Kauai News & Information

There were 1,002 new and 6,425 total claims for unemployment compensation across Hawaii in the seven days through Sunday. Both numbers were down.
New claims fell by 83 and total claims fell by 465, the Hawaii Department of Labor & Industrial Relations reported Thursday. The figures are newer than the data which went into the July unemployment report, also issued Thursday, and give some indication that the next monthly report will be similar to the 3 percent rate logged for July.
New (and total) weekly jobless claims around the islands:
Oahu: 575 (3,773). New and total claims fell at all three Oahu unemployment offices (Honolulu, Kaneohe and Waipahu) and total claims fell below 4,000 for the first time since June 3.
Big Island: 154 (1,163). In the Hilo office, new claims fell from 156 to 107 while total claims fell from 773 to 706. In the Kona office, new claims fell from 89 to 47 while total claims fell from 507 to 457.
Maui County: 94 (746). On Molokai, new claims fell from 15 to 10 while total claims rose from 75 to 65. At the Wailuku office on Maui, news claims fell from 86 to 84 while total claims fell from 719 to 628.
Kauai: 129 (470). Kauai new claims more than doubled from the week before and total claims rose by 120.
There were also 50 new (and 326 total) agent claims, filed against other states by people who now live in Hawaii.

Although the state of Hawaii is today multicultural and multiethnic, the influence of the early Christian missionaries is still quite evident. Last week I described the Anglican/Episcopal presence on the island of Kauai; today’s focus is on three historic Christian churches.
The British explorer Captain James Cook discovered the Hawaiian Islands in 1778. By 1819, “Puritan missionaries” came from Boston, an event fictionalized in James Michener’s epic novel “Hawaii.”
In the 1830s, commercial sugar production began in Kauai, and laborers arrived from all over the world to work on plantations. Faith communities developed to meet the needs of immigrants and proselytize the population.
In the north shore community of Hanalei is Wai’oli Hui’ia Church, founded in 1834 by New England Congregationalist missionaries. A wood and thatch meeting house was constructed by Native Hawaiians in anticipation of the arrival of the missionaries.
Two early churches were destroyed by wind and fire, and in 1912 the present church, now affiliated with the United Church of Christ, was built through donations of descendants of missionaries who taught at the mission school from 1844-1866.
This shingled church, built in American Gothic style, has a belfry housing a bell dating from 1843. Visitors to Hanalei are struck by the building’s green walls and stained glass windows set against the lush green landscape.
For decades the royal family of Hawaii did not allow Roman Catholic Mass to be celebrated in Hawaii, but in 1839 the commander of a French warship threatened attack if Catholics were not allowed religious liberty.
Taking advantage of the new policy, Father Arsene Walsh came to Kauai in December, 1841, and established St. Raphael’s Church, celebrating the first Mass on Christmas Day.
The first church building was completed in 1854, built of native volcanic rock, with mortar formed from sand and crushed coral. It was enlarged several times, and in 1933 an adobe tower was added.
The site of the church, near the sugar production town of Koloa on the island’s south shore, contains many other attractions (besides the old chapel which seats 120): a cemetery, remains of a rectory which was destroyed in 1992 by Hurricane Iniki, a grotto to Our Lady of Lourdes, and a large new church (actually termed a “meeting hall” so its rebuilding could be financed by FEMA funds) featuring clear, etched-glass windows.
On a hill overlooking Lihue, Kauai’s commercial center, is The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lihue. In 1881, German immigrants arranged for a theological student to lead their worship; in 1883, they incorporated as a congregation.
The architecture of the church they erected in 1885 symbolizes their six-month journey on a sailing ship around Cape Horn from their homeland: The floor slants like the deck of a ship, the balcony is the captain’s bridge, the ceiling is like the hull of a ship, the lights are like ships’ lanterns, the pulpit is the forecastle.
Unfortunately, this beautiful church was destroyed by Hurricane Iwa in 1982. With the assistance of gifts and memorials from friends around the world, the present church was erected as a faithful replica of its predecessor.

