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document.write('<li class="rss-item"><a class="rss-item" href="https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/04/how-would-queen-liliuokalani-and-father-damien-legislate/" target="_self">How Would Queen Liliuokalani And Father Damien Legislate?</a><br />');
document.write('<span class="rss-date">Fri, 19 Apr 2019 10:01:54 +0000</span><br />');
document.write('As Notre Dame Cathedral burned, people — Catholic or not, French or not — mourned. Buildings stand for something — good and bad — that we cannot always put into words. As the legislative session draws to a close here in Hawaii, it is worth asking what the State Capitol, watched over by Queen Liliuokalani and Father Damien, stands for. Will what emerges from the 2019 legislative session be policies that put people before corporations? Will the beloved, principled queen who put her people before her throne, or the saint who gave his life caring for the sick who had been shunned, lend their blessing to what emerges from the legislative chambers of today? The spirit of these two exemplars of good government and love of one’s neighbor hovers over those banging gavels, making speeches and casting votes on the floor, as much as those watching from the gallery, and those chanting for justice from the rotunda. Will our lawmakers respond to the spirit of what Queen Liliuokalani and Father Damien represent or will they succumb to the pressure of contributors to their last campaign — lest they not be there for the next? The statues of Father Damien and Queen Liliuokalani on the Capitol grounds. The fight over water rights and REITS has pitted Alexander & Baldwin against the community in ways that have been made clear through the rallies outside the company’s headquarters, and the efforts of advocates from the neighbor islands who flew to Honolulu to be present at the State Capitol at crucial points in this legislative session. Sen. Russell Ruderman invoked the words of Spike Lee last week, reminding his fellow senators of the need to “do the right thing.” Grassroots activism has helped. But the community is still wondering if lawmakers will come through with a living wage. Time is running out — not just for this legislative session — but for the families reduced to living on the sidewalks of a city that depends on enticing people to what is touted as “paradise.” Dignity And Legacy We are now the paradise of makeshift tarp-roofed “villages” where families — the old, the young, the wheel-chair bound, and those who are working two jobs at minimum wage — barely subsist. The state knows that $21,000 a year does not cover the cost of rent, food and essentials for a single person in this high cost state. Businesspeople like me know this too. What are we going to do about it? I volunteer once a week at the Catholic Worker House on the grounds of St. Elizabeth’s Episcopal Church in Kalihi. It’s an education. We hand out food bags, take in or return laundry, accept or return phones that need to be charged or have been charged, and pass on mail that arrives at this oasis for the needy, run by lay Franciscans. The State Capitol should stand for something that lights a fire within us. There is always a little conversation with each person as they sign in. One conversation remains indelible. As he signed for his bag of food, this man in his 40s or 50s, said calmly, “I want to die.” He just kept repeating: “I want to die,” even as he politely accepted the bag of food items. I have not seen him on subsequent visits. Each week I hope he will come by again. As we look toward sine die on May 2, we, the people of Hawaii, should ask lawmakers what they plan to do about all those for whom life has reached the point of desperation. All those who cannot pay for their own food and shelter, even after a full day’s labor. Both Queen Liliuokalani and Father Damien put the lives and dignity of people first. Our lawmakers should respect their legacy by enacting a living wage this year. The State Capitol should stand for something that lights a fire within us. The post How Would Queen Liliuokalani And Father Damien Legislate? appeared first on Honolulu Civil Beat.');
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document.write('<li class="rss-item"><a class="rss-item" href="https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/04/can-a-sustainable-industry-be-built-from-an-invasive-species/" target="_self">Can A Sustainable Industry Be Built From An Invasive Species?</a><br />');
document.write('<span class="rss-date">Fri, 19 Apr 2019 10:01:25 +0000</span><br />');
