HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN CHC 2000-05-10REGULAR MEETING OF THE
HAWAII COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION
WEDNESDAY, MAY 10, 2000
ALPHABETICAL INDEX
Subiect Page numbers
Adjournment 74
Announcements 72
Appointments 8
Attendance 1
Audit Department 7
Board of Appeals 6, 10, 23
Boards and Commissions 9
Call to Order 1
Charter Articles/Sections 8, 9, 10
Article V, Section 5-1.2 8
5-6.2 9
5-6.3 10
Article VI 9
6-2.2 9
6-5.4 9
Section 13-4 9
Communications 16
Cost -of -Government Commission 5, 10, 61
County Managing Director 4, 8, 31
Department Head Qualifications 7, 52
Department of Environmental Services 5, 9
Ethics Conflict of Interest 7
Financial Status Report 15
Fire Commission 1, 4, 11, 36
Hawaii Redevelopment Agency 68
Hawaiian Issues 12
Holdover of Members of Boards and Commissions 5, 49
Impeachment 2, 5, 9, 20
Legislative Research Office 5, 18
Mandate County Council meetings in West Hawaii/Kona 68
Minutes 15
New Business 72
Next Meeting Date 73
Nonpartisan Elections 1, 4, 11, 26
Planning Commission 5, 23
Planning Department functions 5, 22
Police Department/Police Commission 1, 6, 55
Qualifications for Heads of Department of Public Work 5, 19
and Department of Water Supply
Review and Final Vote on Charter Changes
Suggested in Public Testimony 68
Review and Final Vote on Tentatively
Approved Charter Amendments 16
Safety Coordinator 5, 9, 51
Salary Commission 6, 60, 62
Special Counsel 6, 24
Statements from the Public 1
Three At -large Seats 1, 5, 6, 8, 11, 17
Unfinished Business 16
Water Commission 58
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HAWAII COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION
Transcript of Meeting of May 10, 2000
Hawaii County Liquor Commission Conference Room,
Hilo Lagoon Center
Attendance: J. Ray, E. Alonzo, S. Bess, M. Herkes, R. Higashi, S. Irvine, D.
Kurozawa (from 5:15 p.m.), J. Santangelo, G. Yoshiyama, Counsel
C. Yuen
Absent: K. Balog, G. Martin
And 14 members of the publicin attendance.
The meeting was called to order at 5:00 p.m.
RAY: I'd like to call the meeting to order. This is the 1999-2000 Hawaii
County Charter Commission. It is Wednesday, May 10t, 5 p.m. We're in the Hilo
Lagoon Centre, Liquor Control Conference Room.
Attendance. This evening at the present time: Sue Irvine, Marni Herkes, Steve Bess,
Vice Chairman Roland Higashi, John Santangelo, Gary Yoshiyama, Eddie Alonzo, and
myself John Ray, Chair. We are expecting two more members. One of our members,
George Martin, is out of town. He's on the mainland, so we knew that he wouldn't be
here.
Statements from the Public. We have a number people signed up. If you're not, you
need to fill out a form other there and hand it across to the desk.
The first person signed up is Del Pranke, followed by Mai Apple McCullough. Del.
PRANKE: Thank. you, Mr. Ray, Mr. Chair and Commission members. I'm here
to talk against several proposed items. We've talked about these some before, but
new things have happened in the last couple of weeks that I will bring to your attention,
I hope to help you to understand why I've taken some of the positions I have. I won't
talk about all of these because I know there are other people that will talk about some
of them. I've talked with them and they pretty much have some of the same ideas. So
I'm going to skip the non-partisan and the Council 3 at -large seats. I'm opposed to
those.
The Fire Commission and the Police Commission items, number 4 and 16, I'm
going to lump together. The Fire Commission amendment, as it reads now - it might be
changed - reads essentially the same as the current Police Commission, and the
current Police Commission has trouble doing its own job without us getting it fixed. And
the way I read the proposed amendment, that was proposed before, would simply
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cause the Police Commission to get farther involved in the Police Department without
helping solve the problem of real oversight. The Police Commission should not be
involved in running the Police Department. The Police Chief is the only person who
should do that. When you blur the lines of command, you cause more problems than
you solve. And the way I read it, the amendment put in by the Police Commission
would simply do that, simply put them more involved inside the Police Department.
Whoever set up the Police Commission before did at least one good thing and that was
to keep the Police Commission completely out of the day-to-day operations of the
Police Department. That should be a linear, military -type chain of command so there's
no confusion for the people who are out on the street with their lives sometimes
depending upon the fact that they know what their chain of command is. And to set up a
Fire Commission that would essentially be the same kind of thing, with no real control,
or no real oversight of the Fire Department, would be a mistake. I urge you, still, to put
before the voters the opportunity to have the Police Commission and the Fire
Commission, if you wish to put it in, appointed not by one person. Have the Police
Commission and the Fire Commission, one member from each district, appointed by
the Council member from that district and approved by the rest of the Council before
they are appointed. The reason being we cut out some of the political influence that
occurs when one person appoints the people who are overseeing a part of the
government that's run by the person appointing them. It's just a total conflict of interest.
To give you some insight into this, it's come to our attention in the last week or so that
Wayne Carvalho may have falsified a federal document — a document required to be
filled out by someone in the County, and it's required by Executive Order. This is a
document which would allow us to get marijuana eradication funds from the Federal
Government, and they have what they call an OJP, an Office of Justices Program, form
that has to be attached with this. And that OJP form requires that the person signing it
certify three things: (1) that the money won't be used for lobbying; — and there's a
purpose for me telling you this. I'm sorry. (2) there's a debarment, and (3) that we try to
have a drug free workplace. The debarment is the key. The debarment says that you
certify that the person signing this has not been convicted of civil fraud or civil bribery
within the last three years. Mr. Carvalho signed this document on the 11th of April. I
guess he can't remember back to December. The problem is we can't get rid of him,
and here's what's happened. The County of Hawaii has also been convicted of these
things. We may not be able to get any drug control money for the next three years
because we can't get rid -of the guy. We need a Police Commission that has clear
authority to oversee this, that's completely separated from the Executive management
of the County, and has the independence to take things into their own hands, and not
controlled by politics. This is a true fact. This document is now in the hands of the FBI,
and they will be looking at it. And, of course, the County Council asked the Corporation
Counsel to look into it, but we may have a problem with that.
