Disappeared News

“
Why should I die for the Water Board, or at the command of an arbitrarily selected group of variously virtuous people, unless I believe that they are owed obedience, as representatives of something more divine?—from The political animal : biology, ethics, and politics, Stephen R. L. Clark, 1999, p. 147
”

by Larry Geller

We have not given up on the divine right of kings in this country. The ghost of George III still animates our model of national leadership, especially our strong need to deify our elected presidents.

While our military volunteers literally die in obedience to our own “Great Leader,” for the rest of us, it is safe to say that the political and public reaction to Obama, the first black man elected to the White House, has been strongly dependent on whether or not he is recognized as one to whom we “owe obedience,” that is, on whether or not a black man can assume a divine mantle and rule over white people. The prohibition of dark skin is deeply rooted in our religious mythology—was Jesus as light-skinned (and often light-haired) as He is most often depicted?

And so the part of the country that granted Obama near godliness elected him to his office, and then the part of the country that denies him any devine right refuses to cooperate. They feel that they owe no obedience because he could not possibly be closer to their God than they are.

So now come Trump and Clinton. Are either of them fit candidates to rule, which is to say, to don the mantle of the divine right of American presidents in January 2017?

Trump’s behavior so far is far from godly, but he has time to demonstrate some wisdom before election day. He’s a blank slate which he himself can fill in. While Trump is widely despised, he also has a following resembling a widespread religious cult. For sure, many of his followers expect him to not only build walls but to part the waters of government or to turn the thin gruel that the economy provides them with into wine. In fact, no other candidaate holds out those possibilities, though Sanders comes close in some respects (as a Messiah figure perhaps).

Clinton has a track record, and it is full of warmongering. Now, going to war is something kings have always done, but their popularity among the masses depends to a large extent on the outcomes as well as to a lesser extent on their methods. America’s wars have been disasters for so many in Asia and the near-East and so costly to American taxpayers that Clinton is already cut down a few notches on the godliness scale.

Trump is onto something with his emphasis on “winning.” No matter how cruel the dictator, or for that matter how many civilians an elected president or prime minister may dismiss as “collateral damage,” if they can win, we tend to overlook their inhumanity and cruelty.

What of Ted Cruz as a divinely-inspired ruler? I’m not the only one who has latched onto this thesis. John Boener gives him strong negative marks in this regard:

Former House Speaker John Boehner launched a verbal attack against Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz, calling him "Lucifer in the flesh" and a "miserable son of a bitch." Boehner was speaking during a forum at Stanford University. The comments were recorded by journalists from the campus paper, The Stanford Daily. This clip begins with Stanford history professor David Kennedy.

John Boehner: "Lucifer in the flesh. In Washington, I have many Democrat friends, and I have Republican friends. I get along with almost everybody. But I have never worked with a more miserable son of a bitch in my life."

[Democracy Now, Ex-House Speaker Boehner Calls Cruz "Lucifer in the Flesh", 4/29/2016]

A “Lucifer” can lead—one could cite the ascendence of the current leadership of North Korea, of Hitler, or of any of a number of dictators in the past or the present. But we, as Americans, don’t want a Lucifer as our president, hence John Boeher’s warning.

Before I end this rant, let me point out that nothing prevents our national leadership from concluding a “pact with the Devil” provided their divine rights have already been established. For such kings, almost anything is possible. So Bush Jr. can buddy up (or hold hands, even) with the cruel Saudis, yet Obama is condemned for concluding a pact with Iran. Obama’s godliness quotient was too low for him to do get away with that. 

Forget Democracy. From the evidence available, George III is our true Founding Father. We are weighing, in this election cycle, which candidate is fit to rule in his line.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/29/2016 11:59:00 AM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

by Larry Geller

Your help is needed to support a grassroots effort to solve several abuses that diminish democracy in Hawaii.

Stories break into the news and then mysteriously disappear—for example, does former House Speaker Calvin Say live in the district he represents in the House? The question isn’t settled yet even if there are no reporters covering the ongoing struggle.

Another news story that “disappeared:” Hawaii’s Office of Elections' mishandled the 2012 election (see below). Now we find outselves in another election year.

Should we just brace for more missteps, or how about fighting for improvement?

Several legal actions are gathered together in a crowdfunding page for the Hui for Good Government Hawaii. While legal action is typically costly and out of reach of good government advocacy groups, attorney Lance Collins has agreed to argue several cases pro bono (without charge) for these groups. He has argued and won good government cases including cases that have gone to the Hawaii Supreme Court—for example, he won Kanaehele v. Maui County, a Sunshine Law case, in 2013.

But there are court costs that must be paid, and other expenses related to these suits.

Citizen funding can make a difference

Fixing the 2012 election problems comes down to correcting lax rules governing election procedures. Since the Office of Elections hasn’t done this even as we now approach a new election season, it falls to concerned citizens and the court to make ‘em get their act together.

From the crowdfunding page, here is the brief description of the case filed against the Chief Elections Officer:

The Office of Elections' mishandled the 2012 election. They ran out of ballots, delivered ballots to the wrong place, and had people voting on the wrong ballots. Why? We argue they needed more and better rules to protect our right to vote. The case is before the Supreme Court and oral arguments are set for May 18 at 8:45 am.

You can attend the hearing—it’s a historic courtroom and attorney Collins argues eloquently.

Wouldn’t it feel even better if you have chipped in to correct the election errors? Sitting proudly in the front row, you’ll know that you are part of the solution that hopefully will come out of this citizen effort.

This isn’t the first time Collins has tangled with the Office of Elections:

Judge Joseph E. Cardoza granted an injunction today against Hawaii’s illegal use of electronic voting machines and the illegal transmission of vote results over the Internet. A written decision will be issued in the coming weeks, he said.

The suit (Babson v. Cronin, Civ No. 2cc08-1-000378 ) was brought by attorney Lance Collins on behalf of five citizens of Maui against Hawaii’s Chief Elections Officer (see background on Disappeared News in these articles).

[Hawaii’s 2010 elections enjoined by Maui judge, 5/20/2009]

Check out the crowdfunding page, and chip in if you can—small donations can pay the costs of keeping these actions alive.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/27/2016 12:34:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

Check it out here:

https://acluhi.org/homelessness-in-the-city-county-of-honolulu-know-your-rights/

From their news release:

Many of the rights outlined in the guide resulted from the U.S. District Court’s order in the Martin v. City and County of Honolulu lawsuit, brought by the ACLU and the law firm of Alston Hunt Floyd and Ing, in response to City sweeps.

The guide is the latest in a collection of Hawai‘i-specific “Know Your Rights” materials that the local ACLU has created, including a “First Amendment Toolkit” and a “Youth Rights Guide.”

These resources, and more, are available at www.acluhawaii.org.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/11/2016 12:08:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

by Larry Geller

It’s hard avoid the conclusion that the leaders of our state—including legislative committee chairs, legislative leadership, the Governor and his task force on homelessness—really have no intention of doing anything that has a chance of working to alleviate the crisis.

Yesterday I wrote a kind of open letter query which I did send to each task force member, with little to no expectations of a reply, of course.

Today’s Star-Advertiser story bearing the cryptic headline Shed project encounters more hurdles is just the latest chapter in the ongoing  work of fiction that is the state’s program to end homelessness.

The “shed” is a proposed homeless shelter in Kakaako. Even if completed, it won’t make much of a dent in the population of street dwellers. But will it ever be completed? it was proposed to be open in February and to be closed two years later (another reason why it really won’t help much). Don’t get me wrong—more shelter is a good thing, but is no substitute for a correctly implemented Housing First program applied on a scale to match the magnitude of the need.

Gov. David Ige’s office proposed spending $900,000 in annual operating costs for the shelter, which is supposed to operate for only two years.

But a House bill provides no money, and a Senate version includes only half of the requested annual amount, or $450,000.

Scott Morishige, the state’s homeless coordinator, said he understands the public’s frustration that the shed remains empty and unrenovated after it was intended to open in February.

[Star-Advertiser p.1, Shed project encounters more hurdles, 4/11/2016]

I’m not sure the public is frustrated that the shed remains empty—just maybe, perhaps, the public is frustrated that we are now on our third (count ‘em) state housing czar and even have a governor’s task force, but all of that is not moving people into permanent housing.

Maybe the public is frustrated because so many cannot afford soaring rents.

Now, is this simply a case of armchair quarterbacking? I don’t think so. The observation that little is moving that might help to end homelessness here is becoming self-evident as time passes and as plans and pronouncements fail to be fulfilled. The “shed,” as just the latest example, will not get started without funding, which (so far) is not forthcoming. Neither the state nor city requests are so far being funded.

