A strong-wind advisory is in effect for all islands until 6 p.m. Saturday, the National Weather Service said.
The advisory, which is slated to take effect at 6 a.m. today, warns of 20 to 30 mph wind, with gusts of up to 55 mph, the weather service said.
A gale warning for the Alenuihaha Channel and seas around Hawaii island is also posted until 6 p.m. Sunday, with easterly wind of 23 to 35 mph and seas of 12 feet.
A high-surf advisory remains in effect until 6 p.m. Sunday for the east shores of Kauai, Oahu, Molokai, Maui and Hawaii island. Wave heights are expected to be between 8 and 11 feet.
City gets $400K for sex assault program
Honolulu is among seven cities selected as pilot sites for the Department of Justice’s Sexual Assault Justice Initiative, Prosecutor Keith Kaneshiro announced Wednesday.
Honolulu will receive a two-year, $400,000 grant.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch said the pilot sites will implement promising practices for prosecuting sex assault cases and promoting justice for victims.
The grant will fund positions for two deputy prosecutors and a paralegal, who will be added to the prosecutor’s six-person Sex Assault Unit, HPD investigators and therapists at the Sex Assault Treatment Center.
NEIGHBOR ISLANDS
Maui hospital to lose funding
WAILUKU >> The head of the Maui Memorial Medical Center says the hospital expects to lose about $600,000 in Medicare funding in the current federal fiscal year after itscored poorly on an Affordable Care Act performance-measuring program.
The Maui facility will lose 1 percent of reimbursements it receives directly from Medicare in the rating program covering hospital infections and other ailments, The MauiNews reported.
Wes Lo, CEO of the Hawaii Health System Corp.’s Maui region, said Tuesday hospital officials are still working to determine exactly how much they will lose. Based on lastyear, Maui Memorial received $62 million in reimbursements from Medicare, putting a 1 percent reduction at about $600,000.
“It’s a bummer; we are not happy,” Lo said. “We need to provide the appropriate resources for them … to support the doctors and nurses better.”
The rating program scored hospitals on several categories, including patient safety indicators, central-line-associated bloodstream infections, catheter-associated urinarytract infections and surgical-site infections. The reporting periods differed for each category but in total covered July 2012 to December 2014.
Maui Memorial scored near the bottom in all categories except the central-line-associated bloodstream infections category, which was in line with the national average.
Lo said not all of the low scores Maui Memorial received were related to care. Hospital officials in their review also noted problems with coding and physician documentation.
