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Keep Hawaii Hawii

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My brother lived in Maui for 3yrs before moving back to Mainland. Pay definitely has not kept up w/ the cost of living. Especially if you work in the hotel and resort industry. You often hear the same issues discussed by locals at countries whose focus is largely tourism.
 

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There is a small percentage of the population here that have Hawaiian blood or say they are Hawaiian and they are making a lot of noise. During the last year, the people protesting or the protectors of the Mauna on the big island gained a lot of attention. The governor and mayor of the big island handled the protest wrong and suddenly Hawaiian people all over the state started having rallies, flying the Hawaiian flag everywhere and driving around with their flag on the back of their trucks. They held rallies all over the island and started more protest about building a park in Waimanalo. Now, they are protesting windmills and making up reasons why windmill alternative energy is bad. Most of these people don’t work and live off the government or the people they are complaining about. This is a very small part of the population that is getting a lot of attention, but the bad news is that a lot of locals are being wrongfully influenced. Please forget about any negativity you might see and enjoy your vacation. These people are not worth your time.
 

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One other thing, the bill to keep Hawaii, Hawaii was presented last year and did not pass. It is just noise.
 

pedro47

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How much does the state of Hawaii depends on the tourism economy?
That is the big question IMO.
 

Tamaradarann

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When they implemented the TAT, I wrote to the then governer and explained to them that besides the name, Hawaii has fallen way behind most other exotic travel places. In general, they have 50-60 year old hotels, super high priced food, few full service resorts, none that offer "all inclusive" that the Carribean, Mexico, and a large number of other travel destinations have and have had for 20 years. In addition, it is a massively long flight, through many time zones for a large number of their guests. (Japan, East coast US, etc. ) I received nothing back for my efforts to show them the short term thinking of TAT that they eventually adopted.
Don't get me wrong, I love Hawaii, but if I don't feel wanted there, it isn't MY "Spirit of Aloha" that is missing, it would be theirs. I already find that the $50 for two drinks for two at lunch is somewhat ludicrous, without food. It doesn't take a mathematitian to figure out the total cost of a vacation. There are far more travel locations now that have a much better value per dollar than there were 50 years ago. Ask Florida where their tourism industry would be without Disney. I don't see many people flocking to Miami for vacation like they did in the 60's. Hawaii still depends on "It's Hawaii" to bring tourism back. That will not last forever.
Japan is a long flight, and HGVC now has many closer locations the Japanese can visit without that long flight and high meal costs in Hawaii, let alone the cultural differences (tips, language, etc. )
Repeat visitors is the long term life blood of any tourist destination. Owners of timeshares in Hawaii make owners there want to return, but apparently, in Hawaii, they are discouraged, overtaxed, and their growth are stunted, especially on Maui.
If it wasn't for"it's Hawaii", there isn't much for their tourist board to draw vacationer to. They have nothing else to compete with, and they are trying to compete with 50 year old hotel products, high prices, and very long flights into a market that is new, current, resort focussed (not "resort fee" focussed), lots of new things to do, the people can afford, and are also excited to go to.

If you want to keep Hawaii "Hawaii" with no tourism, get used to eating pineapples because there is no other industry. Oh, wait. There are no more pineapple plantations there....

I understand your frustration of the high prices in Hawaii if you stay, eat, and drink at the resorts or touristy restaurants. However, we can actually stay in Honolulu in our timeshare less expensively than living at home on Long Island. We don't get a car and the bus for seniors is $1. We have 3 cars at home to fuel, maintain, insure, and buy. Of course in our timeshare we don't pay for heating, hot/cold water, electric, cable, soap, shampoo, conditioner, lotion, dish detergent, paper towels, toilet paper, clothes detergent, pest control, security system monitoring; all of which we must pay for at home. We stay at the Hilton Hawaiian Village for months, however, we rarely if ever eat and drink there. I don't mean going to other places in Waikiki which are usually as expensive or more. First of all we usually eat breakfast and lunch in our timeshare unit with food that we get from either Target, Walmart or Sam's which have the same prices at home. We eat many other dinners in the room although we do go out to eat at least 4 or 5 times a week. When we do go out to eat we have salad and drinks in the timeshare. If we do go our to eat and drink an example of the places we go to is Gordon Biersch in Aloha Tower for happy hour. Two years ago they had 21 oz craft beer for $3 on Tuesday. Now it is more; $5.50 all the time. There are all kinds of specials every week like $15 off 2 entrees, or buy one get one free. Another bargain for Sam's members is there food court where you usually get dinner for about $5. If you get involved in the larger Honolulu area it is a great place and not too expensive.
 

