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Hawaii Legislature 2019 -- Bills and Resolutions Related to Hawaiian Sovereignty and Racial Entitlement Programs. Text, testimony, and outcome.

Webpage published February 11, 2019 and then updated until end of session in May, whenever a new bill or resolution relevant to Hawaiian sovereignty was introduced and got a committee hearing.

Here is an internal search engine allowing you to find all pages on this website which discuss the topic you're interested in.

The Hawaii legislature is dominated by Democrats, most of whom are far to the left on the political spectrum. Legislation focusing on ethnic Hawaiians is often explicitly and shockingly favorable to racial supremacy, racial separatism in the tribal concept, and/or restoration of Hawaii as an independent nation. That's because ethnic Hawaiians as a group are the state pet: see "NATIVE HAWAIIANS AS THE STATE PET OR MASCOT: A Psychological Analysis of Why the People of Hawaii Tolerate and Irrationally Support Racial Separatism and Ethnic Nationalism" at
https://www.angelfire.com/hi2/hawaiiansovereignty/hawnsasmascots.html

Hawaii has hundreds of racial entitlement programs. See webpage "For Hawaiians Only. Webpages identifying and describing government funded racial entitlement programs providing benefits exclusively to Native Hawaiians using taxpayer dollars from the U.S. and State of Hawaii." at
https://www.angelfire.com/big11a/ForHawaiiansOnly.html

These programs provide financial benefits or governmental authority (such as advisory councils or fishing rights) exclusively to people who have at least one drop of Hawaiian native blood. People without a drop of the magic blood cannot receive benefits or serve on these special commissions. Racial entitlement programs are stepping stones to political sovereignty. Indeed, one of the primary reasons for pushing the Akaka bill, or federal recognition for a Hawaiian tribe, is to provide a legal defense against lawsuits to abolish racial entitlement programs on the grounds that they violate the 14th Amendment clause requiring that government must treat all people equally under the law regardless of race. Tribes are allowed to discriminate; but federal, state, and local governments are not.

Legislation in Hawaii for racial entitlement programs or race-based political power is usually passed unanimously, showing no difference between Democrats and Republicans, most of whom might be called RINOs (Republicans in name only). In previous years there might be an occasional "Nay" vote by the lone Republican Senator Sam Slom, who is politically conservative. As the only Republican in the Senate he was automatically a member of every committee but therefore was physically unable to attend most committee hearings. However, Senator Slom suffered major health issues in 2016 and was defeated for re-election. The Hawaii state Senate during 2017-2018 was the only state legislative body in the U.S. where all members belong to a single political party. For 2019-2020 there is one Republican in the Senate, but he leans left and votes the same way as the Democrats on nearly every item. In the state House which has 51 Representatives only a handful are Republicans. The Republican leader in the House, Beth Fukumoto, announced in 2017 that she would switch to the Democrat party, and in 2018 sat in the House as a registered Democrat.

The bills and resolutions covered in this webpage are troubling. The public should study them to get a grasp of how real are the dangers of racial separatism and ethnic nationalism in Hawaii. Citizens should phone or write to their legislators to express outrage when a legislator sponsors or votes in favor of bills and resolutions like these, which are both dangerous and ridiculous.

Each bill or resolution has its own webpage on the legislature's website. On that webpage there are links to full text of the bill or resolution, list of all the committee hearings including a record of how each legislator voted, a pdf file containing all the written testimony, and the official committee report for each committee. If a bill or resolution is introduced in either the House or Senate and also has a duplicate companion introduced in the other chamber, links are provided to the webpages for both of them. Full text is also provided of the testimony of Ken Conklin on behalf of the Center for Hawaiian Sovereignty Studies. Conklin's testimony was provided to each committee as a formatted pdf file on letterhead, which can be seen in each committee's file of all testimony; but is also provided in simple text here on this webpage to save bandwidth. Bills appropriating millions of dollars (or hundreds of millions of dollars!) are usually listed ahead of non-monetary bills focused on culture or language; and then they are also in order of the date when the first hearing for a bill is scheduled, or its clone companion in the other chamber.

This webpage was created on February 11, 2019 after 19 different bills (not counting cloned companions) had already had numerous hearings held or scheduled in either the House or Senate, or both, for which Ken Conklin had submitted testimony. More items were added to this webpage through the end of the legislative session in May, as new items got introduced and had committee hearings and Ken Conklin submitted testimony. However, ordinarily only Conklin's testimony on the first version of a bill or resolution was posted. Amended versions of bills or resolutions and new testimony can be tracked through the legislature's webpage for that item as listed for each item below.

TABLE OF CONTENTS: List of bills and resolutions in the order they appear below, for the 2019 Hawaii Legislature. Scroll down to find the one that interests you.

HB 402 and SB 1363 RELATING TO INCREASING THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS' PRO RATA SHARE OF PUBLIC LAND TRUST FUNDS.
Establishes $35,000,000 as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs' pro rata share of the public land trust. Transfers $139,000,000 less certain funds to the Office of Hawaiian Affairs for underpayment of the public land trust funds for 7/1/2012 to 6/30/2019. Requires the Department of Land and Natural Resources to provide an annual accounting of receipts from lands described in section 5(f) of the Admissions Act. Establishes a committee to recommend the annual amount of the income and proceeds from the public land trust that the Office of Hawaiian Affairs shall receive annually. Appropriates funds.

HB 172 RELATING TO THE BUDGET OF THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS.
Appropriates funds for Fiscal Biennium 2019-2021 for operations of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs divisions. Includes operating budgets for Office of Trustees � OHA150; Administration � OHA160; and Beneficiary Advocacy � OHA175
* Ken Conklin's note: The concept is that the state general fund should match dollar-for-dollar whatever OHA spends, thus doubling the money OHA takes]

SB191/HB173 RELATING TO STRENGTHENING THE FOUNDATION FOR ENSURING A FAIR AND JUST PAYMENT AMOUNT FOR THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS' PRO RATA SHARE OF THE PUBLIC LAND TRUST.
Requires the Department of Land and Natural Resources to use certain reporting and accountability procedures in implementing the public land trust reporting requirements of Act 178, Session Laws of Hawaii 2006. Requires the Department of Land and Natural Resources to consult with the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to ensure that the accounting and reporting is accurate and inclusive.

SB 1501 RELATING TO THE DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS.
Budget; Department of Hawaiian Home Lands; CIP; Appropriation ($)
Authorizes the issuance of general obligation bonds and appropriates funds for department of Hawaiian home lands capital improvement projects.
[*Note from Ken Conklin: Appropriates $439 Million for DHHL for 2 years!]

HB 893 RELATING TO THE DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS BUDGET.
Appropriates funds for the fiscal biennium 2019-2021 operating budget of the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands programs under the purview of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Water, Land, and Hawaiian Affairs.
[*Note from Ken Conklin: The bill proposes $47 Million plus 204 full-time positions for DHHL]

SB 874 RELATING TO HOUSING ON HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS.
Authorizes the construction and use of micro housing units on Hawaiian home lands approved by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, and leased to native Hawaiian beneficiaries who meet the minimum Hawaiian blood quantum requirement, notwithstanding county zoning laws. Authorizes the use of the Hawaiian Home Loan Fund and Hawaiian Home General Loan Fund for assistance in purchasing or renting micro housing units for use on approved Hawaiian home lands and leased to beneficiaries who meet the minimum Hawaiian blood quantum requirement. Makes appropriations to the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands for construction of micro housing units, subject to certain conditions, and to build general organizational capacity of native Hawaiian-controlled nonprofit housing developers.

SCR 18 / SR 13
URGING THE DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS TO BUILD ALTERNATIVE HOUSING OPTIONS FOR LESSEES.

SCR 69 / SR 47
REQUESTING EVERY COMMERCIAL OR PUBLIC BUILDING LOCATED ON DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS TRUST LAND TO DISPLAY A PHOTOGRAPH OF PRINCE JONAH KUHIO KALANIANA'OLE AND A DESCRIPTION OF HIS ACHIEVEMENTS.

HB 454 RELATING TO KAHOOLAWE ISLAND RESERVE.
Appropriates funds to the Department of Land and Natural Resources to support native dryland forest restoration, management, and maintenance on Kahoolawe Island Reserve.

HB455/SB1296 RELATING TO THE KAHO'OLAWE ISLAND RESERVE COMMISSION.
Appropriates funds to the Department of Land and Natural Resources for support of the Kahoolawe Island Reserve Commission, including 2 full-time equivalent (2.0 FTE) permanent positions.

SB1134/HB1068 RELATING TO HEEIA STATE PARK.
Makes an appropriation for a Heeia State Park community-based long- range plan and education center for the Heeia National Estuarine Research Reserve System.

SB 489 and HB 808 RELATED TO SHARK AND RAY PROTECTION.
Establishes an offense of knowingly capturing, taking, possessing, abusing, entangling, or killing a shark in state marine waters, along with penalties and fines. Expands the existing prohibition on knowingly capturing or killing a manta ray in state marine waters to apply to all rays and to also include knowingly taking, possessing, abusing, or entangling a ray. Provides certain exemptions.

SB 921 RELATING TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL.
Creates a division within the Department of the Attorney General to provide legal advice regarding Hawaiian shoreline public access rights.

SCR 17 / SR 12
REQUESTING THE DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS TO PERFORM AN ACTUARIAL STUDY ON THE SIZE OF THE CURRENT AND PROJECTED FUTURE POPULATIONS OF HAWAIIANS ELIGIBLE TO LEASE HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS.

SB 195 RELATING TO HAWAIIAN AS AN OFFICIAL LANGUAGE OF THE STATE OF HAWAI'I.
Requires that the Hawaiian version of a law be held binding if the law in question was originally drafted in Hawaiian and then translated into English. Requires that 'okina and kahako be used, when appropriate, in documents prepared by or for state or county agencies or officials.

SB 642 RELATING TO HAWAIIAN AS AN OFFICIAL LANGUAGE OF THE STATE OF HAWAI'I.
Inserts article thirteen of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples into the Hawaii Revised Statutes. Requires that the Hawaiian version of a law be held binding if the law in question was originally drafted in Hawaiian and then translated into English. Requires that 'okina and kahako be used, when appropriate, in documents prepared by or for state or county agencies or officials.

HB 1327 RELATING TO ELECTIONS.
Provides that requests for absentee ballots or for permanent absentee voter status may be written in English or Hawaiian. Requires the chief election officer to make English and Hawaiian absentee ballots available. Appropriates funds.

SB 701 RELATING TO THE HAWAIIAN LANGUAGE.
Designates the month of February as "Olelo Hawai'i Month" to celebrate and encourage the use of Hawaiian language. Requires all letterheads, documents, symbols, and emblems of the State and other political subdivisions that include Hawaiian words or names to include accurate and appropriate Hawaiian names, spelling, and punctuation. Establishes references for accurate, appropriate, and authentic Hawaiian names and words, including proper Hawaiian spelling and punctuation. Clarifies that the full text of bills and other official documents are not required to be written in Hawaiian and that misspelled or incorrectly punctuated Hawaiian words and names shall not invalidate the documents or render them unenforceable and no cause of action shall arise accordingly.

SB 1295 RELATING TO THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS ELECTIONS. Requires two at-large seats to reside in an urban district and two at- large seats to reside in a rural district. Requires one urban district candidate and one rural district candidate to be elected in any election cycle. Changes the term of the member who receives the lowest number of votes in the 2020 general election to serve a term of two years and a term of four years after the general election of 2022. Takes effect upon approval; provided that part I shall take effect on January 1, 2022.

HB1119/SB1451 RELATING TO STATE HOLIDAYS.
Reestablishes La Ku'oko'a, Hawaiian Recognition Day, as an official state holiday.

SB 1343 RELATING TO SELECTIVE SERVICE.
Requires compliance with the federal Military Selective Service Act to be eligible for enrollment in a state-supported post-secondary institution, qualify for state financial assistance for post-secondary education, or be eligible for state or county employment or service. Provides exceptions.

SCR 70 / SR 48
REQUESTING THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS TO CONDUCT AN INDEPENDENT FISCAL AUDIT OF ALL LIMITED LIABILITY CORPORATIONS CREATED OR CONTROLLED BY THE OFFICE.

SCR188/SR151
REQUESTING THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS TO COMPLETE THE 2017 INDEPENDENT FINANCIAL AUDIT AND MANAGEMENT REVIEW OF THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS AND ITS SUBSIDIARIES.
** Note from Ken Conklin: SCR70/SR48 and SCR188/SR151 are both scheduled for the same committee hearing; and both have similar content. The difference is that SCR188/SR151 was created and placed on the agenda a day or two after Conklin submitted his testimony on SCR70/SR48 calling attention to the extremely weak and obsequious language "requesting" instead of commanding OHA to do the audit and raising the possibility that OHA and its subsidiaries might not be State government agencies! The second reso appears to be delete all mention of doubts about whether OHA's subsidiaries are government agencies, and the language is somewhat less obsequious. Ken Conklin's testimony supports both resos, and his testimony on the second one notes the improvement over the first one.

============

DETAILS ABOUT EACH BILL, INCLUDING FULL TEXT OF KEN CONKLIN'S TESTIMONY

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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=402&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=1363&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

SUMMARY OF MAIN POINTS:

1. The legislature always has the power to amend or rescind any statute law. Act 273 (1980) requiring payment of 20% of ceded land revenue to OHA has created 39 years of bitter controversy and litigation, and should be rescinded. OHA should be funded the same way as other departments of the State government, through ordinary budget appropriations. Put an end to OHA's incessant lawsuits over the 20% rule.

2. If the legislature chooses to maintain the 20% rule, the base for calculating 20% should be net income after expenses, not gross revenue. Taxpayers pay for all capital investments and operating expenses whereby the ceded lands are enabled to produce revenue, so it is illegal and immoral for OHA to siphon off gross revenue while the other 80% of the land trust beneficiaries, lacking a drop of Hawaiian blood, pay all the costs and receive none of the revenue.

3. The Ceded Lands Trust costs the State many times more annually for operating expense than the 1.2 million acres bring in. A previous state Director of finance and a Land Information Systems Manager acknowledged in a formal court declaration that this disparity between trust expenses and trust receipts has occurred in every year since statehood. Thus there is no net income from the ceded lands to be distributed to OHA or any of the other ceded land trust beneficiaries named in Section 5(f) of the Statehood Admissions Act -- the ceded lands money distributed to OHA is actually tax dollars in disguise.

4. This bill would require an absurd quarterly payout of OHA's share of ceded land gross revenues from each department of government without regard to ceded land deficits (capital investment or operating expenses) incurred by that department in other quarters or deficits incurred by other departments of the State government. Any corporation that irretrievably paid its taxes quarterly for profitable business lines and was never able to offset profits with losses would quickly go bankrupt.

