Episodes

  • Honolulu Media Council Meeting on the Closure of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin

    Not a Price of Paradise episode: a Honolulu Media Council public meeting held September 12, 1999, on the announced closure of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, with the first fourteen minutes of the recording consisting of pre-meeting room noise. Attorney and council member Janice Wolf moderates, with Jim Gaddy and John Flanagan as the primary panelists.

    Gaddy explains that when the Star-Bulletin was sold in 1992, only the right to produce content transferred — not the presses, plant, or real estate — leaving a “virtual newspaper” with little viable for a new buyer. The investors had counted on 5-percent annual growth in Hawaii Newspaper Agency profits that never arrived, making closure more lucrative than continuing. Audience questions press Gaddy on whether a buyer was sought, on Gannett’s long-term commitment, and on whether the Advertiser will absorb Star-Bulletin staff and features. Gaddy announces 20 to 30 new newsroom positions, a beefed-up Capitol bureau, and a transition of starbulletin.com — which drew 50,000 unique weekly visitors — to the Advertiser’s online presence. He rejects a conspiracy theory that Gannett engineered the closure. Flanagan describes the Star-Bulletin’s journalists as having worked with near-total editorial autonomy and calls their run “a glorious ride.”

  • The Final Price of Paradise Radio Show

    The final Price of Paradise broadcast, airing August 23, 1998, opens with Roth announcing the show is ending — at least until after the election, and possibly for good. He explains that he and producer Susie Roth have committed to volunteer for Linda Lingle’s 1998 gubernatorial campaign and conclude they cannot maintain the show’s nonpartisan reputation while doing so. Roth traces his path to civic engagement: a Tax Review Commission appointment in the late 1980s, where he found legislative leadership resistant and media cynical, led to the Price of Paradise books, the Pop ’94 campaign, and five years of the radio show. Callers respond with a range of reactions: many express gratitude and regret at the show’s end, but others challenge Roth for using a public radio hour to endorse a candidate — one caller says she is troubled by the show becoming a bully pulpit, another demands he leave the air immediately. Lingle’s Maui record also draws scrutiny. At the close, Roth thanks the show’s longtime volunteers and listeners; Susie Roth, joining him in the studio for the final minutes, delivers the last line: “This is and was the Price of Paradise radio show.”

  • Bishop Estate Update

    Host Randall Roth, a law professor specializing in trust law, presented the key findings of the Matsumoto Report — the second installment of court-appointed master Cobert Matsumoto’s review of the Bishop Estate — filed two days before the broadcast. With no studio guests, Roth summarized what he described as the report’s principal findings: that the estate’s average total investment return was negative one percent for fiscal years 1994 through 1996, contradicting trustees’ claims of a 17.3 percent compound annual return; that hundreds of millions of dollars of income designated by Princess Pauahi’s will for educating Hawaiian children had been diverted without court authorization; that no comprehensive strategic plan existed despite repeated court orders; and that trust funds had been used to lobby against intermediate sanctions legislation that would have protected the estate. Callers raised questions about whether a large Goldman Sachs investment offset the poor overall record, whether low-return residential leases distorted the figures, whether the trustees were simply waiting out their critics, and whether any conduct amounted to criminal liability. The central question is whether the court will compel removal of the trustees and recovery of misused funds.

  • Judicial Independence

    Ronald Moon, Chief Justice of the Hawaii Supreme Court, and Michael Town, a Circuit Court Judge, joined host Randall Roth to address the meaning and importance of judicial independence in Hawaii’s system of government. Moon argued that judges must be free to decide cases solely on their legal merits, without fear of reprisals from legislators, interest groups, or public opinion polls—a principle he said was undermined by criticism he characterized as factually inaccurate, including allegations that the Supreme Court acted at the direction of a union official. Town described the deliberative process of judging as grounded in law, procedure, and fact, not public reaction. Both guests discussed mechanisms for judicial accountability, including the Judicial Selection Commission’s retention process, performance evaluations by attorneys, and the Judicial Conduct Commission. The conversation also covered the judiciary’s eight-year pay freeze, which Moon said had created a distracting and potentially compromising dynamic with the legislature. The central question remains how Hawaii can balance the need for judicial independence against the public’s legitimate interest in holding judges accountable.

