A GORY BUSINESS: While some might say it's practically oxymoronic we've been been on a quest lately with a holy grail of being nicer and kinder to others.
But yesterday's letter to the editor from that slime ball masquerading as a human being, Ron Agor, was so insulting that all bets are off today.
Agor's defense of apparently-fired Kauai District Archaeologist and SHPD Deputy Director Nancy McMahon on the heels of an onslaught of Kanaka Maoli activists who successfully testified against her appointment to the county's Historic Preservation Commission, was to call the Native Hawaiians "savages" in practically every other paragraph.
Real sensitive to the host culture, Ron- especially from a member of the state Board of Land and Natural Resources. What, heathen and pagan weren't strong enough?
But his screed defending McMahon seems kind of appropriate for these two-peas-in-a-pod, since for the past few years every time some kind of outrageous treatment of`iwi kupuna (bones) burials occurred, the names Agor and McMahon seemed to come up every time.
Agor's rant begins by praising McMahon for her actions as state archeologist in trying to:
compromise with private property owners where the burials are respected and the private property owners have reasonable use of their properties.
Nancy McMahon during her tenure as the qualified state’s archaeologist always did her job in making sure the above mentioned compromise came to fruition on every project subjected to this process.
And compromise the `iwi she did.
In actuality McMahon's cavalier attitude has led to blatant abuse of her position to favor developers, ignoring the wishes of the Kaua`i Burial Council to the point where, during the court battle over the Brescia property cemetery debacle, she was singled out for blame in the fiasco by 5th Circuit Court judge Kathleen Watenabe for, among other things, ordering the `iwi be permanently encased in concrete.
That's what made this statement from Agor all the more removed from reality
It is interesting to know that recently the courts have recognized the practices and procedures of DLNR as reasonable and have often rendered decisions in favor of private property owners when they followed their permit conditions imposed by the State.
Here's what a letter from a group called Kānaka Maoli Scholars Against Desecration- signed by a list of notable scholars as long as your arm- said about McMahon's actions in the Brescia case
The SHPD’s own rules empower the island Burial Council to determine the disposition of previously known burials. The island Burial Council’s decision on this issue is supposed to be binding. Yet, SHPD deputy administrator Nancy McMahon sanctioned the use of vertical buffers and concrete caps on the burials to make way for installing the footings of Brescia’s house. Her authorization for such an intrusive "preservation" measure is a fundamental repudiation of the power allocated to all of the island Burial Councils.
By ignoring the decision of the island Burial Council, her actions undermine both the very concept of historic preservation and the reason for the founding of the island Burial Councils. Tragically, before a court could intervene, and based on McMahon’s unauthorized agreements, Brescia’s team managed to install massive house foundations on a portion of the cemetery.
In another incident almost exactly a year ago on May 12, 2010 the headline of a PNN news story pretty much summed up what happened in saying:
Three Burials Unearthed By Cows At Lepeuli Unceremoniously Reburied By SHPD's McMahon Without Burial Council Notification.
You might want to read the article and followups- it's actually even worse than that with McMahon attempting to cover up the discovery of a Hawaiian house site by another local archeologist.
So how did McMahon get away with this stuff for so long- stuff including many unproven accusations from burial protectors of taking home `iwi and even stealing artifacts from sites and offering them for sale?
Well. many times it was Agor's position on the all powerful BLNR that made it possible.
Agor has been a Republican Party mainstay for many years and so when Republican Governor Linda Lingle took over she appointed him as the lone Kaua`i representative.
Now you'd think that with all the other BLNR members one single rep wouldn't be able to insure things go the way he wants. But the "tradition" on the board is to defer to the single neighbor island reps on matters on their island.
For instance when Lepeuli rancher Bruce Lymon tried to lie his way into a conservation district use permit (CDUP) it was Agor who convinced the board to grant it without examining the facts- a decision that was reversed later after the Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation, OHA and others set the record straight and the permit was rescinded.
As for Agor his tenure has been marked by deceit and misrepresentation to members of the community, often telling people he would assure the BLNR would vote a certain way only to do exactly the opposite according to the minutes of the meeting, as he did with the Koke`e leaseholders and other cases during his tenure.
One thing became clear to us today in reviewing our coverage of the Agor and McMahon- they deserve each other. Their actions go way beyond the usual racism and promotion of monied American interests to, not just being active participants in the continuing genocide of na kanaka, but being leaders in the theft of the land and culture.
And there's nothing nice or kind about that.
We now return you to the "trying very hard not to be mean anymore" Parx.
Showing posts with label Naue iwi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Naue iwi. Show all posts
Monday, May 16, 2011
Friday, April 29, 2011
LICENSE TO DRILL
LICENSE TO DRILL: Atrocious English notwithstanding, today's local newspaper report of the state's latest desecration of kanaka `iwi along the beach in Wailua gave us that old familiar feeling that you know so well.
The article says that apparently, that old black magic was being performed by "(c)ontracted archaeologist Jim Powell, of Scientific Cultural Surveys, (who) also found artifacts associated with ancient Hawaiian burials" according to cultural activist Ka`iulani Edens Huff.
“These guys are all over the place,” Edens said of Powell’s company, which also surveyed Joe Brescia’s property in Naue, on Kaua‘i’s (sic) North Shore. “They are dirty and they are everywhere bones are desecrated.”
Edens of course has been put through hell for daring to try to defend the `iwi against Brescia's graveyard mansion in Wainiha.
But what caught our eye was this citation in the article:
Title 13, Chapter 300 of the Hawai‘i Administrative Rules states that it is “unlawful for any person to remove from the jurisdiction of the state, any human skeletal remains over 50 years old, or any associated burial goods, without prior written authorization” from DLNR.
That's a long way to go to say today's post is a Best of Parx (okay it's a re-run) from July 1, 2008 when we first discovered that there was such a thing as "prior written authorization from DLNR" to desecrate Hawaiian graves.
-----
HEY- THAT’S MY SACRED DOG DISH: After falling out of our chair this morning we got to thinking about the latest statement from developer Joe Brescia who still wants to put his house atop a kanaka graveyard despite a police warning that to do so would violate state anti-desecration laws.
The local paper reports that he told them:
“The law was obviously designed to punish those persons who desecrate burials without authorization.”
Sometimes there are so many different government departments, divisions and offices we can’t keep track of them all. And obviously we missed the one Brescia must be referring to.
We’re pretty sure never-say-die Brescia’s telephone call went something like this:
Hello, Office of Desecration Authorization and Permitting.
Yes I’d like to perform some desecration. Have I reached the right person?
You sure have. What can I help you defile today?
Well it seems like I have these old bones on my property and those jerks put them right where I want to put my obscenely obtrusive illegal vacation rental....
Are they Hawaiian bones?
Yes – they aren’t even white people!
Well nonetheless you have to have a permit to commit sacrilege in this state even against those godless Hawaiians. Now how many are buried there?
There’s at least 30 sets of them.
Oh. my- 30, eh. Well that means you will need a Comprehensive Desecration Permit and don’t qualify for the two-graves-or-less provisions where I could just issue you a Minor Insult Permit today. Now exactly how many people have had their sensibilities outraged?
Well, I’m not sure- there were at least a hundred protesters out there when I....
Hold it right there sir- do you have the names and contact information for those you want to offend?
Well, no but...
Well you must document the names of the persons you’d like to disrespect and provide us with the specific ways each would be likely to observe or discover your actions in order to get authorization to perform your sullying. That involves notifying the specific persons affronted and calculating the level of offensiveness each experienced so you can file your form FU-13 Defilement Filing.
File my defilement filing?...
Yes. Then of course you’ll be publishing your Public Notice of Intent to Desecrate and hold a public hearing....
Public hearing?...
Yes how else can the Desecration Commission tell whether it’s a true sacrilege or just an imposition upon the culture. Now how exactly do you plan to despoil these bones?
I just want to put a house on top of them.
Oh- a house, eh. Then you’ll need to fill out a special GH-100 Spiritual Retaliation Waiver form releasing the Commission of all future liability for ghostly events and apparitions - you know, night marching warriors, fireballs, crying aumakua- you probably know them better as specters, phantoms, poltergeists and the like. It’s all quite common....
Well it’s all quite daunting if you ask me but I suppose I’ve manipulated and paid off so many offices and officials that, well, what’s one more?
Fine sir- we’ll send you our 150 page pamphlet, “So you want to Desecrate Our Host Culture”. Where shall we send it?
Just address it to the biggest jerk in Wainiha. I’ll get it.
Are you sure? I hear there’s a lot of them lately?
Hey- I’ve fought hard for that title. If I know anything it’s how big an a-hole I am..
Very well sir- Is there anything else we can help you thumb your nose at today?
No, I’ve done enough damage for now.
Thank you sir and have a very blasphemous day.
--------
UPDATE: Although our investigative report about abuses in the ofhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giffhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifice of Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri Carvalho was greeted with a collective shrug, to our amazement Councilperson Dickie Chang's lack of recusal in the matter of the obscene $150,000 grant for the Kaua`i Marathon yielded this from the council's May 4 agenda
C 2011-135 Communication (04/28/2011) from Councilmember Chang, providing written disclosure on the record of a possible conflict of interest and recusal on Bill No. 2404 (An Ordinance to Appropriate $150,000 to the Kaua'i Marathon Grant), because he is the Owner of Wala'au Productions which tapes and aires (sic) footage of the Kaua'i Marathon and also he serves as an emcee for the Kaua'i Marathon at several pre and post events.
The article says that apparently, that old black magic was being performed by "(c)ontracted archaeologist Jim Powell, of Scientific Cultural Surveys, (who) also found artifacts associated with ancient Hawaiian burials" according to cultural activist Ka`iulani Edens Huff.
“These guys are all over the place,” Edens said of Powell’s company, which also surveyed Joe Brescia’s property in Naue, on Kaua‘i’s (sic) North Shore. “They are dirty and they are everywhere bones are desecrated.”
Edens of course has been put through hell for daring to try to defend the `iwi against Brescia's graveyard mansion in Wainiha.
But what caught our eye was this citation in the article:
Title 13, Chapter 300 of the Hawai‘i Administrative Rules states that it is “unlawful for any person to remove from the jurisdiction of the state, any human skeletal remains over 50 years old, or any associated burial goods, without prior written authorization” from DLNR.
That's a long way to go to say today's post is a Best of Parx (okay it's a re-run) from July 1, 2008 when we first discovered that there was such a thing as "prior written authorization from DLNR" to desecrate Hawaiian graves.
-----
HEY- THAT’S MY SACRED DOG DISH: After falling out of our chair this morning we got to thinking about the latest statement from developer Joe Brescia who still wants to put his house atop a kanaka graveyard despite a police warning that to do so would violate state anti-desecration laws.
The local paper reports that he told them:
“The law was obviously designed to punish those persons who desecrate burials without authorization.”
Sometimes there are so many different government departments, divisions and offices we can’t keep track of them all. And obviously we missed the one Brescia must be referring to.
We’re pretty sure never-say-die Brescia’s telephone call went something like this:
Hello, Office of Desecration Authorization and Permitting.
Yes I’d like to perform some desecration. Have I reached the right person?
You sure have. What can I help you defile today?
Well it seems like I have these old bones on my property and those jerks put them right where I want to put my obscenely obtrusive illegal vacation rental....
Are they Hawaiian bones?
Yes – they aren’t even white people!
Well nonetheless you have to have a permit to commit sacrilege in this state even against those godless Hawaiians. Now how many are buried there?
