Ka`u News Briefs May 23, 2012

Hawai`i Wildlife Fund is cleaning up an anchialine pond today and invites volunteers to help again next Tuesday. The organization will also roll through the Independence Day parade in Na`alehu June 30, educating the public on cleaning up the coast. Photo by Julia Neal

THE NEW STATE SENATE SEAT on Hawai`i Island, which covers Ka`u from Honu`apo into Volcano and Puna, will be filled during the upcoming primary and general election, three federal judges confirmed yesterday. They turned away a request for an injunction to possibly delay the elections until voting districts could be redrawn. 

Judge Kobayashi, from
Hawai`i. 

     The plaintiffs claimed that non-resident military, as well as students from out of state and the non-resident incarcerated were unfairly deleted from the population count used to carve up the voting districts after the 2010 census. The census showed significant population growth on the Big Island and prompted the state Reapportionment Commission to assign a new state Senator to this island and take one away from O`ahu. Unhappy O`ahu voters organized the legal offense, coming up with eight plaintiffs, four of them in the military or veterans. According to Civil Beat, more than 100,000 military personnel, their dependents and students were excluded from the population count used to draw the voting districts.

Judge Seabright, a
former adjunct professor
at University of Hawai`i.

     The court, however, said that the decision on whether to include the non-resident population is one that should be determined by residents of Hawai`i, rather than federal judges. The judges agreed with Deputy Attorney General Brian Aburano who argued that halting the elections to redraw the districts would create chaos in the elections. The judges said invalidating the redistricting plan now would be "spawning chaos rather than confidence in the election process."
     The lawsuit, however, is not over. It goes to trial with the plaintiffs claiming the plan violates the federal Equal Protection Clause. Civil Beat quotes the decision of the judges: "Although we recognize that the right to representation is fundamental, 'a federal court cannot lightly interfere with or enjoin a state election.” 

Judge McKeown is one
of three federal judges
working on the
Hawai`i elections case.

     U.S. District Judges J. Michael Seabright and Leslie Kobayashi and U.S. Circuit Judge M. Margaret McKeown wrote: "the equities and public interest tip overwhelmingly in (Reapportionment) Commission's favor." Their decision says plaintiffs did "not show that Hawai`i attempted to single out non-resident service members, service member dependents, or non-resident students for any reason other than their lack of permanent residency... The record shows that the means Hawai`i chose to achieve the result were rational and, even using the standard urged by (plaintiffs), pass close constitutional scrutiny." Even though judges rejected the injunction, the issue will proceed to trial, but won’t affect the elections. 

     Candidates for the new Senate seat are House Rep. Bob Herkes, Steven Hirakami, Wendell Ka`ehu`ae`a, Russell Ruderman and Gary Safarik. The candidates for the Senate seat from Honu`apo to Kona Airport are incumbent Josh Green, Michael Last, and John Totten.

Wil Okabe, Hawaii State Teachers Association President.
Photo from HSTA 

PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS completed voting on a contract at midnight last night and results were expected today. The results, however, could be challenged by the state, which claims that the proposed contract between the union and state negotiators is no longer valid. During an earlier vote, the teachers rejected the contract, but Wil Okabe, leader of the 13,000-member Hawai`i State Teachers Association union, called for a revote that started last Thursday. A major issue in the contract is tying teacher evaluation and compensation with student improvement. The federal Race to the Top program, which is providing $74 million to Hawai`i public schools is asking for more teacher accountability. 

Ed Case, former House of
Representatives member
who represented Ka`u,
Volcano and beyond.

MAZIE HIRONO AND ED CASE are neck and neck in a poll released by the Case campaign yesterday. The poll, conducted by Public Strategy Group, Inc., among likely voters in the Democratic primary Aug. 11 reports 46 percent favoring Case and 45 percent Hirono, with 9 percent undecided. “The Democratic primary for U.S. Senator in Hawai`i remains very competitive, with the key match-up question between likely primary voters slightly favoring Case over Hirono within the margin of error. His lead increases with larger Democratic primary voter turnout because typically incremental voters in a Democratic primary tend to be more independent and/or moderate groups that strongly identify with Case.

 Case, with a strong 65-30 favorable/unfavorable rating, enjoys higher favorable ratings and lower unfavorable ratings than Hirono,” a statement from the Case campaign contends. 

