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MR. BALSIS: Mr. Cole?
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<br />MR. COLE: Yes, I believe I’ve been trying to bring this to the attention of this
<br />Board since November the 8th of 2008. Unfortunately, Chairman Dill is not here,
<br />or I’d remind him that currently there’s an ongoing investigation out of the State
<br />Attorney General’s Office and the Office of Information Practices identified as S-
<br />INVESTIGATION-G 10-1. As none of you would recall, because you weren’t
<br />here in June of 2009, I appeared before this Board only to find out that secret
<br />letters of extortion had been sent to Board members prior to my appearance, and
<br />apparently information confidential to this Board had been released to the public,
<br />where public statements were made prior to the Board. So in order to caveat this,
<br />I would like to ask any of you if you’ve received any letters of extortion or letters
<br />explaining or requesting you to make a certain decision, or if the decision has
<br />already been made prior to this meeting. This will be investigated and added to
<br />the current investigation as per my email from Linden Joesting, staff attorney of
<br />the OIP. Hearing none, I assume that you haven’t made your decision or decided
<br />to recuse yourself from this meeting. I come before you—it’s not a question, as I
<br />said before, of the criminal actions identified by Corporation Counsel Ashida.
<br />Corporation Counsel Ashida, in electronic verification of emails under the
<br />Uniform Information Practices Act, sent me the very documents of the issuance of
<br />the bonds, of the issuance of the IRS tax form exemption of bonds, identifying $3
<br />billion of refinancing bond series B, issued me—gave me the copies of the actual
<br />bond issued with the CUSIP number, bearing the signatures of Billy Kenoi and
<br />Nancy Crawford, the communications between Bank of Hawai‘i and County of
<br />Hawai‘i, bearing the signatures of Michael Okumoto, the treasurer. It must be
<br />noted that Michael Okumoto, prior to becoming treasurer, County of Hawai‘i, in
<br />2000 was a senior executive at Bank of Hawai‘i. In continuing, the question
<br />before this Board is one of ethics. Did Mayor Kenoi violate the Ethics Code by
<br />giving proprietary and sole proprietary access to assets of the people, identified
<br />as $10 million that was obtained through the verified and defined illegal actions
<br />by the very Corporation Counsel of the County of Hawai‘i? In verification, I
<br />questioned the very fact that this could not have happened. Mayor Kenoi could
<br />not have sold $10 million of series B bonds on March the 2nd of 2011 under the
<br />authorization of Bill 311, draft 3, because Bill 311, draft 3, had not been
<br />approved or authorized by the County Council. As required by the Charter, all
<br />sales of bonds must be authorized by the Council. In response, Mr. Ashida, in
<br />electronic verification, did in fact confirm that the $10 million bonds were in fact
<br />sold prior to being authorized by the County. That is not a question of a fact here
<br />whatsoever, okay? The question of the fact is, what value did the people of
<br />Hawai‘i get for this $66,000 they paid to Bank of Hawai‘i for the purpose of
<br />having that $10 million wire-transferred from Bank of Hawai‘i on March the 2nd
<br />of 2011 to the First Hawaiian Bank on March the 2nd into bank account—and
<br />here’s the exact deposit slip, here’s the exact bond sold, with the CUSIP
<br />registration number as on file and held in New York Mellon Bank, One Wall
<br />Street, Third Floor, Window 8, on March the 2nd, 2011, CUSIP number
<br />41969CAE6, with a maturity date of September the 2nd, 2011. On that very same
<br />date, the money, $10 million, was used to open a certificate of time deposit, First
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