While attending the Kauai Chamber of Commerce Governor’s Luncheon on May 30, I joined members of the community in congratulating the chamber on its 100th anniversary. Since 1913, the Kauai Chamber has endeavored to represent Garden Island business and industry
While attending the Kauai Chamber of Commerce Governor’s Luncheon on May 30, I joined members of the community in congratulating the chamber on its 100th anniversary.
Since 1913, the Kauai Chamber has endeavored to represent Garden Island business and industry — large and small — as well as improve commerce, quality growth and economic stability on the island. I was therefore pleased to report that we are seeing strength in the state’s overall economy, which benefits us all.
In addition to the steady growth predicted by the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism through next year, Hawaii’s unemployment rate has once again improved — down 20 percent from a year ago — indicating that our efforts to put Hawaii’s people back to work are succeeding. (The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.9 percent in April 2013, down from 6.1 percent in April 2012. For Kauai, the non-seasonally adjusted rate was 5.7 percent in April 2013, down from 7.5 percent a year prior.)
Another welcome sign of our improving economy was last month’s Council on Revenues revised forecast, which reaffirmed its previous General Fund tax revenue projection for the current fiscal year, as well as increased its projections for the next three fiscal years. The projections include tax revenue growth by 8 percent in 2014 and 7 percent in 2015, which would mean $86 million more revenue over the next biennium.
This good economic news means that we can now proceed with many of the transformative initiatives proposed by this administration and the state Legislature.
Recently signed bills specifically impacting Kauai include Act 57 (SB1045), which authorizes the Public Utilities Commission to waive or exempt an electric cooperative, such as the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative, from certain duplicative regulatory requirements. The current law is structured to provide regulatory oversight of investor-owned utilities such as the Hawaiian Electric Company. Since KIUC is a customer-owned organization, this new law enables the PUC to review laws and administrative rules that apply to the cooperative model, ultimately resulting in savings for rate payers.
KIUC must still adhere to statutory statewide clean energy policy mandates, such as the state’s renewable portfolio standards and energy efficiency portfolio standards. But this new law provides the PUC and the state Division of Consumer Advocacy greater flexibility in considering the ownership structure and the ultimate benefit that electric cooperatives have on the communities they serve.
Another measure with the potential to positively impact Kauai is Act 89 (HB726), which extends the state motion picture, digital media, and film production tax credit from Jan. 1, 2016, to Jan. 1, 2019. It also increases the credit ceiling to $15 million per qualified production, and it changes the percentage of qualified production costs that can be applied toward the credit: Increasing it from 15 percent to effectively 20 percent on Oahu and 25 percent in Kauai, Maui and Hawaii Counties.
The intent is to encourage growth of the film and creative media industries — an important component of a diversified economy — by providing enhanced incentives for film and creative media production.
For the public’s convenience, links to these and other bills are available on my website, governor.hawaii.gov (click on “Recently Signed Bills”).
• Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s guest column prints monthly.
