Hirono, Lingle exchange As they searched for votes among environmentalists, Lt. Gov. Mazie Hirono and Linda Lingle sharply criticized each other's records and accused each other of misleading the public.
jabs on environment
The candidates for governor say
the other has misled the publicBy Richard Borreca
rborreca@starbulletin.comThe pair appeared yesterday at a Sierra Club forum at the University of Hawaii-Manoa and immediately disagreed about how to regulate water, who was telling the truth and who had the better environmental record.
Both candidates harshly criticized the other on the broad issue of environmental concern.
Lingle said concerns raised about Hawaii's environment are a reflection of the state's own environmental record.
"During her time as lieutenant governor, the environmental issues have all gone downhill," Lingle said. "We use more fossil fuel, less alternative energy, the streams are more polluted and the parks are in decay."
She added, "She needs to take responsibility for what has happened to this state."
Hirono, in response, said: "My opponent keeps running against the Cayetano administration. Ben Cayetano is not running for governor; I am."
Republican Lingle, the former Maui mayor, said neighbor island residents resent having state commissioners dictate regulations that affect their communities, and said she was opposed to the state Water Commission. Democrat Hirono, however, said the commission is in the state Constitution and serves to unify and protect all of Hawaii's water resources.
She promised to appoint people "with an environmental perspective" to important state boards and commissions, such as the Land Board and the Water Commission.
Hirono went on to charge that Lingle had a spotted environmental record, pointing to her attempts to develop a recycling program on Maui.
"When Lingle was mayor, she issued a request for proposals for recycling on Maui," Hirono said. "She selected as the person to do it her campaign manager, and for whatever reason that recycling plan never got off the ground."
Lingle said Hirono was twisting the truth.
"Being a leader means being truthful," Lingle said. "I did not know my campaign manager (Bob Awana) at the time we went out to bid on the contract."
In previous public meetings, Lingle has said she met Awana after the contract was proposed.
"The contract was for curbside recycling and would have saved the county a half-million dollars a year," Lingle said.
"She (Hirono) knows very well why it was stopped; it was the Konno decision (a court ruling forbidding contracting private workers to handle certain public jobs), and we were not allowed to proceed," Lingle said.
"It is very misleading to say somehow it didn't get off the ground and to try to make it as something bad," she said.
Neither Hirono nor Lingle was endorsed by the Sierra Club during the primary election. The environmental organization instead supported Democratic Rep. Ed Case, who lost to Hirono.
Jeff Mikulina, Sierra Club director, said Hirono is now starting to "lay out some specifics, something she was lacking earlier."
He added that although Lingle had called for specific mandatory state energy savings, she wanted to let the marketplace force energy savings.
"So the question for her is whether she would be willing to mandate the savings if it didn't work with the marketplace," Mikulina said.
