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HAWAII COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSIONPage 18 of 37
<br />BESS: Do you see a need for a public relations firm?
<br />YUEN: We did prepare a mailing about what was going to be, what was being proposed, and that was
<br />just done -. I think we hired somebody to -, just strictly for the graphic aspect of it.
<br />BETHEA: It was at the end, wasn’t it?
<br />YUEN: That was at the very end.
<br />BESS: Do you see that a public relations firm at an earlier point in time would have been helpful?
<br />BETHEA: I don’t.
<br />BESS: I guess -, so you see the function of a public relations firm as being one that, basically, puts out
<br />the message after the fact. All the work has been done, and it’s just kind of frosting on the cake.
<br />YUEN: Well, we were -, I think it’s -, it is part of the Commission’s responsibility to explain to the
<br />public what is being proposed in a neutral fashion, which is what we tried to do with a mailing, and not
<br />to -, the Commission is not pushing the set of amendments. The Commission has proposed them, but the
<br />Commission is not, you know, is not spending money to lobby the public to vote one way or another.
<br />It’s just -, it’s presenting a mailing that says, you know, if you vote yes on this, you’re going to get a
<br />single member district. That means we’re going to have nine districts that are going to be apportioned
<br />roughly, apportioned according to population of the Reapportionment Commission that sets it up. And it
<br />doesn’t go on to say, well, this is going to make the County run a lot better, blah, blah, blah. This is what
<br />it is. Do you want it? And go for it. I don’t think we -, you know, we didn’t spend a lot of money. I think
<br />we were required -, as I recall, there was some requirement that something like that be published.
<br />BETHEA: I think there was.
<br />YUEN: There is a requirement -.
<br />BESS: It needs to be published.
<br />YUEN: That an objective summary of the proposals be published in the paper, and that’s why this was
<br />prepared, and I think the Commission went the extra step of spending the money for a mailing that went
<br />out and -.
<br />On public relations, I’m not sure at an early stage what that would do, if it would -, because it’s -, it’ll
<br />kind of distract what the Commission is doing. And I don’t know, you know, people are not stimulated -.
<br />The people are really going to be interested are the people who read the paper and are -, keep up on
<br />things anyway, and I don’t know that by really trying to publicize your meetings very broadly, that
<br />you’re going to get, you know, really great input.
<br />BESS: Well, one of the things that has come up is that the Commission sees that there may be a need for
<br />educating the public as to what is going here, what this Charter Commission is all about, and providing
<br />them some background early on that might assist in getting people to come out. How do you react to
<br />that? Do you -? To what extent did your Commission feel that it had an education function early on, say
<br />prior to hearings or during the course of hearings, for that matter?
<br />BETHEA: I don’t remember. I think we were-, my impression is we were trying to gather as much
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