5. Section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act identifies 5 purposes for which ceded land revenues can be used. So what about the remaining 4 purposes in addition to "betterment of native Hawaiians"? If OHA gets a dedicated 20% of ceded land revenue to fulfill one of the 5 purposes, then the public school system should also be getting its own dedicated 20% portion; the development of low-income housing should be getting its 20% portion; the Department of Land and Natural Resources (especially the Parks Department) should be getting its 20% portion; etc.

8. The dollar amount for future annual payments as specified in this bill is unsupportable by facts. The dollar amount for makeup of alleged arrears is both unsupportable by facts and would violate previous agreements negotiated in good faith.

SOME DETAILS ABOUT THOSE POINTS

1. There is a long history of contentious negotiation, legislation, and litigation over the amount of money owed to OHA under the rule specifying 20% of ceded land revenue. The first half of this bill reviews some of the elements of that history. The requirement to pay OHA 20% of ceded land revenue is statutory law enacted as Act 273, Session laws of 1980. Therefore, this law can be amended by the legislature at any time to reduce the percentage; or the law can be rescinded entirely.

Act 273, Session laws of 1980 should be rescinded. OHA should be funded in the same manner as any other branch of the State government; i.e., by an appropriation included in the annual or biennial State budget, including a line-item listing of the purposes for which the money is to be spent. Then there would be no further conflict or litigation over how to calculate the 20%. This bill proposes yet another in a long history of complicated formulas for calculating the number of dollars required by the 20% rule. Over the years these recalculations have come to resemble a Rube Goldberg device where a long series of tracks, levers, springs, bells, and whistles eventually propel a ball to its final destination. Let's get rid of that nonsense.

Repeal the 20% rule and fund OHA by ordinary budget appropriations in the same way as any other department of the State government.

Act 273 (1980) says "twenty per cent of all funds derived from the public land trust ... shall be expended by the office of Hawaiian affairs ... for the purposes of this chapter." Act 273 does not say the funds may be invested in an investment portfolio, it says the funds SHALL BE EXPENDED to provide services. Yet OHA seems to think it can grab tens of millions of dollars every year which it then invests or uses for political purposes such as lobbying for the Akaka bill or building a racial registry for "nationbuilding", but OHA fails to provide more than sporadic and inadequate funding for purposes which OHA should be supporting.

OHA currently has over $662 Million in assets. No other agency of the state government is allowed to squirrel away huge amounts of wealth as a permanent cash stash. At its current level of expenditures OHA has enough money in its slush fund to meet all its budget needs for more than a decade. Stop feeding this beast.

2. If the legislature unwisely chooses to keep the requirement of a specific percentage of ceded land revenue to be paid to OHA, then the legislature should write into law that the percentage must be calculated on the base of NET INCOME AFTER EXPENSES rather than gross revenue. It costs a lot of money to construct roads and buildings, supply water and electricity, and pay salaries of staff who operate or maintain the facilities that generate revenue from the ceded lands. Those capital expenditures and operating expenses should be deducted from gross revenue to determine the net income to be used when applying the percentage to calculate how much money to pay to OHA. In many if not most cases, government lands and infrastructure operate at a loss because their purpose is to provide services rather than to make a profit. That's why government imposes taxes in order to provide funding for its operations. Taxpayers pay for all capital investments and operating expenses whereby the ceded lands are enabled to produce revenue, so it is illegal and immoral for OHA to siphon off gross revenue while other land trust beneficiaries pay all the costs and receive none of the revenue.

3. In 2008 Georgina K. Kawamura, Director of Finance of the State of Hawaii, and Arthur J. Buto, State Land Information Systems Manager, stated in a formal court declaration that the Ceded Lands Trust costs the State many times more annually than the 1.2 million acres bring in. They also acknowledged that this disparity between trust expenses and trust receipts has occurred in every year since statehood. Thus there is no net income from the ceded lands to be distributed to OHA or any of the other ceded land trust beneficiaries named in Section 5(f) of the Statehood Admissions Act -- the ceded lands money already distributed to OHA is actually tax dollars in disguise. As attorney H. William Burgess said in 2002, "This can be fairly characterized as a confession of guilt to systematic and massive misappropriation of trust funds over the last three decades." From July 1, 1990 to June 30, 2002 OHA and DHHL together cost the State treasury more than a Billion dollars, and in 2002 the estimated cost for the following 10 years from July 1, 2004 through June 2014 was projected to be an additional two Billion dollars, for a total of three Billion dollars. See documentation of these figures, including spreadsheets filed in Arakaki v. Lingle, at
https://www.angelfire.com/hi5/bigfiles/ohadhhlburdenstatetreasury.html

Enough already! No wonder the State is having budget problems!

4. This bill would require that " ... the departments [named] ... shall determine and transfer to the office of Hawaiian affairs that portion of their receipts from the use, sale, lease, or other disposition of lands within the public land trust collected during each fiscal quarter ... is transferred to the office of Hawaiian affairs, within thirty days of the close of each fiscal quarter ..." This piecemeal attack on each individual department and agency would impose a heavy burden of staff time and accounting. More importantly, it would cause the disappearance of net losses from the overall accounting regarding departments and agencies whose capital expenditures and operating expenses for the ceded lands under their control exceed the revenue generated by those ceded lands. Let's say that more clearly. If a department has a profit for a calendar quarter, it must immediately pay 20% to OHA; but if it has a loss in another calendar quarter, that loss cannot be used to offset the profit in any previous or subsequent quarter; and also, if a department has a loss, that loss cannot be used by any other department or agency to offset its profit. Profits have 20% skimmed off immediately and sent to OHA, whereas losses get swept under the rug. The correct way to do the accounting should be annually not quarterly, and should be done overall for the totality of ceded land revenue from all departments rather than individually for each department separately. A corporation does not send the government irretrievable taxes quarterly for each profitable line of its business while "eating" and ignoring that business line's losses in other quarters and ignoring the losses of other business lines. Any corporation that did its accounting in such a manner would soon go bankrupt (just like the State of Hawaii is on track to do!). As noted in item (3), annual accounting for all departments jointly would then discover that net income is zero or negative, and 20% of zero would be zero dollars for OHA. Indeed, if net ceded land income is negative then OHA should be required pay 20% of that to the State general fund as its rightful share of the loss. Shouldn't OHA help to paddle our collective canoe?

5. Here is the relevant language from section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act identifying the 5 purposes for the use of ceded land revenues: "... for the support of the public schools and other public educational institutions, for the betterment of the conditions of native Hawaiians, as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, 1920, as amended, for the development of farm and home ownership on as widespread a basis as possible for the making of public improvements, and for the provision of lands for public use." So what about the remaining 4 purposes in addition to betterment of native Hawaiians? If OHA gets a dedicated 20% of ceded land revenue to fulfill one of the 5 purposes, then the public school system plus UH should also be getting its own dedicated 20% portion; the development of low-income housing should be getting its 20% portion; the Department of Land and Natural Resources (especially the Parks Department) and the Highway Department should be getting its 20% portion; etc. Furthermore, each of those departments should be getting its money quarterly as the bill requires for OHA, and in the same dollar amount. Really?

6. For the first 20 years of statehood, 100% of ceded land revenue was given to the public schools, where 26% of the children are Native Hawaiians. Thus 26% of ceded land revenues went for the betterment of Native Hawaiians, without any need for race-specific earmarking. Remove racial entitlements, which are both unconstitutional and immoral. A valuable webpage providing information about 856 government funded racial entitlement programs for the exclusive benefit of "Native Hawaiians" was disrupted but has now been partially restored. Several other webpages on the same topic are also available. All these programs, valued into the Billions of dollars, are paid for by tax dollars from the governments of the United States and the State of Hawaii. It is likely that these programs are unconstitutional. Some have been challenged in state and federal courts. Thus far the lawsuits to dismantle them have been dismissed on technical procedural issues including "standing" and the "political question" doctrine. However, those dismissals never reached the merits of these cases. Thus all these programs remain available as targets for future civil rights lawsuits based on the 14th Amendment equal protection clause and other arguments. Keep in mind that this compilation pertains only to government programs funded by taxpayers, and does not include enormous privately funded programs such as Kamehameha Schools (Bishop Estate) which alone is worth $10-15 Billion, Lili'uokalani Childrens Trust, and many others. More recently, the U.S. Department of Interior, Office of Native Hawaiian Relations, has published a 217- page list of federal programs and grants for ethnic Hawaiians.

See details on the webpage "For Hawaiians Only" at
http://tinyurl.com/zrfuy8k

7. As a condition for receiving budget appropriations or ceded land revenues, OHA should be required to fulfill whatever obligation the State may have to fund the operation of the Department of Hawaiian Homelands -- especially the huge amount of alleged arrears which a court decision ordered the legislature to pay. Let the Office of HAWAIIAN affairs support the Department of HAWAIIAN homelands -- that's the real reason why Section 5(f) of the 1959 Admissions Act specified that one purpose for which ceded land revenues can be spent is "for the betterment of the conditions of native Hawaiians AS DEFINED IN THE HAWAIIAN HOMES COMMISSION ACT, 1920."

This bill would establish $35,000,000 as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs' annual share of the income and proceeds of the public land trust beginning in the next fiscal year. Furthermore this bill would transfer to the office of Hawaiian affairs a sum of $139,000,000 to pay the office of Hawaiian affairs amounts received from the use of the public land trust that were allegedly underpaid between July 1, 2012 and June 30, 2019.

But those dollar amounts are unsupportable by facts. There is no inventory of the ceded lands, which is why the state Supreme Court several years ago dismissed OHA's lawsuit as non-justiciable -- there was no way for the court to calculate dollar amounts of ceded land revenues produced from lands for which there was no inventory list.

OHA previously reached a settlement with the State, enacted into law by the legislature, regarding annual payments in lieu of indeterminable ceded land revenues. State land in Kaka'ako valued by mutual agreement at $200,000,000 was transferred to OHA. Comes now OHA crying that the agreed-upon dollar amount was too low. Boo-hoo! How much is enough? Political pressure to pass this bill, along with propaganda film broadcast repeatedly on TV, are evidence that no amount would ever be enough to satisfy the monster that is devouring Hawaii. Enough already! Stop feeding this beast.

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HB172/SB190 RELATING TO THE BUDGET OF THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS.
Appropriates funds for Fiscal Biennium 2019-2021 for operations of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs divisions. Includes operating budgets for Office of Trustees � OHA150; Administration � OHA160; and Beneficiary Advocacy � OHA175
* Ken Conklin's note: The concept is that the state general fund should match dollar-for-dollar whatever OHA spends, thus doubling the money OHA takes]

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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=172&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=190&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This bill attempts to make a distinction between "general funds" vs. "trust funds." The concept seems to be that the trust fund dollars come to OHA as OHA's 20% share of ceded land revenues, while the "general funds" come to OHA as extra appropriations of general fund tax dollars which the legislature arbitrarily decides to give to OHA just because ... just because.

It appears that in most or all of the categories listed in this bill, OHA demands that the State of Hawaii provide one-for-one matching dollars, so that every dollar spent by OHA from its share of ceded land revenue will be matched by a dollar of money collected from taxpayers.

But why? The money available to the State of Hawaii to pay for things available to all the people of Hawaii comes from taxes plus rents paid for the use of the public lands. When 20% of ceded land revenue is given away to OHA, that is money which is no longer available for the State government to deliver services to all the people regardless of race. OHA beneficiaries get 20% of ceded land revenue on top of all the benefits which all Hawaii's people get, including the OHA beneficiaries. In other words, OHA beneficiaries are already double-dipping. OHA beneficiaries get to use the public schools, airports, harbors, roads, beaches, libraries, disease prevention, clean water, etc -- all the things they get simply because they are residents of the State just like all the other residents. But in addition the OHA beneficiaries get extra goods and services set aside exclusively for their racial group -- stuff that is not given to the 80% of Hawaii's people who lack a drop of the magic blood. That clearly is not fair. Government is treating OHA beneficiaries as the favored race -- da punahele race -- while everyone else are second-class citizens.

But that's not enough! This bill proposes to give even more generously to OHA beneficiaries -- this bill proposes that every dollar spent by OHA from "its" trust fund should now be matched by an extra dollar ripped out of the pockets of the taxpayers. What nonsense!

According to its most recent annual report, OHA already has a net worth of $662 Million Squirreled away in real estate, stocks and bonds. This year OHA has bills in the legislature demanding "back rent" of $139 Million, plus $35 Million more every year. And now, on top of all that, OHA wants matching dollars from the State's general fund of tax dollars. Maha'oi loa!

Just say no. Shout it: HELL NO!

---------------------------

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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=191&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=173&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

SUMMARY OF MAIN POINTS:

4. Section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act identifies 5 purposes for which ceded land revenues can be used. So what about the remaining 4 purposes in addition to "betterment of native Hawaiians"? If OHA gets a dedicated 20% of ceded land revenue to fulfill one of the 5 purposes, then the public school system should also be getting its own dedicated 20% portion; the development of low-income housing should be getting its 20% portion; the Department of Land and Natural Resources (especially the Parks Department) should be getting its 20% portion; etc.

5. For the first 20 years of statehood, 100% of ceded land revenue was given to the public schools, where 26% of the children are Native Hawaiians. Thus 26% of ceded land revenues went for the betterment of Native Hawaiians, without any need for race-specific earmarking. Remove racial entitlements, which are both unconstitutional and immoral.

SOME DETAILS ABOUT THOSE POINTS

Repeal the 20% rule and fund OHA by ordinary budget appropriations in the same way as any other department of the State government.

Enough already! No wonder the State is having budget problems!

4. Here is the relevant language from section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act identifying the 5 purposes for the use of ceded land revenues: "... for the support of the public schools and other public educational institutions, for the betterment of the conditions of native Hawaiians, as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, 1920, as amended, for the development of farm and home ownership on as widespread a basis as possible for the making of public improvements, and for the provision of lands for public use." So what about the remaining 4 purposes in addition to betterment of native Hawaiians? If OHA gets a dedicated 20% of ceded land revenue to fulfill one of the 5 purposes, then the public school system plus UH should also be getting its own dedicated 20% portion; the development of low-income housing should be getting its 20% portion; the Department of Land and Natural Resources (especially the Parks Department) and the Highway Department should be getting its 20% portion; etc. Furthermore, each of those departments should be getting its money quarterly as the bill requires for OHA, and in the same dollar amount. Really?

A valuable webpage providing information about 856 government funded racial entitlement programs for the exclusive benefit of "Native Hawaiians" was disrupted but has now been partially restored. Several other webpages on the same topic are also available. All these programs, valued into the Billions of dollars, are paid for by tax dollars from the governments of the United States and the State of Hawaii. It is likely that these programs are unconstitutional. Some have been challenged in state and federal courts. Thus far the lawsuits to dismantle them have been dismissed on technical procedural issues including "standing" and the "political question" doctrine. However, those dismissals never reached the merits of these cases. Thus all these programs remain available as targets for future civil rights lawsuits based on the 14th Amendment equal protection clause and other arguments. Keep in mind that this compilation pertains only to government programs funded by taxpayers, and does not include enormous privately funded programs such as Kamehameha Schools (Bishop Estate) which alone is worth $10-15 Billion, Lili'uokalani Childrens Trust, and many others. More recently, the U.S. Department of Interior, Office of Native Hawaiian Relations, has published a 217- page list of federal programs and grants for ethnic Hawaiians.

