Coffee experts examined coffees from around the world. Ka`u coffee took three of the top ten spots. Photo from scaa.org
THREE KA`U COFFEES placed in the top ten in the world in the annual Specialty Coffee Association of America's Roaster Guild Coffees of the Year competition and will be showcased at the annual convention, this year in Portland, Oregon, April 19 - 22. Top among the Ka`u farmers was Willie Tabios with his Will & Grace Rising Sun, scoring 86.94. Lorie Obra followed with Rusty's Hawaiian scoring 86.47, followed by Francis and Trini Marques with their Ali`i Hawaiian Hula Hands Coffee with 86.41. Ka`u Coffee has been winning top ten in the world in the SCAA Roasters Guild awards, year after year, helping to build its reputation worldwide. Top place finisher worldwide was from Ethiopia. Other top ten finishers were from Honduras and Columbia.
Pahala School and Public Library on Ka`u High campus. Photo by Geneveve Fyvie
STATE SCHOOLS SUPERINTENDENT Kathryn Matayoshi has issued a statement in light of the federal Race to the Top overseers visiting this week. “We are excited to have the U.S. Department of Education here in Hawai`i to conduct their on-site visit. We have clear and compelling evidence to show the federal review team,” she said in a public statement. “Since the U.S. DOE’s last visit in June 2011, Hawai`i has made significant progress on all of the ongoing projects in our Race to the Top initiatives.
We will move forward with our plans to transform Hawai`i’s public education system. We remain committed to our mission that every child graduates college and career-ready.”
Hawai`i is attempting to hold on to $75 million in federal funding and must show the fed significant improvement. Hawai`i and Florida are on probation. According to the DOE, the federal team is expected to visit Ka`u schools while here in Hawai`i as they are part of an “improvement zone.”
See an analysis of Hawai`i schools in the report, Race to the Top: What We Have Learned from the States So Far, which was released this week in Washington, D.C. by the Center for American Progress. The report can be found online at www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/rtt_states.html.
Horizon Lines could discontinue
serving Hawai`i.
HORIZON LINES, the second largest shipping company serving Hawai`i, is losing money and may not be able to continue serving this state, the company reported yesterday. The firm missed a Security Exchange Commission report due earlier this week. It earlier stopped shipping to China and Guam. Horizon reported yesterday, however that its losses are declining, expecting a $6.4 million dollar operating loss last quarter, compared to a $32.6 million operating loss, same quarter last year. Horizon is attempting to restructure $228 million in debt, the company reported. Rising fuel rates are stated as one of the major challenges of shipping companies.
The first all-electric Mitsubishi car came to Hawai`i last
year with encouragement from policymakers. Photo from Mitsubishi
ELECTRIC VEHICLES are a good fit for Hawai`i, according to Hawai`i State Energy Office Chief Mark Glick, writing in the current issue of Pacific Business News. “Three factors have converged to make Hawai`i one of the most attractive markets for electric vehicles in the United States: the highest gasoline prices in the nation, limited driving distances, and public and private partnerships fueled by incentives for EVs and EV charging stations.” Glick writes that a key part of the state’s campaign to increase the number of energy-saving EVs on island roads is the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism’s recently re-energized EV Ready Rebate Program.
“We’ve added $350,000 through Nov. 1, 2012, for a $4,500 rebate on a new electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicle and up to $500 for an electric vehicle home charger.” He wrote that “the growing demand for plug-in cars in Hawai`i has led to a number of major automakers focusing on the Hawai`i market. Last year, Nissan, Chevrolet and Mitsubishi made Hawai`i one of the first locations to introduce new EV models. We also expect to see the plug-in Prius made available later this year at a number of Hawai`i’s Toyota dealerships.”
Madalyn McWhite-Lamson, of Ocean View,
urges Ka`u senior girls to apply. Photo by Julia Neal
TWO SCHOLARSHIPS are open for high school students in Ka`u and Kona from the American Association of University Women. Each scholarship will be $2,000 for senior high school girls headed for a two- or four-year college or university. Criteria includes: academic achievement; involvement in extracurricular high school activities, community organizations or employment experience; educational and career goals; and financial need.
Deadline is April 18. Applications are available from high school counselors or online at www.aauwkona.org.
These scholarships may be used for anything that enables the student to achieve her academic goals. AAUW member Madalyn McWhite-Lamson urges Ka`u girls to apply. For more information, contact Toni Rimer at tonirimer@yahoo.com. AAUW is the same organization that sponsors Ka`u fifth grade girls to attend to the annual Girls Exploring Math and Science career event in Kona.