Now, in addition to the problem of getting rid of the person, we're stuck with the liability
of this because we can't get rid of him, so that brings us to the second thing — the
proposed Charter that I told you, which would be the second possibility, is to allow all
officers of the County to be impeachable. If we could have impeached Mr. Carvalho,
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maybe we wouldn't have been in this position, when we first learned about this stuff
some years ago. And impeachment would have been a simple surgical slice, and then
we could have gone on. But instead, this thing lingers on and drags on and we're stuck
with this situation which is dragging us down. So I urge you to allow people to vote on
the opportunity to have each Commission member on an oversight committee
appointed by Council members — only the four oversight committees — and to allow for
all officers of the County, not just the elected officers, all officers to be impeached. And
I urge you to reject the idea of making the impeachment process more difficult. The
idea of an impeachment is to quickly get something to court because an impeachment
is like a quo warranto. It goes ahead of anything else on the docket as quickly as it can,
so that the judge makes a decision.. Now, the judge is still deciding by law whether
someone has committed an impeachable offense. It's not the 100 people signing. It's
only the judge making the decision. The purpose of the impeachment is to allow for a
quick resolution to something that might otherwise drag on, as we're seeing in this
case.
So those are the things that I would urge you, most urgently. And, of course, from my
friend, Mr. Pierson, — I don't think he showed up. He was going to.
RAY: He's here.
PRANKE: Oh. If he's signed up, I'm sure he'll talk to you about having 'telling
a lie' to be a violation of the Code of Ethics. Thank you very much.
• RAY: Okay, questions?
SANTANGELO: Del, you said you're opposing non-partisan?
PRANKE: I am.
SANTANGELO: In ten words or Tess, why?
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PRANKE: Well, I'm going to let other people talk about it, but non-partisan
elections, I believe, don't allow for third and fourth party candidates the opportunity to
actually gain a foothold into the election process. But the other thing is how do we stop
the money coming from parties? How are you going to say the Democratic Party, or the
Republican Party, the Green Party, cannot solicit money for somebody that they want, if
that person avows himself as a Green, or such a thing? How do the citizens know that?
SANTANGELO: Well, Del, the thing I would counter with that that I struggle with
this, every darn time we've had somebody sit up here and talk about the Mayor, they
want to talk about a minority vote getter serving, and this solves that problem. And time
and time again, on Council races and the Mayoral races, we've said this guy, or this
girl, did not make it, and yet they have the seat.
PRANKE: We oftentimes elect a plurality President. You know. In the past,
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they've been plurality Presidents. That's not been a problem. I don't see the problem
with the plurality — I mean, besides it gives me fodder to pick at him about.
SANTANGELO: Well, that's an honest answer.
PRANKE: But, I know that some people have complained about this, but they
just don't understand the plurality. If we had something like the Israeli system where
you had to get enough support from all these different parties — I mean, there's all kinds
of different systems. But I don't see any problem with this. I'm not in favor of the non-
partisan elections, but I'II let others talk. They're more eloquent than me. Thank you.
RAY: Mai Apple McCullough, followed by Peter Martin.
MC CULLOUGH: Thanks for this opportunity to speak to you folks. I came basically
because it was the last chance for community input to come in, I think, on this Review
Commission or proposed Charter Amendments.
RAY: We are taking final votes this evening, but we will be meeting
again. It's probably not the last chance.
MC CULLOUGH: Thank you. I made a list somewhere here of my yeas and nays,
and I have to say I do basically agree with Del's testimony except for non-partisan
elections. I am 100% in favor of non-partisan elections. I don't think that politics, or at
least party politics, have any business in County Government, and that's what we are
here is a County. I feel real strongly about that.
So, I have yeas on number 1, 3, 5, 9, 11, 17, and 19, with a couple of sparse remarks.
On number 4, I want to say also -
RAY:
record.
Why don't you identify what it is you're opposed to, just for the
MC CULLOUGH: Favoring:
1. Non-partisan elections.
3. Strengthening the authority of the County Managing Director.
4. A yes tentative on waiting until after the — The Fire Commission, number 4 is the Fire
Commission. I'm sorry I feel befuddled by this request. Ya'II have the papers, right?
Everybody knows what they are.
RAY: Actually, no, we don't have.absolute numbers tied to absolute -
MC CULLOUGH: Okay, I just didn't want to take up all the time. Okay.
4. Creating a Fire Commission. I can't really say yes or no because, in my opinion,
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we need to wait to get the Police Commission working so that we have some kind of
rules that we can follow that apply to different Commissions. I don't think we need to
create more of a brouhaha until we get things straightened out with what we've got.
I am in favor of the proposed amendment 5 for a Department of Environmental
Services. Sounds like a good thing.
9. On a Safety Coordinator. Sounds good.
11. is on the Qualifications of the Heads of Department of Public Works and
Department of Water Supply, specifically. Yes, I just think it's a good idea to have
good qualified people and I think we can make exceptions but, overall, I think that we
do need to have qualified people, not necessary somebody gets appointed because
they're somebody's cousin or uncle or somehow related. I think the nepotism that we
have had for the way it's always been done, kind of thing, here in Hawaii County has
really got us pretty deep in shit, if you'll pardon the expression.
I also favor the proposed amendment 19, Cost -of -Government Commission, an
overview that would suggest ways to reduce the cost of government and increase
efficiency. Okay, so that's the yeas.
Now, on the nays:
2. Amendment on the Council to include 3 at -large seats. No way. Every district
must have representation of its own, period.
6. Amendment proposal on Planning Department functions. No, and I think it ought
to just be deleted completely.
The 7th proposed amendment on Legislative Research. I just wanted to ask, well,
why do we need a Legislative Auditor's Office? I don't understand. It seems like this is
already being done. Do we really need another office here? I don't know I guess you
guys know more about it than I am, but unless we really do, I'm not in favor of that. In
other words, I would vote nay.
On the proposed amendment 8, Holdover of members of Boards and
Commissions. I don't think so. I think it does allow the Mayor more authority over
keeping things the way that it is if we don't have a good and benevolent Mayor, then
think that can get us in trouble. I think our Mayor has far too much power in this
County.
I'm opposed to proposed amendment 10 on the Planning Commission powers. I
think that ought to just be taken out too. It's got to go through the Council, all this stuff
— through our elected officials, in other words, not appointees.
The 12th proposed amendment on Impeachment. I would just say no, please leave
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this like it is already. It's hard enough. Don't increase the number of people that are
registered voters who are now necessary to get anyone impeached.
Also, no on 13, which is Special Counsel being appointed for County officers and
employees when Corp Counsel has a conflict without Council approval. This is a
joke. It's a conflict of interest all over the place. Any place but Hawaii County, this
would never get on paper in black and white in front of the public because it's so
ludicrous.
14, I vote no on having a Board of Appeals move to the Corp Counsel.
