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Spring 2002 | Council 2002 |
 President's Message: Hawaii Has the Most Apathetic Voter Turnout... (Maile Bay)Redistricting Work Done (Jean Aoki)Support for Voting for Incarcerated Felons (Dorothy Cornell)How it Looks for Schools in the Legislature (Mary Anne Raywid)Invitation: Saunders Hall DedicationOne Afternoon at the Legislature (Jean Aoki)Ice (Marian Wilkins)Campaign Finance Reform (HCE) (Laure Dillon)Local League News - Big Island - Kona (Marian Wilkins)Local League News - Big Island - Hilo (Alberta Lindsay)Local League News - Honolulu (Pearl Johnson)Local League News - Kauai (Carol Bain)Lunch 'n' Learn the LawCouncil Meeting May 18 |
Campaign Finance Reform (HCE)Our focus is public funding of election campaigns. In brief, we are working once again to establish a genuine public funding alternative for the voters in Hawaii. In Sessions 2000 and 2001, we put forth bills for a pilot program for the Honolulu City Council races in 2002, but both were defeated by Senate committees after successfully passing in the House. This year we have a bill, HB2187 (Schatz), that is very much the same, except the program that would begin in 2004 would be permanent. It has been heard by the House Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs, where, unfortunately, it was deferred. We will continue to lobby for it, so the outcome is unknown at this time. There is a Senate bill (SB2258-Ihara), but the practice for it to be heard by three committees simultaneously (a triple hearing-Committee on Transportation, Military Affairs, and Government Operations; Committee on Tourism and Intergovernmental Affairs; and Committee on the Judiciary) pretty much assures that it will not be heard at all. This is expected. Another bill proposes increasing the check-off from $2 to $5 on our state income tax returns. These funds go into the Hawaii Election Campaign Fund and are the source for the public funding experiment, at this time (HB2189 and SB2249). Of particular importance is yet another bill, SB2431 (Hanabusa), which prohibits corporations and labor organizations from making campaign contributions. It also forbids any person who enters into a contract with the state or counties to make, or promise to make, campaign contributions to any political party. Laure Dillon |
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