The Honolulu Advertiser from Honolulu, Hawaii • 5

The Honolulu Advertiser Tuesday, February 10, 1998 A5 Layoffs: Decision due by March 1 How Dfgffe! IV works FROM PAGE ONE I i The city faces "a $75 million shortfall this year alone, on top of four years of shortfalls totaling $212 million." MAYOR JEREMY HARRIS An image or event is sv.vS'-recorded by a digital camera: HDTV (high-definition television) audio recorded in Dolby sound requires five separate tracks of recorded audio. The i "sound is sampled 48,000 times i second at five different Ipcatlons. Tfce camera scans the image 60 times a second. Each of these 60 images is reflected oy uie lens into the camera. There, a color tube divides picture into 2 million separate dots.

who testified against Senate Bill 2201, which would increase the transient accommodations tax from 6 percent to 7 percent. The bill also would earmark 43 percent of the resulting revenue to provide $60 million a year for tourism marketing and sets up a tourism board to oversee marketing of the industry. Currently, the counties split 95 percent of the revenue from the transient accommodations tax, with the state keeping the remaining 5 percent. The bill is based on proposals from the Economic Revitaliza-tion Task Force, a group of business, labor and education leaders appointed last summer by Gov. Ben Cayetano and top legislators.

Others who testified against the bill included Maui Mayor Linda Lingle and a representative from the office of Kauai Mayor Maryanne Kusaka. Both objected to raising the tax while Hawaii's tourism industry lags and to the reduction in revenue for the counties. Sen. Brian Taniguchi (D-McCully, Moiliili), chairman of the Economic Development Committee, said after the hearing that he would schedule a decision on the bill for Friday. He said he expects to receive more information on the plan today from members of the Economic Revitalization Task Force.

still looking at dramatic layoffs of city personnel within the next few weeks," Harris said. "We will be announcing that when we turn over our budget to the City Council on the first of March." Harris told reporters after his testimony that he could not say yet how many people would be laid off, or from what departments. Honolulu has 9,014 employees, according to the city's budget department. Harris said city officials hoped to "retire as many people as we can" and make other reductions through attrition. But "substantial layoffs" also would be part of the package, Harris said.

Hawaii's seven-year economic slump has been reflected in the city's budget figures. In December, Harris' administration said it would likely ask the City Council to increase real property tax rates in 1998 because property values on Oahu fell 5.4 percent in 1997, resulting in a decline in assessments of $5.3 billion for the 1998-99 fiscal year. The tax rate increase would be needed to keep the same amount of real property tax revenues coming as last year and to help head off a shortfall TV studio controls The camera relays the Image to a studio's master controls, where praphics or IDs are added if necessary. A copy of the image is recorded on a server instead of traditional videotape. Compression is key HDTV uses an encoder to compress data.

then estimated at $63 million, budget officials said. In his State of the City address in January, the mayor said he planned to reorganize city government by making city operations smaller, more flexible and less costly. He promised to unveil his plan "to drastically restructure the city's operations" this month. In his testimony before the committee yesterday, Harris also proposed having the city government collect the transient accommodations tax and use it to pay for city services that benefit tourists. Under this plan, the city also would take over operation of the Hawaii Convention Center from the state and pay off its debts.

Harris was one of several The complex compression algorithms predict and estimate motion of moving objects. The technology also looks forward and back in time to correct errors made in its predictions. Encoder compresses 1 1 010111010110100101011010000100 10101101OOO010OO111O01 00001 001 O1110010OOO1OO1O111OO10O0O1OO1 O111OO10OO01OO101O0O01OOO111O1 010111010110100101011010000100 101011010000100011100100001001 0111O0100O010O101110010OO01O01 011 1 001 00001001 01 00001 0001 11 01 '-10 1 eliminating 98' of binary code Television signal Drought: Wider area feels effects From the encoder, the information is modulated to the correct frequency. The modulated information is relayed up the transmitter to the station's antenna and sent out. FROM PAGE ONE 0 Passengers on the wave The modulator uses another compression technique to fit all the information on the transmission signal.

