Meda made it into the NY Times today with an op-ed, “The Myth of Mean Girls“.
It tracks some of the issues raised in her book, “Beyond Bad Girls“, published back in 2007.
Her one-sentence bio in the NYT managed to include a mini-plug to her forthcoming book, “Fighting for Girls“, published by SUNY Press.
I was surprised to see that in a year where money is so scarce, legislators are preparing to pass SB 2834 SD1, which restores tax deductions for gambling losses. The bill is awaiting a final vote in the House. Since it has not been amended in the House, it would then go directly to the governor for her signature.
A bill digest prepared by the Tax Foundation of Hawaii includes this comment:
As there is no hard data on this deduction, it is difficult to ascertain whether there was any revenue gain when the wagering deduction was suspended during the past year. However, lawmakers did believe that in taking away the provision that allowed the deduction there were additional revenues to be had. Unfortunately, their gambling happy constituency did not think it was fair and apparently lawmakers heard the loud protests.
Think about it. Losses for gamblers are obviously income/profits for the corporations that control the gaming industry.
So it appears that while lawmakers won’t vote to legalize gambling here in Hawaii, which could capture some of those gaming revenues for the state, they’re ready to subsidize the Las Vegas gambling industry by offering tax deductions for losses of Hawaii residents.
So we’re sending off all those local families to Vegas, encouraging them to hit the slots, and then refunding part of their gambling tab at public expense via tax deductions.
If you ask me, that doesn’t make a lot of sense. But no one’s asking.
If we’re going to subsidize vacations with tax deductions, wouldn’t it make more sense to give a tax break for interisland travel by Hawaii families? Let’s use public funds to promote our own travel destinations rather than exporting those tax dollars to Las Vegas and other places where gamblers might travel.
Dan Nakaso had a pretty good story in yesterday’s Honolulu Advertiser on the effort to rewrite Hawaii’s environmental review laws.
If you’re interested in such things, you might want to look at the UH report to the legislature that provided the substantive background for the effort, as well as the “Assessing Hawaii’s Environmental Review Process” blog.
And don’t miss the reply to Dave Shapiro by Hawaii News Now news director, Chris Archer, as well as the comments it drew. All very interesting.
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Dan’s story yesterday was filled with innuendo and tried to make it sound like a big conspiracy was rewriting our environmental review laws. That’s far from the truth. While I wish this process occurred before the legislature started or that the results could have been released sooner, the creation of a working group was simply an attempt to get stakeholders to figure out where compromise could be made. Because there were so many people involved and it was a highly complex topic, it took some time.
Two comments on the advertiser website do a pretty good job of summarizing it up:
I realize it’s easy to be automatically suspcious of anything that’s done behind closed doors, but I’d like to suggest people stop to think about what happens after they reach their consensus. Whatever those parties come to agree on might be introduced at the legislature. Then what happens? It becomes public, for all to see, for all to comment on, for all to testify on, for all to make thier opinions know about. If it’s truly something bad, the public can make their voices heard. It’s not as if it goes straight from their closed meeting to becoming law.
This private brainstorming process allows the parties to hammer out their differences and try to come to some common ground outside of the typical grandstanding in the media spotlight. That approach usually leads to the sides digging in, refusing to budge rather than finding a middle ground.
Their recommendations still go through the normal public vetting once they find some common ground, so really, where’s the harm?
and
It’s a shame that the news article is so poorly written readers are left believing something that isn’t true. If you look as the Senate’s website, you’ll discover that the working group is made up of the guys that wrote the original bill plus all those guys who showed up at the public hearing to testify against it! (And it was twelve, not nine.) It says the whole idea was if the opponents can sit down with the authors and work their differences out, then it’ll be better for everyone. So what’s wrong with that?
http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session2010/CommReports/SB2818_SD1_SSCR2333_.HTM
This is really a story about people with differing opinions actually sitting down and talking without getting into a fight. It ain’t all a big bad conspiracy out there.
This a story about people just volunteering to help. There are no lawmakers in the group. All they can do is make a recommendation to the legislature. They have no power. Wake up, you’ve been duped by bad reporting!
Fantastic article by Meda.
In response to Robert Harris ; I will “wake up” when there is some sunlight allowed into the mediation process. I do not believe those wishing to modifiy the existing envir0nmental review laws will continue to respect the value of the environment when the development and building history of Hawaii has not shown that respect. Transfering their fear of being transparent to the public so we can continue to mistrust and doubt their intentions is not a compromise that is better for everyone. When Brewer Chemical became Brewer Environmental , they did not alter their plan to cover all of the Hawaiian Islands with pesticides and insecticides. The name sure sounds good though.
Now is always a good time to initiate full disclosure when policy is being decided. Now is the time for more community involment, not less. New and existing communication capabilites can be used to share the burden of deciding what is in the best interest of everyone. Let the little working group compromise that if they can comprehend it.
Dean Little