Photos of the Week - January 30, 2012.

It was a great weekend for sunset photos. Here are some from Ala Moana Beach Park.



The sunset crowd (above and below).



Honolulu's beautiful Ala Moana Sunset.



After sunset, dusk.



Hope you enjoyed these. Have a nice week. More photos to be posted by this weekend. Aloha!

More photos at my Flickr photostream.

Danger! Legislature In Session

Can anything be more dangerous than having the Legislature back in session? For our wallets it always is.

Since the Hawaii State Legislature is dominated by a Democrat majority in both the Senate and House, their socialistic agenda is sure to make progress again this year. Hot on the table among Democrat sponsored bills are more tax increases, more fee increases, a new and hefty fee for plastic and paper bags, a possible ban on paper bags, more funding for social programs at a time when the State does not have enough money, "make work" construction programs (where's the money?), gambling, and more taxpayer funded bailouts.

Can we continue to afford the taxes and fees being proposed by the 2012 legislature? No way. They took more than enough money from us in the previous 10 years already. Remember rail? The bottle tax? Cell phone 9-11 tax? Higher gasoline taxes? Ethanol tax? More???

Last year GE Tax exemptions were taken away from many businesses. That has increased the cost for goods and service for many consumers. Wonder why a flight from Honolulu to neighbor islands is so expensive? The local air carrier which has been hard hit by high fuel prices has also been hit by the "take away" of GE Tax exemptions. Now they have to pay more taxes (in addition to higher fuel costs) and pass the increased prices on to us.

We need a break from the expensive state, county and federal governments. Less taxes, less regulation, more freedom and more money in our pockets is what we need. Hold on to your wallets!

Chaotic Five: Classic Rock Lives in Hawaii

There is hope rock still lives in the next generation. Caught a free Ala Moana Shopping Center concert featuring these pint size rockers who excel in musicianship and can belt out the classic rock tunes with the best of them. They're Chaotic Five, billed as Hawaii's youngest classic rock band.

Young they are. Most of them seem to be just around 10 years old... maybe younger. The songs they sing are decades older than they. Last night's set included covers of Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot," Heart's "Barracuda," Guns n Roses' "Sweet Child O' Mine", Blondie's "Call Me" and Journey's "Separate Ways" and "Anyway You Want It". Wow. They rock.

Check the video links below:





More Links:

Chaotic Five on YouTube

Chaotic Five on Facebook

Oppsed to SOPA and PIPA

Yes, I'm opposed to censorship of the internet by the music and movie business. The bills written to do this should be opposed by everyone who values a free and open internet. Don't let government take this away from us.

LINKS:

https://blacklist.eff.org/

http://www.redstate.com/neil_stevens/2012/01/18/sopa-and-protect-ippipa-an-update/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act

Photos of the Week: Sunday Morning Sunrise

This series was taken on the morning of January 8, 2012 at Ala Moana Beach Park at the Magic Island end. Getting up early for the sunrise usually yields a special, visual treat.

The Latest Update on Rail

HonoluluTraffic.com's Cliff Slate is a longtime opponent of the rail project.

The Latest Update on Rail
From Honolulu Traffic.com

I am still opposed to the rail project. Honolulu Traffic.com released the following statement regarding rail (see below). In a related development, former Hawaii Governor Ben Cayetano has announced that he will look into the possibility of running for Honolulu Mayor on an anti-rail platform. Cayetano has also been a longtime opponent of fixed, heavy rail. As a result, Dr. Panos Prevedouros who also opposes the heavy rail project announced that he will not run for mayor this election season. He may support Cayetano's bid.

Here is the statement from HonoluluTraffic.com:

Revised 12/31/2011.

The revision are marked in red

Where the Rail Project stands today

Here is the sequence of events that has to occur before the City can begin building rail:

1. The City/HART has been given permission by the FTA to enter the Final Design phase. However, FTA put so many qualifications on their “approval” of the financial plan that it is not really an approval at all. See our discussion on the main page of December 29.

2. Congress must approve the $1.5 billion in federal funding for the project.

3. The FTA and the City must agree on a Full Funding Grant Agreement (FFGA)

that will for the first time spell out what federal funds will be available to the

City.

       4. At some time before the FFGA the FTA may approve a Letter of No Prejudice

(LONP) allowing the City to start rail construction using its own funds.

5. During this period the city and FTA must also prevail in the federal lawsuit,

Honolulutraffic.com et al. v. FTA and the City.

The precarious state of the financial plan for rail was made clear to the City when they were given permission to enter the Preliminary Engineering process a year ago. The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) wrote,

“Further, the City should be aware that FTA's standards for the financial rating are higher for entry into final design than for entry into PE. The higher standard for final design includes an assessment of the robustness of the financial plan against increases in costs, shortfalls in revenue streams, and competing demands on funding sources. Some elements of the current financial plan may not fare well in the stress tests that FTA will apply to evaluate robustness. These elements include the projected revenue stream from the General Excise Tax, the diversion of FTA Section 5307 funds from ongoing capital needs of the bus system, and the increasing share of the City's annual budget that is required to fund the transit system. Were this plan submitted today in support of a request to advance the project into final design, its weaknesses would likely cause FTA to deny the request. Therefore, continued development and strengthening of the financial plan will be a crucial part of the PE effort.”

Further the FTA wrote in its FY 2011 Financial Assessment,

“Given that GET surcharge revenues are highly leveraged in the financial plan, any shortfall in revenue would have material consequences on the City's ability to finance the local share of project cost, unless other sources of capital funds are identified.” 

And here is what the FTA wrote in their FY2011 Financial Assessment:

“The capital cost estimates/planning assumptions sub-factor is rated Low. The major factors contributing to this rating are: (i) material downside risks to the GET surcharge revenue forecast, and consequently the inability to cover all debt service cost; (ii) no net debt capacity; and (iii) lack of information to substantiate the City's capacity to absorb a material amount (up to $535 million) of cost risk. In addition to these concerns, bus capital funding - clearly needed as evidenced by the relatively old age of the bus fleet - depends on a much higher level of Federal funding than has previously been the case.”

These concerns were made clear to the City prior to the bombshell revealing that the City and the EPA had entered into a consent decree for a $3.5 billion revamp of the City sewer collection system to be completed by 2020 and a further $1.55 billion for sewage treatment plants to be upgraded by 2034. Including finance charges this will total $7.2 billion.

For the City to make the financial plan robust is going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible, since the City is legally only allowed to use the GE tax surcharge, private funds, state and federal funds for construction; it may not use the General Fund.

In addition, the FTA made it clear that for rail construction they do not like the City using the $244 million in federal funds originally scheduled for bus purchases.

The City has nowhere else that it can legally turn to make up the shortfalls except federal New Starts funds presently forecast at $1.55 billion. That amount is so far out of line with what other cities are being awarded that only through Senator Inouye stretching his influence to the limit is Honolulu being considered for such a large sum.

The strange thing about the approval of the City/HART financial plan is that virtually all the same issues are raised in the approval letter. See the FTA letter at: www.honolulutraffic.com/FTA_letter_122911_OCR.pdf

Our initial legal action was a complaint filed in federal court on May 11, 2011 by plaintiffs, Honolulutraffic.com, Governor Ben Cayetano, Judge Walter Heen, Professor Randal Roth, Senator Sam Slom's SBH Educational Foundation, Hawaii's Thousand Friends, Dr. Michael Uechi MD, and Cliff Slater, against the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and the City and County of Honolulu (City).

Since then the City and the FTA have responded separately denying everything and, in addition, have jointly filed Motions to dismiss some of the plaintiffs, and to dismiss some of our allegations concerning historic properties. Our attorneys believe these are nuisance motions intended to delay matters and to try run up our legal bills so that we would be unable to continue with the lawsuit. 

We have replied to their motions and the first phase of our lawsuit, Honolulutraffic.com et al. vs. FTA and the City and County of Honolulu, will be heard in Federal Courtroom AHA KAULIKE (place of equity) this Wednesday at 10:00 AM by Judge A. Wallace Tashima, a Senior Ninth Circuit Judge of California. The order of business is first to hear the Defendants' Motion for Partial Judgment on the Pleadings, followed by a Status/Scheduling Conference. 

The hearing and the subsequent judge’s ruling resulted in the city/FTA Motion being denied on both counts. The judge has further ordered the city/FTA to produce the Administrative Record in its entirety by February 6, 2012. The scheduling conference resulted in an estimate that the final hearings and rulings should take place in mid- Summer.

At the moment we await the Administrative Record. 

Full details of the environmental process are available at

www.honolulutraffic.com/processdocs.htm Full details of the lawsuit are at www.honolulutraffic.com/LegalProcessDocs.htm

Link to the original document (PDF)

The following was released by HonoluluTraffic.com on January 1, 2012:

January 1, 2012.

