Bank of Hawaii Corp., the trustee for the estate, today named PM Realty Group as the exclusive broker for the Galbraith lands, replacing Cushman & Wakefield and Sofos Realty Corp.

The property officially goes back on the market on July 28.

PM Realty’s hiring comes weeks after an effort to sell the land to Canadian developer Dennis Blain fell through. Blain’s $40 million offer was terminated by the bank after Blain asked for a 60-day extension.

Despite a soft real estate market, the new sales effort could get a boost from a measure passed by the Legislature this year.

The law, which took effect today, allows owners of ag lands to petition the state Land Use Commission to convert 15 percent of their acreage for urban or rural use so long as they preserve 85 percent of their land for high-quality agricultural uses.

That means that a buyer of the Galbraith lands could seek to convert 315 acres for housing. A developer could build more than 1,000 homes on that much land.

But any buyer would have to compete with public and private sector efforts to preserve the land for agricultural use. A separate measure, which was passed by the state Legislature this year, dedicates $13 million toward that plan.

Based in Houston, PM Realty Group is a privately held, national real estate company with more than 1,300 employees and 20 offices nationwide. In Hawaii, the company manages about 2 million square feet of property and its clients include Chevron, Morgan Stanley, Pacific Guardian Life and the Employees’ Retirement System of the State of Hawaii.

The controversial measure, which was passed by the Legislature this year without a full hearing, aims to protect Hawaii’s dwindling ag lands.

It allows landowners to petition the state Land Use Commission to lock up 85 percent of their high-quality agricultural land in exchange for allowing them to use 15 percent of their acreage for urban or rural use.

Opponents say the bill accelerate the loss of farm land by creating rural residential subdivisions that inflate land values and increase the cost of farming.

Here’s how some of the state’s biggest landowners could theoretically benefit from the bill:

– Kamehameha Schools, which owns 200,000 acres of agricultural lands, could seek to convert 30,000 acres of those lands for housing,

– Alexander & Baldwin Inc. could see 6,000 acres of its 40,000 acres of ag land used for residential development;

– About 1,350 of James Campbell Co.’s ag lands could be dedicate for future housing;

– Of Maui Land & Pineapple Co. could add another 630 acres to its inventory of residential development;

– Of Dole Food Co.’s 2,900 acres of agricultural lands, 435 could go to new home building.

And that doesn’t include Parker Ranch’s vast landholdings. The ranch owns more than 150,000 acres throughout the Big Island and most of it is zone for agricultural uses.

Of course, none of the landowners are going to try to convert their lands overnight.
The landowners also need to follow the county permitting procedures and other state land use laws.

But the conversion will allow them to cut years off of the zoning process.

One would have expected the state Legislature to have at least held hearings on the bill which such a broad impact on property values, land use and the future of farming in Hawaiçi.

The passage of the bill by conference committee members in the waning days of the legislative session without public debate represent a return to the bad old days of smoke-filled rooms and back-room deals.

Former Aloha Airlines Chief Executive Officer David Banmiller is rumored to be the next CEO of Air Jamaica.

RadioJamaica.com reported today that appointment of Banmiller could be announced soon by the airline’s board. (See)

Banmiller declined comment today.

Banmiller, who lost his position at Aloha on March 31 when the state’s number 2 carrier shutdown passenger service and laid off 1,900 workers, is Air Jamaica’s former chief operating officer.

His expertise as an airline turnaround expert will be in big demand at Jamaica’s financially troubled national airline.

Banmiller is credited for helping Aloha emerge from its first bankruptcy in 2006. He also was was instrumental in the recovery of Minneapolis-based Sun Country Airlines in 2001.

The defunct airline’s court-appointed trustee Dane Field has already sold Aloha’s profitable cargo division, its contract services unit and their receivables for more than $20 million.

And last week the carrier’s main investor Yucaipa Co. bid $10 million of the debt owed by the airline to acquire the legal claims against go! airlines’ Phoenix-based parent Mesa Air Group.

Jim Wagner, Field’s attorney, said after a court hearing last week that Field plans to sell another $10 million to $15 million for remaining aircraft frames, engines and aircraft parts.

That would bring the total haul to somewhere between $40 million to $46 million for the defunct airlines assets.

Aloha’s break-up value is just a fraction of the $215 million in assets that the company listed when it filed for bankruptcy protection on March 20.

That loss of value gives you some measure of how much more a living company, its employees and its goodwill is worth to a community than a mere shell of a corporation.

The failure to approve a multi-billion dollar mass transit system on Oahu dominated local headlines for weeks.

Sound familiar?

That was 1992. It was the beginning of the longest and deepest economic downturn in state history.

Some local policy makers will tell you that things are very different today. They pat themselves on the back and say that the economy has made a lot of structural changes and is better able to weather the financial storms that hit our shores.

I’m not entirely convinced by that.

The shutdown of Aloha Airlines — whose impact on the local zeitgeist was similar to that of the 1992 closure of Hamakua Sugar — is worrisome.

High fuel costs are affecting that moves from car sales, shipping costs, air fares and visitor arrivals.

The financial turmoil in the credit markets probably won’t have as big an impact here as the collapse of the 1990s Japanese investment bubble but it definitely will be felt by the local real estate sector. (Vulture investors — who made millions off of the 1990s recession — are beginning to lick their chops.)

I suspect we’re at one of those critical economic junctures where the policies we adopt now will have long lasting impact. It would be tragic if we allowed history to repeat itself.

