I was kind of at a loss yesterday morning. Tuesday is my weekly deadline to turn in a column to Civil Beat, and I had no good ideas of what to write about. An occupational hazard.

So I settled down, thought some calm thoughts, and started looking for topics off the beaten path. Preferably with some documents to provide an anchor.

Aha. I decided to browse the personal financial disclosure statements filed by candidates running for public office. I soon found a topic for my column in the disclosures filed by the candidates for governor (“Hawaii Monitor: Perusing the Financial Disclosures of Hawaii Gov Candidates“).

The personal disclosures filed by Aiona and Ige are, in short, pretty boring.

But Hannemann’s has some zing to it. He reported receiving as much as $185,000 in consulting fees from the owner of several Waikiki convenience stores, the developers of the two Ritz-Carlton luxury condo-hotels in Waikiki, a drug treatment center on Sand Island, and a Saipan conglomerate which has been one of the largest garment manufacturers in Saipan.

The rest of the column digs through the details found in the disclosure reports.

Along the way, I saw a few other things of note.

Hannemann’s Hawaii Independent Party reported receiving contributions totaling $66,000 during the period from January 1, 2014 through June 30, 2014.

Of that amount, $40,000 was contributed by Hannemann’s sister and her husband, Vaofua and Deryck Maughan, with another $25,000 coming from Signature Cab Holdings, Inc., owners of TheCab. Hannemann himself added the final $1,000.

The contribution from Signature Cab was dated June 19. On the same day, the company’s president and CEO, Howard Higa, contributed $6,000, the maximum allowed by law, directly to Hannemann’s campaign. Two weeks later, Higa’s wife also gave $6,000. The Maughans also each contributed $6,000 to Hannemann, in addition to the $40,000 to the party.

And what did the Independent Party do with the cash infusion? Almost all of it, $64,000, was transferred to a savings account in the party’s name at First Hawaiian Bank. Just over $1,000 was reportedly spent on party expenses, including food for volunteers and inter island travel.

A reader questioned whether Hannemann’s consulting for Pacrep LLC, developers of the Ritz Carlton dual towers in Waikiki, included preparation and presentation of his February 26, 2014 testimony before the City Council in favor of the project. If it did, would it constitute “lobbying” under the city’s ethics law?

Here’s a set of questions and answered published by the Honolulu Ethics Commission on its website defining lobbying.

1. What is a “lobbyist”?
Lobbyist is defined as “any individual, partnership, committee, association, corporation, and any other organization or group of individuals who engages oneself for pay or other consideration for the purpose of influencing directly or indirectly, and whether by such person or through any agent or employee or other person in any manner whatsoever, the policy making process of the City and County of Honolulu. ROH Sec. 3-13.2.

2. When have I “engaged” myself to conduct lobbying activities?
An individual, partnership, committee, association, corporation, and any other organization or group of individuals who accepts membership dues or contributions made, or a fee or salary paid, with the understanding that the person accepting the same intends to devote a portion of the funds contributed or the time for which the salary is paid to lobbying activities shall be deemed to have “engaged oneself” to conduct such activities. ROH Sec. 3-13.2.

3. What are “lobbying” activities?
“Lobbying” means certain activities of a person who is included in the definition of a lobbyist as defined above and not specifically excluded under Section 3-13.3(e) and includes the representation by any person, whether or not compensated, of an association, corporation or organization that accepts membership dues or contributions with the understanding that a portion of the funds so received will be used to influence the policy making process of the City and County of Honolulu.

The city’s lobbying law can be found here.