HMSA IS RAISING RATES AGAIN. The Hawai`i Medical Insurance Association is asking the state Insurance Division to raise rates on some 84,000 on small businesses by 3.8 percent. HMSA received permission for an increase of 3.7 percent last year, after asking for a hike of 4.2 percent. HMSA reported $43.8 million in profits for last year.
Project Hawai`i is looking for local sponsors for food for the keiki. Image from Project Hawai`i
A SUMMER CAMP FOR 45 CHILDREN living in poverty, some of them homeless, is reaching out for help in sponsoring food for keiki. Project Hawai`i Inc. is hosting its seventh annual free camp for three weeks in July with healthy meals, educational programs and a safe environment for summer break. The camp is run by volunteers and public donations. Program directors seek groups, clubs and companies to help with the food. Volunteers can sponsor a full-day menu, or just one meal. Project Hawai`i adheres to the USDA Summer Nutrition Program guidelines. For more, see www.projecthawaii.org or call 987-6018.
THE FINAL WHALE COUNT for 2012 takes place Saturday from 8 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. at various locations throughout Ka`u. Volunteers count humpback whales and document their behavior. Sign up at http://hawaiihumpbackwhale.noaa.gov.
THY WORD MINISTRIES KA`U holds its ninth annual Easter Family Fun Day on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Na`alehu Hongwanji Hall. The event includes a craft fair, free lunch, music, hula and an Easter egg hunt for all ages. For more information, call 936-9114.
Photo from fhvnp.org
PARK ARCHAEOLOGIST JADELYN MONIZ NAKAMURA leads a walk, Kealakomowaena: Life On A Lava Landscape, through time and teaches how Hawaiians living in the shadow of Pele adapted to life on a lava landscape. The walk, sponsored by Friends of Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park, takes place Saturday from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friends members pay $45, non-members pay $65, with students (K-12 and college) pay half price with valid student ID. Call 985-7373 or visit www.fhvnp.org.
The contract to operate Volcano House has been awarded to Ortega National Parks and Aqua Hotels and Resorts. Photo from Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park
VOLCANO HOUSE, its hotel, restaurant and retail operations, will be run by Ortega National Parks, LLC and Aqua Hotels and Resorts, Inc., under an agreement announced yesterday by the National Park Service. The 15-year contract also covers operations at Namakanipaio Campground. The NPS statement says Ortega National Parks, LLC has more than 45 years of hospitality experience and over 16 years’ experience operating concessions within other national parks and monuments including Death Valley, Golden Gate, Bandelier, White Sands, Muir Woods and Carlsbad Caverns.
The contract calls for the partnership, Hawai`i Volcanoes Lodge Company, LLC, to make renovations to the hotel costing between $2.5 million and $3.5 million. It must also pay the Park Service a minimum franchise fee of six percent “to help maintain facilities and other critical visitor services,” the statement says.
Volcano House has been closed since
January 2010. Photo by Julia Neal
NPS has spent more than $4 million on fire and safety improvements at Volcano House, including seismic upgrades. Volcano House shut down on Dec. 31, 2009 with the end of the contract held by former concessioner Ken Fujiyama.
Applicants were evaluated on their re- sponses to questions asked, including how to engage and educate the visiting public on the native Hawaiian culture through interpretive experiences and retail services, including the sale of Native Hawaiian handicrafts and cultural demonstrations. Additional guidelines used to evaluate proposals can be found online at www.nps.gov/commercialservices.
THE VOLCANO PROJECT, an effort led by David Howard Donald and Anne Lee, of Volcano, would have taken Volcano House into operation by a nonprofit organization. Their plan was to make it a culinary and hospitality education institution while serving visitors to the park. They attracted numerous letters of support from county, state and federal elected officials as well as business and Hawaiian cultural leaders and community members. The Volcano Project has manned a table every Sunday for several years at Volcano Farmers Market. Their website says, “The Volcano Project is going forward with our plans to open a world-class hospitality school.” See more at volcanoproject.org.
FEDERAL EDUCATION OFFICIALS could come to Ka`u schools this week, as they plan to visit “zones of school innovation” under the Race to the Top program. The federal Department of Education officials are in Hawai`i to meet with administrators and policymakers, as well as teachers union leader Will Okabe.
The teachers are yet to settle their labor dispute with the state and are working under a “last, best and final offer” from the administration. The dispute is considered one of the reasons that Hawai`i is on probation for some $75 million in Race to the Top funding.
