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Transcript of Meeting of April 29, 2000Page 1 of 64
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HAWAII COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION
Transcript of Meeting of April 29, 2000
Waimea Civic Center
Waimea, Hawaii
Attendance: J. Ray, E. Alonzo, S. Bess, R. Higashi, S. Irvine (from 9:12 a.m.), D. Kurozawa, G. Martin,
J. Santangelo (from 9:18 a.m.), G. Yoshiyama, Counsel C. Yuen
Absent: K. Balog, M. Herkes
And 15 members of the public in attendance.
The meeting was called to order at 9:10 a.m.
RAY: I’d like to call the meeting to order. This is the 1999-2000 Charter Commission Special Meeting.
It’s Saturday, April 29th. We’re in Kamuela, Hawaii at the Waimea Civic Center.
Attendance. Commission members present at this time, myself John Ray; Chair; Roland Higashi, Vice
Chair; Eddie Alonzo; Stephan Bess; Dr. Daryl Kurozawa; George Martin; Gary Yoshiyama. And our
legal counsel, Chris Yuen is with us today and we’re expecting, I think, one or two more members.
So, we’re going to go ahead and proceed with Statements from the Public. Make sure you are signed up
to testify. We would like you to come up to the table and speak into the microphone. This is for
recording purposes. All these proceedings are recorded verbatim so please come up to the table. The first
person signed up to testify is Sandra Scarr, followed by Del Pranke.
SCARR: Good morning. Is this on?
RAY: Good morning. Yes, it’s not to amplify. It’s just to record.
SCARR: Okay. My name is Sandra Scarr. I live in Kailua-Kona. I am here with a group called CERG,
for equitable and responsible government. We feel very strongly that many of the recommended
proposed changes to the Charter are not favorable to better government in Hawaii, and they’re not
favorable to people who live on the West side, in particular. I would point out something, that has not
been discussed very much, that is very much on my mind, is that the position of Mayor has much too
much responsibility in the County Charter. Responsibility can also be translated to mean power, in that
the Mayor gets to appoint Commissions, and in the proposed changes, would appoint the Managing
Director. I think that we need changes that reflect more the elected representatives of the people in their
diversity across the island, and that means relying more on the County Council and less on the Executive
power of a Mayor. And I think we feel that you have not dealt adequately with that issue. And, in fact,
the proposed changes in the Charter amplify that problem. I would hope that you would reconsider that.
When we want representation of all the voters, we need to have less Executive power at the top, more
managerial expertise, and that’s why we would favor a stronger County Manager; one selected and
elected by the Council, not appointed by the Mayor.
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We’ve reviewed carefully the proposed changes. Now, I haven’t had time to read the most recent
language since I walked in the room, but assuming that the substance of the proposals is much the same
as it has been, there are, from our point of view, really some major problems. And one of the major
problems is the at-large Council elections. We feel very strongly that this removes responsibility and
accountability for representatives to their local electorate. We want government that’s responsible to the
citizenry, and the way we get that is by having locally elected representatives who represent the
diversity of interests in this island. We are not all the same. We do have different interests and at-large
elections have many disadvantages. One, they don’t represent any constituency, and two, to elect them
requires a fair amount of money to run an at-large election island-wide. This disadvantages minority
candidates. It disadvantages candidates who are not backed by special interests willing to contribute
substantial amounts of funds to a campaign. The last thing we want is for more special interests to
influence our politics on this island. So, we would really oppose at-large elections for several reasons.
One being they’re very expensive and would likely attract special interest money, but two, they don’t
really represent the local interests of our diverse community. And three, of course, we fear that the
majority electorate on the East side will, in fact, gather three more votes on Council. We don’t need that.
We really are very concerned about the delegation of authority from the Council, which is elected by the
people, to appointees by the Mayor, or appointees in departments. We do not want to see delegated
authority to those who are not accountable directly to the people. Therefore, we oppose changing the
Planning Department functions to allow them to act without Council authority, on their own, and we
certainly oppose the Planning Commission being able to make decisions about planning, zoning, and the
like. This is very much contrary to making government accountable to people. So, I really don’t
understand - I’ll speak for myself, I don’t understand how you could come to these conclusions that this
would make for better government in Hawaii. I think it makes for worse government in Hawaii.
Finally, I would say that we want the qualifications of Department Heads to be improved, not reduced.
And I haven’t read the details, now, of what have been put forward for the qualifications of Department
Heads when you sought to reduce engineering qualifications and substitute something else. But it seems
to me that we need better qualified people in government, not less qualified people in government, so we
would certainly oppose that.
So, if I may summarize quickly. It is that all of the moves the Commission is proposing, to remove
responsibility from elected officials, to remove representation from local constituencies, to concentrate
power in government at the top, are moves that we oppose vehemently. These are not moves for better
government. These are moves for worse government. So we would very much hope that you would,
between now and the time these proposals are final, take another look at this because we are very
concerned. Thank you.
RAY: Because of all the confusion and misunderstanding, that’s probably going to be the reason to drop
some of these. But just, sort of, to take advantage of Chris being here, and a civics lesson, let him
explain to you, especially in regard to the Planning Commission. These aren’t changes that change
anything in terms of the existing situation. They in no way, shape, or form, give more power to the
Planning Commission, but I’d like Chris to explain that.
SCARR: All right.
RAY: But we’ll probably drop them because people seem so confused about it.
YUEN: From 1968, when the County first had its Charter, until 1998, the section of the Charter that
discusses the Planning Commission said that the Planning Commission shall enact rules and regulations
having the force and effect of law. In 1998, along with some other changes that were made to the
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Planning Commission, which were actually more widely discussed, that section of the Planning
Commission powers was taken out. I’ve looked through the history of how this happened. This Charter
Amendment came through the County Council and this section of the Charter was removed between
draft 5 and draft 6, or draft 6 and draft 7, at the County Council level, and there’s not any explanation in
writing at the Council level why this was done, nor is there any other explanation that I’ve been able to
discover. The difficulty that this causes is that the Planning Commission does have rules and regulations
having the force and effect of law, and has had such rules and regulations for about 30 years. To give an
example of the kinds of rules and regulations that they have: The Planning Commission, their actual
powers deal with giving out several kinds of permits, and they’re empowered to give out these permits,
some of them by State Law as passed by the State Legislature, and some of them by County Laws,
passed by the County Council. They have the power to give out SMA permits which are in the shoreline
area. There’s a special permit which is in the Agricultural District, and on the County level, they have
the power to give out something called a Use Permit, where certain uses are generally not allowed in
zone, but can be allowed with a Use Permit. To give you an example of a Use Permit; in a residential
district, if someone wants to put in a church, the Zoning Code, which is passed by the County Council,
says that you can put a church in a residential district but you need a Use Permit from the Planning
Commission in order to get that. So, the Planning Commission has some rules that implement how you
go about applying for, and receiving, permits like this. At really roughly the same time that this Charter
Amendment was being considered, the County Council, in 1996, passed a new version of the Zoning
Code and it said that the Planning Department had the power to enact rules to implement the Zoning
Code, and this was reenacted in 1999 when the Zoning Code was reenacted. So, from strictly a legal
point of view, you have a little bit of confusion here as to whether the Planning Commission has this
power or not. If the Charter had always simply been silent on having this as a power, the Planning
Commission certainly would have the power to enact rules and regulations because both the State
Legislature and the County Council could give them this power on their own, and they have given them
this power through ordinances and State laws that have been put in place. So, that was the purpose
behind putting this back in the Charter, was to eliminate any confusion, or any doubt, that the Planning
Commission might have this power. On further review, and I wrote a letter to the Charter
Commissioners, I don’t think it’s necessary to do this. I think the Planning Commission has the power
without it being in the Charter because I don’t think the intent of the 1998 Charter Amendment was to
forbid the Planning Commission from having the power to enact rules and regulations. I think it was the
intent to not have it be mandatory anymore because it used to say they ‘shall’ enact rules and
regulations. They just, basically, took out that part of it. But I’ve spent a little time trying to - I wrote,
perhaps, too long a letter to the Charter Commissioners going through all of this, but that’s, basically,
the explanation of what was trying to be done by putting this back in the Charter.
SCARR: Chris, our major objection is that the Planning Commission is appointed by the Mayor, not
appointed by the County Council, and that there is very little local input sought or received by the
Planning Commission. We have, many of us in this room, testified many times before the Planning
Commission and been ignored over and over and over again.
RAY: I understand that. That’s really a separate issue from what has been proposed as far as the Charter
Amendment. I just wanted Chris to clarify that, explain it. We are going to take it off so I hope that
pleases you, but I’m saddened that folks don’t take the time to really understand how the process really
works. So, I just wanted to have him speak to that issue again, and we certainly understand your
concerns in regard to other issues regarding the Planning Commission.
SCARR: Thank you.
RAY: The next person to testify is Del Pranke.
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PRANKE: My name is Del Pranke. I live in Pahoa. I’m really sorry you made that last statement, Mr.
Ray, because those of us who don’t understand what’s going on have made an effort to understand, and
sometimes the legalities are not that easy for non-lawyers to understand, but some of us have made an
attempt to understand.
RAY: I agree with you, Del. I was on the Council that voted to delete this in the last Charter
Amendment and I, obviously, didn’t understand at that time, and that was my direct responsibility.
PRANKE: I know. You just made a statement. I understand. That’s not the problem. A lot of us don’t.
The way I see number 10 and number 14, in essence, the Planning Board of Appeals would no longer
have any power because under the Corporation Counsel they would just be a mouth piece for the Mayor,
and the Planning Commission powers, as I see, giving them the force and effect of law for Special
Management Areas is going to reduce their protection for our shoreline. But that’s neither here nor there.
I wanted to talk about several of these items that you have here. I tend to agree with Sandra concerning
her testimony, but I also want to suggest that one way to help the folks on the West side might be to
change your situation with the County Managing Director to provide for two County Managing
Directors, one for each side of the island. Everybody talks about two Mayors. Maybe we don’t need two
Mayors. Maybe we need two Planning Directors.
RAY: Planning Directors or Managers?
PRANKE: I’m sorry, Managing Directors. Excuse me. County Managing Director. One for each side of
the island, because if you look in the Charter, many of the important parts of the County government
come under the Managing Director. He’s still responsible to the Mayor, but that’s a possibility.
I’m against number 13, Special Counsel. If the Corporation Counsel has a conflict of interest, then
having them appoint an attorney is a conflict of interest. The County Council should appoint -
Somebody needs to appoint a special counsel, and they have the authority to do that. If the Corporation
Counsel has a conflict of interest, and God knows, they seldom know when they do, if they have a
conflict of interest, they should not be appointing an attorney to handle a situation where they have a
conflict of interest. Any law firm in the country would be disbarred for doing such a thing. Corporation
Counsel, especially in this Administration, has gotten away with a lot of stuff that lawyers should be
disbarred for. So, I’m against having the Special Counsel be appointed by the Corporation Counsel.
As I’ve said, I’m also opposed to having the Board of Appeals moved to the Office of the Corporation
Counsel. As I’ve talked to you before, the Board of Appeals is an oversight committee. Now, Mr. Yuen,
you just went through this and, being a lawyer, you had an advantage. You were able to go to court and
argue because the Board of Appeals, a politically appointed Commission, failed to follow the law. You
had to go to court to make them follow the law. Most citizens, or some of us, don’t have the wherewith
all, or the ability, to argue that in court. The Board of Appeals is an oversight committee, and like the
Police Commission, like the Ethics Board, they should not be under the Mayor. They should come under
the Council, and the Council should appoint one member from each district for each of those
Commissions; the Police Commission, the Ethics Commission, and the Board of Appeals - it should be
called the Commission of Appeals, as we talked about before, should be appointed by the Council
members. It’s an oversight committee. It’s an oversight situation where they’re supposed to overview,
for the citizens, what the Administration is doing. Remember, most of the times we have Mayors who
have not been elected by a majority of the people, and someone with a minority of the vote should not
have control over a majority without some kinds of checks and balances. And the checks and balances
are these oversight boards. The Police Commission, the Ethics Board and, at least, the Planning Board of
Appeals should all be oversight Commissions placed under the County Council with the Council
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appointing one member from each district. The person coming under the oversight shouldn’t be
appointing these people. It just makes sense.
I’m against putting in a Fire Commission until we get the Police Commission settled. If we have a Fire
Commission, which should also be an oversight committee, appointed again by the political body that
it’s supposed to oversee, again we have the problem of no real oversight. So, on those particular items,
that’s how I would like to see it go.
I gave you the proposed changes that I had the last time. We met with Citizens for Justice and they
agreed that we can represent these as the will of Citizens for Justice. They are in favor of the proposed
changes that I put in to you. The change that would allow any officer of the County to be impeached.
And again, we have right here on this board, a situation where that - Mr. Alonzo and Mr. Balog hadn’t
been here since September. This is the first meeting that Mr. Alonzo’s come back, and even though
you’re from my district, I think you should exempt yourself from voting because I’ve been to more
meetings than you have since September, and I don’t know enough about this to be able to vote. If Mr.
Balog and Mr. Alonzo weren’t going to come to the meetings for a long period of time, they should have
withdrawn, or the Mayor should have had the Council take them off of this Commission and appoint
new people who would come to the meetings. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen because of politics. If
we were able to impeach Officers of the County, we would have been able to impeach those folks and
have new people put on who would have been here to the meetings.
The conduct of the employees. I was glad to read in the paper that you were considering that a lie would
be a violation of the Code of Ethics. I appreciate that. I’m calling that the Coco Pierson Amendment.
And fixing this part of the Charter where the records and meetings are open to the public, where the
Charter has been construed in violation of the State Law, the Sunshine Law. I think that’s an important
thing to fix.
Thank you for your time and listening to me.
SANTANGELO: I have a question.
RAY: Okay. Mr. Santangelo.
SANTANGELO: Del, just help me with a little bit of the separations of power thing here. One thing I
don’t like to try to buy into is this thing that everybody’s crooks and that everybody’s messing with
everybody, but we have to set our government up, and our government should be set, for checks and
balances so that we move forward in the most open way. So, when it comes to County Council
appointing, can you help me, where you’re coming from in terms of how that strengthens our
separations of power, when we look at Legislative, Executive and Judicial?
PRANKE: Sure. Well, as Sandra said, we have a strong Mayor and we all know that, and I’m not
necessarily saying we should change that. It would take a whole major change of the Charter. However,
when the Charter was set up there was no separation set up for oversight committees. These are not
committees who make policy. These are committees; the Ethics Board, the Police Commission, the
Board of Review, and if you put in a Fire Commission, those would be oversight committees designed
to oversee, for the public, what the politicians are doing. Now, even if they’re not crooks, and I’m sorry
to use that term - Even if what’s going on is untoward, there can be mistakes made, as I think might
have been the case here with Mr. Yuen’s case, where it was not easy to determine whether a problem
had occurred. And in that case, a Board that oversees these things should be as neutral as possible. Now,
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having one person appoint all those people - It’s true that Council does approve or reject people, but it
never does it. It seldom does. Mr. Balog is the only one that’s ever been rejected by the Council, as far
as anybody can remember. The Council doesn’t reject them. Now, Council person Tyler has been
subjecting appointees to much more scrutiny lately, but generally they’re going to pass if the Mayor has
put them out there. I’m saying that for Boards and Commissions which are oversight, the idea of having
more than one person appoint those Boards and Commissions makes them more likely to be unbiased in
a politic sense.
SANTANGELO: So, then I’m going to re-frame it in my mind and see if you agree with it. Then we
have a Legislative policymaking body. We have an Executive Branch that has to carry out the day-to-
day operation of our County and implement this policy. So these oversights aren’t overseeing the
Council, and they’re not really overseeing the Mayor, but they’re overseeing the effect of that
Administration.
PRANKE: As a general rule.
SANTANGELO: I don’t want to go into particulars, but is this what you mean in an overview? Is this
basically what we’re looking at, or am I mistaken?
PRANKE: Oversight? Yes. The Police Commission only overlooks activities by the Executive Branch
so, for me, that’s a no brainer. The Ethics Board could oversee things that happen on the Council, but as
a general rule, they’re usually only overseeing things that have to do with the Executive Branch.
However, they would have a little bit of a conflict of interest there. But being appointed by different
members, and perhaps if the terms were five years, they might carry over and might not have been
appointed by the people there.
The Planning Board of Review. Again, the Planning Commission is the arm that works for the Mayor, or
that works to implement what is supposed to be best for the community under the control of the Mayor.
But the Planning Board of Review should be the citizens court without having to go to court and actually
pay all the legal fees and lawyer fees to have whatever the Planning Commission decides overlooked.
SANTANGELO: Okay. But we are predominantly overlooking the effect of government on the people.
Okay, so having the Council appoint that, there is a slight conflict you see there and yet, this would be
the policy helping to oversee the Administration part of it.
PRANKE: Yes.
SANTANGELO: And I do agree that the more people that you have involved in that, probably the
greater the mess. But sometimes I get confused in what’s theoretical and what really works practically.
And you’re a pretty common sense person in that. In the case of the Planning Commission, if that was to
happen - Again, I come from an opposite viewpoint. I’ve worked with people like John Ray and other
politicians. I know them to be very upstanding people, so generally we’re trying to do better for the
people. So in the case of a Planning Commission where you have to have a certain amount of dedication
and expertise and wherefore all, it appears that the smaller the group, the more you could choose that.
On the other hand, the larger the group, generally the better diversification you get. With that in mind,
you would still think that we could get a good Planning Commission that would really work well for the
island if the Council was appointing them?
PRANKE: No, I wouldn’t have the Council appoint the Planning Commission. The Planning Board of
Appeals is what I would have the Council appoint. The oversight committee.
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SANTANGELO: Okay. Thank you.
PRANKE: I’m sorry I didn’t make myself clear. Only the Planning Board of Appeals, the Ethics Board
and the Police Commission, the Fire Commission if that were the case, and possibly the Liquor
Commission, but I’m not so sure that’s quite an oversight Commission.
SANTANGELO: Thank you, Del. Thank you.
RAY: Sue, did you have a question?
IRVINE: I did. You’ve talked before, I think, about this records and meetings open to the public.
PRANKE: Yes.
IRVINE: I have a piece of paper here and I think it came from Mr. Wurdeman. I’m sorry I’m not
positive, but he’s suggesting that Section 13-20 is not entirely consistent with the State Open Meetings
Law. That law adequately covers this area and the present Charter requirements should be replaced by
an incorporation with reference to State Law. Do you know, yourself, Del, or does our attorney know
how we’re in noncompliance in our Charter? Or does Del Pranke actually agree with Mr. Wurdeman on
something here?
PRANKE: It’s actually at the bottom of page 30 of your Charter. It says ‘where personal matters
effecting the privacy of an individual are to be considered, the Council -
IRVINE: Right. Okay.
PRANKE: The Sunshine Law says that a person can ask to go into Executive Session, but the Board or
Commission must then make a determination in an open session, and because they’re making a
determination of a major matter in an open session, it should go into the minutes. If you look at the
Police Commission minutes and agendas, they just willy-nilly. If a police officer says I want to go into
Executive Session, that’s it. They make no determination. I called them on it in this room at the last
Police Commission meeting and they said, well, to heck with you. Go to some other court. So I will. I’ll
go to the Office of Information Practices.
IRVINE: I understand now. Wurdeman was talking about Section 13-20(a) and you were talking about
13-20(b). Different problems.
PRANKE: I don’t know about (a). I hadn’t thought about that. I’ll look at it another time.
YUEN: Are you asking me?
IRVINE: Yes.
YUEN: Briefly. The State Open Meeting Sunshine Law has some exceptions for Boards and
Commissions to go into a private meeting which are not contained in the County Charter. Back in the
late ‘70's this was taken to court by the Big Island Press Club and, I believe, it was Judge Nelson Doi. I
mean, we are talking a long way back, and Judge Doi put out a ruling that said that where the County
Charter was more restrictive of going into private meetings, you had to follow the County Charter. The
State Law basically says that the County can have a more restrictive policy against letting the Boards go
into private meetings than are contained in the State Law. I can’t really answer for the practice of all the
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Boards and Commissions in the County. Judge Doi made this decision, and actually it’s in the form of
an injunction, that the County follow the Charter, and that’s, I think, still in force and effect. Despite the
passage of time, I don’t think there’s anything that caused it to no longer be in effect. It does create a
confusing situation because people will look at the State Law and say you can do that under State Law,
and then people will look at the County Charter and say, well, you can’t do that under the County
Charter. Mr. Wurdeman’s suggestion is that the Charter just follow the State Law so you don’t have to
jump back and forth from one to the other, and I think that’s about the gist of it, the situation where it
stands.
