Tokioka Civic Lesson

SUBHEAD: Repeal Act 55. Do not give it a chance to do further damage to our islands or the people's sovereignty.

By Felicia Cowden on 20 November 2012 in Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2012/11/tokioka-civic-lesson.html)


Image above: Jimmy Tokioka and Ron Kouchi in a promorional poster for "The Sopranos".  Mashup graphic by Juan Wilson.

[IB Editor's note: This article is addressed to Jiimy Tokioka in response to his statements in support of the establishment and rollout of the Public Land Development Corporation by Hawaii Governor Neil Abercrombie.]

Please take the time to read this response. At present, there is an exhausting burden on the citizen to research and refute the public policies designed to benefit the multi-national corporations. It is unfair. It is my fear that any quality response will not be read as our decision makers are too busy to bother to understand the depth of the issue. We are governed in a "cut and paste" world of talking points.


I find your letter's initial comment on the PLDC very disturbing:
"Repealing now would mean that this process has not been given the opportunity to positively affect our future but I am open to repeal in the event the PLDC fails to produce the results it was originally drafted to achieve."
The whole point of a Repeal of ACT 55 is to NOT ALLOW the opportunity for the PLDC to establish itself!!!


BAD EXAMPLES
The Agribusiness Development Corporation has been a very telling trial-run on the potential of a Public-Private land Development Corporation. It has yielded high land-lease bidders who utilize Kauai for projects which are NOT PRO-SURVIVAL for Kauai or the world. In conflict with the sustainability goals for Hawaii, the land has been leased for an export crop of seeds (many believe contaminating our world food supply) that sterilizes the life from the soil and contaminates it for true food production for at least a generation and poisons our water. The community was never informed, nor asked in this decision as the industry increasingly expands further around the island despite community resistance.

Much of these same West Side lands have been utilized for military contractors including the testing of drones. Is that really what we want as Kauai's gift to the world, as children are literally being murdered in strikes in virtually defenseless areas? This land-use was never brought before the public. Meanwhile, the Hawaiian Homes project in Kekaha has been built on an old dump-site, exposing the kanaka people to toxicity. This is a clear demonstration of the land priorities. Duplicity is routine.

We have Papahanaumokuakea, ostensibly to be protecting marine life, but it is really a strategic war test-zone from which the people of Hawaii have been restricted for the benefit of the Pacific Missile Range Facility. Kaula Rock is said to be wildlife preservation while being used for target practice. Other conservation districts are being set up, even moving endangered species (monk seals) to the region to have an excuse to exclude the fisherman, again for the benefit of the military who have acknowledge large "takes" on the marine mammals.

We have the Nature Conservancy in the highlands hunting and killing the goats and pigs which impact the native vegetation, in a format in which the meat is not utilized. Local food hunters are no longer able to make it into these regions. It is illegal to sell or really share hunted meat, as well. Let's see... we can't fish, we can't hunt, and we are contaminating the soil at a wholesale level?

How is this good? This is land-use that is culturally sensitive to our hosts, the indigenous Hawaiian? It creates DEPENDENCE not INDEPENDENCE from the world beyond the Pacific. It is exactly moving us in an imprudent direction.

The westside of Kauai is an example of building an extractive economy that does not benefit healthy, individual sovereignty. You are asking us to have more of that. The closing of the plantations should have yielded a time of opportunity for the people as a whole. It did not. Much of the jobs produced went to exploited immigrants and highly educated people from the mainland, competing for existing housing.

We need to be shown the list of potential land partners and projects. So far, they have mostly been the "bait" of a non-specific neighborhood center, elderly housing, a park, an improved school, etc. How does this work??? None of those items are revenue generating. They generate expense, not income. That is why they are "public."


Image above: Areas in green on Kauai that are "owned" by State possibly affected by the PLDC legislation.

TOKIOKA EXAMPLE

Let's look at your example land use process:
"With respect to public lands, the agency with jurisdiction over the lands upon which a project is proposed (“title agency”) must first agree to transfer management authority of those lands to PLDC and the project partner for the proposed project. If the title agency does not agree to transfer management authority for the lands affected, then the project immediately ceases. 
For example, let’s say a community association submits a proposal for a Native Hawaiian community center to be built on DLNR lands. The Board of Land and Natural Resources must first decide whether they are even interested in having the management rights of these lands transferred to PLDC and a partner. 
If BLNR had other plans for the lands upon which the community association wants to build their Native Hawaiian community center, then the Board can immediately reject the proposal and the project dies. 
However, if the BLNR agrees that the Native Hawaiian community center project is worthy and thinks the lands being proposed are suitable, the Board can approve the project AND impose any conditions they think are necessary to ensure the lands are protected."