There’s at least 30 sets of them.
Oh. my- 30, eh. Well that means you will need a Comprehensive Desecration Permit and don’t qualify for the two-graves-or-less provisions where I could just issue you a Minor Insult Permit today. Now exactly how many people have had their sensibilities outraged?
Well, I’m not sure- there were at least a hundred protesters out there when I....
Hold it right there sir- do you have the names and contact information for those you want to offend?
Well, no but...
Well you must document the names of the persons you’d like to disrespect and provide us with the specific ways each would be likely to observe or discover your actions in order to get authorization to perform your sullying. That involves notifying the specific persons affronted and calculating the level of offensiveness each experienced so you can file your form FU-13 Defilement Filing.
File my defilement filing?...
Yes. Then of course you’ll be publishing your Public Notice of Intent to Desecrate and hold a public hearing....
Public hearing?...
Yes how else can the Desecration Commission tell whether it’s a true sacrilege or just an imposition upon the culture. Now how exactly do you plan to despoil these bones?
I just want to put a house on top of them.
Oh- a house, eh. Then you’ll need to fill out a special GH-100 Spiritual Retaliation Waiver form releasing the Commission of all future liability for ghostly events and apparitions - you know, night marching warriors, fireballs, crying aumakua- you probably know them better as specters, phantoms, poltergeists and the like. It’s all quite common....
Well it’s all quite daunting if you ask me but I suppose I’ve manipulated and paid off so many offices and officials that, well, what’s one more?
Fine sir- we’ll send you our 150 page pamphlet, “So you want to Desecrate Our Host Culture”. Where shall we send it?
Just address it to the biggest jerk in Wainiha. I’ll get it.
Are you sure? I hear there’s a lot of them lately?
Hey- I’ve fought hard for that title. If I know anything it’s how big an a-hole I am..
Very well sir- Is there anything else we can help you thumb your nose at today?
No, I’ve done enough damage for now.
Thank you sir and have a very blasphemous day.
--------
UPDATE: Although our investigative report about abuses in the ofhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giffhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifice of Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri Carvalho was greeted with a collective shrug, to our amazement Councilperson Dickie Chang's lack of recusal in the matter of the obscene $150,000 grant for the Kaua`i Marathon yielded this from the council's May 4 agenda
C 2011-135 Communication (04/28/2011) from Councilmember Chang, providing written disclosure on the record of a possible conflict of interest and recusal on Bill No. 2404 (An Ordinance to Appropriate $150,000 to the Kaua'i Marathon Grant), because he is the Owner of Wala'au Productions which tapes and aires (sic) footage of the Kaua'i Marathon and also he serves as an emcee for the Kaua'i Marathon at several pre and post events.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
CARVING OUT A THIRD WAY
CARVING OUT A THIRD WAY: Something subversive clicked this morning when we read the headline in the Honolulu Advertiser saying “Burial council won't sign rail pact”.
Seems that:
(t)he Oahu Island Burial Council has decided not to join other parties ... in signing an agreement on mitigating the rail project's impacts on historical, cultural and archaeological resources...
The burial council decision is largely symbolic and isn't expected to stop or delay the 20-mile elevated commuter train project.
That last sentence seemed odd considering how much power the Kaua`i Island Burial Council (KIBC) has apparently had in recent doings up at Naue where developer Joe Bresca continues to build a massive house on top of burials despite warning from Judge Kathleen Watanabe, while the planning commission has voted to consider revoking his building permit based on the fact that he doesn’t have the proper “sign off” from the KIBC.
What occurs to us is that the oft repeated conundrum for the KIBC- that they are limited to the two bad choices of either leaving the burials in place or removing them- may not actually be the case.
Because, as the months-long delay in holding a KIBC meeting due to a lack of appointments sufficient to maintain a quorum, they have, in a de facto manner, carved out a third choice- to simply not act on the request.
We’re not sure what the planning process on O`ahu calls for but here one of the numerous “sign-offs”- a so-called “punch list” of agency approvals that the planning commission and department rules mandate- is one from the KIBC.
Though the delay was unintentional, apparently, since the “automatic approval” law is inoperable here, if the KIBC simply “receives the matter for the record” – as the county council does when it doesn’t want to discuss an issue anymore- the planning department would be unable to issue a building permit.
After all it’s only been the widely reviled and truth-challenged State Archeologist Nancy McMahon’s -so that there are only two useless wrenches in the KIBC toolbox.
Who’s to say that if they take a page from the county council’s playbook of obstruction they can’t carve out a third?
Seems that:
(t)he Oahu Island Burial Council has decided not to join other parties ... in signing an agreement on mitigating the rail project's impacts on historical, cultural and archaeological resources...
The burial council decision is largely symbolic and isn't expected to stop or delay the 20-mile elevated commuter train project.
That last sentence seemed odd considering how much power the Kaua`i Island Burial Council (KIBC) has apparently had in recent doings up at Naue where developer Joe Bresca continues to build a massive house on top of burials despite warning from Judge Kathleen Watanabe, while the planning commission has voted to consider revoking his building permit based on the fact that he doesn’t have the proper “sign off” from the KIBC.
What occurs to us is that the oft repeated conundrum for the KIBC- that they are limited to the two bad choices of either leaving the burials in place or removing them- may not actually be the case.
Because, as the months-long delay in holding a KIBC meeting due to a lack of appointments sufficient to maintain a quorum, they have, in a de facto manner, carved out a third choice- to simply not act on the request.
We’re not sure what the planning process on O`ahu calls for but here one of the numerous “sign-offs”- a so-called “punch list” of agency approvals that the planning commission and department rules mandate- is one from the KIBC.
Though the delay was unintentional, apparently, since the “automatic approval” law is inoperable here, if the KIBC simply “receives the matter for the record” – as the county council does when it doesn’t want to discuss an issue anymore- the planning department would be unable to issue a building permit.
After all it’s only been the widely reviled and truth-challenged State Archeologist Nancy McMahon’s -so that there are only two useless wrenches in the KIBC toolbox.
Who’s to say that if they take a page from the county council’s playbook of obstruction they can’t carve out a third?
Thursday, March 26, 2009
BARE CUPBOARD
BARE CUPBOARD: Two emails arrived today regarding the desecration of the burials at Naue Point at Ha`ena on Kaua`i, one from Chair of the House Committee on Hawaiian Affairs, Rep. Mele Carroll, regarding the status and current content of three bills dealing with the state burial councils and one from 22 “Kānaka Maoli Scholars Against Desecration” from across Hawai`i and the U.S.
And though the need is great for reform of the “advisory” burial council system - even the judge who ruled in the case said the laws are insufficient for protection of the `iwi kupuna- as evidenced by the “legal” desecration okayed by the state at Naue, the bills do pretty much nothing but add more “consulting” groups for the councils and set up a “working group” to study what can be done meaning there will most likely be no action this legislative session.
Today, we’re off to the dentist so without further comment we’ll let readers read for themselves the note from Carroll’s office on the three bills and the letter from the scholars describing and decrying the history and current status of the burial issues.
----------
House Committee on Hawaiian Affairs passes resolutions, Senate bills
SB 1083, SD1
(SSCR473)
Status
Senate Bill 1083 SD1 includes additional native Hawaiian organizations for the Department of Land and Natural Resources to consult with to determine whether a burial site should be preserved in place or relocated and to develop a list of candidates for the burial councils. Senate Bill 1083 SD1 passed with amendments, which adds to the list of organizations the Kamakuokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies at the University of Hawai‘i, DLNR’s Historic Preservation Division, and Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawai‘i Nei.
HCR 226
Status
HR 194
Status
House Concurrent Resolution 226 and House Resolution 194 request the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to convene a working group to review the system and procedures for the review of Native Hawaiian burial sites. House Concurrent Resolution 226 passed with amendments. The recommendation was to add language to the resolutions to include that the working group would work with the State DLNR Historical Preservation Division in addressing and seeking solutions to the many serious concerns that the division is faced with, for example, the lack of qualified staffing, the overwhelming unresolved cases pertaining to our kupuna iwi, and other critical issues.
----------
Kānaka Maoli Scholars Against Desecration
Second Statement on Naue, March 24, 2009
As Kānaka Maoli scholars we write to follow-up on our statement from September 13, 2008 publicly condemning the state-sponsored desecration of a Native Hawaiian burial site at Wainiha, Kaua`i resulting from the construction of a new home at Naue Point by California real estate> developer Joseph Brescia. Both the state abuse of power and the desecration continue unabated and must come to a halt.
In the late 1980s, in response to a massive burial site disturbance at Honokahua, Maui, Kanaka Maoli came together to challenge the laws that allowed this type of sacrilege. As a result of this history, five Island Burial Councils were created and are administratively attached to the State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD) of the Department of Land and Natural Resources to address concerns relating to Native Hawaiian burial sites. By Hawai`i state statute, the composition of each island Burial Council must consist of a majority of Kānaka Maoli. The preservation criteria established by state law favor the "preservation in place" of burial sites that contain a "concentration of skeletal remains," or are "pre-contact" or "historic period" burial sites associated with important individuals and events.
At Naue, there are 30 known burial remains within less than half of an acre, with a high likelihood that more remains are present. Naue is a significant historical site that is frequently acknowledged in hula, oli, mele, and other Hawaiian knowledge sources.
Accordingly, the Kaua`i- Ni`ihau Island Burial Council appropriately voted to preserve in place the burial site on the property claimed by Brescia.
In complete contradiction to both their own state law, and the April 3, 2008 determination adopted by the island Burial Council to preserve the burials in place, the SHPD improperly approved a "Burial Treatment Plan" for Brescia without the required consultation with the island Burial Council. The Burial Treatment Plan was submitted by Mike Dega, the archaeologist hired by Joseph Brescia as a consultant in support of his building a private home atop of the burial site.
The SHPD’s own rules empower the island Burial Council to determine the disposition of previously known burials. The island Burial Council’s decision on this issue is supposed to be binding. Yet, SHPD deputy administrator Nancy McMahon sanctioned the use of vertical buffers and concrete caps on the burials to make way for installing the footings of Brescia’s house. Her authorization for such an intrusive "preservation" measure is a fundamental repudiation of the power allocated to all of the island Burial Councils.
By ignoring the decision of the island Burial Council, her actions undermine both the very concept of historic preservation and the reason for the founding of the island Burial Councils. Tragically, before a court could intervene, and based on McMahon’s unauthorized agreements, Brescia’s team managed to install massive house foundations on a portion of the cemetery.
The Kaua`i Planning Commission’s approval of Brescia’s house plans included a specific condition issued in a letter dated December 12, 2007 that "No building permit shall be issued until requirements of the State Historic Preservation Division and the Burial Council have been met." The requirements of the island Burial Council have not been met; the Council recommended that there be no building upon the cemetery. SHPD covered up the island Burial Council’s decision by trying to pretend that vertical buffers and concrete jackets constitute "preservation" ; they do not.
During the consultation required by the preliminary October 2008 court ruling, on November 6, 2008, the island Burial Council recommended that the SHPD reject the revised Burial Treatment Proposal submitted by Dega. Therefore, Brescia still has not met the requirements of the island Burial Council and thus, the building permit should be revoked. Because the Kaua`i Planning Commission’s December 2007 approval was specifically conditioned on Brescia’s meeting the island Burial Council’s requirements, there is no real approval of Brescia’s house plans. The island Burial Council made clear the proposal to build on the burial site was culturally unacceptable to its members, which is why the Council rejected the revised Burial Treatment Plan. The Kaua`i Planning Commission should be held accountable to rescind the conditional approval it gave, since its requirements were not met.
