Tom Yamachika
Latest from Tom Yamachika

Community Voices: Classroom heat
The Department of Education spent $100 million on classroom air conditioners. Now the Hawai‘i State Auditor finds that the DOE has no idea where the money went.
Tom YamachikaAugust 25, 2025

Community Voices: No tax on overtime
Here's what the "no tax on overtime" provisions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will mean for your pocketbook.
Tom YamachikaAugust 18, 2025

Community Voices: Encumbrance for the stadium
Under the State of Hawai‘i's constitution and accounting rules, the $350 million budgeted for a new stadium has lapsed, and yet authorities are proceeding as if it hadn't.
Tom YamachikaAugust 11, 2025

Community Voices: Constitutional expenditure controls
Over the past 50 years, the Hawai‘i state Legislature has steadily whittled away at constitutional controls over its spending.
Tom YamachikaAugust 04, 2025

Community Voices: Pay for no work
In Hawai‘i's broken civil service system, hundreds of state workers are getting paid to do nothing while investigations into their job performance linger.
Tom YamachikaJuly 28, 2025

Community Voices: Nonprofit Blankety Blank bill
In a rush to help nonprofits that are losing federal funding, the Hawai‘i state Legislature pulled together Senate Bill 933, now Act 310 of 2025, putting $50 million in the hands of a four-person committee that will meet in secret. And the Legislature could not have known what it was voting for — this was yet another Blankety Blank bill devoid of financial details.
Tom YamachikaJuly 21, 2025

Community Voices: SNAP cliffs are coming
The federal government will have fully funded the cost of food for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program through 2027. But now that the federal One Big Beautiful Bill Act is law, that is going to change — potentially putting Hawaiʻi at least $36 million in the hole.
Tom YamachikaJuly 15, 2025

Community Voices: Ending 'the turf war' around building schools
Until HB422 gets passed into law, the Hawai'i Department of Education has been urging lawmakers to spend general fund money on building new local schools.
Tom YamachikaJuly 07, 2025

Community Voices: Twenty years of nickels
You buy your bottled beverage. You pay your five cent deposit. What happens next is a mess, and has been for decades.
Tom YamachikaJune 30, 2025

Community Voices: That Dam Special Fund
With the help of the Hawai‘i state legislature, the state Department of Land and Natural Resources turned an appropriation into a seemingly permanent special fund. It may be for a good cause, but it's not how special funds are supposed to work under the state constitution.
Tom YamachikaJune 23, 2025

Community Voices: Intent to Veto
Among the 19 bills on Gov. Josh Green's veto list are two concerning taxation. Did you know that Hawai‘i still offers certain tax credits for sugar cane — and that in 2025, there are still people interested in them? A bill to eliminate such credits is among the possible vetos.
Tom YamachikaJune 16, 2025

Community Voices: The Unseen Stopper Committees
The recently concluded Legislative session highlighted an undemocratic trend at the Legislature — finance committees gaining power over legislation of all kinds, whether there's a financial impact or not.
Tom YamachikaJune 09, 2025

Community Voices: Light at the End
While previous laws put a 15-year statute of limitations on uncollected tax debt, the state Department of Taxation had been finding legal workarounds to chase the money past that point. Act 68, recently signed into law by Gov. Josh Green, requires the state Department of Taxation to release tax debt that it hasn't been able to collect.
Tom YamachikaJune 02, 2025

Community Voices: Legislators ignore rules for special funds
The state Office of the Auditor analyzed 86 proposed special and revolving funds proposed by the Legislature in this past session. Not a single one of them met the legal criteria for establishing such funds.
Tom YamachikaMay 26, 2025

Community Voices: 2025 Legislative Also-Rans
This week, we will be looking at a few bills that passed both houses of the legislature, but did not make it through conference. Those bills may come back to haunt us next year, including capital gains taxes, "green fees" on Hawai‘i visitors and more.
Tom YamachikaMay 19, 2025

Community Voices: The major raid that wasn’t
The state Legislature came close to raiding nearly $320 million from 97 different special funds this session.
Tom YamachikaMay 05, 2025

Community Voices: Small victory
This session, the Legislature eliminated a procedural trap that kept taxpayers from being to appeal to the Tax Appeal Court. Here's what that issue was all about.
Tom YamachikaApril 28, 2025

Community Voices: Fearing federal cuts, state looks to axe tax credits
Renters, landlords, business owners and more should watch out for House Bill 1369, which the Tax Foundation of Hawai‘i has dubbed the "Category Killer," for the categories of tax exemptions and credits it seeks to eliminate.
Tom YamachikaApril 21, 2025

Community Voices: Supporting Government’s Central Services
Hawai‘i's state Department of Transportation pays the most among all departments in internal fees back to state government for its shared expenses. Here's why it may be stuck with that arrangement.
Tom YamachikaApril 13, 2025

Community Voices: Taxing Capital Gains
The Hawai‘i state Legislature wants to change taxes on capital gains by some as yet unstated amount by taxing, for example, the money you gain selling your house at rates comparable to state income taxes. For individuals, this could amount to as much as a 52% increase to the rate someone would pay on capital gains.
Tom YamachikaApril 07, 2025

Community Voices: You Want to Raise the TAT by HOW Much?
Two bills would raise the Transient Accommodations Tax, but won't openly state the new rate, in a process leaving little time for public input.
Tom YamachikaMarch 31, 2025

Community Voices: The new tax cuts website
The Hawaii State Tax Watch Doggie has gone online to check it out and has a few quibbles.
Tom YamachikaMarch 24, 2025

Community Voices: Universal vax for Hawai‘i
A new bill would tax health plans so that the state can buy bulk vaccines for people not otherwise entitled to receive free vaccines. It also immunizes the state itself — against lawsuits.
Tom YamachikaMarch 17, 2025

Community Voices: Taxpayers need a break from old liens
Why the Tax Foundation of Hawai‘i drafted a bill to stop the state Department of Taxation from leaving liens on taxpayers on the books past their 15-year statute of limitations.
Tom YamachikaMarch 10, 2025

Community Voices: A Stealthy Tax Hike
Employers could be hit with a 42% increase in what they pay in state unemployment insurance taxes under a bill being considered by the Legislature.
Tom YamachikaMarch 03, 2025

Community Viewpoint: This Hawai‘i tax break could be a tax hike
Any increase to the GET, such as the one proposed, falls hardest on people with the least income.
Tom YamachikaFebruary 22, 2025