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Hawai'i Skies

Today's Hawai'i Skies was captured by Wendy Roberts on Waimānalo Beach. "This was the third rainbow we saw this day but this one stood out!  Truly a magical sight."

To submit your Hawai'i Skies photo, visit us 

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25 11 18 Steven Roberts

<title>Hawai'i Skies: A magical sight</title>

Today's Hawai'i Skies was captured by Wendy Roberts on Waimānalo Beach.

Hawai'i Skies: A magical sight

Today&#039;s Hawai&#039;i Skies was captured by Wendy Roberts on Waimānalo Beach. &quot;This was the third rainbow we saw this day but this one stood out!  Truly a magical sight.&quot; To submit your Hawai&#039;i Skies photo, visit us online or email: general@alohastatedaily.com For the latest news of Hawai‘i, sign up here for our free Daily Edition newsletter.

Kam Napier Headshot

A. Kam Napier

Columnists

Government & Politics

 was 32 years old on July 1, 2015, as she walked along San Francisco’s Pier 14 with her father and a friend.

Somewhere behind her on the Embarcadero at that moment was José Inez García Zárate, handling a pistol he found under a bench. He fired one shot. That shot hit Steinle in the back. Her father and friend performed CPR, paramedics arrived, but her aorta had been pierced and she died in a hospital two hours later.

In 2017, García Zárate was acquitted on charges of murder and manslaughter, but no one denied he fired the shot, and no one denied some other facts about him.

“A little bit of common sense and discretion might have prevented the killing this month in San Francisco of Kathryn Steinle — a victim not only of random gunfire but of the mindless handling of the city's immigration policy,” 

García Zárate, USA Today noted, “had a felony drug record going back 20 years, had been deported five times and had repeatedly sneaked back into the USA …  [he] was in the San Francisco County jail in April and should have been deported yet again. Federal immigration authorities had lodged a ‘detainer,’ seeking to get custody and do just that. All they needed was a call or other contact from the sheriff's office.

“The contact was never made, not because of some ghastly mistake or miscommunication but because of a city ordinance that prohibits police from honoring detainers except in rare cases. And, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, because of a policy by the local sheriff that bars contact with immigration authorities. After a local charge against Lopez-Sanchez [as his name appeared in early reporting] was dropped, he was held for three weeks, then put on the street.”

One of the top three candidates to be the next chief of the Honolulu Police Department is San Francisco’s David Lazar, whom Aloha State Daily 

Near as I can piece together from Lazar’s 

, he was a captain in the San Francisco Police Department at the time of Steinle’s shooting, then rising to commander in 2017 and then assistant chief before retiring in 2025. We can safely assume he alone did not set the policies that had made San Francisco a “sanctuary city” in 2015, where immigration law would be selectively ignored.

But Lazar has already told us where he wants to take Honolulu. Here’s the relevant quote from our interview with him:

“I come from a department where we don’t cooperate at all with ICE,” Lazar said. “That’s what I’m used to, that’s the right thing to do. If I’m selected as chief, we will not cooperate whatsoever with ICE. We will not participate in anything they have going on.

“We’re not going to transport for them, we’re not going to support them, we’re not going to respond to any of their calls, we’re not going to set up perimeters,” Lazar went on. “Those are the policy decisions that will be made on my watch.”

 is scheduled to make a decision today between Lazar, 

 and Scott Ebner. We profiled Lazar and Lambert, Ebner did not respond to us.

The commission is comprised of Chair Laurie Foster, Vice Chair Jeannine A. Souki, Vice Chair Chris Magnus, and members Kenneth Silva, Elizabeth Char, Blake Parsons and Gary A. Yabuta.

The commission can be reached at 808-723-7580, or by email at 

, if you have thoughts to share on their selection.

The Honolulu Police Commission selected Lazar, more 

A. Kam Napier is editor in chief of Aloha State Daily. His opinions in Pipikaula Corner are his own and not reflective of the ASD team.

0508 1311 David Lazar image 16x9

<title>Pipikaula Corner: David Lazar, Kate Steinle and Honolulu’s future</title>

One of the top three candidates for Honolulu Police Chief, David Lazar of San Francisco, has stated his intention to never let HPD cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. These are the kinds of policies widely believed to have been the reason why Kathryn "Kate" Steinle was killed in 2015 by a five-time deportee, out on the streets of San Francisco because local authorities refused to work with federal agencies on immigration cases.

