Related: Mercado Kim Threatens Investigation Because Son not Admitted to Richardson Law School
read ... Shapiro
KOS: Schatz Should Undergo Sex Change Operation
KOS: Hawai'i has two of the most progressive Senators. Progressive Punch rates Mazie Hirono and Brian Schatz tied for 5th place: most progressive.
But Emily's List just backed a corporatist challenger apparently because she is female. Colleen Hanabusa, rated at 117th by Progressive Punch, has a dismal record both as State senator and as one of Hawaii's two Representatives.
For a state that is blue all the way through and for a politician who ran from a district that went 70% for Barack Obama, one wonders how such a DINO was even elected. ...
She's expressed her opinion that marriage is only between a man and a woman...that (D) by Colleen Hanabusa's name is meaningless given her votes and record.
Brian Schatz is a solid on women's issues (maybe more solid) than Colleen Hanabusa. But he lacks a vagina....
Our Pick for Best Comment: "If Schatz undergoes a sex change procedure, that also could trigger a rescinding...."
Related: Hirono Pleased as Nutroots Boo Case, Apologizes again for not being Gay
read ... What Passes for Intelligent Conversation Among Progressives
Morons Against Monsanto Rallies
Star-Adv Cheers DoE Scheme to Shuffle Tests
SA: Every school district in the country faced No Child's looming deadline of 2014 to get all students proficient in math and language arts, according to the law's criteria. The exemption means that deadline is lifted, as are the increasing, often punitive schedule of consequences meted out to schools that fall short.
(Translation: We can keep our funding and fail too! A win-win!)
Among other chief complaints of the state DOE, at least, was that NCLB simply wasn't up to the task of preparing students for jobs and college, whichever path they choose.
(Translation: The NCLB wasn't doing the DoE's job for it.)
The drive to hit benchmarks in two areas — which educators sometimes call "teaching to the test" — has crowded out classes in the arts....
(Basket weaving has suffered especially hard.)
read ... 'Strive HI' welcome for isle schools
Unemployment Taxes Soar 980%
SA: Hawaii's employers are enduring their fourth straight year of sharply higher unemployment taxes as the state works to replenish the trust fund used to pay jobless benefits.
The state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations estimates employers will pay an average of $980 per worker into the fund this year, a nearly tenfold increase compared with the $100 per worker they paid as recently as 2009.
The state began the series of aggressive tax increases in 2010 after the trust fund ran out of money. A surge in unemployment insurance claims fueled by the 2008-2009 recession drained the fund, forcing the state to borrow from the federal government.
The increased employer contributions boosted the trust fund balance to $104 million at the end of 2012, and the fund is forecast to climb to $285 million by the end of 2013. However, the balance is still short of the DLIR's targeted "adequate reserve level" of $384 million.
read ... As Unemployment Declines
Hawaii County Council Backs Tax Hikes
WHT: The majority of council members contacted last week said they’re inclined to support raising tax rates, after spending the last several weeks meeting with constituents and attending community meetings with Kenoi to explain how the new money will be used.
“It’s just so tough as a newly elected council member. It’s a decision you don’t want to make to raise taxes,” said Puna Councilman Greggor Ilagan. “(But) I’m kind of leaning in favor of it.”
Ilagan has scheduled a budget talk story for 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Pahoa Community Center.
Some council members, however, want to ensure the hikes won’t be permanent. Kohala Councilwoman Margaret Wille said she’d like to see a sunset provision in the plan.
read ... Tax Hikes
Going big on Kakaako plans will redefine our isle home
Borreca: The latest plan, discussed Thursday by Star-Advertiser reporter Andrew Gomes, is offered by the semi-autonomous Hawaii Community Development Authority.
It would chop up the Blaisdell complex by fitting in affordable housing, a movie theater, a business hotel, an "iconic" 700-foot mixed-used high rise, a park and a plaza.
In return for all those high-impact goodies, the HCDA would permit the city to negotiate with the developer to also replace the arena, concert hall and exhibition area....
In Honolulu, the HCDA is doing the planning for the city's heavy rail transit development along the train's Kakaako route. There is not enough time to get into what the inclusion of trains running feet away from some of those newly planned condo towers along Halekauwila will mean. Although I doubt many will think it is a good thing....
the adoption of the "Complete Streets" concept is perfectly sound urban planning. The HCDA defines "Complete Streets" as "streets that have been planned, designed and operated with consideration to the needs of all travelers including people of all ages and abilities whether they are walking, riding a bicycle, taking public transportation or driving."
It makes Kakaako more of an urban village and should foster community.
read ... Going big on Kakaako plans will redefine our isle home
City to restore and improve 5 bus routes
KITV: Country Express Route C, Route 55, Route 1L, Route 2L, Route 5
read ... City to restore and improve 5 bus routes
City Bumbles Handi-Van Procurement Three Years Running
SA: Since the last time the city purchased new Handi-Vans, in 2010, four legal protests have blocked attempts to replenish the fleet. Three of those four protests were filed by Soderholm Sales & Leasing, the Honolulu-based company that has provided Handi-Vans since 1994.
Formby and officials at Oahu Transit Services Inc., the organization that runs the city’s Handi-Van fleet, hope to catch up on the backlog by adding 99 new vans in 2014. But revelations this week of a fourth protest against the city — this time by a different, undisclosed company against an award issued to Soderholm — could push those vans’ delivery back further. The city has not yet made the details of any of the protests public.
“The whole thing is a debacle,” said Erik Soderholm, Soderholm Sales & Leasing’s vice president.
“They’re totally off-track. They should be replacing 20 to 30 a year,” he said.