PRANKE: To me, I believe that this particular part of 13(b) was an attempt to do that, to follow that, but
it got confused in the writing, because it does use some of the terms. But when a person says they want
to go into Executive Session, that doesn’t mean that they go into Executive Session. The Boards and
Commissions still have to use the State Law which says that they must make a determination in an open
session that there’s a reason to go into Executive Session, and that has to be in the minutes because
they’re making the determination in an open session, and it’s a major item. It’s an item that would
normally be in the minutes. The problem we have is that several times, Corporation Counsel, giving
advice to the Ethics Board, and once to the Police Commission, has said we’re following the County
Charter. We’re not following the State Law. And that’s not right because the County Charter here, when
interpreted the way it has been interpreted by the Corporation Counsel in the past, is less restrictive than
the State Law, and so it does not meet the Judge’s requirements. Going into Executive Session just
because somebody asks you to should not be allowed, and because of this confusion, that’s what’s
happened. We’re going to get this straightened up with the OIP but it would be just as nice to have it
fixed in the Charter. Thank you.
RAY: Next to testify is Walter Kriewald followed by Pete Martin.
KRIEWALD: Hi. My name’s Walter Kriewald and I live in Kona, and what I just gave Mr. Ray was a
printout I did, a spread sheet of where the Charter Commission meetings have been held, the attendance
and the sad lack of attendance on some people and the sad lack of meetings in Kona. I also gave him
some figures I got from the web which, I think, go to the heart of the proposal to go to 6-3
representation. These are the receipts and the expenditures by the Council in the last election. Mr.
Arakaki spent over $70,000 running unopposed. To me, this is obscene. If you go to a 6-3 make-up,
what you are doing is disenfranchising three more voters, or three more places on the Council. I’ve gone
back and read all the minutes that I can stay awake reading and it seems that the preponderance of
testimony before this Commission has been for a single - if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And what we have
right now with our single Council districts isn’t broke in my estimation. I think it’s definitely in the
public interest that we keep what we have. And going back through the old minutes, the theme I picked
up of why you wanted to go to a 3 at-large candidates were to keep a holdover and a continuing
experience in the Council. As you all know, there were only two Council people defeated who elected to
run in the last election, and I think this is the way the people want it. They want the ability to say hey,
we elected you. We want a change. And I think if you go to a 6-3 with the three having four-year terms,
and not accountable to their districts, we’re in for trouble.
I would like to see a really strong County Manager type of government. When I broached this subject to
Mr. Ray and Ms. Herkes, Ms. Herkes’ response, well, you know how much these people are going to
cost. And I know they cost a great deal of money. A lot of them are well over $150,000. But what we’ve
wasted, in my estimation, on the Police scandal, we could have paid a County Manager for 20 years with
what’s down the drain in that. We need to pay to get qualified people. I think if you go to the mainland
and get a qualified person who wouldn’t be susceptible so much to the inside politics of this island, and
let them run for a year or two, you might have surprising results. You might have bad results too.
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I think, going back to Mr. Pranke’s, I think all Commissions should be appointed by the Council. It
necessarily isn’t going to change the outcome but I think if you get a diverse point of view. In other
words, the Mayor doesn’t appoint, and obviously we’re going to get a different Mayor, but I think you’d
get a diverse group of people that will look at things. You might have one or two Green Party people.
You may have three Democrats. You may have three Republicans. The names really don’t mean that
much here, but the direction the people are coming from makes a great deal of difference, and I think
you would have a much broader spectrum of the island than the Mayor, no matter who the Mayor is,
appointing all the Commissions.
The lowering of the standards for offices I just don’t understand. You can claim you don’t need to be a
qualified engineer to run this or that department.
RAY: It’s a registered engineer.
KRIEWALD: A registered engineer. Every position has qualifications and I think you have to have
some minimum standard. I think that’s where our school system’s gotten in a lot of problems.
Going back to the Commissions, like, almost every Commission you go to, you see the same people
recycled through Commission, Commission, Commission, and having the Council people would be a
very fresh approach to that.
Unless you, I think, come out with much better proposals to put on our ballot, we’re going to essentially
waste a hundred and thirty thousand bucks that this thing has cost. I think the people want to vote on
something, and only maybe four or five items that they really want. I think you need to keep it simple.
People reading - I don’t know where you’re at in your synopsis of this, but I think, Mr. Ray, that you
should hold up to what you wrote in your letter, and that’s listen to the people. We want fewer items.
We want easily readable items. And we want to vote on them. And I think you should listen to the
presentation that has been given to this Commission.
Two things on the upside. The website, I think, is just great and Sharron is just great. You have to be
commended for that. Thank you.
RAY: Thank you. Roland.
HIGASHI: I just have one question. If the Council were to appoint any Commission, and you spoke of
several, would that have to be confirmed by the fellow Council people, or would it be non-vetoed? I
mean, what do you envision exactly?
KRIEWALD: I would envision that each Council person gets to appoint and they’re accountable to the
people that put them in office. If the people that put them in office don’t like the people that they’re
putting in the Commission, two years they’ll be gone. That’s the way I’d like to see it done, but that’s
my personal opinion.
RAY: Mr. Santangelo.
SANTANGELO: I believe one of the problems that we have with appointments of Commissioners and
things, and I doubt if it’s applicable to you, but we have an influx of population and so often it’s their
snapshot of how things are in their experience in being in a certain community, or environment, and
that’s the way it’s always been and always will be because that’s how they’ve seen it. We are changing
Mayors. I mean this next election is exciting in terms of there will be a tremendous amount of change.
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With that in mind, and the Commissions appointed by Council, would you envision a Council member
making recommendations such as the Mayor, but then being voted on by a two-thirds, or just a simple
majority, of the Council for confirmation? Because these people do, again, effect an island-wide base.
Do you have a problem with that?
KRIEWALD: The problem I have is that a lot of the Council people in the, God knows how many,
meetings I’ve been to, seem not to listen to the Council representatives in the area it effects. The
Kahakai mess is the most recent one. We had five Council people that were coming out. I don’t want to
sound like I’m dividing the island, but they said we don’t care what the local citizens want. This is what
we want and this is the way it’s going to be. And we had 130 people there saying give us a say, and we
got nothing. And I feel that if Mr. Tyler, or if Mr. Arakaki, wants to appoint Joe Smith, let him be
accountable for Joe Smith. Why should the other Council people, who know nothing about Joe Smith,
have a say in it? That’s my personal opinion.
SANTANGELO: That’s what we do with the Mayor. He appoints people and those Council members
have something to say.
KRIEWALD: I wrote many letters about this Commission, to be perfectly honest. Ms. Herkes does not
represent West Hawaii. She does on this Commission, but she doesn’t in my heart, and I think the heart
of West Hawaii. Every Commission meeting, every Council meeting I’ve ever been to, she has spoken
against the majority of the people from West Hawaii, yet she is on this Charter Commission representing
West Hawaii. That is a farce.
SANTANGELO: You’re correct in saying that there’s been an overwhelming amount, in terms of the
people who’ll show up here and talk to us, or write us, and you’ll have to admit, a very small minute part
of the whole island, but these are the people who are getting off their duffs and coming in there, have
objected to that 6-3 Council. But I would hope to instill a little other light on what you got out of the
minutes. I, for one, do favor that, having served on the Council. The reason I favor that - and I may well
vote to take it off because of the input, so I want you to understand that - is for me, it was creating the
closest thing you could have to a bicameral. And in this country, we really failed at democracy coming
out of the Revolutionary War because we didn’t have any checks and balances. A Senate was
established to check and balance this House, and the way we elect the House, and the way our emotions
effect that. And what I saw on the Council was I saw what I felt was bad legislation due to a fact that we
didn’t have people there that were responsible and accountable to a broader base. Now, there was
hybrids to that, and I would hope you’d be as open minded as you ask us to be. I mean, that really is a
prerequisite. Some of us looked at Senate Districts and said well, could we make that a smaller
subdivision then. And I don’t even know if the four-year was important to me so much as a greater base,
so that when Mr. Tyler brought something up, there would be three other people who were accountable
for that constituency. Now, that was my reasoning and that was the only thing behind my reasoning.
Again, I do have to admit, you’re very correct in that we’ve had very little, if no, support for that.
KRIEWALD: The bad part about this, and I hate to get in this side vs. that side, but the other thing that
was told to me by Mr. Tajiri when we had him speak, and Ms. Herkes, again, was Kona’s getting all the
new population and therefore, you will control the three at-large seats and dah, dah, dah. The people that
are coming into Kona, very few of them vote. All the high end stuff on Kohala does not vote. When we
started our mess with Bishop Estate, Keola Childs told me, he said you know, you’re talking, you have
15 registered voters in Keauhou. What are you coming to me for? It means nothing. We don’t have the
votes, and we won’t have until we get a substantial infrastructure of people there, that live there and
want to vote. There are a lot of people that even live there full time but still keep their residency
somewhere else for tax reasons. We aren’t going to get the big, broad base of votes.
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SANTANGELO: Well, you’ve giving me some hope here so I have to ask this question. So, your
objection isn’t that it isn’t good government. Your objection is it wouldn’t be someone that you feel
would be beholden to you?
KRIEWALD: My feeling is that if you go 6-3, you’re going to end up with something that cannot be
changed. In other words, we’re very close, I feel, and I say we’re very close – We’ve very close to
getting a Council, and hopefully in the next election, that will listen to people in different districts and
vote for the good of the island instead of the good of a particular place. And I think if you go 6-3, you’re
going to essentially destroy that opportunity because you may say that the three at-large candidates are
going to be beholden to the whole island. That’s what the Mayor is. He’s elected over the whole island
and, God knows, he’s not beholden to a lot of districts. You have to keep a small a group as possible and
say we elected you here. We want you to do this and you are accountable.
SANTANGELO: Just one last statement. I always like to get in hot water. The thing that frustrates me
about all of this is you’re right about the vote. The rule of thumb has been 50% of a population registers,
and 50% of that votes. But in that crisis is the opportunity that if we, the people, would get off our butts
and get out there, and talk to our neighbor, any district in Kona could control any island-wide election
because they met, talked and moved. We just don’t do it. But, you’re right.
KRIEWALD: I sat in front of Wal-Mart registering people, and what you get is my God, I’m not going
to register. I’ll have to pay taxes here. I’m sorry. That’s the story. Thank you.
RAY: Okay, thank you, Walt. Pete Martin, followed by Marshall Blann.
PRANKE: I think that the vast majority of you folks have done a good job of working real hard, and
while some of us are opposing some of these things, it’s not because we don’t realize you’ve done a lot
of work.
COMMISSIONERS: Thank you.
RAY: Okay. Pete.
MARTIN: Good morning. My name is Pete Martin. I’m from Kailua-Kona, and I’m a representative of
CERG, Citizens for Equitable and Responsible Government. Walt just spoke to you about the three at-
large and I know that some people may feel that we’re beating a dead horse, but I would like to answer
Mr. Santangelo. That good government is not me and thee separated by distance. Good government is
what is fair and equitable for everybody. Now, let’s just say that five years down the road, that Kona has
more people than Hilo. Should we then control the agenda and leave Hilo out? I don’t think so. That’s
not the way to put our island together. The way to put our island together is to make sure that everybody
is properly represented. So we are adamantly opposed to it. Now, I hear you very loud and clear about
bicameral government. And if we truly want a bicameral government, then lets have one. If we want to
have a House and Senate at Hilo, that’s fine, let’s do that, but let’s not correct what’s beginning to work
finally. It’s finally beginning to work. We’ve very close to having a Council that actually represents this
entire island, so we shouldn’t foul that up now, at this point. So what I would like to say to you is if you
think a bicameral government is a really good idea, then let’s go for it.
SANTANGELO: Don’t saddle them with it. That’s my statement, so don’t saddle them with it. And I
use that phrase to describe it.
MARTIN: Okay. And so therefore, that’s why we feel so strongly. I did appreciate your editorial, Mr.
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Ray. Thank you for responding to us. I would like you all to know that we really and truly have a lot of
activity in Kailua now. You said if the people would get together. CERG has a hundred members now
and is growing every day. We are here not to be under your skin, or under the skin of government, so
much as we are here to insist on good government. We’re going to be under everybody’s skin until we
get it. I think all of you got some petitions sometime back from Patty Kealoha, and basically I won’t go
repeat what everyone else here has said this morning. But I would like you to remember that you did get
petitions from CERG and what those petitions have stated, and I thank you for your attention.
RAY: Thanks Pete. You brought up this back - I just can’t resist speaking to this again, this requirement
in regard to changing the job criteria for the Head of the Public Works Department, Water Department;
eliminating the certified engineer. I spoke very strongly in favor of that, and really what’s behind that -
And it was not the Administration at all. In fact, as I pointed out in that Letter to the Editor, that the
Administrative response has been pretty much entirely opposed to that. But it was really that those types
of jobs are really more administrative in nature, and that we needed someone with a strong
administrative background. If you look at who runs business and corporations in America, it’s people
with the strong administrative backgrounds, with the business backgrounds. And I discussed this with a
number of folks that function in those positions, not only Hawaii but elsewhere, and they, pretty much,
philosophically agree with me in terms of the nature of the job. So we weren’t trying to dilute the
professional credentials, but in order to get away from, sort of, a cookie cutter engineering approach vs.
a wider skill set managerial type of outlook. But I think, because of your reaction and most everybody’s,
that’s something that we’re going to pull. But anyway, I just wanted to explain where I was coming
from.
Okay, Marshall. I’m sorry, how do you pronounce your last name?
BLANN: Blann, and I’m from Holualoa and I have just a few comments. That is, I would hope that
anytime the Charter gets revised, be it by referendum or by this committee every ten years, that the goal
be to make the elected officials more accountable to the citizens, rather than less accountable and a lot
more insulated and more prone to abuse. That was a polite certain locution. I hope that’s all right. I think
that we want the appointed officials be made, if anything, more competent and not less competent, or in
some cases, I think our feeling has been incompetent.
And then in regards to impeachment, I’d like to see the 100 signature requirement left. This has not been
abused. If anything, I think, it’s been under-utilized.
I’d like to see the referendum and recall numbers reduced. I think, for referendum it’s 20% and I think
that’s nearly impossible to get that number of signatures the way people are spread around the island.
I think having the members at-large makes it more difficult for the citizens to have their feelings and
voices heard. I think that’s not what we want in government.
My personal choice would be, as Mr. Martin has suggested in the last minutes of this meeting that I read,
that the cities be allowed to incorporate on the island. That may not be something that you’re able to do.
This island is growing very rapidly and we’ve seen it’s difficult for people in Hilo who really refuse to
even drive over to the other side to see the site which is involved in some dispute or issue, make the
decisions. It’s better that each community be able to have their own Boards for zoning, their own
budgets from their own tax base as a part of the total tax take, so that they can make those decisions
more wisely. So my first choice would be to permit cities to incorporate as they wish, and communities
on the island.
If that’s not possible, my next choice would be a professional County Manager form of government. I
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would like that manager to be appointed by an independent, nonpartisan committee of professionals who
might submit three names of three candidates to the County Council, and then they might vote. And then
the County Council might be able to remove that person with at least, say, a two-thirds majority of the
vote.
The question of the at-large delegation has been adequately discussed and I agree with, what I think,
you’ve all heard on that. Let me say that to take a unicameral system and further load it, does not make
it a bicameral system. So, again, I agree that if you want a bicameral system, that’s fine. But it’s not the
same as a stacked unicameral system.
I think that’s basically what I had to say. Thank you very much.
RAY: Thank you. Sue.
IRVINE: Could I just make one comment? Several people have talked about us lowering standards for
our appointed Department Heads, and that’s absolutely not what we had in mind when we were trying to
say we wanted managerial expertise rather than the engineering, which I think John addressed. But I just
wanted to make it real clear that we thought we were helping things become more professional rather
than less. We do not have, according to what we understand, the ability to incorporate cities in our
County. The State has to allow us that power. As far as the County Manager situation, we looked into
that at great, great length and a county of this size and this unwieldiness does not, apparently, lend itself
well to a County Manager form of government.
BLANN: I think I would agree and that’s why I’d like to see the cities incorporate because that’s the
way you’ll get responsive government. On the other point, I mentioned that I hadn’t done a national
survey, but I noticed that Bill Gates is the head of Microsoft and Andy Grove heads Intel and they both
got the professional qualifications for the businesses they’re running.
KUROZAWA: Can I comment on that? Just to let you know, actually, that Bill Gates did not graduate
from college.
I was going to make a quick comment because we’ve heard for weeks about getting this certificate,
being a registered engineer, and being a physician, I can knock doctors. Let me give you a quick
example. If they’re board certified, doesn’t mean that they’re a good physician, and that was the issue
with the engineer. Just because they have a certificate doesn’t mean they’re a competent engineer. So,
just keep that in mind, and I think what Sue was saying is true – it was more a business manager issue
and I think the argument of saying that they have a paper in hand would make them a better manager, or
better engineer, isn’t totally true.
BLANN: Your brain surgeon may not be board certified but wouldn’t you like him to have a degree
from Medical School?
PRANKE: Mr. Ray, could you summarize what Mr. Pavao said at the Hilo meeting? A lot of people
didn’t hear him. I think I was the only one there. You were there. Mr. Pavao was talking about this and
he said that most of the job that he was is administrative, not that he doesn’t have to know about the
water system. My father-in-law put in the water system in our subdivision and Milton came to him for
advice when they had a recent problem out there with the well. I think that’s where these folks are going
on this. I understand that we don’t want to get people that are less competent, but I really have to side
with them on this. It doesn’t mean that we couldn’t get a board certified person. It’s just that if such a
person was not the best person to administer this, it might be.
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RAY: John.
SANTANGELO: I don’t know if this needs to be said enough but for me, it needs to be said more and
more because I agree with this political subdivision as we grow. But we have the supremacy type of
attitude and in law, in that things come down from State, and we are a county at their permission, and
that’s all we can be. And so this will be solved on the State level. Your Council, and Mr. Tyler and
myself and many others, held this view that we were, and he still is, your first level of advocacy, but it
will be done at the State level so whatever you do, don’t let yourself be distracted at the County level. It
is a State thing and it’s got to be changed there, and then we can just go for it.
RAY: You know, we’ve got to keep all this on the record so I’d really like follow the testimony. If
you’d like to come up, Sandra.
SCARR: Yes. It seems to be that there are some things that the County can do to address the issue of
planning on a more local level, and address the issue of budgeting for zoning, and so forth, on a more
local level without even formal incorporation. The West Hawaii Office of the Mayor, and the office is
very small. The Council people have even less support. If West Hawaii citizens are to have their Council
members as their first line of representation, which I think we all feel they are, they need more support,
and that is something that the County can address. The County can provide some planning advice over
there. The County can provide even more of a Planning Office over in West Hawaii. More infrastructure
in Public Works. We could have more local say in what happens to us, and we need more support for
our Council people to be able to be effective representatives. We don’t have enough government over on
the West side, and I think you can see that, as a County, you can address that.
RAY: Thank you. Brenda Ford, followed by Judy Graham.
FORD: I’m Brenda Ford. I live in Captain Cook, and I’m going to be speaking in two parts. The first
part, I’m representing Plan-to-Protect Kona, which is a 501-C3 organization dedicated to sustainable
environment, agriculture, development. And I am going to be reading into record a letter that was
provided by the President of our organization, Duane Erway. And then after that, I’d like to speak for
myself.
Aloha Members.
Plan-to-Protect is a non-profit 501-C3 organization dedicated to sustainable planning and use of
resources. Our supporters are interested in a quality, sustainable life for themselves and their children.
Accordingly, our remarks are confined to those specific topics within the scope of our purpose.
The numbers below correspond to the specific topics numbered by the Charter Commission in your draft
document.
1. Plan-to-Protect, that is PTP, has not developed a position on this topic.
2. At-Large Council Seats: PTP respectfully requests the Charter Commission to drop the proposal for
adding three "at large seats".
Because there are many more people in Hilo, the proposed change would unfairly switch the County
Council balance of power to favor East Hawaii in land use decisions. In addition, the cost of a winning
campaign for island-wide elections would be $100,000 to $200,000; a sum difficult to raise without
substantial contributions from the very people and organizations who can and will profit from decisions
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made by the County Council members.