Digital: Station takes first step into TV's future FROM PAGE ONE and Television News Directors Foundation in Washington, D.C., affiliated with the Radio and Television News Directors Association. "How many digital television sets have you seen in somebody's home? None." Dramatic change Manufacturers showed off the first generation of digital sets in Las Vegas last month. The first TVs capable of actually receiving digital signals aren't expected to go. on the market until Christmas, at an estimated starting price of $3,000. Once digital transmissions land in Island homes, it will be as dramatic a difference as going from black and white to color, said KITV general manager Michael Rosenberg.

Maybe more like the introduction of videotape, said Greg Johnson, KITV's director of engineering. Or live broadcasts, said KITV news director Wally Zimmer-mann. Perhaps, Zimmermann said, it will equal all past television milestones combined. Already, KITV reporter Daryl Huff believes the broadcast picture quality is brighter and crisper because of the digital editing machines, digital videotape and digital cameras used to build their stories. What ends up on the air isn't purely digital, because of the analog broadcast signal, Huff said, but it's an improvement.

"All I know is that the picture that comes into my house is way better," he said. Kent Baker, general manager at KHON-Channel 2, noted viewers can decide for themselves by switching between neighboring cable channels 6 (KITV) and 7 (KGMB-9). "I'm not sure the viewer will see anything different until everybody has these new television sets," Baker said. Consumer pressure By 2006, the Federal Communications Commission wants all to replace their old analog signals with digital ones. So far only a dozen or so around the country are even close, Thalhimer said.

Some general managers of Hawaii's TV stations reflect general industry doubts the 2006 deadline will be enforced. But there will be pressure from consumers as they realize they'll have to buy new sets to take advantage of digital technology. "What price will the consumer be able to pay?" asked KHNL general manager John Fink. "When will the sets be available?" "Right now," said Baker, "the FCC is saying we're going to turn off television as we know it. That's not going to happen." KITV was the first station to receive a construction permit to make a digital commercial broadcast.

And it may become the first to get a digital license, which it expects in six months or so. Landmark move KITV's may be the most significant digital first of the past few years, according to Televi "'It's a life-threatening situation that is going to get worse." 0 AnaSog vs. digital HARRY KIM Cwtt Defense chw The modulator puts the digital Os and Is In distinct positions in time and space within the signal. The digital TV receiver can recognize only eight distinct strength (voltage) levels on the TV signal. This type of modulation.

called 8vsb, differs from the standard TV wave, which is received and interpreted at thousands of different voltage levels. Because of this difference, digital TV will have a much better, more consistent reception 0 Ho more snow Since the digital signal is more distinct than current analog -signals, it is not affected by obstacles such as tall buildings. There is no such thing as a snowy picture. With digital TVyou either get the whole signal or you get nothing. The picture can be picked up using home antennas by sets within about 50 miles of digital place homes and lives at risk.

Backyard burning has been banned for weeks. Like Maui officials, those on the Big Island have scheduled a special meeting today to discuss ways to cope with the drought. The Big Island has more than 15,000 people who depend on rainfall for their drinking, cooking and washing water. Many of them have run out of water and are either hauling 5 and 10 gallons at a time from free county spigots or are buying water from commercial haulers, paying $100 to $150 a load and waiting as long as three weeks for the haulers to get to them. "Tempers are getting short; the stress levels are getting higher each day," said Kim, who is working with police to keep the process calm.

Some people who live in areas without piped water are driving to Hilo to shower and borrow water from friends or relatives. But even Hilo, usually considered one of the country's wettest towns, is suffering, with only 0.14 of an inch of rain since New Year's Day about 1.2 percent of the normal amount. A week ago, Milton Pavao, Big Island water manager, placed about 2,000 homes in Ka'u, Puna and Hilo on restrictions, banning car and boat washing and lawn sprinkling. Farmers on the Big Island have been told to irrigate plants only from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.

Advertiser staff writers Robbie Dingeman, Ed Tanji and Jan Tenbruggencate contributed to this report. dick said water use in Upcoun-try Maui rose by 50 percent, to about 9 million gallons a day, after word spread that the board is considering restrictions. Garret Hew, manager of East Maui Irrigation said yesterday that ditch flows "have been steadily declining" and that Wailoa ditch was down to 27.9 million gallons, well below the capacity of nearly 200 million gallons a day. Lack of water in the Wailoa ditch means the Hawaiian Commercial Sugar Co. plantation must pump more water from its brackish wells in Maui's Central isthmus, increasing the cost of operations, a company spokesman said.