document.write('When Joey Valenti built his dome-shaped tiny house on University Avenue a year ago, it was designed in part to rebut skeptics who said albizia wood was too light and weak to use as a building material. Valenti proved the skeptics wrong with his celebrated, striking structure. He also raised another, bigger question: Why couldn’t Hawaii harvest and process albizia as a building material? The answers highlight many of the problems associated with growing the manufacturing sector in Hawaii. Even with an abundant raw material like albizia – an invasive species that needs to be removed – growing a manufacturing sector in Hawaii can be daunting. Shipping costs, labor, the need for capital investments, a relatively small and uncertain local demand: all of these pose obstacles to starting something new. Joey Valenti’s Albizia Project on the University of Hawaii campus shows the invasive wood can be used as a building material.Stewart Yerton/Civil Beat “That building itself is a myth-buster,” said Matthew Lynch, director of sustainability initiatives for the University of Hawaii. “It shows you can build with albizia and build beautifully.” But can it be the basis for an industry? “What we’re finding is the word ‘industry’ is tough here,” Valenti said. “It can be done. It’s just at what scale and what market does it work for?” “The supply chain exists,” said Lynch. “But it’s not robust yet.” To be sure, there’s no shortage of trees, says Philipp LaHaela Walter, who works on forestry policy issues for the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources. Albizias grow fast, creating a canopy that prevents the growth of native species. They are a fire hazard. And they have a nasty reputation for blowing down in high winds. “If we had built this with Doug fir from Home Depot, would it have been cheaper? Probably,” says Joey Valenti, architect of the Albizia Project.Stewart Yerton/Civil Beat Albizias are such a menace that a group called the Big Island Invasive Species Committee, also known as the Albizia Assassins, has set out to eradicate the trees on Hawaii Island. The organization claims to have killed approximately 12,000 trees in 2017 alone. There’s no argument that removing albizia is a good thing, said Walter, state resource and survey forester for DLNR’s Division of Forestry and Wildlife. The challenge is creating a regular supply of trees needed to support an industry. Many of the trees are in remote areas, far from access roads, Walter said. And many that happen to be near roads also are sometimes near structures, which create technical challenges when arborists go to cut them down. Related Beyond Hotels And Beaches: Can Hawaii Really Diversify Its Economy? April 2, 2019 Carlie Procell/Civil Beat Hawaii’s Population Decline Signals Future Economic Challenges April 4, 2019 AP The High Price Of Luring The Movies To Hawaii April 16, 2019 “Since it’s pretty scattered across the state, this is an issue,” Walter said. “You cannot supply a constant flow of the resource.” And, Walter said, there’s another problem: a relative shortage of wood mills needed to process the trees into planks. In the continental U.S., there are mills that can process a tree every 30 seconds, Walter said. Wood grown in Hawaii can’t compete with that, he said. Plus, there’s the added cost of shipping from Hawaii. “That’s just a level of automation and efficiency that our local operations just can’t compete with,” Walter said. What Hawaii does have, Walter said, is a collection of smaller operations that can fill a niche market for high-end wood. Plenty Of Supplies; Small Market Waimanalo Wood is a case in point. The small sawmill and lumberyard was a co-sponsor of Valenti’s Albizia Project. And Waimanalo Wood’s co-owner, Miles Luedtke, said albizia presents a major opportunity for operations like his. On a recent morning, the mill was buzzing with activity. Customers were perusing the big planks of tropical woods — monkeypod, koa, lychee and the like – that Waimanalo Wood specializes in selling. And in the back of the hangar-like space, Cortney Gusick, founder of Pahiki Caskets, was sanding a piece made out of monkeypod that was destined for Dodo Mortuary in Hilo. Luedtke calls his operation a “tropical micro mill.” It’s essentially a vertically integrated exotic wood seller that makes a business out of processing logs that otherwise would be destined for the wood chipper. Many are trees that need to be removed after falling on people’s property. Miles Luedtke of Waimanalo Wood says the plans to build a house with albizia were met with derision. A big proponent of albizia, Luedtke recalls the naysayers who questioned Valenti’s project. “We got a lot of derisive comments: You can’t sell that. It’s trash. It’s weak,” Luedtke recalls. “Then Joey built a house out of it.” Luedtke’s goal is to create a market for albizia. Gusick makes most of her caskets from the wood, and Luedtke has been experimenting with crafting furniture from albizia. But creating demand is tough, even with the cool