Pipikaula Corner: David Lazar, Kate Steinle and Honolulu’s future

Lopaka and Tanya Kapanui

Lopaka Kapanui and Tanya Kapanui

Hawai‘i History

Named after the famous author and poet Robert Louis Stevenson, this facility was the first in Hawaiʻi to adopt a middle school concept in 1988, hosting students in grades 6-8.

It was initially named after Robert Louis Stevenson in 1937, when it opened as an intermediate school on the site of the Territorial Normal School, teaching children from grades 7-9.

I initially learned that RLS Middle School was built over the site of an important heiau in the Pūowaina complex. These heiau were used for various purposes by aliʻi and kāhuna to support the Pūowaina Heiau at the top of the crater we now call Punchbowl. I’ve quoted this bit of information as fact for years.

As we constantly expand our research and knowledge, we continually uncover new information that sheds light on previously accepted norms. Some of what we learn was passed down from mouth to ear, which may result in misunderstandings of certain moʻolelo or the locations where they took place. In these circumstances, we always offer our apologies and ask for forgiveness from our ancestors. Then, we correct our course and take full responsibility for our hiccup. It’s why research in all its aspects is crucial: because you, the reader, are very important to us. Our humble mahalo to you.

As it turns out, the information I had was partially correct. RLS Intermediate School was actually built over the remains of a heiau. However, the current site is not its original home. The Territorial Normal School, which served as a temporary site for Roosevelt High School, Pūowaina Elementary, and then RLS Intermediate, was located near the corner of Green and Alapai Streets.

By the 1940s, the need for a larger campus was clear, and the search for nearby locations began. A parcel in Kewalo-uka, located at the base of Punchbowl Crater, was chosen, where the U.S. Agricultural Experiment Station used to be. Finally, on November 16, 1952, a dedication ceremony was held on what would have been Robert Louis Stevenson’s 102nd birthday, with more than 600 students, parents, and teachers in attendance.

Although the heiau isn’t where I thought it was, that doesn’t mean the school isn’t haunted. The current location of Stevenson Middle School falls directly in the path of Kamehameha’s warriors as they battled for control of O‘ahu against Kalanikupule’s army. And as we’ve mentioned before, the land has a way of remembering past trauma.

After sharing a video about the middle school, my account was overwhelmed with comments and messages about people’s personal experiences. Many claim to have seen headless bodies, near the banyan tree and on the roof of the building. A general eeriness and the feeling of being watched are common. Two people mentioned the P.E. rooms feeling spooky, and one person said he saw the ghost of a man walk through the cafeteria wall.

Stevenson was one of the stops on the Ghost Hunters Bus Tour that my late mentor, Glen Grant, did before I eventually took over. He shared many of his personal encounters there, and he assured me that as time went on, whatever was haunting the school would soon make itself known to me. 

One evening, my group stood under the banyan tree and began to take pictures. This was in the late ’90s, so people were still using film cameras. When the burst of flashes went off, sparkles floated down toward us in a slow descent. It was a wonderful thing to behold. It didn’t feel spooky, but we made sure there was no one hiding in the branches, raining sparkling lights down on us.

On another night, the usual busload of 25 people was standing in front of the cafeteria’s double doors. I shared the story of the old Kānelā’au, which we believed once stood there, where human sacrifices were offered to the gods. As I shared this account, we all heard the sound of high heels walking down the sidewalk from the far corner of the cafeteria, and we could tell it was coming our way. I continued talking while waiting for the person in high heels to appear so we could get out of her way. No one manifested, but the sound of the high heels walked right past us.

A second later, police cars rolled up, and the officers approached us. They asked if we’d seen a woman in a dress and high heels walking on the cafeteria roof. I explained that we all heard the heels, but it didn’t sound like it was above us. We hadn’t seen anyone, even though the sound seemed to pass right through us.

“That’s the call we got,” one of the officers said, and then they left us to continue our tour while they investigated the rest of the campus.

Many other strange events took place during my tours, including a group of people seeing headless bodies under the portable buildings. But the strangest account comes from a retired police officer who, along with his former partner, used to patrol the area around Stevenson Middle School. His partner had been on the force for many years and was well regarded by his peers.

There was a major car accident in the area, and all officers were called to respond. The man’s former partner didn’t reply and never showed up for the call. His vehicle, a black Crown Victoria, was seen in the Stevenson parking lot. The officer was found inside, slumped over. He had died of a heart attack.