In the midst of this ongoing desecration, last month, on February 4, 2009, the SHPD wrote a letter to Dega acknowledging his sixth proposed Burial Treatment Plan. This is the same Burial Treatment Plan that McMahon circulated to Native Hawaiian Organizations for consultation as part of a court order by Judge Watanabe on October 2, 2008. The outcome of this consultation with Native Hawaiian Organizations was their sweeping rejection of the proposal. Without any regard for this rejection, the SHPD letter to Dega states, "at this time we cannot accept the Burial Treatment Plan without some revisions which are to be addressed below" and then outlines seven concerns for him to deal with such as detailing a landscape plan for burials outside of the house footprint. In other words, the letter basically instructs Dega to revise the Burial Treatment Plan in order for SHPD to approve it. This is unacceptable; if McMahon’s decision is reaffirmed despite the outcome of the consultation with Native Hawaiian Organizations that clearly rejected the proposal, it would set a dangerous precedent and strip the island Burial Councils of any meaningful authority.
To date, 5th Circuit Judge Kathleen Watanabe has denied requests for a temporary restraining order and has even refused to grant a temporary injunction to stop further construction until the full civil suit is adjudicated by the state court. The civil suit — Joseph Brescia v. Ka`iulani Huff, et al. — currently in progress is a travesty. Brescia is suing at least 17 individuals—almost all of whom are Kānaka Maoli —implicated in protecting the burial site from his construction work. Beside trespass, Brescia has accused them of five other counts: private nuisance and harassment, tortious interference with contract, civil conspiracy described as "terroristic threatening" , intentional interference, ejectment, and slander of title. We stand in solidarity with the defendants. Brescia has no one else to blame but himself; he knowingly took the chance of building his house over a grave site when the essence of the island Burial Council’s action was to preserve all burials remains in place.
We must remind the state agencies that their own law, Hawai`i revised statute 711-1107 on Desecration, specifically states that no one may commit the offense of desecrating "a place of worship or burial," and the statute defines "desecrate" as "defacing, damaging, polluting, or otherwise physically mistreating in a way that the defendant knows will outrage the sensibilities of persons likely to observe or discover the defendant's action."We call on all people of conscience to join in our condemnation of the desecration of the ancestral remains by:
• holding the Kaua`i Planning Commission accountable for upholding their own condition by finding Brescia in violation of it by starting to build;
• demanding that the SHPD honor the Kaua`i-Ni`ihau Island Burial Council’s original decision to preserve the burial site without any construction;
• insisting that the SHPD respect the outcome of the court-ordered consultation process and reject the Burial Treatment Plan;
• supporting an end to the illegal construction supported by the state; and
• protesting Brescia’s lawsuit targeted at those who have served to prevent the further degradation of the bones of our kūpuna.
Signed,
Hokulani Aikau, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Political Science, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Carlos Andrade, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Maile Arvin, M.A. candidate, Department of Ethnic Studies, University ofCalifornia San Diego
J. Leilani Basham, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Hawaiian Studies,University of Hawai`i at West O`ahu
Kamanamaikalani Beamer, Ph.D., Mellon-Hawai` i Postdoctoral Fellow, Kohala Center, Hawai`i
Kealani Robinson Cook, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of History, University of Michigan
Lani Cupchoy, Ph.D. Candidate, History, University of California, Irvine
Lisa Kahaleole Hall, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Women’s Studies, Wells College
Sydney Lehua Iaukea, Ph.D., Mellon-Hawai` i Postdoctoral Fellow, Kohala Center, Hawai`i
Lilikalā Kame`eleihiwa, Ph.D., Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Anthropology and American Studies, Wesleyan University
Kanani K. M. Lee, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Geology & Geophysics, Yale University
Jon Kamakawiwo`ole Osorio, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Lessa Kanani`opua Pelayo, M.L.I.S. Candidate, B.A., University of California, Los Angeles
Kekailoa Perry, J.D. Assistant Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Keanu Sai, Ph.D., Lecturer Kapiolani Community College
Noenoe K. Silva, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Political Science, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Stephanie Nohelani Teves, Ph.D. Candidate, Program in American Culture, University of Michigan
Ty Kāwika Tengan, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Anthropology and Ethnic Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Haunani-Kay Trask, Ph.D., Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i, Mānoa
Liza Keanuenueokalani Williams, Ph.D. student, New York University
Erin Kahunawaika` ala Wright, Ph.D. Director of Native Hawaiian Student Services, Hawai'inuiākea School of Hawaiian Knowledge
-------
Contact: J. Kehaulani KauanuiPh: 860-638-1264Email: jkauanui@wesleyan. edu
--------TAKE ACTION
Write individual emails or letters the Kaua`i Planning Commission, State Historic Preservation Division Officials, Governor Linda Lingle, Joseph Brescia, and the Mayor of Kaua`i.
Please cc: all letters and emails to: J. Kehaulani Kauanui,Center for the Americas, Wesleyan University, 255 High Street, Middletown, CT 06459.Email It's important to cc: me so I can track letters and so the recipients know you are keeping one KM scholar in the loop so there's a record of the correspondence.
See addresses below:
Ian Costa
Director of Planning
County of Kaua`i
4444 Rice Street, Suite 473
Lihue, HI 96766
icosta@kauai. gov
Laura Thielan, Chairperson
State of Hawaii, Department of Land and Natural Resources
State Historic Preservation Division
601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555
Kapolei, HI 96707
dlnr@hawaii. gov
Pua Aiu, AdministratorState Historic Preservation Division601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555Kapolei, HI 96707pua.aiu@hawaii. gov
Nancy McMahon, Deputy Administrator
State Historic Preservation Division
601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555
Kapolei, HI 96707
Nancy.A.McMahon@ hawaii.gov
Governor Linda Lingle
State of Hawai`i
Executive Chambers
State Capitol
Honolulu, Hawai`i 96813
governor.lingle@ hawaii.gov
Joseph Brescia, President
Architectural Glass & Aluminum
1151 Marina Village Parkway, Suite 101
Alameda, CA 94501
jbrescia@aga- ca.com
Bernard P. Carvalho, Jr.
Mayor, County of Kauai
4444 Rice St., Suite 235
Lihue, HI 96766
mayor@kauai. gov
And though the need is great for reform of the “advisory” burial council system - even the judge who ruled in the case said the laws are insufficient for protection of the `iwi kupuna- as evidenced by the “legal” desecration okayed by the state at Naue, the bills do pretty much nothing but add more “consulting” groups for the councils and set up a “working group” to study what can be done meaning there will most likely be no action this legislative session.
Today, we’re off to the dentist so without further comment we’ll let readers read for themselves the note from Carroll’s office on the three bills and the letter from the scholars describing and decrying the history and current status of the burial issues.
----------
House Committee on Hawaiian Affairs passes resolutions, Senate bills
SB 1083, SD1
(SSCR473)
Status
Senate Bill 1083 SD1 includes additional native Hawaiian organizations for the Department of Land and Natural Resources to consult with to determine whether a burial site should be preserved in place or relocated and to develop a list of candidates for the burial councils. Senate Bill 1083 SD1 passed with amendments, which adds to the list of organizations the Kamakuokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies at the University of Hawai‘i, DLNR’s Historic Preservation Division, and Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawai‘i Nei.
HCR 226
Status
HR 194
Status
House Concurrent Resolution 226 and House Resolution 194 request the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to convene a working group to review the system and procedures for the review of Native Hawaiian burial sites. House Concurrent Resolution 226 passed with amendments. The recommendation was to add language to the resolutions to include that the working group would work with the State DLNR Historical Preservation Division in addressing and seeking solutions to the many serious concerns that the division is faced with, for example, the lack of qualified staffing, the overwhelming unresolved cases pertaining to our kupuna iwi, and other critical issues.
----------
Kānaka Maoli Scholars Against Desecration
Second Statement on Naue, March 24, 2009
As Kānaka Maoli scholars we write to follow-up on our statement from September 13, 2008 publicly condemning the state-sponsored desecration of a Native Hawaiian burial site at Wainiha, Kaua`i resulting from the construction of a new home at Naue Point by California real estate> developer Joseph Brescia. Both the state abuse of power and the desecration continue unabated and must come to a halt.
In the late 1980s, in response to a massive burial site disturbance at Honokahua, Maui, Kanaka Maoli came together to challenge the laws that allowed this type of sacrilege. As a result of this history, five Island Burial Councils were created and are administratively attached to the State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD) of the Department of Land and Natural Resources to address concerns relating to Native Hawaiian burial sites. By Hawai`i state statute, the composition of each island Burial Council must consist of a majority of Kānaka Maoli. The preservation criteria established by state law favor the "preservation in place" of burial sites that contain a "concentration of skeletal remains," or are "pre-contact" or "historic period" burial sites associated with important individuals and events.
At Naue, there are 30 known burial remains within less than half of an acre, with a high likelihood that more remains are present. Naue is a significant historical site that is frequently acknowledged in hula, oli, mele, and other Hawaiian knowledge sources.
Accordingly, the Kaua`i- Ni`ihau Island Burial Council appropriately voted to preserve in place the burial site on the property claimed by Brescia.
In complete contradiction to both their own state law, and the April 3, 2008 determination adopted by the island Burial Council to preserve the burials in place, the SHPD improperly approved a "Burial Treatment Plan" for Brescia without the required consultation with the island Burial Council. The Burial Treatment Plan was submitted by Mike Dega, the archaeologist hired by Joseph Brescia as a consultant in support of his building a private home atop of the burial site.
The SHPD’s own rules empower the island Burial Council to determine the disposition of previously known burials. The island Burial Council’s decision on this issue is supposed to be binding. Yet, SHPD deputy administrator Nancy McMahon sanctioned the use of vertical buffers and concrete caps on the burials to make way for installing the footings of Brescia’s house. Her authorization for such an intrusive "preservation" measure is a fundamental repudiation of the power allocated to all of the island Burial Councils.
By ignoring the decision of the island Burial Council, her actions undermine both the very concept of historic preservation and the reason for the founding of the island Burial Councils. Tragically, before a court could intervene, and based on McMahon’s unauthorized agreements, Brescia’s team managed to install massive house foundations on a portion of the cemetery.
The Kaua`i Planning Commission’s approval of Brescia’s house plans included a specific condition issued in a letter dated December 12, 2007 that "No building permit shall be issued until requirements of the State Historic Preservation Division and the Burial Council have been met." The requirements of the island Burial Council have not been met; the Council recommended that there be no building upon the cemetery. SHPD covered up the island Burial Council’s decision by trying to pretend that vertical buffers and concrete jackets constitute "preservation" ; they do not.
During the consultation required by the preliminary October 2008 court ruling, on November 6, 2008, the island Burial Council recommended that the SHPD reject the revised Burial Treatment Proposal submitted by Dega. Therefore, Brescia still has not met the requirements of the island Burial Council and thus, the building permit should be revoked. Because the Kaua`i Planning Commission’s December 2007 approval was specifically conditioned on Brescia’s meeting the island Burial Council’s requirements, there is no real approval of Brescia’s house plans. The island Burial Council made clear the proposal to build on the burial site was culturally unacceptable to its members, which is why the Council rejected the revised Burial Treatment Plan. The Kaua`i Planning Commission should be held accountable to rescind the conditional approval it gave, since its requirements were not met.