3 & 4. PTP has not developed a position on these topics.
5. Department of Environmental Services: PTP supports the formation of this department and the
appointment of a professionally qualified department head.
6. Planning Department Functions: PTP opposes any delegation of planning functions from the County
Council to the Planning Department. Accountability for crucial development decisions needs to remain
with elected officials who are answerable to the voters.
7, 8 & 9: PTP has not developed a position on these topics.
10. Planning Commission Powers: SMA Districts: PTP respectfully requests that the Commission drop
plans for giving additional powers - And I do understand what you said, that you’re just writing in the
existing powers, but - giving additional powers to the Planning Commission. Accountability for crucial
development decisions needs to remain with elected officials.
11. Qualifications of Heads of Department of Public Works and Department of Water Supply: PTP
respectfully requests that the Charter Commission drop plans to remove engineering qualifications for
heads of these departments. While it is difficult to find engineers who are good managers, it is even
tougher to find a non-engineering manager who can make competent technical decisions.
12 through 16. PTP has not developed a position on these topics.
17. Water Commission: PTP supports both proposed changes in the Water Commission. Water
Commissioners should be nominated from each Council district and confirmed by the County Council.
18 & 19. PTP has not developed a position on these topics.
In conclusion, PTP thanks each Charter Commissioner for their dedication. You have a big
responsibility to decide what Hawaii Island voters will vote on. This is a precious island and in carrying
out this task, PTP respectfully requests you to consider our positions and arguments with aloha.
That ends my presentation representing Plan-to-Protect, and now I’d like to make some comments on
my own.
Right now, in the Planning Commission, they have the capability of making legislative changes which
have the effect of law, and I understand from the discussion that went on, that you are not going to
incorporate that right into the County Charter because of the adverse effect it’s having on the
community. I would suggest that this is not sufficient. In fact, you need to strip the legislative powers
away from the Planning Commission completely, and all legislative powers need to be located in the
County Council where the elected officials are answerable to their constituents. So I think what you’ve
done is maybe you’ve backed off of what you’re trying to do, but what you’re not doing is going far
enough to remove the powers that have been authorized to the Planning Commission. And that would
eliminate any confusion over who’s got what powers, and by whom. It would be a very restrictive
situation. I do not believe that any Commission should have legislative powers. Only our Council should
do that.
Secondly, regarding Department Heads, I believe that no Department Head should be appointed by the
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Mayor. That politicizes the entire structure of the department. I think the Department Heads should be
approved by the County Council based on submission of qualified applicants by anyone. Anyone can
submit an application themselves, or recommended by someone. But it seems to me that the County
Council should appoint the Department Heads based on a simple majority.
Additionally, the change that you have proposed to strip some of the requirements for the Department
Heads, I object to, and I would like to explain why. I come from a very, very technical industry,
telecommunications. I worked there for 22 years. The telephone company - this happened to be in
California - got on a program where they wanted to professionalize their management team and so they
went to the colleges and they hired hundreds, if not thousands, of MBA’s, and brought them into this
very technical organization, and put them in positions of authority over engineers, technicians,
craftsmen, etc. Even the marketing people, they put them in charge of that. These people had no concept
of what makes a telephone work. They had no concept of a line running from a central office to a home,
and how it had to physically be in one piece or the call didn’t go through. They had no concept of
anything. These people were put in authority, in making technical decisions, over groups of engineers
who were infinitely more qualified to understand and even explain how a telephone system should work.
It was a disaster, a complete disaster. It basically ‘dumbed’ down the functionality of the telephone
company in California for years and years. Most of those MBA’s got so frustrated that they left the
company. I have to agree with Mr. Erway’s comment that it’s very hard to find a qualified engineer
who’s a good manager, but it’s more difficult to find a competent manager who understands and can
make good technical decisions. I think that’s absolutely true. I think what we’re doing is reversing the
two positions in each one of these departments, and when I’m speaking of this, I’m talking about any
department that has a requirement for any kind of technical expertise. The top person, the head of the
department, should be a fully qualified professional capable of making a technical decision based on an
informed decision based on their knowledge, their education and their professional qualifications. The
Deputy Head of that department should be your administrator. That person does not need to have full
technical qualifications to administer the department, but what you’ve done is reversed those positions.
You’re trying to make a manager out of the head technical person and you’re trying to make the Deputy
the head technical person. You need to reverse that. The top person, who has the ultimate responsibility
for making technical decisions, must be fully qualified. Let the Deputy be the administrator. That would
be a more appropriate function, and that’s the way most corporations work in technical corporations.
Regarding the 6-3 Council split. I’m opposed to this. It makes me queasy to think that West Hawaii
would eventually gain the power to dominate three of those votes. It’s not right for us to do it. It is not
right for Hilo to do it. It’s bad government. It’s bad representation and I’m completely opposed to that.
We have had, on this island, one elected official who’s in charge of representing the entire island. Not
only has this individual not represented the entire island, but they have told many people in this room, to
their face, I don’t care about West Hawaii; I don’t care about your roads in West Hawaii; I don’t care
what happens to any of your people in West Hawaii. That is the fear that we, in West Hawaii, have
should we have these three at-large members, that we will have the same negative, adverse attitude
directed at us. It’s the same thing with the representation on this Board. It is so skewed to one side of the
island that we feel that we come and speak here and very few of you really are listening to the concerns
of our side of the island. We drive the tax base. We’re paying outrageous amounts of money, and
Arakaki, himself, said in a Council meeting, you chose to live on that side of the island. Now you can
just pay the taxes. Okay? This is the attitude that needs to stop, and it is not going to stop until we get
equal representation on all of our Commissions, and on our Council. The at-large will not do that.
Now, regarding Commissions. Whatever number of districts we have, and we have nine right now, so
nine’s the number I’m going to pick out of the air. Every Commission should have nine members on it.
There should be one member of each district. I believe that the Council member from that district should
supply a list of potential candidates for that Commission position to be voted on by a simple majority of
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the Council. I would really prefer to see the Council members just appoint the Commissioner because
our Council members know the people, most of the people, in their own district. They know what
qualifications they have for being on a particular Board. If you ever had a Utility Commission, there are
people that could tell you all about utilities because we’ve worked in them, and we might be more
qualified on a Utility Commission. God, hope we never get one of those. But you want people with
some expertise in some areas. If you need planners, you need somebody who has some expertise in
construction and all those different facets of planning. And you can get that because your Council
members know their constituency. They better know them or they’re not going to make it into office. So,
a simple majority would be my second choice on the Commission, one Commissioner per district.
Simple majority would be my second place, and my first place choice would be that the Commissioner
be appointed by our elected officials representing our district who knows their own constituency. Thank
you for your time.
RAY: Thank you. Judy Graham, followed by Tom Beach, followed by Curtis Tyler, who is the last
person signed up to testify today.
GRAHAM: Hi, good morning. I live in Waimea. I guess I thought I might have something original to
say but it doesn’t seem like it. But what I was briefly going to request was that you not institute the at-
large 6-3 Council seats. I felt that they would be divisive, that Hilo would take the seats. Also, I do feel
that the at-large seats, because of this strong burden of advertising, somewhat, do invite special interests
to really fund the candidate. And I happen to have an old 1988 Campaign Spending Report of one such
at-large person from the Hilo side and it’s just full of large West Hawaii developers. And maybe the last
remotely original thing that I might say is that I’ve been, kind of, aware of the Council members since
the mid 1980's and my recollection is that the biggest turnover was in 1996 when there was six new
Council members. But the reason was that five people were no longer running. It wasn’t as if the single
member districts created a lack of continuity. It was that five of the incumbents chose not to run. So, I
think that’s all. Thank you.
RAY: Thanks Judy. Okay, Tom Beach.
BEACH: Good morning. I’m a firefighter. I’ve been a firefighter since 1968. I was a firefighter in
California for about 15 years, and became a Captain there. I’m a Captain now here. And it was not easy
getting to be a Captain here. I’m here to talk about a Fire Commission. And these other people have
already addressed the single member representation, that sort of thing. But, I think it’s really, really
important that we get a Fire Commission, and you can choose them anyway you want, I think, but the
best way would probably be to have someone from each district appointed, or chosen, by that member
from that district from the Council. A lot of this is reinventing the wheel, I might add. It’s as if we’re in
some kind of alternate planet, or something, here. I mean this has all been done and thought about quite
a bit on the mainland.
But, without getting into politics, a lot of our Department Heads are chosen simply because they set up
chairs or donated a cow for barbeque, that sort of thing, and for Police and Fire, I think this is just really
foolhardy. We deal with lives and property, and if we chose our Department Head that way, it can have
dire consequences, and not just cheating on promotional tests, but what happens when there’s no
standards, or no quality, in the delivery of our service. And that’s what it’s coming down to when you
start - It trickles down. When you choose your Department Head that way, you choose your Assistant
Chiefs and your Captains, and on down, like that. I know what’s happening, or has happened through
the years. You probably do too. But, it’s come to the place where it’s who you know and not what you
know. and that’s really unfortunate. And, like I say, it has caused lives and property because people just
didn’t know what the hell they were doing. And I’d like to see that changed. One of these ladies here - I
didn’t catch her name - was saying we need to reverse the process. We need a Chief in charge of our
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department who has met certain national standards of care and delivery of services, not somebody who
has met certain delivery of something else to the Mayor. There are national standards. We have National
Fire Protection Association Standards that, in the department I came from, you had to meet those first,
and then you were qualified to take the test. That didn’t mean that you were qualified for the position. It
meant you were qualified to take the test. When you get beyond Captain, some of these things, there’s
no test at all. It’s just got one. You’ve been a good boy, you know, and you waived the sign, you shaka
and all that, and that’s not enough. And Curtis Tyler knows about this. He’s been really into it, and I
really appreciate all the work he’s done on this. He’s got a lot of files on this, and a lot in his head, and
I’d like to just tell you that a Fire Commission is needed. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. You can
just go to some other municipality where it works. Our Civil Service has been working, for years, on
making job specifications for each rank except for Department Heads. We need to change that. Thank
you.
RAY: Okay, thanks, Tom. Any questions?
BESS: I have a question. Have you reviewed the proposed changes in establishing the Fire Commission?
BEACH: In here?
BESS: Yes.
BEACH: I was looking around for that.
BESS: If you would, what I would appreciate is if you’d take the time to go ahead and look at that and
see - Just with your questions regarding standards, I’d like you to comment as to whether or not the
standards that we have established here are sufficient.
BEACH: Sure. I’d be happy to. Where do I get a copy of that?
RAY: Okay, got one? Curtis, Councilman Tyler.
TYLER: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Good morning members of the Commission and your staff. I, too,
want to begin by thanking you again for the hard work that those of you that have attended regularly
have done. I’m a little disturbed, as others have said, about the poor attendance record of some of your
members, and I hope that in the future, when you make your rules, that you’ll put in some provision that
if somebody misses three consecutive meetings - this is without a valid excuse - that they are to be
removed or subject to removal, or something. This is standard in all Boards, and I’m sure many, if not
all, of you have served on Boards of Directors, and you know exactly what I’m talking about. But, some
of us were quite concerned with some of these, at least one person in particular - well, more than one
person, and we voted accordingly on the Council, and some of our concerns have come true with respect
to at least one that I can think of offhand. Enough of that.
I appreciate your Administrative Assistant providing me with all of the documents in a very timely
fashion. I’m sorry that she had to do that and I wasn’t able to review them on the web, but maybe in my
next life I’ll get a little more ma’a, or familiar with that.
There’s a lot of information that you’ve assembled, and I have some other things I’d like to touch on. I
started to begin with the first page and write my notes, and try to put them together with your proposals,
and I must admit I’ve failed in about half of the Charter. But I’d like to begin by starting with your
Preamble. I would urge you to go back and look at your Preamble and tell me if you think you get
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excited reading that. And go and look at the State Constitution and tell me if you get excited reading
that. I suspect that you’ll get excited reading the Preamble of the State Constitution, but not the former.
And maybe we ought to start out with the right spirit. This thing says well, we’re going to support the
laws of the land and we adopt our Charter. Whoop-de-doo. And you didn’t write that. That’s not a
criticism to you.
Article I, Incorporation and Geographical Limits. I’d like to have you turn to Section 1-2, Geographical
Limits, and I would suggest that, perhaps, you’ll have to discuss this with your legal counsel, that
perhaps you add some language ‘except as otherwise provided by law.’ And the reason for this is that if
you look at the description of the geographical limits, it encompasses the lands and the waters adjacent
to this, and I would suggest that the County’s powers do not extend to certain types of property, in
particular the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands which are sovereign lands, and not under the
jurisdiction of the County or the State, but under the jurisdiction of the Hawaiian Homes Commission
and that is a Federal Law. They are completely separate and distinct lands. They are held by the
fiduciaries, and I don’t say that just because I’m Native Hawaiian, but it’s the truth. Number 2 is that
with respect to any lands which are held in trust by the State of Hawaii. There may be some cases where
the County does not have certain powers over those lands, and I would ask you to look at that in
conjunction with your Council.
And one other preparatory remark, and that is whatever I say here today, and whatever work you’ve
done, I think the key to all of this, and I want to say it again because I believe I said it last time I testified
before you, is that how is the electorate going to perceive this. My experience has been, over the years,
that the more proposals that come before the electorate, the less effective the voters’ actions will be in
terms of whether to adopt or not adopt. I suspect that you’ll get many more blank votes. So, while I have
a lot of things to say in terms of where you might improve this document, I urge your caution in terms of
putting too many proposals forth, and I understand that some of you, if not all of you, are concerned
about that, and I hope that you’ll take that into very careful consideration as you make your final
decisions over the next few months.
I’d like to turn to Article III, Section 3-3, page 2, and this is with respect to the Qualifications of an
individual to run for Council. And you’ll notice there that it says ‘a person must be a citizen of the
United States of America, and have been a duly qualified elector of the county for at least one year
immediately preceding election, or appointment. A person must also have been a resident and registered
voter of the district from which the person is to be elected or appointed for at least 90 days immediately
preceding the Primary Election or the appointment.’ That section was amended in 1990, as I’m sure you
recall, and I think, if we’re going to have these kinds of requirements for the Council, then I think these
kinds of requirements should be imposed on all officers of the County – all officers of the County. And
if you go through and you look at the most recent Charter Amendments, in particular that of the
Planning Commission, you’ll note in there that the language talks about being a resident, does not have a
time limit on it, and I’m not sure that these time limits are constitutional; you’ll have to discuss that with
your counsel, and it has residency and it has registered voter requirements put into it. I wrote that section
of the amendment, and I believe that the language contained in there, and if there’s going to be a
residency requirement, it should apply to all officers. I’m not sure that’s constitutional. But the language
with respect to length of time for residency, I’m sorry. Yes?
IRVINE: Could I ask you what you mean by officer? Do you mean like Department Heads?
TYLER: Officers as defined by the Charter.
IRVINE: Okay.
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TYLER: Okay? Officers include all members of Boards and Commissions. It includes all Department
Heads. It includes all elected officials, and I believe, perhaps, there’s some others in there. It’s very clear
as to what it is, and this was clarified in a Charter Amendment, I believe, in 1996. Anyway, you’ll find it
in your amendments. I can’t remember the year. But this is the least we can do, and this is going to help
to clarify a lot of these problems. The other thing with respect to the requirements for elected office for
departmental consideration in terms of Head, and also for Boards and Commissions, is that they should
all be summed up in Section 13-4. It’s scattered all over and you have all these different requirements,
and you’ll notice some have no residency, no geographical location, no electoral qualifications. Some
have only five, some have 11, some have no numbers. And this is not good. It should be nine for every
Board and Commission, including the Pension Board, including the Water Commission, including the
Planning Commission, should be nine. One from every district. They should be a resident there. I mean,
a bona fide resident, notice the language in the Planning Commission. Not someone who comes there
sometimes. A bona fide resident – like they’re listed in the phone book, you can call them up. You can
expect they’ll be there maybe a few days a week. And the other thing is that they’ll be a registered voter.
You shouldn’t expect any less – We, excuse me, all of us as taxpayers, shouldn’t expect any less from
other officers, who might not be elected, than those of us who are elected. I expect to be held to the
absolutely highest standard, and I would expect that every other officer should be held to the absolutely
highest standard. I expect to be called at 3 o’clock in the morning if there’s a problem. I expect to be
called on the carpet by the citizens if I do something in violation of my oath of office. One time, and I’m
gone. That’s the way it should be, I think. I’m very passionate about this, as you know, but I think that
we’ve got to be consistent here. We can’t say oh well, that’s a holdover from the days when we had a 6-
3. Change the whole thing. Clean it up.
And while I’m at it, 6-3 is a bad idea. I’m not going to say any more. It’s a bad idea. And let me say,
with respect to persons who have sent you very compelling written, and I think, also provided oral
testimony, regarding the good reasons for going to a 6-3, I respect them. And it’s very interesting, and
my former colleague, Mr. Santangelo, has given some of his reasons and I know others of you have
given your reasons, and I don’t mean to demean your reasons at all. I think the key to this is
accountability. It goes back down to accountability. And the second one, it goes to money. Now, I was
stunned to hear that Mr. Arakaki spent $70,000 on his unopposed reelection. I think I spent $36.85, or
something.
KRIEWALD: You spent $5,000.
TYLER: How much?
KRIEWALD: $5,000.
TYLER: $5,000?
KRIEWALD: That’s what it says on the -
TYLER: Wow, I’d better talk to my wife about that. I didn’t think I had that kind of money. Well, that’s
interesting. Well, I’d better keep my mouth shut on this thing. Anyway, moving along.
I want to go to Section 3-9, which is on page 4. And you notice there you have two sections; one for
resolutions and one for ordinances. And I would suggest that resolutions and ordinances have the same
language. In other words, you can see how some of it applies and some of it doesn’t apply. It’s very
clear that resolutions - there’s another section where it says resolutions shall not have the force and
effect of law except otherwise - I’m sorry, 3-8, Actions of the Council. ‘Every legislative act of the
Council shall be by ordinance. Non-legislative act of the Council may be by resolution and except as
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otherwise provided by law, no resolution shall have the force and effect of law.’ You know there’s
sections in here that says this can be done by resolution. The Zoning Code has certain things. We can do
these by resolutions. That’s because the Legislative body so decreed it, but I think the point here, and
this gets very confusing, and I’m sure Mr. Ray and Mr. Santangelo who served on the Council, will
remember that the question comes up – wait a minute now, we’re changing the title of this thing. Are we
changing the intent? Is it more than one subject? Is this what really we were trying to do? So, maybe we
don’t catch it this time but it’s just an observation I’d like to point out to you. This has been an ongoing
situation where the Corporation Counsel comes up and says oh no, that’s a resolution. It doesn’t have
the force and effect of law, and so, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.
Section 3-11, page 4, Emergency Ordinances. I would call your attention to the second paragraph, the
second to the last sentence of which reads as follows: ‘The affirmative vote of all Council members
present or by two-thirds of the entire membership shall be necessary for the adoption of such
ordinances.’ I would suggest to you that ‘of all Council members present or by’ should be deleted
because it’s a violation of State Law. And I think it’s also a violation of our Charter. I don’t think the
intent there was, you know, hey brah, only four guys could come today so we gonna pass em. Can not.
You’ve got to have at least five votes.
MARTIN: Mr. Tyler, excuse me. Page 4 you indicated?
TYLER: Yes sir. Page 4, 3-11, Emergency Ordinances. I can understand the need to call an emergency
meeting. I can understand that but I do not believe that any law, or any ordinance, should be passed in
violation of the spirit, intent and letter of the law, which is you’ve got to have five votes. See, in the
Council committee, if there’s six people present, and the vote is four to two, bugger fails. Fails because
you didn’t have a majority of all the members to which the committee is entitled, which is nine.
RAY: Curtis, I wish we’d have received this input a year ago. We’re really late in the process.
TYLER: Okay.
RAY: You know we’re going to be taking final votes. So I mean, you, as a Councilman, as you well
know, can bring up a Charter Amendment, and especially in regard to some of these Legislative matters
that you folks deal with on a daily basis. I would suggest that would be a more appropriate - Then you
could correct some of these. It’s kind of late for us to be getting involved in this discussion. And as you
aptly pointed out, we already have 19 proposals on our plate and we’re probably going to take off three
or four, but we’re also considering two or three additional ones, so we have a real dilemma with what
we’re already looking at.