About the only thing running “smoothly” is the program of daily raids on street dwellers conducted not only during the daytime but starting often from 1 a.m. or 3 a.m. Those raids do nothing to assist those affected to settle into permanent housing. At least the Mayor can no long destroy personal possessions, but it took a federal court order to stop him. I’ve gone out at night to watch the action on the streets. There’s nothing helpful about the city crews moving people along. If I hung around after a raid I would observe that people simply moved elsewhere, often around the corner, or just came back.

So will there be a renovated “shed?” Let’s see.

Will next year’s count of street dwellers increase yet again? Let’s see.

Will anyone press our state leaders to get busy on the multiple parts of the issue? Let’s see.

Can a czar without an army be effective? Let’s see.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/11/2016 11:45:00 AM   2 comments - add your comment links to this post

“
The Supreme Court never ruled that the laws the White House and the military used to incarcerate these people [Japanese-Americans during World War II]—that’s still on the books. As Justice Jackson, Robert Jackson, said, it’s a loaded gun on the Constitution—Richard Reeves, in Democracy Now interview, 4/11/2016
”

The question of whether Republican frontrunners Trup and Cruz could actually fulfill their threats to lock up all Muslims came up briefly in a Democracy Now interview in today’s program, which also touched on whether it is fair to use the term “internment camps” instead of “concentration camps.”

Click the image to go to the Democracy Now web page, which includes both a video and a transcript.

Watch the full show here.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/11/2016 07:40:00 AM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

“
It’s frustrating that eight months after Gov. David Ige formed his high-profile task force to solve chronic homelessness in Hawaii, the only sound we hear is spinning wheels.
…
The governor’s promised legislative initiative to make a big dent in homelessness has sputtered so far.—Volcanic Ash, 4/10/2016
”

David Shapipro devoted his Vocanic Ash column in today’s Star-Advertiser to detailing the failure that is Hawaii’s response to its growing homelessness crisis. No one else in the commercial media has had the guts to call this non-effort for the failure it is so far.

If you’ve been reading Disappeared News over the past year you’ve seen that I’ve said pretty much the same thing—of course, Shapiro is a much better writer.

So there’s two of us.

Where are the reporters and editors? Where are the social workers at NASW, Catholic Charities, etc? Where are the mental health advocates at Mental Health America of Hawaii and NAMI?

But most of all, where are the members of Governor Ige’s emergency task force?

Shapiro notes that (in my words, not his) the Legislature and City Council have both obstructed progress by denying or drastically reducing funding requests for programs that would move people from the streets into permanent housing.

Evidence has shown that it is cheaper to put people into permanent housing than to pay for ER visits and perpetual social services that maintain them on the streets. So stalling is costing us all money by preventing housing programs from advancing. And so the unhoused homeless count advances each year—per capita it remains the highest in the nation.

Shapiro summed up the funding situation thusly:

[Ige’s] request for $75 million in bonds to develop affordable rentals was cut to $25 million by the House, and a $25 million request to develop affordable homes for purchase was cut in half.

Modest requests of $2 million for homeless outreach, $3 million for Housing First and $2 million for rental subsidies were axed altogether by the House; a Senate measure setting a goal of 22,500 new affordable rental units in 10 years has no funding behind it.

Shapiro holds the City Council and the feds accountable for underfunding programs as well. I can’t quote his whole column here—go buy or borrow a paper please, and turn to p. A2.

It’s not just eight months that have been lost since Ige formed his team. The legislative session is drawing to a close. So more than a  year will have been lost. If we need to create 20,000, 21,000, 22,500, 24,000 or 67,000 affordable rentals in the next decade (according to which estimate you read), we’ll need even more relief as time goes on because we’ve also done nothing to alleviate poverty in the state—more people are dropping out of homes into homelessness and the crisis only deepens.

Funding is finalized towards the end of the legislative session—which is about where we are now. So it’s fair to ask each team member what they are doing to assure that needed programs can proceed.

When the gov’s team was formed, the two legislator members made a commitment:

“The legislature understands the gravity of the situation and the need to pull all executive and governmental agencies to the table in an effort to execute and implement solutions that can be replicated in communities across the state,” said Sen. Tokuda, chair, Senate Ways and Means Committee.

“We really need to come together on enforcement, but also in providing alternative sites and coordinated services. This is a monumental step to pull together resources of the federal, state and county governments,” said Rep. Luke, chair, House Finance Committee.

