Kauai’s newspaper, The Garden Island, has posted a story “Legal funds approved for Ohana Kauai battle.” The appeal, summarized in the story, was argued in February 2007, and is awaiting a decision from the Supreme Court of Hawaii.
Ohana Kauai, a citizens group, helped put thetax relief measure on the November 2004 General Election ballot becauseit felt property tax reform was needed in light of skyrocketingassessments and huge county budgets.
The measure passed with 75 percent of the voters in support of it.
Asubsequent charter amendment proposed lowering homeowner property taxesto 1998 levels and limiting yearly increases to 2 percent.
Butthe county challenged the measure’s validity, questioning whether theamendment should be able to override the county’s state-approved taxingauthority.
Attorneys for Ohana Kauai said citizens also have that right, by law.
In order to prevent the amendment from taking effect, the county attorney filed a lawsuit against the council.
Fifth Circuit Judge George Masuoka later sided with the county’s arguments, which Ohana Kauai appealed to the high court.
Robert Thomas, an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, based in Sacramento, Calif., represents Ohana Kauai.[*]
Prior to yesterday’s action, the council had approved more than $100,000[**] for outside counsel representation on the court case.
The approved funds will be used to continue pay for the services of Honolulu law firm Goodsill Anderson Quinn & Stifel.
Councilwoman JoAnn Yukimura said the approval of the funds was justified.
“Thelawsuit was set up to get a court determination on the ballot issue,”she said. “And (the council) is sworn to uphold the law. So in order toknow what the law is, whether the law is a valid law or not, we have togo to the courts.”
The legal issues in the appeal, summarized in these posts, deal with whether government officials can sue each other to strike down in court laws which they do not want to implement, and whether the Hawaii Constitution delegates the power to tax real property to the counties to “exercise how they see fit.”
Full story here.
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[*] I represent four individual Kauai property taxpayers (who are members of Ohana Kauai), but I don’t represent the organization itself.
[**] In fact, more than $230,000 of public money was previously budgeted.