According to Soderholm, recent employee turnover at the transportation department has led to unqualified staffers writing shoddy and error-laden bid proposals for vans, sparking legal protests (including his own) and grinding the procurement of new vans to a halt.
read ... Three Years
Electric car trailblazer Better Place to file for bankruptcy within days
TI: ...company runs out of steam due to low demand, having burned through more than $800 million but sold barely 2,000 vehicles....
DN: Better Place headed for Worse Place
read ... No Surprise Here
AD Ben Jay has his work cut out revamping UH’s athletic facilities
SA: Ben Jay’s priority facilities upgrade list of candidates for capital improvement funds
1. Repurpose and renovate the historic Klum Gym into a new multi-purpose performance center. Create large strength and conditioning/cardio area and offices, new basketball/volleyball practice facility, new weight and cardio equipment, mondo floor.
2. Renovate women’s softball facility. Build new softball team and visitor locker rooms, coaches offices, umpires room, new handicapped access ramp or elevator lift, expand press box, concessions stand, new restrooms, expand roof cover over seating sections
3. Renovate former workout center into a new expanded Athletic Training Room.
4. Renovate women’s soccer practice field into competitive soccer facility. Install new concrete pad, install bleacher seating for 1,000, press box on top of bleachers with video camera locations. Install new scoreboard. Stub out electrical for future lights
5. Build short game golf practice facility with artificial turf greens, sand traps and roughs.
6. Renovate baseball stadium. Renovate public restrooms, team locker rooms, enlarge press box with broadcast booths, (for TV, home and away radio), add elevator for handicapped access, build additional suites on concourse level, repair and replace worn areas on baseball playing field
7. Renovate outdoor tennis center. Tension canopy structure over back six tennis courts with lighting and dome cameras for live streaming of events. Renovate portable building for coaches offices, membership front counter, stringing room.
8. Repair and replace mondo track at Clarence T.C. Ching Complex.
9. Renovate administrative and coaches offices.
Estimates on the "wish list" range from $10 million to, perhaps, several times that.
read ... Mmmmm ... Contracts
Honoring veterans as monuments decay, funds dry up
AP: On the shoreline of Hawaii's most famous beach, a decaying structure attracts little attention from wandering tourists.
A few glance curiously at the crumbling Waikiki Natatorium, a salt water pool built in 1927 as a memorial to the 10,000 soldiers from Hawaii who served in World War I. But the monument's walls are caked with salt and rust, and passers-by are quickly diverted by the lure of sand and waves.
The faded structure has been closed to the public for decades, the object of seemingly endless debate over whether it should be demolished or restored to its former glory. The latest plan is to replace it with a beach, more practical for the state's lucrative tourism industry — and millions of dollars cheaper, according to state and local officials. They say a full restoration could cost nearly $70 million.
The corroding monument has challenged the community to maneuver a delicate question: How do we honor those who have served when memorials deteriorate and finances are tight?
...an organization called Friends of the Natatorium says the city's cost analysis is wrong and renovation would in fact be cheaper than demolition. The group, led by former state lawmaker (and current OHA Trustee) Peter Apo, wants a moratorium on any plans to destroy the memorial to give the group time to fundraise for restoration.
read ... Natatorium
Delicious Turtles: National Geographic Pushes Back Against Traditional Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights
NG: The turtles seem so numerous today it is easy to forget that only a few decades ago most feared their extinction. The population had been harvested for food – like fish – by local residents and for a commercial fishery that targeted turtles. All harvests were banned in 1978, however, and surveys by NOAA scientists have documented a steady increase in nesting at one rookery ever since.
As a result of this rebound, some have called for the species to be removed from federal protection, de-listed as a threatened species, and for harvests to reopen.
A new study published in the journal Ecography, however, demonstrates that 80% of the historically major nesting sites for the population are extirpated or dramatically reduced and shows how this concentrates the risks posed by climate change.
read ... Historical data suggests Hawaiian sea turtle recovery is limited
Smithsonian Redoubles Assault on Hawaii Fishing Industry
SI: a team of Smithsonian and Michigan State University scientists and their colleagues looked to the ancient bones of seabirds for answers, revealing some of the dramatic changes that have happened within open-ocean food webs since the onset of industrial fishing....
read ... Scientists Find Impact of Open-ocean Industrial Fishing within Centuries of Bird Bones
More pumping, less rain leads to spike in salt levels in water
MN: Currently, the midpoint of the groundwater in the 1,020-feet deep Waiehu well is at 626 feet. In 1985, when USGS hydrologists first started monitoring the well, the midpoint was nearly 200 feet deeper, at 822 feet.
Because freshwater floats on top of saltwater, the shallower the midpoint, the saltier the groundwater, explained USGS research hydrologist Stephen Gingerich, who is based on Oahu. He is in charge of gathering data at the monitoring well in Waiehu, as well as five other wells on Maui.
Hydrologists also look at the depth at which fresh water is no longer safe for drinking - the "freshwater lens" - at which salinity levels are at 2 percent.
Currently, the freshwater lens rests at 495 feet. In 1985, the freshwater lens was at 690 feet deep.
read ... Water Supply
Police Capture Another OCCC Escapee
HNN: Authorities have been looking for 28-year-old Benjamin Pabingwit when he didn't report back to the facility on May 5th.
He re-surfaced Saturday morning after police arrested him in connection with a stolen vehicle case.
Pabingwit first went to OCCC two years ago on burglary drug and theft charges.
Officials say he was on work furlough because he may have been near the end of his sentence.
This marks the second furlough walkaway arrest in recent months.
read ... Another Day, Another Escape
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