In the midst of this ongoing desecration, last month, on February 4, 2009, the SHPD wrote a letter to Dega acknowledging his sixth proposed Burial Treatment Plan. This is the same Burial Treatment Plan that McMahon circulated to Native Hawaiian Organizations for consultation as part of a court order by Judge Watanabe on October 2, 2008. The outcome of this consultation with Native Hawaiian Organizations was their sweeping rejection of the proposal. Without any regard for this rejection, the SHPD letter to Dega states, "at this time we cannot accept the Burial Treatment Plan without some revisions which are to be addressed below" and then outlines seven concerns for him to deal with such as detailing a landscape plan for burials outside of the house footprint. In other words, the letter basically instructs Dega to revise the Burial Treatment Plan in order for SHPD to approve it. This is unacceptable; if McMahon’s decision is reaffirmed despite the outcome of the consultation with Native Hawaiian Organizations that clearly rejected the proposal, it would set a dangerous precedent and strip the island Burial Councils of any meaningful authority.
To date, 5th Circuit Judge Kathleen Watanabe has denied requests for a temporary restraining order and has even refused to grant a temporary injunction to stop further construction until the full civil suit is adjudicated by the state court. The civil suit — Joseph Brescia v. Ka`iulani Huff, et al. — currently in progress is a travesty. Brescia is suing at least 17 individuals—almost all of whom are Kānaka Maoli —implicated in protecting the burial site from his construction work. Beside trespass, Brescia has accused them of five other counts: private nuisance and harassment, tortious interference with contract, civil conspiracy described as "terroristic threatening" , intentional interference, ejectment, and slander of title. We stand in solidarity with the defendants. Brescia has no one else to blame but himself; he knowingly took the chance of building his house over a grave site when the essence of the island Burial Council’s action was to preserve all burials remains in place.
We must remind the state agencies that their own law, Hawai`i revised statute 711-1107 on Desecration, specifically states that no one may commit the offense of desecrating "a place of worship or burial," and the statute defines "desecrate" as "defacing, damaging, polluting, or otherwise physically mistreating in a way that the defendant knows will outrage the sensibilities of persons likely to observe or discover the defendant's action."We call on all people of conscience to join in our condemnation of the desecration of the ancestral remains by:
• holding the Kaua`i Planning Commission accountable for upholding their own condition by finding Brescia in violation of it by starting to build;
• demanding that the SHPD honor the Kaua`i-Ni`ihau Island Burial Council’s original decision to preserve the burial site without any construction;
• insisting that the SHPD respect the outcome of the court-ordered consultation process and reject the Burial Treatment Plan;
• supporting an end to the illegal construction supported by the state; and
• protesting Brescia’s lawsuit targeted at those who have served to prevent the further degradation of the bones of our kūpuna.
Signed,
Hokulani Aikau, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Political Science, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Carlos Andrade, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Maile Arvin, M.A. candidate, Department of Ethnic Studies, University ofCalifornia San Diego
J. Leilani Basham, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Hawaiian Studies,University of Hawai`i at West O`ahu
Kamanamaikalani Beamer, Ph.D., Mellon-Hawai` i Postdoctoral Fellow, Kohala Center, Hawai`i
Kealani Robinson Cook, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of History, University of Michigan
Lani Cupchoy, Ph.D. Candidate, History, University of California, Irvine
Lisa Kahaleole Hall, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Women’s Studies, Wells College
Sydney Lehua Iaukea, Ph.D., Mellon-Hawai` i Postdoctoral Fellow, Kohala Center, Hawai`i
Lilikalā Kame`eleihiwa, Ph.D., Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Anthropology and American Studies, Wesleyan University
Kanani K. M. Lee, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Geology & Geophysics, Yale University
Jon Kamakawiwo`ole Osorio, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Lessa Kanani`opua Pelayo, M.L.I.S. Candidate, B.A., University of California, Los Angeles
Kekailoa Perry, J.D. Assistant Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Keanu Sai, Ph.D., Lecturer Kapiolani Community College
Noenoe K. Silva, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Political Science, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Stephanie Nohelani Teves, Ph.D. Candidate, Program in American Culture, University of Michigan
Ty Kāwika Tengan, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Anthropology and Ethnic Studies, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa
Haunani-Kay Trask, Ph.D., Professor, Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawai`i, Mānoa
Liza Keanuenueokalani Williams, Ph.D. student, New York University
Erin Kahunawaika` ala Wright, Ph.D. Director of Native Hawaiian Student Services, Hawai'inuiākea School of Hawaiian Knowledge
-------
Contact: J. Kehaulani KauanuiPh: 860-638-1264Email: jkauanui@wesleyan. edu
--------TAKE ACTION
Write individual emails or letters the Kaua`i Planning Commission, State Historic Preservation Division Officials, Governor Linda Lingle, Joseph Brescia, and the Mayor of Kaua`i.
Please cc: all letters and emails to: J. Kehaulani Kauanui,Center for the Americas, Wesleyan University, 255 High Street, Middletown, CT 06459.Email
See addresses below:
Ian Costa
Director of Planning
County of Kaua`i
4444 Rice Street, Suite 473
Lihue, HI 96766
icosta@kauai. gov
Laura Thielan, Chairperson
State of Hawaii, Department of Land and Natural Resources
State Historic Preservation Division
601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555
Kapolei, HI 96707
dlnr@hawaii. gov
Pua Aiu, AdministratorState Historic Preservation Division601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555Kapolei, HI 96707pua.aiu@hawaii. gov
Nancy McMahon, Deputy Administrator
State Historic Preservation Division
601 Kamokila Blvd., Room 555
Kapolei, HI 96707
Nancy.A.McMahon@ hawaii.gov
Governor Linda Lingle
State of Hawai`i
Executive Chambers
State Capitol
Honolulu, Hawai`i 96813
governor.lingle@ hawaii.gov
Joseph Brescia, President
Architectural Glass & Aluminum
1151 Marina Village Parkway, Suite 101
Alameda, CA 94501
jbrescia@aga- ca.com
Bernard P. Carvalho, Jr.
Mayor, County of Kauai
4444 Rice St., Suite 235
Lihue, HI 96766
mayor@kauai. gov
Friday, October 3, 2008
OVERKILL FOR THE UNDERDOG
OVERKILL FOR THE UNDERDOG: Sometimes you’ve gotta wonder if people who attended a meeting were in the same room or on different planets.
And supposedly that’s why we have people who call themselves reporters. Their job is to figure out what the “news” is as it occurs, news being not the usual Dog Bites Man” but the unexpected “Man Bites Dog”.
But in this age of corporate newsrooms and busy if not jaded reporters, journalists often have their stories written- at least in their minds- before going in.
Many have apparently forgotten how to, or don’t have the time to, do the job and so often it falls to the alternative press- both professionals and every day citizens- to let us know what actually happened.
And yesterday’s coverage of the meeting of the Kaua`i Burial Council is a case study in how preconceptions can make reporters blind to the overarching “news”.
One could avoid taking their bedtime dose of Ambien by they reading the three mainstream press articles from the attending scribes.
Oh there was plenty of the perfunctory reporting of “five hours of testimony” and “emotion packed, anger-fueled blah-de-blah” and the like as well as tons of regurgitation of background info.
But we had to learn of the fact that the place was filled with armed state “conservation” cops from eyewitness bloggers Katy Rose and Joan Conrow.
Katy describes the scene that greeted her
When I arrived at the meeting at 9:45 a loud debate had broken out about the presence of armed DOCARE officers in the room. The outcry against having guns in the room was so intense that Mark Hubbard, the Burial Council chair, requested that the officers be asked to leave. Pua Aiu, the SHPD administrator, explained that the armed officers were called in because of "unruly meetings" in the past, but she did honor the request to remove them from the room.
As inappropriate as their presence was, it is an indication of the power of the people that the State felt so threatened by emotional testimony that it felt it necessary to call them in the first place.
Joan was even more outraged and provided a little more detail.
I’ll start with the words uttered by Pua Aiu, administrator of the State Historic Preservation Division, when several people asked why men with guns were in the room. She replied that she had requested DOCARE officers because of “unruly meetings in the past” and noted: “They come with guns. That’s how they come equipped.”
As Sharon Pomroy ironically observed, standing up and holding the traditional wood staff carried by Hale Mawae: “Guns are here because there’s a Hawaiian with a stick in the room.”
At the request of Chair Mark Hubbard, the three state enforcement officers did leave the Council Chambers and spent the rest of the day hanging out in the heat and humidity on the front steps of the Historic County Building. Some Kauai cops also showed up because people had called them to complain about the DOCARE officers. It was not only an utter waste of da guys with guns’ time and taxpayer money, but a tragic commentary on the climate of fear that seems to pervade the state when it comes to Hawaiians and their issues.
The last time I saw armed officers at a meeting was when Office of Hawaiian Affairs hit the road to explain to folks why its proposed settlement with the state was such a good deal. Strange, that the two state agencies that deal most closely with Hawaiian issues are so quick to call in the guns. Could it be because they know best how badly the kanaka are getting screwed?
As Tracey Schavone, who is not a kanaka, noted in her testimony to the Council: “It’s very disturbing to think, this is a Hawaiian issue, and oh my god, they think they need to have guns in the room.”
It’s hard to say what’s more appalling, the fact that lawbreakers like Grove Farm VP, Chair Hubbard (he also being the Chair of the unethical Kaua`i Ethics Board) along with dufusses like State Archeologist Nancy McMahon and her coconut overlord Aiu (who caused the whole mess in the first place by skirting the law) though they needed armed guards to protect them at the meeting, or the fact that it went unreported in the mainstream press.
We’ve probably been to well over a thousand meetings in that room, many regarding issues just as, if not more, contentious and have never seen armed guards.
Perhaps that’s what happens when you have a para-military force that isn’t subject to regulation by a citizen panel, only to Land and Natural Resources Chief Laura Thielen.
Her private “Conservation Enforcement” crew is comprised in large part of people who were too unstable to continue being real law enforcement officers... just the type of people we want holding guns at an emotion-packed meeting.. .
But perhaps it’s another chapter in the truly perplexing recent response of the thieves who stole these islands to challenges of their authority to rape the very land they stole.
In the 30 some-odd years since the native Hawaiian cultural and political renaissance the worst thing that the authorities might have physically suffered at the hands of kanaka maoli is a paper cuts from the documents the Hawaiians routinely waive under their arrogant noses.
This disproportionate response is even more bewildering when you look at the words of the common beneficiaries of the genocide who see the theft of Hawai`i as a fait accompli.
To hear them tell it in comment sections of newspapers and blogs throughout the state they don’t seem to be worried that their land deeds may be worthless and that they are illegal immigrants, according to the UN and international law.
They know that crooked Amerikan courts and the yield of bloated military budgets are standing in wait behind the curtain to support and carry out their nefarious piracy.
These worthless slugs laugh like the maniacal James Bond villains they are when someone dares to suggest that their morally bankrupt value system is being challenged by a bunch of peaceful lava-lave clad victims of their genocide.
And perhaps it’s because no matter how restless the natives are it isn’t like anyone can think of even one incident of armed insurrection in this or the last century in response to their “you and what army” challenges.
But obviously these western condo-conquerors either don’t know something their militaristic overlords do or the “authorities” are insanely overreacting to a threat that their minions on the other hand pooh-pooh.
In one way, like Joan and Katy say, it’s a complement to the Hawaiian sovereignty movement that the Amerikan powers that be think they need to arm themselves in response to kanaka demands for justice.
