Editor’s Note: In July 2012, Civil Beat sent six questions to each of the candidates registered to run in the Aug. 11 primary for Hawaii State Senate District 7. Two out of three candidates responded, including Barbara Haliniak. The questions and answers are reproduced below in full. Read the response by her competitor, Kanohowailuku Helm. Kalani English did not send in his questionnaire. Click on each topic listed below to read Civil Beat’s question and Haliniak’s response.

• General Excise Tax
• Environmental Regulatory Review
• Gambling
• Sunshine Law
• Best and Worst Legislation
• Overlooked Issue

Preferred Candidate Name: Barbara J Haliniak

Senate/House District Number: Senate District 7

Date of Birth: 02/21/1942

Place of Birth/Hometown: Born: Maunaloa, Molokai

Current Profession/Employer: Self Employed/The Business Depot Inc.

Education/Alma Mater(s): Molokai Hi School/Hawaii Pacific College – no degree

1. With the exception for Honolulu rail, the state has not raised the general excise tax in decades. Would you consider increasing the GET to help the state meet its budget demands?

No, I would not consider raising the GET. The GET is an escalating tax, businesses pays tax upon tax. The state needs to streamline its operating costs or review operations for redundancies. The state needs to make better decisions not fast track projects where cost is outrages; i.e. the $500M to upgrade ports for the Super Ferry. Support small businesses and not make laws that hinder their production, if small businesses make money so does the state in GET revenues. ↩ back to top

2. Lawmakers proposed relaxing environmental regulatory review to spur development and job growth in the 2012 session, and the issue is expected to resurface next year. Where do you stand?

The proposal of relaxing the environmental regulatory review was only applicable to state and county projects. Special treatment should not be given to streamline state or county construction projects. The environmental regulatory and procurement laws should be reviewed for inefficiencies, redundancies, or being antiquated. Why is the process so lengthy? If need be, fix laws; these laws should apply to all. If the state stays on track to start projects in a timely manner, then there’s no need to streamline these processes. ↩ back to top

3. Gambling — are you for it or against it? If not, why not? If so, what type of gambling and with what kind of restrictions?

Because of annual budget cuts especially to the DOE and not enough funding support for early education, and I would support a lottery type of gaming. The revenues generated from this gaming activity should be put into a special account strictly used for public school education and on the condition that the funds cannot be raided to balance the state budget as was done to the hurricane and rainy day funds. ↩ back to top

4. The Sunshine Law is a hallmark of an open democracy accountable to its citizens. Yet, the Legislature exempts itself from this requirement. Do you support more transparency in government operations, or are there legitimate reasons to conduct some of the people’s business behind closed doors?

The Legislature is there to serve the people. More and more people want accountability from government officials in whatever capacity they serve. We are in a state of economic chaos, thus people want to know what laws are being introduced and passed. These laws affect all of us, the taxpayers, so transparency is very important in government operations. I am against the “gut and replace” close door sessions. ↩ back to top

5. What is the best legislation — and worst legislation — that the Legislature has approved in recent years? Please explain.

The best legislation that comes to mind is the funds appropriated to STEM. Schools now have the capability to empower the students in their STEM projects; i.e. Robotics.

The worst legislation, although there are many, the one that perhaps has not received much attention is Senate Bill 1461 which became effective July 15, 2009. This law, Act 196 advances the filing and payment deadline for general excise taxes. This law changed the filing and payment of GET from the end of month to the 20th of the month. What Act 196 did was caused a cash flow problem for many small businesses, since the payroll taxes are due on the 15th of the month. Businesses now have only 5 days between paying payroll taxes to paying the GET.

But wait! If a business pays its state payroll tax using the website, it pays a portal fee of $1.00; and the state receives the funds the next workday. But, if the tax is mailed, the funds are not available to the state till approximately 10 days after the mailing. Does this make sense to penalize the web user when the state gets the funds quicker? ↩ back to top

6. What is an issue that you would champion at the Legislature — one that perhaps has not received much attention, or an issue that is important to your district?

I would champion the agriculture industry; why is $3.1 billion a year leaving our state to support agriculture elsewhere. The state needs to do more to support this economic driver, why doesn’t the state practice “walk the talk” for agriculture. The state proclaims, “buy local” but yet not practice this for school lunches. School lunch procurement laws should be reviewed to buy local and not frozen out of state products. This procurement change can dramatically increase agriculture production, labor, taxes, etc. These are issues that need to be addressed and I would be passionate to champion at the Legislature. ↩ back to top