See details on the webpage "For Hawaiians Only" at
http://tinyurl.com/zrfuy8k

---------------------------

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

Half a Billion dollars for DHHL? SAY WHAT !!!

$214,918,10 for FY 2019-2020

$224,169,10 for FY 2020-2021

MAKE OHA PAY FOR DHHL. Do not force 100% of Hawaii's taxpayers to pay for a program which 95% of us are excluded from solely on account of race, lacking 50% Hawaiian native blood.

According to its most recent annual statement, The Office of Hawaiian Affairs has assets of more than $662,000,000.00. OHA can easily afford to pay for the administrative and operational expenses of the Department of Hawaiian Homelands; this legislature has the power to make that happen; and this legislature should do so.

OHA gets nearly all its money from ceded land revenues.

Following Annexation, the Organic Act of 1900, providing a government for the Territory of Hawaii, taking the public lands of Hawaii into trust for the benefit of all the people of Hawaii, and requiring that the revenue from those ceded lands must be used "for education and other public purposes."

Section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act says one of the 5 purposes for the use of ceded land revenues: is "... for the betterment of the conditions of native Hawaiians, as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, 1920." HHCA defines "native Hawaiians" as people who have at least 50% native blood quantum -- exactly the same requirement for someone to be granted a lease on DHHL land.

OHA currently has over $662 Million in assets. No other agency of the state government is allowed to squirrel away huge amounts of wealth as a permanent cash stash.

The legislature has the power to command OHA to provide full funding for the administrative and operational expenses of DHHL, including building the infrastructure to support housing development.

The legislature often passes laws compelling OHA to comply with certain requirements or telling OHA what OHA must spend money for. For example, OHA is commanded to obey the state procurement laws, and to cooperate with the state auditor. In recent years the legislature required that OHA must pay for the training program which state government officials are required to attend regarding laws governing "Native Hawaiian rights."

MAKE OHA PAY FOR DHHL. Do not force 100% of Hawaii's taxpayers to pay for a program which 95% of us are excluded from solely on account of race, lacking 50% Hawaiian native blood.

----------------------------

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

47 Million dollars for DHHL, plus 204 FTE positions? SAY WHAT !!!

$23,318,527 for FY 2019-2020 and again for FY 2020-2021 + 204 jobs

MAKE OHA PAY FOR DHHL. Do not force 100% of Hawaii's taxpayers to pay for a program which 95% of us are excluded from solely on account of race, lacking 50% Hawaiian native blood.

OHA gets nearly all its money from ceded land revenues. Following Annexation, the Organic Act of 1900, providing a government for the Territory of Hawaii, taking the public lands of Hawaii into trust for the benefit of all the people of Hawaii, and requiring that the revenue from those ceded lands must be used "for education and other public purposes."

OHA currently has over $662 Million in assets. No other agency of the state government is allowed to squirrel away huge amounts of wealth as a permanent cash stash. The legislature has the power to command OHA to provide full funding for the administrative and operational expenses of DHHL, including building the infrastructure to support housing development. The legislature often passes laws compelling OHA to comply with certain requirements or telling OHA what OHA must spend money for. For example, OHA is commanded to obey the state procurement laws, and to cooperate with the state auditor. In recent years the legislature required that OHA must pay for the training program which state government officials are required to attend regarding laws governing "Native Hawaiian rights."

MAKE OHA PAY FOR DHHL. Do not force 100% of Hawaii's taxpayers to pay for a program which 95% of us are excluded from solely on account of race, lacking 50% Hawaiian native blood.

----------------------

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

Here are six points which need to be made.

1. Some clever politicians are trying to send millions of extra dollars to enrich DHHL by giving the public and the legislature the false impression that the purpose is to provide truly tiny houses to help poor and downtrodden people. Shame!

It is a form of bait-and-switch to use a currently popular term as the name for a proposal which is actually very different. This bill proposes to allow up to 800 sq ft. of floor space for a house or apartment to be branded as a "micro housing unit." That would be two or three times the size of the genuine "tiny homes" and "microunit apartments" that are the current fad in Honolulu for solving the twin problems of homelessness and housing shortage. My own 2-bedroom condo apartment is 723 sq ft and is definitely not "micro." Units of the same size in my building have families of 4 or 5 people living in them comfortably. Renters in my building pay around $2,000 per month for apartments identical to mine, and the assessed valuation is currently $377,100. Micro schmikro!

2. Don't reach into the pockets of Hawaii taxpayers to grab our money to make up for the malfeasance of DHHL leadership. The first sentence in the 2018 version of this bill, HB2473/SB2424, confessed: "The legislature finds that the department of Hawaiian home lands produced no new housing units during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2017, and closed out the year with $30,000,000 in unspent federal housing funds." For that much money they could have bought 80 of my 2- bedroom apartments at current assessed valuation, to provide housing for 300-400 people. Or if we use the estimated construction cost of $125,000 mentioned in this bill, that $30 Million could have yielded 240 homes capable of sheltering 900-1200 people. DHHL leadership is clearly lazy or incompetent, and responsible for protracting the misery of hundreds of people whose well-being it is responsible for.

3. It appears that this bill would actually be discriminating against native Hawaiians. Census data indicate that "Native Hawaiians" have significantly larger family size and household size than the general population of Hawaii. Yet this bill proposes to cram those larger families into smaller "micro housing units" anticipated to be in violation of zoning laws and building codes. That's pretty nasty, isn't it?

4. Section 2 of this bill proposes to override "any county zoning laws, permit provisions, or building code provisions to the contrary to allow micro housing units" on DHHL lands. But those zoning laws and building codes exist for good reasons (or don't they?). Some DHHL residential homelands lie immediately adjacent to normal residential neighborhoods; for example, the one in Waimanalo (which I canvassed for Census 2000). Does the legislature really want to be responsible for the development of overcrowded slum housing ("micro housing units" in violation of zoning laws and building codes) right across the street from middle class suburban homes?

5. I remind the legislature that a class-action lawsuit by 3,000 native Hawaiians on the waiting list for DHHL leases has resulted in a court decision resulting in negotiations for a settlement that could force taxpayers to fork over Billions of dollars not only to individual plaintiffs but also to DHHL. Now comes before you this bill to begin a brand new DHHL project and to pay for it with two startup grants of one million and five million dollars, expected to result in permanent programs for huge megabucks in the future. It would be foolish to give DHHL new money on top of whatever will come out of those negotiations. If DHHL wants to develop a project for micro housing units, let DHHL fund that program, or include it in its demands for a negotiated settlement of the class action lawsuit.

6. OHA already has over $600,000,000. And, according to its bill in both Senate and House, OHA wants to grab an additional $119,000,000 in ceded lands "back rent" plus $35,000,000 per year, in lieu of ceded lands revenue, going forward. Wow!

The legislature has the authority to raid OHA's treasury the same as the legislature raids any of the special funds for hurricane relief or highways. Make OHA pay for DHHL projects. In this case the "raid" would merely be forcing OHA to spend money it was supposed to be spending all along, and to spend it for the exact purpose for which OHA was created. Section 5(f) of the statehood Admissions Act says one of the 5 purposes for the use of ceded land revenues: is "... for the betterment of the conditions of native Hawaiians, as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, 1920." HHCA defines "native Hawaiians" as people who have at least 50% native blood quantum -- exactly the same requirement for someone to be granted a lease on DHHL land.

OHA currently has over $600 Million in assets. No other agency of the state government is allowed to squirrel away huge amounts of wealth as a permanent cash stash.

Make OHA spend its vast wealth for the needs of DHHL -- i.e., for the betterment of native Hawaiians as defined in HHCA. If DHHL decides to use some of the money for "micro housing units" it can do so. DHHL can build slums for low-income native Hawaiians, to the consternation of middle-class suburban homeowners (including native Hawaiians) living right across the street.

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SCR 18 / SR 13
URGING THE DEPARTMENT OF HAWAIIAN HOME LANDS TO BUILD ALTERNATIVE HOUSING OPTIONS FOR LESSEES.

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN SUPPORT

The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act was introduced in Congress in 1920 and enacted into law in 1921. It remains the law, whether or not we like it. It remains the law, and was incorporated into our State of Hawaii Constitution in the Admissions Act of 1959; and we remain bound by it, even if we believe HHCA was unconstitutional in 1921 and remains unconstitutional today.

Following a successful lawsuit in year 2000 to racially desegregate candidacy for OHA trustee I became a candidate for OHA trustee on the ballot in the general election that year. As part of my platform I pledged to work toward OHA turning over its assets to the Department of Hawaiian Homelands to enable DHHL to fulfill its obligation to provide homesteads to eligible native Hawaiians. And as part of that plank in my platform I pledged to demand that DHHL finance construction of homes other than freestanding houses -- homes such as apartments that could be owned or rented by their occupants.

Alternative housing options can be far less expensive than freestanding houses, including larger indoor living space and better amenities. I am the fee-simple owner of my apartment in a high-rise condominium building in Kane'ohe. My apartment has 2 bedrooms and one bathroom, with 723 square feet of indoor floor space, one parking space which I own, and a proportionate share of the surrounding landscape, infrastructure, and common element amenities (meeting room, beautifully landscaped grounds with a variety of native trees including a huge hala, tennis court, picnic table and barbecue grill). Its assessed valuation for the current year is $377,100. Although I live alone, a neighboring apartment of the same size is home to a husband, wife, and three children. This resolution provides information that DHHL holds $38,000,000.00 federal dollars which remain unspent. That's outrageous. It's scandalous! Simple arithmetic shows that $38 Million would be enough to purchase in fee simple 100 of my apartments, easily able to house 500 people, with money left over to throw a huge lu'au for the entire town of Kane'ohe. Considering that DHHL land comes at no cost to the homeowners, whereas land values are a significant portion of my apartment's valuation, that $38 Million might well pay for 200 of my apartments with 1,000 residents.

DHHL leadership should be ousted for malfeasance. This resolution is a much-needed kick to their 'okole.

And have you seen SB1501 to give these clowns 439,087,200.00 during the net two years? Did I see 14 Senators' signatures on it?

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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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SCR&billnumber=69&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SR&billnumber=47&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

Jonah Kuhio Kalaniana'ole is widely regarded as a cultural and political hero among today's ethnic Hawaiians. But there are some important reasons why even Hawaiian sovereignty activists would want to re- evaluate their opinion of him, if they were aware of these facts about his life. Below are details about two of those reasons: (1) He abandoned Hawaii at the time when its independence was being lost to annexation, in order to go to South Africa on an adventure as a soldier fighting for Britain in the Boer War; and (2) he waged a personal attack against ex-queen Lili'uokalani during the last years of her life, trying to have her declared mentally incompetent so he could become conservator of her estate and grab her Waikiki properties for himself.

Before providing some details about those character flaws, let me comment on the idea of putting up a picture of Kuhio in every building on DHHL lands.

In dictatorships around the world there are photos of the dictator looming large over public squares and inside government buildings. It's ugly. After a while those pictures arouse resentment and feelings of oppression more than they inspire love or respect. Haven't we all seen news reports from China showing the huge photo of long-dead Chairman Mao looming over Tiananmen Square in Beijing? I believe that in the old Soviet Union there was a big photo of Joseph Stalin in every classroom in every school, every office in every government building, and every grocery store. Big brother is watching you!

Some ethnic Hawaiians revere Kuhio as a prince for the same reasons the peasantry in any monarchial nation reveres its royalty -- majesty, mystery, pride in the nobility of a great leader, and hope for handouts to help the poor and downtrodden. Wealthy racial separatist Hawaiian government institutions honor Kuhio as their founding father, the man who bowed low enough to the colonizers to bring home the bacon from their far-away seat of power.

But was Kuhio's personal behavior princely? At least two major events in Kuhio's life after the revolution of 1893 should cause Hawaiian sovereignty activists to question his worthiness as their torch-bearer. On these two occasions Kuhio was grossly unpatriotic to his Hawaiian "nation." The first occasion was when he abandoned his nation at its time of greatest peril in order to pursue personal pleasure and foreign adventure. The second occasion was two decades later when he abused his power and prestige to launch a personal attack against Queen Liliuokalani in order to steal her land, for his personal enrichment, from the children she intended to help. Kuhio's behavior on both occasions should be viewed as not merely selfish, but treasonous from the viewpoint of today's sovereignty activists.

In January 1895, at age 23, Kuhio participated in the attempted counterrevolution against the Republic of Hawaii led by Robert Wilcox. He was sentenced to a year in prison, where his fiancee visited him regularly. After his release they got married and went to Europe. It's understandable that the heir to the throne would feel unhappy about imprisonment and about the loss of his future crown. Certainly nobody would begrudge him the right to get married, and perhaps to travel for a while.

But Kuhio's extended absence is inexcusable in view of the major political events taking place in Hawaii. He played no part in fighting against annexation, even while his fellow "patriots" were making speeches, writing articles in the newspapers, and gathering 21,000 signatures on a petition in 1897 opposing annexation. Today's sovereignty activists excuse his non-participation by claiming he was "in exile." But nobody forced him to leave. Others who had been imprisoned with him stayed in Hawaii after their release.

Kuhio extended his European adventure by going to Africa where he spent three years fighting on the side of England in the second Boer War.

Let's put that in different terms so that today's sovereignty activists will get the point. Kuhio, designated heir to the throne, abandoned his native land during a time of great political upheaval and went to war halfway around the world, fighting on the side of one white colonial power against another white colonial power in a war to see which one would win control over the land of a poor, downtrodden dark-skinned native population.

Kuhio returned to Hawaii in time to join the Republican Party and defeat the incumbent Robert Wilcox in the 1902 election for Territorial Delegate to Congress, whereupon he took the oath of office swearing to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic (Traitor to the Hawaiian nation!). He introduced the first bill in Congress for statehood for Hawaii (Traitor to the Hawaiian nation!). He finally "brought home the bacon" after 19 years in Congress with passage of his Hawaiian Homes Commission Act (Sellout!).

The case of Kuhio vs. Liliuokalani in 1915-1916 is perhaps even more troubling. The "prince," now Hawaii's Territorial Delegate to Congress for 13 years, abused his power and prestige to launch a personal attack against Queen Liliuokalani in order to steal her Waikiki land from the children she intended to help. Kuhio publicly accused her of mental incompetence in order to nullify her creation of the Queen Liliuokalani Childrens' Trust, and to establish himself as conservator of her estate, so that after her death her Waikiki properties would go to him instead of to the benefit of the Hawaiian children. Luckily for the children, his lawsuit failed. Full text of the Hawaii Supreme Court decision, including details about what Kuhio was trying to do, is on a webpage: JONAH KUHIO KALANIANAOLE v. LILIUOKALANI, Supreme Court of Hawaii, 23 Haw. 457; 1916. Syllabus and full text of the Court's decision.
http://tinyurl.com/ce7avc

Evelyn Cook's book "100 years of Healing" includes extensive description of the lawsuit, and especially the role of attorney W.O. Smith in defending Liliuokalani. Knowledgeable readers might be surprised, because W.O. Smith was one of the leaders of the revolution of 1893 that overthrew Liliuokalani. But as time went by the ex-queen realized that Smith was completely trustworthy whereas Kuhio was arrogant, selfish, greedy, and profoundly disrespectful to the woman most ethnic Hawaiians still regarded as their Queen. Instead of native Hawaiian "Prince" Kuhio, Lili'uokalani appointed white man W.O. Smith as trustee of her Queen Lili'uokalani Childrens Trust.