Lately it hasn’t been enough to have the cops and courts harass peaceful non violent protesters like those whose plight we’ve detailed or those in yesterday’s show trial for the handful of Maui denizens who were arraigned yesterday for their actions at Iolani Palace this summer, both in attempts to peacefully highlight injustices.
Now they are bringing armed guards to community meetings where both cultural and ethnic non-westerners might show up to challenge the very idea of their authority to desecrate, denigrate and commit genocide.
What’s next?- an naval armada to accompany a unwanted ferry boat and attack surfers and kayakers who are armed with only bathing suits and surfboards?.
Oh, wait...
And supposedly that’s why we have people who call themselves reporters. Their job is to figure out what the “news” is as it occurs, news being not the usual Dog Bites Man” but the unexpected “Man Bites Dog”.
But in this age of corporate newsrooms and busy if not jaded reporters, journalists often have their stories written- at least in their minds- before going in.
Many have apparently forgotten how to, or don’t have the time to, do the job and so often it falls to the alternative press- both professionals and every day citizens- to let us know what actually happened.
And yesterday’s coverage of the meeting of the Kaua`i Burial Council is a case study in how preconceptions can make reporters blind to the overarching “news”.
One could avoid taking their bedtime dose of Ambien by they reading the three mainstream press articles from the attending scribes.
Oh there was plenty of the perfunctory reporting of “five hours of testimony” and “emotion packed, anger-fueled blah-de-blah” and the like as well as tons of regurgitation of background info.
But we had to learn of the fact that the place was filled with armed state “conservation” cops from eyewitness bloggers Katy Rose and Joan Conrow.
Katy describes the scene that greeted her
When I arrived at the meeting at 9:45 a loud debate had broken out about the presence of armed DOCARE officers in the room. The outcry against having guns in the room was so intense that Mark Hubbard, the Burial Council chair, requested that the officers be asked to leave. Pua Aiu, the SHPD administrator, explained that the armed officers were called in because of "unruly meetings" in the past, but she did honor the request to remove them from the room.
As inappropriate as their presence was, it is an indication of the power of the people that the State felt so threatened by emotional testimony that it felt it necessary to call them in the first place.
Joan was even more outraged and provided a little more detail.
I’ll start with the words uttered by Pua Aiu, administrator of the State Historic Preservation Division, when several people asked why men with guns were in the room. She replied that she had requested DOCARE officers because of “unruly meetings in the past” and noted: “They come with guns. That’s how they come equipped.”
As Sharon Pomroy ironically observed, standing up and holding the traditional wood staff carried by Hale Mawae: “Guns are here because there’s a Hawaiian with a stick in the room.”
At the request of Chair Mark Hubbard, the three state enforcement officers did leave the Council Chambers and spent the rest of the day hanging out in the heat and humidity on the front steps of the Historic County Building. Some Kauai cops also showed up because people had called them to complain about the DOCARE officers. It was not only an utter waste of da guys with guns’ time and taxpayer money, but a tragic commentary on the climate of fear that seems to pervade the state when it comes to Hawaiians and their issues.
The last time I saw armed officers at a meeting was when Office of Hawaiian Affairs hit the road to explain to folks why its proposed settlement with the state was such a good deal. Strange, that the two state agencies that deal most closely with Hawaiian issues are so quick to call in the guns. Could it be because they know best how badly the kanaka are getting screwed?
As Tracey Schavone, who is not a kanaka, noted in her testimony to the Council: “It’s very disturbing to think, this is a Hawaiian issue, and oh my god, they think they need to have guns in the room.”
It’s hard to say what’s more appalling, the fact that lawbreakers like Grove Farm VP, Chair Hubbard (he also being the Chair of the unethical Kaua`i Ethics Board) along with dufusses like State Archeologist Nancy McMahon and her coconut overlord Aiu (who caused the whole mess in the first place by skirting the law) though they needed armed guards to protect them at the meeting, or the fact that it went unreported in the mainstream press.
We’ve probably been to well over a thousand meetings in that room, many regarding issues just as, if not more, contentious and have never seen armed guards.
Perhaps that’s what happens when you have a para-military force that isn’t subject to regulation by a citizen panel, only to Land and Natural Resources Chief Laura Thielen.
Her private “Conservation Enforcement” crew is comprised in large part of people who were too unstable to continue being real law enforcement officers... just the type of people we want holding guns at an emotion-packed meeting.. .
But perhaps it’s another chapter in the truly perplexing recent response of the thieves who stole these islands to challenges of their authority to rape the very land they stole.
In the 30 some-odd years since the native Hawaiian cultural and political renaissance the worst thing that the authorities might have physically suffered at the hands of kanaka maoli is a paper cuts from the documents the Hawaiians routinely waive under their arrogant noses.
This disproportionate response is even more bewildering when you look at the words of the common beneficiaries of the genocide who see the theft of Hawai`i as a fait accompli.
To hear them tell it in comment sections of newspapers and blogs throughout the state they don’t seem to be worried that their land deeds may be worthless and that they are illegal immigrants, according to the UN and international law.
They know that crooked Amerikan courts and the yield of bloated military budgets are standing in wait behind the curtain to support and carry out their nefarious piracy.
These worthless slugs laugh like the maniacal James Bond villains they are when someone dares to suggest that their morally bankrupt value system is being challenged by a bunch of peaceful lava-lave clad victims of their genocide.
And perhaps it’s because no matter how restless the natives are it isn’t like anyone can think of even one incident of armed insurrection in this or the last century in response to their “you and what army” challenges.
But obviously these western condo-conquerors either don’t know something their militaristic overlords do or the “authorities” are insanely overreacting to a threat that their minions on the other hand pooh-pooh.
In one way, like Joan and Katy say, it’s a complement to the Hawaiian sovereignty movement that the Amerikan powers that be think they need to arm themselves in response to kanaka demands for justice.
Lately it hasn’t been enough to have the cops and courts harass peaceful non violent protesters like those whose plight we’ve detailed or those in yesterday’s show trial for the handful of Maui denizens who were arraigned yesterday for their actions at Iolani Palace this summer, both in attempts to peacefully highlight injustices.
Now they are bringing armed guards to community meetings where both cultural and ethnic non-westerners might show up to challenge the very idea of their authority to desecrate, denigrate and commit genocide.
What’s next?- an naval armada to accompany a unwanted ferry boat and attack surfers and kayakers who are armed with only bathing suits and surfboards?.
Oh, wait...
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
HARDENED BONEHEADS
HARDENED BONEHEADS: It’s nani-nani-boo-boo time for us today as the Naue cemetery desecration case came to fruition in court yesterday.
As we reported first by delineating a letter from OHA on July 10, the shenanigans of developer Joe Brescia and his henchwoman Nancy “Igor” McMahon violated various provisions of rules and laws.
As Joan Conrow said this morning in referring to the property rights nutsos who have been defending and singing the praises of Brescia and McMahon::
“OK, get out your chili pepper water, your A-1 sauce or your other favorite condiment. Because it’s time to eat some crow — and not the Alala kine, since it’s almost extinct.
Although the ruling was vintage, archetypical Judge Kathleen Wantanabe in it’s equivocations in favor of bureaucratic deference, the ruling confirmed that the desecration of the cemetery at Naue was never legal even according to the administrative procedures much less the state law and constitution.
Because she was a typical gutless government attorney throughout her career, by predilection it seems it never occurred to Judge Wantanabe that she could strike down the “ad rules” that she instead said should be changed legislatively in part because they violate the laws and constitutional provisions.
The ruling is well reported by others today so we won’t detail it here but we can’t wait for the spectacle of next Kaua`i Burial Council meeting, which if they’re smart they’ll hold at the convention hall or stadium.
And of course we anticipate quite the crowd at the planning commission whose discussion of the legitimacy of the construction permits has been on hold pending the ruling that invalidates an essential component- a valid burial plan..
And we’re pretty sure there are prohibitive odds against State Archeologist Nancy McMahon coming in anywhere but last in this Saturday’s council election after the full blame for the mess was deposited at her doorstep.
The only question left is whether her negligence and malfeasance rose to a level that she doesn’t have any immunity against a lawsuit by all sides.
Perhaps we’ll see a civil case with plaintiffs Jeff Chandler and Joe Brescia vs. respondent Nancy McMahon in the near future. Only a complete twit like McMahon could bring those two together on something.
But even though the desecration and destruction is essentially halted for now- though in a typical Wantanabe-istic non-ruling ruling- what strikes us through all of this is the antiseptic way the press, even our friend Joan (although just quoting Wantanabe), has fallen into a pattern of describing the actual desecratory construction last month.
Here’s some snippets from Joan’s post.
Wantanbe also said that doesn’t mean he was authorized to start pouring his foundation, effectively capping some seven iwi in concrete so he could erect pilings for his house...
“While the burials were preserved, they were not authorized according to law and it could be argued that construction of jackets constitutes alteration,” Watanabe said...
The Council could take any number of steps, she said, such as having the jackets taken off the iwi and removing the seven burials that are now under the house and reinterring them elsewhere.
Blogger Charley Foster, who despite his protestations has decidedly sided with the developer, used the words “after jackets and footings were already poured” in a comment although that can be expected.
But here’s a description from the article in the local paper today:
...a Burial Treatment Plan featuring vertical buffers for the house and protective concrete jackets for the iwi.
“Capping some seven iwi in concrete”? “Construction of jackets”? “Having the jackets taken off the iwi”? “Vertical buffers for the house and protective concrete jackets for the iwi”.?
What is with these antiseptic descriptions?. What Brescia apparently did was dig a freakin’ hole and pour concrete all over the bones- “coincidentally” right where they were pouring the concrete for the concrete foundation poles.
They all make it sound like anything but what it is.
There are no stupid “jackets”. Nothing was “capped”. And there were no “preservation measures”.
If we were to suggest the Arizona Memorial be “preserved” by slathering it in concrete we’d be strung up by the short and curlies.
At least malahini Advertiser reporter Diana Leong put the words "concrete jackets" and "buffer" in quotes in her piece this morning.
The news stories made clear that there was no order to stop but the proviso was that construction could continue only as long as there’s “no irreparable damage to the burials”
No one is pointing out the obvious- there was already irreparable harm because the way it’s described with “caps” and “jackets” and “buffers” and “pilings” it doesn’t let people know that they just poured cement over the bones.
This is a certainly a new idea in physical anthropology. Why we could “preserve” all artifacts forever by throwing them in a pit and sealing them in cement. Mayan ruins? Dinosaur bones? George Washington’s wooden teeth? Seal ‘um all in concrete. .
Since McMahon is going to be out of a job we may well be looking forward to the new Joe Brescia Memorial School of Wacko Anthropology... built of concrete.
And as for Brescia, well no one can say he hasn’t cemented relations between north shore developers and Kanaka community.
As we reported first by delineating a letter from OHA on July 10, the shenanigans of developer Joe Brescia and his henchwoman Nancy “Igor” McMahon violated various provisions of rules and laws.
As Joan Conrow said this morning in referring to the property rights nutsos who have been defending and singing the praises of Brescia and McMahon::
“OK, get out your chili pepper water, your A-1 sauce or your other favorite condiment. Because it’s time to eat some crow — and not the Alala kine, since it’s almost extinct.
Although the ruling was vintage, archetypical Judge Kathleen Wantanabe in it’s equivocations in favor of bureaucratic deference, the ruling confirmed that the desecration of the cemetery at Naue was never legal even according to the administrative procedures much less the state law and constitution.