Later, people reportedly saw a black Crown Victoria pull into the parking lot in the late hours of the night. No one could see inside the car, but almost everyone knew who it belonged to. Some patrolmen would drive by that late officer’s house to make sure that the Crown Victoria was parked in the garage, and it was, I was told.

Wanting to see for himself, the retired officer went to the Stevenson parking lot to wait. Sure enough, a little after 1:00 a.m., the black Crown Victoria pulls up.

“Holy crap,” was the only thing I could say as I was covered with chicken skin.

“End of watch, John,” the officer called out, “We got it covered. You can go home and rest.”

He said he couldn’t see inside the car, but he knew it was his friend, and that was all he could think of to put his soul at ease. The car left the parking lot and was never seen again.

Stevenson Middle School

<title>Intermediate Ghosts</title>

If you thought just being in the 7th or 8th grade was scary, imagine if some tragic set of circumstances had you trapped there in the afterlife! Stories abound about the things seen at Robert Louis Stevenson Middle School in Honolulu, long known as an "Intermediate School" in the DOE naming system. Ancient warriors. Headless bodies. A cop on his beat. A mysterious woman in high heels.  All these and more.

Intermediate Ghosts

Square Mike Brestovansky Headshot RGZ3736 Large

Michael Brestovansky

A controversial music festival on Hawai‘i Island has been given the go-ahead despite complaints from neighbors.

The Windward Planning Commission on the Big Island voted 

 to approve a request by landowner Andrew Tepper to hold a multi-day music festival on a portion of his 1,400-acre parcel of land in Pāpa‘ikou.

, called “Falls On Fire,” is described in the request as a four-day event “centered on principles of inclusion, gifting, self-reliance, self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility and respect for the environment.” The event is repeatedly compared to the annual “Burning Man” festival in Nevada; similarly, Falls On Fire would also feature the burning of an effigy.

Tepper had previously held Falls On Fire annually since 2023, but had not received proper permits from the county for the event, leading the county Planning Department to fine Tepper’s company, Teppy Mountain LLC, more than $34,000. The Planning Department later stated that Tepper claimed he was unfamiliar with county and state regulations that required a special permit.

At the Planning Commission’s May 14 meeting on the subject, dozens of residents argued the merits and flaws of the festival, echoing the arguments made during a contested case hearing about the subject in November.

“I’ve heard his festivals,” said Pāpa‘ikou resident Eliza Folkman. “It’s been wildly disruptive already. And I believe this raises questions about accountability and commitment to stewardship. When we start turning these lands into venues for big parties or festivals, especially ones that have already ignored the rules and caused problems before, we risk losing something we can’t get back.”

People opposed to the festival complained about the noise from previous events and worried about the potential impact that 500 festivalgoers will have on the single private road that accesses the festival grounds. Others worried that not all attendees will heed rules on the Falls On Fire 

 urging attendees to not use soap while bathing in streams, leading to pollutants and human waste accumulating downstream.

On the other hand, previous festivalgoers argued that the festival has improved over the years to accommodate neighbor’s complaints.

“Unfortunately, none of us at the camps realized how the sound was carrying,” said Casey Jedynak. “By year two, we organized listening tests and lowered our levels. Looking back, the sound was definitely too loud at times … Going forward, I believe we, the Falls On Fire community, can be more curious about all of it, how loud the music is, where the speakers are directed, what hours the music is playing.”

An attorney for Teppy Mountain, Jake Honigman, said Tepper has agreed to follow most of the recommendations made by the Planning Department, including a commitment to repair any damages caused to the road within a month of the festival, a prohibition on all parking on the road, directing all amplified sounds inland toward the uninhabited portion of Tepper’s land, having at least 5,000 gallons of water onsite for fire suppression, having a sufficient number of portable toilets, and more.

“[Tepper] would explain that he loses money because he provides all of these things for the event like the portable toilets,” Honigman said. “There’s a suggested donation [for attendees], but it doesn’t remotely cover his costs and if people can’t make it, he doesn’t turn them away. This really is about him sharing and giving and bringing people … to the land to experience this festival.”

Ultimately, the commission voted 4-1 in favor of Tepper’s application, albeit with a few additional requirements such as the construction of sound dampening barriers and a 25-foot height limit on whatever effigy is burned.