But higher-elevation fields cannot be irrigated with well water and the plantation has been forced to hold up replanting on some fields, he said. On Kauai, the state's biggest coffee plantation, Kauai Coffee has increased irrigation on dry coffee fields where pumped underground water is available. But the company is limiting irrigation where only surface water is available, because supplies are declining. Lyle Wilkinson, the firm's vice president of operations, said he is limiting the use of reservoir water because water levels at the company's big Alexander Reservoir, mauka of Kalaheo, are unseasonably low. Kauai Water Department manager Ernest Lau said he is noticing increased water use in 6 Demodulator 0 areas with high agricultural demand, indicating farmers are irrigating more to make up for low rainfall.

"We're going to be issuing an advisory next week to start making people aware of the need for water conservation," Lau said. On the Big Island, which has been hardest hit by the drought because of its reliance on rainfall, the drought is no longer an inconvenience. "It's a life-threatening situation that is going to get worse," Civil Defense chief Harry Kim warned yesterday. While he worries about ranchers and farmers who are already cutting back on crops and losing production because of too little water for their plants and animals, Kim said his biggest concern is runaway brush fires. A 400-acre blaze in lower Puna Thursday night kept firefighters busy around the clock.

The fire narrowly missed some rural residences. Kim said any carelessness, such as children playing with matches or unspent holiday fireworks, or a carelessly tossed cigarette, can When the transmitted information is received by a television, a demodulator separates the code from the signal. The digital code is passed along to the decoder. 1 5a 0 RaHroad switch The decoder acts as a switch operator, sending cars to their appropriate tracks. There are different cars for video, audio and auxiliary data.

Each car contains hundreds of bits of data. Much shorter cars called headers announce the arrival of each car. The decoder looks at this information and directs the following car on its way. Center J'V' a irnl ir re LESSONS ff OD A MONTH IS 1 HDSIC 593-2575 BANKRUPTCY Foreclosure STOP Garnishment Harassment KM FREE consultation. Low fixed fees.

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2221 524-4529 "Greg Dunn gels it done" ji Some digital televisions will be traditional picture tube sets. Others will be projection TVs. Because of HDTV's increased resolution, you will feel comfortable watching a larger set at the same distance you view regular TV. but your eyes will sweep back and forth across a 30-degree angle, compared with 10 degrees for regular TV. This, along with surround sound, will increase the reality effect.

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The station spent $15 million to set up its new headquarters at One Archer Lane, outfit it with state-of-the-art gear and install digital antennas in Hilo, Haleakala and Oahu. It was a move that put extra pressure on Hawaii's three other stations, said Michael Murrie, a professor in Southern Illinois University's radio and television department who has followed digital technology. "If I'm station and station goes digital, I have to think pretty seriously about how I'm going to meet that challenge," Murrie said. "Because in television, perception is everything. If the perception is that one station is more technologically advanced, it could be trouble." The general managers at Hawaii's three other stations said it made sense for KITV to convert to digital technology when it moved to One Archer Lane.

KHON will do the same when it moves into a new home within the next two years, Baker said. But none of the stations are in a rush to spend the $5 million to $10 million to go digital. "We're all gomg to get it eventually if we want to stay in Call for a FREE Phone Estimate: Dave MerriM, USA TODAY access separate signals at the same time: one might emphasize sports, another health features, a third weather. Or maybe the extra signals would be used more like the Internet, so viewers could watch the president's State of the Union address on the main channel and then call up articles on health care reform or tap into video libraries of previous speeches. In theory.

In reality, the programming doesn't exist yet. And it took KITV's Johnson several moments of punching buttons just to get up the second signal that KITV broadcasts digitally. After a few moments, the image finally came up. It was a color test pattern. the business," said Ray Depa, general manager of KGMB.

"That's the Jaw. We'll have to convert. But when? The marketplace will dictate a lot of that." Movie screen quality Digital technology is supposed to leave two distinct footprints on American television. The most obvious will be a new signal that will make the current squared-off televisions obsolete. They'll be replaced by sets designed more like movie screens, with exceptional picture quality.

The other will be the ability to send more information over the same broadcast. In theory, people watching a traditional local nevy broadcast could 942-8080 422-8080 263-8080 The Wedding Ring Shop Celebrate Your Love Ala Moana Cenir Street Level between Center Stage Malm-Market M5.77t I Americj'i Mild Service I The, Mai Jff.