Because she was a typical gutless government attorney throughout her career, by predilection it seems it never occurred to Judge Wantanabe that she could strike down the “ad rules” that she instead said should be changed legislatively in part because they violate the laws and constitutional provisions.
The ruling is well reported by others today so we won’t detail it here but we can’t wait for the spectacle of next Kaua`i Burial Council meeting, which if they’re smart they’ll hold at the convention hall or stadium.
And of course we anticipate quite the crowd at the planning commission whose discussion of the legitimacy of the construction permits has been on hold pending the ruling that invalidates an essential component- a valid burial plan..
And we’re pretty sure there are prohibitive odds against State Archeologist Nancy McMahon coming in anywhere but last in this Saturday’s council election after the full blame for the mess was deposited at her doorstep.
The only question left is whether her negligence and malfeasance rose to a level that she doesn’t have any immunity against a lawsuit by all sides.
Perhaps we’ll see a civil case with plaintiffs Jeff Chandler and Joe Brescia vs. respondent Nancy McMahon in the near future. Only a complete twit like McMahon could bring those two together on something.
But even though the desecration and destruction is essentially halted for now- though in a typical Wantanabe-istic non-ruling ruling- what strikes us through all of this is the antiseptic way the press, even our friend Joan (although just quoting Wantanabe), has fallen into a pattern of describing the actual desecratory construction last month.
Here’s some snippets from Joan’s post.
Wantanbe also said that doesn’t mean he was authorized to start pouring his foundation, effectively capping some seven iwi in concrete so he could erect pilings for his house...
“While the burials were preserved, they were not authorized according to law and it could be argued that construction of jackets constitutes alteration,” Watanabe said...
The Council could take any number of steps, she said, such as having the jackets taken off the iwi and removing the seven burials that are now under the house and reinterring them elsewhere.
Blogger Charley Foster, who despite his protestations has decidedly sided with the developer, used the words “after jackets and footings were already poured” in a comment although that can be expected.
But here’s a description from the article in the local paper today:
...a Burial Treatment Plan featuring vertical buffers for the house and protective concrete jackets for the iwi.
“Capping some seven iwi in concrete”? “Construction of jackets”? “Having the jackets taken off the iwi”? “Vertical buffers for the house and protective concrete jackets for the iwi”.?
What is with these antiseptic descriptions?. What Brescia apparently did was dig a freakin’ hole and pour concrete all over the bones- “coincidentally” right where they were pouring the concrete for the concrete foundation poles.
They all make it sound like anything but what it is.
There are no stupid “jackets”. Nothing was “capped”. And there were no “preservation measures”.
If we were to suggest the Arizona Memorial be “preserved” by slathering it in concrete we’d be strung up by the short and curlies.
At least malahini Advertiser reporter Diana Leong put the words "concrete jackets" and "buffer" in quotes in her piece this morning.
The news stories made clear that there was no order to stop but the proviso was that construction could continue only as long as there’s “no irreparable damage to the burials”
No one is pointing out the obvious- there was already irreparable harm because the way it’s described with “caps” and “jackets” and “buffers” and “pilings” it doesn’t let people know that they just poured cement over the bones.
This is a certainly a new idea in physical anthropology. Why we could “preserve” all artifacts forever by throwing them in a pit and sealing them in cement. Mayan ruins? Dinosaur bones? George Washington’s wooden teeth? Seal ‘um all in concrete. .
Since McMahon is going to be out of a job we may well be looking forward to the new Joe Brescia Memorial School of Wacko Anthropology... built of concrete.
And as for Brescia, well no one can say he hasn’t cemented relations between north shore developers and Kanaka community.
Friday, August 15, 2008
MOTHER HUBBARD’S LAMENT
MOTHER HUBBARD’S LAMENT: Government bureaucrats have never been known for their competence or honesty.
But with the way some are being ridiculed by judges lately you’d think people like Honolulu County clerk Denise Decosta and Chief Elections officer Kevin Cronin would show some integrity or at least shame- and resign.
Cronin’s penchant for making it up as he goes along- as pilloried by an administrative judge last week was- surpassed by Decosta in her convoluted attempt to keep a citizen initiative against rail in Honolulu off the ballot because even though it was legally submitted to qualify for the general election the petitioners mentioned a special election in their preface.
Judge Karl Sakamoto’s now “instant classic” ruling yesterday that “(t)he voice of the people should not be suffocated by the erroneous readings of the law by its own government" was apparently part of a new spate of recent rulings by judges asking government officials “what am I an idiot?” in light of their intentional administrative twistings of the law.
The actual Honlulu City Charter provisions- which trumps the confusing special ordinance and administrative rules- says:
Any petition for proposed ordinance which has been filed with the council at least ninety days prior to a general election and which has been certified by the clerk, shall be submitted to electors for the aforementioned general election."
So how old is Decosta? Six? When they read her the actual prevailing rules of the game she apparently pointed to an out of context phrase, showed us what her mommy said, put her fingers in her ears and yelled “You said it- nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah- I can’t hear you- nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah.”
But on Kaua`i we’ve apparently got a new judge for whom the answer to what am I an idiot? is an unqualified “yes” when it comes to abuses of administrative a-holes
But what do you expect? Firth Circuit Court judge Kathleen Wantanbe came straight from the government bureaucracy to her perch on the bench and seemingly her rulings don’t just give the benefit of the doubt to government officials but they consider complaints about it to be a nuisance- just like her bureaucratic brethren .
Yesterday’s hearing in Joe Brescia’s genocide and desecration case was punctuated by a distinct flavor of telling the government that they can do no wrong if press reports are accurate.
First she ruled that only the reportedly allegedly corrupt Kaua`i State Archeologist Nancy McMahon could testify but not archeologist Dr. Michael “No Pun Intended” Graves who represented the aggrieved iwi and their descendents.
Independent reporter Joan Conrow described it this way this morning
Before the proceedings got to that place, Watanabe refused to qualify Dr. Michael Graves, a witness called by the Native Hawaiian Legal Corp., as an expert in Hawaiian archaeology. Never mind that he spent 21 years at UH teaching undergraduate and graduate students in archaeology and served as head of the department.
Since that prohibited Graves from discussing whether the State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD) acted properly in its treatment of the Naue burials, much of the hearing was devoted to Kauai state archaeologist Nancy McMahon defending her decisions regarding the burials there.
What a surprise- a career government lawyer deciding that self-serving government officials’ testimony is expert- even one whose job is in jeopardy, being under fire for not knowing what the heck she is doing, what the law really says and lying to both the Kaua`i Burial Council and Planning Commission- and denying a private sector university professor with no bone to pick, so to speak.
And what they were arguing about puts the meter on Wantanabe’s “what am I an idiot?” rating in the red zone.
As Star-Bulletin reporter Tom Finnegan said today
The Native Hawaiian Legal Corp.. argued that the state archaeologist reversed the decision of the Kauai Ni`ihau Burial Council when she allowed Brescia's contractors to build the home and cap seven grave sites with concrete.
Chandler's lawyers blame state Historic Preservation Division archaeologist and Kauai County Council candidate Nancy McMahon for pushing through both the permits at the county level and the burial council's plan to keep the burials in place. Then, the lawyers argued, she approved the contractor's plan without returning to the burial council for its input.
McMahon, who testified yesterday, said that... no evidence has been found that would make anyone believe the area was a cemetery, rather than 30 individual graves. (emphasis added)
However, Alan Murakami, Chandler's lawyer, said that the burial council wanted to preserve the burials as a unit, and McMahon took it on her own to interpret its ruling.
By allowing the house to be built atop the graves, rather than preserving them, "the state has disemboweled the burial council," Murakami added.
Oh- well, that explains it all- it’s just a coincidence. Those stupid Hawaiians just threw their dead all over the place and randomly and independently decided to inter their dead there in a concentration that exponentially outstrips most other nearby locations of “iwi kupuna”
Apparently there was no actual plan to screw poor Joe Brescia 500 years in the future by burying all the bodes in one place bodies there.
Well, we’d better pull our tongue out of our cheek long enough to ask if McMahon’s contention exposes anything but the depth of depravity of the administrative scope of genocide that continues to percolate through the Hawai`i State apparatus.
If she contends that despite the concentration of 30 full sets of remains in an 18,000-square-foot beachfront property it was not purposefully done as what westerners would call a cemetery she obviously presumes that the pre-western contact Hawaiians were too dumb to coordinate a place to inter their dead.
After all those brown skinned people are akin to a bunch of animals who have no capacity to concentrate their burials in a certain area with any intent..
Because as we all know a concentration of trees is not forest- unless you look at a dictionary.
The significance of this is that McMahon has used this as the premise- in addition to using tortured readings the law- to take away authority from the burial council to preserve the area.
And so Wantanbe acceded to this shibai by accepting the “30 burials do not a cemetery make” postulate in allowing construction to continue at least until the hearing continues weeks from now, saying essentially the only reason she wasn’t dismissing the case was that "I understand the community is split... I understand the need for finality and ... some closure." according to Finnegan.
This is the same judge that, for example, refused to allow public examination of the minutes of a Kaua`i County Council Executive session minutes as the OIP called for because it was “impossibly intertwined” with the material OIP had suggested be redacted when the rest was released.
What is it with Kaua`i judges? Well maybe it’s that “once a bureaucrat, always a bureaucrat”.
With Wantanbe and ex-politician Randall Valenciano- he of the famous refusal to hear the challenges to the Superferry after the Supreme Court remanding to a similar court on Maui- filling the bench over here we can expect any tortured reading of the law that allows political manipulation of people’s rights to be upheld.
If Decosta and Cronin finally do get canned we have a feeling that they’d always have a job on Kaua`i where our government functionaries can just make up the law as they go along and get their former cronies, now on the bench, to uphold them.
But with the way some are being ridiculed by judges lately you’d think people like Honolulu County clerk Denise Decosta and Chief Elections officer Kevin Cronin would show some integrity or at least shame- and resign.
Cronin’s penchant for making it up as he goes along- as pilloried by an administrative judge last week was- surpassed by Decosta in her convoluted attempt to keep a citizen initiative against rail in Honolulu off the ballot because even though it was legally submitted to qualify for the general election the petitioners mentioned a special election in their preface.
Judge Karl Sakamoto’s now “instant classic” ruling yesterday that “(t)he voice of the people should not be suffocated by the erroneous readings of the law by its own government" was apparently part of a new spate of recent rulings by judges asking government officials “what am I an idiot?” in light of their intentional administrative twistings of the law.
The actual Honlulu City Charter provisions- which trumps the confusing special ordinance and administrative rules- says:
Any petition for proposed ordinance which has been filed with the council at least ninety days prior to a general election and which has been certified by the clerk, shall be submitted to electors for the aforementioned general election."
So how old is Decosta? Six? When they read her the actual prevailing rules of the game she apparently pointed to an out of context phrase, showed us what her mommy said, put her fingers in her ears and yelled “You said it- nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah- I can’t hear you- nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah.”
But on Kaua`i we’ve apparently got a new judge for whom the answer to what am I an idiot? is an unqualified “yes” when it comes to abuses of administrative a-holes
But what do you expect? Firth Circuit Court judge Kathleen Wantanbe came straight from the government bureaucracy to her perch on the bench and seemingly her rulings don’t just give the benefit of the doubt to government officials but they consider complaints about it to be a nuisance- just like her bureaucratic brethren .
Yesterday’s hearing in Joe Brescia’s genocide and desecration case was punctuated by a distinct flavor of telling the government that they can do no wrong if press reports are accurate.