TYLER: Okay, I understand. Thank you very much. I’ll defer those things until the next ten years or
next Council -
RAY: No, you can do it, as you well know, at any time.
TYLER: Right. Or next time when we can -
RAY: And so, maybe in regard to the confusion of the voters in this election, two years down the line
might be the more appropriate time.
TYLER: Okay, let me go on and respond to, then, what you folks have put forward directly. I’ve already
spoken about number 2.
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Number 1. We’ve read some interesting articles, Letters to the Editor, regarding number 1 and I have
been, at times, a strong proponent of non-partisan elections. I’m reconsidering my position on that. I’m
speaking personally now because I’m just trying to think about this more clearly. But I’m glad you put it
on because I know many people would like to see it on there.
To strengthen the authority of the County Manager. I’m in favor of that inasmuch as you are not going
to afford the voters the opportunity to vote on a County Manager/ County Executive type of situation. I
think this may be an interim, may be a good way to see what happens. I am not in favor, not in favor, of
creating a new department. Not in favor of that. I just think a new department is going to grow the size
of government and the last thing we need is to have government get any larger any place in this state,
unless something is commensurately reduced. Because we may not have enough police officers, as an
example. I know we don’t in Kona, but I don’t think we need a lot more clerks, or we need more
Administrative Assistants, and this kind. We don’t need that stuff. The person can either do the job or
they can’t do the job, so I wanted to give you a half yes and a half no on that.
RAY: Curtis, this is really just a restructuring of management.
TYLER: I can see that.
RAY: There are plenty of bodies and plenty of positions, it’s just a matter of how you use them and how
you arrange them, so it will be subject to the Administration’s call, the Mayor’s call. But I don’t see any
additional cost in government in the way that I envision, other than possibly the salary, bringing in a real
City Manager type, and I would hope that you and everyone would support that if that’s the kind of
position we really want. You know we’re going to have to pay for it.
TYLER: Right. Of course, and we’re going to have to pay well for that too. But with respect to that, the
Department of Management is the Executive Branch of government. That’s the Department of
Management. We don’t need another department. And let me also say that if you’re going to put this
language forward -
RAY: By the way, this is the way that Maui County is organized. This is taken -
TYLER: Okay.
RAY: Well, I just wanted to point out to you, and I would argue of all jurisdictions in the state, they
operate much more effectively than any other, and so it’s following that structure.
TYLER: Okay, thank you. May I suggest that I go through my comments. If you have questions, fine. If
you want to tell me what your position is, well that’s okay too, but otherwise I think we’re going to be
here because some of you may not agree with me, with all due respect.
But with respect to that proposal, you have Section 6-1.2 Managing Director, and you say ‘the
Managing Director shall be appointed by the Mayor, confirmed by the Council, and may be removed by
the Mayor’. It should say ‘with the approval of the Council’ or ‘if approved by the Council’. If you go
through and you look at the Charter, you’ll see these things. Some places are ‘with the approval of the
Council’; some, the Mayor can just tell them take a hike. It’s gone, and once again, it’s inconsistent, so I
would suggest that you make it consistent with the language if you’re going to leave that one in.
The Fire Commission. I have had many firefighters, members of Fire Department who have indicated
that they really want to have the Fire Commission. I am sure you have heard this individually, and you
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heard today from Captain Beach. I think Captain Beach, and another member of the public who testified
today here, brought up some very legitimate concerns, and that is let’s not repeat the kinds of problems
that we’re seeing today with the Police Commission, or at least perceived by some of us, with the Police
Commission. I mean we don’t need two of these things going on. And please change it to nine members.
Do not make it five members. Please, please don’t fool around with that any more.
And by the way, with respect to the at-large seats, one of the other reasons – I think even if I was for this
thing, I would ask you to delete it because there’s so many what ifs that go along with this proposal that
it is really confusing, really confusing. I realize I’m not an exceptionally bright person, and so maybe I
get more, as the Mayor says I’m confused again, more so than maybe some others, but I say this in all
sincerity that this may be the thing that kills it all. And all your hard work, and all these other good
things, many of these good things that you put in here, may just go by the wayside. People may just
hang it up.
It’s been proposed, with respect to appointments to Boards and Commissions, that you’ve heard from
people today, and I think at other times, that the Council propose some names. I think, in principle, that
makes for greater accountability. I think it makes for greater accountability. One gentleman came up
here and said maybe what happens is, like, there is a civilian board that sends three names forward, or
nine names, or whatever it is. Maybe that makes more sense. I don’t know. I think the Council should
have some say so, and of course we do in terms of whether we ratify the Mayor’s appointment or not,
nomination. If I could just say -
RAY: So do you support the Council making these appointments with the confirmation by the Council,
or not?
TYLER: Well, I think the idea of having some citizen group maybe appointed to bring forward the
names is maybe a better idea. Maybe one from each Council district because I think it’s difficult – I
can’t speak for the Council members but I’m just trying to think about this in terms of my ability to do
this as frequently as it seems to need to be done because of resignations or failure to come, or
something, or whatever. So maybe a citizens group might work. I don’t know. Maybe a citizens advisory
group. I don’t know. I’m not really prepared to comment on that, but I do think that all Boards and
Commissions should be nine members, one from each district, with the qualifications that I mentioned.
Department of Environmental Services. I think the principle of this is excellent. Once again, I’m a little
concerned about a new department and I just want to be sure that we’re not shifting the inability to deal
with these very, very, very important things to another department where someone moves over there and
now the same thing goes on.
Planning Department functions. This should be taken off, should not be on the ballot, and I’m going to
say here, since I was the author of most of the Charter Amendment, that if you’ll look at the Charter
carefully, you will see that the word ‘advise’ the Council, ‘advise’ the Mayor, ‘advise’ the Planning
Director is in there. It is nowhere’s in there about decision making, and Mr. Yuen spoke this morning
about the history of this. If you’ll go back and look at the State Law, you will see that, at one point, the
Legislature, I believe it was in the late 60's, gave the authority for the Planning Commission, and I
believe then, when the CZM, Coastal Zone Management Act came in, and the responsibilities were
given to the State, the Legislature did that. By the way, it’s not consistent with the Constitution because
we have a Home Rule Charter and the Constitution provides that Administrative functions, etc., shall be
superior to the statutory requirements, and I draw your attention to that section of the Constitution. It’s
Article VIII, Section 2. It says ‘Charter provisions with respect to political subdivision’s executive,
legislative and administrative structure and organization shall be superior to statutory provisions, subject
to the authority of the legislature’, etc. And it corrected that, I believe, when the SMA, Chapter 205(a)
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came in, and what they did was they said if the Planning Commission is decision making then the
SMA’s will go to the Planning Commission. If not, it stays with the Council. And I cannot find any
place in here where they’re decision making except that which was given to them by the State, or
acquiesced by the Council. And my position on that is as follows: You can delegate authority but you
cannot delegate responsibility. Legislative and policy making decisions are reserved entirely and
completely unto the Council. That’s right in that Charter, right in the beginning.
Legislative Research Office. I think that’d be too confusing. I think you ought to take that off of there. I
understand the intent, and thank you for trying to work on that, but I think it may be too confusing.
Holdover of members on Board and Commissions. I think this is not a good idea, and the reason I think
it’s not a good idea is that it gives the Executive, whether current or future, the power to hold this over
longer instead of just actually making the decision. And as you may have seen over the years, there’s a
lot of musical chairs involved in the Boards and Commissions. People just move from this one, that one,
over here, this one, that one, and I know some of you have been in that situation. I’m making an
observation, not a criticism. I think there are many, many competent people in the community and we
should be very careful about having this revolving chair thing that just moves around here. And as you
know, some of these people were inappropriately appointed and therefore, rejected because they were
not in accordance with the law. So I would be real careful about that.
Safety Coordinator. I think this is a good move. What can I say? I think you all know what that situation
is.
The Planning Commission powers. Pull this thing before it sees any more light of day because they do
not have those powers except as the Council has acquiesced, as I said.
11. I’m sorry, I got confused on number 6. Planning Department functions. I’m sorry, I called that the
Planning Commission. Planning Department functions, I think, just leave that the way it is. I mean don’t
put that forward. I think it’s too confusing.
Qualifications of Heads of Departments.
RAY: You missed the Planning Department change which is the Charter change which would allow the
reorganization, that Division of Permitting concept.
TYLER: The Planning Department Function. Yes, right. No, and I think – Some of it go in the
Department of Public Works.
RAY: It would allow that to happen without a future Charter change. It wouldn’t mandate it happening.
So you’re speaking against that?
TYLER: I think that maybe it’s one more thing that the voters don’t need to consider this time. There are
many more important functions. And I’m sorry I didn’t do more research on that.
RAY: No, no, they’re confusing the way they’re laid out.
TYLER: When I saw Planning I automatically was thinking of the Planning Commission powers, so I
jumped ahead. I’m sorry.
Qualifications of Heads of Departments. I agree with the previous testimony.
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RAY: We had it on both sides. Which one?
TYLER: I’m going to give you a 50/50 answer on that. Let me tell you why.
RAY: You sound like Santangelo.
TYLER: You know me, John. I’m not wishy-washy, so let me tell you why. Okay? At least we got some
laughs out of this, right? Let me tell you why. Here we go. Here’s why. I’m on your proposed language,
the changed to Section 6-2.2, and it takes out ‘the Chief Engineer shall be a registered professional
engineer’ and it adds ‘the director shall have a minimum of five years experience in administrative’ dah,
dah, dah, dah, dah. And I think that’s a wonderful addition, and I think that addition should be put in
there and I think the deletion should be taken out. In other words, it should say ‘the Chief Engineer shall
be a registered professional engineer and shall have a minimum of five years experience in
administrative capacity in public service or private’ dah, dah, dah. Something like that. Because I think
we’re both saying the same thing. The reason they need this qualification is because they’re the ones that
are approving the documents in accordance with our Code. And the same thing with our Water
Department; same thing with the Planning Director; same thing with the Corporation Counsel who
doesn’t have to be a resident here, I notice. It’s kind of interesting. Well, look at it. It’s right there.
RAY: Well, in the case of Ms. Kurisaki, that was a case of hiring a highly qualified Chief Engineer. I
think she came in from Oahu for that job. I mean I don’t think there was anything - you know -
TYLER: Yes. Okay, well maybe so. Maybe in that case you don’t need to have that. I, maybe, hadn’t
thought that completely through. Maybe what I’m thinking of is Boards and Commission members and
elected officials. That’s what I should have said. Amazing what happens when it’s early in the morning.
Impeachment. No, I think you ought to just leave it. Maladministration is pretty bad. I mean
maladministration costs a lot of money. I think you should just leave it. As one gentleman pointed out,
he said it hasn’t been abused. Some of my colleagues might feel otherwise.
Special Counsel. Do not put this one on there. This is not a good idea. Not a good idea. Mr. Pranke has
given you some of his thoughts on it. I agree with him, and I think that the authority to appoint Special
Counsel should be reserved entirely and completely to the Council as it currently states.
The Board of Appeals. Don’t put that one on. Don’t put that one on because if the other one doesn’t go,
if the Planning Department doesn’t go -
RAY: Right, yes.
TYLER: Okay, so that one doesn’t go, there. I’m almost done here.
Department Head Qualifications,15. Sorry to take so much of your time here.
RAY: No, no, no.
TYLER: It’s a lot of stuff going on. I appreciate your patience.
IRVINE: We appreciate hearing from a working member of the County Council.
TYLER: You’re very welcome.
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I think the Planning Department already has to have this. It’s in a different section of the Charter. I was
looking for it. I couldn’t find it, but the Planning Director, I believe, already has to have this experience.
I mean, they should have experience. There’s no question about this. The same with Parks and
Recreation.
And the Police Department. The proposal, as I understand it, is to give additional powers to review the
operation of the Police Department and to recommend improvements, and it says ‘to report the
evaluation to the Mayor’. I think it should also be to the Council, so at least we find out about this right
up front because in terms of policy making, I once again draw your attention to the Charter which is
very specific about the functions of the Council. And it says that ‘the legislative powers of the County
shall be vested in the County Council’. It doesn’t say some. It implies all, and that’s why it’s called the
Legislative Branch. ‘It’s primary function shall be legislation and public policy formulation as distinct
and separate from the executive administration of County government’, and the reason for that is
because the Mayor is the Chief Executive Officer. In a corporate structure, the Chief Executive Officer
carries out the policies of the Board. Now the Corporation Counsel does not agree with me on this, and I
believe the Mayor doesn’t agree with me on this, but I don’t know what part of this language we don’t
understand, but anyhow.
Water Commission. Yes, all of the Commissions; the Police Commission, the Water Commission,
everything – I’ll just repeat it again – should be nine, one from each member. Same with the Salary
Commission.
And this Cost-of-Government Commission. Quite frankly, I can’t make too many comments on it
because I haven’t reviewed it real carefully. I’m not sure how it’d be implemented, etc.
I understand you’re also considering, if I read the paper correctly, dismantling the Hawaii
Redevelopment Agency, and I say hooray, do it as quickly as possible. Give the land use authority on
that area back to the Council. We’ve got too many shenanigans going on in one particular case that I can
think of.
And please, once again, as I asked you at the first time I came to you, put all the Boards and
Commissions requirements into 13-4, instead of some here, and these are different over here. Because
just from a purely Legislative standpoint, we’re sitting there and I’ve got a file this thick, and I’m trying
to figure out now wait a minute, is it five members or is it seven members. And Mr. Legaspi sends us
this stuff and sometimes it’s correct and sometimes it’s not. So, I’ve got to sit there and figure out now
which one is this. Is this correct? Is this a violation, or that? Just make it simple so we all understand it,
and maybe you can’t do it this time. Maybe I need to do it, or the Council needs to do it – not me, I can’t
do it.
Almost done. Executive Session. Mr. Pranke spoke to you about Executive Session, and I would just
like to say that this is a very sore subject, and the Sunshine Law, and they’re both inexplicitly tied
together. You know you’ve got the Administrative Procedures Act; you’ve got the Sunshine Law; and
you’ve got the OIP, Office of Information Practices; and you’ve got the AG’s Office, and they’re
sending some really, kind of, mixed messages. I believe that Mr. Pranke is correct in what he’s said
today. He’s submitted to me, and other member of the Council, I believe, very detailed notes and
Opinions, etc., from the AG’s Office, and it’s real clear that going into Executive Session is really to be
the exception, not the rule. And that you’ve got to give a reason. You’ve got to get permission from the
person. You’ve got to have a request. And there’s some exceptions, as Mr. Yuen pointed out, but if
there’s any confusion in here. And I wasn’t aware of this letter from the Corp Counsel. I just heard about
it today. That’s why I’m commenting on it. Then be real careful because some members of the Council,
in the past, met on one occasion and the AG’s Office sent an Opinion which, some portions of it were
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just ridiculous. It essentially said that if two other Council members were here, like if Mr. Santangelo
was still on the Council and Ms. Leithead-Todd came, and I came up and gave you all these opinions,
they ought to leave the room because it would be almost like deliberations. And personally, I don’t agree
with that but we have to be able to go and testify at public meetings, not only to share what we’ve heard
from our constituents, what we believe as well, and if we can represent our families, we do. So with that,
I’m going to stop and I appreciate the opportunity to go on. Thank you.
RAY: Curtis, we were talking a couple of nights ago and I mentioned to you the possible addition of
putting something in the Charter in regard to specifying that the County Council would meet in West
Hawaii, or maybe specifically in Kona so many times per year. Does that seem like a good idea?
TYLER: Thank you, Mr. Ray. I forgot to comment on that. You did mention that to me. I think, in
principle, it’s a real good idea. I’m trying to think about the logistics of as things move through the
Council. What the Planning Commission does is they try to do the East Hawaii stuff in East Hawaii and
the West Hawaii stuff in West Hawaii, and that’s very commendable, even though sometimes the results
are not credible. But that’s commendable and I think in principle this is good, but how do we segregate
this stuff? There are time constraints on the passage of some things, and so many days, and the Sunshine
Law, and this may - I’m in favor of it in principle. I don’t know in practice. I haven’t thought it out to
know from an administrative point whether we’re creating a nightmare. I suspect, as I told you the other
night, Mr. Ray, that some of my colleagues would say this is a wonderful idea and others would say
well, we don’t need this because we already respect the wishes of three when we want to go for a public
hearing, and when a request has come it, it hasn’t really been denied. It’s sort of the sense I get of it. Not
being critical again. I’m just trying to make an observation. Once again, it hasn’t come out to the public
so I don’t know what the specifics of it are. In principle, I believe that since a lot of these things that
come before us, in the Planning Commission, pertain to West Hawaii that maybe those items get held
here, but many of these also involve changes in the Code, they’re island-wide, and each of us represents
all the districts.
Mr. Martin is ready to eat so I -
SANTANGELO: But Curtis, if you looked at it as like equal mistreatment under the law, that you just
took those Council meetings there, and if something came up that was a final vote that effected Hilo,
they’d have to travel there the way West Hawaii’s had to travel to Hilo, and just let the chips fall where
they may. Would you have a problem with that?
TYLER: No.
SANTANGELO: Okay, thanks.
TYLER: No, I’ll go wherever the meetings are.
RAY: George.
MARTIN: Yes, I’d like to apologize for that but I do have to leave. I’ve got a plane that I’ve got to
catch. I was supposed to be on it this morning and there are some subject matters I’d like to address with
my Commissioners here before I leave, at some point in time.
TYLER: I understand. Thank you all very much. I appreciate this opportunity. Thank you, Mr. Ray.
RAY: Okay, George.
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MARTIN: You going to allow me to move the agenda?
RAY: Sure.
MARTIN: Okay. What I’d like to do is bring something new, and I think that Mr. Tyler, you hit the nail
on the head when you talked about the Hawaiian Homes Act and the prelims that that includes. We’ve
mulled this over and had some testimony from different peoples in different venues, and what I’m
proposing here now is that we, as a Charter Commission, put forth an amendment that would, in fact, put
an ad hoc committee together to address this problem and have it ready for the next election, so that
would be the 2002 election, so that we’d have enough time to deal with it rationally and put what lands
and what properties we’re talking about that should be excluded, or precluded, from this Charter, if any.
It’s not a slam dunk situation that we have time. As was mentioned with our mulling over the Managing
Director, we really don’t have enough time to do it. From when we were seated to this present time, as
you know, we have to put forth what we’re going to do to the State and have it in valid form by a certain
date, and we didn’t have the time to do that. So what I’m proposing here now is to address this on the
ballot, in some form – Chris can write it up – If the general populace wants to address it then it can be,
and once it is voted in on this set of proposals in the Commission, then the ad hoc committee would be
put together. They’d have eighteen months, I’m calculating as it was told to us, then it would give them
four months to put it in ballot form and then again be put to the voters in the 2002 election. Who sits on
this ad hoc committee? I think, of course, a no brainer would be some of the Hawaiians from the
Hawaiian communities, and possibly some sort of petition, or possibly application from the general
public, whoever would be interested. There’s ways of doing it but I think it’s a legit issue and I think it’s
something that, if it cannot be addressed at the State level, at least let us address it here because if, in
fact, what has transpired with the Federal Court hearing with Cayetano vs. Rice, or whichever way it
worked, there’s some legitimate goings on that we should be addressing, and let’s not be afraid of it. As
was mentioned in the very beginning, we wanted to tackle some of the more important things, and I
think this is one of them. It gives us some validity, coming out of whatever else we do come out with as
far as putting to the voters.
RAY: Okay, because Mr. Martin has to leave -
MARTIN: And again, I apologize for that.
RAY: And because Mr. Martin won’t be here for our next meeting, right, May 10th?
MARTIN: Correct. I am gone for two weeks so again, I’d like to vote on it right here and now, if at all
possible.
RAY: Are there any questions from the Commission members in terms of what it is he’s suggesting?
BESS: Well, I have a question. George, with all due respect, I agree with what you’re proposing. I mean
I think it’s a legitimate proposal but I don’t feel that I can vote on that today. I would like to give this
some careful thought as to coming up with a proposal that has a little bit more structure to it than what
you suggested. So, I would be opposed to voting on it today, but I would like for the Commission to take
it up at our next meeting. That would give us some time. And George, I appreciate your wanting to be
there and providing your input, but it’s just a little too early for me.