 For the latest news of Hawai‘i, sign up 

Fallsonfire 16x9

<title>Hawai‘i Island 'Burning Man' festival given green light</title>

Windward Planning Commission approves application for "Falls On Fire" festival, despite trepidation from neighbors.

Hawai‘i Island 'Burning Man' festival given green light

Kelli Shiroma Braiotta Headshot

Kelli Shiroma Braiotta

Food & Dining

This new spot serves up frozen Greek yogurt.

Avenue in March. It’s open daily from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. The biz faces 

Avenue and is located close to International Market Place.

The biz offers self-serve frozen Greek yogurt with Hawaiʻi-inspired flavors. You can choose from flavors like mango, ube, original tart and Big Island Lehua honey. There are also rotating flavors like guava, lilikoʻi and lychee.

The yogurt costs $1.35 per ounce. Customers are invited to pick a bowl, choose their flavors and add toppings. Complimentary yogurt samples are available.

The toppings bar includes fruity options like strawberries, blueberries and pineapples, along with chia seeds, almonds, granola, coconut flakes and macadamia nuts.

Although this is Greek yogurt, it isn’t extremely tart and features a creamy consistency. Customers can enjoy a 10% 

Aloha Greek Yogurt yogurt bowls 051126

<title>New frozen Greek yogurt spot in Honolulu</title>

Aloha Greek Waikīkī opened recently on Kūhiō Avenue. The business offers self-serve frozen Greek yogurt with Hawaiʻi-inspired flavors like ube, mango, liliko‘i and pineapple.

New frozen Greek yogurt spot in Honolulu

Stephanie Salmons Headshot

Stephanie Salmons

Real Estate

A new affordable housing project in Makiki is set to welcome its first residents.

A crowd gathered Saturday for the grand opening of the Makiki Banyan, located at 1568 Pensacola St.

It brings 80 one-bedroom and 10 two-bedroom units to the neighborhood, available to households earning up to 80% of the area median income. While income limits depend on household sizes, 80% AMI for a one-person household is $86,240 and for a family of two is $98,560, according to 

[{"type":"text","text":"Construction began in March 2025 and was completed in 13.5 months."}]

, itself led by Paul Lam, and co-developers Geena Thielen and Evan Amakata, under the City and County of Honolulu's 

Bill 7 was adopted by the Honolulu City Council in 2019; these projects are also referred to as ROH Chapter 32 projects. According to the city's 

, ROH Chapter 32 relaxes development standards and offers financial incentives for affordable rental projects in certain zoning districts and on lots no larger than 20,000 square feet as long as 80% of the units are rented to those earning no more than 100% of Honolulu's AMI for at least 15 years.

Makiki Banyan is the fifth affordable and workforce housing project that Lam Capital has so far developed under Bill 7. According to

 a recent announcement from the developer, previous projects include developments on Ernest, Kīna‘u and Algaroba streets and University Avenue.

The company has another 750 units in the pipeline across 12 projects in various stages of development, the announcement noted.

"We acquired the first parcel four years ago and we acquired the second parcel three years ago, so it's been a four-year project. We're just absolutely thrilled," Lam told Aloha State Daily on Saturday, when asked how it felt to see the project finished. "Rental housing is what we need as a community. So many people can't afford to buy."

Lam says he would "absolutely not" be able to do this kind of development without Bill 7.

"This is the piece of legislation that ... can help to solve infill urban housing needs."

Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi told ASD Saturday that Makiki Banyan was the "execution of a concept done very, very well."

"The thing about a Bill 7 project like this is not only does it allow 90 families eventually to move in here at really good rates, it's where it's located and all the things that come with it," he says. "... The compounded value beyond the low rent is this location. [To] be able to live in an urban area with bus stops, walking distance to schools, to shopping centers, all those conveniences that just add to the quality of life. Not the least of which is they built a beautiful building where people could feel proud about living in a place that has great street appeal."

Davis Pitner, spokesperson for the city's Department of Planning and Permitting, told ASD in an email that eight Bill 7 projects have so far been completed, with certificates of occupancy issued. These projects have added 250 affordable housing units to O‘ahu's housing stock.

Meanwhile another 52 Bill 7 projects are in the pipeline, which Pitner says could create about 1,540 affordable housing units.

Currently, 31 of those projects are under review with the applicant; five are under review with the city and DPP, one project has been approved; and 15 are under construction with building permits issued, he told ASD.

