By Patrick Downes Hawaii Catholic Herald Hawaii Family Forum, a moderate to conservative, mostly evangelical Christian organization with a Catholic connection, wanted to know where its members stood on the coronavirus pandemic. So they took a poll. The survey, conducted March 29-April 7, was not scientific. Hawaii Family Forum president Eva Andrade said she simply […]
Eva Andrade: Finding funds in all the wrong places
LEGISLATIVE REPORT The nation is dreadfully divided and families are struggling to get back to a more normal life. While local leadership begins cautiously to reopen the economy, the discussion continues on how best to help Hawaii’s residents. Therein lies the crux of where Hawaii’s legislators are focusing their attention and action this legislative session […]
Eva Andrade: Diocese tracking housing, minimum wage, mental health bills
Note: The Hawaii state legislature is temporarily closed due to COVID-19. LEGISLATIVE REPORT The Hawaii Catholic Conference, the public policy voice for the Diocese of Honolulu, has been tracking bills addressing homelessness, the minimum wage, mental health and other issues of concern now making their way through the Hawaii State Legislature. The positions and priorities […]
Eva Andrade: Session ends with a surprise
LEGISLATIVE REPORT The 30th Hawaii state legislature ended May 2. The biggest surprise was the failure of the bill that would permanently remove the window on the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse — HB 18 SD1. At the last hour, the bill ended up not leaving the conference committee. We understand that some […]
Eva Andrade: Bills, good and bad, take shape
LEGISLATIVE REPORT The last month of the legislative session has a lot of action but not much public discussion. At this point, the public can only participate in shaping legislation if they are granted facetime with a legislator. Most deals on bills at this juncture are made behind closed doors in conference committee where legislators […]
Eva Andrade: Many issues and an odd resolution or two
LEGISLATIVE REPORT The frenzied action on the bills reported in my last column is beginning to wind down now that we are moving toward final decking — the legislative point-in-time where bills are finalized in the opposite chamber and are returned to the originating one. Bills that have changed since they crossed over will either […]
Eva Andrade: Crossover crunch time at the Capitol
LEGISLATIVE REPORT The last week in February, when I am writing this, is normally the first crunch time for bills at the Hawaii State Legislature. Committees are fast and furiously getting bills ready for a final vote in the originating chamber so they can pass them over to the other one. By the time you […]
Commentary: On cutting short the end-of-life journey
Eva Andrade is president of Hawaii Family Forum and communications director of Hawaii Catholic Conference, the public policy arm of the Diocese of Honolulu. For about 20 years, she has been on the front lines at the State Legislature and in the public square in the fight against the law to permit physician-assisted suicide. By […]
Hawaii Catholic Conference | Legislative report: March 28, 2014
Diocese gives many bills the thumbs up The Hawaii state legislative session has moved into its second half and the Hawaii Catholic Conference is pleased to report that most of its efforts have been in support of some really good pieces of legislation. Here is a summary of some of these efforts. MEMORIAL BILLS The […]