LIHU’E – The Kaua’i unit of the Hawai’i Carpenters Union, looking for candidates who support new construction and timely rebuilding of properties such as Coco Palms Resort, likes incumbents in this fall’s state representative and County Council races. At the
LIHU’E – The Kaua’i unit of the Hawai’i Carpenters Union, looking for
candidates who support new construction and timely rebuilding of properties
such as Coco Palms Resort, likes incumbents in this fall’s state representative
and County Council races.
At the council level, six of the seven incumbents
have the support of the 250 active and retired union members. The favorites are
Bryan Baptiste, Daryl Kaneshiro, Ronald Kouchi, Billy Swain, James Kunane
Tokioka and Randal Valenciano.
Of the incumbents, only Gary Hooser wasn’t
endorsed. None of the nine challengers got the nod, though some were
interviewed by the seven-member Kaua’i Political Action Committee (PAC), said
Angela A. Chinen, field representative.
The Kaua’i PAC members follow
politics closely and are familiar with the stances of many of the candidates,
she said. Because there are some “new and returning” faces in this year’s
council race, the PAC conducted some interviews.
Key issues the candidates
were questioned about included improving the island’s infrastructure, getting
Coco Palms rebuilt, and how much the candidates could help get construction
projects going on the island, Chinen said.
State House incumbents, both
Democrats, who won union endorsement are Ezra Kanoho of the 13th District (Puhi
to Waipouli) and Bertha Kawakami of the 14th District (Po’ipu to Barking Sands,
Ni’ihau).
The union did not endorse a House candidate in the 2th District
(north Kaua’i, east Maui), where Democrat Mina Morita is the
incumbent.
Earlier, the Hawai’i Carpenters Statewide PAC endorsed Vice
President Al Gore for president, and U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka and U.S. Reps.
Patsy Mink and Neil Abercrombie for re-election.
The union endorsement
process for local candidates sees the Kaua’i PAC members, led by unit chairman
Al Belliveau, make endorsement recommendations to the statewide union PAC,
which gave its seal of approval.
In this month’s carpenters’ magazine,
members are encouraged to vote for and participate in the campaigns of those
endorsed candidates.
While there are only about 250 Hawai’i Carpenters
Union members on Kaua’i, there are 5,000 on O’ahu, making it a potential force
in this year’s elections.
Chinen said the Kaua’i unit has registered at
least 20 union members to vote in this year’s elections, and she was a bit
surprised to see a large number of union members not registered.
The list
of all registered voters on the island was compared to the list of union
members, and all those union members not registered to vote have been contacted
by the union and encouraged to register and vote, she explained.
Several
Kaua’i PAC members have been deputized as election registrars, giving them the
ability to register new voters, or re-register those who did not vote in the
1998 elections.
The union is also working with other organized workforces,
namely the AFL-CIO, on voter registration matters. The partnership has been
beneficial to all concerned, Chinen concluded.
A carbon copy of the six
Council endorsements came courtesy the Hawai’i Hotel Association, which has an
active Kaua’i chapter that includes virtually every hotel and resort big and
small on the island in its membership.
The HHA also endorsed House
incumbents Kanoho and Kawakami. The HHA is a statewide trade association of
hotels, hotel management firms, and suppliers.
Staff writer Paul C.
Curtis can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 225) and [
HREF=”mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net”>pcurtis@pulitzer.net]
