Officers and directors of the Sand Island Business Association contributed over $225,000 to a variety of political candidates and elected officials between 2006 and 2012, according to data from reports filed with the Campaign Spending Commission. The contributions came as they were trying to generate political pressure to force the Department of Land and Natural Resources to agree to a deal giving them fee-simple title to the 70 state-owned acres that make up the Sand Island Industrial Park.
It looks a lot like the same “make friends and rent influence” tactic SIBA used 25 years ago when it lobbied to obtain control of the property through a master lease and major financial concessions from the state, although at that time their actions were more flagrant and contributions more concentrated on key officials.
My weekly “Hawaii Monitor” column in Civil Beat last week highlighted the group’s latest lobbying effort, again aimed at securing the fee simple title (“Business Group Presses For Sand Island Land Swap“).
SIBA provides a good example of money and politics, but when I wrote that column last week, I hadn’t yet had a chance to check SIBA’s recent campaign activities. I finally got around to it over the weekend.
I started with a list of SIBA officers and directors from the state’s online business registration records.
NOHARA, RODNEY
KOBATAKE,JAMES
KIM, RODNEY
KINOSHITA, ROBERT N
KANESHIRO, CLYDE T
ARAKAKI, WALTER Y
NOHARA, GLENN M
TEVES, NICHOLAS W JR
BORJA, JUAN S JR
MUDD, RITCHIE N
I then jumped over to data.hawaii.gov, the state’s new data portal, data.hawaii.gov, which includes a searchable database of “Campaign Contributions Received By Hawaii State and County Candidates From November 8, 2006 Through December 31, 2012.”
Then it was just a bit of copying and pasting to search for contributions by each director and then combine them, finally ending up with these totals.
In addition, members of the SIBA board gave $15,000 to the Democratic Party of Hawaii during the 2012 election, and one director gave $17,500 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee. And they combined to donate over $45,000 to federal campaigns of Hawaii candidates for Congress and U.S. Senate, both Republicans and Democrats.
I doubt these totals are complete, since I didn’t go the next step to track contributions made directly by the businesses owned by SIBA directors.
As far as I can see, there’s nothing illegal in this show of political influence or the attempt to pass narrow, special interest legislation. But heeding the axiom, “Follow the money,” would in this case be a good idea.
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And if you read the “findings clause” of the legislation over the years and the testimony that goes with it, you just wanna puke. Having gotten that master lease and then investing millions in improvements, SIBA argues that it would be unfair not to sell thwem the land because of all the money spent improvements!
Talk about wanting to have your cake and eat it, too. In ordinary business transactions involving commercial leasehold property, you amortize your investmenst in improvements over the life of the lease, knowing that the improvements go back to the landowner when the lease is pau. But this was/is no ordinary lease transaction; it’s one that oozes political juice and the sense of entitlement that comes with fat campaign donations. YUK!
Interesting that it appears to be an old boys’ club with a few exceptions.
Lotta smoke here…but where’s the fire?Looks like a bunch of bad investments in failed candidacies and (somewhat irrelevant) campaigns. Republicans? Neighbor island Mayors? Half this $$$ was wasted, the remaining half, spread over all the offices, the years, and the number of donors, breaks down to pretty manini levels of influence with sitting legislators. No wonder they keep losing.
The real scandal here is the paradigm of leasehold lands in Hawaii. Reversion, valuation of lands held by an oligopoly, adhesion contracts, reluctant courts, the “guild” of appraisers….that’s the scandal.
Can you do one on the Honolulu Planning Commission? We want to know how did this people get on this powerful board.
Ka’iulani K. Sodaro, Chair
Cord D. Anderson, Vice-Chair (related to Ikaika Anderon)
Gayle Pingree, Member
Rodney Kim, Member
James C, Pacopac, Member
Arthur B. Tolention, Member
Steven S. C. Lim, Member
Dean L Hazama, Member
Will they approve ENVISION LAIE against majority opposing?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLvE0hh3DZs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_oxlTXUB_s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJi-pP4xqjE