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It is sad. I used to love going but to me, things have changed. Of course because of my heritage, I am respectful. But I don't look or sound Hawaiian so I don't pass as easily as others. I think that there's a lot of exclusivity issues in many cultures today, Hawaii is no different. I think that the aloha spirit is still there but the bad apples are a lot more vocal today. My bad run in was at a Heiau on the BI. I was with friends, explaining what it was, why it was there etc and a local guy came up and started yelling at us to leave. He honestly acted like it was *his* heiau. I've been all over the world and visited culturally sensitive places. I've never been yelled at before. Plus I am Hawaiian too, at least in bloodline (not culturally as I was born and raised in CA) and I knew that I had as much right to be there as he did. He wouldn't back off though even though we decided to leave - we walked back to the car and he followed us and kept ranting. It was ridiculous. Finally I asked him if he knew my uncle - an elder on the island - and that shut him up. I really didn't want to have to do that but I was annoyed at being followed. At the end I smoothed things over with the guy who was frustrated at insensitive tourists and I didn't tell my uncle for three years (lol) because I didn't go to Hawaii to cause problems for anyone but I started looking at things differently after that. I've noticed a lot more aggressive driving by locals (big lifted trucks), and in Sept I saw lots of upside down Hawaiian flags being flown (Mauna Kea issue). I don't want to be immersed in another controversy while I am on vacation, so we're taking a break for awhile.
I get that tourism is taking a toll in many ways so I am sympathetic but I don't know what we can do to fix it for them.

We have never had a local confront us about being a tourist and not belonging. We have heard about that type of confrontation in some of the other areas in the Hawaiian Islands. We were in Maui about 10 years ago and drove to one of the surf spots that was frequented only by locals. We did get some unusual stares that gave a message "what are you doing here". Since we mostly stay in Honolulu so it doesn't concern us. If we were going to hang out or live in some of the rural areas on any of the islands it would be a concern. Some of the local are very mad. The issue is real but we are moving forward in what we feel comfortable doing in Hawaii.
 

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How much does the state of Hawaii depends on the tourism economy?
That is the big question IMO.

The Military and Tourism are the 2 biggest industries in the economy in Hawaii. They are trying to build up their agriculture but the expensive labor situation makes it difficult. I have suggested to some local farmers and agriculture advocates that there are a whole lot of people on the southern boarder of the continental United States that would love to provide some inexpensive labor just as the sugar and Pineapple plantations of yesteryear brought the Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Filipino farm workers to Hawaii.
 

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How much does the state of Hawaii depends on the tourism economy?
That is the big question IMO.

Tourism and the military is everything driving the economy. But it is not the locals that decided to raise TAT or the cost to tourist. The politicians are looking for ways to collect more money with every possible mean. That is happening everywhere. TAT in Seattle, San Francisco, New York and many other places is equal to or higher than Hawaii. I just came back from Tallahassee and rented a car for one week that cost $180. But the local tax was $90. That is a 50 percent tax that people pay because they don’t have a choice. That city gets a lot of travelers on a business trip that have to deal with the governor or someone at the capitol. They raise the tax because people will pay it. I normally fly into Orlando or Atlanta and rent a car to save money. Flights are $650 RT to other cities and cost $1000 to Tallahassee. But this last trip was to short and I just decided to pay the extra expense. That is what most people do. At some point, tourism in Hawaii will slow down and they will decrease the tax or find incentives
 

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How far back in time should one go to determine original inhabitants. The Polynesians should all leave and give Hawaii back to the birds and seals.
 

