia subpoenaed Alvarez’s films, hard drives, unpublished notes and other correspondence in what Alvarez called a “fishing expedition”, the ACLU and local attorney Jim Bickerton used the Journalism Shield Bill to protect his unpublished work.
read … Shield Bill
$26.6 Million to Settle Lawsuits Against the State
HR: … $14 million in back pay for substitute teachers in the public schools;
$5 million for children who were sexual assaulted at the Hawaii School for the Deaf and Blind while they were on campus or on the school bus by a gang of students known as the Ringleaders. Some 35 special needs students are involved in the class action lawsuit against the state;
And another $3 million will go to an autistic child who won a lawsuit against the Hawaii state Department of Education.
read … Settlements
Rock Climbers vs Trial Lawyers
SA: State Land Board Chairman William Aila said he plans to meet with the House Judiciary Committee and Chairman Karl Rhoads to explain details in the bill and get it passed.
"I'm optimistic," Aila told the Star-Advertiser….
the lawyers group Hawaii Association for Justice said the bill is unnecessary because it's doubtful a lawsuit would prevail if it took place on unimproved state land, and the state doesn't need that kind of protection.
"I don't know what they're concerned about," said Association official Robert Toyofuku.
Rhoads said he's trying to find out from the state administration why the bill is needed at all, since there seems to be enough protection under state law.
read … Trial Lawyers Resist
Bill: Prohibit ‘Biased-Based’ Policing
CB: It’s House Bill 52, introduced by Rep. Roy Takumi, and it has a hearing Tuesday (March 12).
The bill explains in part, “’Biased-based policing’ means the practice of a police officer or police department, relying, to any degree, on actual or perceived race, ethnicity, national origin, immigration or citizenship status, sexual orientation, gender identity, or religion in selecting which individual to subject to routine or spontaneous law enforcement activity following the initial contact.
(This will make it hard to arrest transsexual prostitutes. It would also give the defense bar another lever to let criminals off.)
read … Bill: Prohibit Biased-Based Policing By Law Enforcement
HB1481: Bigger Welfare Payments for Wanna-Be Politicians
SA: House Bill 1481 would do just that by modernizing Hawaii's outdated public funding program for elections. The state House passed the bill, and it is now awaiting a hearing in the Senate Judiciary and Labor Committee.
read … Welfare for Politicians
SB573: Back-Door Pay Hike for HSTA
SA: The bill defines qualifying purchases as books, supplies other than athletic supplies, computer equipment such as software, and supplementary materials used in the classroom.
The Tax Foundation of Hawaii cited concerns about the bill, saying the tax system shouldn't be used to compensate teachers and calling the credit a "backdoor pay increase for teachers."
"Credits are appropriate for alleviating an undue tax burden, which certainly is not the case," the foundation wrote in testimony. "While there is much empathy for the anecdotal reports of teachers using their own funds for classroom materials, the problem is with the bureaucratic system of requesting the funds and having the system take as much as six months to approve the money."
The state Tax Department noted that a $250 federal tax deduction already exists for elementary and secondary school teachers.
"We appreciate what the Legislature is trying to do for teachers, but when they get the federal deduction, that means they're not being taxed on that income, and the state credit would be on top of that," said Tax Department spokeswoman Mallory Fujitani.
read … Tax Credits
Lax military in Hawaii led to California cops' deaths
SFG: Rep. Jackie Speier is demanding to know why the military turned future Santa Cruz cop-killing suspect Jeremy Goulet loose after he was accused in 2006 of raping two women on an Army base, charges that could have put him behind bars for life.
Goulet was drummed out of the Army with a less-than-honorable discharge in exchange for having rape charges in Hawaii dismissed, but served only a few months in confinement while in the military. After returning to civilian life in 2007, he racked up arrests for peeping, most recently last year in Berkeley. And on Feb. 26, police say, the former Black Hawk helicopter pilot gunned down two Santa Cruz police detectives investigating him for a misdemeanor sexual assault….
