Caldwell not hiding his desire for more revenue

Somewhere in a Honolulu park there is a swimming pool pump rusting away, awaiting parts that aren’t coming because the city doesn’t have the money.

Almost everywhere there is a road that still needs paving, a new city program awaiting implementation, a park bathroom unusable because it hasn’t been cleaned.

Because the city does real stuff — pick up the garbage, chase the crooks and make sure buildings have stairs built according to code — the city’s interest in the state budget is reality-based.

So when Mayor Kirk Caldwell comes to the state Capitol today, he is watching for a bill to give him more money.

That bill, House Bill 1671, would increase the city’s share of the spoils from the state’s hotel room tax.

The share was capped to pay off the state’s deficit back in 2009. Instead of a percentage, the counties got a total of $93 million a year. Now times are better; the state isn’t in a financial crisis and the counties need the love.

In an interview Thursday, Caldwell said the city is chasing a $46 million shortfall and he wants more of the transient accommodations tax (TAT) money.

"The money should be shared. We are on the front line. TAT is an appropriate tax; I’m not looking for a different one," Caldwell said.

Caldwell has not been hiding his desire for more city money. Previously he has asked that the hotel tax be raised; he is thinking about raising hotel property taxes, he wants to tax garbage pickup and charge more for city services.

Getting the counties more money is on the mind of all four Hawaii mayors.

On Maui the situation is black and white.

Mayor Alan Arakawa wants to raise property taxes, water rates and residential trash collection fees. The money would go for those new county worker pay raises and the daily business of running the county’s roads, water systems and parks.

Arakawa, however, told reporters earlier this week that the property tax rate hikes could go away if the state gives the counties back the hotel tax money.

But if more money goes to the counties, less money goes to the state — and as state Budget Director Kalbert Young noted in testimony, the bill would have a "negative impact on general fund revenues and the sustainability of general-funded programs throughout the state."

Caldwell is mostly an optimist in all the budget wrangling because he wrote his budget without the state hotel tax law change.

Besides taxes, Caldwell is looking at other way to grow the Honolulu pie, and that includes his own ideas of the somewhat controversial Hawaii Community Development Authority.

He thinks the state’s power to control growth in Kakaako should slowly be returned to the county, but meanwhile, he has to admit that all those new shiny and expensive condo towers will do wonders for his own property tax base.

"With the increase in value, we are going to see a benefit," Caldwell said.

Caldwell likes the Kakaako building boom — and if critics see narrow sidewalks and huge buildings looming over the property lines, Caldwell sees a lot of potential for growth.

"I don’t want to stop what is occurring. At the end of the day, we are the beneficiaries of what is going on over there," the mayor said.

Also at the end of the day, Caldwell knows without money from hotel rooms or money from new condos, that rusting pool pump will never get fixed.

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.