Tamaradarann

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Tourism and the military is everything driving the economy. But it is not the locals that decided to raise TAT or the cost to tourist. The politicians are looking for ways to collect more money with every possible mean. That is happening everywhere. TAT in Seattle, San Francisco, New York and many other places is equal to or higher than Hawaii. I just came back from Tallahassee and rented a car for one week that cost $180. But the local tax was $90. That is a 50 percent tax that people pay because they don’t have a choice. That city gets a lot of travelers on a business trip that have to deal with the governor or someone at the capitol. They raise the tax because people will pay it. I normally fly into Orlando or Atlanta and rent a car to save money. Flights are $650 RT to other cities and cost $1000 to Tallahassee. But this last trip was to short and I just decided to pay the extra expense. That is what most people do. At some point, tourism in Hawaii will slow down and they will decrease the tax or find incentives

I agree it is not the "locals" if you mean specifically the Native Hawaiians as your definition of the "locals". However, while you are correct is it the politicians(who are local people) that are looking for ways to collect more money with every means possible, implementing a TAT or other tax that is paid for by transients doesn't effect the "local people" negatively by raising their taxes. Furthering that thought the property taxes in Hawaii, which are mostly paid by "local people", is extremely low compared to Long Island where we live. About 1/10 the amount for the value of the property.

Now I will give you a contrary thought which is one of my pet peeves about Hawaii taxes which I don't understand the logic. The sales tax which in Hawaii is called a GET, General Excise Tax" is between 4-5% is low relative to where we live where it approaches 9%. However, the GET is on everything including all the food bought in supermarkets. In NY supermarket food is not taxed. "Local people", as well as lower income people" buy a lot more supermarket food than transients and the wealthy, therefore, taxing supermarket food is regressive tax which negatively effects the "local people" and the low income people. No clue why that is, they could eliminate the tax of supermarket food and raise the sales tax on everything else a small amount to collect the same amount of money.

As far a the TAT in the cities you mention. I don't know about Seattle and San Francisco, however, we were just in New York in August and September staying at a NY Hilton Timeshare and we didn't pay anything when we checked out.
 

Sandy VDH

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Any in Hawaii the TAT is to "occupy" something that you already paid property tax on. They did it because they know that the majority of owners and users of those timeshares are not voters. But it essentially a double tax. Because they can.

The entire history of civilizations is occupy and rule, been happening for tens of thousands of years now. Having it be the "Hawaiian's Hawaii", then what came before them that they displaced. You can't go back in time to just the point of history you want and claim that is the perfect time to move back to and restore.

History is littered with civilization that were taken over and defeated. Take your pick, what is the correct one to try to revert to....there is NO correct answer.
http://www.localhistories.org/world.html
 
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JIMinNC

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The entire history of civilizations is occupy and rule, been happening for tens of thousands of years now. Having it be the "Hawaiian's Hawaii", then what came before them that they displaced. You can't go back in time to just the point of history you want and claim that is the perfect time to move back to and restore.

History is littered with civilization that were taken over and defeated. Take your pick, what is the correct one to try to revert to....there is NO correct answer.
http://www.localhistories.org/world.html

The Hawaiians would argue that their history is much simpler than other ancient civilizations in Europe, North America, and Asia, so it is easier to trace to where they began to lose their native culture.

Most historians believe the first Polynesian settlers arrived sometime in the 500AD to 1000AD range. Those are believed to be the first human occupants of the islands, and are the original Hawaiians. They would be the civilization that ruled the islands for as much as 1000 years, before the Europeans arrived in the 1700s. Even then, the Hawaiian people still ruled their land, and in fact, the weapons that Kamehameha I acquired from the Europeans allowed him to unify the islands and create the Kingdom of Hawaii.

The changes started happening when the American missionaries came to the islands in the 1800s, followed by American sugar plantations. They banned many Hawaiian traditions (like hula) on religious grounds, and the plantation owners forced a new constitution that disenfranchised the rights of many native Hawaiians to the benefit of the Americans. This ultimately led to Hawaii being a US territory and then a state.

While it is correct that occupy and rule has been part of history as long as there have been civilizations, there is often anger and resentment in the occupied cultures that never goes away. Many of todays problems in the Middle East have their roots in sectarian/cultural/religious conflicts that have been festering for hundreds or thousands of years and were exacerbated by the European occupation and subdivision of the Middle East. Fortunately, the resentment in Hawaii hasn't reached those levels.
 