[NEWS RELEASE: Governor Ige announces leadership team on homelessness, way forward, 7/27/2015]

These two legislators effectively control the purse strings. So as the session winds down, it’s fair to ask what they have done or will do to fulfill their earlier committments.

Team member Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s funding requests have been stymied by the City Council, but he has something to answer for himself—his frequent 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. raids on sidewalk dwellers.

Just how do these costly raids contribute to ending homelessness? I have described them as cruel because of the timing: trucks move out in the dead of night. While most sidewalk dwellers raided may be single individuals, there are also children and families caught outdoors and faced with disruption that can’t help the kids do well in the classroom. Yes, these are supposedly “sweeps” and not “raids.” but given the City’s history of institutional violence against the houseless I think the term is fair.

Remember, it took a federal court order to stop Caldwell’s people from unconstitutionally seizing and destroying personal property such as ID, money and medical supplies. Apparently he has yet to discipline the staff responsible for the long-term civil rights infractions.

Who on Governor Ige’s team has stepped up to the plate to state that these raids are counterproductive in terms of solving the homelessness crisis?

Yes, the streets need to be clear of obstruction and debris, but this is clearly not happening as witnessed by the daily scheduling of night and daytime raids. Tents and makeshift structures move from one spot to another.

Moving people into permanent housing, as many other states and municipalities have successfully done, is a much better and more cost-effective way to keep the streets passable.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/10/2016 02:56:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

Download Hawaii Legislative Bill Digest 4.12.16 from Disappeared News

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/10/2016 01:47:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

“
In an alternate universe (that is, any other universe but ours) either this would have been accounted for or a different route chosen.—(quoting myself, 11/16/2015)
”

by Larry Geller

Should Honolulu’s rail officials quit, as the City Council chair is reported to be asking in this Star-Advertiser story today?

The story cites a letter from Martin that refers to utility pole clearance issues that were known to rail officials some time ago:

“I find it very disturbing to learn that HECO’s concerns were first raised three years ago and yet the guideway has been built too close to the utility poles on Farrington and Kamehameha Highway for workers to safely maintain and repair them,” Martin wrote.

Such clearance issues now threaten to drive up costs further and could delay the project’s completion by another year, officials say.

[Star-Advertiser p. A19, Martin urges rail officials to quit, 4/8/2016]

Certainly, this neglect should be dealt with. But the City Council itself is responsible for the choice of elevated rail technology and for settling on the route—and includes congested and narrow Dillingham Boulevard. Will they take responsibility for their choice?

I ran this photo in 2008 and again last year (see: Dillingham power lines are and were a known obstacle that Rail would have to deal with, 11/16/2015):

Should the cost of shoehorning an overhead guideway into this morass have been figured into the budget early on? Certainly. From the very beginning, this section of the route should have been scrutinized as a particularly difficult bottleneck in the rail project.

There are other concerns as well, including disruption during construction causing irreparable harm to businesses along the route, and what exactly Dillingham Boulevard will look like after the ugly elevated structure goes up. It’s not exactly pretty now…

Anybody could see this snafu coming, and certainly responsible rail officials should have pulled out their abacuses early on and figured the cost to resolve clearance issues along the route including Farrington Highway, Kam Highway, and soon Dillingham Boulevard.

We should remember that the City Council itself, with admittedly questionable motivation, chose the route.

It’s fair to fault rail officials for their defective budgeting, but they were given the route. The City Council and current and former mayors share also in the responsibility for their support of a questionable decison-making process. Whatever mess we may find ourselves in now or in the future, it was not caused solely by the current managers of the project.

Here is the Star-Advertiser front page article (11/16/2015) that prompted my post that same day.

The headline is “Power lines could snarl rail work.” Yes, but that should not have been news in late 2015.
So perhaps rail officials should resign. That won’t, however, solve the problem, unless the route is cut short or re-routed. And who knows how much an unplanned re-route would cost. Whoever might replace current rail officials will be stuck in the exact same mess as current leadership.

Read Dillingham power lines are and were a known obstacle that Rail would have to deal with for a recap of earlier City Council discussions on the rail route and keep in mind that then, as now, our elected leaders were bankrolled by those who profit from rail and development (see: Op-Ed: Honolulu City Council Revote on Rail a Mockery, 10/14/2015).