Aloha Everyone,

I’m sure you have heard that the city has announced that they have received permission to enter “Final Design”, and the city is alluding to a more optimistic outlook for federal funding. The Star Advertiser headline was,

 “Rail project cleared for federal funding”

However, that headline was plain wrong. You had to read further on in the Star Advertiser to find out what the federal government was really saying.

“[FTA Administrator} Rogers noted the city's current financial plan proposes several ways the city might raise additional money if construction costs escalate unexpectedly or if the anticipated local or federal funding does not materialize.

“For example, the city suggested in its September financial plan that it might seek state approval to extend the half-percent excise tax to help cover any shortfall, and noted that extending the surcharge by two years, through Dec. 31, 2024, would generate an extra $740 million. The city also suggested that, if necessary, it might engage in "value capture" strategies to raise additional money if there is a shortfall.

Those might include issuing tax increment financing bonds, which would allow the city to borrow against expected future increases in property tax collections.”

When you read the FTA’s actual letter, the wording is even stronger:

“FTA notes that the financial plan HART submitted is sufficient to advance the project into final design. However, it must be further strengthened before FTA will consider awarding an FFGA. Specifically, the financial plan states that additional revenues may be obtained from an extension of the General Excise Tax or implementation of value capture mechanisms. However, these revenue sources require actions by the State of Hawaii and/or the City that have not been taken and which are beyond HART's ability to control. Prior to the Project's consideration for an FFGA, HART should demonstrate the availability of additional revenue sources that could be tapped should unexpected events such as cost increases or funding shortfalls occur.

“Additionally, HART made assumptions in three areas that require further justification or amendment: (1) the containment of bus and HandiVanoperating expenses; (2) the increasing share of the City's annual budget required to fund the transit system; and (3) the diversion of Section 5307 funds from preventive maintenance to the Project. Prior to the Project's consideration for an FFGA, HART should either provide further documentation justifying the reasonableness of these assumptions or consider revising these assumptions to more closely follow historical patterns.”

Carefully read the “value capture” strategy. And the last sentence from the Star Advertiser explains it all: “Those might include issuing tax increment financing bonds, which would allow the city to borrow against expected future increases in property tax collections.” In plain English, the city can borrow on the property tax hikes that they know are coming but have not yet even told you about! Do you think they are taking you for granted?

You need to email, tweet and/or post on your Facebook page your objections to more taxes for rail. Note that Verizon recently proposed a $2 user fee for people paying their bills online. Within 24 hours, they dropped the idea because of the thousands of emails and tweets they received that were adamantly opposed to it.

Here are some of the email addresses and tweet information you need to make your voice heard. Send emails, or tweet, all your friends and any email lists you have to voice your objections to any more taxation for the rail monstrosity.  And, especially email your council members with the following addresses. Make sure you include your address so that they know you are a constituent of theirs. Ask your friends to do the same.

ianderson@honolulu.gov

akobayashi@honolulu.gov

rcachola@honolulu.gov

ngarcia@honolulu.gov

tberg@honolulu.gov

emartin@honolulu.gov
Stanley Chang <ccldistrict4@honolulu.gov>

bharimoto@honolulu.gov

tgabbard@honolulu.gov

Rail proponents have started lobbying State Legislature members whose votes they need to increase General Excise Taxation and any other new taxes. Make sure they know where you stand.

Find your representative at: http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/members/legislators.aspx?chamber=H

Find your senator at: http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/members/legislators.aspx?chamber=S

All the best to everyone for the New Year!

Aloha,

Bobbie and Cliff Slater

Comment: The rail project must be stopped.

Happy New Year - 2012 is Here

The New Year arrived with the usual pomp and noise in Honolulu yesterday. 2012 will be an election year so excitement in the political field will be prevalent.

Here in Honolulu this author celebrated the arrival of 2012 with the usual low-key stance as he normally does... The major highlight of New Year's Day was to wake up early and catch the first rays of the new light of the new year. Sunrise fans flocked to Diamond Head lookout and other similar destinations to witness the first sunrise of 2012 and document all of its colorful glory. Pictures from Diamond Head lookout are posted here as well as on Flickr.





The second New Year event this author attended was the small celebration that took place at the Don Quijote Store on Kaheka Street. Things got underway at 9AM with lion dances and the bursting of hundreds of firecrackers. The lion dancers then proceeded into the store followed by a crowd of customers eager to complete their morning shopping.

Photography is generally discouraged at Don Quijote, but yesterday's event was a good excuse to break out the camera and get some images from inside the store.

Happy New Year of the Dragon.







More photos on Mel's Flickr Photostream.