Akaka Tribe: Frankenstein Bill to Create a Frankenstein Tribal Roll
Hirono, Schatz Vote Would Impose Hawaii GE Tax on Pension Contributions, Stock Transactions
Moving the Tax Burden to Others
Chang, Espero, Takai, Oshiro for CD1? CB: Stanley Chang, the only declared candidate in the CD1 race, attended the convention and had a promotional table and wall poster set up. State Sen. Will Espero told Civil Beat that he was leaning toward a run, given that his state seat is not up until 2016, so he would keep his day job should he lose a bid for Congress.
Word is that Senate President Donna Mercado Kim will not run, and Majority Leader Brickwood Galuteria may pass, too. But state Rep. Mark Takai remains a possibility, as does Abercrombie's deputy chief of staff, Blake Oshiro. It's an open contest, and a rare opportunity for a Democrat to "pull a Tulsi."
Joshua Wisch, an attorney (and Omidyar Fellow) who did a stint at the Attorney General's Office before moving over to the state's tax department, defeated Choe and Pohai Ryan to become party chairman.
Wisch has ties to Hirono and Abercrombie....
Dante Carpenter, chairman of the state party, described Gill's move as "a magnanimous gesture on the part of a real Democratic Party leader." Carpenter said the current primary system, which allows voters to select the ballot of any party, infringes on the right of Democrats to nominate their own members.
Oahu County Democrats also adopted nearly a dozen resolutions, including ones encouraging the Hawaii Legislature to increase the minimum wage, pass same-sex marriage legislation, decriminalize marijuana, allow for publicly financed elections and extend the media shield law.
Bart Dame, a member of the party's State Central Committee, authored four of the resolutions....
Delegate (and convicted thief) Michael ('Bitchbear') Golojuch Jr., who spoke in favor of the marriage equality resolution, said: "If you put a 'D' after your name, you should mean it."
read ... Progressives Only Need Apply
Gays Describe How they Tortured Hanabusa to Force Marriage
SA: Last spring, after President Barack Obama announced that he supported marriage equality, completing his own evolution on the issue, Hanabusa had said she had always believed that marriage should be between a man and a woman.
(Convicted thief) Michael ('Bitchbear') Golojuch Jr., chairman of the Democratic Party of Hawaii's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered caucus, said Hanabusa had the ideal chance to disclose that she changed her position when she was running for re-election or when Obama made his own announcement. Instead, he said, her revelation did not come until December, when she wanted the appointment to fill the Inouye vacancy.
"It was like pulling teeth to get a statement from her at Christmastime when we were looking at replacing Senator Inouye," he said.
Several gay-rights advocates also blame Hanabusa — who has sought to distinguish herself from Schatz based on her experience, including, among other things, the heavy lifting she often did on legislation in the state Senate — for the failure of a civil unions bill in the Senate in 2009.
(The purpose of this rhetoric is to defeat Hanabusa in Democrat Primary.)
SA: Statements show movement toward marriage (sic) equality (sic)
read ... Gay Torture
Oahu Democrats, Abercrombie show frustration with Legislature SA: Abercrombie has not submitted a gay-marriage bill to the Legislature, and his advisers say he will wait to see how the U.S. Supreme Court rules this summer on two cases related to marriage equality before deciding how to proceed next session.
"We need to get in line with the rest of the country and see to it that we bring that to fruition," he said.
Oahu Democrats approved five resolutions on Saturday that show their frustration with Democrats who control the Legislature but fail to advance the party's platform and agenda. The resolutions cite the failure to pass a minimum-wage increase, marriage equality, the legalization or decriminalization of marijuana, expanded public financing of elections, and an extension of a news media shield law.
John Radcliffe, one of the state's most influential lobbyists, was able to persuade convention delegates to soften the language of the resolutions from "expressing disappointment" with the Legislature to working with lawmakers on the issues, but the sentiment was unmistakable, part of the chasm between party activists and elected Democrats.
Bart Dame, a progressive activist behind several of the resolutions, diplomatically said it was "less than a perfect session for many of us."