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/08/2016 08:20:00 AM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

by Larry Geller

History tells me that the Hawaii state government has no intention of fulfilling its federal obligation, which came with statehood, to uphold the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act. The act was passed by Congress in 1921. Native Hawaiian beneficiaries are still dying while on the waiting list.

It’s not that the state is falling short—the state is not even making an effort to comply.

To start a conversation, Kokua Council invited Moses Haia, the executive director of the Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation, to speak on “A lifetime spent waiting—why too many beneficiaries of the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act spend their lives waiting in vain for a homestead.”

Click the image below to watch the video of his presentation on March 28 to the regular meeting of Kokua Council.

Moses Kalei Nahonoapi`ilani Haia III is the executive director of Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation. As a staff attorney at NHLC he obtaining landmark victories in native rights cases seeking to protect ancient Hawaiian burials and Native Hawaiian water rights.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/07/2016 06:24:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

“
Plans by Mayor Kirk Caldwell to create a housing development division appear doomed, and the future of the Hale Mauliola homeless center at Sand Island and related programs could be as well, under the latest draft of the $2.3 billion operating budget that moved out of the City Council Budget Committee on Wednesday.—Star-Advertiser, 4/7/2016
”

by Larry Geller

The only meaningful thing that Honolulu is doing about its homelessness crisis appears to be to conduct almost nightly raids that antagonize street dwellers but do nothing at all to reduce the annual increase in the number of those living on the streets (see below). Meanwhile the City Council and the Mayor feud and obstruct anything that could even be confused as progress on the issue.

Football season not over in Honolulu

Football season may be officially over, but in Honolulu, children, families and individuals who are homeless are still being treated like footballs in some kind of competiton between Mayor Kirk Caldwell and the City Council. See: City budget panel thwarts mayor’s proposal to open housing division (Star-Advertiser p.1, 4/7/2016).

Yes, while this game goes on, nothing meaningful results that will make even a small dent in the growing homelessness count that demonstrates Honolulu’s inability to even locate the goal posts.

From as far back as 2003, the lack of truly affordable housing has been an identified issue and remains the main barrier to reducing or ending homelessness in Honolulu and in Hawaii. It’s not the only thing that needs a concerted effort to resolve—for example, the lack of a meaningful minimum wage means that individuals and families would not be able to pay the rent even if it were affordable.

How will any of these issues achieve progress when politicians spar for elected office instead of serving the people they supposedly represent (that’s a joke, get it?).

The crisis we find ourselves in will continue to grow until realistic plans, including dedicated resources, specific personnel assignments, an adequate budget and agreed timelines are in place. How will 20,000, 24,000 or 67,000 low-rent homes—whatever the number du jure is—ever be built if the City Council and city administration won’t spend a dime to get off the dime on this?

Meanwhile, the Star-Advertiser editors have correctly challenged the current system of shelters we do have—a system that has flaws that result in large numbers of vacancies going unfilled night after night. See: Ensure that shelters fill beds, 4/6/2016.

There are also time limits that have been set for length of stay at the Sand Island shelter, which, if enforced, would seem to dump residents back onto the streets again after their stay.

Why individuals and families might prefer to live on the streets has been noted in testimony and at various conferences and meetings but does not seem to merit either government action or media attention until now.  In other words, we know the system is broken but we leave it at that while the newspaper reports primarily on establishing “sweeps” if it reports anything at all.

Who is ths “we?” in truth, it is all of us, but in particular, it our wayward Honolulu city government.

The editorial refers to legislative action focused on the shelter issue. But the devil is in the details. Shelters won’t be a preferred choice if complaints persist about fleas, even bedbugs, noise, lack of privacy, robberies, refusals to admit, etc.

Homelessness is complex. The city appears to want the houseless out of sight of tourists and businesses in Waikiki, and having basically achieved that, is not going anyplace fast enough to beat the numbers. People are dropping out of housing and into homelessness. We are getting deeper into the problem, not solving it. Nothing is in place to deal with each part of a complex problem on a scale necessary to achieve meaningful results. That’s what the annual increase in the homeless count reveals.

Mayor’s Cruelty continues

The City is required by a federal court order to notify the ACLU of Hawaii of its plans for street raids (“sweeps”) the next day. Here are two recent tweets which are typical—that is, these two examples are not cherry-picked:

Note the times—1 a.m. today and 3 a.m. yesterday.

While the majority of those raided will be individual men, they also include families with children.

And we know that the next day they are back, or they simply relocate and set up nearby.