RAY: John.
SANTANGELO: Maybe directed at our Counsel. I’m not real clear. In spirit I don’t know how I could
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oppose anything like that. I’d have to support. Chris, could you just maybe clarify for us what the
mechanics of this is and how that works because, frankly, I’m confused from a legislative, or from a
process, viewpoint.
YUEN: If I understand correctly, George, you would be suggesting a Commission that would consider
the question that was brought about, inclusion of Hawaiian homes land within the County.
MARTIN: Not inclusion, but I guess it would be exclusion from dealing with the Charter as is being
mentioned to us. Again, they have specific lands that is theirs, and theirs alone, and the governing of
those lands is probably spelled out someplace in State Constitution, maybe even Federal Constitution,
with different Articles, and with that, I think these are some of the issues that should be addressed by
this ad hoc committee. Again, the reason I use ad hoc is because once it’s a done deal, like how we are
right now, technically an ad hoc committee, once the Commissioners here put together whatever we’re
going to put together to put forth to the voters, we no longer exist. We become void and null at that
point. So, same type of situation, yes?
YUEN: I’ve written a couple of letters to the Commission on this, and let me try to summarize because
it’s been brought up. The County of Hawaii, the boundaries are set by State Law. They properly include
all lands on the island, including the Hawaiian homes lands. This is not just a matter of my interpretation
of the law, but Mr. Kahawaiola’a and Mr. Jim, who have been testifying about the Hawaiian homes
lands not being under the jurisdiction of the County of Hawaii, brought this issue to the Hawaii Supreme
Court when they were arrested on the grounds of Prince Kuhio Plaza during the demonstration, and
claimed that they could not be arrested by County Police because the County Police had no jurisdiction
on Hawaiian homes land. The Hawaii Supreme Court said no, that’s not correct, that the County of
Hawaii did have jurisdiction over Hawaiian homes lands because they were never excluded from the
County of Hawaii on the Hawaiian Homes Act or the Admissions Act of the State of Hawaii in 1959,
hence, were properly within the boundaries of the County of Hawaii. And also, there’s no difference
between the jurisdiction of the County insofar as crime and police. Now, as I mentioned in my letters,
the County’s powers over the Hawaiian homes lands are somewhat different in certain areas, such as,
most prominently, zoning. However, that does not mean that those lands are not within the County. To
give you another example: The County has no zoning authority over conservation lands, the Forest
Reserves. Those are not within the County zoning power, however, those lands are within the County.
They’re within the boundaries of the County. The County has some jurisdiction over those lands; police,
fire, and the like. People who live on conservation land get to vote for the Mayor, and get to vote for
their Council member. You just have to be very careful about how the word ‘jurisdiction’ is used in
connection with various kinds of land like Hawaiian homes land or State land or the National Park land,
to take another example. The National Park is within the boundaries of the County. People who live
within the National Park get to vote for a County Council person and get to vote for Mayor. But the
County has no zoning jurisdiction over the National Park, and it also has no police jurisdiction within
the National Park. It’s different from that in Hawaiian homes land. As strictly a practical matter, the fact
that Hawaiian homes land are within the County means that the people who live on Hawaiian homes
land get to vote, get a representation there. If they hear a noise in the middle of the night and somebody
is breaking in, they can call 911 and expect a County Police Officer to show up, the same as any other
place in the County. And if there’s a fire on Hawaiian homes land, they can expect the County Fire
Department to respond to that, the same as any other neighborhood in the County. So, I guess the end
result of my legal analysis on this is that there isn’t an issue for the Charter Commission insofar as the
relationship between Hawaiian Homes and the rest of the County government.
RAY: George.
MARTIN: Okay. As I’ve indicated, and have indicated in the past, all we’re doing is putting forth a
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proposal. Now, in this venue that I’ve just mentioned, again, what Chris is saying could be talked into
the 18 months and maybe nothing would come out of it. All I’m saying is give the opportunity to the
voters, because we’re not going to make the decision. All we’re going to do is put it forth on a ballot.
The proposal would be pretty simple, so put together the ad hoc committee to address the potential
problem. As Chris is indicating, he doesn’t see there is a problem, and maybe I’m using the wrong word
when I say that there’s a problem. Let’s say it’s an issue that should be addressed. And if nothing comes
out of it, then it would be nothing to put on the ballot 18 months down the road. But if, in fact, there
was, it gives them time to address the issue. That’s all I’m saying.
RAY: Any other questions in regard to George’s proposal? Sue.
IRVINE: I guess I wonder if we have the power to do anything but amend our Charter, or were we
thinking of making this a Charter Amendment, adding something to our Charter saying there will be an
ad hoc committee set up?
MARTIN: I believe we do, but I’m sure Chris would give us a rendering decision on that.
YUEN: Just speaking generally, certainly the Charter Commission can establish Commissions that
would have certain responsibilities. For example, there’s a proposal for a Cost-of-Government
Commission, so there is the power to do that. I am just, perhaps, looking forward at the end of the
process. As far as the Charter being the structure and function of the County government, and how that
is set up, there is really no issue to be dealt with there on the structure and function of County
government insofar as how it relates to either Hawaiian homes land or Hawaiian issues generally. These
are all matters that are within the State Constitution, the State Statutes, Federal Statutes, and Federal
Constitution.
RAY: Anymore comments? Okay, so I guess we’ll mull on that and see where we go with it.
SANTANGELO: And stay in contact. Give John a call.
PRANKE: I appreciate your comments. Mr. Martin and Mr. Yuen weren’t at the Volcano meeting where
I suggested - I didn’t write up a proposal for this - that the Charter Review Commission should be a
standing Commission, and that would give us the time to work on those things. Rather than forming an
ad hoc Commission, let’s have a standing nine-member Charter Review Commission, perhaps adding it
in with the Reapportionment Commission under the County Council, and just let them work on these
things over the time. As you know, you don’t have enough time here every ten years to take care of
everything.
MARTIN: I agree with that comment that there should be some sort of a formula that would allow, but I
think there is, in fact, with the Council members in having the ability, they could write up legislation and
have it implemented every two years. But this one here, again, is a separate and different issue in that it
may be mulled over at times but nothing done about it. If you have an ad hoc specifically for one issue,
then I think it puts a little bit more emphasis to get whatever needs to be gotten done.
RAY: Anymore response on that? We’re going to take a five or ten minute break right now, a little
break.
RECESSED The Chairman called a recess at 11:28 a.m.
RECONVENED The meeting reconvened at 11:38 a.m.
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RAY: Can everybody have a seat so we can start again.
Next on the agenda, we have Minutes Approval. Minutes of the April 1st meeting, can I have a motion
to approve?
HIGASHI: So moved.
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Okay, discussion? All in favor?
COMMISSIONERS: Aye.
RAY: The minutes of April 12th, can I have a motion to approve?
HIGASHI: So moved.
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Discussion? All in favor?
COMMISSIONERS: Aye.
RAY: Financial Status Report as of 3/31, $72,311.48. We really don’t have a projected, kind of, post-
balance, in other words, to give us the projected balance when the majority of our legal expenses and
administrative expenses are wrapped up because that’s a figure we really need to take a look at before
we seriously can engage the options for educating and publicizing the Charter Amendments. But my gut
feeling is that we’re in pretty good shape. Chris gave me a just-off-the-top-of-his-head ‘guess’timate for
his expenses to wind things up somewhere in the range of about $6,000. Of course he doesn’t know how
long we may carry on this discussion and where it may go, so that was based on, I think, wrapping
things up pretty quickly and developing the language.
SANTANGELO: John, can I interrupt? So, in that vein, in the last Commission, as I understood, there
was a lot of stuff he had to work on into the midnight hours that created some expense, and we haven’t
done that. Is that what you’re saying? Have we been pretty clean with you, or would we have to throw
something extra into the ball game to effect that?
YUEN: Well, you guys have been absolutely clean with me.
SANTANGELO: I just meant voting crap. I hate these minutes.
YUEN: No.
RAY: I’m glad you answered that directly.
YUEN: I’m expecting, to use your phrase, you’re not going to load a lot of crap in. You know, the
packet that I put together, which is based on the preliminary votes that were taken, is pretty close to
being ready to go. If you decide to take things out, that’s a few minutes with a red pen and they’re out.
There are a few little fine points that need to be worked on. If there are any new amendments, I have to
spend a little time working with them, putting the exact language together. But for the most part, on the
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things that have been considered, whether the decision is made to go forward, or take them out, it’s not
going to be a lot of work. If there are relatively minor changes made, that’s not a lot of work. To give
you an example of a relatively minor change; the Fire Commission was written up with five members. If
you want to change it to seven members, or nine members, and change how they’re selected, that can be
done pretty quickly. Those kinds of changes are not a lot of effort. This might be a good time to give the
Commission an idea of what, like mechanically, needs to happen to be finished. Step one is decide what
goes on the ballot. Step two is there are a few fine points. Most of the things have been worked through.
There are going to be a few fine points that have not been completely decided that need to be decided.
Step three is for the Commission to approve the final language that would actually appear in the Charter
if the ballot questions were adopted. Most of those have been drafted up and the way it would basically
be enacted, or if there were slight changes made, those languages would be changed. Step four is to
prepare the actual language that would appear on the ballot, like questions for people. And I would like a
first crack at doing a draft of this but I’d like the Commission to have the final word, and read it and
finally approve how the ballot questions appear. And step five is preparing a digest for the public of
what these ballot amendments mean. The exact language sometimes doesn’t really convey to people the
full importance of what is being discussed. The question that appears on the ballot is going to be a little
condensed, is going to be shorthand or simplified, and the digest is something, really, in-between that
gives a full explanation of that. And again, I would like to have a crack at doing that, but then have the
Commission actually vote and approve that before it goes out.
RAY: Sharron prepared a bunch of information for us in regard to cost for putting together information,
brochures, mailing costs, newspaper ads, and radio ads that might possibly be in conjunction with some
sort of a public relations effort. So, this is just for our information right now so we can kind of get a
sense of these costs involved. One other discussion that has been ongoing is with the League of Women
Voters in regard to our possibly participating in some sort of a joint voter information pamphlet which
would, in their mind, include candidate profiles and information on candidates, as well as Charter
information and, kind of, pros and cons type information, similar to the background information we’ve
gotten from the League of Women Voters. We’re not, for whatever reason, communicating real clearly
in terms of just who would do what and exactly what this would look like. My understanding is that the
League doesn’t have, or couldn’t bring much in the way of financial resources to the table, so in terms of
participating financially, my sense is that we would be paying for the majority of this, and then their
contribution would be more in putting together the candidate information and developing the pros and
cons portion. And then Chris has some reservations in regard to just some issues there. Do you want to
speak to that?
SANTANGELO: Before he does, I have an issue I’d just like to bring up and it might be encompassed
in that. When it comes to the League of Voters, or any group that’s outside this body, I would feel
comfortable in what we put together if they wanted to incorporate it, but for us to go into a union with a
specific other organization that’s going to do pros and cons, and have other controversial issues, I’m
wondering, and I would ask Chris, what’s the appropriateness of that? In theory I don’t have a problem
with it, but in reality it never really works that way. I’d be more, at this point, in favor of us putting
together the proper thing that comes from this Commission and then anybody that wanted to use it,
would use it the way they saw fit.
IRVINE: John, might I say, being a member of the League, I think they would be perfectly happy to just
– Well, I can’t speak for the League actually. They’re trying to do a candidate brochure which would be
candidate statements. It’s not anything that the League is writing up. League does have some pro/cons
which they’d like to put in on the Charter issues but I think we could tell them look, we have our own
digest. You can’t do that. League does this sort of thing nationally, or has in the past, and I think it
wouldn’t be bad if they are willing to come up with more money than they’d indicated to John so far,
and if we did candidates as well as our issues, in some kind of a mailing, although maybe it’s just too
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expensive and we should just go to our newspaper thing. People might be more likely to look at a
brochure that included everything rather than just our Charter Amendments.
SANTANGELO: I just want to state, and my only concern is being prudent, or at least dealing with the
perception. And the other thing is I’m in favor of pushing this information into the most hands in the
most timely fashion, and so that’s why I asked the question because If it helps it get in more hands. But
definitely we want to get this information out to people so that they can go through it, but I wouldn’t
want to have done it and then have it come back and bite us.
RAY: Chris, and while you’re addressing this, I also notice this is a County of San Diego voter
information packet and they did use some private advertising. So, I guess that begs the question, could
we do that as well? Could we use some private funds to help pay for the cost of this. I mean, obviously
they sold advertising. It might be a way to save the taxpayers some dollars, for civic minded
organizations to help defray the costs on this. So, I don’t know if you have any -
BESS: And then you’d run into the problem where you’d have candidates wanting to advertise, perhaps.
And then how would you decide which commercial groups would -
RAY: Actually I take that back. What this says is it’s a thanks to the following businesses for honoring
poll workers throughout San Diego County.
YUEN: Let me just, like, start with it. Let me say just generally. The Charter Commission has budget
and can spend its money for disseminating neutral information about the ballot proposals, and that’s a
legitimate function to inform the public about what’s being proposed for the ballot so that the public
understands it. I can say quite absolutely that the Charter Commission cannot spend its money to help
pay for a mailing about candidates for public office. There’s no authority for the Charter Commission to
do that, period. Basically it would be a form of public financing of campaigns. If the County Council
wants to do that, they can appropriate the money to do that, but the Charter Commission does not have
the authority to do that. I would question the Charter Commission paying for a pros and cons of the
amendments because I think that it’s very difficult to prepare something like that in a neutral way.
People can argue about what’s a pro and what’s a con, and what should be the pros and what should be
the cons, and what is a fair statement of it. I have no qualms, or doubts, that we can come up with a fair
digest that explains what we’re trying to do, explains the differences of what we’re trying to do from the
present system, and leaves it to the voters to decide whether they think that’s a good idea or not, which
is their ultimate decision and ultimate choice. So, I think that’s about the gist of my comments.
HIGASHI: One question. In terms of our expenditures, are we subject to the County’s Procurement
Laws? Is there a certain process that we have to go through.
RAY: Sharron, you’ve checked into that.
HENRY: If we use a State or County Department/Division printing services, we do not have to go
through the three-bid procurement process. If we use an independent printer, then the Finance
Department has to go through the three-bid process. The quote that I got was from the State Correctional
Department only. I have not gone to a private printer yet. That was information that the County Finance
Department gave me in regard to printing, and what they say is the easiest and simplest way to get the
process going. We, obviously, haven’t ruled out quotes from private businesses as well, but this was the
one quote that I got with the urging of the Finance Department. But, yes, we have to go through the
procurement process.
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SANTANGELO: And Sharron, like this mailings to households and this and that, there’s vendors out
there, Mail It for one of them, that have these electronically set up so that they can pinpoint a zip code, a
house, a box, where you never duplicate and they can get it really down and dirty single person.
HENRY: Right, and that’s through the procurement process. Al Konishi gave me a name of a mailing
service. They’re located on Oahu. We still, in turn, have to produce the distribution, we have to get it to
them – they’re on Oahu. We will have to pay for the postage. The postage is the very largest expense.
SANTANGELO: But you say it’s on Oahu. Are they already approved?
HENRY: They are a service that the County uses, and it’s Cardinal. It’s the one that the County uses.
I’ve been given that information. I haven’t followed through with that additional cost because the cost
we have here is going to be the same plus an additional cost for a mailing company, like Cardinal, to do
it. They’re just going to do what I would do in my living room, and it would take me longer hours to do
it. There are very specific procedures for mass mail-outs. The County has never, and I’ve been told by
the copy department, they’ve never done more than a mail-out, from this county, of 2,000 or more at a
time. Their eyes got really big when I said 70,000. So, it can be done. It can be done in quantities of
anything above 200, meaning we would not take all 70,000 for them to do at one time. It would take
getting a specific bar code postage for bulk rate. And, again, the price of $14,500 is for bulk rate, the
very least expensive way to do, and that’s just the postage.
SANTANGELO: But these services, when they do that, and you may know this, but for your
information, they’re able to bar code it, they’re able to address it in a way that when it gets to the post
office, if it’s not done just right, the post office, themselves, throws it in the rubbish can and wastes it.
But there’s a way that they insure that it gets into every single box and household at a minimum cost.
HENRY: You still have to provide all that information to the mailing service. We have to go through the
Elections Office and provide the data base listing. All they’re doing is putting it together and getting it
out for you.
SANTANGELO: But a three-bid process on this island wouldn’t take that long and we have people on
this island that you just hand them your stuff and they take care of all of it, and probably for less than
this. But, they could bid on it.
HENRY: Okay. I may be wrong and I’ll double check that, but my information from the mailing
department and Mr. Konishi, and from my experience back using Cardinal through the company I
worked with on Oahu for years, all the information has to be furnished to them. So, all the gathering, all
of that – they can’t go to a County Elections Department and say give me your data base listings.
SANTANGELO: Well, the people on this island have all of that.
HENRY: Like I said, this was just one quote, so we can, obviously, follow up and go further.
RAY: What’s your understanding, Roland?
HIGASHI: Chris, the Charter says we need to have a digest.
YUEN: Yes.
HIGASHI: Does it say we have to mail it to every voter, or does advertising in a newspaper of general
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circulation, does that suffice?
YUEN: Yes.
HIGASHI: So we need to decide what means we want to use to let the public know what we’re doing.
RAY: Right, and we’ve gotten this input and this is just Al Konishi’s opinion of why. It’s self
explanatory.
HIGASHI: I volunteer to work with Sharron on this. If anybody else wants to get involved -
HENRY: Thank you, Mr. Higashi.
RAY: Well maybe John and you guys can do a little subcommittee and look at the costs and the services
available from the different mailing services. Because I understand what Al is saying here but somehow
it goes against my, just kind of, grain that we wouldn’t do a mail-out. I don’t know. It just seems like
even though a lot of them do end up in the trash, that you’d want to make that effort.
HIGASHI: But one thing. Multiple voters live in one house so it’s not 70,000 people.
RAY: Right, so we need to address that.
SANTANGELO: And again, if we want to do a mail-out, I absolutely guarantee you can take 70,000 of
these, put it on the right guy’s desk and that’s it, walk away, and it will only go to the household, no
matter how many voters are within that household, and that’s done completely by section or by the
whole island, so that’s not a problem. And to have somebody like Sharron do it, would drive you crazy.
On the other hand, I think what I would ask, and I think maybe you and I need to find out, Roland, do
we really want to do a direct mail to every household.
RAY: Yes, we’ll look at our fund balance. We’ll weigh those issues and start to figure that out. Roland.
HIGASHI: We may do multiple things. We may do a mass mailing. We may do a tabloid at the end, or
an insert in the paper, depending on how much money we have.
RAY: Right. That would be my sense.
SANTANGELO: John, point for Chris. As Roland said, tabloids, and we’ve done tabloids for our
communities. In general, you go out and you put a lot of advertisement in that. Would it be legal if we
did a tabloid in which we used advertisement to offset the cost of it? Would that imply endorsement one
way or the other? And not that we’d want to consider it. I just bring that up.
IRVINE: It might compromise our -
SANTANGELO: If so, what, if there are no legal issues?
IRVINE: No, I wasn’t thinking legal. I was thinking people looking and saying oh God, McDonald’s is
supporting this, and they would not eat there. I’m talking food. I guess it’s lunch time.
SANTANGELO: So, Chris? Or would you just stay away from that?
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YUEN: It’s hard to say that it’s actually illegal. The difficulty that I have with it is that I don’t think this
is true for any of the amendments we have here, but it is certainly possible that some business interests
might either be for or against a particular Charter Amendment, and volunteer to spend money to
publicize it one way or the other. I think that we’re not likely to make very much money including some
Pizza Hut brochure in with our mailing, at any rate.
SANTANGELO: No, it’s the tabloid that you would put in the newspapers (indiscernible).
YUEN: You wouldn’t make any money because the newspaper charges people - you know, you pay so
much for space in the newspaper anyway, and the newspaper sells ads, so why would they buy an ad and
put it in with the Charter Commission Amendments fold-out instead of just buying an ad and putting it
in the newspaper.
SANTANGELO: Okay, maybe this is a bad idea, but I tell you what, because I’ve done this, where we
put out from Ka’u, we put out an island-wide tabloid in the Tribune-Herald, and it wasn’t dispersed
through our stuff, but again, that’s a community issue there. But the advertisement completely paid for it
in its whole and it wasn’t a form of endorsement. The advertisements were on their own pages, but this
was completely paid for through advertisement. It was a complete stand alone tabloid that was put in the
Sunday paper.
