Measure to repeal
OHA hits Senate
resistance

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By Bruce Dunford
Associated Press

Sen. Fred Hemmings' proposals to repeal the state's Office of Hawaiian Affairs and put its assets into a private trust to benefit native Hawaiians appears to be dead on arrival at the Senate's Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs Committee.

"To repeal OHA at this particular point in time does not seem to fit into what I feel to be the major commitment, which is to remain with the native Hawaiian entitlements and assist the native Hawaiians in any way that we can in the self-determination and federal recognition process," said Sen. Colleen Hanabusa (D, Nanakuli-Makua), the committee's chairwoman.

And taking state action to establish a private trust for Hawaiians would likely invite more constitutional challenges based on legal conclusions in the U.S. Supreme Court's Rice vs. Cayetano ruling on Feb. 23, 2000, that Hawaiians-only voting requirements for OHA trustees amounted to unconstitutional racial discrimination, said Hanabusa, an attorney.

"I respectively disagree with her reasoning not to hear the bills," said Hemmings (R, Lanikai-Waimanalo).

"Colleen Hanabusa's opinion, for me, is not the final word on anything.

"By liberating OHA from being a government entity, I believe Hawaiians would be able to control their destiny themselves and probably make better use of the resources as we know government agencies have a propensity to be more concerned about preserving themselves rather than serving the people they are supposed to," he said.

One of Hemmings' bills would place on the 2004 general election ballot a measure to repeal the 1978 constitutional amendment that created OHA.

The other would establish the private trust similar to one proposed in 1998 by then-state Rep. and now U.S. Rep. Ed Case, D-Hawaii. Case's bill provoked a noisy protest march by Hawaiians, a 24-hour Capitol vigil and overwhelming opposition at a contentious 10-hour hearing where Case was accused of interfering with Hawaiian sovereignty. He withdrew the bill.

Hemmings said time is running short because of continuing legal challenges that Hawaiian programs amount to racial discrimination.

"Basically, what the state has to do is get out of the business of running an agency that is in conflict in an ongoing basis with the Constitution," he said.