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Campaign 2000
A Look At The Hot Legislative Races
LIHUE -- Only one of the three state House races on Kauai is generating anything remotely resembling heat, and even that one's just barely lukewarm. All three incumbents are seeking re-election. Excitement low,
civility high in
Kauai racesAnthony Sommer
Star-BulletinEach of the current officeholders has achieved a first-name identification with the voters that all politicians long for. Drop the names Ezra or Bertha or Mina in a conversation on Kauai and everyone knows who you're talking about. Their home addresses and telephone numbers are listed in the phone book.
In District 12, which includes the south and west sides of Kauai, Republican John Hoff is trying, for the second straight election, to knock off longtime incumbent Democrat Bertha Kawakami.
In District 13 on Kauai's east shore, Republican Juan Lugo is running against another Kauai political icon, Democrat Ezra Kanoho. But Lugo and Kanoho are friends, and the race lacks even a hint of animosity.
And in District 12, which Kauai's north shore shares with east Maui, incumbent Democrat Hermina Morita is being challenged by Ann Tickle-West of the Natural Law Party. Tickle-West is not actively campaigning and her party has endorsed Morita.
Hermina Morita (D) HOUSE DISTRICT 12
North Kauai (Haena to Kapaa), East Maui (Haiku to Kaupo)
Occupation: Legislator
Background: Former Kauai planning commissionerAnn Tickle-West (Natural Law Party)
Occupation: Radio talk-show host
Background: Counselor
Ezra Kanoho (D) HOUSE DISTRICT 13
East Kauai
Occupation: Legislator
Background: Retired Kauai manager for Hawaiian Telephone Co.Juan Lugo (R)
Occupation: Operations manager, trucking company
Background: Former Kauai County GOP chairman
Bertha Kawakami (D) HOUSE DISTRICT 14
Koloa, Waimea, Niihau
Occupation: Legislator
Background: Former school principalJohn Hoff (R)
Occupation: Landscaper
Background: Retired general contractor
The only sound and fury has come from Hoff criticizing Kawakami for spending more time on Oahu than Kauai, although his evidence mainly consists of her purchase of a new car that she registered in Honolulu.
He also criticizes Kawakami for turning down the chairmanship of the House Finance Committee two years ago when she could have used the position to help Kauai. Kawakami doesn't respond to Hoff's charges but Morita does: "The title doesn't mean anything. Bertha calls the shots whenever she wants to."
Kawakami has held the seat since 1987, when she was appointed to fill the unexpired term of her husband, Richard Kawakami, who died while serving as House speaker. She is an officer and director of H.S. Kawakami Stores, a retail empire founded by her father-in-law and now run by her brother-in-law. It includes Big Save supermarkets, Menehune Food Marts and several others.
Hoff is a retired general contractor who now operates a landscaping business. Two years ago he made a strong showing in Poipu, a Republican stronghold.
Kanoho is the dean of the Kauai delegation, first having been elected in 1986. Prior to that he worked for Hawaiian Telephone Co. for 39 years, the last 10 as manager of the company's Kauai operations. His district encompasses much of what passes for urban area on Kauai, including all of Lihue.
Lugo has nothing but praise for Kanoho and some say he appears to be positioning himself for the time Kanoho retires. But at 73, Kanoho, like the battery bunny, just keeps running and running.
Lugo, 54, a native of Yuma, Ariz., and a Kauai resident for 12 years, is operations manager of Kauai Veterans' Express Co., one of the island's major trucking companies. He holds a teaching degree from San Diego State University and is a strong advocate of local control of schools. He formerly served as Kauai County Republican chairman.
Kauai's GOP fortress is on the north shore. In the House, the district is represented by Morita, 46, an anti-development Democrat who lives in Hanalei and gained prominence as a member of the Kauai Planning Commission.
Not a single GOP candidate could be found to run against her this year. Morita said she finds that especially strange because the incoming Legislature will be the one that draws the district boundaries for the next decade.
Morita's secret weapon is what Kauai residents consider the "other" half of her district on Maui. Both in 1996 and 1998 she was defeated in her Kauai precincts. But she won big enough on Maui to take the district.
Tickle-West, her only opponent, says she ran strictly to show the Natural Law Party banner. The Natural Law Party promotes organic foods and campaigns against genetically-altered products.
"I'm not actively campaigning," she said. "Someone has put up some signs for me but I've never asked anyone to."
Republican House candidate Mindy Jaffe says Democrat Brian Yamane's vote on one piece of legislation last year shows he is soft on crime, but the incumbent says Jaffe doesn't have her facts straight. Candidates air
differences on drug-
crime sentencingGordon Y.K. Pang
Star-BulletinThe two are facing off Nov. 7 for the 19th House District seat that includes Diamond Head, Kaimuki and Kapahulu. Yamane has held the seat since 1994.
Jaffe, a 50-year-old Waikiki resident, noted that Yamane was among those in the House voting for a bill that would have eliminated mandatory minimum sentencing for people convicted of third-degree promotion of a dangerous drug when that drug is crystal methamphetamine.
Mindy Jaffe (R) HOUSE DISTRICT 19
Diamond Head, Kaimuki, Kapahulu
Occupation: Full-time campaigner
Background: Lived in Hawaii 10 years; board member of the Greater East Honolulu Community Alliance; former magazine publisherBrian Yamane (D)
Occupation: Legislator; self-employed insurance agent
Background: Lifelong Hawaii resident; former president of Diamond Head Lions; member of Hawaiian Lodge; mediator for Neighborhood Justice Center
Instead, the bill would have allowed a judge to sentence people with third-degree ice convictions to probation and require them to participate in a drug treatment or education program.
"These people don't need treatment and education," said Jaffe, a former publisher of a running magazine. "They need to be locked away."
Yamane said that while the bill "gives the judge a little more flexibility, it didn't take away the potential for the judge to put (convicted ice users or dealers) in jail."
Besides rehabilitation, he said, the bill addressed the state's prison overpopulation problem.
Yamane, a 53-year-old self-employed insurance agent, said judges still have the option of sentencing those convicted of ice offenses to prison and added that he believes anyone convicted of selling the drug should be imprisoned.
The bill, introduced by Gov. Ben Cayetano, was approved in the House, 36-14, but was rejected in the Senate. Mandatory imprisonment for crystal meth offenses was first established by the Legislature in 1996.
Jaffe said she will work for tougher sentencing laws and enforcement if elected.
But Yamane, a Kaimuki resident, said he's supported tougher drug legislation, including a bill that made the manufacturing of crystal meth a felony.
Yamane said among his top priorities is to provide more government-aided services to communities with larger concentrations of senior citizens.
