Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 34, Number 2, 1 Pepeluali 2017 — TEAM OHA AT THE CAPITOL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TEAM OHA AT THE CAPITOL

By Wayne īanaka

/ i t's going to be crazy," * * warns Jocelyn Doane, OHA Puhlie Policy Manaaer, to the room

of selected OHA staff. "Make sure you enjoy your weekend, because it might be your last ehanee for a while." We are an hour into our annual training led by Puhlie Policy Advocate Kamaile Maldonado, who is giving us the game plan for our work at the state Capitol this year. The Legislature's Opening Day is less than a week away, and for the following five months, OHA's legislative advocacy will be our kuleana. With OHA's enormous mandate - to advocate for the betterment of the conditions of Native Hawaiians - this means we will collectively review 2,000 or more pieces of legislation, recommend positions on over 1,000 of these, and draft and present hundreds of pieces of testimony on issues ranging from environmental protection, to cultural perpetuation, to food self-sufficiency, to affordable housing relief, criminal justice reform and puhlie heahh. As members of the OHA legislative team, ourroles are also varied: researchers, subject matter experts, copy-editors, legislative and community liaisons, oral testifiers. Coffee, maybe, will heeome our one most eommon element. The testimony writers listen in as Maldonado reviews how to double-check whether the Board of Trustees or its Advocacy Subcommittee has officially taken a position on any particular measure. She explains, "We want to be very clear who we are speaking for." "Remember to cite back to our strategic priorities," advises veteran Policy Advocate Moniea Morris. Others ehime in. "Three hours before eaeh hearing, double eheek to make sure the committee has received your testimonies." "Don't change anything while I'mprinting the matrices!" says Anuhea Diamond Patoc, Puhlie

Policy's administrative assistant who, like a ship's engineer, will keep our systems running as smoothly as possible over the next few highoctane months. Doane begins her presentation on OHA's own legislative proposals, and Lōpaka Baptiste, Community Outreach Coordinator, asks questions he anticipates receiving about OHA's budget bill. As Doane explains, OHA's budget bill requests $4.6 million in state general funds per year, for the next two years. Although a relatively modest amount, this could result in a total annual impact of $19.3 million per year for community programs, through the leveraging of OHA trust funds and other funding sources — a good investment for the state, by any standard. This might be a conservative estimate: OHA more than quintupled the impact of the state funds it received for program services over the last hiennium. "There will always be different ideas on how to address OHA's mandate, to improve the lives of Native Hawaiians," Doane reflects. She points to budget infographics posted on OHA's website. "But our community investments have been very impactful, and not just for Native Hawaiians." Advocate Deja Ostrowski reminds us of how OHA-funded Hawaiian Community Assets

won national recognition for its success at helping dozens of families secure permanent housing. Morris points to OHA's support

of Hawaiian culture-based and language immersion puhlie charter schools, many of whom have eamed high ranks or even dominated state education scorecard metrics, such as reduced truancy and high ACT scores. Taking the eue, Doane moves on to OHA's second bill, whieh requests a study on the perpupil funding system for puhlie charter schools. Despite their demonstrated success, systemic funding inequities may be limiting puhlie charter schools' potential to act as "labs of innovation" for the larger puhlie school system. An in-depth study could be the first step to understanding if there are disparities with the per-pupil system, and better ensure that puhlie charter schools receive a fair and adequate share of state funding support. Our third measure, a resolution, explains the konohiki fishing rights system, whieh relied on ahupua'a tenants' intimate knowledge of their nearshore area, to guide harvesting practices and ensure the continued abundance of their plaee. The resolution further highlights how such principles underlying the konohiki systemcould again be successfully applied, through modem, eommu-nity-driven fisheries management proposals. The meeting winds down, and staff share their final pieces of wisdom. "Keyword searches are tedious, but they let us catch important bill amendments. We don't want to miss anything." "No one is allowed to get sick during legislative session." And finally — "They post hearing notices for Monday at 5:30 on Lriday, so always eheek every Saturday morning for bills we need to submit testimony on." Lor more information on and updates regarding OHA's legislative package, visit www.oha. org/legislation. ■

G0VERNANCE To restore pono and ea, Native Hawaiians will achieve self-gover-nanee, after whieh the assets of 0HA will be transferred to the new governing entity.