Last week, we spent some time on “variance reports,” which is how our state government agencies report differences in position count and spending from one year to the next. The agencies are also supposed to report on performance measures that … Read More
Although our legislature hasn’t opened yet, legislators are at work already. The money committees, for example, have started quizzing the various executive departments on their budget requests for the upcoming biennium (2019-2020). According to law, specifically HRS section 37-75, the … Read More
Recently, the State Auditor released Report No. 18-19, which reviewed special funds, trust funds, and trust accounts of our Department of Land and Natural Resources. Under law, the Auditor is supposed to review an agency’s special, revolving, and trust funds … Read More
On November 28, our state Climate Commission, consisting of 22 county and state government officials, issued a press release affirming that it supports a carbon tax “to achieve Hawaii’s ambitious and necessary emissions reduction goals.” The climate commission includes three … Read More
We continue with our series about a timeshare association suing Maui County seeking to invalidate its “Time Share” property classification, with the county then striking back. This week, we look at whether the property classification challenged was valid. The circuit … Read More
We continue with our series about a timeshare association suing the county, with the county then back assessing the association for $10 million. Here we examine: “Are back assessments of property tax legal?” In most of our counties, the ordinances … Read More
In last week’s article we gave some background about a case working its way through the court system. Timeshare association sues county; county then back assesses association for $10 million. The first issue for our deep dive is, “Are we … Read More
This week we begin a series on a long and hotly litigated property tax case from Maui. This case isn’t about wind turbines like we wrote about a couple of weeks ago. This one involves timeshares. Some timeshare projects in … Read More
About half a year ago, we wrote about some limited liability companies formed by our Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA). These companies received cash and property, including 1,600+ acres of land in Waimea Valley, from OHA. The question we raised … Read More
Recently, there has been fierce debate over Bill 42 before the Honolulu City Council. Here’s the background: In 2007, the City passed Ordinance 07-001, which says that the Honolulu rail project would be funded only with proceeds of the general … Read More