On Tuesday, the Bank of Hawaii Corp. called off a deal by Canadian developers Dennis Blain and Phil Archer to buy the 2,100 acre Central Oahu parcel for $40 million. (See)

The bank now has to relist the property and may have to hire a new broker, which could take months and could add hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs.

The bank may end up having to settle for less than $40 million due to the softening economy.

But the delay also provides more time for state and city lawmakers and local community leaders to buy and preserve the agricultural lands.

The new sales effort could get a boost from a measure passed by the Legislature this year that allows owners of ag lands to convert 15 percent of their acreage into new housing development.

The bill, which is awaiting Gov. Linda Lingle’s signature or veto, could result more than 300 acres for new housing, which vastly increases the value of the Galbraith Estate lands.

People familiar the Galbraith Estate said the previous deal collapsed on Tuesday after Blain and Archer asked for a 60-day extension to see if the ag bill gets signed and to review its potential impact.

They also say that Canadian group is trying to find a way to revive their bid.

Either way, it looks like any sale won’t be completed until the end of the year. This means further delay in the termination of the trust and further delay in the distribution of its assets to the 600-plus beneficiaries of the estate.

On Sunday, I wrote a story about truck and SUV sales tanking. (See:) The story quoted a number of dealers, truck owners and even an urban planner about the slowdown in big-car sales now that gasoline has risen above $4.00.

The story included an anecdote about a Salt Lake resident who could only get $8,000in trade-in value on a 2004 Dodge Ram truck that she bought for $30,000 and still owed $18,000 on her car loan.

If there was a theme to the story, it would have been: “Who in their right mind would buy a truck or SUV when gas prices are so high?

I did. Two weeks ago, I bought a used Honda Passport from a local car dealership. I didn’t intend to buy a car, let alone an SUV. If fact, I just went to the dealership to see what kind of prices they were offering.

Plus, my 1990 Mazda (One of my friends used to kid me that “Miata” means “piece of #@&!” in Italian) had major transmission problems that would cost more to fix than the car was worth.

Call me a contrarian but since I live about a mile away from my work and drive an average of about 4 miles a day, I’m not going to feel the car’s 16 to 18 miles per gallon fuel mileage the same way a Mililani commuter would. Plus I’ve also decided to walk to work at least once a week to save on gas.

If prices for large trucks or SUVs are being discounted, buying one might make sense for someone in similar situation. I just hope I don’t regret the purchase when the price of gasoline rises above $5 a gallon.

Duane “Dog” Chapman, whose popular reality television show “Dog the Bounty Hunter” is back on the air after a six-month suspension, is now on the hunt for a new home.

Chapman and his wife Beth have looked at several multi-million dollar properties in the east Honolulu area in recent weeks, local real estate people said.

The Chapmans own a home in Denver but rent in Hawaii, where they plan to raise their two young children, said Mona Wood, Chapman’s spokeswoman.

Advertiser Library Photo

“Here is home for them,” said Wood. “They really want to find a long-term” residence.

In November, A&E Television Network suspended Chapman’s show — one of its highest rated — after Chapman used the n-word when referring to his grown son Tucker’s African-American girlfriend. The private call had been recorded and Chapman apologized.

A&E announced last month that it would resume the show’s fifth season on July 16 and Chapman has promise to watch his words.

The new season includes a “swear jar” at Chapman’s Da Kine Bail Bonds on Queen Emma Street to which Chapman has to contribute each time he swears.

Hawaiian Airlines and go! have already raised fares three times this year and twice since Aloha shutdown on March 31.

The standard fare is now $64 one-way fare, or more than double the fares of a year ago.

I told her that I thought that the airlines are going to raise fares again.

Hawaiian Chief Executive Officer Mark Dunkerley all but conceded point during an editorial board meeting with the Advertiser last week.

According to Dunkerley, the price of aviation fuel has nearly doubled to about $4.01 a gallon in the past year, adding $204 million to Hawaiian’s already bloated fuel bill.

While airline executives rarely predict future ticket prices, Dunkerley was quick to quote local aviation industry historian Peter Forman, who believes that that Hawaiian and go! would have to charge between $75 to $85 each way to break even.

Some of my more pessimistic friends in the airline industry think that interisland fares in the $90 range aren’t that far away.

My co-worker’s family trip to Kauai is already going to cost her several hundred dollars more that it would have cost her last year.

But it could cost a lot more if she waits until next month to book her flights.

Theft charges against Otsuka resulted in a mistrial last August. Now, prosecutors say they plan to retry Otsuka in Circuit Judge Dexter Del Rosario’s courtroom.

Otsuka’s case has been bouncing around the court system for nearly six years now, although some of that was due to her frequent changes of attorneys.

Otsuka was indicted in September 2002 for allegedly stealing more than $3,000 from a Tahitian dance group. According to the grand jury indictment, Otsuka helped organize a fundraiser at a Restaurant Row night club in 2001 but allegedly held onto the proceeds.

Otsuka has denied the charge, saying she turned over the money to the group. Her lawyer William Harrison is asking the court to dismiss the case.

The amounts involved are relatively small and actions alleged of Otsuka are frequently the subject of civil lawsuits. No doubt, her alleged links to a former pollster to the Harris campaign were a big reason this case has been alive for so long.

As part of the 2001-2005 investigation into alleged political donations to the Harris campaign, city prosecutors were trying to find out how tens of thousands of dollars paid by the Harris campaign to pollster Harry Mattson later went to Otsuka’s bank accounts.

The alleged transfers of funds didn’t lead to criminal charges and the Harris investigation has been pau for several years. The judge will likely weigh these factors when he hears Otsuka’s motion to dismiss the case in September.