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tompalm

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I agree it is not the "locals" if you mean specifically the Native Hawaiians as your definition of the "locals". However, while you are correct is it the politicians(who are local people) that are looking for ways to collect more money with every means possible, implementing a TAT or other tax that is paid for by transients doesn't effect the "local people" negatively by raising their taxes. Furthering that thought the property taxes in Hawaii, which are mostly paid by "local people", is extremely low compared to Long Island where we live. About 1/10 the amount for the value of the property.

Now I will give you a contrary thought which is one of my pet peeves about Hawaii taxes which I don't understand the logic. The sales tax which in Hawaii is called a GET, General Excise Tax" is between 4-5% is low relative to where we live where it approaches 9%. However, the GET is on everything including all the food bought in supermarkets. In NY supermarket food is not taxed. "Local people", as well as lower income people" buy a lot more supermarket food than transients and the wealthy, therefore, taxing supermarket food is regressive tax which negatively effects the "local people" and the low income people. No clue why that is, they could eliminate the tax of supermarket food and raise the sales tax on everything else a small amount to collect the same amount of money.

As far a the TAT in the cities you mention. I don't know about Seattle and San Francisco, however, we were just in New York in August and September staying at a NY Hilton Timeshare and we didn't pay anything when we checked out.

There is no tax to pay when you stay in a timeshare. You already paid property tax on the property that you own. I have stayed in the Hilton Timeshares in Waikiki many times and never paid tax. The hotels all charge GET and TAT that is pretty close to New York City. Below is the current tax for New York.

NYC hotel taxes are 14.75% plus $3.50 per room per night.

I think the city tries to make living in Hawaii affordable by keeping property tax low. Living here requires people to accept a lower standard of living for housing. The cost has always been high, but a lower property tax helps people that own homes and it keeps rent a little lower too.
 

tompalm

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Some other city tax comparison.

Within the City of Seattle, the tax rate for hotel and motel facilities with 60 or more units is 15.6%.

Hotel fees in San Francisco include 14 percent occupancy tax, 0.195 percent California Tourism fee, and an 1.5 - 2.25 percent Tourism Improvement District assessment dependent upon the location of the hotel property.

Chicago hotel guests pay a combined 17.4 percent tax on their rooms
 

Tamaradarann

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There is no tax to pay when you stay in a timeshare. You already paid property tax on the property that you own. I have stayed in the Hilton Timeshares in Waikiki many times and never paid tax. The hotels all charge GET and TAT that is pretty close to New York City. Below is the current tax for New York.

NYC hotel taxes are 14.75% plus $3.50 per room per night.

I think the city tries to make living in Hawaii affordable by keeping property tax low. Living here requires people to accept a lower standard of living for housing. The cost has always been high, but a lower property tax helps people that own homes and it keeps rent a little lower too.

I don't know if we are talking about the same things here. I am talking timeshare stays. When you check out of Hilton Timeshares in Waikiki your credit card is not charged for an Occupancy Tax for each night depending on the size of the accommodation? I have stayed over 1000 nights there and always pay that tax!!

I have no clue what the NYC hotel tax is, I have never stayed there in a Hotel, but as I said when we checked out of the NY Hilton Timeshare earlier this month and we paid NO tax!!

As far as Hawaii keeping the property tax low I have some thoughts: I agree that keeping the property tax low helps people that own homes. This is good to allow low income people to continue to stay in their houses. (That is one of the reasons I am dismayed by the regressive GET on supermarket food!). However, the low property taxes for low income people could be accomplished by a low income property tax exception which is what NYS has implemented.

In addition, the low property taxes also helps people that don't live in Hawaii pay low property taxes on second homes of very expensive real estate. It keeps real estate prices high since when you buy million dollar houses or condo the property taxes are only about $3000/year. We pay $8,000/year on a house that is worth about $300,000 on Long Island. With that level of assessment the property taxes on a million dollar house in Hawaii would be about $25,000/year. If absentee owners in Hawaii had to pay that level of tax on million dollar real estate the demand and investment property prices would probably not be that high or if it was Hawaii would be getting some nice revenue for those expensive properties to solve some of their revenue problems.

What do you mean by a "lower standard of living for housing" in Hawaii. Except for the quality of the public schools, which I will discuss in more detail below, we feel that the standard of living in Waikiki is higher than where we live on Long Island!