Current House of Representatives
member Mazie Hirono who
represents Ka`u,
Volcano and beyond.

     The Case campaign has slammed Hirono for turning down prime time television debate opportunities. Hirono’s campaign released a statement saying, “It is difficult to comment on a poll that seems to have little meat and information about how it was conducted and therefore doesn’t meet any level of transparency. Mazie has been out meeting and talking with residents. The feedback she has been getting has been nothing but positive and encouraging. We are confident that the voters will decide that she is the best person to serve as Hawaii’s next U.S. Senator.
     “As for the former Congressman’s remarks relating to the upcoming Democratic State Convention and debates, the people of Hawai`i want a Senator like Mazie Hirono who attacks Hawaii’s and the country’s challenges with personal determination and a cooperative style. Not someone who attacks other people with personal pettiness and a divisive approach,” said the Hirono campaign.

OIL IS DOWN TO $90 A BARREL on the commodities market. However, gasoline prices in Ka`u, are lagging behind the lowering cost. Ka`u Gas in Pahala was selling regular this morning for $5.02 a gallon. The Na`alehu 76 $4.72, Kahala Gas in Ocean View $4.72, Ocean View Market – if you pay with a credit card - costs $4.72. Pay cash and get it for $4.67. Lowest price in Ka`u is at Kahuku Country Mart at $4.66 a gallon.

HAWAI`I WILDLIFE FUND is looking for volunteers to help clean up an anchialine pond in Ka`u today and again next Tuesday, May 29. Contact Megan Lamson at 769-7629 or meg.hwf@gmail.com.

OCEAN VIEW COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORP. meets tomorrow, 5:30 p.m., at Ocean View Community Center. For more, call 929-9910.

AARP DRIVER SAFETY TRAINING is available Friday. Mike Last teaches this four-hour class that has no driving, tests or exams. Current members pay $12 and non-members by $14. The class is open to everyone. For more, call 929-8422.

SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS AT PAHALAPLANTATIONCOTTAGES.COM AND KAUCOFFEEMILL.COM.

Ka`u News Briefs May 22, 2012

Iwao Yonemitsu listens and answers questions about the history of Ka`u agriculture. Photo by Dianne Signs

WEST KA`U is expected to remain in a severe drought that could worsen this year, according to the National Weather Service. La Nina conditions are expected to keep rainfall at low levels during the next five months. The drought, however, is worse farther north. It is ranked severe in South and North Kona and extreme in South Kohala and Pohakuloa. 

National Weather Service predicts
persistent drought.

      The weather service predicts that rains will be heavier in the first five months of 2013. The drought is particularly harmful to ranching and could affect macadamia production in South Kona, where many Ka`u residents work for MacFarms. 

KONA CAME TO KA`U last weekend when the Kona Historical Society brought 39 of its members to an educational tour led by historian Iwao Yonemitsu and naturalist John Replogle. The tour began at the base of Ka`alaiki Road with stops along the old sugar plantation road where Yonemitsu explained the history of early ranching followed by the sugar industry. Replogle gave a presentation on The Nature Conservancy’s work in Ka`u, where it protects native species and the watershed on several preserves. The visitors, from as far away as Waimea, also learned about ranches and the emerging coffee industry, creating independent small businesses for the new Ka`u economy. Local people joined the cavalcade with 60 having lunch at Aikane Plantation coffee farm, followed by a tour of Pahala town and a visit to Honu`apo.

Japanese and Hawaiian hula dancers at this year's Ka`u Coffee Festival
plan to return next year on May 4, 2013. Photo by Julia Neal

THE KA`U COFFEE FESTIVAL committee got going on next year’s event last night, setting the date of the Ho`olaule`a for Saturday, May 4, 2013, with Ka`u Coffee College on Sunday, May 5. Organizers declared this year’s event a great success with significant sales and contacts made for the coffee farmers. Chris Manfredi, chair for the 2012 Ka`u Coffee Festival, noted front-page stories in the local and Honolulu newspapers, as well as television and continuing coverage on local radio. Such sponsors as Hilo Hattie have also come on board. Much of the coverage can be seen on www.kaucoffeefest.com. 