Oahu Democrats also elected Joshua Wisch, an attorney who works at the state Department of Taxation, as their new chairman.
read ... Election Year Priorities
Legislature Graded: 42% F, 31% D
Shapiro: » University of Hawaii President M.R.C. Greenwood retired after a year of battering over the Stevie Wonder fiasco, and Sen. Donna Mercado Kim said it's "the best course for the university." It was Kim's polite rendition of the old Nancy Sinatra refrain: "These boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do. One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you."
» In a Star-Advertiser Big Q poll, 42 percent of responding readers gave the 2013 Legislature an "F" and 31 percent gave a "D." It's amazing how our legislators have so many opinions about how to run the University of Hawaii when they don't even have the grades to get in.
» The Hawaii State Teachers Association is one of the top political donors to state legislators, giving $108,250 in the past two years, according to FollowTheMoney.org. It's a sign of the times when teachers can't afford to buy school supplies, but they can afford to buy politicians.
read ... Pols fail to make the grade yet still rake in bonus points
Souki: Republicans Involved, Coalition Strong, Great Session
MN: "I felt I had some things I still needed to do as speaker, so I went against my old friend Calvin Say," said Souki, who as speaker had appointed Say as chairman of the Finance Committee in 1993. "It was nothing personal, I just felt I needed to break that deadlock to allow more changes so new people could have opportunities."
Those "new people" included not only the 25 former Democrat dissidents who were unhappy with Say's leadership, but also the first-year representatives and Republicans, who had not had much influence in previous years under Say's rule.
"This session, Speaker Joe did a fantastic job in creating synergy between all of us," West Maui state Rep. Angus McKelvey said after session adjourned. "The Republicans were involved as well, the coalition was strong, and it was a great session."
read ... Souki says one time in ’82, as freshman, he was ready to quit
Ritte Joins Danner's Attack on DHHL
SA: Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, the agency created to help Native Hawaiians, is infuriating some of its beneficiaries by leasing 30 acres of Molokai farmland to the company through a month-to-month revocable permit....
"This just shows the disconnect," said Molokai homesteader and GMO opponent Walter Ritte, who recently asked DHHL to revoke the company's permit for the 30-acre parcel in Palaau. "This is totally unacceptable."
But Darrell Young, DHHL's deputy director, said until GMO crops are outlawed in Hawaii, the department is committed to assisting farming homesteaders in their efforts to be successful.
"DHHL does not see the GMO issue to be a major controversy within our homestead communities," Young said in written responses to Star-Advertiser questions.
"Our homestead communities have GMO and organic farmers alike living and working side by side and hand in hand to support one another's businesses on their homesteads. If and when disputes arise, they work those issues out amongst themselves without waiting or requiring any advice from us. It is what self sufficiency and self determination is all about."
Ray Foster, a Monsanto representative on Molokai, said in a written statement to the Star-Advertiser that the 30 DHHL acres represent only 1 percent of the 2,300 acres the company owns or leases on the island. The DHHL land is used occasionally for seed corn but primarily to grow sweet corn three to four times a year, with that corn donated to Molokai organizations for fundraising, he added.
read ... Pay me or I'll Keep Protesting
Cigarette maker Altria tops in lobbying spending since 2006
ILind: Altria Client Services, the subsidiary handling lobbying, litigation, and other aspects of the tobacco company’s business, along with its affiliates, spent $1,126,508 over the seven year period, an average of more than $160,000 a year.
The company spent 72.6% more than second-ranked Kamehameha Schools, which spent $652,329 over the same period.
The list of the top 25 spenders includes two public agencies, the Hawaii Tourism Authority and the Honolulu Board of Water Supply, along with several unions, a few of Hawaii’s top corporations, and industry or trade associations.
Union-affiliated groups include the Hawaii Operating Engineers Industry Stabilization Fund (#3), Hawaii State Teachers Association (#4), Hawaii Ironworkers Stabilization Fund (#16), and University of Hawaii Professional Assembly (#17).
Only three local corporations, Hawaiian Electric (#12), Outrigger Enterprises (#14), and Hawaii Medical Service Association (#20), made it into the top 25.
