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Hawaii nonprofits seek $150M to blunt Trump spending cuts

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Hawaii nonprofits seek 0M to blunt Trump spending cuts


HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Leaders from 213 nonprofit organizations testified at the Hawaii State Capitol Thursday, seeking emergency funding as federal spending cuts impact Hawaii’s charity and human service sector more severely than anticipated.

Lawmakers set aside $50 million in May for nonprofits affected by Trump administration spending cuts, but organizations requested more than $150 million from the fund.

“We had, you know, over $150 million in requests, you know, for $50 million pot. So I think that should just show you the need out there. A lot of community members going hungry,” said state Rep. Daniel Holt, co-chair of the emergency grants committee.

Organizations detail funding shortfalls

The West Hawaii Community Health Center requested $1.8 million “to stabilize and sustain this workforce, jobs and keep people healthy,” said CEO Richard Taaffe.

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Kids Hurt Too sought $394,500. “Since the funding cuts, we have expanded our peer support, mentoring, and community activities for grieving and traumatized youth and families,” said executive director Walker Rowsey.

“We are humbly requesting $350,000 to help Hawaii’s most disadvantaged youth,” said Cathy Ogawa of Big Brothers Big Sisters.

Alu Like reported a $189,403 cut in Department of Labor federal funding. “Our employment and training program, which was forced to reduce staff work hours by 20% to address the $189,403 cut in our Department of Labor federal funding,” said CEO Mervina K.M. Cash-Kaeo.

Lawmakers face difficult decisions

“We’re gonna try and prioritize, you know, needs in our community, you know, food is definitely important, you know, health care, things of those things,” Holt said.

The requests come as federal food aid remains stalled and tens of thousands of federal workers live without paychecks.

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“I feel like we are getting punched in the gut multiple times, right, from all directions,” said state Rep. Lisa Marten, chair of Human Services.

Republican state Sen. Brenton Awa was asked if Trump can be blamed for the crises said partisan politics should not affect people’s needs.

“It’s sad that we live in a time where party politics has to be this divisive at the cost of people. And, you know, what we got into office for was to represent people. So when we see this, this is the kind of stuff that makes us sick,” he said.

Revenue generation under consideration

The funding shortage could prompt lawmakers to seek additional revenue from taxpayers.

“Things always have to be relooked at. When they’re on such a large scale, you know, we always could use additional revenue generation, which we’re always looking at, but that’s always tough,” Holt said.

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Marten said everything should be on the table.

“We have to look at the big picture and see what can we find and what can’t we find? Because replacing all federal programs with state funds isn’t possible,” she said.

Lawmakers had reserved a day for a potential special session in late November to address federal budget cuts, but will now most likely wait until the regular session begins in January.



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Suspect arrested in attempted armed robbery on North Shore

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Suspect arrested in attempted armed robbery on North Shore


HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Police have arrested a suspect in a violent attempted robbery on Oahu’s North Shore. Another suspect still has not been located.

Police said the two men approached another man in Mokuleia Friday night. One of the men allegedly assaulted the victim while the other one threatened him with a handgun.

According to police records, the suspects ran off when the victim called police.

Officers later identified one of the suspects as a 50-year-old man. He was arrested Tuesday and faces possible charges of robbery in the first degree.

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Few state bills this year face potential veto – West Hawaii Today

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Few state bills this year face potential veto – West Hawaii Today






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Hawaii displays historic photos of Martin Luther King Jr. wearing flower lei during Selma march

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Hawaii displays historic photos of Martin Luther King Jr. wearing flower lei during Selma march


HONOLULU — Photographs of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. adorned with flower lei from Hawaii residents who traveled to Selma, Alabama, to join him on a pivotal Civil Rights march went on public display Tuesday in the state Capitol in Honolulu.

The Selma-to-Montgomery marches galvanized passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which did away with most barriers such as poll taxes and other forms of voter discrimination targeting Black Americans in the Deep South.

A delegation of five people brought dozens of flower lei with them from Hawaii to Alabama in March 1965. Images of King wearing lei, garlands that are synonymous with Hawaiian culture, have been previously published — but most of the photos displayed in Hawaii’s new exhibit have never been seen before. Some photos have subtle variations, while others include figures who may have been deemed unimportant at the time. The exhibit runs through July 7.

One of the lei-bearers was Charles Campbell, a high school teacher and chairman of the Hawaii Civil Rights Conference, who a March 20, 1965 article in The Honolulu Advertiser quoted as saying: “Selma has the capability of becoming a real sore that could affect the entire nation.”

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King was photographed wearing lei about two weeks after the event known as Bloody Sunday when state troopers violently attacked Civil Rights marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma on March 7, 1965.

The photos were taken by Civil Rights photographer Matt Herron, whose widow donated them to Hawaii’s Department of Accounting and General Services for the state’s archives.

After the photos were unveiled, Steven Springel stared at a photo of his mother, Nona Ferdon, who was a divorced mother of two children and a graduate student when she traveled to Selma.

This photo provided by Jeannine Herron shows Charles Campbell, who traveled to Alabama for the march from Selma to Montgomery, placing a lei on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Brown Chapel AME in Selma, Ala., March 21, 1965. Credit: AP/Matt Herron

Springel remembers he was just about to turn 7 and only realized as an adult how important her trip was. Growing up in Hawaii, “we never experienced segregation or racial inequality,” he said of his and his sister’s childhood. Ferdon died in 2021.

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The exhibit, part of Hawaii’s programming to mark the 250th anniversary of the United States, is a reminder people from the Aloha State participated in an important event in history, said Keith Regan, who oversees the department as the state’s comptroller and presided over the photo unveiling as acting governor while Gov. Josh Green is out of state.

The small delegation traveled thousands of miles “to be a part of the Civil Rights movement, to show ‘aloha’ to the world that Hawaii was there holding hands with our fellow brothers and sisters to ensure equality and justice were heard throughout the nation,” he said.

The Hawaii members also wore lei during first day of the 50-mile (80.46-kilometer) march. Mothers of Kawaiahaʻo Church in Honolulu strung together fragrant plumeria plucked from church grounds to assemble the lei.

This photo provided by Jeannine Herron shows Nona Ferdon, a...

This photo provided by Jeannine Herron shows Nona Ferdon, a graduate student who accompanied the Hawaii delegation that traveled to Alabama in 1965 for the march for voting rights, attends the march in Selma, Ala., March 21, 1965. Credit: AP/Matt Herron

Giving lei, a word that is both singular and plural in the Hawaiian language, continues to be a way to share the “aloha” spirit. People in Hawaii give and receive lei for all kinds of reasons, including to celebrate birthdays and promotions, or to show appreciation or recognition.

Tomi Knaefler, who had traveled with the delegation as a reporter with the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, planned to attend Tuesday’s news conference. But at 96 years old, she wasn’t feeling up to it, said her daughter, Pamela MacDonald, who did attend.

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MacDonald said she was 14 when her mother went on the assignment, “the one that she holds dearest to her heart.”

The exhibit comes at the end of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2026 term, which included a ruling gutting the remaining piece of the Voting Rights Act, setting off a wave of partisan gerrymandering in states in the South and endangering generations of gains in Black political representation.



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