Southwest Airlines Vacations has added Hawaii to its package destination spots, even though Southwest Airlines doesn’t fly to Hawaii.
The Friday offer is effectively a further expansion of the code-share alliance by which Phoenix-based Southwest (NYSE: LUV) uses ATA Airlines as its Hawaii extension. Southwest tickets over ATA provide the last leg of travel.
“Prior to adding Hawaii to our vacation destinations, 22 percent of our customers told us that their next vacation would be to a destination that we did not serve at that time. Travel packages to Hawaii were on the top of their lists,” said Rich Basen, general manager of the vacations division.
While both Southwest and ATA will benefit when travelers book such packages, the service is actually offered by a third-party. Southwest Airlines Vacations is operated by Mark Travel Corp. of Orlando.
The roster of 43 Southwest Airlines Vacations destinations now includes Honolulu and Maui, a land-only package in Kauai, and, starting in one week, a package to the Big Island, flying into Hilo.

Federal funds aid the project to remove hazardous waste

KILAUEA, Kauai » Five months after the Ka Loko dam breach sent millions of gallons of water, waste and debris down Wailapa Steam, killing seven people, Kauai Mayor Bryan Baptiste announced yesterday the beginning of hazardous-waste removal in the area.
The hang-ups, county officials said, were finding the money to pay for the cleanup and getting right-of-entry forms from all the affected landowners.
Baptiste said almost 20 of the entry forms have been completed and notarized, with a few in the process of being completed. Also, the county just found out that debris removal work qualifies for funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Kauai’s Hurst R. Excavation will be in charge of the cleanup, which includes removing cars, vehicle parts, and propane and acetylene tanks along Wailapa Stream.
“We need to be sure these items don’t contain any oil or other flammable liquids before recycling them,” said Troy Tanigawa, program administrator for the county’s Solid Waste Division.
The hazardous-waste portion of the cleanup is expected to cost $33,000 and take a couple of weeks, Tanigawa said, but it could take longer if more hazardous waste is discovered in the area.
Local residents have complained since the March 14 break that hazardous debris likely washed into Kilauea River, which joins with Wailapa to reach the ocean.
“If that needs to be done, (residents) need to speak to” the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, which is responsible for the river, the mayor said.
The next step would be green waste and woody debris removal, which is expected to cost the bulk of the $1.5 million in state and FEMA funds allocated for the project.
“Our target completion date for the entire cleanup is the end of October,” Tanigawa said.

A home-made bomb found Sunday in Kauai was determined to be a hoax, according to Kauai police.
It happened near Kaikea lookout in Kealia.
Three local males were driving down a cane haul road at around 6:45 p.m. when they discovered what appeared to be an “improvised explosive device.”
The tubular device was about a foot long with wires protruding from it, including a trip wire, according to Kauai police.
A team from the U.S. Army Explosive Ordinance Dispatch Unit at Schofield Barracks was sent to Kauai to examine the device, but later found the device to be safe.
There were no injuries or damages related to the incident, according to police officials.

McDonald’s is loving a Kapa’a teenager. The fast food giant selected Nick Mortell to be a new face in their “I’m Loving It” campaign.
Mortell entered a global casting call that asked consumers to submit personal stories of what they love. He beat out 13,000 entries world-wide.
What is he loving? Football!
Mortell is among 25 stars chosen. He’ll be seen on McDonald’s packaging early next year, for at least one year.
McDonald’s is giving all 25 the star treatment with an all-expense paid trip for them and a guest to London.