      Edmund C. Olson Trust II committed to more than $7,000 in funding for the stage, entertainment and recipe contest for 2013. The committee agreed to work on promoting the festival early so that visitors from afar and residents from other parts of the island can plan to stay in Ka`u during the event. The Hawai`i Tourism Authority was a significant funder of the event this year, providing $15,000 through the county Department of Research & Development’s County Product Enrichment Program. The committee discussed working over the next few years to help make the festival more self-sustaining.
      Minako Yamazaki, a volunteer and tourism marketer who travels back and forth between Japan and her Pahala home, sent a message to the group saying she will work on bringing visitors from Japan as the next festival will be during Golden Week. The committee also talked about a possible May Day theme.
      Volcano Art Center board chair Anne Lee said VAC is interested in participating in the next Ka`u Coffee Festival, perhaps with such events as bringing artists to Ka`u to create a collection of paintings of Ka`u Coffee farms.
      Trini Marques, whose coffee ranked in the world's top ten at the Specialty Coffee Association of America convention this year, talked about the vision of the coffee festival growing into a major event that will raise money to give back to the community.
      Anyone interested in volunteering to work on the next Ka`u Coffee Festival can look for updates at www.kaucoffeefest.com or come to the next meeting on Monday, June 18 at 5 p.m. at Pahala Community Center.

SO2 monitor in Pahala showed sulfur dioxide in the air throughout the night at levels risky to sensitive people.

AIR UNHEALTHY FOR SENSITIVE PEOPLE registered on vog monitors in Pahala throughout last night and the night before. Vog is more likely during windless nights when fumes from Kilauea Volcano can drift across the Ka`u Desert and onto the village and stay there before morning winds come up and blow it away. Health officials recommend closing windows at night before going to sleep for protection from vog. Air cleaners and air conditioners can be used for warm nights and for clean-air sleeping, significantly reducing overall daily exposure to vog. Sulfur dioxide levels are available online at www.hiso2index.info.

LIQUID ROBOTICS SET SAIL again yesterday from the Big Island, launching two of its data capturing PacX Wave Riders, one headed toward Japan and the other toward Australia. It’s the final phase of a first-of-its-kind scientific expedition across the Pacific Ocean, with approximately 5,000 nautical miles until the final destinations. The Wave Gliders have collectively already traveled more than 13,000 nautical miles, collecting and transmitting, in near real-time, unprecedented amounts of ocean surface data on a scale never before continuously collected across the Pacific Ocean.

Liquid Robotics launched data collecting, unmanned Wave Gliders from
the Big Island yesterday. Photo from Liquid Robotics

      According to a story in CNN Money, Liquid Robotics founder Joe Rizzi “first heard the underwater songs of humpback whales a decade ago while scuba diving near Hawai`i. Enthralled, he decided to pipe their migration music into his beachfront home.” The venture capitalist “started with a glass pickle jar, a hydrophone and a kayak.” For its research, Liquid Robotics raised $22 million from investors, has 80 employees and such customers as BP Oil and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration.

HAWAI`I WILDLIFE FUND is looking for volunteers to help clean up an anchialine pond in Ka`u tomorrow and again next Tuesday, May 29. Contact Megan Lamson at 769-7629 or meg.hwf@gmail.com.

THE FREE YOUTH ARTS FESTIVAL at Volcano Art Center’s Niaulani Campus takes place Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Activities include hands-on drumming, painting on silk, drawing and a musical petting zoo. The event begins with a Taiko drum performance at 10 a.m., followed by Hip Hop dance with Zulu Nation, Hula and Oli with Meleana, Qigong with Priya, a free concert by Brittni Paiva and Youth Poetry Open Mic. No experience in the arts is necessary, and everyone is welcome. Seating for Brittni Paiva’s concert is limited. Call 967-8222 for reservations.

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Ka`u News Briefs May 21, 2012

Manta in Big Island waters. Photo from Manta Pacific Research Foundation

WHEN WILL FLOTSAM FROM THE JAPAN TSUNAMI REACH KA`U? When a Japanese fishing ship drifted into Alaska waters, a Japanese kid’s soccer ball landed on an Alaskan island, a Harley washed up on the Canada Coast and trash tumbled onto Washington’s Olympic Coast shores, it seemed like the rubble should have reached Ka`u.

