2005-01 Disclosure of Exact Salaries OIP Opinion 05-03

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the Finance Department Budget Division provides the Council (and the public, since the Charter requires this document to be a public record) budget documents consistent with the aforementioned advisory. Our offices have also previously opined that such a practice is consistent with Section 92F-12(a)(14), Hawaii Revised Statutes, as amended (hereinafter "HRS"), which provides in pertinent part as follows: Any other law to the contrary notwithstanding, each agency shall make available for public inspection and duplication during regular business hours: The name, compensation (but only the salary range for employees covered by or included in chapter 76, and sections 302A-602 to 302A-640, and 302A-701, or bargaining unit [8]), job title, business address, business telephone number,job description, education and training background... O/P Opinion No. 05-03 At the onset, we note that much of the legal analysis in OIP Opinion No. 05-03 focused on the question of whether the Kauai County Charter provision requiring public disclosure of the budget (which contained the exact salaries of civil service employees)was repugnant to HRS Section 92F-12(a)(14). Section 19.02 of the Kauai County Charter (erroneously cited as "Section 9.02" in OIP Opinion 05-03), provides in pertinent part as follows: The proposed annual budget ordinance, consisting of the operating and capital budgets for the ensuing fiscal year, shall be prepared by the director of finance and submitted by the mayor to the council, together with a budget message and any proposed revenue measure, on or before the fifteenth day of March of each year. Similar requirements are found in Hawai'i County's Charter. Article X, Section 10-2 of the Charter (2000), provides in pertinent part as follows: No later than March 1 of each year, the mayor shall submit to the county council: (1) An operating budget for the ensuing year. (2) An operating program for the ensuing three fiscal years. (3) A capital budget for the ensuing fiscal year. (4) A capital program for the ensuing six fiscal years. (5) An accompanying message. Both Charter provisions are silent on whether the names and exact salaries of each County employee must be submitted to the Council. Apparently, on Kauai, the Council has requested this information, in the form of a "detailed