Workers complained to Kauai County officials that Ka Loko Dam owner James Pflueger covered the reservoir’s emergency spillway in 1997 or 1998, creating a potentially dangerous situation, a spokesman for C. Brewer & Co. said yesterday.
C. Brewer maintenance workers at the reservoir “told Mr. Pflueger that filling in the spillway could be dangerous, and they reported it to the county,” company spokesman Jim Boersema said yesterday. They “could do no more than that. Pflueger owned the land.”
Pflueger has filed suit in Oahu Circuit Court against C. Brewer and others for the Ka Loko Dam breach that killed seven people March 14. He alleges that C. Brewer knowingly sold him the dam in 1987 even though it had structural problems.
Pflueger’s attorney, William McCorriston, said yesterday that if anyone had complained to the county about the blocked spillway, it would have been included in the numerous claims the county made against his client.
Starting in 2001, the county filed a lawsuit and criminal charges against Pflueger for illegal grading work at his makai property near Pilaa, as well as grading work done on the other side of Ka Loko Reservoir. He was fined a total of about $12 million.
“If the county had (received) a complaint, they had ample opportunity” to ask Pflueger to fix it, McCorriston added. “Everything the county … complained about, we fixed.”
While Boersema said he could not identify the maintenance staff who witnessed the blocking of the spillway, he believed Tom Hitch, the current owner of Kilauea Irrigation Co., was likely employed by C. Brewer at the time of the spillway work.
Hitch, who is also being sued by Pflueger, would not comment on the spillway, and neither would his lawyer, Peter Morimoto.
“We don’t want to try this case in the media,” Morimoto added.
State investigators and others close to the Ka Loko breach case said they had heard rumors about a county Department of Public Works report that included a complaint about the spillway. But they have yet to receive a copy of the report, although they have subpoenaed all county records on Ka Loko.
Kauai County Engineer Donald Fujimoto was on Oahu and could not be reached for comment.
Boersema, who was responding to the lawsuit filed Wednesday by Pflueger against the former “Big Five” sugar company, also said the lawsuit’s premise was false.
Pflueger’s suit says C. Brewer was negligent and committed fraud by selling the dam in 1987 without notifying Pflueger of any trouble. A 1982 federal draft report about the dam, McCorriston said, mentions seepage from the dam and says the irrigation system would cost $1.8 million to fix.
The Mary Lucas Trust, which owns half of the reservoir, received a copy of that report, Boersema said yesterday, and Pflueger was the co-trustee of the trust.
“Nothing was hidden from him,” Boersema said.
McCorriston denied that Pflueger ever received the draft report, and said that he “has no memory of receiving” the 1984 final report on the irrigation system.
He added, “The important thing was that it was not disclosed in the sale.”
Boersema also denied the lawsuit’s claim that the irrigation system was faulty. C. Brewer employees “did do normal maintenance every month” to the Ka Loko irrigation system, he added.
“The problems didn’t start until he (Pflueger) filled up the spillway,” he added.

Dallas’ David Arlen and Dr. Bob Weisberg both failed to make a hole-in-one yesterday at the Puakea Golf Course.
But they did manage to accomplish something else.
Their donations to the Kauai Food Bank was well worth the shot.
“It feels good to support a local charity now that we’re apart of the community,” Arlen said.
The business partners recently purchased property on the island.
The Second Annual ‘Hole-in-One For Hunger Challenge’ began with no aces, but many greens for the local charity that keeps tummies full.
“We’d love to have more individuals out here to win something and help out the community at the same time,” Puakea director of golf Paul Ito said.
So far, Ito said this year’s turnout has been better than expected.
“Our real goal was at least 50 percent of the golfers donating to the Kauai Food Bank and the numbers have been in our favor,” he said.
The event continues until Sunday at 5 p.m. You must play a round of golf in order to try for a hole-in-one at one of the four par-3s on the course.
Jim Saylor and Bob Friedman decided to hit the links yesterday and while on the course, the twosome tried their luck at the par 3s.
“My ball went into a trap,” Friedman said. “I was way off.”
Up for grabs were a Dell computer system, a set of Ben Hogan irons, a Bose stereo system and on the No. 6 hole, golfers have the chance at $10,000 cash.
“All the proceeds go towards the Food Bank,” Ito said. “It’s a minimum $10 donation.”

Although it was tabbed as the “Just For Fun…Just For Kaua‘i” golf tournament, event officials of the Kauai United Way chipped in with more than what they expected.
The sixth annual tournament, which was held on July 23 at the Princeville Makai Golf Course, netted over $31,000, an increase of 72 percent over last year. The original goal was to raise $25,000.
The money will provide a huge boost toward the organization’s 2006 annual campaign, which gets underway soon.
“It is indeed gratifying to know that in the coming year, tens of thousands of Kaua‘i people in need will receive social services through programs provided by our 24 participating agencies, made possible in part by funds we raised in this tournament,” event organizers said in an open letter to donors. “To top it all off, it was a lot of fun.”
Almost 200 players entered the event, which was the biggest turnout so far in the tournament’s history.
Team YMCA of Kauai, led by captain Tom Tannery, Fred Atkins, Phil Fill and Ron Agor, took the low net title (48.2).
Because it was the sixth year of the tournament, event officials decided to hand the grand prize to the sixth place squad, Team Red Rockets (Tom and Donna Rice, Marie and John Mosley).
They won a Big Island getaway golf package, including airfare and room accommodations at the Mauna Lani Resort, a Dollar Rent-A-Car rental and golf at the course.
Other winners included Team Kauai Lagoons (Ron Kouchi, Scott Kouchi, Royden Pablo and Paul Ganaden), which received a Po‘ipu golf getaway with rooms a the Kiahuna Plantation by Castle, golf at Po‘ipu Bay, lunch or dinner at Po‘ipu Tropical Burgers and Big Save gift certificates.
Team Rob’s Good Times Grill (Rob Silverman, Jason Apilado, Glen Batoon and Norvin Olivas) took home a Kuku‘i‘ula prize package, which included a Tori Richard silk shirt, a burlap Kuku‘i‘ula bag, cap and island living book.
Dustin Moises of Team S&S Business Machines was the grand prize lucky number drawing winner.
He scooped up a Las Vegas package including a travel certificate of $800 and a four-night, five-day stay at the California Hotel and Casino.
In the meantime, Jules Cannon putted his way to a brand new 27-inch color television from Otsuka’s.
Next year’s event is already set for Sunday, July 22 at the Princeville Makai Golf Course.

