A petulant political move by the state Senate may thwart efforts to pass sorely needed election reforms this year.

The House approved a project to test publicly financed county council elections on the Big Island in 2010, a step toward ending the dominance of special-interest money, increasing competition for elected office and rebuilding voter participation.

The House also rejected a move by the Senate to increase allowable corporate contributions from $1,000 to $25,000.

Senators responded by cynically poisoning the House bill for publicly funded elections by amending it to include their increases in corporate contributions — creating a mocking piece of legislation that works at cross purposes with itself.

If the Senate doesn't back down in conference committee, House negotiators and election reformers may have to decide whether it's worth achieving one important reform by accepting a big step backwards to get it.

More than political gamesmanship, this is one of the most important issues the Legislature will decide this year, described by Voter Owned Hawai'i as "the reform that makes all other reform possible."

Untouchable incumbents propped up by special-interest money are making democracy a formality in Hawai'i, with lightly contested elections and the lowest voter turnout in the nation.

In 2006, five of 13 state senators up for re-election and seven House incumbents were unopposed, with most other incumbents facing little-known opponents with scant resources.

The state Campaign Spending Commission reported that winning Senate candidates in 2006 — mostly incumbents — raised an average of more than $91,000, while losers raised only $32,000. House winners had an average of over $46,000 to spend while losers had only $15,000.

House members deserve credit for their willingness to try reforming a stacked system that works so strongly to their benefit; senators deserve disdain for putting their own interests and those of monied benefactors ahead of public interest in fair elections with high participation.

Voter Owned Hawai'i says public-election funding in Maine and Arizona has reined in special-interest influence while increasing competition for public office and voter turnout.

The Big Island Council made it easy for the Legislature to see if it works as advertised without breaking the bank by volunteering to become the first elected body in the state to try publicly financed elections.

House Bill 661 authorizes a pilot project limited to Hawai'i County in which qualified candidates who choose public financing would get 90 percent of the average amount spent by winning candidates in the previous two elections.

The Senate said it supports the Big Island trial, but linking it to the conflicting proposal to increase corporate donations is a potential poison pill.

Corporations once could make unlimited donations to political action committees that support candidates, but legislators set a limit of $1,000 three years ago.

Legislators said the limit was inadvertent and immediately set about trying to repeal it, but ran into opposition from a coalition of public-interest groups wanting to ban corporate donations altogether.

The latest Senate bill sets a $25,000 limit on corporate PAC contributions, but the increase is still at odds with the purpose of the measure it's attached to and defeats election reform as much as promotes it.

If the Senate doesn't drop its amendment and stop playing games with the future of democracy in Hawai'i, advocates of honest elections should play hardball and hold the 19 senators standing in the way of reform individually accountable.

David Shapiro, a veteran Hawai'i journalist, can be reached by e-mail at dave@volcanicash.net. His columns are archived at www.volcanicash.net. Read his daily blog at blogs.honoluluadvertiser.com.

David Shapiro, a veteran Hawai'i journalist, can be reached by e-mail at dave@volcanicash.net. His columns are archived at www.volcanicash.net. Read his daily blog at blogs.honoluluadvertiser.com.