RESIDENTS VOICE CONCERNS TO LAWMAKERS

About 100 people crowded a conference room at the University of Hawaii
at Hilo Wednesday night to voice their concerns to East Hawaii's state
lawmakers.

State Sens. Russell Kokubun and Dwight Takamine, and Reps. Jerry
Chang, Faye Hanohano and Clift Tsuji listened as a number of local
residents sounded off on just about everything, from medical marijuana
to the varroa mite.

Noelie Rodriguez, a sociology professor at Hawaii Community College,
urged legislators to restore funding to the state's Fair Elections
Act, a pilot program on the Big Island to explore comprehensive public
funding of elections.

"People are starting to realize that government is not as democratic
as it pretends to be," Rodriguez said. "Is this government of the
people, by the people and for the people or is it government for the
big corporations?"

Cory Dizon, a Kurtistown beekeeper, said enough is not being done to
check the spread of the varroa mite, a parasite which has decimated
bee colonies statewide.

"The feral bee population is about to be wiped out," she said.
"Without the feral bee population, diversified agriculture is in
jeopardy because they need those pollinators ... for a whole host of
different agricultural crops. It's kind of the crutch of
sustainability on this island.

"Beekeepers are now in trouble because it isn't just the feral bees
that are dying. Managed bees now are sick. Before, we had about
800,000 feral beehives on this island. Those are about to be wiped
out, and we will be left with 10,000 managed hives."

Dizon asked the lawmakers to hire a state apiary specialist and to
extend funding for the position beyond the two years already covered
by a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant.

Don Pakele of Hilo advocated harsher penalties for vehicular homicide.
He said his brother-in-law, a former marine and Vietnam War veteran,
was killed on his motorcycle two years ago by a drunken driver.

"She killed my brother-in-law and she got 18 months," Pakele said.
"Right about that time, we had the case of the guys in Honolulu
stealing copper from the side of the road. And they got 10 years."

A number of constituents asked legislators to amend the state's
medical marijuana law to allow for patient-run marijuana cooperatives
or state-regulated dispensaries.

Andrea Tischler, Big Island representative for Americans for Safe
Access, a national advocacy group for medical marijuana patients, said
the state's 10-year-old medical marijuana law was "seriously flawed
when it was passed" and has not been amended since.

"The law allows patients to obtain a permit from a licensed medical
doctor for the medical use of cannabis, but is completely silent about
how patients should obtain the medicine, short of growing it
themselves or having a caregiver," Tischler said. "The overwhelming
number of patients can neither grow their own medicine nor find a
caregiver to grow their medicine for them. This forces them to buy
their medicine on the black market, which supports a criminal underworld.

"Further, buying from the black market exposes the patient to danger,
forces them to pay high prices for low quality and possibly tainted
cannabis medicine."

Wolf Daniel Braun said he has a medical marijuana card, but is not
healthy enough to garden. Braun, president of the Peaceful Sky
Alliance, which wrote the initiative passed by voters last year making
adult use of marijuana the "lowest law-enforcement" priority on the
Big Island, rose and walked to the microphone with the help of a cane.

"I can't get down on the ground; I can't get to my knees anymore,"
Braun said. "I can't pull weeds. ... I am dependent on either
caregivers to provide me my medicine, or I have to find somebody in
the street or a parking lot to sell me marijuana.

"Some of these people are very sketchy people. ... I don't want to go
to these people to buy my medicine. I want to have a legal dispensary.
I want to be able to go into someplace safe to buy my medicine."

Glenn Carvalho of Pepeekeo told lawmakers that proposals to raise the
state excise tax by 1 percent and to allow counties to levy their own
excise tax of up to 5 percent on business transactions will hurt those
who can afford it least, those on disability and Social Security pensions.

"The people's pockets are empty," Carvalho said. "The legislature is
going to have to look at other ways to make money.

"I'm told we have a rainy day fund. ... If this is not a rainy day,
what is?"