Monthly Archives: September 2017

Civil Beat now offering in-depth video coverage

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An old friend called attention to Civil Beat’s video coverage of portions of a Honolulu Police Commission meeting this week in which commissioners Steve Levinson and Loretta Sheehan attempted to question Kevin Sumida, attorney for former Police Chief Kealoha (I say attempted because Sumida consistently avoided answering by instead throwing back his own questions, even when repeatedly asked to answer the question being posed).

After viewing the video, my friend wrote in a Facebook post:

Um, Civil Beat’s coverage of Honolulu Police Commission meetings. Watching Levinson question Kevin Sumida is pure soft porn. And then Commissioner Sheehan has at it. If I smoked cigarettes, I’d be a pack in.

The Civil Beat video of the commission meeting is about 36 intense minutes long. It’s worth setting aside the time to watch the whole thing.

And, by the way, it’s technical quality is very good.

It’s a real expansion of Civil Beat’s news gathering, and gives readers/viewers new options for educating ourselves.

Feline Friday: Another week’s worth of cats

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Toby has had a good week. He’s still with us, and that’s the best. But he’s not just surviving. He’s enjoying eating, he’s able to sleep comfortably, he’s moving between favorite spots in different rooms. And we’re in a gradual process of reducing his medications. As long as his condition doesn’t deteriorate, it’s all good.

We know this is a reprieve and not a long-term cure. But for now, we’re happy to have more good times with him.

The other cats seem to know that he’s sick and aren’t bothering him. They’ll circle when he’s eating, but haven’t tried to push him away and take over his food. And they’ll share our bed with him, which they wouldn’t have normally done.

Anyway, click on the photo to see more of this week’s cats.

Feline Friday: September 22, 2017

Worries about Illegal gambling in Kaimuki

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This is part of a post on kahala.nextdoor.com, a message board for local neighborhoods. It describes an illegal gambling operation in Kaimuki.

I am writing as a neighborhood resident, and a concerned member of the Hale Kaimuki homeowner’s association, to express my concern about the presence of an illegal gambling operation the building at the corner of Kokohead and Waialae Ave. There had been rumors of illegal activity at the location for sometime, which coincide with a rash of recent reports of property crime in garages, car ports, car break-ins and home burglaries on Kokohead Ave in recent months.

I regularly walk around this neighborhood, and as so many other folks, enjoy the family, and neighborly environment that we have and have had here in Kaimuki for many years. I usually am walking in the morning and late afternoons. But about two weeks ago, I took a walk during the evening hours, around 11 PM, and I walked down Kokohead towards Waialae Ave. There was a lot of activity on the street at that time of the night, there were several groups of men in parked cars, and I witnessed several individuals entering and exiting the double glass doors of the building in question, directly across from the Goodwill drop off door. As I walked down the sidewalk I noticed a large man standing outside the doors, and he initiated conversation so I stopped to chat with him. Following a few pleasantries I inquired, “do you live around here?” , to which he responded “no, I’m working security for the games, keeping the street clear”. I pointed to the doors and said “oh, there’s game going on?”. He confirmed that there was and that there are a number of electronic machines and a bunch of “players”.

The same evening I continued waking where I encountered another individual standing beside a car with the doors on the sidewalk side open, and I chatted with him as well and he offered that he was driver for several individuals who were “gambling”.

The post generated quite a bit of discussion. Lots of expressions of concern. There’s some criticism of HPD for seemingly doing nothing, at least one person offering the opinion that HPD looks the other way. Another comment, though, supported HPD, saying it takes some time to gather evidence and make a case before busting up the operation.

Several people suggested the best way to move forward is to contact the media.

I took that as tacit encouragement to share the information more widely.

What would you do about relatively open gambling near your home?

Homelessness in a previous era

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I was looking through a couple of copies of my old Hawaii Monitor newsletter, and came across a book review by the late Chuck Frankel, who spend much of his career at the old Honolulu Star-Bulletin.

Frankel was reviewing a history of the city published by UH Press: “The City and County of Honolulu, a Government Chronicle,” by Donald D. Johnson.

One snippet caught my eye. Time passes, it seems, but things don’t necessarily change a lot.

Frankel wrote:

The homeless, much in the news today, were called “squatters” in the 1920’s. The head of the Hawaiian Tourism Board suggested that Squatersville at Kewalo Basin be turned into a tourist attraction as a “typical Hawaiian village.”

So many city plans to eliminate slums and to beautify the island turned out to be ways to sweep aside Hawaiians and others who were poor and powerless.”