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We finally hit it: More than 10 million tourists enjoyed Hawaii last year, the latest record in a nearly decade-long string of records. The 10,424,995 visitors were a 5%-plus increase over 2018, say preliminary stats from the Hawaii Tourism Authority. It’s hard to ignore the economic good: Those tourists spent
$17.8 billion statewide, generated nearly $2.1 billion in state tax revenue and support 216,000 jobs.
But there’s the bad, too: growing pressures on the environment and on infrastructure such as roads. Those have led to more investment in sustainable tourism, plus an Oahu crackdown on illegal vacation rentals. It’ll be interesting to see this year’s total.
A real race to be prosecutor
In the past 38 years, Honolulu has had only three prosecutors chosen by voters: Charles Marsland, Peter Carlisle and Keith Kaneshiro. So it was unusual — and refreshing — to see five candidates for city prosecutor making their pitches at a public forum Tuesday night. The candidates — Megan Kau, RJ Brown, Tae Kim, Jacquelyn Esser and Steve Alm — all pledged to restore trust and accountability to the office, sorely tested under Kaneshiro, now a target of a federal investigation and on paid leave. Kaneshiro is not seeking re-election, but voters should still choose wisely. There are no term limits for prosecutor — yet.