Hawai`i welcomed Race to the Top officials this week who could visit
schools in Ka`u. Photo from www.americanprogress.org
Hawai`i and Florida are the only two Race to the Top grant recipients that still have a lot to prove, according to a new report from the Center on American Progress. The Washington, D.C.-based think tank for education policy reports that 10 of the 12 Race to the Top winners are scheduled to continue receiving their grants, but Hawai`i and Florida are “not meeting expectations.”
The report gives a state-by-state review of educational progress and challenges. Regarding Hawai`i, it says, “If desire is any indication, the state is headed in the right direction. But clearly there are still significant promises to keep — and challenges to address – the months and years ahead.” The entire report, called Race to the Top: What We Have Learned from the States So Far, was released yesterday for reading at www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/rtt_states.html.
School officials said they are planning to prove to the Race to the Top overseers that Hawai`i schools are making a lot of progress.
KALAEKILOHANA has opened up reservations to the general public for its Ka`u Coffee Festival event on Saturday, May 5. The $100 a ticket evening at the upscale B&B on South Point Road is called Ka`u Farmers’ Table: A Feast for the Senses and features with dinner by Chef Morgan Star of Mi’s Italian Bistro and an evening of music with Robert Cazimero. The gathering is one of the two new official events of the Ka`u Coffee Festival, which will hold its Ho`olaule`a on Saturday, May 12 and its educational day on Sunday, May 13. Also planned as a new Ka`u Coffee Festival event is a recipe contest, this time for cookies, candies and crackers, at Ka`u Coffee Mill on Wood Valley Road above Pahala on Sunday, May 6. See more at www.kaucoffeefestival.com.
Ranger John Stallman
HAWAI`I VOLCANOES NATIONAL PARK ranger John Stallman discusses the natural history and conservation of Hawai`i’s ancient native palms at After Dark in the Park today at 7 p.m. in Kilauea Visitor Center Auditorium. $2 donations support park programs, and park entrance fees apply.
PANDANUS WEAVING is the topic tomorrow from 10 a.m. to noon on the Kilauea Visitor Center lanai in Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park. Participants learn how to weave bracelets from the leaves of the hala tree. The event is free, and park entrance fees apply.
THE FINAL WHALE COUNT for 2012 takes place Saturday from 8 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. at various locations throughout Ka`u. Volunteers count humpback whales and document their behavior. Sign up at http://hawaiihumpbackwhale.noaa.gov.
THY WORD MINISTRIES KA`U holds its ninth annual Easter Family Fun Day on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Na`alehu Hongwanji Hall. The event includes a craft fair, free lunch, music, hula and an Easter egg hunt for all ages. For more information, call 936-9114.
Ka`u High students, with advisor Theodore Brattstrom, competed in FIRST over the weekend.
ALTERNATIVE ENERGY TAX CREDIT REDUCTIONS for solar hot water and photovoltaic and wind systems could be on the horizon. The state Legislature is considering several bills. Senate Bill 2288 was referred to the Senate Finance Committee last week, after going through amendments. The latest version would initially raise maximum tax deductions for solar hot water systems from $2,250 to $2,500 and photovoltaics for single-family houses from $5,000 to $7,000. It would eliminate the $500,000 cap on deductions for commercial properties. However, by 2015, the tax credits would be reduced from 35 percent to 20 percent of the cost of purchasing the systems. The new law also would prohibit the tax deductions when the system is established with a power purchase agreement with a government agency, and it would allow one tax credit per tax map key, reducing incentives for putting in solar on `ohana units and for duplexes, triplexes and other multifamily units.
Installations of photovoltaics may decline if tax
credits are reduced. Photo from forms.iapmo.org
The Solar Voltaic Coalition opposed the reduction in tax credits over time, noting that 15 percent of all construction jobs in Hawai`i in 2011 were related to solar power installations. “The measure’s impact on the residential market will have the greatest impact on PV specialists contractors, who perform the bulk of residential installations. The disruption caused by this measure will ensure that many of these entities will be forced out of business as the market adjusts to the radically changed incentive regime,” the Coalition testified.
Blue Planet opposed the House Draft of the measure, saying it would significantly reduce the incentive to invest in renewable energy, likely damage the solar and wind industries in Hawai`i and deliver a major setback to the state’s clean energy efforts.”
The Hawai`i Renewable Energy Association also opposed the changes, testifying that they would “set the state back in its overall efforts to increase our use of renewable energy, reduce employment in the construction sector at a most inopportune time, and stymie efforts by state agencies to reduce their energy costs and thereby save taxpayer dollars.” The Sierra Club called the measure “penny-wise, pound-foolish.”