And I vote heavy no on the 16th proposed amendment on the Police Commission
being given powers to get into the doings of the Police Department. A Police
Commission, by my understanding, is supposed to serve as a check and balance over
the Police Department. That means they look at stuff and say, because they can be
objective, oh, this isn't good. They've got to be objective. They can't be too involved in
the administration, or the running, of the Police Department because then they won't
have any objectivity.
And I also vote no on the 18th proposed amendment on the Salary Commission
being given power to set salaries. I think that this, as it is, established by ordinance,
is just fine the way it is.
think that's everything. I'm sorry I was so verbose and used a bad word. Thank you.
RAY: Okay. Peter Martin, followed by Marshall Blann.
MARTIN: Good evening members of the Commission. We have been before
you a couple of times before recently talking about these issues. And the last time I was
assured by a couple of members that we wouldn't need to worry about at least one of
them, the at -large. I'd like to see some show here as to how we stand on the at -large,
from the members, because there's no sense -
RAY: You'll see as soon as we vote on it.
MARTIN: All right. We feel very, very strongly, many of us, not just in my
group, but all over the County. Yes Marni, we do.
HERKES: Some do.
MARTIN: And those people who have been listening know that. I will say that
should you choose to vote for 3 at -large, we will be obliged, as groups, and this is not a
threat, with all due respect, to do our very best to defeat all the issues because we
can't pick out one and hope that people will remember the number. So this is very,
very important. We finally have a Council which is more and more representative of all
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of the districts of the island. And what this is going to do, the 3 at -large, is to take that
representation away.
The other thing is the proper qualifications for Department Heads. This is really a
critical issue in the good functioning of any government. If you take the Department
Head qualifications away, you leave the door open for favoritism, appointment of
people who are not qualified but happen to be friends of so and so, etc., etc. We don't
ask a surgeon that hasn't gone to medical school to take out our appendix and we
shouldn't be asking a non -engineer to make engineering decisions. So we ask you
very, very sincerely to pay heed to these things. They are very important. Thank you.
RAY: Okay, thank you. Marshall Blann followed by Walt Kriewald.
BLANN: Thank you for the opportunity to voice my opinions. I've had a
chance now to study the document which I picked up at the Waimea reading. I have a
series of comments; some a little bit substantive, the other a little bit more nitpicking.
To go out of order before going into the order of the list from Waimea, first thing was
the Audit Department. My understanding was, because they hadn't done an audit in
eight years, we're going to change the name to Legislative Research. Now, it might be
the reason they haven't done an audit is because none of them appointed has any
accounting experience or auditing experience. The Mayor may have his reasons for
appointing people like that.
RAY:
Administration.
This is part of the County Council Office. It's not part of the
BLANN: Okay, thank you. What I was going to say is any governmental
agency that has $180 million annual budget, or even a smaller, needs to have an
accounting done every year, if it's not. In fact, it, I don't think, should be done by the
Audit Department. So, if they're not doing that, I'd say get rid of the Audit Department.
(indiscernible) be done by an independent national auditing organization.
RAY: By the way, the County is audited by an independent national
auditing agency every year.
BLANN: Are they? Oh, okay, thank you. I'm relieved then because
thought that wasn't.
The next item I wanted to mention is I don't know if it's possible to put some sort of an
ethics conflict of interest resolution before the County to vote on. It's nice to brag to
my friends from Texas that members of our Council from Hilo and Puna get
contributions from as far away as Long Island, New York, and that they're appreciated
by corporations that far away, but I think when they vote on issues effecting those
corporations, it would be ethical and correct for them to recuse themselves. I think the
voters of this island would go along with that. I think it would be nice if they had a
chance to vote on that.
All right, now I'd like to go to some of the specific items. I would say I'm not in favor of
the at -large, as I stated last time.
The Managing Director. I don't know that it's stated but I would think he should have
the same professional qualifications as a County Manager would have, though I would
prefer that there be, in fact, a County Manager.
On Article V, Section 5-1.2, I would just suggest a small change of wording. It says
'the mayor may serve for more than two terms but shall not serve more than two
consecutive full terms'. I'd suggest changing that 'may serve for more than two terms,
but shall not be elected to more than two consecutive terms'. Conceivably one day,
you might get someone unscrupulous who might resign just before the end of the term,
as it's worded now, and run again for re-election. That would not be in the sense of
this. So if we just said `shall not be elected to more than two consecutive full terms', I
think that would take care of that.
13-3, Appointments. I want to say, again, proper professional degrees are needed.
As written, I think maybe, the terms there such as `proper investigation ' and 'related
fields' are so ambiguous that they don't mean anything. They're too broad and I think
maybe one wants to say a little more clearly what constitutes `proper investigation' and
`related fields'. That's done somewhat for the Planning Director but I'm a little taken
aback by the term 'geography' as a qualification. It might be nice if they can tell you
where the Holy Roman Empire used to be in a map of the world, and the Ottoman
Empire, but it's not clear to me what that has to do with running a Planning Office. An
appointment in Hilo would probably be able to tell us.that the Grand Canyon is not what
he reaches back and finds, but I don't see that as relevant, again, to running the
Planning Department.
RAY: Actually, the field of geography is quite broad. I studied Coastal
Geography when I was in college, which was actually directly applicable to planning
issues in this County.
BLANN:
might say —
Okay, it's not what comes to my mind by 'geography'. Geology, I
HERKES: Mr. Ray, could I ask a question?
BLANN: Please.
HERKES: I went through about 15 different Charters, or documents, from
different entities on the mainland and across this island, and I looked for language for
Managing Directors, for qualifications. I didn't find a lot of language that pleased me, or
that I felt comfortable with. Do you have any specific language that you could propose?
I mean, like five years experience, and those kinds of broad things, are fine, but they
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don't really fill the bill.
• BLANN: What I would do, for example, for a County Manager or for the
Managing Director, is I would go to a professional organization. I suspect County
Managers have one. Most professional groups do. I would try to get information from
them, and possibly consultants from some of their Boards, and have them help outline
what is proper language in that field. And in general, in the different areas, I would try
to contract professional organizations, try to get some ideas from those and condense
those into what seemed good.
HERKES: Thank you.
BLANN: Article VI, Chapter 5, Department of Environmental Services.
Again, maybe I misread this, but it didn't seem as though the qualifications of the
Director needed to have any experience in Envir6nmental Science Management. It
looked like it was purely administrative, and I would think that that post would need
someone who, preferably, had a degree in Environmental Science and some
experience in management processes.
6-5.4. I put let the Council submit names, one list from each Council member, so that
must have been some Board or Commission.