Kuhio does not deserve to be ensconced as head of a cult of personality. Defer this resolution to avoid the embarrassment of voting against it or the even larger embarrassment of voting for it.

--------------------------

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This bill proposes to transfer $6,000,000.00 taxpayer dollars to the Department of Land and Natural Resources to provide funding for construction of infrastructure for drylands forestspecified programs of the Kaho'olawe Island Reserve Commission at the rate of $3,000,000.00 for each of two fiscal years 2019-2020 and 2020-2021.

Please do not place this burden on the taxpayers of the State of Hawaii.

Let OHA pay all costs associated with the rehabilitation of Kaho'olawe -- an island which this legislature and OHA both believe will be handed over in the near future to the Hawaiian tribe which OHA has been working so hard to create for at least 19 years.

As the language of HB455 points out (another bill you have under consideration right now), "Pursuant to section 6K-9, Hawaii Revised Statutes, the management and control of the Kaho'olawe island reserve will be transferred to a sovereign Native Hawaiian entity upon its recognition by the state and federal governments. This event is anticipated to occur within the timeframe of the 2026 strategic plan."

In Act 195 (2011) this legislature set in motion a process now underway to create a Hawaiian tribe. The U.S. Department of Interior recently proclaimed a regulation whereby that tribe can get federal recognition -- the final rule 43CFR50 proclaimed by the U.S. Department of Interior by publication in the Federal Register on October 14, 2016. Both Act 195 and the Department of Interior regulation insist that the Hawaiian tribe must be exclusively for Native Hawaiians, and that anyone lacking a drop of the magic blood must be ruthlessly excluded.

According to OHA trustee Lei Ahu Isa, OHA has used approximately $33 Million of state government money over the years to lobby for federal recognition of a Hawaiian tribe either through the Akaka bill or through advertising and racial registration programs both in Hawaii and on the mainland. OHA provided the entire funding for an election of delegates and a monthlong meeting in 2006 which produced a proposed constitution for the tribe. OHA has repeatedly pledged that when a Hawaiian tribe has achieved federal recognition, OHA will transfer all its assets to the tribe.

If the tribe is successful in creating itself and getting federal recognition, section 6K-9 of the Hawaii Revised Statutes guarantees that the island of Kaho'olawe will immediately be ripped away from the State of Hawaii and handed over to the Hawaiian tribe, to which people with no native blood are forbidden to belong.

This legislature simply must not confiscate tax dollars from 80% of Hawaii's people for a project which they will be racially excluded from.

It would be foolish and immoral for the State of Hawaii to spend taxpayer dollars collected from 100% of Hawaii's people of all races to pay for upgrades to an island which is expected to be removed from the State of Hawaii and handed over to a sovereign "nation" [tribe] restricted by law to one racial group whose people are perhaps 20% of Hawaii's people, most of whom will probably not even join the tribe. Once the tribe has been created there will be negotiations between the State of Hawaii vs. the tribe to decide how much additional land and money the State will give to the tribe. The State should not give away resources before the negotiations even begin.

OHA's most recent annual report (2017) shows that OHA has total assets of more than $662 million. And it continues getting more payments of state government money (ceded land revenues plus legislative appropriations) every year, including a bill in this year's legislature demanding $35 million per year from ceded land revenues.

Enough already! OHA can easily afford funding for Kaho'olawe. Let OHA pay whatever money it wishes to pay to KIRC to rehabilitate Kaho'olawe -- an island which this legislature and OHA both believe will be handed over in the near future to the Hawaiian tribe which OHA is working so hard to create.

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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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=1296&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=455&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This bill proposes to transfer $1,000,000 taxpayer dollars to the Department of Land and Natural Resources to provide funding for specified programs of the Kaho'olawe Island Reserve Commission for fiscal year 2019-2020, plus an additional $72,000 for two FTE staff positions; and then the same amounts again for FY 2020-2021.

It's interesting that last year, 2018, the same legislation, SB3027 and HB2594, demanded only $600,000 instead of $1,000,000 to support the activities of KIRC. That's a 67% inflation rate in a single year! Yes it's an island, but does that mean we must spend like drunken sailors? Please do not place this burden on the taxpayers of the State of Hawaii.

As the language of this bill points out, "Pursuant to section 6K-9, Hawaii Revised Statutes, the management and control of the Kaho'olawe island reserve will be transferred to a sovereign Native Hawaiian entity upon its recognition by the state and federal governments. This event is anticipated to occur within the timeframe of the 2026 strategic plan."

This legislature simply must not confiscate tax dollars from 80% of Hawaii's people for a project which they will be racially excluded from.

----------------------

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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=1134&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=1068&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This bill should be rejected because it provides zero information about the administrative structure, board of directors, or bylaws of the (startup?) organization(s) who would be given nearly a million dollars during a two year period; and there is also no requirement for a publicly available audit or at least a report on how the money gets spent. Dear legislators, it is your responsibility to the taxpayers to reject legislation which conceals such information. We demand transparency and accountability.

Suspicion is warranted about the political intentions and fiscal accountability of the (currently hidden) people behind this bill, because of two decades of race-based political activism focused directly at the land and water resources at He'eia State Park, He'eia fishpond, and the associated upstream areas of Ha'iku Valley and 'Ioleka'a Valley. When testimony on this bill becomes visible to the public it will probably be easy to see the roles of leaders and members of the Ko'olaupoko Hawaiian Civic Club, Kako'o 'Oiwi, Paepae o He'eia, the Ko'olau Foundation, and an apparently dormant or defunct group known as the Ahupua'a Restoration Council of He'eia.

The Ahupua'a Restoration Council of He'eia (ARCH) started out looking like a grass-roots community effort to restore the environment in keeping with Hawaiian cultural values, but gradually revealed itself to be a Hawaiian sovereignty front organization. I, Ken Conklin, live in Kane'ohe and attended nearly all the meetings of this group from 1999 through 2002, which were held inside a large meeting hall at He'eia State park and later held in a small museum attached to it. As time went by the group leaders, including several activists who lived far outside the area, steered the meetings toward formalizing an organization which ended up as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt with written bylaws. The bylaws explicitly established racial control by ethnic Hawaiians; at which point Ken Conklin ruined the unanimous "decision- making by consensus" [i.e., group pressure] by resigning and never returning. The complete story, including verbatim portions of the bylaws, is on a webpage "The Use of Cultural and Environmental Restoration as a Political Front for Hawaiian Sovereignty -- The Ahupua'a Restoration Council of He'eia" at
https://www.angelfire.com/hi2/hawaiiansovereignty/fraudahupuaa.html

Those groups -- Ko'olaupoko Hawaiian Civic Club, Kako'o 'Oiwi, Paepae o He'eia, the Ko'olau Foundation, and ARCH -- have consistently maintained ethnic Hawaiian dominance in any community groups seeking to exercise control over environmental restoration or historical interpretation. Their own organizations usually have written bylaws or informal but well-enforced rules that allow membership to community residents of all races who are welcome to provide financial support and volunteer labor, but voting rights and leadership roles are restricted to "Native Hawaiians." For example, the group "Kako'o 'Oiwi" has a lease on the He'eia wetlands where they grow taro; their name "Kako'o 'Oiwi" literally means "support Native Hawaiians". It is certainly immoral, and probably illegal, for the State government to provide monetary grants to organizations that allow first-class membership exclusively to a favored race but restrict all other races to second- class membership that does not allow voting rights or leadership positions.

All of these groups refuse to consider growing rice even though rice can be grown wherever taro can be grown, rice has been grown here decades ago, and rice would be a far more marketable crop important to food security because it is preferred by Hawaii's large Asian population. But in the Hawaiian creation story taro is the elder brother of "Native Hawaiians", and under Hawaii law taro gets special water rights not available to rice because taro cultivation was a "traditional and customary" Native Hawaiian cultural practice protected under the Hawaii Constitution as revised in 1978. Planting and cultivating taro is a method whereby "Native Hawaiians" assert and seize race-based control over water resources and therefore over the land, according to the "public trust" doctrine for water, as seen most notably in the litigation and contested case hearings regarding Wai'ahole Ditch on O'ahu and Na Wai 'Eha on Maui."

In previous years the template for government-mandated racial control of an ahupua'a was explicitly made clear in bills before the legislature to establish Ha'iku Valley (Kane'ohe) as a Hawaiian cultural preserve. Testimony from supporters (probably authors) of the bills was publicly visible, showing that they were (and remain today) leaders in the Ko'olaupoko Hawaiian Civic Club, the Ko'olau Foundation, etc.

The bill regarding Haiku Valley, HB2704, was actually passed by the 2008 legislature but vetoed by Governor Lingle. The Senate voted to override the veto, but the House failed to override it. The text of the bill can be seen at
http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session2008/Bills/HB2704_.htm

Notice that the 2008 bill was actually a Hawaiian sovereignty bill thinly disguised as a bill for environmental and cultural preservation. It specified that the Ha'iku Valley Cultural Preserve Commission would have seven members, including one member of the Ko'olau Foundation, two members of the Ko'olaupoko Hawaiian Civic Club, one appointee from OHA, and one appointed by the governor from a list provided by native Hawaiian organizations. Notice also that the bill requires that "the office shall transfer management and control of the valley cultural preserve to the sovereign native Hawaiian entity upon its recognition by the United States and the State." Essentially the same bill was attempted in 2012, but failed. See webpage about this one particular 2012 bill: "Putting Haiku Valley, Kaneohe, Under Racial Control"
https://www.angelfire.com/big09/HaikuValley2012HB2246.html

Similar legislation was also attempted regarding Makua Valley and Kahana Valley, and probably other places where I was not paying attention. Those bills also included guaranteed ethnic Hawaiian racial majorities on the board of directors, and the same provision for transfer of the ahupua'a to a future Hawaiian tribe.

The Makua Valley Reserve Commission bill for 2015 was HB 1430. Bill text (including all amended versions), history, committee hearings, pdf of all testimony submitted to each committee (including by Ken Conklin), YEAs and NAYs, committee reports:
http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx? billtype=HB&billnumber=1430&year=2015

The description of the present bill relating to He'eia State Park says: "Makes an appropriation for a Heeia State Park community-based long- range plan and education center for the Heeia National Estuarine Research Reserve System."

This bill would appropriate $800,000.00 at the rate of $400,000.00 for each of the two fiscal years 2019-2020 and 2020-2021. For each of the two fiscal years $250,000.00 would be given to establish a "Heeia state park community-based long-range plan", and for each of the two fiscal years $150,000.00 would be given to establish an education center there.

As a veteran of the ARCH fiasco, and with years of experience testifying against proposals for a Haiku Valley Cultural Preserve Commission, this current bill feels exactly the same. I believe it's a boondoggle to send nearly a million dollars to a shadowy group of Hawaiian sovereignty activists who have tried repeatedly for two decades to set up racial-supremacist organizations to control land under an umbrella of approval by the state legislature.

Suspicion is warranted about the political intentions and fiscal accountability of the (currently hidden) people behind this bill, because of two decades of race-based political activism focused directly at the land and water resources at He'eia State Park, He'eia fishpond, and the associated upstream areas of Ha'iku Valley and 'Ioleka'a Valley. When testimony on this bill becomes visible to the public it will probably be easy to see the roles of leaders and members of the Ko'olaupoko Hawaiian Civic Club, Kako'o 'Oiwi, Paepae o He'eia, the Ko'olau Foundation, and the apparently dormant or defunct group known as the Ahupua'a Restoration Council of He'eia, in which I was an active participant for more than two years.

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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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=489&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=808&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION, UNLESS THE BILL IS AMENDED TO ENSURE RACIAL EQUALITY IN THE PERMISSIVE EXEMPTIONS:

This bill provides good reasons why sharks and rays should be protected. The bill provides severe penalties for anyone who captures, kills, or takes a shark or ray within state waters.

The problem with this bill is that it contains language strongly implying that exceptions should be made only for members of one particular racial group. But those exceptions should not be based on race. The exceptions should be for the exercise of traditional or customary cultural or religious practices which were done by some native Hawaiians prior to 1778 but which are now done by some Hawaii residents of many races and cultures. The exceptions should be defined by cultural or religious practices regardless of the race of today's Hawaii residents who engage in those practices.

There are four places in this bill where the language should be amended to make the exceptions culture-based or religion-based rather than race-based.

Page 1, line 17 should be amended to say "valued figures in certain cultures or religions and are important"
Page 2 line 7 should be amended to say "industry, and for their value to specific cultural or religious"
Page 5, section 2(f) lines 7-10 should be reworded to say "Nothing in this section shall be construed to restrict the exercise of traditional and customary cultural or religious practices engaged in by some native Hawaiians prior to 1778 which now are engaged in by Hawaii residents of various races, as protected by article XII, section 7, of the Hawaii State Constitution."
Page 7, section 3(f) should be reworded to say "Nothing in this section shall be construed to restrict the exercise of traditional and customary cultural or religious practices engaged in by some native Hawaiians prior to 1778 which now are engaged in by Hawaii residents of various races, as protected by article XII, section 7, of the Hawaii State Constitution."

The point of these amendments is that the exceptions should include all people regardless of race who are exercising practices which were traditionally and customarily engaged in by the native Hawaiians who lived in that ahupua'a prior to 1778.

Let me illustrate with an example. We know that in ancient times native Hawaiians, who were the entirety of the population in Hawaii, had the right to gather food and building materials from anywhere in the land controlled by their ali'i or konohiki, and also had the right to cross any land for the purpose of going to the ocean. Such rights were preserved after the Mahele, when royal patent deeds were awarded to create private ownership of land -- but the gathering rights and shoreline access rights were preserved for the tenants (residents) of each ahupua'a. Those rights were race-neutral; i.e., every person (kanaka) who was a tenant (hoa'aina) had those rights regardless of race. Although such rights for hunting and fishing and gathering were probably not exercised very often by wealthy foreigners, there was no prohibition against them. The words "kanaka" and "hoa'aina" were race-neutral words not limited to people with native blood. Today the laws of Hawaii recognize that all residents (hoa'aina), regardless of race, have the right to cross public lands as well as undeveloped or even partially developed private land to go to the beach. This right survives from ancient times right up to the present, for all residents regardless of race.

