Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 29, Number 5, 1 May 2012 — Waiheʻe: 2 new laws show state's Gommitment to Hawaiian issues [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Waiheʻe: 2 new laws show state's Gommitment to Hawaiian issues

By Francine Murray As the Native Hawaiian Roll Commission prepares to embark on a eampaign next month to gain support for Hawaiian sovereignty, its ehairman contemplates the signiheanee of two major legislative wins for Hawaiians in back-to-back years. First eame Hawaiian recognition in 2011. That was followed by a ceded lands past due revenue settlement in 2012 - an achievement that had remained elusive for almost two decades. "I think both Acts demonstrate the Legislature's and the state administration's commitments to deal with and pursue Hawaiian issues," said commission Chairman John Waihe'e. That said, Waihe'e noted, "This was a long overdue issue," referring to the bill Gov. Abercrombie signed into law in April settling OHA's claims to past due revenue fromceded lands. It was an issue Waihe'e thought had been resolved two decades earlier. The former governor was one of the main proponents of OHA at the 1978 Constitutional Convention, and in 1990 he had engineered a

settlement designed to resolve the claims. It included a formula for calculating the pastdue and future ineome that OHA is entitled to for Native Hawaiians as its 20 percent prorata share from state ceded land revenues. Act 304 paved the way for OHA to receive about $134 million in back revenue (Act 35) and about $8 million annually. "I mean we had already settled it and then it was overturned by the courts," Waihe'e recalled. The Hawai'i Supreme Court invalidated Act 304 in September 2001, because portions dealing with ceded land revenue from airport lands conllicted with federal law. Subsequently, all ceded land revenue payments to OHA stopped until 2003, when then-Gov. Linda Lingle reinstated the undisputed amounts of the annual payments to OHA. The new law Abercrombie enacted in April addresses the disputed past-due claims. "It's all part of reconciliation," said Waihe'e. "It's reconciling the injustice that occurred at the illegal overthrow, and where we are today." "The settlement had to do with past-due XI GEDED LAND ON PAGE 12

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Former Gov. John Waihe'e answered Gov. Neil Abercrombie's extended fist with a fist bump after the ceded lands settlement hill cleared its final hurdle in the full House in March. Abercrombie would sign the measure into law in April, making it the second major pieee of Hawaiian legislation that lawmakers and Abercrombie approved in two years. - Photo: Lisa Asato

CEDED LAND Continued from page 5 rent and Act 195 had to do with recognition," explained Waihe'e. Last year the state passed Act 195, whieh recognizes Native Hawaiians as the only indigenous people of Hawai'i and established a Native Hawaiian Roll Commission to create and publish a list of qualified Native Hawaiians for participation in the organization of a governing entity. Both the roll commission and the formation of OHA by the 1978 Constitutional Convention were efforts to establish Hawaiian self-gover-nanee, Waihe'e explained. "The creation of OHA was an attempt to move forward on a Native Hawaiian self-govemance, and it was anheipated back then that it would be possible for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to evolve to some kind of self-goveming entity, even beyond what it was when it was first estab-

lished." The key to that scenario was the Hawaiians-only election, whieh was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in Rice v. Cayetano. "As a result of that decision it has heeome apparent that we need to try a different approach. That is the reason for the roll commission," he said. "What we want to do is develop a campaign to gain support for the concept of Hawaiian sovereignty and develop a roll for eligible Hawaiians who want to participate in the coordination of a self-governing entity," Waihe'e said. They expect to kiek off the campaign in June. "There is a real interest in getting this done. The reason we chose June is because given the logistics of all that we have to do, it is the earliest possible date that we could get started. In looking for a day in June, it is the month in whieh we eelebrate King Kamehameha's birth." What better time than that to unify as a people? ■

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