Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 24, Number 2, 1 Pepeluali 2007 — Legislative Update [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Legislative Update

OHA legislation focuses on education, housing, Hawaiian land issues

By Sterling Kini Wnng Publicatinns Editnr OHA's advocacy efforts at the state Legislature this year remain nearly the same as in past legislative sessions, as the agency continues to push for bills that focus on educational, housing and land issues facing Native Hawaiians. "This year our package of bills is aggressive, considering the number of issues we've taken on," OHA Administrator Clyde Nāmu'o said. "But if passed, these bills would give the agency greater control in affecting the conditions of Native Hawaiians and thereby ensuring that OHA lives up to its mandate." Onee again, one of OHA's top priorities for this legislative session is trying to get the state to partially fund the development of the agency's office building and Hawaiian cultural center, whieh is being proposed for 5.2 acres of state land on the waterfront between Kaka'ako Park and Honolulu Harbor. This year, however, OHA has folded its $26 million state appropriation request for the building into its hiennial budget request hill to ensure that it at least gets a hearing, whieh in the past several years it has not. "By including the request in our budget, we are almost assured now that our sister agencies, partners and

stakeholders ean testify in support of this hill," Nāmu'o said. "The Legislature has in the past funded other ethnic cultural centers, and the notion of having a building that serves a dual purpose of an OHA office and Hawaiian cultural center would satisfy a lot of our beneficiaries because they put a lot of value in a plaee that is set aside specifically for them." New to OHA's legislative paekage this year is a hill that addresses the agency's emergence as a major landowner in Hawai'i. With its acquisitions last year of the l,875-acre Waimea Valley and the 25,856-acre native rainforest Wao Kele o Puna on Hawai'i Island, OHA is seeking the same legal protections afforded to the state from potential lawsuits stennning from accidents and other incidents that may occur on its properties. OHA is also introducing a new hill that would make it a criminal offense to violate state laws governing the maintenance and management of dams or reservoirs. First-time violators would be slapped with a $2,000 fine, and by the third infraction, individuals would have to pay $8,000 and face a possible five-year prison term. The hill comes in the wake of Kaua'i's Ka Loko Dam disaster that killed seven people in March 2006. Education This year, OHA has included

in its legislative package several Hawaiian education issues that lawmakers have considered in the past, including efforts to ensure that Hawaiian innnersion and puhlie charter schools receive adequate funding. One of the repeat bills that OHA has taken up would provide tuition waivers for Native Hawaiian students enrolled in any University of Hawai'i campus. Hawaiians have historically been underrepresented in the state's higher education system due in large part to their poor socio-economic standing. In addition, the agency is seeking to improve the Hawaiian language program in Hawai'i's puhlie school system by requiring all middle, intermediate and high schools in the state offer Hawaiian language courses within ten years. While the state is mandated to provide some fonn of Hawaiian language instruction, few schools carry such classes. "I think this hill would ensure that in the future Hawaiian language will not be neglected as it was 30 years ago, when no school ever taught Hawaiian," said Nāmu'o, pointing out that Hawaiian is one of the state's two official languages. "This prevents school officials facing a budget crunch from saying, Tet's cut out Hawaiian language."' Land and resource board seats As it is has in the past several sessions, OHA is seeking to reserve one seat eaeh on the Land Use Commission, Board of Land and Natural Resources, Water Resource Management Conunission and Coastal Zone Management Advisory Board for an appointee to be chosen by the

governor from a list of nominees submitted by OHA. "As the 'fourth arm' of state government, charged with looking out for the interests of Native Hawaiians," OHA Chairperson Haunani Apoliona said when the bill eame up last year, "it's right that OHA pursue seats on these boards. And we feel that asking for one vote among a number of sentiments available on policy boards is not a very threatening thing." Kuleana lands OHA has combined several past measures aimed at protecting kuleana lands (hereditary lands awarded to Hawaiian ten-ant-farmers at the time of the Māhele) into one omnibus bill. The bill would exempt kuleana landowners from property taxes, give OHA a greater role in kuleana title cases and prohibit claims to kuleana lands based on adversepossession. (See story on page 8.) Land and housing OHA continues to lobby state lawmakers to prohibit the state from alienating ceded lands without the consent of OHA's board. According to its constitution, the state is supposed to pay OHA 20 percent of all revenues derived from ceded lands, whieh are former Hawaiian Kingdom lands that after annexation were transferred to the federal government and then to the state. While the agency does receive some ceded lands payments, it believes it is owed more. One of OHA's housing bills would give OHA the authority to develop housing projects that would be exempt from zoning and other state and eounty regulations - mueh as the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands is now able to do. "This is one of our most aggressive measures," said Nāmu'o. "The purpose is to establish OHA as an attractive partner for housing development, but the real benefit comes in helping to deal with the affordable housing and rental crisis, especially for Native Hawaiians." S

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