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Rhode Island and Delaware. It’s the same size as the State of Connecticut. They say
<br />really? I said really. So, we take limited services and try to deliver the services to small
<br />rural communities spread out of a large geographical area and there’s going to be other
<br />costs and challenges. So, when I take office, 2008, December, the County of Hawai‘i’s
<br />first year, we had a $38.1 million deficit. This fiscal year a $44.8 million deficit. Next
<br />year $38.8. That’s $121 million. Mind you I just came back from Honolulu this morning.
<br />I have to go back tonight. Why? That’s the last week of the Legislative session. Once
<br />again the state is talking about taking the county Transient Accommodation Tax, the
<br />TAT. That’s $18 million a year to the county. And if we were unsuccessful these last
<br />two years, you add$36 million on top of the $82.9, not counting the $38.8 next year.
<br />That’s $118 million down. You know, it’s no fault of anybody. You know, you never
<br />hear myself or this administration ever make an excuse, ever point a finger or ever
<br />blame anybody for this situation we find ourselves in. It is what it is. Our job is to
<br />reduce the size and the cost of government year in and year out. It’s the bottom line.
<br />We cannot continue to just raise revenue or ask people to pay more on services, for the
<br />services they receive. So what do we do? When I took office, the county budget was
<br />$403 million. Now the budget we submitted on March 1 was $366 million. That’s a
<br />9.2% decrease from when we took office. So every year we’ve cut in spite of the rising
<br />cost of healthcare. For example last year healthcare for 2600 employees increased
<br />23%. Gloria, healthcare, that’s just something you cannot control. But 23%? That’s
<br />phenomenal. You know, you budget 10, you budget 13% and then EUTF comes back
<br />with 23. The year before, same thing. You budget, you give your best estimate. You
<br />do a strategic analysis and you get blindsided. Higher fuel costs adds across to
<br />everything we do. But in spite of all of that we’ve been able to reduce both the size and
<br />cost of government. I’m very proud of that. When I first took office, the only staff we
<br />furloughed was myself and my executive staff, asked everybody to take a five percent
<br />cut. This past year, all county government employees took a 9.23% cut –a savings of
<br />$7 million to the county, two day a month furloughs.
<br />This next budget, of course you guys are aware collective bargaining continues to be
<br />negotiated. How it works is this employee representatives, county deals with four–
<br />HGEA, UPW, SHOPPO AND Fire, HFFA. On our employers side, we have four mayors
<br />and the governor. The governor has four votes, each mayor has one vote. Those are
<br />the votes needed, a majority is needed to move collective bargaining forward to one,
<br />pass the proposal across the table. A proposal cannot even be passed over unless
<br />there is some agreement between the employer bodies. Because we don’t have any
<br />final agreement, my budget, all we did was again, furlough myself and my executive
<br />staff. So we’ve done that all three years. I just feel that should be done through
<br />leadership. My first year in office we asked the Salary Commission, freeze all step
<br />movements. Our executive, nobody gets a step movement, because it’s not a
<br />promotion, it’s just steps. You have Step A, B, C, D, E, F, G for different salary ranges,
<br />SR-10, SR-12. We froze all of that. No step movements. So, my budget, just in the
<br />mayor’s office, in three years, when I took office in 2008, the mayor’s office budget was
<br />$2.2 million. The mayor’s office budget today is $1.3 million. It’s a 40% reduction. It’s
<br />not talk. That’s what has to happen. There’s just no way around that. In addition to
<br />reducing the cost of government, we have to reduce the size of government. And these
<br />are all unprecedented steps. You go back look at the budget, you’ve never seen three
<br />decreasing years in county government. And that’s going to continue. It’s going to
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