structure in Manoa. And until there’s clear demand for the product, there’s unlikely to be an investor who will step up to create a large processing facility, Walter says. Fast-growing albizia trees are an invasive species that the state is trying to eradicate.Courtesy: Forest and Kim Starr Luedtke has a vision of small independent operators harvesting trees and processing them into rough cut planks on portable mini-mills. The environment could benefit, and so could local economies, he said. The idea, he says, is for “Hawaiians in rural communities to be the stewards and beneficiaries of this natural resource.” Another idea: to create a cooperative or association of smaller mills to process the trees from rough cut green planks to the more refined dried lumber used as building material. “That totally makes sense,” Walter said. “But nobody’s really taking the lead on that, and I don’t have the capacity to take the lead.” Costs Are Unclear The cost of building with albizia also isn’t clear. Valenti said that in terms of strength and durability, albizia can be processed to be as strong as Douglas fir, a standard material in the construction industry. But Valenti said he is still working to calculate the cost of building with albizia versus wood imported from outside of the islands. Many of his project’s sponsors donated work, so figuring out all of the processing costs is tricky. “Really the way I think about it is we can evolve business and enterprise. We can create a new species of business.” — Matthew Lynch, director of sustainability initiatives, University of Hawaii “If we had built this with Doug fir from Home Depot, would it have been cheaper? Probably,” he said, standing inside the hulking dome of his structure on the University of Hawaii campus in Manoa. “But you’re competing with a huge lumber industry on the mainland.” By contrast, his trees came from the back of Manoa Valley, where they had been cut down and piled up to rot. And that’s the point, says Lynch. A former banker, Lynch is looking at the economics of albizia and the positive side effects of using its lumber as a building material. Getting rid of a nuisance has inherent value, Lynch said. And there’s additional value in clearing forests to make space for more valuable native trees like koa, which also help protect the watershed, he said. A question is how to quantify and make money off these positive side effects, to turn what economists refer to as positive externalities into a form of capital that can serve as the basis for a new business model, Lynch said. “Really the way I think about it is we can evolve business and enterprise,” he said. “We can create a new species of business.” It might seem like heady stuff for an architecture student who merely set out to build a cool house out of discarded trees. But Valenti sees a quickening movement. “I feel like we’re approaching that tipping point,” he said. “I think we’re close.” “Hawaii’s Changing Economy” is supported by a grant from the Hawaii Community Foundation as part of its CHANGE Framework project. The post Can A Sustainable Industry Be Built From An Invasive Species? appeared first on Honolulu Civil Beat.');
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document.write('<li class="rss-item"><a class="rss-item" href="https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/04/ige-assures-caldwell-of-ala-wai-flood-control-financing-plan/" target="_self">Ige Assures Caldwell Of Ala Wai Flood Control Financing Plan</a><br />');
document.write('<span class="rss-date">Fri, 19 Apr 2019 10:01:01 +0000</span><br />');
document.write('Hawaii Gov. David Ige is reassuring city leaders that the state remains committed to help fund the Ala Wai flood control project, despite the Legislature’s refusal so far to pass a spending bill for that effort. In a letter sent Thursday to Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell, Ige notes that the state will include in its biennium budget debt service payments on the $125 million it eventually needs to contribute to the sweeping flood control project. “Consistent with our agreement, I am committed to seek state funding for the local sponsor’s one-time share of the project,” Ige told Caldwell. The move essentially keeps the state’s foot in the door: It allows it to commit some funding now, on debt service, while paying the lion’s share later. The $125 million represents the local match for Congress’ appropriation of $345 million for the project last year, received with the help of former U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa. Water levels due to king tides rise along the Ala Wai Canal in 2018.Cory Lum/Civil Beat “For the state of Hawaii, whenever the the federal government gives us $220 million to do a project, we think it is very important to move a project forward,” said Ford