Editorials
Tuesday, February 24, 1998THE Economic Revitalization Task Force came up with an ambitious package of recommendations requiring legislative action. Much of that package, it now appears, is not going to be enacted into law, at least not in the current session. Legislators rejected
key reform proposalsGovernor Cayetano has in effect acknowledged that the proposed increase in the general excise tax from 4 percent to 5.35 percent had no chance of passage, saying a more modest increase would be acceptable. Whether he will get anything is still uncertain. This is easily the most sensitive part of the tax package.
Legislators are of course more inclined to go along with the proposed cuts in personal and corporate income tax rates and with a hike in the hotel room tax. That would be paid by tourists, who don't vote here. But the counties are fighting the proposal to slash their share of room tax revenues. How all this will play out in the end is far from clear.
Already consigned to oblivion are the task force's proposals to abolish the state Land Use Commission and to replace the elected state Board of Education with county-level appointed boards. There is little hope for effective action on privatization, somewhat more for the proposal to give the University of Hawaii more autonomy.
These were probably the most important structural and policy changes to come out of the task force's deliberations. Yet the legislators, facing re-election in the fall, are refusing to make decisions that could cost them votes.
Public employee union leaders, particularly Gary Rodrigues of the United Public Workers, won't go along with any meaningful privatization bill that would reverse the Supreme Court decision last year invalidating Hawaii County's privatization of landfill operations. And the legislators are afraid to buck the unions.
The state Land Use Commission has been used by anti-development activists to delay and block many projects, thereby hurting economic growth. Its functions should be left to the counties. The elected Board of Education has been ineffective in upgrading the public schools. Giving the governor the authority to appoint county school boards would make him accountable for the performance of the school system.
The UH's President Kenneth Mortimer has been campaigning for autonomy, arguing persuasively that it is essential if the university is to fulfill its potential in helping the state. He's right, but the micromanagers in the state government don't want to give up their power.
Without action on these issues, the Legislature isn't going to do very much to revitalize the economy.
LAWS that require authorities to notify communities about the addresses and job locations of sexual offenders have survived a court challenge, allowing the public to be on the alert for repeat offenses. The U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to consider the challenge is a victory for proponents of the original "Megan's Law" in New Jersey and similar laws in 36 other states -- but not Hawaii -- although more challenges remain. Megan's Law survives
The New Jersey legislature in 1995 enacted the law, named for 7-year-old Megan Kanka, who was kidnapped, raped and murdered the previous year by a twice-convicted sex offender who had moved in across the street from her home. Her murderer has been sentenced to death for the crime.
New Jersey's law requires authorities to notify schools, day-care centers and youth groups about moderate-risk offenders. It calls for police to go door-to-door to notify neighborhood residents of high-risk offenders. Lower courts upheld the notification requirements but allowed sex offenders to question the level of risk assigned to them. The high court's refusal to consider the appeal allows those decisions to stand.
Hawaii's version of Megan's Law, enacted last March, lacks such notification requirements, instead providing for public access to current street names, but not house numbers, of about 500 residents convicted of sex crimes. States were required -- under threat of federal cutbacks -- to maintain such registries and release "relevant information" about sexual offenders to the public. All 50 states now have such laws, which were not challenged in the case that went to the Supreme Court.
Opponents of Megan's Law maintained that its retroactive application violated their rights, but lower courts ruled that it did not constitute punishment and, thus, double jeopardy. Vigilantism that opponents warned would result from what was described as a declaration of open season on sexual offenders has not materialized. Once again, public awareness is no cause for alarm.
WHEN it comes to hopeless miscalculation, there are few if any equals in American history to the Bay of Pigs, the 1961 attempt to invade Cuba by exiles backed by the CIA. The scathing report on the fiasco by Lyman Kirkpatrick, the CIA inspector general, was suppressed for more than 30 years but was finally released last week in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. Bay of Pigs report
The Associated Press obtained a copy of the report and says it criticized almost every aspect of the CIA's handling of the invasion -- poor planning, faulty intelligence, misinforming the Kennedy administration and conducting a military operation beyond "agency responsibility as well as agency capability."
CIA officials feared that if the document leaked it could have resulted in devastating public criticism of the agency. Perhaps, but its suppression may have resulted in more damage to the public interest by leaving Americans with too little skepticism of their government's military policy decisions. It was left for the disaster of Vietnam to instill such skepticism, at a much higher cost in American lives.
Rupert E. Phillips, CEO
John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher
David Shapiro, Managing Editor
Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor
Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors
A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor
