According to an amended lawsuit filed by “West Hawaii Today”, five County Council members violated the state’s sunshine law when they went on a lobbying trip to Honolulu i April. The lawsuit claims the council members would “quickly pass” a resolution asking for a repreived from the state’s Clean Election Law. “West Hawaii Today” believes the trip was an apparent violation of the open meeting law, which prohibits more than two council members from discussing council business outside a public meeting.
A move to give Hawaii Copunty’s auditor fiscal independence failed to gather support and was postponed at the request of South Kona Councilwoman Brenda Ford. Ford told the “Hawaii Tribune-Herald” that she doesn’t want the County Council or mayor to have the ability to cut the legislative auditor’s budget to prevent an unfavorable critique of a specific program. Hilo councilman Donald Ikeda said the bill is flawed because all other departments must come before the council to justify their spending requests.
A man who calls himself an animal rescuer is running into problems from neighbors who label him as a public nuisance. According to the “Hawaii Tribune-Herald”, neighbors of Warne “Keahi” Young have asked police, the mayor’s office, and event the planning department to force Young to remove his dogs. In December 2007, Young faced charges of animal cruelty and was allowed to keep no more than 10 dogs. Neighbors contend Young has 14 dogs on his property–animals he must remove by next Tuesday.
(AP). The University of Hawaii at Hilo has named Dexter Irvin to be its new athletic director. Irvin has been the AD at Dixie State Colleg in St. George, Utah, for the past decade. He succeeds Kathleen McNally. She served as athletic director from 2002 to 2009, when she was placed on paid adminsitrative leave until her contract expired later that year.
The Hawaii State Department of Health will distribute antiviral medication to al neighbor islands and prepare hospitals and community health centers statewide for emergency distribution with a full-scale, multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional emergency response exercise today. Planned almost three months ago, the exercise will demonstrate the state’s capacity to widely distribute antiviral stockpile assets to support the state’s response to the ongoing influenza epidemic.
Hawaii County will resurface one mile of Kuakini Highway starting just below Highway 11 to Pottery Terrace starting Thursday, September 10th. Roadwork will be between 8 am and 5 pm, weekdays. One lane will be closed. Motorists are advised to use Walua Road or Lunapule to enter Pottery Terrace and Highway 11 or Ali’i Drive to enter Kailua-Kona.
(AP). The 64th anniversary of the end of World War II is being marked today at the Battleship Missouri Memorial, the ship where Japanese officials signed the surrender documents concluding the war on September 2, 1945. The Missouri has since been decommissioned and now serves as a museum.