RAY: Okay, so maybe you can -
SANTANGELO: No, we may not want to do this at all.
RAY: I understand that, but why don’t you -
SANTANGELO: But understand, my only reasoning behind that is if this could be done, and I don’t
mind trying to do this, then that frees up money. I’m just looking at getting this information to the most
people and I think that has the best chance of doing it.
RAY: And the point is not to spend every dollar that’s in the budget, right?
SANTANGELO: Right.
RAY: Moving on.
Communications. There were some new communications that came in the packet today. I especially
want to point out comments from Jay Sasan. It’s taken him 15 months to finally weigh in. I wish he’d
engaged us sooner, but anyway, that’s interesting.
Okay, let’s move on to the meat of our session here, Unfinished Business, and what I’m going to do is
go through the proposed amendments one by one, and let’s just kind of get a sense of what we need to
do to clean these up, or things we might need to address before taking final votes. Roland.
HIGASHI: Wouldn’t it be a better idea if we take our final votes and see what’s in and out? Then we
can finalize the language.
RAY: Can’t we do that as we go along?
HIGASHI: On May 10th, or whenever we’re going to vote, and what’s left, we finalize the language.
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IRVINE: I thought we said we were going to vote May 10th, though.
HIGASHI: Yes, May 10th.
RAY: On a preliminary basis, if the strong consensus that we want to take these things out, there’s no
point spending a lot and money on them, right? And on the other side, if we’re in total agreement that
there are some things we want to add, we should figure that out, right? I mean, that’s how we got to
where we are today with this preliminary list. This was not anything that was guaranteed to appear.
These were just things that we took preliminary votes on that we wanted to go out for discussion. So,
let’s just go through.
Non-partisan elections. It’s my understanding that we’re -
HIGASHI: Wait, are we voting?
BESS: No, we’re just getting a consensus. If there are any strong objections, then we -
HIGASHI: Wording?
BESS: No not wording. This is just concept. Right?
RAY: This is just a consensus. Didn’t you want to go through and get a preliminary approval or not, and
then go back?
HIGASHI: No, my thought is we vote on the 10th when we told everybody we were voting.
IRVINE: Oh, absolutely.
HIGASHI: And then what’s left, we make sure the language is exactly what we want.
RAY: I’m sorry. Go through that again.
SANTANGELO: So, no preliminary voting now. The only voting we do is next time.
HIGASHI: My position is on the 10th we’re going to vote, and we can make sure the language is such
after the vote. Obviously, we’re going to take out some stuff we haven’t agreed to. Today’s not a day
we’re going to take any kind of preliminary approval vote or anything.
SANTANGELO: I thought that’s what John suggested. I thought we were doing preliminary -
RAY: I did, but it’s open for discussion. We can do whatever the majority wants to do.
HIGASHI: I thought we were going to look at the language today and then vote on the 10th.
RAY: Okay, but what’s the point of spending a lot of time on the language for something that we -
HIGASHI: That’s my point. We vote on the 10th. Let’s vote on the 10th and whatever survives, those
language be -
SANTANGELO: So we’re going to have another meeting past the 10th. He was saying that would be
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our last meeting.
HIGASHI: Not necessarily our last meeting.
RAY: It’s not going to be our last meeting, but I thought our goal was to wrap up final votes on as much
as possible on the 10th so that Chris could go ahead and have the go ahead to act on those final ones.
BESS: Can’t we just do it as John has suggested? We can take the sense of where people stand with
regard to each one of these issues today, and if any individual has strong objection to that, then maybe
we should table it and go on to the May 10th, but for all of those where there is no difference of opinion,
let’s go through them. That’s my sense, today.
HIGASHI: I may change my vote on certain issues on the 10th.
BESS: Then you should indicate this is an issue that I would prefer that we not come to some consensus
on today, and I’d like it moved to the 10th. How about that?
RAY: Non-partisan. All in favor, at this time, with the non-partisan election.
HIGASHI: I still don’t’ feel comfortable with this voting. What if it goes the other way, what happens?
SANTANGELO: We can vote it down next time.
HIGASHI: I mean, Daryl just left with the idea that we’re not voting. He left. He went to go someplace.
SANTANGELO: Why did he leave with that idea? John’s letter to us told us exactly what we were
going to do.
IRVINE: That we were going to do a lot of discussing today. That’s what I thought, that we were really -
HIGASHI: Discussing, yes. We’re not voting. Do you want to go to each one and figure the language?
YUEN: Let me clarify what the effect of voting on these things would be, then. If seven of you said no,
we don’t want non-partisan, would that have the effect of you’re not going to consider non-partisan
anymore?
HIGASHI: That’s my problem.
BESS: Here’s my understanding, and maybe it’s just what I’m reading into this. On the 10th, we are
going to be voting – voting, all right, and that is a final action of the Commission. Today, at least I am
aware of the fact that there are several of these things that we’re looking at taking off, 6-3 for instance.
And if that’s the case, shouldn’t we be discussing – I’d like to know what’s on the table of all the
Commission, and this is a good time to do that, and that we’re taking this preliminary action so that it’s
going to make that 10th meeting a lot more efficient and a lot more effective.
YUEN: Is your idea that suppose you discuss the 6-3 Council and you take another vote and five say no
and two say yes. Then it still gets voted on again on the 10th?
BESS: It still gets voted on on the 10th.
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YUEN: So then, what is the point of having a vote today?
IRVINE: The point of taking some kind of consensus was so that we -
BESS: Then, as far as I’m concerned then we should close the meeting today and there’s no more that
we should be doing.
RAY: Let me give you an example of one in particular, and that’s number 2, the 6-3. We have not
developed the language and there’s some real critical issues here around when this would be
implemented. Would the terms be concurrent, the at-large seats, with the Mayor? Just how all that would
work. If we don’t work that out now, we’re going to have to sit down and work all that out at the 10th,
or else we’re not going to have anything to vote on. There’s lots of detail in this that we haven’t
developed language on, and decision for, and that’s clearly the major one that probably has more of
substance.
BESS: But if the sense of the Commission is that they’re going to take that off, why should we be
wasting our time on the language? That’s where I am.
RAY: That’s a valid viewpoint. I don’t know that we have that sense right now. Gary.
YOSHIYAMA: I guess what I would prefer doing today is I wouldn’t call it a vote, but all of us
expressing where we’re coming from on the intent, or the concept, of a proposal. I guess that’s number
one, and I would agree with Steve, if the feelings are strong on the one hand that we’re going to put
something on the ballot, or drop it, I think we’ve made a major move somewhere. I would support
anybody here, I’ll just use Roland as an example – If six of us, if we’re strong for 6-3 and let’s put it on
the ballot, and if Roland says let’s hold off and let’s really discuss this at length on the 10th, I would
support him on that.
BESS: Absolutely.
YOSHIYAMA: Just as an example. That’s where I would come from.
YUEN: If I could make a suggestion here. I don’t really have any suggestion for how much you discuss
any one of these things, but I am concerned about the idea of voting because it was announced to the
members that the big vote was going to be May 10th. So for the members who are here, there are 7
members here and certainly if all seven of you don’t want something on the ballot, that will kill it. But in
fairness to the other members who were told that the May 10th was going to be the big vote, maybe
there’s one of them that would like to see it on the ballot and would argue persuasively and articulate the
reasons, and change everybody’s mind. And that’s the purpose of having these kinds of meetings is so
that the members can have a discussion and come to their final decision. On the other hand, if everybody
wants it off, it shouldn’t take long on May 10th to get rid of it. So I have a feeling that nothing much is
to be accomplished by taking a vote on these items as they go through.
RAY: What about working out the particulars of number 2, the Council to include at-large seats?
YUEN: That’s, sort of, a matter of order. What was passed as a preliminary matter by the Commission
earlier was lacking in only one detail, and that was how you handled the Boards and Commissions that
followed the nine Council districts. Other than that, it was in complete form.
RAY: It is not in a complete form that I agree with. In other words, I am opposed to the way it’s written
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right now because the terms are not concurrent with the Mayor. In other words, I’d like to see that
change and if we are going to pass this, I think it would make a lot more sense setting it up in a different
way. If it is going to kick in in 2002, that to make it concurrent with the Mayor’s term. For instance, I
think the least controversial way to set it up is the first at-large term would be for two years only and
then that would make it concurrent with the Mayor, and that also would not conflict with the term limits.
The way we have it set up now, I’m just saying if it were to pass – I’m opposed to this, but if it were to
pass, that’s, to me, the way it should pass. So, if something passes, even if I don’t agree with it, I want it
to be in the best way possible in terms of effecting public policy. So, that’s all I’m saying.
HIGASHI: Is that the only amendment you have?
RAY: So, if it kicks in at 2002, that the first term be for two years only. So what that would do is that
would make the at-large seats concurrent with the Mayor’s term and there would be no conflict with the
term limits. So, we wouldn’t have to worry about that issue.
HIGASHI: I have no problem with that.
RAY: To me, if it’s going to pass, that’s the way it should pass. I’m not going to vote for it, but if it
should pass -
IRVINE: I agree with John entirely.
CHRIS: It’s a legitimate thing to do.
HIGASHI: So, hearing no objection, I guess everybody would agree to that language?
BESS: Well, let’s not take a vote.
YUEN: Certainly, to have this kind of discussion right now can be fruitful and you get an idea of what
people want, but I would suggest that on May 10th, if somebody wants to make a motion that you have a
6-3 Council put on the ballot then they make that motion and they say change from what we had before
to go two years starting in 2002 and then four years starting in 2004, and make that motion at that time.
We can have a discussion here now as to what’s a better way to do it but because we have talked about
having the vote on May 10th, the package itself should be part of the motion to adopt the particular
amendment.
RAY: Eddie.
ALONZO: I have a question. You know when the voters vote on these amendments, you have the
undecided votes, or the blank votes. Is that going to be counted as no votes or is just throw away? It’s a
yes votes and no votes. Undecided or blank votes you discard that?
YUEN: The blank votes are ignored, and so it’s yes vs. no. And if there are more yes’s than no’s, it
passes.
RAY: Can we move on? Number 3.
IRVINE: Did we do number 1? That was what I was going to ask.
RAY: Are there any changes anybody needs to discuss?
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IRVINE: I had one thing. In Section 13-4, where Commission members are appointed, there’s reference
to parties and I was wondering if we were going to do away with that in there as well, or just our elected
officials.
BESS: Good point.
YUEN: It does not necessarily tie together. I mean, if you want to do that that’s entirely up to you folks
as far as changing that, but it doesn’t tie in. It’s not a necessary tie-in to the idea of having non-partisan
elections. What that does is it prohibits a majority from actually being party members, like card carrying
members of a political party. And so, when the Mayor is considering an appointment, they ask if you’re
a member of a particular party and they’re supposed to keep a list of how many are on the Board or
Commission. So what I’m saying is it doesn’t have a necessary tie-in to the non-partisan elections. I
imagine you’ll continue to have political parties after this, and to the extent that I suppose the reason
was, at some point, that they didn’t want all the people in a particular Board or Commission be card
carrying members of a particular party. If you think that that’s still a good idea then leave it in, and if
you don’t then take it out.
RAY: John.
SANTANGELO: For me, I’m looking at non-partisan as saying that party affiliation has little, or
nothing, to do with County government. It has everything to do with government that has a superior to
that, and so any reference to party in County government, if we go to non-partisan, to me, should be
removed. And if so, can that be incorporated in the non-partisan? Because it would only be necessary if
the non-partisan was approved. So, is there a phrase that says in there that all reference to party will then
be removed from the Charter upon adoption of this?
YUEN: You could join it in one ballot question if you wanted. It’s related enough. We can discuss
further whether it’s a good idea or not. But generally, to put things in one ballot question, there has to be
a common purpose behind doing them, and I think there is enough of a common purpose so that if you
did want to change that, it could be joined in with the non-partisan election, or it could be, if you chose,
put as a separate issue.
SANTANGELO: Thank you. And I would say to the Commissioners that I would like to see something
like that if there were no strong objection. If there is, it’s not something like I’m married to, but I
thought it was a good point to bring up because that was my intent. Thank you.
IRVINE: Might have been a good point to bring up but I have a feeling it’s probably better to leave it off
unless people -
SANTANGELO: So every Commissioner that goes up to the Council should have, on it’s application,
whether it’s a Green, Democrat or Republican, and what in the world does that have to do with the price
of tea in China when you are no longer recognizing party within the County government. You’re afraid
that they’re going to be all Democrats or all Republicans or all Greens?
YUEN: No, people can put no party affiliation as well. It’s only the people that actually are members of
the political party, like card carrying, that are supposed to put their party affiliation on -
IRVINE: So, it’s probably not important.
SANTANGELO: I think he’s saying it’s important.
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YUEN: Well, I’m not going to give you an opinion whether it’s important or not. I’m just trying to say
what the thing means and relatively few people are actually members of a political party. I think Roland
is and, frankly, I am.
RAY: I think it’s, kind of, a non issue, practically speaking.
SANTANGELO: Just leave it alone. Okay. And I don’t want to ever get involved in just a knee-jerk
thing, so if you feel like leave it alone, leave it alone.
RAY: County Managing Director. Are there any particulars on this that we need to discuss today as far
as the proposed language? Steve, did you have -
BESS: This relates to the Cost-of-Government Commission. In keeping with what we’re trying to do
here, in professionalizing the Managing Director’s Office and making it clear that he’s got to be
managing things efficiently, I had thought that what might not be a bad idea here is on the Cost-of-
Government Commission - I know I’m jumping but they’re related, okay - That the Managing Director
shall serve as an ex-officio Commissioner of that Cost-of-Government Commission, and then to say
that, when you’re looking at (d), Section 6-1.3 of the Managing Director’s duties, down to the last
sentence of that, ‘a report shall be made to the responsible Commission and the Cost-of-Government
Commission whenever an evaluation or analysis is performed’, and then when we look at (h), it talks
about ‘perform all other duties as required by this Charter or assigned by the Mayor’. Now that language
need not be changed because it would take into account what we put in the Cost-of-Government
Commission but, again, in trying to show that the Managing Director, it’s very important that there be a
close tie between the Cost-of-Government Commission and his office, and so I would even go so far as
to suggest, even at the risk of being repetitive, to say one of his duties is to serve as an ex-officio
Commissioner of the Cost-of-Government Commission in the Managing Director’s duties.
SANTANGELO: But if you do that and that passes but the Cost-of-Government doesn’t, then you’ve
got dead language in there, or can that automatically be taken out?
BESS: As I said, John, it’s not really important that we include that language in this. (h) says what I
said, but I just thought it was just another way of emphasizing what we’re trying to do is trying to make
this Managing Director responsible to that. And so what I’m telling you is if that’s a problem, or it
confuses the ballot, leave it off. That was the intent.
RAY: Okay.
IRVINE: Does our lawyer think we should leave it off on that note?
YUEN: What happens is that it becomes stray language if Cost-of-Government passes and there’s no
way around this kind of thing because if you have Charter Amendments that are submitted to the voters
independently, but do interrelate to some extent, like mentioning the Cost-of-Government Commission
in the Managing Director’s Office, then if they don’t pass the Cost-of-Government Commission while
the voters still pass the thing on the Managing Director that referred to this, it just shows up in the
Charter as a little stray thing that years later people say what the hell is this doing here. And there are
things in the Charter that are like that. I wouldn’t call it a big problem if it happens that way, one way or
the other.
BESS: I just think I’ll withdraw the suggestion that it specifically make reference to that in the
Managing Director’s and (h) would refer to the Cost-of-Government Commission anyway.
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YUEN: Actually, let me suggest a way of doing this. What we should do is say, in the Cost-of-
Government Commission, that the Managing Director is an ex-officio member there. Oh, it’s already
there.
BESS: No, that’s what I suggested. That’s why I said that (h) would serve that purpose. I was just
underscoring the idea that he would be a responsible member of this Commission and responsible to it.
RAY: Gary, did you have something?
YOSHIYAMA: Yes, I have a concern but no solution here. My concern is, as we’ve heard testimony,
that some people are perceiving that we are creating another department, and even if we say we’re not
and it’s all there already; we’re trying to beef up the professionalism of this office, is there a way that we
can get rid of the word ‘department’? I only have this concern. I don’t have the solution, as I said. Can
we do something without changing our intent because that’s what we’re calling Department of
Management and people are latching on to that rather than what we’re trying to do? So I’ve got to bring
up that concern.
SANTANGELO: Didn’t we make department there so it could go through the proper process? I think
that word was important so that it was appointed by the Mayor and approved by the Council. And
maybe it isn’t necessary. That’s what I understood, but, yes, that’s what I was trying to do is increase the
qualifications of an existing position.
BESS: But would it help to just to say Office of the Managing Director, and there shall be an Office.
YOSHIYAMA: I don’t know .
BESS: Or Managing Director and requisite staff. If Department is the buzz word, then let’s get rid of
Department.
IRVINE: The Maui Charter does use that Department of Management and that’s why we did it, but I’ve
had the same input. Well, we’ve had it here. The people think oh, you’re creating another department
and you’re not.
YOSHIYAMA: I don’t know.
IRVINE: I don’t know the answer either.
SANTANGELO: Excuse me, and we should cop up to it. But we were, weren’t we? And that’s what I
want the ruling on. We were creating something that changes - because right now, the Mayor hires his
Managing Director, end of story. But in appointing Department Heads, then he brings up the nomination
and that’s confirmed by the Council. So I thought that’s what we were doing here. And if that’s not
necessary, then get rid of it.
BESS: How about we just use the existing language in the Charter that talks the Managing Director and
Agencies under the Managing Director, and then we’re not changing anything.
SANTANGELO: The ruling I’d like to know is can we make this Managing Director subject to Council
approval without it being a Department Head. That’s all.
YUEN: Yes, just got to say so. And I think that the actual powers that we were granting to the Managing
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Director that are in addition to those presently in the Charter could be done without creating a so-called
Department of the Managing Director, if that is a hang up here.
RAY: Any other comments? Steve.
BESS: To reiterate, I think that department may be a bug-a-boo for some people and I think we ought to
delete that reference, and I would suggest that we just use the existing language in Article VI in the
existing Charter. We delete Executive Branch but we can say the Office of Managing Director, or just
use the existing language. And then, if we use the existing language then there wouldn’t be a big
concern about us creating some expensive department.
YOSHIYAMA: With confirmation.
IRVINE: Yes.
BESS: Yes, we leave the language as is.
YUEN: The question of this Department Head. The Department Head has the power to appoint staff,
and I think that is a difference. Currently the Managing Director is in the Office of the Mayor and I think
all the staff is technically the staff of the Mayor. I need to mention that. Now, another difference is that
positions in the Office of the Mayor are exempt from Civil Service. The staff in the Department of the
Managing Director, if appointed by the Managing Director, would be Civil Service.
SANTANGELO: So it’s significant if we remove department.
IRVINE: We did hear this before.
YUEN: From the standpoint of how the staff functions, yes. The powers of taking the other agencies and
putting them under the Managing Director, that can be done without creating a department. If you want
to give the Managing Director the power - I don’t know how it works in practice right now. I know the
Managing Director has staff and it may be that the Mayor allows the Managing Director to select certain
people, and the Managing Director has an Executive Secretary I’m quite sure can be selected by the
Managing Director. But if you want to create a department with Civil Service staff then you’ve got to
make a department. I mean the amount of staff is subject to appropriation by the County Council. It
could be two people or it could be 20 people, but that would be a difference between having a
department and not having a department.
SANTANGELO: Question. If this is not a department, and it’s patronage, not Civil Service, but isn’t
there a process that the Mayor’s Office can go to create these positions? It’s put in the budget. I know in
the Council we did that. I’m not sure how it works from the Executive Branch. It could set up this
patronage or Civil Service, or does it have to be a department?
RAY: I like it the way it is. There is some risk. It is going to draw some fire, there is no question, but
generally I’ve received real positive endorsement of this, so I don’t think it’s that much of a risk. I’d
hate to see it go down for that reason.
BESS: Chris, given what you’re saying, what we could do if department is a problem with the voters, we
delete the reference to department, but we provide in this language, the ability for him to be dealing with
personnel, as you’ve suggested he should do if it were a department. So, that could be taken care of right
in this section to show what kind of personnel policies apply.
