LWV-Hawaii - Hawaii Newpaper clippings

Honolulu Advertiser - Sept. 30, 1958
Charter Opinion Split Along Party Lines
By ROBERT JOHNSON

Republican candidates for the Legislature tend to favor adoption of the City Charter as drafted by the Charter Commission and submitted to the voters in the recent special election.
Democratic candidates tend to be for a charter with major changes from that drafted by the commission.
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THIS PARTY line division on the charter is substantiated by a questionnaire poll of 80 candidates for the Legislature, just completed by the League of Women Voters of Oahu.
(Eighty answered out of a total of 130 candidates running for the Legislature.) Thirty-two Republicans said they were for the charter without revision while 14 Democrats said they were against the charter as drafted.
Further showing the party division, only two Republicans expressed themselves against the commission charter, only three Democrats said they were for it.
* * *
REPUBLICAN opinion on the charter was most clear-cut. Of the 46 Republicans responding to the poll, 32 said they were for the charter, eight said they were for it with minor changes, two had no opinion, two said they were against the charter.
The Democrats, however, had a more scattered response. While 14 were against the commission charter, nine ware for it with reservations, seven had no opinion now, three were for it and one was against it with reservations.
THE TWO Republicans who said they were against the commission charter are Dan K. Kamalani and Yuzur Morita, both 10th District (Ewa-Waianae) House candidates.
The three Democrats who said they were for the commission charter are Frank F. Fasi (who sees the charter election as a I mandate), Steere G. Noda, and Carl J. Guntert.
Fast and Noda are seeking j nomination to the Senate in the 5th District. Guntert is a House candidate from the 14th. District (Pauoa).
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THE LEGISLATURE candidates also were asked if they were ft,r annual sessions of the Legislature. Five said they were not. All the rest favored an annual term, except a couple who didn't want to commit themselves.
Just about all the candidates said they, didn't favor an excise tax on basic foods and medi
cine, but many pointed out the difficulty of removing this tax in the face of the Territorial budget needs.
One candidate, Fook Yin I Yap, suggested the tax be hidden. "The consumer pays it anyway," he said frankly, "Why rub it in?"
CITY AND COUNTY candidates were asked to say what they considered would be the major issue of the next two years, how new industry might be attracted to Oahu, under what circumstances they favored subdividers being required to offer school and park sites to the city at raw land values, as a certain law provides.
Four county candidates saw the charter as the major issue in the next two years, (one added statehood to it); four thought schools would be; two said traffic; two said zoning and related land problems. The rest varied.
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ANSWERS on new industry tended toward offering tax incentives, providing zoning that would spur land use, and cooperating with Territorial economic development. agencies.
Herman G. P. Lemke, seeking reelection to the Board of Supervisors, had a different idea. He suggested trying to gel Pearl Harbor's West Loch from the Federal government for use as a new civilian harbor to open up Ewa industrial development.
Answers to the subdivisionschool and park site question were inconclusive.

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