Goulet was a Marine Corps reservist from 1996 to 2002 and joined the Army two years later. Just a week after he arrived at Wheeler Army Airfield in Honolulu in 2006, a female officer accused him of climbing through her window and raping her, said his attorney, Donald Wilkerson.
Instead of locking him up, military superiors ordered Goulet confined to the base and assigned him to watch over barracks.
"The commanding officer found a way to sweep it under the rug," Speier said. "They put him in some kind of guard-monitoring role. There were no penalties imposed."
Several months later, he allegedly raped a second female officer at a party. He was then sent to a brig for several months and charged in both cases.
read … Military Justice?
Sen Sam Slom on The O'Reilly Factor
Tentatively, I'm scheduled to appear on the FOX Channel's "O'Reilly Factor" tomorrow afternoon (Thursday via tape from KHON-TV)) to discuss why the Hawaii majority lawmakers refused to hear or vote on "Jessica's Law" this Session. With New Jersey this year, 45 states have adopted such a law which prescribes a 25 year to life minimum for child predators. The bill which would be a real deterrent to those who would sexually assault or murder our children, was apparently found to be too tough for local lawmakers though they have no trouble passing tough bills relating to animal cruelty. Bill O'Reilly has made it his personal crusade to go after child molesters and has backed Jessica's Law and its sponsors for more than 8 years.
read … SBH News
Steven Tyler on Hawaii's 'Steven Tyler Act': 'Now I Can Walk Around Naked'
RS: "[In Hawaii], they are allowed in with their lenses and they get the most intimate of shots, which is what they are really looking for to make money. Not on my watch!" (His watch? He’s on watch??) Tyler told Billboard. The former American Idol judge noted his oceanside home "doesn't even have windows" and that photographers also pester his children. "They chase my kids and get in the way of traffic . . . We almost got in an accident and so before it happens, you want to do something about it. They're just looking for a taste of blood. They're not gonna get it."
Twenty-three of Hawaii's 25 Senate members voted in favor of the bill, according to the Associated Press, and the measure will now go to the House for consideration. "Now at least Joe [Perry] and I can go to Maui and walk around naked in the back lawn and write some crazy songs," Tyler joked.
read … Rolling Stone
Caldwell: Keep Waimanalo Gulch Open
Mayor Kirk Caldwell said Tuesday he does not believe another landfill on the island will be needed because technology is advancing at a rate that the city will soon be able to get rid of the most objectionable, if not all, solid wastes without putting them into the Waimanalo Gulch Sanitary Landfill at Kahe Point.
That would mean the city would keep open the landfill, a sore point between various mayors and Leeward Coast residents, who have demanded for more than a decade that it be closed.
But Caldwell, in an interview with the Star-Advertiser, insisted that the extended life of the city's only municipal landfill would be temporary.
"I want to eliminate the need for an everyday landfill. That's still my goal," Caldwell said. "I think we are on the way to doing that."
The completion last October of a third boiler at the HPOWER plant in Kalaeloa paves the way for as much as 90 percent of the city's solid waste to be converted to energy, with a good part of the rest being recycled, he said.
Installing a $10 million sludge intake facility at HPOWER would allow the waste-to-energy facility to accept sewage sludge, diverting what residents consider the smelliest and most objectionable waste away from the landfill, Caldwell said.
read … His Latest Excuses
City suspends Jeff Stone’s Aina Haina permit
Sam Slom: Hao Street Pau (For Now). The Department of Planning and Permitting (DPP) yesterday temporarily suspended the building permits at a construction site on Hao Street in Aina Haina where two single-family homes are being built by developer Jeff Stone.
The permit suspension came a day after DPP received a letter from William Aila Jr., Department of Land and Natural Resources Chairman and State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD) Officer, suggesting that the City stop the construction because SHPD believes a historic site may exist or existed. The suspension is temporary while DPP considers SHPD's recommendation that an Archaeological Inventory Survey (AIS) be completed at the site.
SHPD does not have the authority to order a developer to suspend construction, but can make a recommendation to DPP, which is the permitting authority, to halt construction activity. The property had not been flagged by SHPD and no records of historic sites were found in DPP files as being of cultural or historical significance. However, some community members have stepped forward and reported what they said were historic sites and asked that work be halted until an AIS is completed.
George Atta, DPP Director Designate, said DPP will use this time to meet with the developer, Residences at Aina Haina LLC, and SHPD to clarify SHPD's request.
Last Thursday, more than 150 Aina Haina residents jammed the Aina Haina Library for the monthly Kuliou'ou Neighborhood Board Meeting to protest the Hao street project which has disturbed Native Hawaiian artifacts, blocked trail access, and creates a potential flooding hazard.
read … SBH News
Electric Car Chargers Have only 700 Customers
GI: Better Place stated that it has almost 700 drivers in Hawaii and 77 charge spots and 154 charge points at public locations on Oahu, Maui, Kauai and the Big Island. It added that Hawaii has more plug-in vehicles per capita than any state in the US.
read … Not Much Charge
Hawaii Supreme Court to decide whether a ‘medical’ marijuana user can be stopped at the airport for carrying his ‘medicine’
HR: Oral arguments will be heard by the Hawaii Supreme Court on Thursday in a case related to whether a person can be arrested for “promoting a detrimental drug” if he is carrying a valid medical marijuana certificate in addition to the weed.
The case is SCWC-11-0000097 and will be heard on Thursday, March 14, 2013, at 9:30 a.m., but not in the usual courtroom. Instead, the case will held at the Moot Courtroom at the William S. Richardson School of Law at UH Manoa.
read … Supreme Court
I Aloha Molokai -- Celebrate Our Way of Life
Feel the Beat in the Heart of Maunaloa March 30, 2013
All are invited to come to IAM/Molokai Ranch’s community potluck celebration at Maunaloa Rec Center on Staurday, March 30th at 1 p.m.
With the Ranch’s decision to put a halt to the Big Wind Project, we celebrate the saving of our abundant Hawaiian Historical sites, the environment, the health of our people and the animals which share our ‘aina.
Bring your family, friends and your favorite dish or desert. The main dishes of venison and lamb will be provided.
You are welcome to bring your musical instruments for some grass roots sharing of entertainment, kanikapila, Molokai style!
read … I Aloha Molokai
Small Business Day at the State Capitol is March 27
From NFIB Hawaii
NFIB/Hawaii urges its members to make every effort to attend the annual Small Business Day at the Capitol on Wednesday, March 27.
Every major poll shows small-business owners the most highly regarded group in America, and every elected official claims to be your friend. So how come this doesn’t translate into better legislation and laws for Main Street enterprises? Because out of sight is out of mind.
During the cut and thrust of legislative activity, even lawmakers who should know better can fall victim to the persuasion of the supremely well-funded lobbying machines of trial lawyers, big labor, and advocates for bigger and bigger government—while small-business owners must attend fulltime to the running of their enterprises.
To help blunt the force of big money, NFIB hosts annual Small Business Day events at the Capitol, and the more members who attend, the louder we speak, and the less we are forgotten. Tentatively scheduled for the day’s events are:
- Welcome/Overview of NFIB legislative priorities from NFIB/Hawaii Leadership Council Chairman Ron Heller
- Mahalo to cooperating organizations: Business Alliance, Chamber of Commerce, Building Industry Association
- Meet the Legislators reception from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Further speakers will be forthcoming. There’s no cost to attend, but reservations are required. Bring along a fellow small-business owner, even if he or she is not an NFIB member. You can make your reservation by email with NFIB Member Support Manager Stacy Jenkins, or by phoning her at 866-307-2846.
NFIB/Hawaii Small Business Day at the Capitol
Wednesday, March 27 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.
State Capitol, Honolulu
Commander Of U.S. Pacific Forces Says Global Warming Is Our Top Threat
WZ: America’s top military officer in charge of monitoring hostile actions by North Korea, escalating tensions between China and Japan, and a spike in computer attacks traced to China provides an unexpected answer when asked what is the biggest long-term security threat in the Pacific region: climate change.
Related: 49% Waste: Inspector General Slams Hawaii Navy Solar Projects
read … Commander Of U.S. Pacific Forces Says Global Warming Is Our Top Threat
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