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YUEN: You mean just to say something like Managing Director with necessary staff, something like
that?
BESS: Yes.
YUEN: Yes. I think administratively they end up in the Office of the Mayor. Now you can
administratively create a department, but this ties in with Civil Service basically. The way it works is
that everybody is Civil Service except exemptions, and exemptions are Department Head, Deputy,
Executive Secretary to Department Head, positions in the Office of the Mayor. There are other
exemptions. Office of Housing and Community Development is an exemption. And the positions in the
Office of the Mayor, not being Civil Service, are then basically at-will appointees who get turned over
all the time. If you create a Department of the Managing Director, say they have staff management aides
that run around and do management, whatever. Then they become Civil Service and their tenure then
outlasts the term of the Managing Director. Now currently, the positions in the Office of the Mayor have
to be appropriated by the Council so the number of aides that are there are the public affairs person and
then I’m not sure how many people actually work directly for the Managing Director, but those are all
appropriated as positions in the Office of the Mayor by the Council. And I’d say that’s the principal
difference in how this thing would be set up if you created a department and you didn’t have a
department.
IRVINE: So if we set up this department, then we’re going to have a Civil Service staff which would
carryover from one Managing Director to the next.
YUEN: If the positions were created, yes. You would have a Managing Director and a Deputy.
RAY: This would be basically like your Auditing staff. If this is the direction we want go in, I believe
there are some risks but -
IRVINE: You mean like a Legislative Auditor’s staff?
YOSHIYAMA: I have a suggestion. But before I do that, it’s my opinion that the positions may or may
not be Civil Service depending upon their level and the nature of their job because if they’re handling
confidential personnel matters, and some of this may be – you know, the auditing function and stuff,
they’ll be excluded from Civil Service. But since I brought up this concern, what I think I will do is I’ll
check it out. I’ll meet with the Civil Service Department and I’ll make a proposal if there is something
that I can do, or something. How’s that, rather than prolong discussion? Is that okay?
RAY: Okay, moving on. Fire Commission. We have a number of suggested changes which have come
up several times. Mr. Holschuh has suggested language in regard to EMS language. He also testified in
regard to the Chief’s experience. Another suggestion that’s come up a number of times is nine
Commissioners rather than five, and tied to the single member districts. We’ve heard that on a number
of occasions.
IRVINE: I really would like to see our Commissions be more consistent and representing the nine
Council districts. I also think we could add that medical services business, that Fred Holschuh was
talking about in 6-4.2, very easily. He also testified about the language in our proposal, the bottom line
of 6-4.2, the statement of policy. He said something about it says ‘the Fire Department shall be
conducted in accordance with the following’. What if we just said the Fire Department shall operate in
accordance with the following? I think it would make better English.
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SANTANGELO: Well, it’s two different things. One is a policy states things on a general outline for
conduct and the other says you will do this.
IRVINE: ‘The Fire Department shall operate in accordance with the following’ isn’t as strong as ‘shall
be conducted in accordance with the following’? I just think the English is bad.
YUEN: ‘Shall operate’ is better.
IRVINE: Thank you.
YUEN: My opinion.
IRVINE: That’s my opinion too.
YUEN: ‘Shall be operated’ is better language.
RAY: Okay, that’s not a substantive change. Do we have exact language on the EMS?
IRVINE: The second line right above there. It says ‘declare to be the purpose of this chapter to establish
in the County system, fire protection and prevention and emergency’. He wanted ‘medical services’ or
plain old ‘emergency services’ rather than ‘rescue’ in there. Let’s just say ‘emergency services’. Leave
out the medical in case there’s some other broader emergency service.
YOSHIYAMA: I thought he said medical services and rescue.
RAY: That’s what I have written down.
IRVINE: What do you have written down?
RAY: Emergency medical services and rescue.
IRVINE: Okay. I thought it was replacement but maybe it’s both.
RAY: Didn’t he give us stuff in writing?
BESS: Yes, he did.
IRVINE: Did he?
BESS: Yes, he did. Yes, I saw something. I was looking at it earlier this morning but I don’t know
where it is. No, you know where it came up. Maybe it was in the minutes.
IRVINE: I think it was in the minutes.
BESS: That’s where it was.
RAY: Roland.
HIGASHI: One potential problem is that right now EMS is funded by the State in lieu of providing the
services themselves. In other jurisdictions, as in Oahu, it’s done on a private basis. What would happen
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if the State decides to contract it to someone else? Would that language be binding us to providing
medical emergency services, Chris?
YUEN: Yes, it sounds like it. And that’s one of the general considerations in keeping these things a little
bit open ended sometimes. There is a catchall in here that says ‘such other powers and functions as may
be provided by ordinance’. If you put something in that you’re supposed to do and then there’s a higher
level reorganization, then again, you have one of these little orphan provisions and people wonder why
it’s in there. Unless you’re making a conscious decision that the County Fire Department should be the
ones that always provide this particular service, then I would leave it out of the Charter.
IRVINE: Do you think emergency services is vaguer than emergency rescue, which is written in there
right now?
HIGASHI: Rescue.
YUEN: I think the question was on medical services.
IRVINE: What if we just used emergency service?
YUEN: Very often people will come and say they should be doing this, and they’re doing it. And not
saying it explicitly doesn’t keep you from doing it. Saying it explicitly may cause a problem down the
road if there is some kind of general reorganization. And so I think Roland’s point is a good one, and
that it could cause a problem in the future.
BESS: I’m wondering, Chris, whether or not we might take care of that concern by changing the
language in that statement of policy to make it more open ended? What we’d be doing is ‘it’s declared to
be the purpose of this chapter’ instead of ‘to establish in the county that we would provide for a system
of fire protection and prevention and emergency medical services’ or whatever the additional language
might be, and it would go on ‘which shall be based on qualified and professional leadership and
personnel’ and then some language where - you know what I’m getting at.
YUEN: Right. Yes, I think if we simply said ‘emergency services’ instead of ‘emergency rescue’ that
that would include medical and nobody would complain about how come you’re doing a medical
services and obviously, you could continue to do emergency rescue services with that.
IRVINE: We also have to change it at the very bottom of the page if we’re going to change it up above.
The last line says ‘emergency rescue personnel’. We’d have to put in ‘emergency services personnel’
instead.
SANTANGELO: John, I need to get a little with this. I remember Fred giving this but if we don’t do
this, are we hurting someone? And if we do it, are we helping someone? I really didn’t see how this
thing went beyond a particular person’s concern with something, and how it translated out to the
community.
IRVINE: I think it is better to have it more general, rather than specific, in this case.
RAY: It seems like just the ‘emergency services’ is the simplest way to go. It’s kind of a middle road.
It’s not exactly as far as Fred wanted to go, but let’s just change that.
IRVINE: Yes. I guess the other question I had about this; we have ‘the Fire Chief shall have a minimum
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of five years training and experience’. This is down under 6-4.3. I think our Police Chief we have in at 3
years. I think Mr. Benn, sort of, said Fire Chief, Police and Deputy should have - Oh no, he was talking
about hiring and firing them that they should have the same kind of due process.
RAY: Right.
YUEN: No, I think the Police and Fire are the same. The three years is for administrative in the Police,
and the same thing proposed for the Fire.
IRVINE: Okay, I’m sorry.
RAY: Mr. Benn’s point had to with the removal language. I went through his comments and tried to
figure out if it made sense to make things more consistent, and it didn’t. And I think the way I came up
with it, I looked at each one and it seemed to be the way it made the most sense to me rather than to
come up with some sort of a uniform language. And it seems like he’s just looking for a cookie cutter
approach to everything and that’s not the way life is.
IRVINE: Okay.
RAY: Okay, and then the other one is Fire Commission. I’m in favor of making this a nine-member
Commission. I think that fits our island better than Oahu.
BESS: Right.
SANTANGELO: Yes.
HIGASHI: So, Mr. Ray, are we saying that we’re going to be consistent wherever it says Commissions,
that we’re going to go with nine?
RAY: No.
HIGASHI: Okay.
RAY: I understand that argument but I don’t think it makes sense across the board for every Board and
Commission to be nine members. I know it’s a little more confusing but I don’t think that’s necessarily a
reason to change it. I’d be in favor of this Commission being nine members, but not going through and
changing all of them. That’s just my opinion. Certainly all the major Commissions. But we’re just
dealing with this one right now, okay? So let’s just go through and then we can look at additional
suggestions. That’s a whole other group we’re going to look at after this.
Department of Environmental Services. I like Department of Environmental Management. I thought that
suggestion was good.
IRVINE: I vote for that. I think we’ve had plenty of testimony. As a matter of fact -
RAY: Just changing ‘Services’ to ‘Management’.
IRVINE: I was back on the e-mail with Mr. Boucher this week, and then I ended up going to Honolulu
and he didn’t get back to me, but he is still concerned about having landfill diversion, wastewater
management and non point source pollution in there, I think.
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RAY: Under the powers, duties and functions, and any other related functions prescribed by ordinance. I
would tend to leave that up to how the Administration and the Council wants to set this up.
IRVINE: Recycling is, I think, somewhat a smaller category than landfill diversion which is the words
that they’re using now. You know what I mean? I do have one more thing written up, but if I were to
give this language to Chris, or something – Did people feel that it might be good? I know at the last
meeting I handed out the statement about ‘the Department of Environmental Management is established
to protect and preserve and enhance our island’s environment’ at the beginning rather than just saying
there will be a Department that consists of a Commission and a Director and staff. Because we’ve done
that for the Police and the Fire, and I think if we’re changing something -
RAY: Sure.
BESS: Yes, that’s good.
IRVINE: Should I give Chris this?
YUEN: Again, what I would suggest is that on the May 10th meeting, you make a motion that we adopt
this amendment but change the name to Management and include a statement of purpose that you’ve
already circulated, and that would be the most orderly way to go about doing it.
I wanted, myself, to make one suggestion here and that would be – and let me ask Sharron to remind me
of this too. Where it says that ‘it shall manage certain functions’ and then it says ‘any other related
functions prescribed by ordinance’. I would take out the word ‘related’ so that nobody gets into an
argument later on whether something is related or not, and leave it to the County Council to have the
good sense not to put something in that doesn’t belong there. Basically, what we’re leaving it open is
that the County Council can add functions to this department by ordinance, and if they vote to add a
function, I don’t think they should have to have a debate in the Council about whether it’s, quote,
related, unquote, or not to the other functions that have been put there.
RAY: Roland.
HIGASHI: I have one question, Sue. What is exactly non point sources of pollution?
IRVINE: I just learned this this week. It’s all water that isn’t in the sewer lines. I mean all the runoff
from -
HIGASHI: All the cane field, yes? I mean that’s a major problem.
RAY: All the drainage systems. It’s under the Engineering Department right now to deal with.
HIGASHI: A lot of that is addressed by Department of Health.
IRVINE: It is.
HIGASHI: Are we going to have two agencies looking at all the -
RAY: No, no, no. This is just at the County level, which would be the County -
IRVINE: The implementation.
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RAY: Level agency responsible for dealing with it, and right now -
HIGASHI: As an example, Wailuku River, when it rains, I mean, there’s a lot of sludge coming down.
Is this department going to oversee the problems of that or managing -
IRVINE: That’s probably an act of God. They’re talking more like parking lots that -
HIGASHI: Managing all the agriculture practices. I mean that’s where it comes from.
RAY: The County still has whatever level of responsibility it has under Federal Law, under State Law,
so it would just be a matter of where we would directly place the responsibility to deal with it within the
County. So right now, it’s under the Public Works Department. It’s in the Engineering Division is the
coordinating division.
HIGASHI: A runoff of ag lands?
RAY: I’m not sure, Roland, but that’s not going to change.
IRVINE: It’s runoff, I think, more in downtown.
HIGASHI: From subdivisions I can understand where the County controls the standards.
IRVINE: Yes, I think that’s what we’re talking here.
RAY: But all this would change is if this department is created and the Council, by ordinance, wanted to
put the non point source pollution responsibilities of the County, and move it from Engineering to this
department. That’s all. It wouldn’t create any more responsibilities. We already have the responsibility.
HIGASHI: How do we ensure that? Are we talking about streams and preservation of gulches?
RAY: The two aren’t related.
IRVINE: I don’t know. I wonder if the Graham’s sometimes know more about these environmental
things than I do, or Chris does. Can you tell us?
YUEN: Can I, kind of, briefly discuss this? Let me get to my bottom line on this. I would suggest that it
not be stated in the Charter that non point source pollution be a responsibility of this new department. If
this thing passes, there’s going to have to be a reorganization of the Department of Public Works, and
they’ll pass an ordinance, they’ll move certain positions, and they’ll move certain functions into this
new department. And at that point, there’s a level of detail that I think is very hard for the Charter
Commission, sitting here, to know and to specify how some of these things should be split up. Just to
give you an example to focus this a little more on non point source pollution. The principle activity that
the County issues permits for right now, that would effect non point source pollution, would be the
County grading permits, the County Grading Ordinance. There are a number of reasons for having a
grading ordinance and one of them is erosion control. It’s only one of them. There’s also slope
protection; things don’t fall on people when they’re working and the roads don’t collapse, but erosion
control is part of it. I don’t know that we are really prepared, sitting here, to take the step of deciding,
okay, enforcement of the Grading Ordinance goes into this new department. Maybe it should, but, sitting
here, I’m not sure we are ready to do that. It can be put there. The language that we have set up here
does certainly allow that to be put there. Saying non point source pollution might mandate that it be put
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there.
IRVINE: Okay, let’s leave it out then on that’s your suggestion.
RAY: How’s everybody doing? We’ve still got a ways to go. Are we going to be able to go through with
no food? What’s the feeling?
HIGASHI: I just asked her how many people take a quorum. It’s six. It’s seven with me and I’m going
at 1:00.
IRVINE: You’re going to leave when?
RAY: Okay, well, let’s keeping going then.
YOSHIYAMA: I have one more question. As far as implementation, should this pass, the general
question, I guess, Chris, how quickly must this be implemented?
YUEN: We haven’t spelled that out. When you elect your Council members, they stand up and they
swear this oath to uphold the County Charter, and one of the things is there shall be this new department
and they’re supposed to set down and pass an ordinance. But, again, there’s only so far that you can go
with these things. You could say it shall be established no later than two years after the date that the
Charter Commission votes on it. And then what happens if they don’t do it? There’s really no way.
BESS: And then it gives them an excuse not to do it for two years.
YUEN: There isn’t a time frame for doing this, and you could put in a time frame but how much do you
accomplish by doing that?
IRVINE: I guess the final question I have about this – In the very first statement up there we call it as an
advisory Environmental – we’d better put Management in there also – Commission. We had some
testimony from the County that what they were hoping was that, at some point, these people might be
able to be setting sewer rates, or something, with less political pressure than the County Council has
because they’re not able to make hard decisions about charging for sewers. Does anybody have any
thought on that?
RAY: Yes, we don’t want to go there right now.
IRVINE: But do you want to leave the advisory out so that if the Council wanted to set it up? You see
what I mean? Because if we call it advisory up there, then I don’t know if the Council has the ability to
have them do this.
RAY: So, just call it an Environmental Management Commission?
IRVINE: Yes.
RAY: Okay, why don’t we do that.
SANTANGELO: In doing that, have you broaden its responsibility?
IRVINE: Down below it says they advise on this and that.
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SANTANGELO: I was asking Chris.
YUEN: There’s a way to do it. What you can do is we take out the word ‘advisory’. Then at the last
paragraph we say – it already says it shall advise the department, blah, blah, blah, and then we add a
little comma, and it says ‘and shall have such other powers and functions as may be provided by
ordinance’ and so, therefore, if the County Council wants to give it some real powers, it can do so. The
County Council has the power to establish Boards and Commissions. They can establish new Boards
and Commissions, so they can give additional powers to existing ones. If that’s where you want to go,
that can be done.
RAY: Okay. 6 and 10. I won’t say take a vote but let’s not spend a lot of time on these.
BESS: I want a clarification, if I could. On the Fire Commission, when we talked about there being a
Fire Commission consisting of nine members, did we say leave that with broadly representative of the
community, or was it the intent to make each County district?
RAY: Per district.
BESS: And then, that same language that we would use there in that Fire Commission, I think probably
ought to be used here in the Environmental Services Commission, as well. When I read this again this
‘one member shall be a resident of each Council district’, it’s a little confusing. That language should be
cleaned up.
IRVINE: We have several Commissions now that are going to be nine members that have one from each
Council district.
BESS: Yes, that standard language should be used across the board.
IRVINE: Okay. Where is it not being used? You think here in the Environmental thing?
BESS: First of all, my question is what question did we use in the Fire Commission? What language did
we decide on? Nine members representing each of the Council districts?
RAY: Right.
BESS: All right, and that Environmental Services Commission should consist of nine members and
representing the Council districts.
RAY: That’s what it says, right?
BESS: I’ve got to tell you, I see it but the normal guy reading this, you know this ‘one member shall be
a resident of each Council district’, it’s just the way it’s stated. With all due consideration to Chris, I just
think it’s cleaner that way.
IRVINE: Yes. Is that easy, Chris, to be consistent?
YUEN: It’s easy.
IRVINE: Good.
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YUEN: I guess I got it.
BESS: I got it but the thing is I just think it’s a lot clearer.
IRVINE: I don’t care whether we get it or not. I really don’t like our language that changes from elected
voters to this, to that, to whatever, when we’re talking about things in the Charter. If we can state it
exactly the same way, and we probably should just say ‘appointed as in Section 13-4', and have one way
of saying that you have one from each Council district.
YUEN: Well, the Police Commission says one member shall be appointed from each of the respective
nine County Council districts.
IRVINE: Are we changing that?
YUEN: I’m just telling you there are two that are being done by district now. The other one is the
Planning. They’re both inserts.
ALONZO: Mr. Chair. I have a question on residents of the district. Instead of ‘residents’, it should be
‘lives in the district’ because some people might use a P. O. Box address, but they’re not living there.
IRVINE: The Planning Commission is ‘a legal resident and registered voter of the district in which the
member represents’.
YUEN: There’s no consistency in the existing Charter because these things are done by different people
at different times. They mean the same thing, though. And we can work on the language on
Environmental Services.
RAY: So, the question is, as Curtis has pointed out, that it’s really so hard to deal with. I was on the
Council and didn’t find that to be the case that it’s so hard to figure out what’s what. I mean it’s right
there in front of you, which Commission it is you’re dealing with and what the rules are. And is it
confusing for the general public? Well, the general public never looks at it anyway. So I don’t know
who it’s really confusing to. I mean, it would be better, for sure, if it were more consistent.
YUEN: Let me say this. I told Steve that I understood it. I guess I probably wrote it so I understood it
perfectly well, but if you, too, find something that is confusing, please do say so because it very often is
the case that having immersed yourself in something, that you understand completely where you’re
coming from but somebody will read it fresh and be confused by it. On this particular point, we are not
going to be able to have a consistent way of saying these ‘nine districts’ without changing some of the
ones that are already in there.
BESS: Okay. My point is it’s not a question of being confused with your language. It’s a question of
making the language clearer for all those reading it, who may, or may not, be attorneys.
RAY: 6 and 10, Planning Department/Planning Commission changes. My opinion is drop them both. I
just think we don’t have to do it.
HIGASHI: Let’s move along.
IRVINE: Yes, let’s move along.
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RAY: Okay. Well, we’ll decide. Number 7. I’d say kick, punt.
HIGASHI: Move along.
BESS: Move along.
RAY: Number 8. You heard the testimony on the holdover. I still like the idea.
BESS: I like it.
SANTANGELO: Yes.
RAY: Number 9, Holdover Boards and Commissions. You have something to say on that?
IRVINE: It was something Del Pranke said. Page 29, we’re changing it to 90 days for Boards and
Commissions. Right now it’s 45 and the heads of Departments are 90? He wanted us to be consistent. I
have this written down somewhere.
HIGASHI: Maybe we can discuss it on the 10th again.
IRVINE: Okay, thank you. I’ll try to find it.
RAY: Safety Coordinator. Any comments there?
SANTANGELO: No.
Department Head Qualifications, DPW and DWS. We’ve all heard the confusion associated with that.
HIGASHI: Move on.
RAY: Impeachment. Okay, here’s one that we’ve gotten a lot of comment. There’s been a lot of
discussion internally, and both from the public testimony.
