Hawaii State Government

...With two days left before the Second Crossover deadline more than 220 bills have crossed over from the House to the Senate....

....Grassroot president says high taxes, regulations discourage higher-paying jobs....

... A Hawaii State Senator goes for somewhere between $50K and $100K per year--and its all legal ....

...Second Crossover is one week away....

...Other Post-Employment Benefit Liabilities, 2017 surveys the more than 100 state-administered post-employment benefit plans, such as health insurance, Medicare advantage, life insurance, and other non-pension benefits....

...HI-EMA and News Media Fail to Inform Public of Oahu Emergency Siren Test....

...highlights include funding for...Ohana Zones....

Suzuki has been serving as the acting chief legal and law enforcement officer for the state since February 2 when Attorney General Doug Chin resigned to become Lieutenant Governor....

...hackers got access to Hawaii state computers using a technique called "password spraying"....

...sex harassment complaints have been secretly adjudicated against three unnamed State Representatives and one State Senator....

...Sex Harassment: Hawaii Legislators Admit Covering up Four Cases....

...Suzuki has been acting as the chief legal and law enforcement officer for the state since February 2 when then Attorney General Doug Chin resigned to become Lieutenant Governor....

...March 16th, 12:00 noon  --  Hawaii State Capitol, House Chamber....

...an economic plan based on general excise tax collections....

...bills introduced by members of the House Republican Caucus that crossed over to the Senate....

... these 128 are in addition to bills passed earlier ....

...The following are a few of the measures to pass on third reading....

...Thousands of files have been digitized at the state’s disability compensation program. However, they need hardware with capacity for more storage to continue progress....

...We reviewed 85 house and senate bills proposing 64 special and revolving funds during the 2018 legislative session of which none met criteria....

...In the middle of this process, sometimes a letter from the Governor arrives saying, “We need to make some adjustments...."

...The bills include housing, homelessness, education, health, the environment, public safety, governmental affairs, the environment, and other important issues....

...The ESRB’s decision to label video games with paid add-ons essentially does nothing to address the complaint that loot boxes are akin to gambling....

...the PUC’s $2.8 million Document Management System (DMS) is almost universally considered by management and staff to be difficult to use, unreliable, slow, and obsolete, with staff developing elaborate workarounds to accommodate for the system’s shortcomings. Yet the PUC has no firm plans to fix or replace this problematic system....

...Committee members asked some very telling questions that identified loopholes that still remain in the bill.  The Attorney General's representative couldn't definitively state that all their concerns from the 2017 version were resolved in this current version that is supposed to have more robust protections.... 

...All House bills are in their final committees, they have until March 8th to pass out of their last committee and pass third reading to cross over to the Senate....

...Hawaii takes the longest in the nation to make decisions about transparency disputes....

...the oft-cited, debate-driving statistic that Americans use 500 million plastic straws a day is the product of a 9-year-old's guesstimations....

...complete list of bills remaining alive after First Lateral deadline....

...how to adapt the new federal tax law changes to Hawaii....

...The Hawaii Department of Transportation (HDOT) and the Office of the Attorney General are pleased....

...A bill proposed in the Hawaii Legislature would ban the use of plastic straws. But the problem runs much deeper than the straw bill....

...Chattergy told WSJ Hawaii will continue to sell these put contracts, convinced the income will offset market turbulence....

...Construction is scheduled to begin in five years....

...Here are some bills introduced by members of our Republican Caucus that are moving through the legislature....

...in recent years, OIP’s average time for review quadrupled, it is deciding fewer matters per year on average, and its backlog is trending upward despite a downward trend in new filings....

... Ige this week signed an executive order that most likely will discourage competition and innovation among internet service providers ....

...Ranking each state's highway system in 11 categories, including highway spending, pavement and bridge conditions, traffic congestion, and fatality rates....

...Hoshijo served as education and political director with the Hawaii Regional Council of Carpenters. He also worked for the International Longshore and Warehouse Union for 26 years....

...HB 2368 and SB 2795 would begin replacing private contractors with civil service employees....

...Local ISPs: Net Neutrality is a Fake Issue....

...Senate Bill 2004, tells the story of just one signalized crosswalk yet to be built....

...Ige Admin testimony shows that OHA rent-seeking is driving up hospital bills, public housing rents, and University of Hawaii tuition for everybody—including native Hawaiians.... 

...First Deputy Attorney General Russell Suzuki has been appointed to serve as acting attorney general....

...Federal Communications Commission conducts open meeting to hear investigator's report on false missile alert....

...Spectrum is channel slamming ‘Ōlelo – displacing channels 49, 53, 54, and 55, including Video On Demand channels 50 and 52....

...To stop the factional fighting and stalemate-causing dysfunction in the Hawaii House of Representatives, Representative Cynthia Thielen has placed her name for consideration as Speaker....

...the 2017 Economic Freedom of North America report, ranks Hawaii a low 46th in the nation in terms of economic freedom, due to its high taxation, high regulation and high cost of living....

...Updates required at Hawai’i Terminals would prevent TOTE from entering Hawai’i trade in 2020/2021....

...jump-start the testing and operation of "driverless" cars in Hawaii....

...Our bill package strives to make our government and our state more accountable, affordable, and accessible....