Under Section 13-4, having to do with the 90 day succession of appointments from
the previous Administration, I would say no. I would write it that they may continue up to
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90 days if requested in writing by the new appointive authority. So if it was a post that
the Mayor would appoint, the new incoming mayoral candidate could request that the
people stay on, but he shouldn't be saddled, with dolts for 90 days if he doesn't wish to
be. That could foul up the setting -up of a new Administration.
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5-6.2. I'd borrow from old Office of Price Administration and ask if the trip is really
necessary. It seems we may be creating a lot of new governmental posts. This, I hate
to sound like Ronald Reagan but, is increasing the cost of government and making
government bigger. Wasn't clear to me, if that Commission was necessary.
At the bottom of the page, I would suggest a wording from the present, `should the
Safety Coordinator be abolished' to the more genteel `should the position of Safety
Coordinator be abolished'.
6-2.2. Again, do not remove the professional qualifications.
Section 2, under Impeachment, I would plead with you to leave it alone. It has not
been abused. As I said, if anything, it's under-utilized. I see no reason to change it
and to clutter the ballot with a change when it has not been a problem, unless the
politicians are thinking of changing their.activities, getting very abusive, and they want
to be further insulated from the voters rather than responsible. But what I would like to
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see, if we're going to change the numbers, is the requirement of getting an Initiative on
the ballot from 20% down to a level of two or three percent. I think that's more
reasonable and feasible. What danger is there to let the people vote on whether they
think something is a good idea or not?
HERKES: May I ask another question?
BLANN: Please.
HERKES: On impeachment, do you favor island -wide impeachment for single
district members, or do you favor single district voters only impeaching. I mean, I could
reach into somebody else's district and impeach their Councilman.
BLANN: Right now, I think that's exactly what I'd like to see.
HERKES: So you favor island -wide for single districts. Okay.
BLANN: There was 5-6.3, Board of Appeals and my recommendation there
is to make it nine members, 'again one from each district, consistent with some of the
suggestions that have come from this group on some of the other Boards.
Department of Research and Development, I've already given my ideas on that.
The Cost -of -Government Commission, finally. It seems to me that the meetings are
too frequent as proposed, that every three to four years would be more appropriate if
you had such a Commission. That's because it takes them one year to study the
operation of the government It would take a second year to put the changes they
recommended into effect. By then you're appointing a new committee to study again. It
seems that the changes haven't really had a chance to work in and see if they're
effective until they've had a year in place.
RAY: We are amending that to every four years.
BLANN: Great. That is everything I wish to say. Thank you.
RAY: Walt. Kriewald, followed by Councilwoman Bobby Jean Leithead-
Todd.
KRIEWALD: I don't want to keep hitting a dead horse here, but there are a
couple of things in the minutes of your previous two meetings before the Waimea
meeting that I took issue to, and both of them come from Ms. Herkes. One of them, she
says about spending money for campaigns, and she says `do you know how much, let's
pick Chairman Arakaki, spent in his last campaign', and I brought that up at the
Waimea meeting. He spent $71,000 running unopposed. Finance matters a great deal
in the County elections, and I didn't have time to pull the rest of them, but I just picked
Al Smith's, but I'm sure Ms. Leithead-Todd can speak to it, maybe. Mr. Arakaki's ran 40
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pages and I didn't want to burden anybody with that. But, 60% of his funding comes
from West side developers. The rest of his funding comes from the East side of the
island, but it's all — I don't want to say all, pardon me — most of it is from lawyering
firms, planning consultants. It essentially has no small person input. What you're
doing is financing campaigns with contributions from large developers. If you go to a 6-
3, this will just burgeon out of control. If Mr. Arakaki can spend $71,000 in a single
district running unopposed, you can do the math and see where you're going to come
up with a campaign island -wide and where all the money's going to come from. It's just
not going to come from $100 from Jim Smith and Sara Jones.
The other thing that I would like to state. In here she says 'and I think a lot of it has',
and she's speaking again about 6-3, 'with our elected officials using their lack of power
and blaming other people, so they blame other people so that makes it more difficult for
government to function. You know how West Hawaii loves to blame East Hawaii for all
their ills.' I find that offensive.
RAY: Well, let's don't get into personal attacks. If you've got some
testimony that directly relates to the Charter Amendments, that's fine.
KRIEWALD: Okay. That's my testimony. It's in the minutes of your Charter
Commission.
RAY: I understand that. Okay. Thank you.
KRIEWALD: Thank you.
RAY: Okay, Councilwoman Bobby Jean Leithead-Todd, followed by
Harold Jim and Patrick. These are the last two people signed up to testify, so if
anybody else wants to testify, you need to sign up over there. Hi, Bobby Jean.
LEITHEAD-TODD: Hi. This past weekend the Hawaii County Democratic Party held
its County Convention. The convention was co-chaired by Nancy Pisicchio and myself.
We had three resolutions in front of the convention concerning proposed Charter
Amendments and we voted on those resolutions.
The convention approved a resolution favoring the creation of the Fire Commission.
We took a position in opposition to the 6-3 proposal for Council elections and passed a
resolution in favor of retaining the nine single member districts.
And we also took a position in opposition to non-partisan elections.
And that's basically all I'm here to speak to.
RAY: Okay, thank you. Any questions for Councilwoman?
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IRVINE: Bobby Jean, can you just say a bit about what the vote on the non-
partisan, why they're in opposition? I suppose they are a Party and that might mean
why.
LEITHEAD-TODD: Part of it is Party, but some of the rationale in opposition to non-
partisan was similar to the rationale for our support of single member districts. We think
that in a non-partisan election, by removing labels from people, you're really removing
information about the candidates from the population, and that most of the Parties go
through a process where you have Precinct meetings, you have a County Convention,
you adopt a platform, you take positions on various issues, and so there is a process
before people run as candidates where they receive input from the entire island. And
also for those of us who go to the State Convention, we get input from the entire State
regarding their positions on particular issues. When you run in a non-partisan election,
you don't have any of that, what we consider grassroots input, so we think that it
weakens grassroots participation in the political process. You know that some of the
criticism you have about the current system, we think will be worse in a non-partisan
situation. We think it will favor the candidate who is an incumbent. We think it will
favor the candidate who has the biggest war chest. That's some of the reason we are
also opposed to the single member district. Those things cut both ways for us as
Democrats. If I happen to be the Democrat —
RAY: You mean opposed to the at -large district?
LEITHEAD-TODD: Yes, we are opposed to the at -large. It raises the cost of the
• elections and it also, I think, makes it more difficult for grassroots participation.
