Plaza at Waikiki project breaks ground

Honolulu-based developer MW Group held a groundbreaking ceremony Monday for a senior rental apartment building with assisted-living health care services in Wai­kiki.

The eight-story Plaza at Wai­kiki project with space for 152 residents is at 1812 Kala­kaua Ave. across from the Hawai‘i Convention Center and adjacent to the former Hard Rock Cafe.

MW Group obtained a zoning change for the site from a community business designation that had a 60-foot height limit to a business mixed-use designation with a 150-foot height limit.

The project, which is slated to be finished late next year, will become the fifth senior rental apartment complex on Oahu for MW under its Plaza Assisted Living brand following completion of a fourth project in Pearl City slated to open late this year.

Maui Land’s stock increases to 5-year high

Maui Land & Pineapple Co.’s stock reached its highest level Monday since June 2009 as the once-downtrodden shares continued their recent surge.

The stock has jumped 47.8 percent to $9 since the start of the year and has been up for the last five trading days, including Friday when it soared 23.4 percent, or $1.72, to $8.99 on the New York Stock Exchange. Volume on Friday was 442,082 shares, more than 21 times its average daily volume of 20,770 shares.

MLP’s shares added a penny to close at $9 in Monday’s trading. The last time MLP’s shares were at that level was on June 1, 2009, when they closed at $9.30.

The Kapalua-based company has been selling assets in the wake of soured resort and family operations and sold some land in November to reduce its full-year loss to $1.2 million. That compares with a $4.6 million loss in 2012.

But there has been no recent news to explain the shares’ sudden rise, and CEO Warren Haruki and Chief Financial Officer Tim Esaki could not be reached Monday for comment.

Former AOL co-founder and Hono­lulu native Steve Case is the company’s majority shareholder at 63.5 percent.

Hawaiian Air passenger traffic falls 3.1%

Hawaiian Airlines’ passenger traffic declined 3.1 percent in March as the state’s largest carrier reduced seat capacity from the year-earlier period. The airline transported 829,584 passengers last month compared with 855,746 in March 2013. Its load factor, or percentage of seats filled, dropped 2.8 percentage points to 78.5 percent from 81.3 percent.

Revenue passenger miles, or one paying passenger transported one mile, fell 5.3 percent to 1.09 million from 1.15 million. Available seat miles, or one seat transported one mile, dropped 1.9 percent to 1.38 million from 1.41 million.

Castle Foundation awards $1.9M in grants

The Harold K.L. Castle Foundation said its board has approved grants to five organizations totaling more than $1.9 million to support initiatives to improve student education by developing a strong pool of leadership talent in Hawaii’s schools. Amounts and award recipients are:

» $762,690 to be used over three years for the New Teacher Center, which will work with the state Department of Education to establish a process for recruiting, training and supporting in-school mentors for all new teachers and for struggling veteran teachers.

» $668,832 to be used over two years to finance the Hope Street Group program to develop State Teaching Fellowships to help teachers refine their leadership skills, influence state policy and generate solutions for educational reform.

» $395,641 to be used over two years to support New Leaders Inc.’s Emerging Leaders Program and recruit up to 35 outstanding teacher-leaders.

» $40,000 for the Wai­ma­nalo Learning Center, a community program at the Wai­ma­nalo Agricultural Research Station that supports more than 1,500 youths and adults in partnership with three Windward schools as well as community organizations.

» $5,250 for the Roman Catholic Church in Hawaii to implement Common Core educational standards at three Windward Catho­lic schools as well as customize the professional development of principals, teacher-leaders and faculty.

The foundation board also approved a $50,000 grant to the Coral Reef Alliance to promote sustainable tourism and coral reef conservation in Hawaii through collaboration with hotels and condominiums on Hawaii island and Maui.

Consumer borrowing up $16.5B in February

WASHINGTON » U.S. consumers increased their borrowing in February on autos and student loans by the largest amount in a year. But for a second straight month, they cut back on their credit card use. Consumer borrowing climbed $16.5 billion in February, up from a $13.5 billion gain in January, the Federal Reserve reported Monday.

The category that includes credit cards fell $2.4 billion after a $241 million drop in January. But this decline was offset by an $18.9 billion increase in borrowing in the category that covers autos and student loans.

Hawaiian ranks No. 3

Hawaiian Airlines ranked third among the nation’s top 15 carriers in a study that looked at on-time performance, customer complaints and lost bag rates, among other factors. The Airline Quality Rating report found that airline performance improved in 2013 compared with 2012. Virgin America and JetBlue were the top two airlines.

ON THE MOVE

Island Air appointed Edward M. Davidson as chief operating officer. Davidson, who replaces interim COO Tim Rainey, has more than 35 years of experience in air transport flight operations, flight safety and line flying. Davidson previously was vice president of flight operations at Toronto-based regional carrier Porter Airlines. Inc. where he had a background in the NextGen Q400 aircraft, which Island Air is phasing in later this year.

Anthology Marketing Group has announced two appointments: 

» Alex Cheng is an experienced designer. He has 15 years of art and graphic design experience with firms in Cali­for­nia, New York City and Hono­lulu.

» Aven King is an assistant account executive. King’s experience has focused on communication and marketing, including serving as a senior sales associate and divemaster for Sea­sport Divers on Kauai.

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