Fuchigami, the governor’s administrative director. “And that is the reason the governor and I put so much effort to come up with the $125 million to move this project forward.” A spending bill for that local match, Senate Bill 77, died in this year’s legislative session after House Finance Chairwoman Sylvia Luke asserted that the city had refused to sign a deal with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Caldwell took issue with that assertion in an April 11 letter to House and Senate leaders imploring that they provide the funding. Army Corps officials have estimated that Waikiki, with its 54,000 residents and nearly 80,000 daily visitors, faces an annual 1% chance of a major flood that would cause $1.14 billion in damage to more than 3,000 structures. The neighboring low-lying communities of Moiliili, McCully and lower Makiki would face residual flooding, they said. The issue stems from costly decisions about a century ago to create the Ala Wai Canal, destroying the wetlands that once absorbed rushing floodwaters and leaving heavy development in their place. Caldwell said the funding was a matter of public safety for the Ala Wai basin, and that the island risked losing its federal dollars if it failed to provide the local match. Nonetheless, the Ala Wai project has met intense opposition among residents and schools in Manoa and other upland areas, where the Army Corps intends to create detention basins and debris catchment structures. Caldwell was unavailable for comment late Thursday. House Speaker Scott Saiki declined to comment. Ige’s letter to Caldwell was the second time in one day that the governor inserted himself into controversial matters pending before the Legislature. He also sent a letter Thursday to the leaders of the House and Senate asking them to reconsider House Bill 1326, the water rights measure. The governor’s Ala Wai letter also states that the Army Corps agreed to allow the state to defer its payments until after the the project was completed. Read Ige’s letter here: The post Ige Assures Caldwell Of Ala Wai Flood Control Financing Plan appeared first on Honolulu Civil Beat.');
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document.write('<li class="rss-item"><a class="rss-item" href="https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/04/protecting-marine-creatures-may-help-slow-climate-change/" target="_self">Protecting Marine Creatures May Help Slow Climate Change</a><br />');
document.write('<span class="rss-date">Fri, 19 Apr 2019 10:01:00 +0000</span><br />');
document.write('As the prospect of catastrophic effects from climate change becomes increasingly likely, a search is on for innovative ways to reduce the risks. One potentially powerful and low-cost strategy is to recognize and protect natural carbon sinks – places and processes that store carbon, keeping it out of Earth’s atmosphere. Forests and wetlands can capture and store large quantities of carbon. These ecosystems are included in climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies that 28 countries have pledged to adopt to fulfill the Paris Climate Agreement. So far, however, no such policy has been created to protect carbon storage in the ocean, which is Earth’s largest carbon sink and a central element of our planet’s climate cycle. As a marine biologist, my research focuses on marine mammal behavior, ecology and conservation. Now I also am studying how climate change is affecting marine mammals – and how marine life could become part of the solution. A pod of pilot whales mill off the coast of Lanai. Scientists say whales  can trap and store carbon for long periods of time.Nathan Eagle/Civil Beat (NMFS Research Permit No. 15330) What Is Marine Vertebrate Carbon? Marine animals can sequester carbon through a range of natural processes that include storing carbon in their bodies, excreting carbon-rich waste products that sink into the deep sea, and fertilizing or protecting marine plants. In particular, scientists are beginning to recognize that vertebrates, such as fish, seabirds and marine mammals, have the potential to help lock away carbon from the atmosphere. I am currently working with colleagues at UN Environment/GRID-Arendal, a United Nations Environment Programme center in Norway, to identify mechanisms through which marine vertebrates’ natural biological processes may be able to help mitigate climate change. So far we have found at least nine examples. One of my favorites is Trophic Cascade Carbon. Trophic cascades occur when change at the top of a food chain causes downstream changes to the rest of the chain. As an example, sea otters are top predators in the North Pacific, feeding on sea urchins. In turn, sea urchins eat kelp, a brown seaweed that grows on rocky reefs near shore. Importantly, kelp stores carbon. Increasing the