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P G,�uN an. <br /> Bill 18 testimony. March 2, 2011 <br /> The council is supposed to be a representative body for the districts of the island. <br /> These districts should be contiguous and were once loosely based on the 9 historical <br /> districts, or moku, as defined by the natural segregations of terrain, which subsequently <br /> shape settlement patterns. <br /> The County Charter very clearly defines the role and rules of the County Redistricting <br /> Commission. Creating an entirely new chapter within the County Code to screw down <br /> more exacting numbers of population by district will make the Redistricting Com.'s job <br /> much more difficult, the process more expensive, and it ignores the traditions of our <br /> 'host culture'. <br /> Yet Bill 18 does try to define things that are "weird ", "ridiculous" and "bizarre ". Do we <br /> really want to go there with our County Code? The language of Bill 18 seems designed <br /> to directly force any contention directly into the judicial grinder. <br /> To expand the Charter definition through Bill 18 presents a potpourri of <br /> micromanagement rules via the CC that shall succeed in further oppression of host <br /> culture traditions of district division by moku. Also, Bill 18 charges the CRC to balance <br /> 'ideal' numbers of residents yet Bill 18 ignores numbers that might measure things like <br /> the number of non - voting immigrants, or felons, and the too young to vote, or the infirm <br /> that reside in a district. Is this the right thing to do when trying to have equal <br /> representation? <br /> Creation of a new chapter of the CC micromanages and hobbles the work of the CRC to <br /> a point to make their job almost useless; the only flexibility they will have is to nudge <br /> lines around in an effort to precisely equalize the population between districts. But our <br /> Charter is already quite clear on this detail: "Districts shall have approx. equal resident <br /> populations ". <br /> The authors of the Charter included the language " approx. equal resident populations" <br /> to allow for contiguous expansion and contraction of districts, to allow council <br /> representation to follow future settlement patterns. Bill 18 severely undercuts the <br /> purpose and intent of having a CRC at all. Bill 18 creates CC that strives to have <br /> extremely equal numbers of population per representative, but Bill 18 sacrifices_, <br /> balanced representation of contiguous communities and the historical moku and - <br /> ahupua'a. Bill 18 undermines both geographic -and social- district repres(eltatior)Hin <br /> favor of equalizing head counts. <br /> The ordinances proposed by Bill 18 are unnecessary and ultimately wasteful. Please <br /> discard this proposal. <br /> Comm. No. 67 2,0 <br /> Ref. T o: preseeed Co tcn C: <br /> Ref. Date MAR A 9 7tltt <br />