Hawaii State Fact Sheet

AARP State Fact Sheet

Source: AARP.org | January 2009

AARP Hawaii is proud to represent and serve nearly 160,000 AARP members age 50+ in the state. 

We are committed to championing access to affordable, quality health care for all generations, providing the tools needed to save for retirement, and serving as a reliable information source on issues critical to Americans age 50+.  AARP and the AARP Foundation are also working to improve the lives of Hawaii residents through vital services, including fraud prevention, driver safety and tax assistance programs. 

Age 50+ voters:  55 percent of Hawaii residents age 50+ voted in the 2008 election, sending a clear message that it's time for elected officials from both sides of the aisle to come together to solve our nation's problems.

AARP:  Working To Improve the Lives of All Hawaii Residents

Providing Real Relief:  We are working with Congress to support struggling workers by:

• Extending unemployment insurance for the 4,907 Hawaii residents age 50+ hardest hit by the economic crisis.

Reforming Health Care:  We are working with Congress to fix our broken health care system by:

• Making quality health care more affordable for the families and employers in Hawaii now spending more than $9,000 a year on premiums alone; and
• Ensuring all Americans have access to care, especially the 26,751 uninsured Hawaii residents age 50-64.

Helping the Most Vulnerable:  We are working with Congress to pass legislation that would help more low-income Americans with access to health care by:

• Strengthening the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) and Medicaid to ensure that more than 17,000 Hawaii children and nearly 230,000 of the most vulnerable Hawaii residents get the care they need.

Aging in Place:  We are working with Congress to ensure that the 89 percent of individuals ages 50+ who wish to remain in their homes as long as possible, can by:

• Expanding access to home and community-based services through Medicaid – the largest payer of long-term care – which, in 2007, spent only 17 percent of long-term care dollars in Hawaii on home and community based-services for older adults and adults with physical disabilities and 83 percent on institutional care for the same population.

Strengthening Medicare:  We are working with Congress to improve and strengthen Medicare, which provides health care for 193,333 Hawaii residents, by:

• Putting more emphasis on quality and efficiency, capping out-of-pocket expenses in Medicare, and making prescription drugs more affordable.

Ensuring Social Security:  We are working with Congress to strengthen Social Security for current and future generations by:

• Reaching a balanced and bipartisan solvency agreement that will preserve Social Security's role as a guaranteed floor of income security, as it now does for 207,992 Hawaii residents currently receiving Social Security.

Promoting Retirement Savings:  We are working with Congress to ensure that every American has a simple, dependable way to save for retirement at work by:

• Enacting Automatic IRA legislation, which would help many of the estimated 190,000 Hawaii residents who currently do not have access to a retirement savings plan at work.

Addressing the Housing Crisis:  We are working with Congress to help people facing foreclosure so they can stay in their homes while paying off their debt, including:

• Allowing bankruptcy judges to restructure mortgage loans for primary residences, which would help over 688 Hawaii residents age 50+ who are in or near foreclosure.

AARP: Fighting for Hawaii Residents

AARP has approximately 400 appointed volunteers and 2,000 activists in Hawaii. We have volunteer offices on three islands (Hawaii, Kauai and Oahu) that serve as hubs for volunteer and member engagement. The AARP Hawaii state office recently launched a new volunteer structure to better connect with members and create a more focused and agile presence in our congressional districts. The structure features geographic teams engaged in integrated education and advocacy activities led by Area Volunteer Leaders. There will be seven teams initially: Urban Oahu, Leeward Oahu, Windward Oahu, Kona, Hilo, Kauai, and Maui - with plans to add a team on Molokai as capacity allows.

Appointed volunteer leaders receive regular issue training each year. E-mail and telephone are the primary methods for keeping AARP volunteers and activists informed about federal and state legislation. Each summer we engage between 500 and 1,000 members in Advocacy Celebration and Training (ACT) on every island. AARP Hawaii regularly conducts voter education and candidate forums as well as consumer education events (i.e., our Caregiver's Conference series, held for the past six years, has engaged between 1,100 and 1,600 family caregivers annually). 

In 2007, AARP, Business Roundtable, National Federation of Independent Business, and Service Employees International Union launched Divided We Fail (DWF) – a national initiative that compels elected officials to take action on fixing health care and financial security. Through this initiative, DWF convened faith leaders, medical professionals, non-profit leaders, veterans, and community members to talk about the future of America's health and financial security systems. DWF also succeeded in getting the entire Hawaii delegation to sign the congressional pledge.

In recent years, AARP volunteers and staff in Hawaii have helped to successfully pass legislation to create a prescription drug bulk purchasing program through the state; establish a Long-Term Care Commission to make recommendations to the state legislature for system-wide long-term care reforms; get rid of an offset that unfairly penalized working Social Security beneficiaries when they were laid off; increase funding to improve crosswalks at dangerous intersections; pass county charter amendments to make Honolulu a pedestrian and bicycle friendly city; and allow the City and County of Honolulu to build a steel-on-steel rail system.

AARP Foundation: Serving Hawaii Residents of All Generations

• AARP Tax-Aide is the nation's largest, free, volunteer-run tax preparation and assistance service available to low and moderate-income taxpayers. With 48 locations throughout Hawaii, AARP-trained and IRS-certified volunteers helped 13,489 Hawaii residents, including those eligible to file for their economic stimulus checks, and filed 1,378 EITC returns, putting $1,568,393 in the pockets of those who need it most.
• The AARP Foundation Consumer Fraud Prevention project engages peer volunteers in alerting older consumers to telemarketing and other types of fraud that endanger their financial security. Volunteers reach out to known and potential fraud victims to offer tips and information about telemarketing scams and other forms of fraud. Through this program, AARP helped 355 fraud victims or potential victims of fraud in Hawaii during the first three quarters of 2008.

These and additional Foundation programs served more than 13,923 Hawaii residents in 2008.

AARP Contact Information

Hawaii: Barbara Kim Stanton, Hawaii State Director; bstanton@aarp.org; 808-545-6001
Washington, DC: Greg Wang, Senior Legislative Representative; gwang@aarp.org; 202-434-3767

_{References
Providing Real Relief: AARP Public Policy Institute Tabulations of the A132007 American Community Survey (U.S. Census Bureau, 2007).
Reforming Health Care: Premiums: The Kaiser Family Foundation. 2008. State Health Facts.
Reforming Health Care:  Uninsured: AARP PPI Report:  "Health Care Reform:  What 50- to 64-Year-Olds Have at Stake"
Helping the Most Vulnerable: SCHIP, Medicaid: The Kaiser Family Foundation. 2008. State Health Facts.
Aging in Place: AARP Public Policy Institute, 2008. A Balancing Act: State Long Term Care Reform.
Strengthening Medicare: The Kaiser Family Foundation. 2008. State Health Facts.
Ensuring Social Security: Social Security Administration. 2007. OASDI Beneficiaries by State and County.
Promoting Retirement Savings: Based on data from the US Census, State and County Business Patterns and Current Populations Survey statistics on Pension Coverage. 2004.
Addressing the Housing Crisis: AARP Public Policy Institute. 2008. A First Look at Older Americans and the Mortgage Crisis.}