number of sea otters reduces sea urchin populations, which allows kelp forests to grow and trap more carbon. Carbon stored in living organisms is called Biomass Carbon, and is found in all marine vertebrates. Large animals such as whales, which may weigh up to 50 tons and live for over 200 years, can store large quantities of carbon for long periods of time. When they die, their carcasses sink to the seafloor, bringing a lifetime of trapped carbon with them. This is called Deadfall Carbon. On the deep seafloor, it can be eventually buried in sediments and potentially locked away from the atmosphere for millions of years. Whales can also help to trap carbon by stimulating production of tiny marine plants called phytoplankton, which use sunlight and carbon dioxide to make plant tissue just like plants on land. The whales feed at depth, then release buoyant, nutrient-rich fecal plumes while resting at the surface, which can fertilize phytoplankton in a process that marine scientists call the Whale Pump. And whales redistribute nutrients geographically, in a sequence we refer to as the Great Whale Conveyor Belt. They take in nutrients while feeding at high latitudes then release these nutrients while fasting on low-latitude breeding grounds, which are typically nutrient-poor. Influxes of nutrients from whale waste products such as urea can help to stimulate phytoplankton growth. Finally, whales can bring nutrients to phytoplankton simply by swimming throughout the water column and mixing nutrients towards the surface, an effect researchers term Biomixing Carbon. Fish poo also plays a role in trapping carbon. Some fish migrate up and down through the water column each day, swimming toward the surface to feed at night and descending to deeper waters by day. Here they release carbon-rich fecal pellets that can sink rapidly. This is called Twilight Zone Carbon. These fish may descend to depths of 1,000 feet or more, and their fecal pellets can sink even farther. Twilight Zone Carbon can potentially be locked away for tens to hundreds of years because it takes a long time for water at these depths to recirculate back towards the surface. Quantifying The  Carbon To treat “blue carbon” associated with marine vertebrates as a carbon sink, scientists need to measure it. One of the first studies in this field, published in 2010, described the Whale Pump in the Southern Ocean, estimating that a historic pre-whaling population of 120,000 sperm whales could have trapped 2.2 million tons of carbon yearly through whale poo. Another 2010 study calculated that the global pre-whaling population of approximately 2.5 million great whales would have exported nearly 210,000 tons of carbon per year to the deep sea through Deadfall Carbon. That’s equivalent to taking roughly 150,000 cars off the road each year. A 2012 study found that by eating sea urchins, sea otters could potentially help to trap 150,000 to 22 million tons of carbon per year in kelp forests. Even more strikingly, a 2013 study described the potential for lanternfish and other Twilight Zone fish off the western U.S. coast to store over 30 million tons of carbon per year in their fecal pellets. Scientific understanding of marine vertebrate carbon is still in its infancy. Most of the carbon-trapping mechanisms that we have identified are based on limited studies, and can be refined with further research. So far, researchers have examined the carbon-trapping abilities of less than 1% of all marine vertebrate species. New Basis For Marine Conservation Many governments and organizations around the world are working to rebuild global fish stocks, prevent bycatch and illegal fishing, reduce pollution and establish marine protected areas. If we can recognize the value of marine vertebrate carbon, many of these policies could qualify as climate change mitigation strategies. In a step in this direction, the International Whaling Commission passed two resolutions in 2018 that recognized whales’ value for carbon storage. As science advances in this field, protecting marine vertebrate carbon stocks ultimately might become part of national pledges to fulfill the Paris Agreement. Marine vertebrates are valuable for many reasons, from maintaining healthy ecosystems to providing us with a sense of awe and wonder. Protecting them will help ensure that the ocean can continue to provide humans with food, oxygen, recreation and natural beauty, as well as carbon storage. Steven Lutz, Blue Carbon Programme leader at GRID-Arendal, contributed to this article. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The post Protecting Marine Creatures May Help Slow Climate Change appeared first on Honolulu Civil Beat.');