In other words, the raids don’t work. Yes, they may be necessary to keep the streets clean and passable, but why are they scheduled for 1 a.m. or 3 a.m.?

That’s cruelty. Let’s call it for what it is.

To rouse children at 1 a.m. simply disrupts their lives and probably makes it difficult for them to benefit from their education.

US troops were hated in Afghanistan for their night raids. So should the City of Honolulu be condemned, IMHO, for this practice.

At least, the City is no longer able to seize and destroy personal property including schoolbooks, toys, ID, money, medicine, etc. That was the purpose of the ACLU/Alston Hunt lawsuit in the first place—to stop that aspect of cruelty and unconstituional conduct on the part of the City. Interestingly enough, a City official who denied that the City was destroying these items has not yet, to my knowledged, been discplined either by the court or anyone else and remains on his job. See: ACLU files new motion to stop Honolulu’s illegal destruction of property during sweeps of homeless camps (11/4/2015).

If you doubt that the City would act cruelly towards its citizens living on the streets, here’s a snip from that article, from the deposition of a former worker who was forced to destroy personal property at the order of her supervisors:

Q. To this day does this enforcement action make you sad?
A. Yes.
Q. Why?
A. There were quite a bit of children, their toys and stuff, and it just wasn't a good day.
Q. Did you throw kids' toys away?
A. Well, if the supervisor said so, yes.
Q. So do you remember, did you throw kids' toys away?
A. I remember some, yeah.
Q. And what did you think about that?
A. I didn't like it.
Q. Why not?
A. They're children.
Q. You felt like they should be allowed to keep their toys?
A. Yeah.
[***]
Q. What did you want to do instead?
A. Wanted to give it to them.
Q. But your supervisor said no?
A. It's his decision, so…
…
A. They could have gave it to the kids, they could have allowed them to take it.
Q. Were the kids asking to take their toys?
A. They were crying

So now the Mayor can’t destroy kid’s toys, but he can still disrupt their lives in the dead of the night as many times each week as he likes.

And his cruel actions solve nothing.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/07/2016 12:52:00 PM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

“
(CN) - A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit lobbied hard Wednesday for Hawaii to pause its plan to privatize money-pit hospitals on Maui and Lanai that would lead to 500 unionized workers losing their jobs.—Courthouse News Service, 4/6/2016
”

Those who live on Maui or who have been following the state’s plan to privatize Maui hospitals may want to read the excellent summary of arguments befoe the Ninth Circuit in this Courthouse News Service article: Judges Lobby to Pause Hospital Privatization. Click to go to the article, which contains links for further reading.

The case is United Public Workers, America v. David Ige, Case Number 16-15219. The oral arguments are posted as an mp3 file here (32 minutes of easy listening).

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/07/2016 10:23:00 AM   0 comments - add your comment links to this post

by Larry Geller

I find this wanton disregard for House rules on public notice to be particularly disturbing when it is perpetrated repeatedly by chosen House leadership.

Just minutes ago, at about 1:46, House Judiciary Committee chair Karl Rhoads requested and obtained waivers from the Speaker of the required 48-hour notice—to hold hearings at 2 p.m. today! That’s 14 minutes notice, if you were there any paying attention.

If you want to be there, hurry up. You get no waiver. By the time I post this, you will have about 1 minute and 30 seconds before the first hearing.

House Finance Chair Sylvia Luke gave only a wee bit more notice, but not much: 1:38 p.m. for a 2:01 p.m. schedule, or 23 minutes notice.

As usual, I want to spotlight the perpetrators, in case you spot them in your neighborhood:

The bill scheduled for a 2:00 p.m. hearing (request time-stamped 1:46 p.m.) is SB2103. Bills scheduled for a 2:01 p.m. hearing (request time-stamped at 1:38 p.m.) are SB2849, SB2645, SB2076, SB2476. SB2071, SB1374, SB2301, SB3102, SB2131, SB2604, SB2535, SB3034, SB837, SB194 and SB3099.

If these chairs were at all concerned with public notice, couldn’t they at least have requested the waivers at the beginning of the floor session??

Sylvia Luke is a repeat offender. Of course, she could not cut the public out without the connivance of the Speaker.

Ok, hurry up. You have about a minute before the first hearing and two minutes to get ready for the second. Speed legislation. Speeding by public accountability as fast as they can manage.

Shame.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 4/07/2016 01:58:00 AM   1 comments - add your comment links to this post