The first post this blogger saw was in the afternoon on Tuesday, January 24.
The second one wasn’t too far after, maybe mid-afternoon.
So for this piece, let’s peg the “honeymoon” period that Governor Green had from his State of the State address, held on Monday the 23rd, at about 27 hours.
And then one minute after 27 hours, the honeymoon was over.
The first piece this blogger saw was a post on Twitter by Healani Sonoda-Pale of Ka Lāhui Hawai‘i, doing a “Hewa Alert” (Hewa meaning “mistake” or “error” in Hawaiian) about Green’s executive order to declare homelessness an emergency.
PC: Twitter post by Healani Sonoda-Pale
While Ka Lāhui’s concern is about the desecration of the Iwi, it should be noted that the Executive Order signed by Green on the Senate Floor during his speech, also eliminates a number of requirements for developers to fulfill before starting a project. So, in essence, what could happen (hypothetically) is that a developer could declare a new development being built addresses the EO, and get going with building.
The call-out by Ka Lāhui on this may have ramifications that extend to the courtroom if the opposition to Green’s EO grows. Anything close to bothering Iwi is kapu in the Hawaiian community, and you can bet a lot of developers may be bothering iwi, with the permission of Governor Green.
The second came from Politics Hawai‘i with Stan Fichtman’s friends at Hawai‘i Free Press. At about 2 p.m. the site posted an article from Ililani Media, calling out the Governor for his plan to ramp up the production of Hydrogen as an energy fuel source, in Hawai‘i. Governor Green announced that the state would be pursuing a billion-dollar grant from the federal government’s department of energy. to pilot a regional hydrogen hub (H2Hub) with an emphasis on green hydrogen.
He is selling it as a potential “new leg” to the economic chair of Hawai‘i, a chair that currently has 2 legs – one for tourism and one for the military. But Earthjustice ain’t having it.
PC: Henry Curtis’s Twitter Page
In a post on their blog, Henry Curtis, the Executive Director & Vice President of Life of the Land, states, “Hydrogen is being touted as a bridge fuel: make renewable electricity, use it to isolate hydrogen, and then use the hydrogen for power. “But, when you clear away the industry smoke screen, there are many reasons to be skeptical.”
To this blogger, a statement like that says Life of the Land is going to be one who will come out in opposition to Governor Green’s vision, and that the blog post is just an opening statement to a larger narrative that will be written during the legislative session.
Even with Legislative leaders, at best, giving Governor Green the benefit of the doubt about his vision through his speech, it would seem that those not buying the vision are ramping up and getting ready to make their points known.
So if Governor Green thought it was going to be a cakewalk to outline and implement a vision of Hawai‘i, it only took 27 hours for him to find out it might not work that way.