The quality of public schools in Hawaii is not good. The public schools in Hawaii are underfunded and teachers are underpaid particularly with the high cost of living. The teachers on Long Island make about twice what the teachers make in Hawaii, however, the schools are funded with property taxes. Since the quality of public schools in Hawaii is not good, people with significant income send their kids to Private Schools. That continues to have negative effects on public schools. The kids from lower income families don't have the opportunity to mix and socialize with the kids from upper income families and the upper income families don't have a vestige interest in the quality of the public schools since their children aren't and won't be going to those schools. Therefore, the absentee owners who don't have kids in any schools in Hawaii and the people with higher incomes who live in Hawaii want to keep the property taxes low and have little to no interest in providing better funding to upgrade public schools from property taxes!!
 

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There is no tax to pay when you stay in a timeshare.

UPDATED:

In Hawaii there has been a tax on timeshare stays since 1998. It is derived by taking the maintenance fees of the unit, dividing that number by 2, then dividing by the number of days associated with your maintenance fee (usually 7) . That result is then multiplied by the tax rate.

The tax rate enacted in 1998 was 7.25%. In 2014 the tax rate was 9.25% and it is currently 10.25% as of January 2018.

I can confirm to the penny that is exactly how the TAT charged to me for our use of a 2-bedroom lockoff at The Westin Ka'anapali Ocean Resort Villas North was charged for our 7-day stay in September 2019.

http://files.hawaii.gov/tax/legal/brochures/tat_brochure.pdf
 
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Tamaradarann

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In Hawaii there has been a tax on timeshare stays since 1998. It is derived by taking the maintenance fees of the unit, dividing that number by 2, then dividing by the number of days you stay. That result is then multiplied by the tax rate.

The tax rate enacted in 1998 was 7.25%. In 2014 the tax rate was 9.25% and it is currently 10.25% as of July 2019.

I have paid the tax since 2007 and I never knew how it was calculated but I knew it varied on unit size. However, I don't know if that formula could be used to calculate the TAT for the length of our stay which is about 100 nights in a Studio. If the maintenance in a Studio is $1000 divided by 2 is $500. That divided by say 100 is $5. That multiplied by 10.25% is only about $.50. I know I pay about $4.00 now.
 

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I just paid $8.68 a night TAT for a one bedroom timeshare in Hawaii. I wonder how Tom gets away with not paying it?

103380860657c9b7860ec2ae834a769f.jpg



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro
 

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controller1

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UPDATED:

In Hawaii there has been a tax on timeshare stays since 1998. It is derived by taking the maintenance fees of the unit, dividing that number by 2, then dividing by the number of days associated with your maintenance fee (usually 7) . That result is then multiplied by the tax rate.

The tax rate enacted in 1998 was 7.25%. In 2014 the tax rate was 9.25% and it is currently 10.25% as of January 2018.

I can confirm to the penny that is exactly how the TAT charged to me for our use of a 2-bedroom lockoff at The Westin Ka'anapali Ocean Resort Villas North was charged for our 7-day stay in September 2019.

http://files.hawaii.gov/tax/legal/brochures/tat_brochure.pdf

See UPDATED post and calculation above
 

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I use all my points to stay in Las Vegas, Orlando and San Diego and stay in Waikiki when rooms are available at last minute or the 30 day open season window. I just called the Lagoon front desk and asked about TAT on Timeshares and was told open season reservations do not have to pay. I guess it might have been included when I paid for the room and that was such a great deal at $80- $120 per night that I didn’t pay attention to the total cost because it was so cheap. I need to go back and look to see what it was, but it has been several years since I stayed. In 2009, I went down with friends and booked three rooms one month and went back a couple other times that year. Things were very slow during the last recession. I think open season cost more these days and I have not seen it available in a long time.

She did say the TAT was $5-$30 depending on the size of the room, or studios are $5, one bedroom less than $10, etc... Sorry for any confusion that I caused with this. I have yet to be charged in other places I stay. I hope this TAT thing doesn’t catch on in other areas.

I don’t agree with how the local politicians treat tourist. I think it will have a negative impact someday. I know the price to play golf cost twice as much in Hawaii when you are from out of state and I don’t like that either. Not much I can do about it.
 