RAY: Okay. Thank you. Harold Jim and Patrick Kahawaiola'a.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Good evening. My name is Patrick Kahawaiola'a. I'm a Native
Hawaiian and a resident of Keaukaha. I would like to preface my statement, and
maybe show some disappointment, but, however, with our coming before this Charter
Commission, being asked to propose some language for Charter review a month ago,
and not have had the opportunity by the Commission to even receive any kind of
acknowledgment, approval, or disapproval, of our language based on, maybe, some
unfounded fears that we hope maybe could have been cleared up. So let me again
thank you for allowing us, as Native Hawaiians, to come forward and make testimony. It
pains me based on the fact I don't know how many Native Hawaiians, or somebody
sitting here, that have really, within their hearts, the ideas and the thoughts that what
Native Hawaiians go through in their own lands. However, I'm not going to dwell there
because I believe you have responsibilities, and the responsibilities that you, some so
aptly gave testimony to, with different people that I've been privy to sit in on in your
discussion here with interacting with other people that gave testimony, was that one, I
guess, Commission member mentioned that they were duly constituted under the laws,
and as far as they were concerned, they're operating here in a legal fashion. I'm not
saying that you're illegal. I'm saying that you need to consider the facts and the plights
of the Native Hawaiian. When you took this job, some of you swore to uphold the
12
Constitution of this State. In this State of Hawaii, the Constitution reads right off the
bat, it says the people, the State and its people will uphold the Hawaiian race.
• happen to be that Hawaiian race. This Charter, which is only 36 pages long, makes no
provisions for Native Hawaiians. We brought that language forward for you to consider
that would incorporate Native Hawaiians into your Charter. Your Charter starts off in the
Preamble and it says this: 'We the people of the County of Hawaii'; then you go to your
definition in Article I, Section 1-1 gives the clear definition of who that people are. 'The
people of the County of Hawaii shall be and continue as the body politic and
incorporate by the name County of Hawaii hereinafter in this charter call County.'
That's who the people of this County of Hawaii is. I hope you're not assuming that I'm
part of that body political just because I happen to be here in the County of Hawaii. I
was born and raised here. So I need for you, in the language we've proposed, because
come from the land. I happened to be born and raised on the lands within this county.
That's why we were here again. In the second section of that Article I, it talks about the
geographical limits. The Island of Hawaii and all islands within the shores thereof and
the waters adjacent thereto shall be the County of Hawaii.' Again, I come back to ask
you, the confusion that this county has perpetrated to the Hawaiian people is that we
once received an Opinion of your counsel here that says we're all included. This deals
with Hawaiian home lands also. And if it does, put Hawaiian home lands in there then.
Put it there. Don't say the whole island and then when we go to different departments
within this county, we have no jurisdiction over Hawaiian home lands. That's the
confusion part that's sending out the message to the Hawaiians out here that we are
secondclass citizens, third, fourth class citizens. We're not included in your Charter.
• That was the language. The language was to help include us and how we can get
things done within this county. We sent a letter to the Mayor asking that we be
included because about a month ago this question was asked of the Corporation
Counsel by Curtis Tyler. Does the County have jurisdiction on Hawaiian home lands?
The answer of Gerald Takasi was no. No. And that's the guy you're dealing with in
your Council, in your Charter. You're going to make Corporation Counsel, include them
— they're all in here. But the Corporation Counsel says clearly no. We have a decision
from Mr. Wurdeman, an Opinion, in a totally unrelated matter, however, he does state
this in his Opinion; the Hawaiian Homes Act did not authorize the State or local
government to apply a tax lien to Hawaiian home lands. We take away the tax lien to
the extent that the real property lien is an incumbrance on the property created by non-
administrators of the Act, of the DHHL land. An Act of Congress would be required to
attach it to Hawaiian home lands. The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act also
embodies express provisions that the Governor — the Governor and the Board of Land
and Natural Resources not exercise their powers and duties over lands having the
status of Hawaiian home lands. That's in Section 206. This provision evidence a
strong intent that Hawaiian home lands not be controlled by State or local
governments, but by DHHL. The disposition of Hawaiian home lands by county tax
here would be in contradiction of this intent. This is just one avenue. All I'm trying to
lead you up to is that it needs to be included in your Charter. It needs to be included.
Are we included or are we excluded? Because the Opinion of Mr. Wurdeman is clear,
and your counsel agreed to it because he wrote something about it, that provides the
incumbrance authorized to be placed on Hawaiian home lands by officers other than
13
those charged with the admission of such Act shall not be increased except for the
consent of Congress. That's basically where we're at. This County has no consent
• from Congress to increase the incumbrance. A tax lien is an incumbrance. A building
permit is an' incumbrance. A zoning.. change is an incumbrance. It's been ruled. It's
senseless for us Hawaiians to come here before you, but we do because we're trying to
work within the system. It's again a notice. I do know that a lot of you, and this counsel
that you have — don't put this on. Don't put those Hawaiian things in the Charter. Don't
do it. And if you're prepared to do that, please sign a document saying that you're not.
Then give it to me and I'II take it somewhere else. Because, again, I go back to your
responsibilities. You said you upheld the Constitution, took this job as County
Commissioners to review the Charter, and then again ignore us when we come before
you. Trust me. You can all say personally no, that's not what we feel, but that's how
Hawaiians feel.
IRVINE: Sir.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Yes.
IRVINE: I don't think we're ignoring you.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Thank you for your thought.
IRVINE: I think we're doing our best to understand, and it is very, very
difficult to understand whether you wish to be part of the County or exempt. I do not feel
that I could vote for anything that would not continue to provide Police and Fire
protection on Hawaiian homes, and I'm afraid if we exclude you in some sense, or
include you in some special sense, that you may lack that help.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Then may I just say that if it was your intentions to do that, please
let us know, so we know how to explain it better, if you didn't understand it. But to
ignore us, to ignore us sends that message. It should have been explained. You got
counsel here. He knows absolutely what. This is not his first time sitting here on the
Charter Commission. He used to be with the Land Use Commission. Please avail
yourselves. Don't treat us as second class citizens.
