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Editor’s note:��For Hawaii’s Nov. 5 General Election, Civil Beat asked candidates to answer some questions about where they stand on various issues and what their priorities will be if elected.

The following came from Emil Svrcina, Republican candidate for State Senate District 18, which covers Mililani Town, Waipio Gentry, Crestview, Waikele, portion of Waipahu, Village Park and Royal Kunia. His opponent is Democrat Michelle Kidani.

Go to Civil Beat’s Election Guide for general information, and check out other candidates on the General Election Ballot.

1. What is the biggest issue facing your district, and what would you do about it?

Lack of election integrity. Act 136 (mail-in ballots) has to be reformed/repealed. It promotes criminal corruption. Hawaii has unconstitutional ballots. Chief Elections Officer Scott Nago has to be fired, as well as the current chairman of the Elections Commission, Michael Curtis.

Lawsuits pointing out violations of many Hawaii Revised Statues have been filed. Without an honest election process, special interests (not we the people) will govern Hawaii. Therefore, the economy in general, commonsense projects (interisland ferry, food self-sufficiency, cheap energy production) and overall lifestyles of many working people will suffer.

Life in Hawaii will continue to be unsustainable, education will be substandard intentionally while overall dependency on overgrown government will be promoted and legislated.

Only you (voters) can change the status quo — impossible without election integrity.

2. How do you feel about the massive income tax cut just approved by the Legislature and the governor? Do you have any concerns that it will force reductions in state services in the years to come?

I feel good about that. Factual data and time will tell how real it is and what will be the specific financial improvement of life of all residents and especially struggling working families in Hawaii.

3. Hawaii continues to struggle with pay-to-play politics and corruption in government. What meaningful reforms do you think would change state government for the better?

We have to have an honest election process to get rid of all corrupt politicians, not this existing system.

4. Candidates often say they will support reform proposals in the Legislature. And yet major reform proposals don’t pass. Will you back good-government proposals even if it means going against leadership? If you are an incumbent, can you point to an example of a reform that you supported?

Yes

5. Do you support comprehensive public financing of elections for candidates who choose to participate? Why or why not?

According to the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization and based partially on my own experience (running as candidate for various offices since 2008), a major problem is that the level of public support has not increased much in decades.

Expenditure limits that made sense in the mid-1990s are far too low today, leaving candidates who accept public funding without sufficient resources to run serious campaigns. Relying entirely on public dollars would not provide enough money to make most candidates even remotely competitive.

A one-page campaign literature/simple flyer costs about $5,000 in a House district with about 10,000 households. I would personally ideally rather have people taking their right to vote seriously and do their homework and informing themselves about the candidates ahead of Election Day.

But that’s my wishful thinking. Therefore, incumbents who are spending taxpayers’ money sending their self-promotion several times during the year, campaigning while still in their office, getting media exposure, will always have the advantage, especially among low-information and uneducated voters in Hawaii.

6. Hawaii is the only Western state without a statewide citizens initiative process. Do you support such a process? Why or why not?

Yes. Government shall exist only with the consent of the governed. So initiative process has to be available in case government is not governing with the consent.

For example, Hawaii does not have a position of county sheriff “elected directly by the people,” like in most of the U.S. states.

Therefore, in Hawaii there are no sheriffs to protect we the people whose unalienable rights are violated by any government official, governor’s mandate or anybody. We don’t have sheriffs who can put handcuffs on any legislator, governor or anybody violating their oath of office by violating our rights protected by the Constitution.

7. Thanks to their campaign war chests and name familiarity, incumbents are almost always reelected in Hawaii legislative races. Should there be term limits for state legislators, as there are for the governor’s office and county councils? Why or why not?

If the election system worked properly and honestly with integrity, and a majority of people would participate, then these reelected incumbents would be serving people excellently with the consent of the voters. So no problem if they serve over and over. No term limit necessary.

However, with this abysmally low voters’ participation, all of these incumbents represent a minority of people of Hawaii. Today Hawaii’s government is full of recycled, well-connected “pay-to-play” types of politicians. therefore term limits would be appropriate across the government — state and county.

8. What will you do to ensure accountability at the Legislature? Do you support ideas such as requiring the Sunshine Law to apply to the Legislature or banning campaign contributions during session?

Media have to do their job informing/educating the public. Yes, apply the Sunshine Law and impose severe punishment (forced resignation) for accepting campaign contributions during session.

9. How would you make the Legislature more transparent and accessible to the public? Opening conference committees to the public? Stricter disclosure requirements on lobbying and lobbyists? How could the Legislature change its own internal rules to be more open?

Media have to do their job informing/educating the public. We have to know who are the lobbyists influencing the Legislature against the will of the people for profit, greed and control, and boycott their services and products. The Ethics Commission has to do its job, courts have to do their job as well and punish the perpetrators.

10. Many people have talked about diversifying the local economy for many years now, and yet Hawaii is still heavily reliant on tourism. What, if anything, should be done differently about tourism and the economy?

We have to reform the Jones Act to make Hawaii exempt. This will break the corrupt shipping monopoly people of Hawaii are held hostage by. People have to be able to short-term rent out their rooms, houses (owner-occupied only) to tourists. This will break the tourist industry’s monopoly and at the same time improve the economy of the people of Hawaii.

We have to break the energy monopoly as well and end this most expensive electricity in the nation legacy — three times national average is too much for too long. Independent electricity producers have to be welcome — cheaper fuel liquefied petroleum gas, nuclear, floating electro plants and other ideas.

11. An estimated 60% of Hawaii residents are struggling to get by, a problem that reaches far beyond low-income and into the middle class, which is disappearing. What ideas do you have to help the middle class and working families who are finding it hard to continue to live here?

Election integrity enforced and overall cleanup of the elections in Hawaii will open the door for more usefully educated experts to enter government, experts who did already produce something useful in their lives, did benefit others and have commonsense ideas how to do more with less (not just lawyers and recycled politicians).

Such government will easily contribute to a much better, thriving future of all working people by lowering or eliminating some taxes, promoting common-sensical, immediately useful solutions like an interisland ferry (not boondoggles like the rail), reforming the Jones Act and opening Hawaii to shippers from around the world, which will bring huge revenues for all residents.

People of Hawaii need to unite and brave, investigative, impartial media have to work for the people again. We need an infowar to weed out all of this rampant mafia-like corruption in Hawaii.

There is no justification for the economic struggle of any family, anybody willing to work and contribute. If the current government is not capable to maintain a high standard of living for all our residents, it is the wrong government and has to be ”gutted and replaced.”