First she ruled that only the reportedly allegedly corrupt Kaua`i State Archeologist Nancy McMahon could testify but not archeologist Dr. Michael “No Pun Intended” Graves who represented the aggrieved iwi and their descendents.
Independent reporter Joan Conrow described it this way this morning
Before the proceedings got to that place, Watanabe refused to qualify Dr. Michael Graves, a witness called by the Native Hawaiian Legal Corp., as an expert in Hawaiian archaeology. Never mind that he spent 21 years at UH teaching undergraduate and graduate students in archaeology and served as head of the department.
Since that prohibited Graves from discussing whether the State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD) acted properly in its treatment of the Naue burials, much of the hearing was devoted to Kauai state archaeologist Nancy McMahon defending her decisions regarding the burials there.
What a surprise- a career government lawyer deciding that self-serving government officials’ testimony is expert- even one whose job is in jeopardy, being under fire for not knowing what the heck she is doing, what the law really says and lying to both the Kaua`i Burial Council and Planning Commission- and denying a private sector university professor with no bone to pick, so to speak.
And what they were arguing about puts the meter on Wantanabe’s “what am I an idiot?” rating in the red zone.
As Star-Bulletin reporter Tom Finnegan said today
The Native Hawaiian Legal Corp.. argued that the state archaeologist reversed the decision of the Kauai Ni`ihau Burial Council when she allowed Brescia's contractors to build the home and cap seven grave sites with concrete.
Chandler's lawyers blame state Historic Preservation Division archaeologist and Kauai County Council candidate Nancy McMahon for pushing through both the permits at the county level and the burial council's plan to keep the burials in place. Then, the lawyers argued, she approved the contractor's plan without returning to the burial council for its input.
McMahon, who testified yesterday, said that... no evidence has been found that would make anyone believe the area was a cemetery, rather than 30 individual graves. (emphasis added)
However, Alan Murakami, Chandler's lawyer, said that the burial council wanted to preserve the burials as a unit, and McMahon took it on her own to interpret its ruling.
By allowing the house to be built atop the graves, rather than preserving them, "the state has disemboweled the burial council," Murakami added.
Oh- well, that explains it all- it’s just a coincidence. Those stupid Hawaiians just threw their dead all over the place and randomly and independently decided to inter their dead there in a concentration that exponentially outstrips most other nearby locations of “iwi kupuna”
Apparently there was no actual plan to screw poor Joe Brescia 500 years in the future by burying all the bodes in one place bodies there.
Well, we’d better pull our tongue out of our cheek long enough to ask if McMahon’s contention exposes anything but the depth of depravity of the administrative scope of genocide that continues to percolate through the Hawai`i State apparatus.
If she contends that despite the concentration of 30 full sets of remains in an 18,000-square-foot beachfront property it was not purposefully done as what westerners would call a cemetery she obviously presumes that the pre-western contact Hawaiians were too dumb to coordinate a place to inter their dead.
After all those brown skinned people are akin to a bunch of animals who have no capacity to concentrate their burials in a certain area with any intent..
Because as we all know a concentration of trees is not forest- unless you look at a dictionary.
The significance of this is that McMahon has used this as the premise- in addition to using tortured readings the law- to take away authority from the burial council to preserve the area.
And so Wantanbe acceded to this shibai by accepting the “30 burials do not a cemetery make” postulate in allowing construction to continue at least until the hearing continues weeks from now, saying essentially the only reason she wasn’t dismissing the case was that "I understand the community is split... I understand the need for finality and ... some closure." according to Finnegan.
This is the same judge that, for example, refused to allow public examination of the minutes of a Kaua`i County Council Executive session minutes as the OIP called for because it was “impossibly intertwined” with the material OIP had suggested be redacted when the rest was released.
What is it with Kaua`i judges? Well maybe it’s that “once a bureaucrat, always a bureaucrat”.
With Wantanbe and ex-politician Randall Valenciano- he of the famous refusal to hear the challenges to the Superferry after the Supreme Court remanding to a similar court on Maui- filling the bench over here we can expect any tortured reading of the law that allows political manipulation of people’s rights to be upheld.
If Decosta and Cronin finally do get canned we have a feeling that they’d always have a job on Kaua`i where our government functionaries can just make up the law as they go along and get their former cronies, now on the bench, to uphold them.
Friday, August 8, 2008
BONEHEADED
BONEHEADED: All’s quiet on the northern front it seems- for at least another week..
As detailed on the front pages of the local and two Honolulu newspapers
and excellently reported by Kaua`i Eclectician Joan Conrow today all it took was a linked chain of defenders to stand up for justice in order to get a week reprieve in construction at the Naue graveyard owned by genocidal-maniac and illegal-vacation-rental-baron Joe Brescia until next Thursday when the case will be heard in court.
Belying the constant press reports that repeat the lie that Brescia is just a businessman who wants to build his house, his string of non-VDA vacation rentals- also cited as illegal by the State DLNR for their commercial activity in a conservation area- he continues to use his millions to slap the host culture in the face and buy administrative and judicial actions by corrupt self-serving boards, commissions and assorted government lackeys and legislators.
For Brescia this is no longer about building a house. It’s about a line in the sand to insure that money talks and people don’t matter in a cesspool of corruption like Hawai`i and specifically Kaua`i.
But an article accompanying the excellent on-site story by Blake Jones in the local paper provided coverage of the Kaua`i Burial Council meeting being held simultaneously with the north shore events and contained information that helps explain “how the heck did this guy get this far” in trying to build his pseudo-hotel in a graveyard.
The “new”- or new to us- fact reported was not what happened at the meeting but who chaired it- none other than the man cited recently here and in the pubic eye as the chief defender if corruption on Kaua`i- functionaries Mark Hubbard. .
Hubbard, as we previously detailed, is the former Grove Farm honcho whose own ethically challenged actions as head of the Kaua`i Ethics Board has led to establishment of a body that refuses to enforce the primary conflicts-of-interest laws on Kaua`i because he would have to leave his position if they did so.
Grove Farm- one of the largest land owners on Kauai-has had numerous projects stopped by discovery of iwi kupuna- bones of the dead of kanana maoli- and his presence on the council is as conflicted as conflicted can be.
The incident’s conclusion- the stand down by police and the establishment of a “people’s injunction” in place after the local judge refused to stop it- is driving the western property-rights nut-cases and self-absorbed, juvenile troll crowd up the wall because the police stood down and avoided a confrontation, presumably at the behest of new chief Darryl Perry.
Perry has again garnered, if not full support, at least respect from many in the community that have criticized the militarization of the local police force they fear will be used against non-violent civil disobedience such as yesterday’s direct action or the Superferry protests last year, including the harassment of the head of the Hawaiian sovereignty group Nation of Atooi. who was arrested and is bring tried in connection with the Superferry events.
It’s fun to watch steam coming out of the ears of some western invaders as they call for Perry’s head for this with their pathetic little bleatings of “death to all who would get between a rich man and his desires” and use the “rule of law” to call for more desecration.
But the problem is that genocide isn’t against the law because the one with the most money gets to say what the law says. Seems a couple of hundred years ago that attitude on the part of “the authorities” caused quite the little protest on the very mainland they come from and whose laws they cherish so.
Sorry to inform you but justice doesn’t come from laws. Laws are supposed to come from the concepts of justice.
Theoretically a governance by laws in a “nation of laws” provides justice. But it does not in the US these days.
The laws are written by corporate thieves and administered by corrupt petty bureaucrats like Hubbard and State Archeologist Nancy McMahon who lie as to what the law says and manipulate the system to make sure that justice is only for those who hire the most lawyers and have the right connections.
When that happens actions like those in Naue yesterday are not only understandable and predictable but are imperative. Despite what the self-obsessed maniacs of the property-rights movement try to tell us in their ratings and support for Brescia’s asinine behavior, the people have the real rights..
And when the law is flouted and manipulated and turned on its head they have every right to stand up to the law... to stand up for justice, not just adjudication.
The rule of law is subject to the consent of the ruled and when the other golden rule- he who has the gold, rules- is the law of the land, the ruled withdraw their consent and it can’t be blamed on those who will not follow the law but on those who do not join them is violating it..
If defenders of Naue are arrested next time, inappropriate questions like “what are you doing in jail” will be answered with the Thoreau retort of “what are you doing out there?”
When the law fails to provide justice and the ability to change the law is subject to others’ paying for their own versions of the laws, it’s time for revolutionary acts such as those in Naue yesterday.
As detailed on the front pages of the local and two Honolulu newspapers
and excellently reported by Kaua`i Eclectician Joan Conrow today all it took was a linked chain of defenders to stand up for justice in order to get a week reprieve in construction at the Naue graveyard owned by genocidal-maniac and illegal-vacation-rental-baron Joe Brescia until next Thursday when the case will be heard in court.
Belying the constant press reports that repeat the lie that Brescia is just a businessman who wants to build his house, his string of non-VDA vacation rentals- also cited as illegal by the State DLNR for their commercial activity in a conservation area- he continues to use his millions to slap the host culture in the face and buy administrative and judicial actions by corrupt self-serving boards, commissions and assorted government lackeys and legislators.
For Brescia this is no longer about building a house. It’s about a line in the sand to insure that money talks and people don’t matter in a cesspool of corruption like Hawai`i and specifically Kaua`i.
But an article accompanying the excellent on-site story by Blake Jones in the local paper provided coverage of the Kaua`i Burial Council meeting being held simultaneously with the north shore events and contained information that helps explain “how the heck did this guy get this far” in trying to build his pseudo-hotel in a graveyard.
The “new”- or new to us- fact reported was not what happened at the meeting but who chaired it- none other than the man cited recently here and in the pubic eye as the chief defender if corruption on Kaua`i- functionaries Mark Hubbard. .
Hubbard, as we previously detailed, is the former Grove Farm honcho whose own ethically challenged actions as head of the Kaua`i Ethics Board has led to establishment of a body that refuses to enforce the primary conflicts-of-interest laws on Kaua`i because he would have to leave his position if they did so.
Grove Farm- one of the largest land owners on Kauai-has had numerous projects stopped by discovery of iwi kupuna- bones of the dead of kanana maoli- and his presence on the council is as conflicted as conflicted can be.
The incident’s conclusion- the stand down by police and the establishment of a “people’s injunction” in place after the local judge refused to stop it- is driving the western property-rights nut-cases and self-absorbed, juvenile troll crowd up the wall because the police stood down and avoided a confrontation, presumably at the behest of new chief Darryl Perry.
Perry has again garnered, if not full support, at least respect from many in the community that have criticized the militarization of the local police force they fear will be used against non-violent civil disobedience such as yesterday’s direct action or the Superferry protests last year, including the harassment of the head of the Hawaiian sovereignty group Nation of Atooi. who was arrested and is bring tried in connection with the Superferry events.
It’s fun to watch steam coming out of the ears of some western invaders as they call for Perry’s head for this with their pathetic little bleatings of “death to all who would get between a rich man and his desires” and use the “rule of law” to call for more desecration.
But the problem is that genocide isn’t against the law because the one with the most money gets to say what the law says. Seems a couple of hundred years ago that attitude on the part of “the authorities” caused quite the little protest on the very mainland they come from and whose laws they cherish so.
Sorry to inform you but justice doesn’t come from laws. Laws are supposed to come from the concepts of justice.
Theoretically a governance by laws in a “nation of laws” provides justice. But it does not in the US these days.
The laws are written by corporate thieves and administered by corrupt petty bureaucrats like Hubbard and State Archeologist Nancy McMahon who lie as to what the law says and manipulate the system to make sure that justice is only for those who hire the most lawyers and have the right connections.