SANTANGELO: I don’t know how the other Commissioners feel. In certain public part of it, there has
been maybe a consistent threat, but by the same token, in going to different Chambers and going to
different organizations, there’s also some opinion that’s very, very favorable to this. So I don’t know
how -
RAY: Okay. ‘Maladministration’, that’s not terribly controversial. The number of votes and the issue of
standing seems to be more in the air. In other words, are we going to accept signatures from outside of
the district, and then is that going to change the requirement?
IRVINE: I really think we initially came up with letting people from all over impeach someone in your
district, and I don’t think that’s going to fly at all. I think that would be something that will knock this
amendment down, because it doesn’t make logical sense from first glance.
SANTANGELO: Question. So you’re saying that if you have it there where people from all over the
island can impeach someone, which is what they all like doing, that they’re going to vote it down?
IRVINE: No, I guess I just think thoughtful people will look at it and say gee whiz, you can’t come in
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from somewhere -
SANTANGELO: I love these oxymorons. For me, my concern is, just again, what do we feel is good
government here, and if it’s too much then reduce it a bit. If it’s too little, increase it. But it appears to
me, in a single member district, you should be impeaching that person. On the other hand, it makes a lot
of sense, and again, the public doesn’t buy into this when they talk about single member districts, that
these people are being elected to administer a whole County policy. It’s not a single member policy.
IRVINE: Del Pranke also said he’d go along with us if we put in Maui’s language about being able to
impeach any officer of the County. Just depends if you want to get it passed or if you -
RAY: Any feeling on this? How about just as far as what we’ve got in front of us, the number of
signatures and the standing issue? The 3% seems like it may be beyond the threshold of acceptance.
IRVINE: If it’s per district, though, that’s only going from a hundred to 240 voters, the way I look at it.
We have 71,000 registered voters and nine districts which is about 8,000 per district.
RAY: Yes, but what about for the Mayor?
SANTANGELO: In each district you have about -
IRVINE: 8,000, yes? And 3% of that is about 240.
SANTANGELO: And it’s registered voters, not people who voted in the last election.
IRVINE: I think so.
RAY: Maybe we should just kick this one out. It’s too much trouble. I don’t think this is going to pass
anyway, and we’re sitting here spending all this time.
HIGASHI: We can look at it on the 10th.
RAY: Okay, let’s think this one through. We may be beating a dead horse here.
Special Counsel. We heard the testimony. We’ve heard it on both sides.
IRVINE: Sounds like we could can that one too, if we wanted to get rid of things.
RAY: We could. I don’t think it’s a big deal. Mr. Wurdeman framed it as just something that may be a
conflict at some point in the future. It hasn’t been, and so -
SANTANGELO: John, some of these, if the Council can deal with them - I think we should deal with
things that Council just has so much trouble dealing with that does support things that people need. But
if it’s something that wouldn’t be controversial for the Council that needs to be done, let them handle it.
RAY: Okay, move on. Board of Appeals. I think we’ve kicked that.
Department Head Qualifications. I didn’t spend a lot of time reviewing this but, because of Mr. Benn’s
testimony, I went through to see if I could come up with, sort of, a cookie cutter approach to make them
all the same, and I couldn’t. I still came out with the same sort of language I did the first time, as far as
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what made sense to me. But if anybody wants to have a shot at it - I don’t see the whole logic of
everything’s supposed to be the same and the departments and the responsibilities are entirely different.
The job qualifications, in my mind, are very different, so why would you have them be exactly the same.
Okay, let’s move.
IRVINE: Can I just ask one thing? Chris had told us on March 8th that if we dealt with the Finance
Chair at the same time, then we’d have everything out of that conglomerated part of the Charter where
all the Department Head things went, under 13. Do you know what I’m talking about?
RAY: Oh, I know one thing that Curtis mentioned today was that if we do leave the Public Works, the
Chief Engineer, the registered engineer in, I think it does make sense what he said was to add the years
in administrative capacity. In other words, as well as being a Chief Engineer, if we leave that in, the
whole point of our change in the first place was to make the job more administrative, so it makes sense
to add that in.
BESS: Right.
RAY: So just add in five years experience in administrative capacity. So if we’re giving up on the
engineering, at least we put something in there about the administrative skills.
HIGASHI: But he doesn’t have to be a registered engineer at the same time he’s doing his
administrative - Could be different.
IRVINE: That’s what I was talking about. We were trying to get rid of all those Department Head
qualifications in 13, and Chris said to accomplish that, what you want to do, is we could add Finance
Director to item number 15 on the summary list. You wouldn’t actually have to change any of the
qualifications, but just move it, and that would do it.
YUEN: That’s right. But you’re talking about two different things here. One is this organizational
question of some of the Department Head qualifications being stuck in Article XIII rather than being in
their departments, and the second is how you’re going to handle the specific qualifications of
Department of Public Works.
IRVINE: Okay, I’m sorry.
YUEN: So, the way to fix that Article XIII is what I just said.
IRVINE: But it’s not in here right now in our proposal. Is that correct?
YUEN: Right.
RAY: And in addition to that, let’s add in the Chief Engineer, the additional language in regard to the
five years experience in administrative capacity. In other words, we’ll delete the whole number 11, so
that will go out, Qualifications of Heads of Departments of Public Works and Water Supply. But then
we add into number 15, under Department Head Qualifications, something on the Department of Public
Works which leaves it as a registered engineer, but adds 5 years experience in administrative capacity.
And we also add in the Finance Director, right?
IRVINE: And Deputy is under here as well it says, on page 28, under 13-
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RAY: So we could just take the language from Chapter 13 and put it in there as existing unless
somebody wants to change it.
YUEN: Right, if the only change you want to make to the existing qualifications for Department of
Public Works and Department of Water Supply Chief is to add this administrative capacity, it would
logically go in with this one that has four or five other Department Heads in it on number 15, and it
could be stuck in there. And then it could be all voted on in one amendment. And then the qualifications
could be rerouted in the Charter back to the Chapter regarding the Departments, and taken out of Article
XIII.
IRVINE: I definitely think that’s been our intent, quite a few times.
RAY: Roland.
HIGASHI: Under the Parks and Recreation Director on the bottom, it has administrative capacity in
public service or a private business, or both. Why don’t we take out ‘or both’.
RAY: Okay.
SANTANGELO: Wait, before you do that. Could that be construed as two years of one and three of
another?
IRVINE: That’s what I thought the both meant. It would allow flexibility. Whereas if you just said in
public and private, could it be argued that it would be one or the other? Which I don’t think we’d
necessarily want. I thought of the same thing. It seems redundant, but -
YUEN: It’s a little awkward saying ‘or both’ and when you take a vote on it, and if you take out ‘or
both’, put it in the minutes by the person making the motion that two years of public and three years of
private is fine, because I think that’s where the Commission is coming from, and that will serve to cover
the point if anybody has problem with it later.
RAY: So, the only one now that’s left without putting in the administrative capacity, is the Water
Manager. Do we want to do the same thing we did with Department of Public Works; in other words,
include the Water Manager in 15 as well, and put in the Administrative capacity, or not?
BESS: I would think so. I would be in favor of that.
RAY: Okay. So then that would be consistent.
IRVINE: Yes, it would be consistent. The Public Works is a really, really big department as you know.
RAY: So is Water.
IRVINE: Is Water equally complex? And somebody could get that kind of experience?
RAY: I think ‘in administrative capacity’ is pretty loose. I don’t think that’s terribly restrictive.
Okay, 17. Police Commission/Police Department. Looks okay to me.
BESS: Just as a comment, not to beat a dead horse, but the language here that says ‘the Police
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Commission shall consist of nine members’. Next sentence – ‘One member shall be appointed from each
of the respective nine County Council districts’. That’s very clear, and I think that language is the magic
language that might be used in others.
IRVINE: We also had the comment that the Mayor would nominate and the County Council appoint.
SANTANGELO: Well, there was this whole argument about the difference between approving and
appointing.
IRVINE: Yes.
SANTANGELO: Okay, Chris?
YUEN: If I could just make a suggestion on that. It would be more technically correct to say that the
Mayor nominates and then it is confirmed by the Council, however, the Charter has, for 30 years, said
Mayor appoints and Council approves, and nobody has had a problem with it, so I wouldn’t bother with
it.
IRVINE: But, it’s just if we’re rewriting, we can start a new trend, although then we’re getting
inconsistent instead of consistent.
SANTANGELO: But we have to leave something for the next 10 years.
IRVINE: Okay. I just like clarity.
RAY: Department of Water Supply. The only other suggested change there is that we name the Water
Commission the Water Board because of the confusion in some people’s minds over confusing the State
Water Commission with - Anybody have any strong feelings on that other than Steve Bowles?
IRVINE: Is it worth an amendment or can we throw it in with something else? Maybe not.
RAY: I don’t think so.
IRVINE: Probably not.
RAY: I deal with it a lot and it’s not a big deal for me.
IRVINE: You’re so smart, John. You understand all these things other people have problems with.
HIGASHI: We’re going to do an amendment to that section anyway, aren’t we? We’re going to do nine
member districts.
RAY: Yes.
IRVINE: Okay, so let’s change it to the Board.
RAY: Okay.
HIGASHI: So there’s an amendment to that section anyway.
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RAY: Okay. Is somebody going to remember that?
YUEN: Are we just making them spend money changing their stationery and their stamps and their
seals, that sort of thing?
IRVINE: You can’t vote on that one, Roland. As supplies run out and trucks die, they will change their
name to the Board Of.
RAY: It doesn’t say when so maybe the ‘when’ will be when the stationery runs out. Okay, we’ll move
on. We’ll see.
Salary Commission.
BESS: Move on.
RAY: Move on? Okay.
19. Cost-of-Government Commission.
SANTANGELO: Wait, before you move on, real quick. Because I missed a meeting, the Salary
Commission, what are we doing with that?
RAY: Nothing. No change.
Cost-of-Government Commission.
BESS: That’s where my amendment comes in. I think there ought to be an appropriate place to put ‘the
Managing Director shall serve as an ex-officio Commissioner’, and then Item 4, this is a manini detail,
but the Commission would submit a report of it’s findings and recommendations to the Managing
Director, comma, Mayor, and Council not later than...’.
RAY: Okay. Now, the other one that has generated some interest is having this Commission, the term
appointed every four years during the second two-years of the Mayor’s term. That was the
recommendation from Keola Childs.
SANTANGELO: So it’s not concurrent.
IRVINE: Why don’t we just change it to every four, rather than every two, years, or do you think it’s
good to specify exactly when?
SANTANGELO: If you say every four years and you have an implementation date, it automatically
does that, right?
IRVINE: We could put a date, you mean, instead of having to say in the second year of the reign of the
Mayor?
SANTANGELO: If it goes into effect in the year 2002, you’ve done it. And your intent, John, is that
there’s a holdover from each Mayor, that they may serve under two different Mayors?
RAY: I haven’t thought this -
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BESS: One thought just occurs to me, looking at the term of Commission, is that this last sentence, ‘No
member of a Commission shall have served as a member of the preceding Commission.’ This has to do
with our earlier discussions about getting qualified people to serve on these kinds of Commissions, and
I’m just wondering whether or not that may be too restrictive and we’re knocking out some good people
who may have served on a preceding Commission. So what we might say is ‘no more than two members
of a Commission shall have served in a preceding Commission’. You might really have some people
who are really tuned in Cost-of-Government that you’d want to include. And I understand that you don’t
want the same old cronies controlling the thing, but at the same time you’d like to draw on the expertise
of the preceding Commission members.
SANTANGELO: I don’t see that that’s something that’s going to make it pass or not pass, and I agree
with you. And sometimes we have to understand that some of these people sit here and speak for the
whole darn island and would kill anybody else that would say the same thing about them. And they
don’t. There’s a lot of people out there that feel differently. And Administrations change and I don’t
necessarily buy into that. I think sometimes it’s good to have some experience. There’s some real pluses
on the other side.
BESS: But there may be a need to address that concern about having the old cronies just continue on.
IRVINE: This Commission, though, doesn’t just continue on. It starts on March 1st and concludes on
the last day of February of the following year, even if we go to a four-year cycle, right? So, it would
only be every four years and, like you said, we just dropped that last sentence.
BESS: Okay, we could drop it all together or limit -
IRVINE: I would think so that you’re not going to have people sitting on it forever because it only
happens every once and a while.
RAY: So does anybody have any good language for the -
IRVINE: How does instead of ‘biannual’, to call it ‘every fourth year’?
YUEN: I can whip that up, if that’s what you want to do. And on May 10th, just say ‘change it to every
four years’ and I’ll whip it up and you folks will get a chance to vote on it at the next meeting after that,
the exact language. It’s pretty simple.
IRVINE: I was thinking of dropping that last sentence as well.
YUEN: Put it in a motion on the 10th and we can do that.
RAY: Some other items I want to bring up. I don’t know how much we want to discuss them today. One
is deleting the Redevelopment Agency. That seems to make sense. So that could be a possible addition.
BESS: Yes.
RAY: Del Pranke – To me, there were a number of suggestions he made. I don’t know if we want to
include any of those in terms of impeachment, in terms of lying.
IRVINE: Lying just doesn’t seem to me like something you have to say people can’t do it. Isn’t that sort
of understood?
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SANTANGELO: It’s an attitude that’s very difficult to legislate, and I think it comes to ethical, and let
people decide.
RAY: What about the cycle of the Reapportionment and Charter Commissions. There were some
suggestions that we try to change that so that the Charter Commission was convened after
reapportionment, just to take into account if the Charter were to deal with matters effected by
reapportionment. And if they were, then it would be logical to have the Charter convene after.
IRVINE: I know what you mean, but I also think the Reapportionment Commission would then feel that
they didn’t have everything in place if they were reapportioning things and then the Charter came along
and changed it all right after they got done. It’s chicken and egg, sort of. No?
YUEN: I don’t really have a comment on that. The Reapportionment Commission - I remember working
in the dates for that and that’s set up with the census, that you have the census data when the
reapportionment comes out. I don’t know if we were sitting here knowing how the Council districts had
been apportioned – if we were doing this one year later, would that have made much, if any, difference
to how the Commission looked at any of the issues. I just don’t know that.
IRVINE: Well, to me, the reapportionment might have had to meet again right after we got done if we
did go for 6-3 or something. Right now we’ve said we’d go along with the State House Districts, but
what if we’d come up with some different notion.?
SANTANGELO: But Sue, do we want to put up an amendment for a, kind of, remote possibility? You
know what I mean? We may well not take up the 6-3, and it may not be taken up for a long time.
IRVINE: No, I’m arguing against putting an amendment up.
SANTANGELO: Oh, okay. Fooled me.
IRVINE: I guess I didn’t make myself clear.
RAY: Mr. Benn brought up qualifications for the Head of the Department of Personnel. Chris answered
that to my satisfaction, why we don’t need to do that.
We could be getting a suggestion from Public Works and the Prosecutor’s Office in regard to a certain
type of appeal, the appeal process. It’s something they gave me a call about and I was, kind of, in the
middle of five things and I said talk to Chris about it, see if it needs a Charter Amendment and get us the
stuff in the next couple of days. And they haven’t yet, but, Steve, maybe you’re familiar with this.
There’s a type of appeal which, I guess, the argument is that if they could deal with it administratively
vs. having to go to the Prosecutor’s Office. It’s the kind of thing that the last order of priority for them
and it just doesn’t make sense the way it works.
BESS: Doesn’t ring any bells with me. Does it ring a bell with you, Chris?
YUEN: I’m guessing that they want to have an expedited process for administrative fines and
administrative penalties for building permit violations rather than referring them to the Prosecutor’s
Office, and I would need to sit down with them and look at that so see whether that needs to be a Charter
Amendment, or whether it’s something that could be done more simply by ordinance. But I’m guessing.
RAY: So that’s something that may come to us. And so, other people - this is just my notes - Do other
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people anticipate, or are there things that have come up that we need to think about before the 10th?
SANTANGELO: I’m just looking for things to drop.
RAY: We’re going through the agenda. We covered the Hawaii Redevelopment Agency. Oh, I brought
it up from the public testimony, the mandatory West Hawaii meetings of the County Council. As a
citizen, more or less, of West Hawaii, I think it would be beneficial to know that the County Council
would meet at least on a quarterly basis in Kona, so that at least once every three months the full
Council is coming to meet. It would just allow an opportunity on a regular basis to get to know, to
become familiar with, the Council proceedings, attend meetings. I think that would be positive and it
would be, I think, a step in the right direction in terms of including and empowering West Hawaii into
the process.
SANTANGELO: John, I have a question for you. Just to be devil’s advocate a little bit. And again, I’m
not against this at all. On the other hand, do you feel that people do, or do not, attend, and mostly don’t
attend in Hilo because it’s just been there all these years and is so available that they’ve already burnt
themselves out on it? And what I’m addressing is the fact that very few people do come to a County
Council meeting, I mean really, really few, unless it’s a hot issue and then they’ll go to hell to be there
for that. So, there’s just that that occurred to me. On the other hand, it’s a nice thing and all that.
RAY: Yes, it would be as symbolic as anything else, but I think it would -
IRVINE: That’s what I was wondering, if people would think, well, we’re not doing this, we’re not
doing that, and we’re throwing them a little ‘well, you can have this meeting over there’. It’s a positive
idea, yes.
RAY: One thing, in terms of just general public education, from an educational and community
standpoint, a lot of students, classes, civic groups, they do get to come in and experience the Council, so
that’s something that would be an opportunity, at least, for classes and civic classes to come in and they
don’t have that opportunity now. That would be another reason. And it would also, if the Council would
have to be over for full Council meetings, I think they’d do more things. They’d take advantage of it and
probably do more things and probably have more committee meetings in West Hawaii as well. So, the
idea would be something in the Charter in the County Council under 3.7, ‘the county shall meet
regularly at least twice in every month at such times and places...’. So in that section, we’d have to come
up with some language. I talked to the Clerk about this and he didn’t seem to think it was any big deal.
SANTANGELO: Were you going to ask Curtis to come up with a better preamble for us?
RAY: No.
So, I’m anticipating bringing that forward on the 10th. So, Review of Charter Changes Suggested in
Public Testimony. Anything there? Okay, Gary.
YOSHIYAMA: Maybe it just falls right in between what you just said and was just brought up. Chris, in
your experience in the Charter Commission, did past Charter Commissions make recommendations for
further action to the County Council or to the Mayor, rather than just making Charter proposals?
Because we might all feel like John. Periodically the County Council should be meeting in West Hawaii.
We don’t want to clutter up the ballot, so it should be taken care of either administratively, or by
ordinance, or by the Council, so that’s why I’m bringing it up. It seems to me like a good idea. We
might keep it in the back of our heads that we would write some recommendations for somebody else to
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take care of.
YUEN: They haven’t done it. I think the Charter Commission could do it, sort of a resolution-type thing.
YOSHIYAMA: Is it spinning our wheels? That was my next question. If they had, what came out of it?
Because we don’t want to spin our wheels.
RAY: I think that’s a good point, and in terms of coming up with some sort of a final report, we might
have an official communication to the Administration and the Council. One thing that I have thought of,
and we tried to do it, but to formally submit all our Legal Opinions, and make sure the Council has that
because that’s something that’s really pertinent to a lot of the issues they deal with on a regular basis. So
it would be good to share that.
SANTANGELO: And John, just a comment to Chris. Thank you very much for your Opinions because I
find that it not only addresses what we’re dealing with, but I come away from it very well educated, and
it’s been a lot of fun. If there’s been one thing about this paperwork I’ve enjoyed, it has been those
Opinions. I feel I’m better for it.
BESS: Wow.
RAY: Under New Business, I think we’ve had our General Review of the Charter.
YUEN: I’ll have to do some more of it.
SANTANGELO: No, but that was a jealousy from another lawyer.
BESS: No. I’ve just never heard anybody thank a lawyer for their opinion.
YUEN: It’s a first for me. I’ll tell you that.
RAY: Announcements. Next meeting date, Wednesday the 10th. We will be taking final votes and
getting as much closure as possible on these items. But I think we shouldn’t regard this as an absolute
deadline by any means, and to give ourselves as much time as we need to finish up the process. So if
things come up, let’s be prepared to deal with them.
Motion to adjourn?
ALONZO: So move.
BESS: Second.
RAY: Okay, meeting adjourned.
The discussion ended at 1:45 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
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Sharron Henry
Secretary-Administrative Assistant
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