(c) Copyright July 25, 2024
Kenneth R. Conklin, Ph.D.
All rights reserved
Some of the materials available on website of the City and County of Honolulu:
Reso 24-151 introduced 6/04/24 Committee on Planning and the Economy, as approved.
https://hnldoc.ehawaii.gov/hnldoc/document-download?id=21473
Reso 24-151 CD1 list of amendments and proposed text after amendments are made
Introduced July 19, 2024; includes detailed map.
https://hnldoc.ehawaii.gov/hnldoc/document-download?id=21919
Agenda for committee meeting Thursday 7/25/24, at 9:00 AM; and how to testify in writing, orally (1 minute), or both.
https://hnldoc.ehawaii.gov/hnldoc/document-download?id=21923
Written testimony supporting the resolution was provided by representatives of two institutions: Madelyn McKeague representing Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement; and by Kali Watson representing Department of Hawaiian Homelands. Written testimony opposing the resolution was provided by 9 individuals including Ken Conklin; most of the people in opposition were homeowners living in Kailua downslope from the parcel, who described unstable soil conditions and drainage problems that have already severely impacted their houses, and their fears that such soil conditions in the parcel proposed for transfer would even more strongly impact their homes if houses are actually constructed on the parcel. A pdf file of 8 megabytes containing all the written testimony can be downloaded at:
https://hnldoc.ehawaii.gov/hnldoc/document-download?id=21953
Status, committee reports, minutes
https://hnldoc.ehawaii.gov/hnldoc/measure/2982
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WRITTEN TESTIMONY submitted online by Ken Conklin on Monday July 22, 2024 for discussion on Thursday, July 25, at a meeting of the Committee on Planning and the Economy, whose chairperson is Esther Kia'aina. Oral testimony is limited to one minute per person, and can be given either in-person or through Zoom. The meeting might be televised live or on videotape.
To: Committee on Planning and the Economy
Honolulu County Council
From: Kenneth R. Conklin, Ph.D.
Email Ken_Conklin@yahoo.com
Re: Reso 24-151 including proposed CD1
Date: Thursday July 25, 2024; 9:00 AM HST
TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION
This resolution proposes to give away a large parcel of vacant land in Kailua, either as an outright gift in its entirety (CD1) or after recipient pays approximately five percent of its estimated value. It also proposes that roads inside the parcel shall remain the property of CC Honolulu (CD1). The designated recipient is the Department of Hawaiian Homelands, presumably for the purpose of creating housing.
Five main objections, and additional lesser ones, are provided below.
OBJECTION #1: CC Honolulu taxpayers will be hit with higher property taxes to pay for services to DHHL homeowners who are totally or almost totally exempt from property taxes. The main reason mentioned for the giveaway is that the land is now vacant (no homeowner services needed), but under DHHL control it would become host to a large number of houses. In its present vacant condition the land costs CC Honolulu virtually zero money for maintenance; but after houses are built they would require large expenditures of tax dollars to provide services such as water, sewage, police and fire protection, etc. BUT the homeowners on DHHL lands pay zero property taxes for their first 7 years and then a mere token payment per year forever after -- on O'ahu that manini payment is $100. CC Honolulu property taxes run to thousands of dollars for each homeowner or their renters, who would soon see higher taxes to make up for the taxes not paid by DHHL homeowners who nevertheless consume the same services. Indeed, this week is when O'ahu homeowners will be receiving their new property tax bills, which will cause an outcry against county council members -- especially the ones who recently grabbed a 64% salary increase, like the member who is sponsoring this resolution! CC Honolulu would not only be giving away valuable land for no compensation; CC Honolulu would be incurring major expenses and responsibilities (subject to lawsuits if there is failure to deliver) which it does not currently have.
OBJECTION #2: The Hawaiian Homelands are racially exclusionary by law -- more strongly segregated than mainland neighborhoods decades ago where redlining and racial covenants, Jim Crow laws in Southern states, and even Ku Klux Klan violence, kept Black people out. Here in Hawaii there is no visible violence to keep out people lacking a sufficiently high level of the magic blood; there's only the silent violence of racist laws which gentle people are too timid (or in-timid-ated) to challenge. The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act introduced by Mr. Kuhio in 1920 and passed in 1921 was probably unconstitutional (14th Amendment Equal Protection clause; but nobody objected back then). Delegate Kuhio introduced it to do his duty for constituent service. He persuaded his colleagues to pass it when he called upon their respect for him and because he evoked their sympathy for what he called a dying race. He was perhaps the first tycoon of the now-flourishing Native Hawaiian grievance industry. CC Honolulu people should not be forced to pay their tax dollars to support the donation of government land to maintain a system that is probably unconstitutional and certainly immoral. Aside from the loss of tax-base, there is a much more important reason to reject this resolution. In the Aloha State we should be bringing people together to promote unity and equality. It is both legally and morally wrong to divide our lands and people along racial lines.
OBJECTION #3: DHHL and the State of Hawaii have engaged in numerous land-swaps over the years. If the sponsors of this resolution think it's especially important to get this particular parcel of land transferred to DHHL, despite these objections, then the resolution should be amended to include a provision that DHHL will transfer to CC Honolulu a parcel of land it owns, which has been sitting unused for decades, in Ha'iku Valley, town of Kane'ohe, Ahupua'a of He'eia, Ko'olaupoko. For general understanding, those lands are near the Ha'iku Stairs (Stairway to Heaven), near the H-3 expressway and the Omega Station. Both parcels are in District #3 whose Councilmember is Esther Kia'aina. Ms. Kia'aina has pushed hard for the Stairs to be dismantled. It would seem that the main reason she wants the Stairs dismantled is because they are an 80-year-old historical artifact reminding us of U.S. military presence (the Omega Station for radio communication with ships around the world in WW2) and thus comprising a blight in a "sacred valley" where a group of activists has worked for years to push a bill through the legislature to turn the entire valley into a Native Hawaiian cultural center under a commission where at least 2/3 of the board members would be specifically required to have native blood.
Nepotism is the corrupt use of decision-making power whereby a person with such power uses it to give jobs, money, or other favors to family members or friends. Nepotism is an extreme form of selfishness which destroys good government by placing a decision-maker's personal interest above the best interest of the wider community being affected by decisions. The broadest range of family to be beneficiaries of nepotism would be the powerful person's entire ethnic group; while the narrowest range of nepotism would be the individual person wielding the power. At the narrow range: Ms. Kia'aina (and some other councilmembers) shamelessly voted to give herself a 64% pay raise immediately, instead of following the precedent set by Congress where pay raises do not get implemented until after the next election. Gimme! Gimme NOW!! At the widest range of nepotism to favor one's own entire ethnic group: Ms. Kia'aina has a LONG history of racial partisanship working for Bishop Estate (Kamehameha Schools), OHA, DLNR, pushing the Akaka bill during years 2000-2012 as policy advisor for Congressman Ed Case and Senator Dan Akaka; and then working for 4 years as Assistant Secretary of Interior 2012-2016 where her main accomplishment was to get regulation 43CFR50 proclaimed which remains as a "sleeper agent" to facilitate creation of a Hawaiian tribe and give it federal recognition.
Many property deeds nationwide include easements to guarantee ownership and access for electric, cable, water, and sewer lines. But Hawaii is unique among the 50 states in having racial entitlements which strip government and private landowners of property rights commonly recognized elsewhere and give superior rights to one racial group. Ethnic Hawaiians are given special rights by explicit racial language in some laws, and by the way some non-racially-explicit laws are interpreted on account of traditional and customary practices. The Hawaiian racial easements are broad and pervasive, affecting all property. They are subtle and insidious, to the extent that most newcomers are unaware of them and will not find them listed in any deed. See webpage
https://www.angelfire.com/big09a/RacialEasementsOnLand.html
This analysis is NOT intended as a personal attack on Esther Kia'aina. She seems to be a friendly, nice lady whose personal life is probably filled with love. But her political life is filled with individual selfishness, race-supremacist activism, and ethnic nepotism, doing great damage to the unity of our multiracial society and to our desire that government should treat us all equally under the law regardless of race.
Perhaps Ms. Kia'aina could begin her long journey of rehabilitation from nepotism if she would be willing to persuade DHHL to disgorge its Ha'iku Valley property and give it to CC Honolulu as a condition for transferring the parcel in Kailua to DHHL, and in return for stopping the dismantling of the Stairs and using the (former) DHHL land as a parking and staging area for visitors who wish to climb the stairs. Maps and description of the DHHL parcel in Ha'iku Valley, and also text and testimony of the most recent bill in the legislature attempting to create a Native Hawaiian cultural center there, can be seen in footnotes following Objection #8.