JIM: Let me give you some kind of guidelines of the mandatory law, the
General Law of this county, the local government. It's very simple. You turn to Article
XII, Section 3. It clearly express the incumbrance. Those are mandated, compelled, by
the State and government that you cannot increase the incumbrance without the
authority of government. That's preempt law by Congress, that you accepted it under
the Compact on Article XII, Section 2. It's not something that you have to put on the
ballot. It's something that's mandatory. Now, if you decide that you the rumors we
have — we find ourselves very difficult to come before this Board because their
concerns is about the Native Hawaiians on the Constitution uses of the law of the body.
political, which you are. You don't belong. to us. The Constitution separates us. Can
you come on our land? That tells you no. Can you get a sewer plant come on our
14
i
land? Right now the County passed a law. They're going to buy Waiakea's sewer
plant. Hell, they are. The Mayor ain't signing nothing because he cannot receive no
land from Hawaiian homes because your Charter forbid him to even accept the
proposal the body political, which is the County police powers. They can't. They can
make a ruling, come before him to the management. He can't without the incumbrance
transferred to him, and it can't be done. We are not trying, here, to make fools out
people. We are trying to let the process to understand it's impossible without the
consent. You are compelled, the courts, this State, are compelled by Congress. Here
they're off right now — I am giving you notice. You are liable to exclude us. Thank you.
RAY: Patrick.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Yes.
RAY: By the way, we not only did not ignore this, we discussed it at some
length at our last meeting in Waimea. We did have an additional correspondence from
our legal counsel in regard to this issue, and we did discuss it in full and grapple with it.
apologize if you did not receive a copy of that.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: We did not receive it.
RAY: But we did discuss this at some length.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Then let me apologize before you because if we had known, we
could have responded and maybe not -
JIM:
response.
Let me put it this way. Just receive it. Within ten dajrs you'll get a
KAHAWAIOLA'A: We'II be responding within ten days to it.
HERKES: I think it's we that should apologize to you that you didn't get that
letter sooner, and I apologize.
KAHAWAIOLA'A: Ma'am, I accept your apologies, with the only fact forgive me
because when we don't have it, we assume. And when you assume, you make ass out
of you and me. So, thank you very much.
RAY: That concludes our public testimony unless we have anybody else
that wants to sign up. Moving on.
Minutes Approval. There are no minutes to approve this evening.
Financial Status Report. Our financial status report is the same as it was on 3/31,
showing a balance of $72,311.48. In regard to finances, just for your information, we
did discuss various scenarios and costs attached to public education and advertising in
15
regard to getting out the proposed Charter Amendments before the election. So we will
be looking at that once we have a sense of remaining funds, just what our options are
and be developing a final budget in regard to that.
Communications. In our packets today are the minutes which we just received; a
communication from Commissioner Irvine in regard to the Department of Environmental
Management; a communication from Commissioner Herkes in regard to a Code of
Ethics draft; and correspondence, two letters, one from Tom Beach and one from Judy
Graham.
Moving into Unfinished Business, Review and Final Vote on Tentatively Approved
Charter Amendments. We're going to go through one -by -one. If it seems a little bit
confusing, and we have to, sort of, start and stop, a number of things were under
discussion at our last meeting in Waimea, and so we don't have formal changes in front
of us in terms of everything that was discussed, so we're just going to, kind of, work our
way through this, and that's the process. So, what you're hearing is our continuing
discussion from the last meeting in Waimea in regard to any proposed changes in
regard to the 19 proposed amendments. We are also going to be entertaining a vote
on a couple of proposed amendments that were not listed previously; one in regard to
the Hawaii Redevelopment Agency, and another in regard to language which would
mandate mandatory West Hawaii meetings of the County Council. So those are two
other items that are coming up. The Chair will entertain a motion to delete items if
someone wants to make that motion.
HERKES: Can we amend the agenda to get something else on? I want to put
the Preamble on it. Do I have to wait until next time?
YUEN: Yes, it would be better to do so. Yes.
RAY: If there's an item that a Commissioner wants to move forward that
has not been agendized, then our counsel has advised us that we would be better off
agendizing it and taking it up at another meeting.
SANTANGELO: Mr. Chair.
RAY: Yes.
SANTANGELO: Question. Would you like a format of taking this as they're
numbered, one at a time, and then accepting a motion for consideration, or not to
consider it? Would that be appropriate or you just want us to go helter-skelter and start
grabbing —
RAY:
person.
IRVINE:
Let's see how it goes. I've always been, kind of, a helter-skelter
don't know about helter-skelter but we might move to get rid of
16
what we think we might be able to get rid of right now. I could see that.
• SANTANGELO: Rather than accept — okay. Then I'd like to make a motion, Mr.
Chairman.
RAY: Okay.
SANTANGELO: On item 2, Council to include 3 at -large seats —
HIGASHI: Are we going to go from 1 down or just —
SANTANGELO: Well, that's what I just asked. We're going to delete things so I'm
jumping in there.
HERKES: He's making an assumption.
SANTANGELO: Yes.
RAY: So, you're going through with your deletions, right?
or
SANTANGELO: I don't know. Excuse me. I'm in the middle of a motion but I'II
retract that, and I was asking for guidance and I thought the discussion between you
and Sue said let's get rid of the things first.
IRVINE: Go for it, John.
SANTANGELO: All right. I move that number 2, Council to include 3 at -large
seats not be moved forward and placed on the ballot. I would ask for a second for
these reasons: I think that this is something I have supported. I've seen, in my own
heart, a lot of good that this could do. On the other hand, the overwhelming public
testimony opposing this, the lack of understanding, or certainly me being understood as
well as others, and the fact that we may well not be ready for this just yet. We have
moved into nine single member districts and it seems like we just need to get more
comfortable with that. And so, based on a lot of the public, and how I've been led to
feel, I move that we not include it.
RAY: Okay, do I have a second?
HIGASHI: Second.
RAY: Second from Mr. Higashi. All in favor of deleting it raise your right
HERKES: No discussion?
RAY: Discussion. Excuse me.
17
HERKES: I think we all should discuss it. I'm going to change my vote also. I
wanted to get this on the draft so that we could hear the discussion, so that we could
hear the testimony. I really am in favor of it but there's no testimony — I got phone calls
from all over the island in favor of it, especially from people in West Hawaii, and I
certainly feel that if you can spend $70,000 to get elected in a single member district,
the reason given that it's cheaper to have single member districts is probably not a
good one. However, there's no real support from a lot of people who've taken the time
and trouble to come and testify before us, and the people who are calling me are not
necessarily ones that put it in writing. Some of them were elected officials. Some of
them were state officials. But most of them were people that I knew in West Hawaii.
But I want to change my vote and vote against it.
RAY: Other discussion.
SANTANGELO: Call for the question.
RAY: Call for the question. Raise your right hand if you're in favor of
deleting.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Okay, we'll delete. So, we're deleting; we will not be moving
forward the Council to include at -large seats.
• MC CULLOUGH: Was that unanimous?
RAY: Yes. Okay, Mr. Santangelo.
SANTANGELO: No, that was -
HERKES: Do you have another one?
SANTANGELO: No, I'm willing to share.
