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minutes 10-13-99Page 15 of 31
<br />PRANKE: Yes, and so is the Ethics Board. I don’t mean to belabor this but let me give you two
<br />examples about the Police Commission. First, when the current Police Chief was chosen back in ‘94, I
<br />believe, I’m not sure, but at a meeting just prior to his being chosen, we found out at a Police
<br />Commission meeting, I believe it was in Kona, that the Police Commission had turned all of the
<br />confidential folders of all of the police officers who were vying for the Police Chief’s job, to the Mayor.
<br />When we asked about this, one of the Police Commissioners said, well, I don’t see anything wrong with
<br />that. Turning over confidential records to the Mayor. The Mayor is not supposed to be in the process of
<br />choosing. We know, that in this case, the person that he wanted was chosen, and part of the reason was
<br />the rules were broken, and the rules were broken by giving these confidential records. This is in the
<br />Police Commission minutes. This is not me making it up. Now, the second thing that happened at the
<br />Police Commission at about that time was the Chairman and the Vice Chairman of the Police
<br />Commission attempted to slander Mr. Pierson and I before the rest of the Police Commission.
<br />Fortunately, we found a couple of letters that these two had written, under the Police Commission motto,
<br />on the Police Commission stationery, without the approval of the Police Commission. The Police
<br />Commission decided, for that reason, to get rid of these two guys, or not to re-elect them as Chair. But
<br />they were in the process of attempting to slander the people who came before them to bring the
<br />processes to them. This is clearly out of whack, and we need an independent Police Commission. The
<br />Police Department does a pretty good job here. There are a lot of dedicated police officers. My next door
<br />neighbor is one of them. But when I talk to them, I find out that there’s a lot of morale problems within
<br />the Police Department because of the things that are going on, and an independent, civilian Board of
<br />Review is what usually helps stop those problems. Now, the problems with promotions, that’s going to
<br />be something else. I don’t think that an independent Police Board is going to be involved in promotions
<br />at a higher level, but as far as getting police officers’ complaints heard, them having a place to go
<br />without violating the so called ‘code of blue’ would be a big help for morale, I believe. The Ethics
<br />Board has a situation. By rule of the Charter, each Board and Commission gets an officer, a lawyer from
<br />the Corporation Counsel’s Office. Whenever someone is brought before the Police Commission, the
<br />Board of Ethics, etc., etc., and they are an officer or an employee of the County, the Corporation
<br />Counsel’s Office sends a lawyer to advocate for them before the Board. If that happened in private
<br />practice, the judge would disbar the whole law firm for having people on both sides from the same law
<br />firm. That’s a problem that we have with the County Charter that needs to be remedied. One of the
<br />remedies is to move the Police Commission and the Ethics Board from under the Corporation Counsel’s
<br />Office. But you can’t remove all the Boards and Commissions and put them over in the County
<br />Prosecutor’s Office. The ones that I’ve talked about are only those that have oversight responsibilities,
<br />those four that I know of, but as I said, the problem with separation of powers gets to be a problem when
<br />you get to the Planning Commission and the Liquor Commission. But the Police Commission and Board
<br />of Ethics; there’s no problem with moving them and putting them under the Prosecuting Attorney’s
<br />Office.
<br />SANTANGELO: Mr. Chairman, just a quick comment.
<br />RAY: Okay.
<br />SANTANGELO: Del, it never ceases to amaze me how intelligent and dedicated people in the
<br />community are about their government. It makes you feel great, and this is a great proposal. One of the
<br />things I liked about what you said, and I agree, not that you said this, but you can’t legislate, you cannot
<br />dictate ethics. That comes from within. But we can lead. And independent Commissions, like this, that
<br />deal with a department that has to deal with the public the way it does, and I agree you, I sat with Curtis
<br />and John on the Council. This was a hard one because we know that police officers are under a lot of
<br />morale problems with all of this going on. They don’t want to see this stuff out there. But if we are able
<br />to help have better oversight. If we’re setting an example, at one level, that can hold other people and get
<br />through leadership, you draw others to a higher ground, so I appreciate this very much. Thank you very
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