OBJECTION #4: If CC Honolulu leadership wishes to give away land in expectation that the recipient will develop the land with houses and thereby ease the housing shortage, then the land should be used by CC Honolulu to develop low-income housing which CC Honolulu administers or else delegates its administration as is already done with numerous other projects in urban Honolulu, Kane'ohe, Kailua, and elsewhere on O'ahu; or else the land should be given to a charitable organization which does not engage in racism but would benefit needy people regardless of race -- such as Habitat For Humanity, or Catholic Charities, for example. No Ms. Kia'aina, not OHA; not Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement. Unfortunately Habitat For Humanity in recent years seems to be functioning in Hawaii as a wholly-owned subsidiary of DHHL, since virtually all houses created by Habitat in recent years have been located on DHHL lands!
OBJECTION #5: It appears there is no language in this resolution or CD1 that would require recipient DHHL to actually dedicate that parcel of land to housing! DHHL has often been criticized for leasing some of its lands to businesses which then pay lease rent and a percentage of business income to DHHL, which DHHL claims to use for developing housing infrastructure but which might be simply invested or spent on bloated administrative overhead and salaries for relatives and friends (see the discussion of nepotism in Objection#3 above). In recent years there have also been proposals for the legislature to pass laws allowing gambling, including proposals to allow DHHL to build and operate a gambling casino on its land (of course the neighbors in Kailua would just love that!). If a Hawaiian tribe ever gets federal recognition (which Esther Kia'aina spent perhaps 20 years working toward), and if any form of gambling gets approved by our legislature (even merely bingo or poker), then the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act would apparently allow a Hawaiian casino on DHHL land even without state approval. It might be worth considering a conspiracy theory: perhaps it was Ms. Kia'aina's hidden purpose all along, to use the proposed land transfer to DHHL as a way to allow a gambling casino to get established in Kailua to generate megabucks for her ethnic group. The only way to resolve this conspiracy theory is to write a provision into the transfer document whereby DHHL is forced to agree to use the Kailua land solely for housing.
OBJECTION #6: The proposed amendment would make the burden on taxpayers even worse than without the amendment, by specifying that roads inside the land area would not be transferred to DHHL ownership but would remain owned by CC Honolulu -- thereby the millions of dollars needed for road construction, repair and maintenance would be borne by CC Honolulu taxpayers rather than by DHHL or its homeowner/lessees, in addition to all the costs for water, sewage, police, fire, etc. as noted in Objection #1.
OBJECTION #7: Language in the resolution and amendment praising Mr. Kuhio as creator of the Hawaiian Homelands and especially as creator of the county governments for the Territory of Hawaii is gratuitous and disingenuous. Kuhio was Territorial Delegate for Hawaii in Congress beginning 2 years after Annexation was consummated and continuing for about 20 years -- as such, he was more than happy to give 203,000 acres of U.S. government land to his favorite racial group (the "spoils system" at work), and it was his duty to provide the best possible governing structure to all Hawaii's people by devolving power and accountability to the local citizens of the separate islands.
OBJECTION #8: When Delegate Kuhio engaged in tear-jerking by telling his colleagues that native Hawaiians were a dying race, he could have cited Census data from the Kingdom, Republic and early Territorial periods. Some reputable sources estimated there were perhaps 400,000 "pure Hawaiians" before Captain Cook arrived -- one exaggerator claims a million. Diseases brought by Europeans and Asians devastated the native population, while consorting with immigrants diluted the blood quanta of their resulting babies and the large number of immigrants reduced the natives' percentage of population. The praises for Kuhio in this resolution seem to be saying: We like Kuhio, so let's honor him by engaging in a racist land giveaway to the agency he founded.
Here are some facts to counteract the sob-story about Hawaiians as a dying race:
Hawai'i Census of 1890 (Kingdom): Total population 89,990; Hawaiian 34,436; Part Hawaiian 6,186. Therefore ethnic Hawaiians (full or part) total 40,622 out of 89,990 which is 45%.
Hawai'i Census of 1896 (Republic): Total population 109,020; Hawaiian 31,019; Part Hawaiian 8,485. Therefore ethnic Hawaiians (full or part) total 39,504 out of 109,020 which is 36%.
U.S. Census of 1900 (Territory): Total population 154,001; Hawaiian 29,799; Part Hawaiian 9,857. Therefore ethnic Hawaiians (full or part) total 39,656 out of 154,001 which is 26%. Japanese were 61,111 out of 154,001 which is an astonishing 40%, far outnumbering any other ethnic group.
Straight-line interpolation is not entirely appropriate due to differences in which month the census was done, and the accelerating rate of immigration; but the approximate figures for 1893 (overthrow of the monarchy) and 1898 (annexation) would be:
1893 (overthrow) ethnic Hawaiians (full or part) 40,063 out of 99,505 which is 40%.