There are many residents of Hawaii whose heritage is from various Pacific island nations such as Samoa, Tonga, Marshall Islands who engage in Polynesian or Micronesian cultural practices, and should be allowed to continue doing so, even if they have no Hawaiian native ancestry. Likewise there are thousands of residents of Hawaii of Asian or Caucasian ancestry, with no Hawaiian native blood, who participate actively in hula halaus, for example, where their kumu hula might expect them to make their own sharkskin drums or sharktooth martial weapons.

So if this committee wishes to make an exception, then the exception should NOT be for people on account of their race, but rather should be for the traditional and customary activities formerly engaged in by native Hawaiians before 1778 but which are now engaged in by residents of all races. If you are unwilling to allow the exceptions for cultural activities regardless of race, then I believe the U.S. Constitution, 14th Amendment Equal Protection clause, requires you to entirely delete any exceptions based on culture or religion.

There is no good reason to make the exemption racial. The exemption should be based on preservation of historic skills or ongoing cultural or religious uses, regardless of race. Examples of acceptable circumstances for automatic exemption would include harvesting sharkskin for making a drum, or harvesting shark teeth to make an ornament for personal adornment or a replica of an ancient weapon for use in museum displays or school lessons.

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SB 921 RELATING TO THE DEPARTMENT OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL.
Creates a division within the Department of the Attorney General to provide legal advice regarding Hawaiian shoreline public access rights.

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

The entire purpose of this bill is found in Section 2(d), proposing to establish a new division in the department of the attorney general, headed by at least 3 deputy AGs, specifically to focus on advising and enforcing shoreline access rights and "the traditional Hawaiian rights to gather firewood, house timber, aho cord, thatch, and ki leaf; to access drinkinq water and running water; to have right of way to the ocean and shoreline; any other such rights so recognized; and any related or similar rights." The 3 new deputy AGs must each have "at least four years of formal education in the Hawaiian language and Hawaiian culture. The division shall also have one or more staff members who have at least a baccalaureate degree in Hawaiian studies, Hawaiian history, or the equivalent, to assist the division's attorneys."

WOW! Shoreline access is a right long enjoyed by all Hawaii's people regardless of race. There's no need to adopt a racist attitude toward it. The PASH decision of 1995 was written in English. There's nothing in it that requires the use of Hawaiian language. Instead of interpreting the gathering rights described in PASH to be based on race, why not regard those rights as belonging to all Hawaii's people. The PASH gathering rights were practiced by native Hawaiians before Captain Cook arrived, and continued to be available to all residents including newcomers of Caucasian, Asian, and African ancestry. Those rights run with the land, not with any racial group exclusively.

Shoreline access and gathering rights were affirmed by the Hawaii Supreme Court in the PASH decision of 1995 (Public Access Shoreline Hawaii). According to that decision Native Hawaiians have a right to access the shoreline, or to gather certain plants, even if doing so is accomplished by trespassing through undeveloped or partially developed land, subject to regulation by the State. But there's nothing in that decision that restricts shoreline access or gathering rights to the racial group who are descendants of residents from before Captain Cook's arrival. The PASH decision recognizes that that racial group has those rights, but the decision does not prohibit the interpretation that those rights run with the land regardless of the race of the land owner or the race of the person seeking access or gathering; and the PASH decision certainly does not prohibit the State from extending such rights to everyone.

The PASH decision is based on the concept that the bundle of rights obtained when purchasing fee-simple land in Hawaii (including the right to exclude trespassers) is limited by the rights possessed by tenants (residents) of the ahupua'a before Captain Cook's arrival, or certainly before the Mahele started in 1848. When land is sold or inherited, the land comes infused with the rights granted to tenants in the Mahele; and those special rights make land ownership in Hawaii very different from the other 49 states.

The word for "tenant" under the Mahele is "hoa'aina" which has no racial designation. It literally means "friend of the land" or refers to someone familiar with the land; i.e., a resident of the ahupua'a rather than an outsider. There is no such thing as "NATIVE tenant rights" despite attempts by sovereignty activists to insert the racial designator. We are free to adopt the realization that access and gathering rights under the PASH decision belong to all Hawaii's people equally regardless of race. So far as I am aware there has never been a court decision saying that PASH rights are exclusively for ethnic Hawaiians. The demand to have racial exclusivity has not been the focus of litigation, simply because racial exclusivity has been the automatically presumed default in Hawaii. How sad! For further analysis of the PASH decision see Paul M. Sullivan, "Customary Revolutions -- The Law of Custom and the Conflict of Traditions in Hawaii" published at 20 University of Hawaii Law Review 99 (1998); available at
https://tinyurl.com/23668n

If rights are deemed to be officially and explicitly granted to only one group of people, does that prohibit those rights from being extended also to all the rest of the people? The ruling in a Hawaii lawsuit (Day v. Apoliona) says there's no problem in extending the rights. Because if the rights are given to everyone, then those rights will thereby be given to the particular group originally designated to have them.

If a law or regulation provides money explicitly for the benefit of native Hawaiians with native blood quantum higher than 50%, is it lawful to provide that money to Native Hawaiians whose blood quantum is below 50%? Hawaii courts have ruled that it's OK to do that. If benefits are designated for a smaller group, then it's perfectly legal to provide those benefits to a more inclusive larger group which includes that smaller group inside it. Presumably the same legal arguments would allow the State to extend the same benefits to all citizens regardless of race, because the set of all citizens includes the subset of all Native Hawaiians regardless of blood quantum, which in turn includes the sub- subset of all native Hawaiians with blood quantum higher than 50%.

The lawsuit Day v. Apoliona arose because Section 5(f) of the Hawaii Statehood Act of 1959 required that ceded land revenues could be spent for any one or more of 5 purposes. One of those purposes was "the betterment of native Hawaiians as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920" (i.e., at least 50% native blood quantum). When OHA was created in the State Constitutional Convention of 1978, the legislature then funded OHA by giving it 20% of all revenue from the ceded lands. But as time went by OHA was spending that money on projects for all Native Hawaiians regardless of blood quantum -- such projects as creating a racial registry, lobbying for the Akaka bill, loans for small-business, etc. A group of high-quantum native Hawaiians filed a lawsuit saying that spending ceded land money on low-quantum Hawaiians violated the Statehood Act. But the courts ruled it was OK, because the high-quantum beneficiaries were included as a subgroup of all Native Hawaiians. See "Day v. Apoliona" at
https://tinyurl.com/yo2ovk

Please stop enacting racist laws. The U.S. Constitution 14th Amendment Equal Protection Clause, and the 5th Amendment, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and many other federal laws guarantee equal rights under the law for all persons in the U.S. regardless of race. The Supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution says that whenever a federal law conflicts with a state law, the federal law takes priority and renders any conflicting state law moot.

But must we make legal arguments and threaten litigation? Surely there's a better way. We in Hawaii claim to be governed by a higher moral and spiritual concept -- The Aloha Spirit. It is contrary to the Aloha Spirit to demand that traditional and customary practices are the exclusive property of any racial group and should be denied to others who lack a drop of the magic blood. Only a heart filled with hate would contemplate racial exclusivity or apartheid.

I see six signatures on this bill, but all of them are illegible. Perhaps those signers are ashamed to display their identities? They should be! But you can redeem yourselves. Has my testimony made anyone angry? Good. Harness that energy to rescind your support of this bill and restore your lokomaika'i and your embrace of pono. Do the right thing. Trash this bill.

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Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This resolution is proposed in partial fulfillment of a hidden agenda, which is somewhat displayed in the final whereas clause: "... a more recent calculation of the size of current and future eligible populations will give state and federal entities the information they need to adjust the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act as necessary..."

In the regular session of 2017, the legislature passed HB451 HD1 SD2 CD1 which was signed by the Governor and became Act 080 (7/05/17). That law lowers the native blood quantum required for a lease on the Hawaiian homelands.

Currently an original lease can be given only to someone who has at least 50% native blood, although someone with at least 25% can inherit a lease. But if Congress approves, then according to Act 80 (2017) the blood quantum requirement will be only 1/32; i.e., a mere 0.03125% As we have discovered recently, that's even lower than the Cherokee blood quantum of Senator Elizabeth Warren, laughingly given the nickname "Pocahontas" by President Trump.

So the motive behind this resolution is obvious -- provide data to help persuade Congress why it should allow the blood quantum for a Hawaiian homestead lease to fall to such a ridiculously low level.

I'll tell you what the level should be reduced to: zero. There should be no requirement for any native blood for someone to be able to have a homestead lease on the public lands of the State of Hawaii. That's the way it was during the Kingdom period, and the Provisional Government period, and the Territorial period prior to the 1921 enactment of the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act. Ex-Prince Jonah Kuhio Kalaniana'ole cried to Congress about his poor downtrodden homeless natives, and Congress created a series of red-lined neighborhoods for them, changing race-neutral lands available for fee-simple home ownership into leasehold lands that must always remain inside the boundaries of a racial ghetto.

Now we have 27,000 native Hawaiians of 50% or higher native blood quantum crying because they have been on the waiting list for a long time -- sometimes for decades. But the legislature, in its lack of wisdom, decided in 2017 that it would be a terrific idea to vastly increase the length of the waiting list by reducing the required native blood quantum down to Elizabeth Warren levels.

So now comes this resolution to measure how awful is the debacle of Act 80 (2017), hoping that Congress will see it as a splendid opening up of opportunity for hundreds of thousands more so-called Native Hawaiians now to be defined as 0.03125%. Do you legislators imagine that Congress will provide funding for such wild dreams? Don't be silly. Just imagine how many Billions of dollars will be demanded in future lawsuits against the taxpayers of Hawaii to provide the "promised land." 40 acres and a mule will not be enough. The Hawaii judiciary will issue an order commanding the legislature to satisfy the obligation it has enacted.

Aside from the bad practical consequences, this resolution stinks of racism when it blames high-quantum native Hawaiians for loving and making babies with non-natives. As though high-quantum Hawaiians have somehow betrayed their race and sacrificed their mana by failing to engage in ni'aupi'o matings. The story of Kauikeaouli and his sister Nahi'ena'ena is indeed a noble vision and a great tragedy as such a mating was demanded by both their culture and their royal duty. Even from Shakespeare we hear the plaintive cry of Juliet screaming in despair "Wherefore art thou a Romeo?" as she loved a man belonging to the wrong tribe. But those are bygone days. It's time to let people love whom they wish, and not to resent them for choosing outside the requirements of the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act.

Just say NO to this resolution. People should not be treated like dogs needing a pedigree..

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Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

This bill is poorly written and sometimes chaotic. I wonder whether the writer is capable of logical thought and cogent expression.

The most dangerous portion of this bill is section 2 on page 2, lines 17-20; and is repeated verbatim in section 2 on page 5, lines 13-16: "... provided that if the law in question was originally drafted in Hawaiian and the English version was translated based on the Hawaiian version, the Hawaiian version shall be held binding."

Very few, if any, members of the legislature are sufficiently fluent in Hawaiian to be capable of reading and comprehending a bill written in Hawaiian. To the members of this committee, I ask you to be honest with yourself when you answer these questions: Did you take the time to read page 1 of this bill, written in Hawaiian language? If so, did you then feel it was not necessary for you to read the English translation of it? Of course not! You probably skipped the Hawaiian language content as you would skip a bunch of gibberish, in order to get down to business by reading the English language content.

Giving priority to Hawaiian language is a political stunt to bolster ethnic pride and get votes from a constituency that demands visible tokens of validation and status; but it has no practical usefulness. It seems likely that every person who speaks Hawaiian also speaks English with greater fluency. Hawaiian activists, following the lead of Princess Ruth Ke'elikolani (hoo dat?), sometimes insist on speaking Hawaiian in the courtroom or when giving speeches, interviews, or testimony; but they are perfectly capable of speaking and understanding English. Nobody NEEDS to speak or hear Hawaiian to express himself or to understand what someone is saying -- the activists demand it to score a political point and sometimes to simply "gum up the works."

I refer you to a large and detailed webpage "Hawaiian Language as a Political Weapon" at
https://www.angelfire.com/big09/HawLangPolitWeapon.html

If this bill were enacted into law, the Hawaiian language content would be the official law whether or not you understand what you voted for when you read page 1. And you can be quite sure that Hawaiian- language zealots would give top priority to writing many important bills in Hawaiian before getting them translated into English, thereby invoking the new rule that the Hawaiian version takes priority. Would your expertise in Hawaiian be sufficient to enable you to detect kaona (wat dat?) -- subtle double meanings that you would never vote for if you knew they were in the law you just finished enacting? Kaona were widely used orally in ancient times and later in Hawaiian language newspapers, as a sort of secret code, so that insiders "in the know" would understand dangerous hidden political meanings in poetry or songs that seemed to be describing a needle piercing a flower while stringing a lei, or a bee spreading pollen while flitting from flower to flower sipping nectar. Perhaps you're aware that there are some Hawaiian sovereignty activists who would love to get you to enact laws that would undermine or even overthrow the [fake!] State of Hawaii and replace it with a rejuvenated Kingdom.

I merely want to point out that there were no diacritical marks in Hawaiian language until professors at the University of Hawaii invented them. The marks were invented as a way of guiding pronunciation for people who were beginners at learning Hawaiian in an environment where they seldom heard the language actually being spoken. People who are fluent in Hawaiian do not need diacritical marks to guide their pronunciation. But enforcing the marks does provide highly paid jobs for teachers who can give bad grades to students who fail to properly grovel or knuckle under. And passing this bill would create LOTS of jobs for people who have spent years learning Hawaiian language, since their expertise would now be needed by every legislator and attorney who feels a need to be thorough and careful as part of "due diligence."

Thānk yoʻū for your kind attentiʻōn to this testimōny.

---------------------------

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

One of the things I oppose about this bill is that it would incorporate a United Nations declaration into the Hawaii Revised Statutes. For those people who believe that "international law" is binding on all nations, the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, adopted by the U.N. in 2007, has already been a part of Hawaii's law for more than a decade, so incorporating it into HRS is redundant. In 2011 President Obama unilaterally signed it (without Congressional approval), which further embedded the U.N. Declaration into Hawaii's law; so to now incorporate it into HRS would be additionally redundant. It is a matter of considerable controversy whether Supreme Court decisions should be based on "international law" or whether Supreme Court decisions should be based solely on the U.S. Constitution and statutes passed by Congress. In any case, no State of the United States has any power to make treaties with foreign nations nor to adopt laws which are contrary to U.S. law.

This bill is poorly written and sometimes chaotic. I wonder whether the writer is capable of logical thought and cogent expression.

The most dangerous portion of this bill is section 2(b) on page 3, lines 5-8; and is repeated verbatim in section 2(b) on page 6, lines 7-10: "... provided that if the law in question was originally drafted in Hawaiian and the English version was translated based on the Hawaiian version, the Hawaiian version shall be held binding."