When that happens actions like those in Naue yesterday are not only understandable and predictable but are imperative. Despite what the self-obsessed maniacs of the property-rights movement try to tell us in their ratings and support for Brescia’s asinine behavior, the people have the real rights..
And when the law is flouted and manipulated and turned on its head they have every right to stand up to the law... to stand up for justice, not just adjudication.
The rule of law is subject to the consent of the ruled and when the other golden rule- he who has the gold, rules- is the law of the land, the ruled withdraw their consent and it can’t be blamed on those who will not follow the law but on those who do not join them is violating it..
If defenders of Naue are arrested next time, inappropriate questions like “what are you doing in jail” will be answered with the Thoreau retort of “what are you doing out there?”
When the law fails to provide justice and the ability to change the law is subject to others’ paying for their own versions of the laws, it’s time for revolutionary acts such as those in Naue yesterday.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
DEM BONZ:
DEM BONZ: In a yet another somewhat stunning development in the case of the desecration of kanaka maoli burials at Ha`ena point the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) Tuesday requested that the attorney general’s office send a cease and desist order to halt all construction there.
The letter questions not only the legitimacy of the state burial council’s administrative rules under state constitution and statues but details how the State Archeologist Nancy McMahon and the developer’s attorney’s Walton Hong lied to both the Kaua`i Planning Commission and the Burial Council.
The highly legally notated letter, available only in a pdf file for now, first cites HRS 6E-13 and 6E-13(b) allowing the attorney general or any citizen to file suit “for the protection of an historic site or burial site and public trust therein or improper demolition alteration or transfer of property or burial site”
Then it cites 10(4)4 and 10 1(b) which essentially requires state agencies to assist OHA saying “(i)t shall be the duty and responsibility of all state departments ... to actively work toward (OHA’s) goals”.
But the heart of the request is based on Article Vii Section 7 of the State Constitution which says the state “shall protect all rights customarily and traditionally exercised for substance cultural and religious purposes”.
Then citing HRS 6E and Chapter 13-300 of Hawaii Administrative rules which regulate the Burial Council it quotes McMahon and Hong misrepresenting the law to the two citizen panels.
At the heart of the claim is the state’s contention that the burial councils, as they have been told, have no right to have any say over burials other than to say either remove them or let them sit where they are.
OHA goes on to show that this is not true when the actual laws and rules are read, claiming that the burial council also has the right to say “no- you’ can’t build there” or other appropriate actions.
It questions the legitimacy of the process and says because the process was abused that the current decision allowing Joe Brescia to build a house on top of the numerous burials, both discovered and undiscovered at the north shore parcel at Naue in Ha`ena must be revisited and the decision of the burial council be considered void and illegitimate.
The letter includes many other specific details of and objections to the way the Burial Council, under the State Historic Preservation Department (SHPD) has violated the constitution and state laws and presents the transcripts of the misrepresentation by SHPD head McMahon, and Brescia’s attorney Hong before both the Kaua`i Planning Commission and the Burial Council.
What’s most surprising is that it took so long for OHA to start going through this process. But the confluence of events brought to light by Ka`iulani Edens Huff, Nani Rogers Louise Marston and a host of others over the last month or so has perhaps spurred them to action
And perhaps the very adamancy of the right wing wacko property rights crowd in supporting Brescia’s “right to desecrate” because he “followed all the rules” was just the thing needed to spur action by OHA,
OHA outrages their own community with regularity in its state-lap-dog habit of fighting against its own beneficiaries on so many occasions that it has become a joke to most kanaka in light of its mission.
And the fact that Chief Darryl Perry on Kaua`i brought up the state law against desecration- even though it is written separately from the laws protecting the traditional cultural and religious rights of the descendent of pre-western contact islanders- might have been contributory enough to finally provoke the ever conservative OHA to finally stand up for the rights of the people they represent.
It is an election year- for OHA too- and this story has been getting statewide media attention of late and has gotten to the point where not just many but most, in the Kaua`i community agree that something is wrong as typified by a letter in today’s local paper .
The one problem may be that the person who OHA is requesting/demanding write the cease and desist letter is allegedly the most corrupt of the hacks in the Linda Lingle administration Attorney General Mark Bennett who is responsible for the Superferry debacle and various other gubernatorial sleazy ploys, using blatantly unethical if not illegal secrecy ploys to cover-up alleged crimes by administration personnel.
How he answers the letter will be most interesting but it is apparent that asking him to do it is only OHA’s first move and that if he refuses, OHA makes it most clear that they will proceed on their own.
We leave you with the words of Nani Rogers on the current situation written this week when the corrupt pols in the AG’s and the local Kaua`i Prosecutor Craig Decosta’s office refused to back up Police Chief Perry ’s assertion that Bescia’s and Hong’s actions were desacratory.
I pray all is maita`i with you and your loved ones. Auwe! Auwe! Auwe! Kaua`i na po`e are crying over the unbelievable disrespect and denial of State and County agencies. For their disrespect of sacred burials and their denial of the truth and cultural and natural laws that protect graveyards from desecration. It is a criminal act, in anybody's law book, to desecrate burials; the Naue burials date back to the 13th century and are of great significance to our na po`e that are lineal descendants ofna iwi at Naue and to all na po`e and supporters that have been camping near by to protect them from harm for the last three months. It has been a long and hard battle but we will go on, we will continue to be there and to stand up to any challenges they may throw at us.
We urge na kanaka to come to Naue and be eye witnesses to the desecration so you can go home and tell your ohana and children. They need to learn our ways.
Ka`iu, myself, and others will be at Naue this afternoon to camp overnight again. We made a vow to protect our na po`e buried there, we must keep our promise to do all we can to do so.
To Mr. Joseph Brescia, who says he owns the `aina, to Mr. Walton Hong, his lawyer, to Mr. Galante, the contractor, to Pua Aiu, SHPD Director, to the Police Dept., the Attorney General and to Governor Lingle, et al, we say, BEWARE! get ready for the grave (pardon the pun) spiritual consequences your actions will cause. Remember that you will have brought it all upon yourselves, nobody else is to be blamed but you for anything that may happen to you and your family. Can you see that?
We pray that our na Akua, na Aumakua and na Tupuna continue to surround and protect us at Naue. We pray that our na po`e; men, women and children; buried there may continue to rest in peace. Mahalo!
The letter questions not only the legitimacy of the state burial council’s administrative rules under state constitution and statues but details how the State Archeologist Nancy McMahon and the developer’s attorney’s Walton Hong lied to both the Kaua`i Planning Commission and the Burial Council.
The highly legally notated letter, available only in a pdf file for now, first cites HRS 6E-13 and 6E-13(b) allowing the attorney general or any citizen to file suit “for the protection of an historic site or burial site and public trust therein or improper demolition alteration or transfer of property or burial site”
Then it cites 10(4)4 and 10 1(b) which essentially requires state agencies to assist OHA saying “(i)t shall be the duty and responsibility of all state departments ... to actively work toward (OHA’s) goals”.
But the heart of the request is based on Article Vii Section 7 of the State Constitution which says the state “shall protect all rights customarily and traditionally exercised for substance cultural and religious purposes”.
Then citing HRS 6E and Chapter 13-300 of Hawaii Administrative rules which regulate the Burial Council it quotes McMahon and Hong misrepresenting the law to the two citizen panels.
At the heart of the claim is the state’s contention that the burial councils, as they have been told, have no right to have any say over burials other than to say either remove them or let them sit where they are.
OHA goes on to show that this is not true when the actual laws and rules are read, claiming that the burial council also has the right to say “no- you’ can’t build there” or other appropriate actions.
It questions the legitimacy of the process and says because the process was abused that the current decision allowing Joe Brescia to build a house on top of the numerous burials, both discovered and undiscovered at the north shore parcel at Naue in Ha`ena must be revisited and the decision of the burial council be considered void and illegitimate.
The letter includes many other specific details of and objections to the way the Burial Council, under the State Historic Preservation Department (SHPD) has violated the constitution and state laws and presents the transcripts of the misrepresentation by SHPD head McMahon, and Brescia’s attorney Hong before both the Kaua`i Planning Commission and the Burial Council.
What’s most surprising is that it took so long for OHA to start going through this process. But the confluence of events brought to light by Ka`iulani Edens Huff, Nani Rogers Louise Marston and a host of others over the last month or so has perhaps spurred them to action
And perhaps the very adamancy of the right wing wacko property rights crowd in supporting Brescia’s “right to desecrate” because he “followed all the rules” was just the thing needed to spur action by OHA,
OHA outrages their own community with regularity in its state-lap-dog habit of fighting against its own beneficiaries on so many occasions that it has become a joke to most kanaka in light of its mission.
And the fact that Chief Darryl Perry on Kaua`i brought up the state law against desecration- even though it is written separately from the laws protecting the traditional cultural and religious rights of the descendent of pre-western contact islanders- might have been contributory enough to finally provoke the ever conservative OHA to finally stand up for the rights of the people they represent.
It is an election year- for OHA too- and this story has been getting statewide media attention of late and has gotten to the point where not just many but most, in the Kaua`i community agree that something is wrong as typified by a letter in today’s local paper .
The one problem may be that the person who OHA is requesting/demanding write the cease and desist letter is allegedly the most corrupt of the hacks in the Linda Lingle administration Attorney General Mark Bennett who is responsible for the Superferry debacle and various other gubernatorial sleazy ploys, using blatantly unethical if not illegal secrecy ploys to cover-up alleged crimes by administration personnel.
How he answers the letter will be most interesting but it is apparent that asking him to do it is only OHA’s first move and that if he refuses, OHA makes it most clear that they will proceed on their own.
We leave you with the words of Nani Rogers on the current situation written this week when the corrupt pols in the AG’s and the local Kaua`i Prosecutor Craig Decosta’s office refused to back up Police Chief Perry ’s assertion that Bescia’s and Hong’s actions were desacratory.
I pray all is maita`i with you and your loved ones. Auwe! Auwe! Auwe! Kaua`i na po`e are crying over the unbelievable disrespect and denial of State and County agencies. For their disrespect of sacred burials and their denial of the truth and cultural and natural laws that protect graveyards from desecration. It is a criminal act, in anybody's law book, to desecrate burials; the Naue burials date back to the 13th century and are of great significance to our na po`e that are lineal descendants ofna iwi at Naue and to all na po`e and supporters that have been camping near by to protect them from harm for the last three months. It has been a long and hard battle but we will go on, we will continue to be there and to stand up to any challenges they may throw at us.
We urge na kanaka to come to Naue and be eye witnesses to the desecration so you can go home and tell your ohana and children. They need to learn our ways.
Ka`iu, myself, and others will be at Naue this afternoon to camp overnight again. We made a vow to protect our na po`e buried there, we must keep our promise to do all we can to do so.
To Mr. Joseph Brescia, who says he owns the `aina, to Mr. Walton Hong, his lawyer, to Mr. Galante, the contractor, to Pua Aiu, SHPD Director, to the Police Dept., the Attorney General and to Governor Lingle, et al, we say, BEWARE! get ready for the grave (pardon the pun) spiritual consequences your actions will cause. Remember that you will have brought it all upon yourselves, nobody else is to be blamed but you for anything that may happen to you and your family. Can you see that?
We pray that our na Akua, na Aumakua and na Tupuna continue to surround and protect us at Naue. We pray that our na po`e; men, women and children; buried there may continue to rest in peace. Mahalo!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