For rental information or questions about leasing, contact 

Makiki banyan 051626

<title>Affordable housing development opens in Makiki</title>

Makiki Banyan is the fifth project from Lam Capital developed under the City and County of Honolulu's Bill 7 program.

Affordable housing development opens in Makiki

Higa headshot white shirt square

Sterling Higa

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Ben Sasse is bleeding from the face."}]

He’s seated across from New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, 

, and he pauses to note it. He’s dying of stage 4 pancreatic cancer. One side effect of the treatment is that his body can’t grow skin.

“Yeah, you look terrible,” says Douthat.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"“Thank you,” says Sasse with a smile."}]

Since his diagnosis, Sasse has appeared on 

 stage, and a parade of podcasts. He uses the time to say what most politicians never dare to.

He talks about faith. He quotes R.C. Sproul. He discusses Tocqueville with the ease of someone who has actually read him.

Sasse is a two-term Republican Senator from Nebraska, a Harvard graduate, a Yale PhD in History. He voted to impeach Donald Trump and took the consequences. Though popular with voters in his home state, he left the Senate to serve as President of the University of Florida.

Now he spends his last days making one argument: American political life has gone badly wrong. Not because the wrong party is winning. Because the whole enterprise has lost its bearings.

Sasse starts with something most politicians would rather ignore: the pace of technological change. Previous economic transformations — industrialization, electrification — unfolded across generations. This one won’t. Robotics and automation will wipe out whole careers within a single working life.

Sasse sees a second shift: disembodied consciousness, the way screens let people leave their world. Families are breaking apart. Communities are dissolving. The local ties — churches, civic groups, the small-scale institutions Edmund Burke called “little platoons” — that help people absorb hard times are being stripped away. The formation of souls and citizens is at risk, and government is mostly ignoring it in favor of clickbait and rage.

He thinks our loves should be ordered, first to God, then to those nearest us, rippling outward from family to neighborhood to state to nation. Caring about a national political party more than your own community isn’t just confused. It’s a disorder of affection.

What’s true of the nation is true in Hawai'i. The legislature introduces three thousand bills a year. How many of those take the large challenges seriously? The demographic shifts, the cost pressures squeezing local families, the slow hemorrhage of young people off the Islands? The floor speeches and press releases gesture toward these problems, but the lawmaking doesn’t match the problem.

Sasse’s example suggests why. He can sit for an hour-long interview on dense political and theological matters because he has a clear philosophy — a disciplined way of working through problems. It also gives him the power to persuade, which is the precondition for coordinated action.

The founders studied rhetoric and philosophy with the same care they gave the law, because republican government runs on argument and clear speech. Most of Hawai‘i’s lawmakers couldn’t sustain an interview like Sasse’s, and the laws show it. There’s no clear direction. No will to rally the public. Few signs that anyone has thought hard about what government is for. What fills the vacuum is performance: press releases, floor speeches written for social media, outrage timed to the news cycle.

Sasse has a simple framework for what a coherent politics looks like. He describes four ways of valuing government, measured in cheers. No-cheer people — hardcore libertarians — don’t understand that government exists to secure liberty. Three-cheer people believe in a state that controls everything. Republicans, he says, are the one-cheer party. Democrats are the two-cheer party. Each has an extreme wing. Hawai‘i’s loudest voices are at the extremes.

What we lack are the one-cheer leaders: those who see government as necessary but flawed, able to secure order but not to deliver salvation.

Government should do a small number of important things well. It should get out of the way of the little platoons. It should never present itself as the path to utopia. Hawai‘i’s government casting itself as humanity’s last best hope has always been faintly comic.

Sasse’s sharpest line comes when he describes what voters already sense about the way their leaders talk.

They know it’s bullshit, he says — and they don’t want to be lied to. Why can’t politics do a small number of important, long-term things?

There is something clarifying about a man making that argument while bleeding from the face. He has no election to win, no caucus to protect, and by his own reckoning, weeks or months to live. What he’s chosen to do with his time is sit down and think hard about what government is and isn’t for, and what we’ve lost by confusing the two.

In watching Ben Sasse die, Hawai‘i might learn something about how to live.

Ben Sasse Getty Images 1231346544

<title>Ben Sasse is dying in public</title>

The former U.S. senator from Nebraska is talking about big ideas everywhere he can as pancreatic cancer takes his life. Hawai‘i's politicians could learn from what he has to say about government doing fewer things well, says ASD opinion columnist Sterling Higa.

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