Question: What is the date of this year’s primary election? I understand that it has been changed compared with other elections. Also, what is the date of the general election?
Answer: This is a good heads-up for Hawaii voters used to voting in a primary election in September.
Beginning this year, the primary election will be held the second Saturday in August in every even-numbered year. This year that means Aug. 11.
Previously, the Hawaii primary was held the second to last Saturday in September in every even-numbered year.
The date was moved up to comply with the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act, signed into law by President Obama in 2009, which says ballots must be mailed to overseas voters at least 45 days before an election.
The September primary election date did not provide enough time between elections to comply with the new law.
General Election Day this year is Tuesday, Nov. 6.
Question: What is happening with reapportionment? Also, what is the deadline for candidates to file for running for election?
Answer: A new reapportionment plan for state legislative districts is expected to be filed late this month, possibly Feb. 23.
Candidates for congressional and county seats could begin filing nomination papers Feb. 1, but those wanting to run for seats in either the state Senate or state House are in limbo until the 2011 state Reapportionment Commission realigns district boundaries to meet constitutional standards.
The deadline for candidates to file nomination papers is 4:30 p.m. June 5.
In response to two lawsuits challenging the state legislative boundaries, the Hawaii Supreme Court last month ruled that the boundaries proposed by the commission were “constitutionally invalid” because nonpermanent residents, such as members of the military and out-of-state students, were included in the calculations.
In redrawing the legislative district boundaries, the commission also has to establish precincts and polling places and assign more than 600,000 registered voters to the new precincts. (See is.gd/JtQ24B.)
As prescribed by law, the Reapportionment Commission last year also worked on the congressional district boundaries to account for population shifts.
However, the congressional reapportionment was not challenged. The criteria for setting congressional districts does not include counting only permanent residents as the population base, an election official explained.
For more information about election deadlines and updates, go to the Office of Elections website, hawaii.gov/elections.
Mahalo and Auwe
To a young woman, school staff and others who helped after I fell and turned my ankle on Jan. 21 while taking my regular walk down Prospect Street next to Stevenson Middle School. As I lay with my eyes closed, the young woman, Kawehi, who had been in the playground, asked, “Are you OK?” Kawehi and a kind gentleman parked in his pickup truck got me up, but it was obvious I wasn’t walking anywhere. Kawehi’s dad appeared with an electric cart and I was driven to the school, where school nurse Laurie cleaned and bandaged me. At the administration office, Iris called me a cab, then drove me out to meet it. The cabdriver patiently waited outside while I hobbled up to my apartment to get money. How lucky I was to be near such wonderful people. But “auwe” for the condition of the asphalt that pretends to be a sidewalk on Prospect and upper Liliha streets, where I also walk.
— Ann Beeson
———
Write to “Kokua Line” at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.