How is this supposed to inspire confidence???!!! Again, the land use is solely at the whim of hand-selected boards to do with as they like. It again places the local communities in the position of begging to the folks on Oahu, in competition with a high bidder, like the US military contractors who essentially have an unrestrained budget, ultimately paid by US taxes.

We have not been given any real examples of the business plan for a Public-Private-Partnership. We should be given the specifics of how the Alawai Canal, for example, can be managed with a revenue generating or self-sustaining manner. Where are the details on a specific beach park management that makes this PLDC program essential? As former DLNR chair, Laura Thielen, points out, all of those partnership funding structures are in place already. Kauai's Gary Hooser, has also clearly pointed out how the land use elements of the legislation are gutted, and that 343 is a paper tiger, essentially toothless for holding environmental accountability.

Let's discuss the larger picture for a moment. The United Nations has an Agenda for the 21st Century known as Agenda 21, in which large scale decisions are made to manage humanity like a herd of livestock to make best use of global resources. The intention sounds good, but there is no home rule or freedom of choice. Please click on those links. They are real and typical of what the uninformed call "conspiracy theory."

The UN has an openly stated global plan, with the multi-national companies having a full seat at the table with as much or more standing as countries. Our President Obama has signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership which allows more access to the global corporations than it does the US Congress. It is like the PLDC in its vague, broad sweeping structure that basically says, "trust us, we'll do what's best for business and the economy." Hawaii will be a pawn of this initiative which was signed at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Honolulu.

The PLDC is the grease that removes the public friction for land use planning that might get in the way of these global resource planners. These shifts in authority over land use are innocuously happening all over the USA through locally based initiatives spawned by organizations like the American Legislative Exchange Council - please watch the little video on that link.

BOTTOM-LINE

The PLDC is not about funding neighborhood centers and homeless shelters. It is about opening the door wider for the globalists to do whatever they wish with Hawaii Nei, regardless of whether our policy-makers are akamai enough to figure that out or not. The worldwide strategy is to cloak any and all of these initiatives as being of humanitarian benefit. The goal is the the concentration of power and full control over worldwide resources and land use.

Yes, Hawaii needs to learn to live within our fiscal budget and to make the development procedure more streamlined. We need to figure that out on our own through our legislative process. The PLDC has been a seemingly easy shortcut to overcome the obstacles imposed by the government. It is a Trojan Horse. It needs to be fully repealed.

We will not be able to unravel the damage created by such a policy as the PLDC, any easier than it would be to roll back the impacts of the military or the changes made to Waikiki. The PLDC allows the globalists to grease the machine that will push home-rule out of the way and for them to do as they like with our little jewel of an island.

I choose to assume that our legislators are simply too trusting, naive and busy to have taken a harder look at the implications of this ACT 55. I don't believe the same for the governor. He has sold us out, and I not only voted for him, I campaigned for him. I am so ashamed.

CONTACT TOKIOKA
Representative James Kunane Tokioka
House Leadership~Majority Whip
House Legislative Management Vice Chair and Tourism Vice Chair
District 15- Wailua Homesteads, Hanamaulu, Lihue, Puhi, portion old Koloa Town, Oma'o
(808)586-6270 phone
808-586-6271 fax
reptokioka@capitol.hawaii.gov email

This article was sent to:
Bernard Carvalho<mayor@kauai.gov>,
Beth Tokioka <btokioka@kauai.gov>,
Ron Kouchi <ron@ronkouchi.com>,
Rep. Derek Kawakami <repkawakami@capitol.hawaii.gov>,
Dee Morikawa <dmorikawa@hawaiilink.net>,
Mel Rapozo <melrapozo@gmail.com>,
Jay Furfaro <jfurfaro@kauai.gov>,
JoAnn Yukimura <jymf@hawaiiantel.net>,
Nadine Nakamura <nnakamura@kauai.gov>,
Kipukai Kualii <kipukai.kualii@gmail.com>,
Dickie Chang <dchang@kauai.gov>,
Tim Bynum <tim@timbynum.com>,
Gary Hooser <garylhooser@hotmail.com>,
sens@capitol.hawaii.gov,
reps@capitol.hawaii.gov
.

1 comment :

Dharma Sanctuary said...

Felicia has written an important passionate letter. This PLDC things is bad business! I don't understand how our politicians can support it. Are they ignorant of the larger issues of where corporatist government is heading? I just don't get it. Are they getting bought out? Where do they think the benefit will come from? Are all these people in power glad for this centralization of control. Don't they know unnmitigated power leads to fascism?

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