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minutes 12-08-99Page 15 of 31
<br />SANTANGELO: So it occurs to me again, that you go back to the genesis, when you hire, you’ve got to have that condition
<br />written in. Okay, thank you.
<br />J. HERKES: And not that it’s not done by other counties. I think we might be very unique in this situation, to my knowledge,
<br />and that’s only from reading past minutes from other counties, and reviewing what they have asked of their Chief, and how
<br />he responds, the goals that have been set. We can’t compare apples to apples because, for instance, the Chief of Honolulu is
<br />hired for a five-year term unless otherwise, by the Commission. If he failed to do his responsibilities, they have that power to
<br />dismiss him. We don’t have that same ruling with our Police Chief here.
<br />SCHEELE: But, they just recently did that.
<br />J. HERKES: Yes, when there was a change of Police Chiefs.
<br />YUEN: I just wanted to ask a question. Apart from the area of discipline, can you give me examples of questions that you’re
<br />not allowed to ask, or not supposed to ask?
<br />SCHEELE: Well, we’re not supposed to ask about what happened to the money in Kona.
<br />YUEN: Okay.
<br />J. HERKES: Are you referring to when we submitted an evaluation sheet that Corp Counsel advised that, perhaps, some of
<br />those questions were in a gray area?
<br />YUEN: Yes. And I’m not trying to get anything that is, in itself, confidential.
<br />SCHEELE: No, but I have a form here. One of the things that we had on the evaluation form that we were going to use was it
<br />specifically says promulgates policies, procedures, rules, and regulations necessary for the organization and internal
<br />administration of the department, and reviews, analyzes, and revises the same. That was something that we were not to ask
<br />because it interferes with the administration.
<br />Plans, coordinates, and directs, through subordinate management supervisory personnel, the overall functions and activities
<br />of the line divisions. And, we had six of those listed; the Office of the Chief, the Intelligence Enforcement Unit, Internal
<br />Affairs, and we weren’t to ask that because that was administrative also.
<br />Directs the serving of processes and notices, both in civil and criminal proceedings. We couldn’t ask about that because that’s
<br />administrative. So, I’ve got five or six pages.
<br />SANTANGELO: So, you hire an administrator but you can’t ask about administration.
<br />SCHEELE: Yes.
<br />YUEN: You know, part of the awkwardness of my role as your attorney is that when you ask about whether things need to be
<br />changed in the Charter, to achieve certain results, it means that I have to give you an interpretation of what is allowed and
<br />possible under the present Charter. I am not a member of the Corporation Counsel Office, and as we’ve heard, attorney’s
<br />opinions about things can differ. However, I can give you an example of the way I think things are supposed to work under
<br />the present Charter and I think that perhaps the lines are not being drawn correctly.
<br />Let me give an example of some things that are clearly administrative, and which the Police Commission is not supposed to
<br />interfere in, just to take a couple of things. The use of sick leave and workers compensation in the Police Department: How
<br />much is being used, how the Police Department handles that; there’s really nothing for the Police Commission to actually do
<br />about that. Those are administrative matters. However, the Police Commission can certainly inquire of the Police Chief how
<br />much sick leave is being expended; how many workers compensation claims are filed; how many are granted; what the
<br />trends are in those matters. So, the Commission has the ability to inquire about a broad range of matters within the
<br />department, under the present Charter, and I don’t see how the Commission can do its job of deciding when to retain or fire
<br />the Chief without inquiring into matters like those kinds of things. I think that a Commission that’s evaluating a Chief of
<br />Police, just to take those as matters, might look at those things, and if there were a great increase in sick leave, which is
<br />sometimes an indication of morale, or great increases in workers compensation, they could use that as a factor that would be
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