BY NANCY COOK LAUER |WEST HAWAII TODAY HILO — West Hawaii’s four County Council districts are shaping up to have competitive races, with candidates beginning to come forward weeks before the Feb. 1 start of pulling papers for nominations. ADVERTISING
BY NANCY COOK LAUER |WEST HAWAII TODAY
HILO — West Hawaii’s four County Council districts are shaping up to have competitive races, with candidates beginning to come forward weeks before the Feb. 1 start of pulling papers for nominations.
At least two newcomers to the election process are among those contemplating candidacies, in addition to several who have launched unsuccessful candidacies in the past. Candidates have until June 5 to file to run for election.
Margaret Wille, a Waimea attorney who’s been active testifying and presenting proposals to the county Redistricting Commission and Charter Commission, said she’s planning on running for the Kohala District 9 seat, where incumbent Councilman Pete Hoffmann is term-limited. Wille, 64, said she’d focus on good jobs and educational opportunities for District 9 residents, preventing crimes and social problems, agricultural self-sufficiency, implementation of a 511 traffic alert system and completion of the Kawaihae to Waimea bypass, among other priorities.
Hoffmann stopped short of an outright endorsement, but told West Hawaii Today that Wille would make a good council member.
“I think Margaret is by far one of the smartest individuals that I have had the pleasure of working with on many occasions in the past,” Hoffmann said. “I know of no other individual better qualified.”
Also likely to run for the seat is Leningrad Elarionoff, a retired police captain who ran unsuccessfully in 2006. Elarionoff, 73, who is active in the trucking business and as a volunteer on the Waimea Trails and Greenways Committee, will run on a “no new taxes, no tax increases” platform.
“We can’t raise taxes at a time people are suffering,” Elarionoff said.
Two candidates who ran in 2010, Raynard Torres and Bill Sanborn, are also potential candidates.
In North Kona’s District 8, where incumbent Councilman Angel Pilago has decided not to run for re-election, longtime county legislative worker Karen Eoff has stepped up as a first-time candidate, and Debbie Hecht said she’s likely to enter the race for the third time.
Eoff, 63, said she’d focus on bringing more openness and citizen participation to the process, a goal she says she’s accomplished in her positions as secretary to the Charter Commission and the Redistricting Commission. She’s also served as council aide and legislative assistant to Pilago, aide to former Council Chairman J Yoshimoto and deputy executive assistant to former council Chairman Pete Hoffmann and council Chairman Dominic Yagong.
“I feel that I am the best person to carry on with the work of the council,” Eoff said, citing her experience. “I’ve worked with a lot of people in the community; I’ve worked very well in partnerships with most of the other levels of government and also the community.”
Hecht, 60, a Kailua-Kona real estate broker, missed challenging Pilago in the 2010 general election by 35 votes in a four-way primary. Hecht spearheaded the successful 2006 drive to put a 2 percent land fund on the ballot, and was recently appointed by Mayor Billy Kenoi to the county Public Access, Open Space and Natural Resources Preservation Commission.
“I’m leaning toward a yes,” Hecht said. “I don’t have any doubt that I would do a very good job.”
District 7, which now excludes the residence of South Kona Councilwoman Brenda Ford because of redistricting, has become a wide-open seat. The 2010 candidates for that seat were Kailua-Kona resident Enock Freire and Kealakekua resident Steven Texeira.
Ford has said she’ll seek election in District 6, which now spans a good portion of South Kona in addition to Ka’u. Current Ka’u Councilwoman Brittany Smart has said she’s not going to seek re-election.
Maile David, 59, who had also run for the District 6 seat in 2010, said she’s going to try again. David is a longtime government worker, having served as a paralegal for the Hawaii Judiciary, a County Council aide and currently a legislative specialist for the County Clerk’s Office.
David’s campaign bogged down when there were issues about whether she was qualified to run, because of the address shown on voter registration records. This year, there will be no such problems, she said.
“I had a late start last year, but there was so much support from the community,” David said. “I need to run again and fulfill the promise that I made to my friends and family.”
Ford said she has no comments about any of the competition at this point.
Former Ka’u Councilman Guy Enriques, who was upset by challenger Smart in 2010, said he’s not ready to jump back into the race. Perhaps six years from now, when his children are older, he said.
“These last few years, I realize how much I was away from my family,” Enriques said.
ncook-lauer@westhawaiitoday.com