410
HERKES: I'd like to put on the table the Legislative Research Office as one
not to put on the ballot. Not because I don't think it's a good idea to reorganize it, but
the County Council can reorganize that office anytime they want to. They don't need a
Charter Amendment. Unless they have the will to reorganize the office, they get to live
with what they have and we get to live with it also, and I'd love to see a real Legislative
Research Audit Office, but the County Council does not want one. I will work very hard
to get some Council people elected that can change that office into a research office.
But right now, nobody understands what actually happens in that office. It's probably
just as well.
IRVINE:
made one.
I'd like to second Marni's motion, although I'm not sure she really
18
HERKES: I did. I moved to take it off the ballot.
IRVINE: All right. For the same reasons. We need a real internal audit and
we weren't able to turn that office into it so I think we should just remove it.
HERKES:
RAY:
Leave it alone.
More discussion?
SANTANGELO: Just real quick. I know what some of the Chambers that I sit on,
and their facts. They oppose this, and mainly because they misunderstood it, and you
and I both sat on the Council. We know what needs to be done and I think Ms. Herkes
articulated it quite well. And it is their mess and they'll have to deal with it. I think it was
a good try on our part but there's more important things, and this doesn't need to cloud
it, so I will be voting against this.
RAY: Any other testimony? AH in favor of deleting, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
HIGASHI: Mr. Chair, I. move to delete number 11.
RAY: Number 11 is the Qualifications of Heads of the Departments
• of Public Works and Water Supply. This is the amendment that would delete the
requirement that those departments be headed by a registered engineer. So if this is
deleted, that requirement would stay in place. We have a second?
ALONZO: Second.
RAY: Discussion?
BESS: I have a question. I understand the sense is that we want to
reinsert that both of these people be professional engineers, and registered engineers,
but are we saying that we're also going to omit 'the Director shall have had a minimum
of five years experience in an administrative capacity'?
RAY: No, my understanding is that we would delete this one and then in
the Department Head Qualifications, which is number 15 on most people's list, we
would add, so it would still say they would have to be a registered engineer, but in
addition, they would have to have five years of administrative service.
BESS: All right.
HERKES: Promise.
IRVINE: Yes, with that understanding.
19
HERKES: Was there a second to that? I'd like to say that I had a lot of input.
A lot of people called me from Commissions that had worked under engineers who said
help. You need a CPA, you need a Human Resource people, you need something else
besides engineers. So 1 think it's real important to understand that while it sounds
good to have engineers as head of technical bodies, they are not the best people to
administer a hundred people in some personnel things — may not be.
RAY: Other testimony? Mr. Yoshiyama.
YOSHIYAMA: Yes, I would speak against the motion. I don't think we're shutting
the door on engineers, or registered engineers. I would like to see us open the doors to
other qualified people. I think that, as Marni said, we are heading in that direction of
professional management, and that's all.
RAY: Other testimony? I'd just say I'II vote to delete this but I do think it's
a good idea. I think it was entirely misunderstood, and the input I got from people, a •
number of whom, and in fact, one who had served as Chief Engineer, thought this was
a terrific idea. But in any case, I'II vote to delete it because it has been, I think, so
entirely taken the wrong way, and it seems to go contrary towards trying to beef up
professional qualification's overall. Okay, so all in favor of deleting, raise your right
hand.
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Alonzo, Bess, Higashi, Irvine, Kurozawa, Ray,
Santangelo.
RAY: Opposed?
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Herkes, Yoshiyama.
RAY: So two votes opposed. So that's three. We're on a roll.
SANTANGELO: Mr. Chair. I would have preferred to second this but there was a
pause. Don't do that. Number 12, Impeachment. Would move to delete that. Again,
for the same reason. I think it's been terribly misunderstood, but I have to say that I
have been convinced by the testimony brought forward that where I started from
probably wasn't where it is. It really hasn't been misused per se. It has some pretty
good safeguards in it, and again, 1 would move to delete that.
RAY: • Do we have a second?
BESS: Second.
RAY: Okay. Discussion.
HIGASHI: What would be the main reason for deletion?
20
SANTANGELQ The main reason for my motion was that basically it hasn't been
abused. I think, arid -I -don't -want to wade into murky water, but I felt this last attempt
maybe wasn't the most ethical on the part of the people, but it's the only time it's ever
been tried that way. Del Pranke brought up the fact that there is a litigation that takes
place. It does incur some expense. And again, I think with some of the more important
things this Commission's put their energy into, that what we're trying to do here maybe
be misconstrued as not being in the best interest of the people — that maybe. And I've
served with this Commission and have respect for how they feel about it, whether they
vote it up or down.
RAY: Ms. Herkes.
HERKES: I go back to the fact that we are not the only body that can amend
this Charter. If it is abused, the County Council can amend the Charter every year, any
time they want to; every time there's an election, or every two years when there's an
election, so if it starts to be abused then.there is an avenue to stop the abuse.
RAY: Other testimony?
IRVINE: I wasn't planning to vote to just throw this out, but I think it's
probably quite reasonable. It hasn't been -
RAY: Quite reasonable to throw it out?
IRVINE: To throw it out? Yes. We have had a lot of testimony. I don't think
we're making a lot of difference with going from the hundred to the 3% if we were voting
within districts. If you have to go outside a district, the way we have it written right now,
don't think I would probably vote for it. I think people should be impeached in their
own district, and that 3% is only like 240 people.
HERKES: Maybe we'll work a little harder to elect people who can instill
confidence in us and the integrity of government, that we won't need an avenue like
impeachment.
RAY: I tend to agree. I don't see it as really that much of a problem, and
it's such a divisive issue, sort of a target, so I would vote to eliminate it. All in favor of
eliminating, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: So we've eliminated the Impeachment. What about Planning
Department Functions/Planning Commission Powers?
HERKES: I move we eliminate those because it doesn't change a thing.
KUROZAWA: Second.
21
RAY: Now, we're looking at two separate amendments. The one, 6 on
most of our schedules here, has to do with the Planning Department functions which
would eliminate language that would preclude the reorganization and create this idea of
a Division of Permitting. So we need to deal with that one first. So, would someone
like to make a motion in regard to the Planning —
SANTANGELO: We do have a legal motion on the floor right now, Mr. Chair. Point
of order.
HERKES: Was there a second?
SANTANGELO: Yes there was.
KUROZAWA: I seconded it.
HERKES: Okay, sorry.
RAY: Does anybody have a problem with voting on both?
HERKES: I withdraw the motion.
SANTANGELO: Your second has to agree.
KUROZAWA: I withdraw my second.
111111
RAY: Can I have a motion in regard to number 6, if someone would so
choose, in regard to the Planning Department functions?
