Environment / Invasive species pose the single biggest threat to Hawaii’s general health, economy and natural environment, according to the National Wildlife Research Center. And the Hawaii Department of Agriculture (HDOA) is our front line of defense against them.
Science / To Hawaiians, the top of Mauna Kea is the pinnacle of prayer, where Papa and Wakea meet. The world’s tallest mountain, at 13,769 feet, is also the only tropical alpine desert in the world.
Outside / When people think of being outdoors in Hawaii, they typically picture being at the beach. In the world of rock climbing, Hawaii has never really been well known; moreover, most of our sharp, volcanic rock is assumed by most mainland climbers to be less-than-climbable.
Green / Saunders Hall at the University of Hawaii at Manoa has been home to multiple environmental projects, including a solar energy test bed. It’s hard to believe that until five years ago the building was doing more harm than good.
Health / In the state of Hawaii, it’s illegal for anyone other than a licensed professional, working in a professional studio, to work as a tattoo artist. There are potential health risks involved, and tattooing is an especially easy way to transmit communicable diseases–like hepatitis, HIV, HPV and tuberculosis–when proper health guidelines aren’t followed.
Development / With new developments happening all over the place–and a couple of controversial ones looming menacingly on the horizon–Oahu residents have to ask themselves: What is the limit to growth on Oahu? According to the 2010 census, 953,207 people currently reside in Honolulu County–up 8.8 percent from the year 2000.
Development / It seems a shame that verdant squares of fenced-off, overgrown plots remain untouched, languishing in terra-purgatory. Who owns that huge lot on Dillingham Boulevard and Colburn Street, the plot on King Street and Poha Lane or Kapiolani Boulevard and Hauoli Street?
Community / On May 17, 2011, Gov. Neil Abercrombie released his 90-Day Plan on Homelessness in Hawaii: A (surprisingly short) manifesto consisting of nine objectives “designed to provide visible, measurable and significant relief that will benefit persons who are chronically homeless.” The 90-day mark is fast approaching, as is APEC 2011.
Community / Prostitution has been a part of life in Downtown Honolulu for many years. Hookamakama was the Hawaiian term referring to sailors seeking amorous ladies during their ship stops in the Hawaiian Kingdom.
Community / Customers these days are paying more for groceries. We all know that.
Hawai‘i Farmers Union United, HB 667 / Local farmers met with Governor Abercrombie at his office last week to talk about food safety and the future of small farms. While recent federal reform of food safety regulations has made exceptions for some farmers, many here in Hawaii say that a bill passed out of the Hawaii legislature last month–HB 667–advantages big agribusiness over small farms and will put some families out of business.
HI-5, Eating in Public / Eating In Public–the organization that’s taken on the public HI-5 recycling challenge on Oahu–provides cheap and efficient handmade, wire mesh recycling cages throughout the Island. Their signs are familiar to most of us: HI-5.
Hawai'i Housekeepers / On June 16, 2011, a Kihei man received a life sentence for the March 12 unprovoked multiple stabbing of a 62-year-old hotel housekeeper who was cleaning his room at the WorldMark Resort in Kihei, Maui. According to MauiTime, the victim was left paralyzed and has had to re-learn how to speak, how to walk and how to sit up.
Rev. Roger Christie / With a new attorney and a delayed trial date, Hilo’s marijuana minister plans to challenge the basis of the government’s case by calling into question the Drug Enforcement Agency’s (DEA) current, allegedly disingenuous, classification of marijuana. Facing anywhere from five to 40 years in federal prison for crimes relating to the distribution of marijuana, Rev.
International Surf Day / Even when campaigns fail and change seems impossible, activists like those with the Surfrider Foundation stay optimistic enough to eventually overcome the hurdles. With about 300 chapters worldwide–from Oahu to Japan–and four chapters in Hawaii alone, the group is celebrating International Surf Day on June 20th, an event started in 2002 by Matt McClain, the marketing and communications director of the Surfrider Foundation Headquarters in California.
Opinion / Childhood obesity statistics have caught the attention of every aspect of our nation. Currently, between 16 and 33 percent of children and adolescents are obese.
Mauka to Makai / Imagine: It’s Saturday morning. You take the kids and head down to your local farmers market to pick up your weekly box of fruits, vegetables, taro and sweet potatoes from your ahupuaa co-op.
On a rainy January morning in downtown Honolulu, a small group of dejected homeowners met in a coffeehouse to commiserate with each other about the impending foreclosures on their family homes. Each blamed large, deceptive Mainland mortgage lenders for a variety of dishonest actions–and in some cases outright fraud–for the “wrongful” loss of their homes.