I refer you to a large and detailed webpage "Hawaiian Language as a Political Weapon" at
https://www.angelfire.com/big09/HawLangPolitWeapon.html

Regarding the use of 'okinas and kahakos -- notice that I place a letter "s" at the end of a word to make it plural because the sentence I am writing is in English, not Hawaiian, and I refuse to adopt the affectation of using Hawaiian grammar in the course of writing an English sentence (Hawaiian language zealots would want me to say "na 'okina" instead of "'okinas" and they would give me low marks for failing to put a kahako over the letter "o" in the word "kahako"). I merely want to point out that there were no diacritical marks in Hawaiian language until professors at the University of Hawaii invented them. The marks were invented as a way of guiding pronunciation for people who were beginners at learning Hawaiian in an environment where they seldom heard the language actually being spoken. People who are fluent in Hawaiian do not need diacritical marks to guide their pronunciation. But enforcing the marks does provide highly paid jobs for teachers who can give bad grades to students who fail to properly grovel or knuckle under. And passing this bill would create LOTS of jobs for people who have spent years learning Hawaiian language, since their expertise would now be needed by every legislator and attorney who feels a need to be thorough and careful as part of "due diligence."

Thānk yoʻū for your kind attentiʻōn to this testimōny.

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Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

'ŌLELO HO'IKE KŪ'Ē

ʻO ka mea 'ōlelo i ka 'ōlelo Hawaiʻi e hiki iā ia ke 'ōlelo Pelekania, a ʻoi aku kona 'ōlelo Pelekane ma mua o kāna 'ōlelo Hawaiʻi. No laila, ʻaʻohe pono e hana i nā pāloka a i ʻole nā mea koho 'ē aʻe ma ka 'ōlelo Hawaiʻi. Mai hōʻaleʻa i ke kālā ma kahi hoʻopailua no ka mea lapuwale.

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Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN SUPPORT

HO'IKE KAKO'O

Aloha kākou e na po'e lala o Ke Kōmike Kuleana Hawai'i ma Ka 'Aha Kenekoa.

No'u ka hau'oli e kako'o i keia pila SB701.

'Oi aku ka maika'i o kēia pila SB701 ma mua o nā pila maika'i'ole o SB195 a me SB641. No ke aha? E 'olu'olu, e heluhelu i ko'u hō'ike e pili ana i kēlā 'elua mau pila.

Mahalo iā 'oukou.

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Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

The first sentence of this bill is false. I believe the author(s) of this bill knowingly and intentionally wrote that sentence to mislead the legislature. It says "The purpose of this Act is to ensure a more democratic election process for the office of Hawaiian affairs ..." That's utter nonsense.

A democratic election process is described by the principle "one person, one vote." A democratic election process would ensure that each voter has equal power to determine who wins the election, regardless whether the voter lives in an urban area or a rural area. The way OHA trustees are currently elected provides disproportionate voting power to rural residents. As you will discover below, the real purpose of this bill is to further worsen that already disproportionate voting power of rural residents at the expense of urban residents. Trust me -- I have a masters degree in Mathematics.

Under the current system there are a total of 9 trustees. Five of them must be residents of particular islands: one must be a resident of Hawai'i Island, one must be a resident of Kaua'i/Ni'ihau islands, one must be a resident of Maui Island, one must be a resident of Moloka'i/ Lana'i islands, and one must be a resident of O'ahu. The other four are at-large, meaning they can be residents of any of those seven islands.

This bill defines "'Rural district' means the second congressional district of the State. 'Urban district' means the first congressional district of the State." Thus we see that under the current system 4 of the 9 trustees are guaranteed to be from the rural district. According to World Population Review
http://worldpopulationreview.com/states/hawaii-population/
the 2019 population of the State of Hawaii is approximately 1,425,000 while the population of O'ahu alone is approximately 953,000. Thus the total number of residents of all the islands except O'ahu is approximately 472,000 which is 472/1425 = 33% of the total population of Hawaii. But their guaranteed minimum of 4 OHA trustees out of 9 comprise 44% of the trustees. So under the current system the 6 populated islands outside of O'ahu, with only 33% of Hawaii's population, are already greatly over- represented by having 44% of the OHA trustees.

Under terms of this bill, the 4 OHA trustees who are "at large" would now be apportioned with 2 of them required to be residents of the "rural district" (Congressional district 2). The "rural district" would therefore have the 4 trustees already guaranteed to be from the 6 rural islands, plus the 2 newly apportioned formerly-at-large but now "rural" trustees, for a minimum total of 6 OHA trustees who must reside in the rural Congressional district 2, out of the total of 9 OHA trustees. Thus the trustees residing in the rural district would be 6/9 = 67% of all the OHA trustees.

But the two Congressional districts are required by federal law to have approximately equal population. Therefore if this bill is enacted a minimum of 67% of OHA trustees would now be residing among only half of Hawaii's population.

In addition it is quite possible that the seat reserved for a resident of O'ahu could be filled by someone who lives in the rural portion of O'ahu that is part of Congressional district 2. If that happens, then 7 of the 9 = 77% of the OHA trustees would be residents of the "rural district" which comprises the approximately half of Hawaii's population residing in Congressional district 2.

In conclusion, enacting this bill would worsen the already significant underrepresentation of our urban residents on the OHA board, while unjustly increasing the already significant overrepresentation of our rural residents. The half of Hawaii's people in the "rural district" would have at least 6 and possibly 7 of OHA's 9 trustees.

Congressional district 1, which has half of the State of Hawaii's population, would have AT MOST 3/9 = 33% of the OHA trustees, and perhaps as little as 2/9 = 22% of the OHA trustees.

Anyone who votes for this bill needs to explain why you choose to discriminate so viciously against our urban residents.

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HB1119/SB1451 RELATING TO STATE HOLIDAYS.
Reestablishes La Ku'oko'a, Hawaiian Recognition Day, as an official state holiday.

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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=1119&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SB&billnumber=1451&year=2019

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY IN OPPOSITION

It is both funny and sad to see that so many legislators have signed their names in support of this bill, which is deceptively named and would be bad policy. Pandering to anti-American secessionists is a very bad idea. This bill is not about memorializing a success of diplomacy from 1843, it's about supporting a highly divisive cult of activists who want to enlist you as a partisan in an ideological civil war which threatens to rip the 50th star off our flag.

Maybe you'll step away from this bill when you see how your predecessors in the 2007 legislature were lied to and fooled by the same gang now pushing this bill, and then those legislators were justly ridiculed for their pandering.

The following points are proved in detail later in this testimony. Please take the time to read the details.

1. The word "ku'oko'a" does NOT mean "recognition" -- it means "independence". Look it up in the dictionary. Also apply, to two other bills, this lesson on how easy it is to fool you legislators about the meaning of Hawaiian words -- I refer to SB195 and SB642, which would make it law that if a bill "was originally drafted in Hawaiian and the English version was translated based on the Hawaiian version, the Hawaiian version shall be held binding."

2. Look at the reasons openly stated for why Hawaiian independence activists have pushed to revive this holiday. They want the "fake- state" legislature to go on record that Hawaii has always been AND REMAINS an independent nation, or should be re-established as such. If you agree with that agenda then you should resign from the legislature of the STATE of Hawaii, which you have sworn an oath to support and defend.

3. The legislature was badly burned in 2007 when every Democrat voted in favor of officially creating a new permanent holiday every April 30, to be called "Hawaiian Restoration Day." Please note that the perennial April 30 holiday solemnly enacted by the 2007 legislature is not included in the list of holidays in Section 2 of today's bill. Why not? When you read item #4, you'll discover that what you should do is to add the now-official holiday of April 30 to the list in Section 2 WITH A LINE THROUGH THE NAME AND DATE TO INDICATE THAT THIS BILL IS REPEALING IT just as this bill proposes to do with Presidents' Day.

4. Some of the same people who push today's bill were also pushers of the 2007 bill, knowingly telling falsehoods that President Grover Cleveland had proclaimed April 30 to be a U.S. holiday of fasting and repentance for the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy. You can see for yourselves a 4-page flyer that makes a laughing stock of the legislature for falling for that absurdity, especially after being presented with proof that President Cleveland's alleged proclamation was actually an April Fools [not April 30] satire against Cleveland published as an editorial in an anti-Cleveland newspaper and that the resolution's authors were aware of that fact. Maybe they couldn't imagine that a "reverend" would knowingly and cunningly tell a lie for a political purpose. A webpage provides further details about the actual newspaper editorial, and about the fact that the pushers of the resolution knew their testimony was false.

-------DETAILS PROVING THOSE POINTS---------

1. The meaning of "Ku'oko'a" or "La Ku'oko'a"

"Ku'oko'a. nvs. Independence, liberty, freedom; independent, free. La Ku'oko'a. Independence Day. Ho'ike no ke Ku'oko'a. Declaration of Independence. Ka Nupepa Ku'oko'a. The Independent Newspaper [name of a Hawaiian-language newspaper published in Honolulu 1861-1927]. ho'oku'oko'a. To establish independence. Make independent."

As you can easily see, the word "Recognition" is never mentioned anywhere in the definition of "ku'oko'a." This bill is extremely deceptive when it says (page 1, lines 9-10) La Ku'oko'a was known as Hawaiian Recognition Day, and when the description of the bill in the hearing notice says the bill "Reestablishes La Ku'oko'a, Hawaiian Recognition Day, as an official state holiday."

2. Hawaiian independence activists seek to revive "La Ku'oko'a" as an assertion that Hawaii is now, or should be, a sovereign independent nation. This bill also falsely states that "La Ku'oko'a" was actively celebrated throughout the Kingdom, Provisional Government, Republic, and several years into the Territorial period.

Leon Siu styles himself as Foreign Minister of "Ke Aupuni o Hawai'i, the Hawaiian Kingdom." For many years he has actively traveled to United Nations meetings in New York and Geneva (Switzerland) asking delegates of other nations to publicly challenge U.S. sovereignty over Hawaii. In 2018 his buddies in the independence "movement" staged a publicity stunt nominating him for the Nobel Peace Prize. On November 20, 2018 he authored another in a series of "Ke Aupuni Update"s in the Free Hawaii blog, entitled "Celebrating La Ku'oko'a - Independence Day". His excellency "Foreign Minister Siu" has never referred to the Kingdom holiday as "Hawaiian Recognition Day."

This bill says "Throughout the 1850s and 1870s, Hawai'i celebrated La Ku'oko'a with lu'au, music, and marches. The celebration grew under the reign of King Kalakaua, with formal proclamations sent by official circular to the foreign diplomatic corps in Hawai'i and the Hawaiian Kingdom consuls abroad, informing them of the holiday. The day remained a national holiday under the Provisional Government of Hawai'i (1893), the Republic of Hawai'i (1894-1898), and the initial years of the Territory of Hawai'i."

But the Free Hawaii blog of November 27, 2018 says "After a failed armed attempt by Hawaiians to retake their Kingdom in 1895, the usurpers announced that Lā Kū'oko'a would no longer be celebrated, and the American holiday Thanksgiving Day would be the official national holiday instead. Removing a holiday like Hawai'i Independence Day was a way to cover up and try to destroy the history and identity of the Hawaiian Kingdom and its people. ... Tomorrow's celebration of Lā Kū'oko'a asserts that Hawai'i is still an independent nation, even under prolonged illegal occupation."

A writer of Hawaiian history describes how a very similar Kingdom holiday of even greater importance was hugely celebrated for a few years but then fell out of public awareness just like Ka La Ku'oko'a. July 31, 1843 was the day when King Kauikeaouli Kamehameha III uttered his famous statement from the steps of Kawaiaha'o Church: "Ua mau ke ea o ka 'aina i ka pono." (Sovereignty has been preserved because it is righteous). For several years this date was actively celebrated as a national holiday: Ka La Ho'iho'i Ea (Sovereignty Restoration Day). Today's sovereignty activists like to say it was a national holiday for all the remaining years of the Kingdom. However, a book friendly to the activists' general viewpoint says otherwise. Helena G. Allen, "The Betrayal of Liliuokalani" (Glendale CA, Arthur H. Clark Co., 1982), p. 61, says the following: "In the afternoon [July 31, 1843] Kamehameha III went in a solemn procession with his chiefs to Kawaiahao Church ...A ten-day celebration of Restoration Day followed, and was annually observed. The last of the Restoration Day celebrations came in 1847. The missionary element in the government were thereafter to declare the celebrations 'too expensive.' ... A thousand special riders, five abreast ... were followed by 2500 regular horsemen ... arrived at the Nuuanu picnic ground in a pouring rain, with spirits undampened. ... It was to be the last of such Hawaiian festivities ..."

3 and 4: What happened in 2007 when every Democrat in the legislature foolishly voted to establish a permanent holiday on April 30, called "Hawaiian Restoration Day," despite testimony proving that the alleged historical basis for the holiday was completely false and that the pushers of the legislation knew it was false. Are you legislators today so gullible, and are you prepared to be ridiculed like your colleagues were 12 years ago? See the evidence, and the flyer.

Read the full text of House Concurrent Resolution 82 (2007) "PROCLAIMING APRIL 30 OF EVERY YEAR AS HAWAIIAN RESTORATION DAY." Some highlights are:

"... in a proclamation dated February 25, 1894, President Cleveland declared that "April 30 [of every year] be set aside as a day of solemn fasting, and prayer for the injustice to me [President Grover Cleveland] and my great good sister [Queen Liliuokalani] for her speedy return to the throne" ... the Legislature hereby proclaims April 30 of each year as a special day of remembrance, education, and prayer, for people of all faiths, for Grover Cleveland, a great American who stood for the true values and principles of the United States Constitution, and for "liberty and justice for all"
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session2007/bills/HCR82_.htm

See the status tracking of HCR82 as it got enacted:
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session2007/status/HCR82.htm

Webpage title: "Twisting History -- Reverend Kaleo Patterson knowingly used a fake Grover Cleveland proclamation from 1894, cited it as fact, and used it as the basis for a media blitz in 2006 in Hawaii and on the mainland calling for a national day of prayer for restoration of Native Hawaiians and repentance for the overthrow of the monarchy. He repeated his local and mainland propaganda campaign in 2007 and pushed a resolution through the Hawaii legislature citing the joke proclamation as real. In 2008 the Honolulu Star-Bulletin published a story describing the Cleveland proclamation as a fact and refused to publish a correction. In 2010 Patterson made a trip to Caldwell N.J. in furtherance of his hoax, where the town council gave him a check for $2920 to defray his expenses." [Caldwell N.J. is the birthplace and tomb of President Grover Cleveland]

Read the gory webpage details at
https://www.angelfire.com/hi5/bigfiles3/fraudpattersoncleveland.html

The Goebbels Award For Outstanding Use of Media for Propaganda Disguised As Fact was given to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin for its publication of the false historical information and for its refusal to correct the falsehoods despite proof:
http://bigfiles90.angelfire.com/ GoebbelsAwardHonStarBull042308.html

See the 4-page flyer poking fun at the 2007 legislature for enacting HCR82, and providing photographic proof that the so-called Presidential Proclamation by Grover Cleveland was actually a sarcastic editorial directed against Cleveland by an anti-Cleveland newspaper.
http://bigfiles90.angelfire.com/ AprilFoolsGroverClevelandHawResoFlyer.pdf

------------------

SB 1343 RELATING TO SELECTIVE SERVICE. Requires compliance with the federal Military Selective Service Act to be eligible for enrollment in a state-supported post- secondary institution, qualify for state financial assistance for post-secondary education, or be eligible for state or county employment or service. Provides exceptions.

