LIHU’E — Seven Kaua’i residents will be among 97 Hawai’i residents who will be vying for seats on the nine-member Office of Hawaiian Affairs Board of Trustees in the Nov. 7 general election. Up for grabs in a regular election
LIHU’E — Seven Kaua’i residents will be among 97 Hawai’i residents who will be
vying for seats on the nine-member Office of Hawaiian Affairs Board of Trustees
in the Nov. 7 general election.
Up for grabs in a regular election are four
seats that will expire in 2004 and five seats in a special election that will
expire in 2002.
It will be the first time non-Hawaiians will be able to
vote in an OHA election and the first time non-Hawaiians are eligible to run as
candidates. This year’s race has at least two non-Hawaiians registered to
run.
In response to a lawsuit filed by a non-Hawaiian resident, the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled in February that previously held OHA elections that allowed
only Hawaiians to vote for trustees were race-based, and thus
unconstitutional.
Because Governor Ben Cayetano pursued court action in the
Hawai’i Supreme Court to remove them in compliance with the federal ruling, all
nine trustees subsequently resigned earlier this year.
In the minds of
some Hawaiians, the outcome of the race will determine whether Hawaiians will
be able to still control OHA’s assets.
They include programs and revenues
from 1.8 million acres of ceded lands that were taken by the U.S. government
after annexation and were transferred to the state as a trust for the benefit
of Native Hawaiians.
Healani Waiwai’ole, a Kaua’i resident who is running
for the at-large seat in the regular race, urged non-Hawaiians to vote in the
election.
“People should vote, and they should vote Hawaiian,” she
said.
Waiwai’ole said it is “important to keep the Kanaka maoli (the
aboriginal people of Hawai’i) in OHA until we can make a smooth transition of
OHA assets into Hawaiian hands.”
In the special election, candidates will
be vying for three at-large seats and two other seats for O’ahu and
Mau’i.
In the regular election, candidates will compete for one at-large
seat, and seats for Kaua’i, the Big Island and Molokai. These seats expire
this year.
In the regular election, Jean I.K. Beniamina of Kekaha, Donald
Cataluna of Koloa, Eloise Oclit of Kapa’a, Randy Rego of Kilauea and James
Torio of Anahola will be running for the Kaua’i seat, according to county
election officials.
Kimo Evans, who has a post office box in Kilauea, will
be running for one of three at-large seats in the special election, officials
said.
The Kaua’i seat in the regular race became vacant after Moses K.
Keale resigned Oct. 31, 1999, because of health reasons.
Because the board
did not select a successor, Governor Ben Cayetano appointed Cataluna to the
post.
But in response to the February Supreme Court decision on the OHA
voting restrictions and Cayetano’s intentions to remove them to comply with the
decision, the nine board trustee resigned Sept. 8 to be eligible to run in this
year’s general election.
Subsequently, Cayetano appointed nine temporary
trustees, including OHA members who had resigned Sept. 8, Clayton Hee, Rowena
Akana and Hanna Springer, to hold office until the November election.
Waiwai’ole said she was surprised Cataluna wasn’t reappointed because he was
originally selected by the governor to fill the post.
The dismantling of
the OHA board came about as result of the U.S. Supreme Court decision.
The
high court ruled that OHA elections violated the 15th amendment, which was
written during the Civil War to protect the rights of former slaves.
The
case came about after Big Island rancher Harold “Freddie” Rice, a
fifth-generation Hawai’i resident, claimed his constitutional rights were
denied when he was barred from voting in a OHA election in 1996.
Rice sued
the state in U.S. District Court and in May 1997, U.S. District Judge David
Ezra ruled against him.
More than year later, the decision was upheld by
the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which said limiting voting to Hawaiians for
OHA races was legal.
Rice then appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme
Court.
The state of Hawai’i took the side of Hawaiians, contending that
because they are the sole beneficiaries of OHA elections, only they should be
allowed to voted for the agency’s trustees.
The state also argued that
OHA’s voting restrictions related to Native Hawaiians was not based on race,
but was based on a political relationship that existed between the federal
government and the Hawaiians, much like what the government has with Native
Americans.
OHA was created in 1978 by an amendment to the state
constitution, has an investment portfolio of $300 million and develops and
manages programs for Hawaiians.
OHA’s primary source of revenue is from
the ceded lands.
Staff writer Lester Chang can be reached at 245-3681
(ext. 225) and lchang@pulitzer.net