German filmmaker Werner Herzog once described auctioneering as “the last poetry possible, the poetry of capitalism.” Now and throughout the month of June, non-profit organization Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement (CNHA) and sister non-profit organization Hawaiian Way Fund (HWF) will host the Hawaiian Way Fund Benefit Native Arts Auction. But this auction won’t necessarily be the auction Herzog was harkening back to.
It is an especially rewarding time of transition for the University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa’s William S. Richardson School of Law, where 15 law students graduated at this year’s annual Spring commencement ceremony on May 15 with the Native Hawaiian Law Certificate.
Located in the historic Edwin Thomas Home at 41 South Beretania is a building that many people in Chinatown know well. Despite popular belief, it’s not a soup kitchen.
Chefs and Farmers Facing the Future / Perhaps the greatest conceit of the recent Chefs and Farmers Facing the Future food forum was assuming that all the participating chefs would care about food security. The premise of the forum was that they would “join the cause for a sustainable local food system,” said co-organizer Dan Nakasone.
KAHEA: The Hawaiian-Environmental Alliance / A 26-story condo/hotel proposed by Kyo-ya Hotels and Resorts for the lot between the old Moana Hotel and Kuhio Beach Park will be the target of a grassroots protest organized by KAHEA: The Hawaiian-Environmental Alliance. The public is invited.
Politics / After last week’s cover story on “Foreclosure Fraud,” distressed home loan borrowers are anxiously awaiting the reaction to Sen. Roz Baker’s 95-page legislative bill on mortgage foreclosures to be shared with the House committee on Wednesday.
Ethics / Senate Bill 249 proposes the state takeover of Oahu’s last remaining slaughterhouse in the face of its impending closure and lack of alternative private investors. Like many of the bills considered during this legislative session, SB249 will weigh heavily upon Hawaii’s local food system and determine the extent to which Hawaii will either remain dependent upon the Mainland for its food or increase its local food security through the development of a sustainable local food system infrastructure.
Given the city’s crumbling infrastructure and rail controversy, it’s hard to believe anyone would want to be the next mayor of Honolulu. But a few do want the job, including the incumbent, Mayor Peter Carlisle, the former Honolulu Prosecuting Attorney who won a 2010 special election to fill the remainder of Mufi Hannemann’s term.
I’d never been to a Honolulu City Council meeting until a few weeks ago. Features, not politics, was my beat.
Victoria Holt Takamine is a kumu hula, a cultural activist and a teacher and has an impeccable pedigree to back up all these titles. Born of an alii family whose kuleana was in Moanalua, she graduated as a hula teacher under the legendary Auntie Maiki Aiu Lake and taught hundreds of students in her own halau (Pua Alii ‘Ilima) and at the University of Hawaii.
On April 25, a state judge dismissed trespassing charges against a Kauai man after finding that he had been exercising traditional native Hawaiian rights hunting wild pigs on private land. Kui Palama, 28, was arrested on Jan.
The city plans to dish out $3.5 million from its Affordable Housing Fund and either purchase or renovate a structure to provide transitional housing for Honolulu’s special needs homeless population. “Our community has invested considerable effort and resources in addressing homelessness,” Mayor Peter Carlisle said in a statement, “but there remains a population whose disabilities or chronic conditions make it difficult for them to participate in traditional shelter programs.” Carlisle is referring to those homeless with mental illnesses, addictions and physical disabilities.
Makaweli Poi faces an uncertain future after its owner, a corporate subsidiary of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) ordered the West Kauai mill to suspend operations May 23. Mona Bernardino, chief operating officer of the corporation, Hiipoi LLC, says the move to shut down Makaweli Poi was prompted mainly by financial concerns.
A resolution adopted by the City Council will solidify an agreement between the City and County of Honolulu and the University of Hawaii Water Resources Research Center (UH-WRRC) to conduct an analysis of impacts from ocean sewer outfalls on the marine environments off of Oahu. The city will pay UH-WRRC as much as $2.5 million for biological and sediment studies in portions between now and June 30, 2017 .
Along with the deep, verdant growth of spring sprouts an unyielding desire to spend more time in the open air. That’s why it should come as no surprise that National Bike Month falls in the sun-drenched time of May.
Of the many letters you publish against rail, how many offer an alternative that won’t send us into further economic demise? Billions of gallons of oil are imported for us from every oil-producing nation on this planet so that we can buy billions of gallons of gasoline.
TheBus is taking a back seat to rail. At the May 3 Downtown Neighborhood Board meeting, an audience member asked city Transportation Director Wayne Yoshioka when we could expect the bus route cancellations and changes to be reversed.
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