Industry groups included the Hawaii Association for Justice, formerly known as Consumer Lawyers of Hawaii, (#6), Western States Petroleum Association (#8), Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii (#9), Pharmaceutical Researchers & Manufacturers (#10), Hawaii Medical Association (#13), American Beverage Association (#21) and the General Contractors Association of Hawaii (#22).
The 25 highest spending interest groups reported a total of nearly $10 million spent to influence legislative actions over the 2006-2012 period.
A full list of all 630 organizations with registered lobbyists is available here. For an alphabetical list of all lobbying organizations, with their overall rank and total spent, click here.
read ... Cigarette maker Altria (Philip Morris) tops in lobbying spending
Touching tribute for fallen Kailua airman
HNN: Flags flew at half-staff ahead of Saturday night's memorial service for a fallen Kailua airman. A huge crowd showed up at Central Union Church for an emotional tribute honoring Capt. Reid Nishizuka. The 30-year-old was the pilot of an Air Force MC-12 Liberty aircraft that crashed in Afghanistan two weeks ago. Three other airmen were also killed. Nishizuka's casket arrived in Hawaii on Thursday. Those close to him shared their memories at the funeral about the man they will dearly miss.
read ... Touching tribute for fallen Kailua airman
Billing fee gets tempers boiling
SA: In a transition from its previous two-month billing cycle, the Honolulu Board of Water Supply in January began collecting a fixed "billing" charge on a monthly basis, effectively doubling the amount paid by consumers.
Niethammer and most other Board of Water Supply residential customers used to pay the fee — currently $7.02 — once every two months. Now they pay it once a month.
"It really caught us off guard," Niethammer said. "It's a huge new source of revenue for them. Instead of $7 times six months, it's now $7 times 12 months," she said.
The seven-member Board of Water Supply board of directors voted in November 2011 to double the billing charge for most residential customers as part of a five-year rate-hike plan that went into effect in January 2012. The BWS held off on doubling the billing charge until January of this year, when it switched to the new monthly billing cycle
read ... Billing fee gets tempers boiling
Hawaii Co Food Bank Buys New Building, Can't Account for $200K
WHT: When the Hawaii County Council last year took the unprecedented step of dipping into the county’s disaster fund to give the nonprofit Food Basket Inc. an emergency $200,000 appropriation, strict reporting standards were put into place to ensure full accountability of taxpayer money.
But a West Hawaii Today investigation has found that none of the reporting requirements in the May 3, 2012, contract were met, despite $199,000 of the emergency money given to the Food Basket, as well as $74,000 from a separate council action. The required reports couldn’t be located by the Clerk’s Office, former council members or the Mayor Billy Kenoi administration.
Food Basket Executive Director En Young, who has been on the job since February, assured the newspaper the county’s money was spent only for food.
The Food Basket last month moved into a new $420,000 building it had purchased in Hilo, twice the size of its previous building
read ... Food Basket?
Hundreds of families on public housing wait list see hope
KITV: Steve Palsis had been waiting in line at the Housing Authority office since 7 a.m. Saturday.
But it’s just a fraction of time compared to how long he's been waiting for low-rent housing.
“We’ve been applying for almost 10 years,” said Palsis, as he stood in line with his wife and two children.
He and his family are among the 380 applicants out of 10,000 on the wait list to make it through the initial screening.
Palsis said he applied before but didn’t qualify in the past because of his income. But what he made wasn’t enough to afford rent in Honolulu. To finally to be eligible for low-rent housing, was great news....
Those in line are those who need housing the most. They're either homeless, victims of domestic violence or being involuntarily displaced....
Iosis and his family moved from the Marshall Islands so his wife could get medical treatment for a thyroid condition....
They've been living in shelters in Kapolei and Maili for the last three and a half years.
read ... Hundreds of families on public housing wait list see hope
Gabbard: Sex Assault in Military a Handy Excuse to Put Military Justice Under Outside Control
SA: “The commander should not have the power to overturn a jury's verdict,” Gabbard said.
Duckworth and Gabbard said they both support having independent investigators within the military take charge of sexual assault allegations free of commanders who can reverse a military court’s decision.
read ... U.S. Reps. Gabbard, Duckworth interviewed about military sex assaults
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