The state, however, claims it is losing tens of millions of dollars each year to the write-offs for installing alternative energies.
See more testimony and the bills themselves at hawaii.capitol.gov.
Thermal camera shows temperatures in lava flow field. Photo from USGS/HVO
HAWAIIAN VOLCANO OBSERVATORY has increased its webcams from 6 to 14 webcams these days and has upgraded its website to provide more real time seismic, deformation and gas concentration data, webcam images of eruptive areas and maps, photos and videos.
Four of these new webcams are thermal cameras. These cameras provide a picture of temperatures in the field of view, with cool colors (blue, purple) depicting lower temperatures and hot colors (orange, red, white) showing higher temperatures. Lava at Kilauea is erupted at around 2,012 degrees F, but normally develops a cooler crust within seconds of being exposed to the air. One of the primary benefits of the thermal cameras, compared to conventional webcams, is that they can “see” through thick fume (although it may depress the measured temperatures). See more at hvo.wr.usgs.gov.
GASOLINE PRICES ROSE an average of 6.7 cents per gallon across the state in just one week, averaging $4.50 per gallon yesterday. The national average went up to 3.86 per gallon, a 4.5 cent increase, reports the website HawaiiGasPrices.com. Prices in Hawai`i yesterday were 29.2 cents higher than the same day a year ago and 23.5 cents higher than a month ago. The national average is 29.5 cents per gallon higher than this day one year ago.
The national average rising 21 consecutive days is “a troubling sign,” said gasbudd.com analyst Patrick DeHaan. “Typically, we expect such increases to occur more so in April,” he said.
Prices in Ka`u this morning for regular: $4.72 at Ka `u Gas in Pahala and $4.76 at the 76 Station in Na`alehu. In Ocean View prices were $4.60 at Kahala Gas and Ocean View Market and $4.55 at Kahuku Country Market.
Members of the Ka`u High Robotics Team adjust their
machine. Photo by Andrew Suenobu
KA`U HIGH’S ROBOTICS TEAM is back from the FIRST competition at the Stan Sheriff Center at University of Hawai`i on O`ahu. The students built a robot that competed in putting balls through a hoops in a game called the Rebound Rumble. Team leader Leilani Desmond said the Robotics group is looking for financial support to help pay for their expenses. The faculty advisor is chemistry teacher Theodore Brattstrom.
Kohala High and Kealakehe High School teams will travel from the Big Island to the national competition in St. Louis beginning April 25. “Every year student competitors amaze everyone with their teamwork and outstanding technical skills,” said Shelley Rowley, co-chair of FIRST in Hawai`i regional competiton. FIRST means For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. To contribute to the Robotics Team, call Ka`u High at 928-2088.
INDIVIDUAL STUDENTS AND STUDENT GROUPS from public, charter and private schools, as well as for-profit or nonprofit youth organizations are eligible to apply for the county’s Student Malama Award, the first Hawai`i Island student sustainability award to highlight and celebrate youth-led stewardship and sustainability initiatives on the Big Island. Outstanding student leaders in this field will be awarded $500 scholarships.
Projects may include, but are not limited to, topics such as renewable energy and energy efficiency; agriculture such as school gardens and local foods; resource management such as zero waste, community-based volunteerism, social and community service and environmental projects such as conservation and preservation of the ocean, land and forest.
Scholarships will be awarded to winners in K-5, 6-8 and 9-12 grade categories. An awards ceremony luncheon with Mayor Billy Kenoi will be scheduled for the end of the school year.
Applications are available on the Office of the Mayor’s website at www.hawaiicounty.gov/office-of-the-mayor/categories/SMA. The deadline is April 15.
For more information, contact Barbara Kossow at 323-4448 or Lisa Robertson at 961-8211.
Loulu, Hawai`i's ancient native palms, are the topic at
After Dark in the Park tomorrow. Photo from NPS
AT AFTER DARK IN THE PARK tomorrow, Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park ranger John Stallman discusses the natural history and conservation of Hawai`i’s ancient native palms. The program begins at 7 p.m. in Kilauea Visitor Center Auditorium. $2 donations support park programs, and park entrance fees apply.
PARTICIPANTS LEARN HOW TO WEAVE lauhala bracelets from the leaves of the hala tree on Wednesday from 10 a.m. to noon on the lanai of Kilauea Visitor Center in Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park. The event is free, and park entrance fees apply.
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