1898 (annexation) ethnic Hawaiians (full or part) 39,580 out of 131,511 which is 30%.
But U.S. sovereignty in Hawaii has been spectacularly beneficial to ethnic Hawaiians, who are thriving, no longer dying out.
The first Census after Statehood in which "Native Hawaiian" was an identity category took place in 2000; people could check one or more race identity boxes; the "Native Hawaiian" box was checked by 401,000 people -- a ten-fold increase during the first century of U.S. sovereignty in Hawaii. In Census 2010 there were 527,000 people who checked the box.
On September 21, 2023 the Census Bureau published an article with long-delayed 2020 data saying "Newly released results from the 2020 Census Detailed Demographic and Housing Characteristics File A show that the populations of nearly all the 31 detailed Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander (NHPI) groups grew over the past decade ... The Native Hawaiian alone or in any combination population grew by 29.1% from 527,077 in 2010 to 680,442 in 2020. It remained the largest NHPI alone or in any combination group in 2020, comprising nearly 43% of the NHPI alone or in combination population in the United States. The Native Hawaiian alone population was also the largest NHPI alone group (199,880 or 29.0%) and grew 28.0% between 2010 and 2020."
Almost certainly by now, extrapolating to four years later, the number of Native Hawaiians has grown to 750,000.
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/09/2020-census-dhc-a-nhpi-population.html
Really almost 200,000 "pure Hawaiians" in 2020? That's obviously wrong -- it happened because Hawaiian race-based institutions and individual ethnic Hawaiians themselves had adopted racial pride and race-partisanship to such an extent that huge numbers of mixed-race Hawaiians chose to identify solely as native Hawaiian for political purposes, thereby disrespecting the majority of their ancestors; and to exaggerate their "right" to racial entitlement programs. Even in the Censuses of 2000 and 2010 the number of self-proclaimed "pure Hawaiians" was slightly above 80,000.
Long-time Hawaii residents will remember TV commercials sponsored by OHA attempting to revive the "dying race" pity-party. The commercial showed a glass case in a museum where a man, woman, and child were displayed with a label saying "Native Hawaiians, now extinct." We're not falling for it anymore. See also my book review of "Then There Were None" at
https://www.angelfire.com/hi2/hawaiiansovereignty/lindseynoyesthennone.html
FOOTNOTES FOR OBJECTION #3:
Note1:
Detailed descriptions and maps of the DHHL parcel in Ha'iku Valley are in a draft of legislation from 2014:
HAʿIKÜ VALLEY PROJECT
DESCRIPTION: A Cultural Preservation
Plan for Sites 50-80-10-333 and -332
In the ʿIli of Haʿikü, ahupuaʿa of Heʿeia, Koʿolaupoko district, mokupuni of Oʿahu
TMK: (1)4-6-015:001, 009, 011, 012, and 014
Hälawa-Luluku Interpretive Development Project
August 2014
https://www.oha.org/wp-content/uploads/Attachment-C-Haiku-Valley-Project-Description.pdf
Note2: The draft "cultural preservation" plan was produced in 2014. Nine years later, in 2023, the most recent Ha'iku Valley bill in the legislature was offered and had hearings, still trying to develop a so-called "cultural preservation" commission. This commission was heavily stacked racially, with 5 out of 7 commissioners required to be ethnic Hawaiian, and the remaining 2 also could be (and probably would be).
Note3: HB1313 (held hearings in 2013, and was held over for further action in 2024 [but no action was taken])
RELATING TO HAIKU VALLEY.
Establishes the Haiku valley cultural preserve commission with OHA to provide policy and management oversight of the Haiku valley cultural preserve. Establishes the Haiku valley cultural preserve special fund. Initiates the process of conveying Haiku valley
Bill text (including all amended versions), history, committee hearings, pdf of all testimony submitted to each committee, YEAs and NAYs, committee reports:
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=1313&year=2023
also
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/sessions/session2024/bills/HB1313_HD1_.htm
Notice especially the following section 9, which accepts as fact that there will be a sovereign independent nation of Hawaii recognized by the state and federal governments, and commanding that the entire valley will thereupon be transferred out of the State of Hawaii and into that race-based nation.
"§ -9 Transfer. (a) Upon its conveyance to the office, the resources of the Haiku valley cultural preserve shall be held in trust by the office as part of the public land trust; provided that the office shall transfer management and control of the Haiku valley cultural preserve to the sovereign Native Hawaiian entity upon its recognition by the United States and the State."
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