      Not necessarily. Megan Lamson, of Hawai`i Wildlife Fund that schedules regular cleanup days on the Ka`u Coast, is looking for debris from Japan but is yet to see any. The giant swirling gyre that rotates in the Pacific between Asia and North America is carrying the debris far north of Hawai`i. However, as debris is caught up in this gyre, called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, it will travel south past California and head back west toward Hawai`i. Debris that has washed up on other coasts so far is free of radiation.
      Last week Congress discussed the need for funding to clean up the debris as it arrives on U.S. shores. On March 11, 2011, a 9.0 quake created the tsunami in Japan as high as 130 feet and sweeping over some 217 square miles, washing millions of tons of debris into the ocean.

MANTA RAYS FROM KA`U TO NORTH KOHALA are protected by state law but in danger of being entangled in fishing lines and caught up in ocean debris, warns the Manta Pacific Research Foundation.

      In a story in West Hawai`i Today this morning, Manta Pacific co-founder Keller Laros tells the story of a manta wrapped in fishing line and unable to get away from a tiger shark, even though divers tried to save it. Laros said that 160 manta have been documented from Ka`u to North Kohala. Forty Giant Ocean Manta Rays were also seen here, he told a group of people during Jack’s Diving Locker’s Eighth Annual Ocean Fair last Saturday in Kailua-Kona. 

      The story by Chelsea Jensen says that the state act protecting mantas was signed into law in 2009. Anyone capturing or killing a manta ray can receive a $500 fine for first offense, $2,000 for second and $10,000 for additional convictions. Laros told West Hawai`i Today that mantas attract divers and snorkelers – an industry worth some $3.6 million a year to the snorkeling and dive shops, boats and guides on the Big Island.

FOUR SCHOLARSHIPS were recently awarded by `O Ka`u Kakou to Ka`u students for the next school year. “All of the entrants added an essay of their goals and expectations in life. They all have also participated in many community service activities,” said Fred Ramsdell, member of the scholarship committee.
      Le`a Moses, of Wai`ohinu, will receive a $1,000 per semester scholarship. Moses attends Hawai`i Community College and will transfer to University of Hawai`i at Manoa next year. Moses plans to return to Ka`u after receiving her Bachelor of Arts degree in social work from UH.
      Kayla Andrade will be graduating from Kamehameha School in Kea`au this year and will receive a $500 per year scholarship to the University of Hawai`i at Manoa. Andrade will be studying business management.
      Layla Abellera, who graduated last weekend from Ka`u High, will receive a $500 scholarship to Hawai`i Community College. Her goal is to become a pediatrician and return to Ka`u.

Ka`u Coffee Growers Cooperative shared success at Ka`u Coffee Festival.
Photo by Julia Neal

      Miki Moses has been studying at Myron B. Thompson Academy and will graduate this year. She plans on using her $500 scholarship to attend Brigham Young University, Hawai`i and pursue courses in agriculture. 

      `O Ka`u Kakou offers six scholarships each year, two $1,000 for students in higher education and four $500 for high school graduates. Not all scholarships were awarded due to lack of applicants. “We need more students to fill out applications,” said Ramsdell.

KA`U COFFEE FESTIVAL organizers hold a meeting at 5 p.m. today to discuss the recent event and to begin planning for next year. Everyone interested in helping is invited to attend.

HAWAI`I WILDLIFE FUND sponsors cleanups of anchialine ponds in Ka`u this Wednesday and again next Tuesday, May 29. Volunteers can sign up with Megan Lamson at 769-7629 or meg.hwf@gmail.com.

Ka`u `Ohana Band holds rehearsals every week.

KA`U `OHANA BAND rehearses every Wednesday and Thursday from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. at Ocean View Community Center. The band recently performed at Spring Fling in Na`alehu and the grand opening of Ka`u Coffee Mill in Wood Valley. Call 929-7544 for more information. 

KA`U SCHOOL OF THE ARTS is planning a Creativity Day for King Kamehameha Day, Monday, June 11 from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at Pahala Plantation House. The free event for all ages engages attendees in a wide choice of guided art activities including macramé, stitchery dolls, traditional Pacific Island dances and weaving, clay miniatures, metal intaglio, acrylics on textile and more. Call 929-7544 for more information.

SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS AT WWW.PAHALAPLANTATIONCOTTAGES.COM AND WWW.KAUCOFFEEMILL.COM.