News Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 1st, 2002
CONTACT: Jeff Mikulina 226-4987

Sierra Club unveils legislative scorecard

Group ranks state legislators on environmental actions

HONOLULU — The Sierra Club, Hawai`i Chapter unveiled its legislative scorecard today that ranks Hawaii’s lawmakers on how they voted for—and against—the environment during the 2001 -2002 legislative sessions.

“This scorecard presents a clear picture of how our state lawmakers voted on important issues impacting Hawaii’s environment,” said Jeff Mikulina, Director of the Sierra Club, Hawai`i Chapter. “We want to provide our members and other citizens a tool to use to hold their elected officials accountable.”

In the State House, Representative Hermina Morita (D- North Kauai, Hana) was among eight representatives receiving the highest score of 100%. The Sierra Club noted her relentless advocacy for clean energy reforms and bottle deposit legislation.

“Representative Morita has proven herself—in the most trying of circumstances—to be the strongest ally of Hawaii’s natural resources,” said Mikulina.

Representative Joe Gomes (R – Waimanalo, Kailua), on the other hand, received the lowest score of 0%. Representative Gomes voted against all five environmental measures recorded in the scorecard and took actions in opposition to other green bills.

In the Senate, Senator Kalani English (D – Kahului, Upcountry) and Senator Bob Nakata (D – Kaneohe, Kahuku), each received the highest score of 88%. Both were advocates for fixing automatic permit approval, the creation of the environmental workforce, and other environmental initiatives. Senator Sam Slom received the lowest score of 13%, voting against the bottle bill, a smart growth measure, and other green bills.

The passage of such key environmental measures as the bottle bill, parks funding, and net energy metering prompted high scores for many legislators.

“Some positive measures have come out of the legislature the past two years. The key advocates deserve praise for making them a reality.”

The scores for the 76 legislators were based on a maximum of eight points. The scorecard analyzed the floor votes of five House and Senate actions—ranging from the bottle bill to renewable energy to a Water Commission appointment—that either would help or hurt Hawaii’s environment. The measures are detailed in the scorecard. In addition to the five possible points for voting with the Sierra Club’s position on the five measures, an additional score between 0 – 3 was recorded based on each legislator’s actions on other bills regarding Hawaii’s environment. This “other actions” score is represented by the number of native birds shown on the chart by the legislator’s name. This method was selected in order to present the many votes and actions that are taken in committee or outside of the formal floor votes.

“Residents are concerned with protection Hawaii’s environment, but to them what happens at the State Capitol is just too confusing or too distant from their everyday lives. We hope this scorecard will serve as a tool to judge how well their views are being represented by their lawmakers,” said Mikulina. “Constituents have a right to know how their elected officials are voting on issues that impact Hawaii’s environment.”

The 2001-2002 Legislative Scorecard is available online at www.hi.sierraclub.org/action/2002/scorecard02.pdf (60KB PDF).

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