Growth and Sustainability
Kauai’s Grove Farm proves the two concepts are not mutually exclusive
It’s funny, but lately, Grove Farm President and CEO Warren Haruki has been sounding an awful lot like counterpart David Cole, who runs the other Steve Case-owned company, Maui Land & Pineapple Co. Over the course of our most recent interview with Haruki, he talked a lot about “building communities” and taking care of the locals. He discussed reforestation and other conservation projects the Kauai-based firm has in the works. He even mentioned the S-word, sustainability. Anyone who’s ever heard Cole speak, or read any of the countless print interviews he’s done knows that he practically owns the local rights to the use of the word “sustainability.”
But Haruki says any similarities to Cole and his MLP mantras are by and large coincidental. “I’d say our business philosophies are very similar, but it’s not by intense collaboration,” he says. “Grove Farm’s emphasis has been, and will continue to be to satisfy the various needs of the local housing markets and pushing forward on projects that promote smart growth.”
So what has changed? The real estate market, for one. In the late ’80s, when Grove Farm began work on a massive 600-acre, mixed-use project in Puhi, the market had never been hotter and the company stood to make a nice chunk of change. But a taxing county requirement to sell 60 percent of its units at “affordable” rates, combined with the market crash in the mid- to late- ’90s changed all of that, and nearly bankrupted the company. By the time Steve Case came in and rescued the revenue bleeding company in 2001, by purchasing it for $26 million, the company was $60 million in debt.
Over the past few years, however, things have taken a big turn for the better for Grove Farm. Last year, the company cracked the Top 250 for the first time, posting 2004 sales of $21.7 million. This year, the company jumped almost 100 spots up the list, from 232 to 136, thanks to a 190.3 percent increase in sales — the highest of any Top 250 company.
Haruki says the frenzied tempo of Kauai’s real estate market last year was the main reason for the whopping increase in sales. In 2005, Grove Farm sold one big parcel to Schuler Homes, 88 residential lots in Puhi and a handful of commercial lots near the island’s first Home Depot, and closed the year with $63 million in revenues. He expects the sales growth to continue through this year, albeit at a more tempered pace.
But forget about numbers and dollar signs for a moment. Let’s get back to Grove Farm’s commitment to the community and this concept of sustainability. “We don’t want to just sell real estate. We want to build communities that the local people can live in and be proud of,” explains Haruki. “We’re also trying to focus heavily on Kauai residents. For example, we’ve put shared appreciation clauses into our real estate sales, so that if the buyer chooses to sell within the first three years, he has to share the appreciation with us 50/50. That’s in order to prevent and deter speculation.”
So far, so good. According to Haruki, roughly 95 percent of Grove Farm’s real estate has been sold to Kauai residents.
In addition to its residential and commercial projects, the company has several community projects in the works as well. Grove Farm has been working with nonprofit organizations to reforest some of its agricultural land with koa wood and other Native Hawaiian plants. The company also recently built nene goose habitats surrounding a water purification plant it installed near Wailua Falls.
One of its biggest community initiatives has been the creation of a 5-acre taro farm operation on the mauka side of its Mahaulepu lands. “The amount of taro being grown in the state has been diminishing and Mahaulepu is pretty fertile ground for growing taro,” says Haruki. “So we’re trying to attract long-time taro farmers to take over and further expand the taro production, hopefully to about 20 acres by the end of the year. There are so many products that can be made from the taro, so, in a small way, for Kauai, it’s a step toward — and I use this term loosely — sustainability.”