  • Annexation Debate

    The centennial of Hawaii’s annexation to the United States frames a debate over two newly published books. Tom Coffman, whose Nation Within drew from seven petitions he found in the National Archives — signed by the vast majority of the roughly 37,000 Hawaiians then alive — argues that native Hawaiians overwhelmingly opposed annexation and that U.S. expansion into the Pacific was deliberate policy, not accident. Thurston Twigg-Smith counters that Hawaiian legislators dominated the territorial legislature for two decades after annexation, voting unanimously for statehood in 1903, and that Coffman implicitly paints all Hawaiian supporters of annexation as collaborators. Jim Mee calls the period more complicated and points to figures like Robert Wilcox who held shifting, contradictory positions. Historian Ed Crepeau traces American expansionism to James G. Blaine and notes that annexation required a joint resolution rather than a Senate two-thirds vote. David Forman draws parallels to colonialism across Cuba, Guam, and the Philippines. Chuck Freedman argues the book promotes understanding rather than division. Callers press on the petition’s legal standing, whether annexation was inevitable, and what moral obligations — if any — flow from events a century old.

  • The Future of Waikiki

    Two city planners with opposing views debate whether 1996’s repeal of Waikiki’s density-reduction framework was a serious mistake or a practical necessity. Don Bremner, who headed the Waikiki Improvement Association for 17 years, argues that the 1974 Waikiki Special District rules were benchmark legislation designed to reduce overcrowding through attrition — and that their repeal now allows density increases up to 20% above 1960s boom levels. Mel Kaneshige of Outrigger Hotels counters that the rules were a straitjacket: 89% of Waikiki’s buildings predate the WSD, meaning compliance would have required demolishing roughly 41% of hotel rooms and 52% of apartment units. Kaneshige insists the real problem is not overbuilding but aging, deteriorating infrastructure that keeps repeat visitors away. Bremner attributes declining mainland visitor numbers to over-density; Kaneshige says visitor growth from 2 million to 7 million between 1976 and 1990 proves density was never the issue. Bremner also suggests the density liberalization opens the door to casino development — a charge Kaneshige rejects. A mainland visitor calling in says she was shocked at how sad Waikiki looked and would not return. Roth asks whether government may ultimately need to condemn and purchase properties to achieve any meaningful redesign.

  • Judicial Selection

    Hawaii’s system of selecting state judges through a Judicial Selection Commission, created after the 1978 constitutional convention to replace direct gubernatorial appointment, came under scrutiny from several directions. Jim Koshiba, a practicing attorney who chaired the commission during its first six years, argued for greater transparency, including public ranking of nominees and an open process for selecting commissioners. Momi Cazimero, who served on the commission from 1983 to 1989, described a broadly constructive experience but noted tensions between confidentiality and public accountability. Senior U.S. District Court Judge Samuel P. King offered observations from the perspective of a federal court. By telephone, retired Hawaii Supreme Court Justice Frank Padgett proposed removing all lawyers from the commission to eliminate conflicts of interest, with the commission consulting the bar association separately on professional qualifications. Ellen Colburn, a former commission member from 1989 to 1995, called for more rigorous commissioner selection based on independence and judgment, arguing lay members offered a counterweight to attorneys trained in advocacy. The standing question is whether the commission’s processes — its composition, the confidentiality of deliberations, and the appointing authority’s latitude when choosing from an unranked list — deliver genuine merit selection or leave room for political influence.

  • Health Care Revolution

    In 1998, Hawaiian medicine is being reshaped by managed care, and Roth’s three guests describe the tensions from inside the system. Ken Kipnis, a UH medical ethicist, frames the shift: doctors have moved from autonomous professionals to employees of managed care organizations, caught between quality care and cost containment. Fred Holschuh, a 30-year Hilo emergency room physician and that year’s Hawaii Medical Association Physician of the Year, lists six consequences—denied care, squeezed reimbursements, burdensome paperwork, and the erosion of long-term doctor-patient relationships. He argues physicians are “drawing a line in the sand.” Fred Fortin of HMSA counters that health plans feel equally besieged—by government regulation, consumer demands, and the threat of mainland managed care conglomerates entering Hawaii’s market.

    All three agree Hawaii differs from the mainland: two dominant plans, HMSA and Kaiser, and stronger communication channels have softened the worst effects. Kipnis warns that defining what counts as medically necessary care cannot be left to MBAs or physicians alone—it needs a community-wide debate. Callers press on patient control, HMSA’s governance, and rising malpractice concerns.