Ken Conklin's TESTIMONY URGING DELETION OF EXCEPTION #3

Please delete Exception #3, Section 5, page 4, lines 18 and 19, "Neither a United States citizen nor a resident immigrant".

That proposed exception is contrary to the federal law regarding who must register. See the chart provided by the Selective Service System at
https://www.sss.gov/Registration/Who-Must-Register/Chart

You will note that in that chart, the section entitled "Immigrants" specifically shows that the following categories are required to register:
Permanent resident immigrants
Refugee, parolee, and asylee immigrants
Undocumented immigrants
Dual national U.S. citizens

As you can see, foreigners who reside in the U.S. must register with the Selective Service System, and could be drafted into the military in case Congress or the President reactivate the draft.

One difficulty I foresee with exception #3 is that there are some political activists who were born and raised in Hawaii, and continue to reside in Hawaii, but who nevertheless assert that they are NOT U.S. citizens because "there is no Treaty of Annexation" or "The U.S. lacks jurisdiction in Hawaii" or "I am a subject/citizen of the ongoing independent nation of Hawaii and cannot be compelled to be a citizen of a foreign nation (i.e., the U.S.) against my will." Many of those activists accept benefits from Hawaii's welfare system as though they are citizens even while refusing to pay federal and state income tax and refusing to get Hawaii state driver licenses because, they say, Hawaii is a "fake state" and the U.S. lacks jurisdiction here. These activists have the right to assert whatever they wish, but they should not be coddled or exempted from their responsibilities under the Selective Service System merely because of their bogus assertions.

Anyone who refuses to register with the selective service system because he asserts the U.S. lacks jurisdiction in Hawaii and he asserts that Hawaii is not a part of the United States, should not be "eligible for enrollment in a state-supported post-secondary educational institution or qualify for state financial assistance for post-secondary education, or to be eligible for state or county employment or service", as SB1343 specifies.

----------------------

SCR 70 / SR 48
REQUESTING THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS TO CONDUCT AN INDEPENDENT FISCAL AUDIT OF ALL LIMITED LIABILITY CORPORATIONS CREATED OR CONTROLLED BY THE OFFICE.

Resolution 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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SCR&billnumber=70&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SR&billnumber=48&year=2019

Ken Conklin's lengthy TESTIMONY IN SUPPORT URGING THAT THE RESOLUTION BE STRENGTHENED FROM MERELY A REQUEST TO A DEMAND; AND PROVIDING DETAILED PROOF THAT OHA AND ITS LLCS ARE AGENCIES OF THE STATE GOVERNMENT AND THEREFORE CAN BE REGULATED AND HELD ACCOUNTABLE BY THE LEGISLATURE LIKE ANY OTHER STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY

The Center for Hawaiian Sovereignty Studies strongly supports the intent of SCR 70 requesting the Office of Hawaiian affairs to conduct an independent fiscal audit of all limited liability corporations created or controlled by the office.

However, the language in this resolution is far too meek and obsequious. Please strengthen it. The 5th whereas clause expressing doubt whether OHA and its LLCs are government agencies is the problem. So to help you understand the importance of that issue, and for future reference, that topic is explained in great detail.

This RESOLUTION REQUESTING an audit should actually be a BILL REQUIRING it.

Although it is too late in the 2019 session to introduce a new bill, it is not too late to achieve that result -- any bill now under consideration to provide funding for OHA can and should be amended to specify that no money shall be transmitted to OHA unless and until OHA has published the official report of an independent fiscal audit of all limited liability corporations created or controlled by OHA, and that any funds that would otherwise be transmitted to OHA shall be reduced by ten times the amount of money that the audit shows was improperly spent or cannot be accounted for.

The 5th whereas clause, page 1 lines 21-26, should be either deleted or revised to avoid raising doubts about whether OHA and its LLCs are government agencies -- the clause should be strengthened to put the legislature on record as affirming that OHA and all its LLCs are indeed government agencies and therefore are subject to laws such as the State Procurement Code, State Ethics Code, Sunshine Law, and Uniform Information Practices Act. Even if this is merely a resolution requesting, and not a bill requiring; the legislature can certainly use even a humble resolution to assert its strongly held opinion that OHA and all its LLCs are indeed government agencies -- an opinion which will be future evidence of legislative intent even on other topics.

----

PROOF THAT OHA IS A STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY CAN BE FOUND IN THE FACT THAT THE LEGISLATURE HAS COMMANDED OHA TO SPEND TRUST FUND MONEY FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES, AND OHA OBEDIENTLY COMPLIED.

One proof that OHA is a State government agency is found in the fact that the Legislature has the power to command OHA to spend money for particular projects which the Legislature mandates. For example, HB1745 and its companion SB2134 in the regular session of year 2018 ordered OHA to spend OHA's own ceded land trust funds to pay for materials and staffing to greatly enlarge the number of state employees required to take a course organized by OHA to indoctrinate those employees with OHA's views regarding special rights for ethnic Hawaiians. The bills in 2018 cited a law enacted in 2015 that created this course, and made clear that the Legislature is mandating OHA to spend its own trust fund money for specific purposes:

"In Act 169, Session Laws of Hawaii 2015, the legislature found that pursuant to Hawaii's constitution, statutes, and case law, the State recognizes a mandate to protect native Hawaiian and Hawaiian traditional and customary rights. Accordingly, Act 169 amended chapter 10, Hawaii Revised Statutes, TO REQUIRE THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS TO ESTABLISH, DESIGN, AND ADMINISTER A TRAINING COURSE on native Hawaiian and Hawaiian rights, the sources of these rights, and how infringement of these rights affects the native Hawaiian and Hawaiian people. ... The legislature finds that the training course required by Act 169 has been implemented ... the purpose of this [new 2018] Act is to require certain additional government decision-makers at both the state and county levels to attend the training established by Act 169. ... THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS, AT ITS OWN EXPENSE, SHALL ESTABLISH, DESIGN, AND ADMINISTER A TRAINING COURSE relating to native Hawaiian and Hawaiian traditional and customary rights, native Hawaiian and Hawaiian natural resource protection and access rights, and the public trust, including the State's trust responsibility. The training course shall include: ... THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS, AT ITS OWN EXPENSE, SHALL DEVELOP THE METHODS AND PREPARE ANY MATERIALS NECESSARY TO IMPLEMENT THE TRAINING COURSE, ADMINISTER THE TRAINING COURSE, AND NOTIFY EACH PERSON ..." [emphasis mine]

----

IT IS LONG OVERDUE FOR THE LEGISLATURE TO REASSERT ITS RIGHTFUL AUTHORITY OVER OHA, WHICH HAS A LONG HISTORY OF ASSERTING INDEPENDENCE FROM STATE LAWS

On August 10, 2011 the online newspaper "Civil Beat" published an article entitled "OHA Employees Were Public Last Year -- But Not This Year?"

Civil Beat raised the issue (again!) because it wants information about the salaries of employees of the State of Hawaii Office of Hawaiian Affairs, in conjunction with CB's extensive research and publication of salary information about all state government employees.

In 2010 OHA refused to disclose such data. Office of Information Practices acting director Cathy Takase ruled that OHA is a state agency and must disclose such information on the same basis as any other state agency. But then Governor Abercrombie fired Takase over Takase's insistence that Abercrombie must disclose the names of nominees for a position on the Supreme Court (reminiscent of President Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre when he fired Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox for demanding secret White House tapes).

So in 2011 OHA was again stonewalling in hopes that Abercrombie's new OIP director Cheryl Kakazu Park would issue a different ruling on the question whether OHA is a state agency and therefore must disclose salary information. For details see the Civil Beat article at
http://www.civilbeat.com/posts/2011/08/10/12472-oha-employees- were-public-last-year-but-not-this-year/
See also a followup news report on August 29, 2011 where Civil Beat once again raises the issue of OHA employees being public employees, and once again criticized OHA for stonewalling and criticized OIP for letting OHA get away with it.
http://www.civilbeat.com/posts/2011/08/29/12666-oha-takes- second-shot-at-claiming-its-employees-arent-public/

-----

IT IS ABSURD FOR OHA TO CLAIM THAT IT IS A STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY ONLY WHEN IT SPENDS MONEY APPROPRIATED FOR OPERATING EXPENSES BUT IT IS NOT A STATE AGENCY WHEN IT SPENDS MONEY FROM ITS "TRUST FUND" (HOARDED CASH STASH OF CEDED LANDS REVENUE)

OHA likes to make the distinction between the money it receives in annual legislative appropriations of tax dollars (less than 10% of the money it gets), vs. revenues from the ceded lands (more than 90% of the money it gets).

Here's a quote which was seen on the OHA website here (but later deleted):
http://www.oha.org/index.php? option=com_content&task=view&id=242&Itemid=152
The quote was also repeated on the Kau Inoa website here (but later deleted):
http://www.kauinoa.org/faq.php

"When OHA is spending State general fund revenues, it needs to operate as a state agency and, as such, must comply with various state laws and regulations. However, when OHA operates as a trust, its allegiance is to its beneficiaries."

It is ludicrous to claim that an organization is both a state agency and a private trust, depending on where the money comes from on different occasions. Various novels feature schizophrenic characters with split personalities: for example, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde; or The Three Faces of Eve. But in real life, there's only one OHA. If the source of money or property were the determining factor in deciding whether an organization is a government agency or a private trust, then the Boy Scouts would have to be called a government agency whenever they make use of the camp at the upper end of Pupukea Road whose land was donated to them by the government; and the City of Honolulu would be a private trust whenever it uses lands and memorial statues that were donated to the City from private sources.

The OHA "trustees" (a terrible misnomer) receive their salaries and benefits from the State of Hawaii just like all other elected officials. They are elected on the ballot in the statewide general election. If there's a vacancy on the board through death or resignation, and if the board is unable to agree on a replacement, then the Governor appoints one. In February 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the racial restriction on who can vote in OHA elections is unconstitutional. One result was that Governor Cayetano forced all nine OHA trustees to resign (because they had been illegally elected). The Governor then appointed temporary replacements for all of them, to serve until the elections later that year. Clearly, OHA is a state agency, as shown by the fact that the Governor seized control of it and that its board of directors are elected on the ballot in the state election.

There is no doubt whatsoever that OHA is an agency of the government of the State of Hawaii.

Therefore there is no doubt that the State legislature has the power, jurisdiction, and authority to ORDER OHA to pay for and perform an audit of the LLC entities which it has created, and to publish a report about the audit to be made available for scrutiny by the news media and the legislature. Indeed, the LLCs themselves are government entities -- they were created by OHA, received their funding from OHA, and have their administrative officers appointed by OHA's CEO.

===

THE U.S. SUPREME COURT HAS RULED IN AT LEAST THREE DIFFERENT CASES, BETWEEN YEARS 2000 TO 2016, THAT THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS IS INDEED A STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY

AND IN THE MOST RECENT OF THOSE CASES THE SUPREME COURT RULED THAT A SO-CALLED "PRIVATE" ENTITY CREATED AND FUNDED BY OHA [JUST LIKE THE LLCS] IS A GOVERNMENT AGENCY AND THEREFORE CANNOT HOLD AN ELECTION WHOSE VOTERS ARE RESTRICTED BY RACE.

1. RICE V. CAYETANO, 2000, REGARDING THE RIGHT OF ALL REGISTERED VOTERS, REGARDLESS OF RACE, TO VOTE FOR BOARD MEMBERS OF THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS

http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/ 2016/08/29/15-17134.pdf

RICE v. CAYETANO 528 U.S. 495 (2000) Decided February 23, 2000

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-818.ZS.html

Syllabus
Congress may not authorize a State to establish a voting scheme that limits the electorate for its public officials to a class of tribal Indians to the exclusion of all non-Indian citizens. The elections for OHA trustee are elections of the State, not of a separate quasi-sovereign, and they are elections to which the Fifteenth Amendment applies

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/pdf/98-818P.ZO

pg 1
"The Hawaiian Constitution limits the right to vote for nine trustees chosen in a statewide election. The trustees compose the governing authority of a state agency known as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, or OHA. Haw. Const., Art. XII, �5."

pg 24
"OHA is a state agency, established by the State Constitution, responsible for the administration of state laws and obligations. See Haw. Const., Art. XII, ��5�6. The Hawaiian Legislature has declared that OHA exists to serve "as the principal public agency in th[e] State responsible for the performance, development, and coordination of programs and activities relating to native Hawaiians and Hawaiians." Haw. Rev. Stat. �10�3(3)); see also Lodging by Petitioner, Tab 6, OHA Annual Report 1993�94, p. 5 (May 27, 1994) (admitting that "OHA is technically a part of the Hawai'i state government," while asserting that "it operates as a semi- autonomous entity")"

p.25
"Although it is apparent that OHA has a unique position under state law, it is just as apparent that it remains an arm of the State."

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HAWAII V. OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS, 2009, REGARDING THE RIGHT OF THE STATE TO SELL CEDED LANDS AND THE INEFFECTIVENESS OF THE APOLOGY RESOLUTION TO BLOCK SUCH SALES
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/08pdf/07-1372.pdf

Hawaii v. Office of Hawaiian Affairs, 556 U.S. 163 (2009)
No. 07�1372. Argued February 25, 2009--Decided March 31, 2009

The Hawaii State Supreme Court had ruled unanimously, 5-0, that the State of Hawaii cannot sell any parcel of ceded lands until such time as a final settlement is reached between native Hawaiians and the State regarding ownership of the former government and crown lands of the Kingdom of Hawaii; because the U.S. apology resolution in 1993 stated that the overthrow of the monarchy had been illegal and would not have occurred without U.S. intervention. But the State of Hawaii appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled unanimously, 9-0, that the ceded lands rightfully belong to the State of Hawaii in fee simple absolute, under terms of the Statehood Admissions Act of 1959; and that the federal apology resolution of 1993 has no force or effect to retroactively change the terms of that transfer of lands.

"JUSTICE ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the question whether Congress stripped the State of Hawaii of its authority to alienate its sovereign territory by passing a joint resolution to apologize for the role that the United States played in overthrowing the Hawaiian monarchy in the late 19th century. Relying on Congress' joint resolution, the Supreme Court of Hawaii permanently enjoined the State from alienating certain of its lands, pending resolution of native Hawaiians' land claims that the court described as "unrelinquished." We reverse."

This case made it abundantly clear that the State of Hawaii is the rightful owner of its public lands, and that OHA is a state agency which must obey state law and has no right to interfere with state government decisions to sell public lands.