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document.write('<li class="rss-item"><a class="rss-item" href="https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/04/case-trump-has-not-been-exonerated-by-mueller-report/" target="_self">Case: Trump ‘Has Not Been Exonerated’ By Mueller Report</a><br />');
document.write('<span class="rss-date">Fri, 19 Apr 2019 01:53:18 +0000</span><br />');
document.write('U.S. Rep. Ed Case, Hawaii’s newest congressman who had promised to take a wait-and-see approach to the investigation of President Trump by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, said Thursday he was shocked by revelations in the 448-page redacted version of the report. Speaking to reporters at the State Capitol, Case said an unedited version needs to be released immediately, and that Congress should turn to the courts if the Trump administration is unwilling to do so. “Clearly what I have read of the report is highly disturbing and although Mr Mueller did not find overt collusion, certainly many, many people turned a blind eye” to Russian intervention in the 2016 presidential election, Case said. “There is compelling evidence” that a number of people engaged in activities that “could rise to the level of a crime,” said Case, a moderate Democrat. Congressman Ed Case, right, talked to reporters in the Hawaii Capitol Rotunda on Thursday about the Mueller Report.Cory Lum/Civil Beat Contrary to Trump’s assertion that the report found there was no collusion with Russia or obstruction of justice, Case said the report makes a strong case for the opposite. “He has not been exonerated … Nobody can read that report and consider that the president has been exonerated.” Case said that the summary of the report released in March by Attorney General William P. Barr misled the American public. “I think you see a pretty deliberate effort to cherry-pick for interpretations” that would place Trump in a favorable light, Case said. President Trump has called the investigation a “witch hunt” that is interfering with getting things done in Washington. Case acknowledged that the investigation has been “highly divisive,” but added, “the fact that (investigations) are polarizing and disruptive does not mean that you don’t do them. That is our job.” His views were echoed from Vietnam by U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono. “Despite the Attorney General’s attempt to spin the Mueller Report in Donald Trump’s favor, it’s clear the Special Counsel’s investigation found serious wrongdoing by the President and many of his associates,” the Hawaii Democrat said in a statement Thursday. Hirono is participating in a military fact-finding mission to Asia with Senate colleagues. “The Special Counsel also confirmed what our intelligence community had already unanimously concluded: that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 election to elect Donald Trump,” she said. “Although the Special Counsel felt he couldn’t meet the high bar necessary to prove criminal conspiracy with the Russians, he demonstrated that Donald Trump and his campaign were willing to engage with our foremost adversary to gain an advantage in the 2016 election. This is just wrong, plain and simple.” Case said before he took office in January that he was taking a wait-and-see approach to the Mueller investigation. On Thursday, he had reached some conclusions.Cory Lum/Civil Beat The redacted report released Thursday provided evidence that the Russians had sought to interfere with the U.S. election to derail the campaign of Hillary Clinton and promote Trump. “The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion,” the report stated. It also found that the Russians had hacked the Democratic National Committee’s computer network, causing sensitive emails to be publicly released, some of them through the organization Wikileaks. At a press conference in Washington on Thursday, Barr said the full Mueller report did not find “any evidence that members of the Trump campaign or anyone associated with the campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its hacking operations.” In early April, Case told voters at a town hall meeting in Ewa Beach that he did not believe the initial Mueller report, as represented by Barr, merited an effort to impeach the president. But he said that he would be willing to pursue the impeachment of Trump if he believed the facts showed that the president had behaved unacceptably. “I am not shy about exercising that responsibility if I feel it’s warranted,” Case said at the time. On Thursday, Case said that he continues to believe that impeachment may not be the way to proceed. But he urged people to read the report for themselves. “You can’t read this report without re-evaluating your conclusions to date,” Case said. The post Case: Trump ‘Has Not Been Exonerated’ By Mueller Report appeared first on Honolulu Civil Beat.');
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