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See UPDATED post and calculation above

Thank you Controller for sending the information about how the TAT is calculated. After reading it I think my calculation might be done accurately this way. The maintenance for the entire 2 BR lockout of which my Studio is a small portion might be $2000. Therefore the Studio maintenance would be about $560. Divided by 2 is $280. Divided by 7 days is $40. Multiplied by the 10.25% rate would be about $4. That makes total sense.
 

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I use all my points to stay in Las Vegas, Orlando and San Diego and stay in Waikiki when rooms are available at last minute or the 30 day open season window. I just called the Lagoon front desk and asked about TAT on Timeshares and was told open season reservations do not have to pay. I guess it might have been included when I paid for the room and that was such a great deal at $80- $120 per night that I didn’t pay attention to the total cost because it was so cheap. I need to go back and look to see what it was, but it has been several years since I stayed. In 2009, I went down with friends and booked three rooms one month and went back a couple other times that year. Things were very slow during the last recession. I think open season cost more these days and I have not seen it available in a long time.

She did say the TAT was $5-$30 depending on the size of the room, or studios are $5, one bedroom less than $10, etc... Sorry for any confusion that I caused with this. I have yet to be charged in other places I stay. I hope this TAT thing doesn’t catch on in other areas.

I don’t agree with how the local politicians treat tourist. I think it will have a negative impact someday. I know the price to play golf cost twice as much in Hawaii when you are from out of state and I don’t like that either. Not much I can do about it.

Since I have been a tourist for the last 12 years I have to agree somewhat that the local politicians do treat the tourists as the golden goose. While the Hotel tax and sales tax(GET) are in line or lower than other cities, the TAT is an additional tax that other cities in the US don't charge and falls mainly on the tourists.

However, as I mentioned in a previous post while the sales tax (the GET) is actually lower than where we live and most other cities it includes supermarket food and that aspect does NOT target tourists but the lower income Hawaii Residents. That is something that I don't understand but if I become a voting Hawaiian Resident I will voice my concern. )Even as tourists we have gone to the Capital for the opening of the Legislature in January). I would raise the GET a small amount and exclude supermarket type food to keep revenue neutral.

Furthermore, I understand that while schools where we live are funded by property taxes, in Hawaii they are funded by the State which gets it revenue from an Income Tax, the GET, the TAT and other sources that both Hawaii Residents as well Tourists pay. There is little justification for tourists to pay to Educate Hawaii's Children. While not everyone has children IMHO being a resident and citizen of a community it is your responsibility and to your ultimate benefit to support the public education of the youth. As I mentioned before, the schools in Hawaii are not well funded and the teachers are poorly paid. Therefore, raising the property tax particularly focused on absentee owners, which I now also pay, with a property tax exemption, would be a good thing to raise the level of education in Hawaii.
 

controller1

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Furthermore, I understand that while schools where we live are funded by property taxes, in Hawaii they are funded by the State which gets it revenue from an Income Tax, the GET, the TAT and other sources that both Hawaii Residents as well Tourists pay. There is little justification for tourists to pay to Educate Hawaii's Children. While not everyone has children IMHO being a resident and citizen of a community it is your responsibility and to your ultimate benefit to support the public education of the youth. As I mentioned before, the schools in Hawaii are not well funded and the teachers are poorly paid. Therefore, raising the property tax particularly focused on absentee owners, which I now also pay, with a property tax exemption, would be a good thing to raise the level of education in Hawaii.

Hawaii is far from the only state where taxes generated from non-residents are utilized for public education.
 

Tamaradarann

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Hawaii is far from the only state where taxes generated from non-residents are utilized for public education.

I know I am sure New York City does the same since property taxes there are low, and by the way the public schools except for the elite and specialty schools are poor. The reason I brought this up was the the issue of the Hawaii's local politicians raising revenue by targeting tourists with taxes and I have a problem with using the pot that the Get and TAT funds go into for public schools. Paying for services that tourists use and need such as Emergency Services, Police, Roads, Street Lighting, Public Transportation, Airports, Parks, Beaches, Refuse Removal etc. should be the purpose of those revenue sources.
 
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