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AKINA V. HAWAII, 2015-2016, PREVENTING A NON-PROFIT "PRIVATE" CORPORATION FINANCED BY OHA FROM COMPLETING A RACE-BASED ELECTION, BECAUSE THE NON-PROFIT CONTRACTOR WAS A GOVERNMENT AGENCY BECAUSE IT WAS FUNDED AND DIRECTED BY OHA WHICH IS A GOVERNMENT AGENCY (see Rice v. Cayetano)

On July 6, 2011 Hawaii Governor Abercrombie signed Act 195 (formerly SB1250, Legislature regular session of 2011) which established a Native Hawaiian Roll Commission (thus an agency of the State government) whose members would be appointed by the Governor, whose purpose would be to compile a list of qualified "Native Hawaiians" who would then be allowed to vote in an election of delegates to a "Constitutional convention" for the purpose of writing a Constitution for a Hawaiian tribe, which Constitution would then be ratified by a vote of the Native Hawaiians who had registered with the Roll Commission. Governor Abercrombie then appointed the members of the Roll Commission, including former Governor John Waihe'e III as its chairman. OHA (state government agency) gave many millions of dollars (government money from ceded land revenue) to the Roll Commission during the next several years. A non-profit corporation called "Na'i Aupuni" [which means "Conqueror" and was a title used by King Kamehameha The Great] was created by a group of "Native Hawaiians" under the guidance of OHA and the Roll Commission. The Roll Commission hired Na'i Aupuni as a contractor to organize, publicize, and conduct an election of delegates to the Constitutional convention with the voters being people who had signed up with the Roll Commission. However, the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii headed by President Keli'i Akina, with help from the nationally famous Judicial Watch organization, filed a federal lawsuit to block the election. The lawsuit was dismissed by the U.S. District Court in Honolulu, and the dismissal was upheld by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. But as the time grew near for the votes to be counted in the election of Convention delegates, Grassroot Institute and Judicial Watch filed an emergency request with the U.S. Supreme Court to block the counting and/or publication of election results. Supreme Court Justice Kennedy (author of the 2000 decision in Rice v. Cayetano, who was also the Justice overseeing emergencies in the 9th Circuit) issued the temporary injunction; and a few days later the full Supreme Court upheld the injunction by vote of 5-4. The case was remanded to the 9th Circuit for further proceedings. Meanwhile Na'i Aupuni, now prohibited from completing the election or publishing the results, declared that all the candidates in the election would be seated as delegates to the convention. The convention then met for the entire month of February 2016, with salaries and expenses paid by OHA, and produced a Constitution which the delegates approved. Na'i Aupuni declared that its work was finished, and dissolved itself. Later in 2016 the 9th Circuit Court ruled that the lawsuit Akina v. Hawaii was now moot because Na'i Aupuni no longer existed. On October 14, 2016, the U.S. Department of Interior proclaimed a law in the Federal Register -- a lengthy, detailed new federal regulation, to take effect on November 14 -- providing a process whereby a Hawaiian tribe could obtain federal recognition by creating a Constitution and holding an election to ratify it, and getting it approved by the Secretary of Interior. So far as the public has been informed (or not informed!) no further action has been taken since the election of President Trump in November 2016.

Throughout all the court proceedings in the District Court, the 9th Circuit Court, and the Supreme Court, the focus of attention was on the question whether OHA is an agency of the State government, and especially whether Na'i Aupuni was a government agency. Because according to the decision in Rice v. Cayetano, it is a violation of the 15th Amendment for a State government, or any agency of a State government, to hold an election where there is a racial requirement or racial restriction on who can vote. The U.S. Supreme Court, in issuing its emergency injunction against the Na'i Aupuni election, clearly relied on the precedent of Rice v. Cayetano, and clearly concluded that Na'i Aupuni was a subsidiary of the Roll Commission, and OHA, and Act 195 (2011) of the Hawaii legislature. Follow the money. Follow the chain of command. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck; then ...

The final ruling by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on remand from the Supreme Court, was handed down on August 29, 2016. It dismissed the lawsuit for being moot after Na'i Aupuni dissolved itself. The decision provides useful details, and can be viewed here:
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
No. 15-17453
D.C. No. 1:15-cv-00322- JMS-BMK
http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/ 2016/08/29/15-17134.pdf

Akina v. Hawaii - The Documents are collected here by the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii.
http://www.grassrootinstitute.org/2015/10/akina-v-hawaii-the- documents/

Further information including full text of news reports and commentary is here:
History of efforts to create a Hawaiian tribe during the 114th Congress (January 2015 through December 2016), including efforts to create a state-recognized tribe and efforts to get federal recognition through administrative rule changes, executive order, or Congressional legislation
http://big11a.angelfire.com/AkakaHist114thCong.html

----------------------

Resolution 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/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SCR&billnumber=188&year=2019
and
https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/measure_indiv.aspx?billtype=SR&billnumber=151&year=2019

TESTIMONY IN SUPPORT, WITH RECOMMENDED IMPROVEMENTS

The Center for Hawaiian Sovereignty Studies strongly supports the intent of SCR 188/sr151 requesting the Office of Hawaiian affairs to complete the 2017 independent financial audit and management review of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and its subsidiaries.

However, the language in this resolution should be strengthened This RESOLUTION REQUESTING an audit to be completed should actually be a BILL REQUIRING it.

Although it is too late in the 2019 session to introduce a new bill, it is not too late to achieve that result -- any bill now under consideration to provide funding for OHA can and should be amended to specify that no money shall be transmitted to OHA unless and until OHA has completed the internal audit mentioned in this resolution, and unless and until OHA has published the official report of an independent fiscal audit of all limited liability corporations created or controlled by OHA, as called for in SCR70/SR48; and that any funds that would otherwise be transmitted to OHA shall be reduced by ten times the amount of money that the audit shows was improperly spent or cannot be accounted for.

The legislature should go on record as affirming that OHA and all its LLCs are government agencies and therefore are subject to laws such as the State Procurement Code, State Ethics Code, Sunshine Law, and Uniform Information Practices Act. Even if this is merely a resolution requesting, and not a bill requiring; the legislature can certainly use even a humble resolution to assert its strongly held opinion that OHA and all its LLCs are indeed government agencies -- an opinion which will be future evidence of legislative intent even on other topics.

-------

PROOF THAT OHA IS A STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY CAN BE FOUND IN THE FACT THAT THE LEGISLATURE HAS COMMANDED OHA TO SPEND TRUST FUND MONEY FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES, AND OHA OBEDIENTLY COMPLIED. One proof that OHA is a State government agency is found in the fact that the Legislature has the power to command OHA to spend money for particular projects which the Legislature mandates. For example, HB1745 and its companion SB2134 in the regular session of year 2018 ordered OHA to spend OHA's own ceded land trust funds to pay for materials and staffing to greatly enlarge the number of state employees required to take a course organized by OHA to indoctrinate those employees with OHA's views regarding special rights for ethnic Hawaiians. The bills in 2018 cited a law enacted in 2015 that created this course, and made clear that the Legislature is mandating OHA to spend its own trust fund money for specific purposes:

----

IT IS LONG OVERDUE FOR THE LEGISLATURE TO REASSERT ITS RIGHTFUL AUTHORITY OVER OHA, WHICH HAS A LONG HISTORY OF ASSERTING INDEPENDENCE FROM STATE LAWS

On August 10, 2011 the online newspaper "Civil Beat" published an article entitled "OHA Employees Were Public Last Year -- But Not This Year?"

-----

There is no doubt whatsoever that OHA is an agency of the government of the State of Hawaii.

===

THE U.S. SUPREME COURT HAS RULED IN AT LEAST THREE DIFFERENT CASES, BETWEEN YEARS 2000 TO 2016, THAT THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS IS INDEED A STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY

1. RICE V. CAYETANO, 2000, REGARDING THE RIGHT OF ALL REGISTERED VOTERS, REGARDLESS OF RACE, TO VOTE FOR BOARD MEMBERS OF THE OFFICE OF HAWAIIAN AFFAIRS

http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/ 2016/08/29/15-17134.pdf

RICE v. CAYETANO 528 U.S. 495 (2000) Decided February 23, 2000

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-818.ZS.html

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/pdf/98-818P.ZO

p.25
"Although it is apparent that OHA has a unique position under state law, it is just as apparent that it remains an arm of the State."

----

Hawaii v. Office of Hawaiian Affairs, 556 U.S. 163 (2009)
No. 07�1372. Argued February 25, 2009--Decided March 31, 2009

----

Akina v. Hawaii - The Documents are collected here by the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii.
http://www.grassrootinstitute.org/2015/10/akina-v-hawaii-the- documents/

==========================
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HAWAIIAN SOVEREIGNTY BILLS AND RESOLUTIONS IN THE STATE LEGISLATURE IN PREVIOUS YEARS -- TESTIMONY BY KEN CONKLIN AND SOME MEMBERS OF THE ALOHA FOR ALL AND GRASSROOT INSTITUTE GROUPS.

Personal note by Ken Conklin: I came permanently to live in Hawaii in 1992. From then until 1998 I spent full time doing independent study about Hawaiian language, history, and culture. I felt a strong spiritual relationship with the land and people, which I sensed on three summer vacations beginning 1982 and was one of my main motives for coming to live here permanently. Because of the beautiful spirituality in Hawaiian music, hula, and legends, I was inclined to go along with the historical victimhood narrative pushed by Hawaiian sovereignty activists on such topics as the overthrow of the monarchy (1893), annexation (1898), and statehood (1959). I attended a large number of Hawaiian sovereignty rallies, panel discussions at University of Hawaii, and conversations in public places or in private homes; and read many books. But having a Ph.D. in philosophy I am accustomed to studying issues that are both complex and controversial, asking lots of questions, and doing research. And my masters in Mathematics made me feel a need to be logical and keep my beliefs clear and consistent. The more questions I asked, the more my erstwhile "friends" began questioning my "loyalty" to them and to their movement. In many cases they did not know the facts; and in some cases they did know the facts but persisted in telling me half-truths or outright lies. It took many months of soul-searching, gut-wrenching introspection to figure things out; and then everything fit together within a few days and I saw the whole gestalt picture -- the face of evil in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement. Since then I gradually began stepping out of private life, writing letters to editor, creating this website, running as a candidate for OHA trustee in 2000, writing my book, etc. I began writing testimony on bills in Congress and in the state legislature around year 1999. For the past decade the internet has made it increasingly easy to keep up to date about bills in the legislature and to submit testimony by email or through the legislature's website.

Below are some webpages providing testimony to the Hawaii legislature over the years, mostly by myself but also some by friends who were members of the Aloha For All and Grassroot Institute of Hawaii groups. This is an incomplete list, but it shows the kind of issues arising in the legislature over time and how civil rights activists are fighting back in an effort to protect unity, equality, and aloha for all. There's a gathering storm in Hawaii as racial supremacists demand either creation of a racial separatist tribe recognized by the state and federal governments, or else restoration of Hawaii's status as an independent nation with racial supremacy for ethnic Hawaiians under the modern theory of "indigenous rights." See my book "Hawaiian Apartheid: Racial Separatism and Ethnic Nationalism in the Aloha State"
http://tinyurl.com/2a9fqa

I hope that Hawaii citizens who read the bills and testimony in the 2019 legislature, and in the legislatures since 2002, will see the dangers, rise to the occasion, and hold their state Senators and Representatives accountable.

Here are webpages covering State of Hawaii legislation related to Hawaiian sovereignty in previous years, listed in reverse chronological order (most recent listed first).

Hawaii Legislature 2018 -- Bills and Resolutions Related to Hawaiian Sovereignty. Text, testimony, and outcome.

Hawaii Legislature 2017 -- Bills and Resolutions Related to Hawaiian Sovereignty. Text, testimony, and outcome.

Hawaii Legislature 2016 -- Bills and Resolutions Related to Hawaiian Sovereignty. Text, testimony, and outcome.

Hawaii Legislature 2015 -- Bills and Resolutions Related to Hawaiian Sovereignty. Text, testimony, and outcome.

In 2014 no compilation was kept of racist bills in the Hawaii state legislature. However, special attention was given to very dangerous legislation creating and expanding a racial registry for building a Hawaiian tribe. See webpage

"Building a Hawaiian tribe through actions of the state legislature: May 2014 progress report (Roll Commission failure to follow the requirements of enabling legislation Act 195; identity theft of 87,000 names from earlier racial registries; enrollment of minor children; legislative hearing as cheerleader rather than oversight enforcer; and more issues)" at
https://www.angelfire.com/big09/KanaiolowaluMay2014ProgRpt.html

March 11, 2013: Racial entitlement bills in the 2013 Hawaii legislature (and how all the Republicans except Senator Slom and Representative McDermott are voting in lockstep with the Democrats)

February 10, 2013: U.S. apology resolution 20th anniversary -- A resolution was introduced in the Hawaii legislature to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the U.S. apology resolution; and testimony was offered to the Hawaii legislature in the form of a substitute resolution explaining that the apology resolution is filled with falsehoods, has produced bad consequences, and should be repealed.

July 24, 2011: Racial set-asides of land, money, and political power -- how Act 195 will move Hawaii toward New Zealand and Fiji

July 12, 2011: Gearing up for the divorce -- Klub Kanaka greedily looks ahead to property division and alimony from the State of Hawaii (Hawaii House Committee on Hawaiian Affairs holds informational briefing for government departments to tell how they can help implement Act 195 creating a state-recognized tribe)

May 4, 2011: Hawaii begins to create a state-recognized tribe. SB1520 passed the legislature on May 3, 2011. Why did they do it? What happens now?

April 1, 2011: HR258 and HCR293 in the Hawaii legislature of 2011 -- A resolution to rip the Treaty of Annexation out of the hand of President McKinley in his statue in front of McKinley High School

March 22, 2011: HCR107 in the Hawaii legislature of 2011 -- A resolution establishing a joint legislative investigating committee to investigate the status of two executive agreements entered into in 1893 between United States President Grover Cleveland and Queen Liliuokalani of the Hawaiian Kingdom, called the Liliuokalani assignment and the agreement of restoration.

February 3, 2009: Ceded lands issues in the Hawaii Legislature, 2009

February 3, 2009: Legislation in Hawaii in 2009 to declare ethnic Hawaiians as an indigenous people

January 17, 2009: Office of Hawaiian Affairs -- Watching the Moves It Makes in 2009 to Expand the Evil Empire. Subpages include protest of Supreme Court ceded lands case; OHA demand for legislative moratorium on ceded land sales; OHA demand for "back rent" settlement; Akaka bill; other issues as they arise in 2009 including Waimea Valley, Waokele o Puna, etc. Links to coverage of evil Empire expansion in previous years.

January 14, 2009: Some important issues for the Hawaii Legislature in 2009. Stop the giveaway. Just say no.

October 12, 2008: Iolani Palace and the Golden Jubilee of Hawaii Statehood. The Palace was the Capitol of the Republic of Hawaii (1894-1898), Territory of Hawaii (1898-1959), and State of Hawaii (1959-1968), where the transition to Statehood took place in 1959. But the state government is now prohibiting use of the Palace for jubilee celebration due to threats from secessionists and concerns for political correctness.