Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 25, Number 2, 1 February 2008 — What is the No. 1 issue you woulel like lawmakers to address this session? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

What is the No. 1 issue you woulel like lawmakers to address this session?

I Wallaee Ishibashi Jr. International Longshore & Warehouse Union Loeal 142, business agent Hilo

(Jur womnan s eomp issue is one ot tne big ones, protecting the workers, protecting our presumption clause, in whieh it is presumed under the law currently that if you get hurt it did happen on the job. We're one of the few states that have that presumption clause.

Maile Hallums Nā Kūpuna o Wai'anae, member Nānākuli The proposed Native Hawaiian Child Welfare

Act is being reintroduced this year by Rep. Maile Shimabukuro. The Act is established to stop the involuntary termination of parental rights for Native Hawaiian ehildren. We discovered through research that for a large majority, their parental rights have been tenninated and children have been adopted out in non-Hawaiian families. They're taken from here to the mainland and nobody knows where they are. That is totally against our culture. We never had a termination of parental rights; we always had a hānai system, and it's alive today.

Ikaika Hussey DMZ Hawai'i/Aloha 'Āina, a network of demilitariz,ation groups, member Kāne'ohe

To stop the momentum toward federal recognition, whieh will close off our native and nahonal rights.

Aaron J. Salā Recording artist Kailua I would like to see more monies and more

resources appropriated to students in the public schools system, both Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian. I'd like to see more things happen for public school children, charter school children to prepare them for life after high school whether they decide to go into the workforce or on to college.

Lilikalā Kame'eleihiwa University ofHawai'i, Kamakakūokalani Centerfor Hawaiian Studies, professor He'eia

Today I am supporting more regular positions systemwide for Hawaiian studies, Hawaiian language, Hawaiian student services. Another very critical issue is free tuition for Native Hawaiians at the university system. We still have more Hawaiians in prison than we have in the UH system, so we feel it's a cost saving for the state — open up the doors for Hawaiians in education, we won't be in prison. We spend $3,500 dollars a year on a student in school; we spend $35,000 a year for a Hawaiian in prison. Also, we should do all that we ean do to mālama 'āina — to have sustainable energy in the State of Hawai'i. This is an issue that's not only for Hawaiians, it's for all of us. E3

KWO caught up with Native Hawaiians at the opening day of the Legislature and asked: