HILO – Economist Leroy Laney has some good news for the Big Island.

Speaking Thursday at the 36th annual First Hawaiian Bank Economic Outlook Forums in Hilo, Laney said an economic recovery is now under way or at least imminent for the island’s economy.

Laney, the bank’s economics adviser and professor of economics and finance at Hawaii Pacific University, says Hawaii County can look forward to better times.

He says Big Island job growth shows the same pattern as the state as a whole – still declining, but at a decreasing rate.

Laney says the Big Island has further to go in returning to positive job growth than the overall state, because all the Neighbor Islands have felt the recent recession more acutely than Oahu’s relatively diversified economy.

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Maui News

Kauai puts curbside recycling to the test

LIHUE – Kauai officials are beginning a pilot curbside recycling program in parts of the island.

Workers will pick up recycling at homes in Puhi and parts of Lihue starting next Thursday.

Kauai County has already delivered specialized recycling carts with blue lids to 1,300 homes in the area.

Kauai has contracted Garden Isle Disposal, Inc. to sort and track the recyclables.

The program will accept cardboard, newspaper, mixed paper, aluminum and plastics marked with the numerals 1 or 2 in a recycling logo.

It will also accept glass food and beverage containers. We are so behind in the curbside program, I hope this goes well because we need to be apart of the “green movement”

Maui News

A public opinion survey of state transportation issues revealed a yearning for an interisland ferry, with 83 percent of those polled by SMS on behalf of the state Department of Transportation saying a marine transportation system should be part of the state’s overall infrastructure, although pro-ferry sentiment was much weaker on Kauai.

An interisland ferry has been part of the state’s long-range transportation planning since the first plan in 1961. That plan, now called the Hawaii Statewide Transportation Plan, is undergoing its sixth revision.

Each revision looks forward 25 years, so the current one will attempt to assess needs through 2035, planning officer David Shimokawa told a lightly attended informational meeting Monday night at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center. The past revision was completed in 2002.

Security was the question most people didnt answer. Maui news is wondering how all the illigal fire works get here and security should be a concern. To read more you can go to Maui news.com

The Maui County Council voted 7-1 Tuesday to give initial approval to a compromise bill aimed at getting condominium owners to pay the correct property tax rate on their units.

The sole dissenting vote was cast by Council Member Jo Anne Johnson, a West Maui condominium owner who said she would prefer tax rates be determined by the zoning in a condominium’s location.

As amended, Bill 53 requires condominium associations to file an annual report listing how owners are using their units – personal residence or a long- or short-term rental. Originally, the bill would have required condo owners to pay taxes according to the “highest and best use” of their properties, based on zoning, as other landowners do now.

The revised bill came after condo owners complained and associations offered a compromise in which they would file annual lists of how units are being used. The lists would be filed with the county Department of Finance, and the director of the department “may, after investigation, reclassify and reassess any unit in a condominium association to be in violation of the owner’s certification of actual use.”

Johnson said she believed such language pitted condominium associations against condo owners. Council members voting in favor of the amended bill were Mike Molina, Joe Pontanilla, Danny Mateo, Gladys Baisa, Bill Medeiros, Wayne Nishiki and Mike Victorino. Council Member Sol Kaho’ohalahala was absent and excused from the meeting.

As originally drafted, the bill was meant to close a loophole that allows condo owners to declare how their property should be classified for tax purposes. All other landowners in the county automatically pay taxes according to the highest use allowed under their property’s zoning.

But condo owners complained that units in areas zoned as hotel would be unfairly paying higher property tax rates.

The bill also consolidates the current “improved residential” and “unimproved residential” property tax categories into a single “residential rate.”

Victorino said the revised bill is the best attempt at ensuring that the correct condo taxes are paid.

“Again, we try our best,” he said, adding that if problems surface the council could revisit the issue and amend the ordinance.

Prior to voting on the bill, Nishiki said that Johnson had brought up an “interesting” argument against the bill, but he voted in favor of it, saying he still believed it was the “fairest” way to implement tax rates for condos.

“Our thrust was to catch the cheaters,” he said, adding that he believed the bill as rewritten would be a “very honest way” of accomplishing the county’s goals.

The bill is expected to be brought up for second and final reading at a council meeting next month.

According to a Budget and Finance Committee report on the bill, Finance Director Kalbert Young reported that the county would have generated approximately $8.5 million in additional real property tax revenue if all condo units were assessed at their highest and best use.

The director identified 11 condominium projects that would be most affected by the proposed bill.

Those condominiums would have had property taxes assessed at the hotel/resort property tax rate of $8.30 per $1,000 of net taxable assessed value, instead of the lower apartment rate of $5 per $1,000 of assessed value.

With upscale and luxury resorts leading the way, Maui hotel occupancy jumped to 68.3 percent during the first half of 2010.

Higher-end resorts on Oahu also enjoyed a big bounce, and Oahu’s average occupancy jumped from 70 percent to 75, according to Hospitality Advisors.

Maui upscale resorts, which had average rack rates of $195, saw their occupancy rates rise from 64.3 percent to 70.3 percent. Luxury resorts, with average posted prices of $324 a night, saw occupancy rise from 61.1 percent to 67.6 percent.

Those prices reflected some cutting, about 5 percent for upscale resorts and more than 7 percent for luxury rooms compared to 2009.

On Maui, more modest resorts also turned to price cutting.

Midprice room rates were lopped more than 7 percent to an average of $139, but that pushed occupancy rates up only to 62.8 percent, although from a very low (for Maui) 55.8 percent the year before.

Occupancy rates less than 60 percent were almost unheard of until the recession began in the middle of 2008.

Maui’s economy hotels cut their rates by nearly 7 percent to $124, and this got the biggest proportional gain in occupancy, up from 53.6 percent to 66.6 percent.

Maui doesn’t have any rooms that Hospitality classes as budget, but on Oahu there was a huge jump in demand for cheap rooms. Prices were cut by a modest $3 a night, but occupancy leaped from 67.2 percent to 83.1 percent.

The cuts in posted or rack room rates probably understate the aggressiveness of price cutting on Oahu and Maui, because of offers of free breakfasts and the like. Maui resorts also have the advantage of being able to offer room and golf packages that in some cases have offered almost free golf.

Kauai and the Big Island have resisted cutting rack rates, and Hawaii County has paid the price in occupancy.

Big Island rack rates have moved only from an average of $187 to $183 a night, and occupancy has hardly budged, rising only from 54.6 percent to 55.4 percent.

On Kauai, posted rates have moved from $192 to $183 – closer to the moves made on Maui – but occupancy improved only from 58.5 percent to 60 percent.

In June, the last month reported by Smith Travel Research to Hospitality, there was a perhaps significant change from previous months.

Statewide, rack rates were nearly unchanged from June 2009 (down less than $3 to $170), but occupancy jumped from 61.8 percent to 71.4 percent.

Maui’s experience was similar but not exactly the same. Rack rates in June were $6 lower at $224, and occupancy improved but not as much as that in the rest of the state, from 59 percent to 65.7 percent.

Overall for the year so far, Maui has cut its rates the most (9.1 percent) and has improved occupancy the most (8.2 percent).

“Summer bookings for Oahu and Maui are strong,” said Hospitality Advisors President Joseph Toy, but still far below the peaks of 2007.

Bargains are plentiful, especially in the fancier places. “The upper end of the market is seeing a lot of trading-up in travel given the attractive pricing.”

By price class, luxury resorts increased their revenue by 6 percent in the first half to $692 million. The other four price classes saw their revenue almost stagnant, and all four together grossed only $521 million.

First-half revenue was nearly unchanged at $1.21 billion from depressed 2009, and it was about $360 million below the totals achieved in 2006, 2007 and even 2008, which had finished higher overall thanks to a fast start and a slow finish.

(Maui News, MSN Realestate, Karen, Donna)