IRVINE: I move that we remove number 6 from our consideration.
RAY: Do I have a second?
HERKES: Second.
RAY: Would anybody like to speak to that?
ID
SANTANGELO: I would like to ask other Commissioners to comment. The reason I
struggle with dropping that, and I will cooperate, is we're asking the people to authorize
the Council to do something. It's not like the people vote and it's a done deal. It still has
to go through the Council. It has to be by ordinance. And so it's just simply giving a little
bit more guidance and a little more leeway for the Council to be involved in the
restructuring of the government. So I, kind of, struggle with that and I'd ask for the
rationale from others. Thank you.
RAY: I'll speak to that. In my mind, a future Administration may want to
put forth this type of reorganization, and the County Council will be very much involved
22
in that. And if they do want to, then the Council can go ahead and amend the Charter
in regard to allowing that to happen. But it's confusing. It's putting a confusing
amendment forward which may or may not ever be acted on in the future. So for that
reason, I think a more reasonable way is if a future Administration would like to
reorganize the departments in that fashion, and they need a Charter change, and the
Council agrees with them, then they can make the Charter change. Anybody else?
Okay, all in favor of eliminating number 6, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY:
Powers.
That was unanimous. Number 10, Planning Commission
IRVINE: I move we remove this from our consideration as well, due to the
large amount of confusion on the part of the public about what we were doing here.
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Would anybody like to speak to that? We've had a lot of
discussion and input from our legal counsel. It doesn't seem to be a substantive issue,
and it has paused a lot of confusion. All in favor of eliminating raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
• RAY: Okay, number 10's eliminated. The other items we discussed, and
I don't really have a sense of how strongly people feel about them. Oh wait a minute,
one for sure; Number 14, the Board of Appeals. That was connected with number 6,
the Planning Department Functions. So I think if we're going to eliminate number 6, it
makes sense to eliminate number 14.
•
HERKES: I move we eliminate number 14.
IRVINE: Second.
RAY: Can you say which is -
HERKES: Board of Appeals.
RAY: Moving the Board of Appeals. We have a second. All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Now, the item in regard to the Special Counsel. There was a lot of
discussion back and forth on that at the - We just voted unanimously to eliminate
moving the Board of Appeals.
23
•
HERKES: I move that we eliminate Special Counsel, number 13.
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Discussion.
IRVINE: I think it's entirely appropriate to remove it in light of the fact that
think it was pointed out to us that the Corporation Counsel shouldn't be the ones hiring
the attorneys for the other side, so to speak. That the County Counsel themselves
should probably do that.
RAY: That's really a different issue, but —
IRVINE: No. That was my feeling. I often have a different take.
RAY: Any other discussion on eliminating amendment number 13 in
regard to the Special Counsel? This was brought forth by Corporation Counsel.
SANTANGELO: Mr. Chair, is it appropriate for Mr. Yuen to refresh our memory on
that for some of the group, maybe, because I see it a little different?
YUEN: Presently the Charter requires that if the County is going to hire
any attorneys other than Corp Counsel, that the hiring of that attorney specifically be
authorized by the County Council. So Corp Counsel has to go to County Council to
request that other attorneys be hired. There are situations where Corporation Counsel
is definitely prohibited from representing officers and employees of the County because
of ethical requirements of attorneys, and so they simply cannot represent those officers
or employees. However, the County is required to provide counsel for them. There are
situations where Police Officers are legally required to be represented by counsel paid
for by the County, for example; What the amendment would do, if it were enacted, the
Corp Counsel, in those situations where they have a conflict of interest, they would not
have to specifically go to the County Council for the authorization as long as there had
been a blanket appropriation of money for that purpose. They could use that
appropriation and hire the attorney on their own authority without going to the Council.
SANTANGELO: Thank you. And that's where the conflict comes in with me.
Former Councilman Ray and myself both sat on Councils that went into Executive
Session. We dealt with things like this, I think it was in Executive Session, but it seems
so confusing. It's a matter of a technical thing, and if we have room going out to the
people, I would support this being on because it does have merit. But I have seen most
people misunderstand this and it is difficult to explain.
RAY: Mr. Yuen, to the best of your knowledge, has this ever been a
problem in the past?
YUEN: Well, I don't know if it's been a problem. I don't think that the
24
Council has refused to hire Special Counsel where Corp Counsel had a conflict of
interest. I don't know how much debate and how much difficulty there was in getting the
Council to that point, but I don't think the Council actually refused to do it.
RAY: Thatwas my understanding from Mr. Wurdeman, that he thought
this was a problem that might arise in the future, but it hadn't occurred in the past, if
that makes any difference.
SANTANGELO: But just one more question. The reason that I did support this is
we had something similar come up to the Council, as you may remember, Mr. Ray, in
which we've never had pay raises disputed either, and we would have pay raises
negotiated through binding arbitration even come before the Council and, as an elected
body, we had to vote on that, which meant that we had the right to vote yes or no. And
in one case we did eventually vote no which caused a huge problem. I'm totally willing
to vote it down but my only problem with it was that should that arise, you need to
supply Counsel for these individuals, you need to hire them, and you could get into a
situation where we did. Now, if it's never been a problem — But that was where I
struggled with this.
IRVINE: John, the present wording allows the County Council to hire
counsel. We're just saying that the Corp Council may employ Special Counsel.
SANTANGELO: Just to explain. There's situations in which Corp Counsel can't
defend, but the County needs to defend that person. And they need to hire that
attorney. Okay?
IRVINE: Right.
SANTANGELO: So you need to get Council approval. Okay?
IRVINE: Right.
SANTANGELO: If the Council says no, but you're obligated by law to do it, but your
lawmaker doesn't, now you've got a real dilemma.
IRVINE: It says 'the Council may, by two-thirds vote of its entire
membership, authorize —
RAY: But it may not, as well.
SANTANGELO: It may not, and yet you're still legally obliged to defend these
people.
IRVINE: Well, then they're acting outside the law if they don't because it
says in impeachment cases, that the County cannot defend, etc.
25
•
SANTANGELO: Again, I appreciate that, Sue, but what you go back to is if you've
elected someone to represent you, they have the right to vote yes or no, so you can't
say you've broken the law because you voted no. You See, it's a dilemma, and that's
what this was going to address but I think it's very complicated and maybe we'll just let
them deal with it.
RAY: Mr. Bess.
BESS: I would speak in favor of this provision. However, in the interest of
presenting a ballot to the public that is small enough and has issues that are of true
importance — I mean this is an issue that may or may not arise, and given the number
of amendments that we are proposing to the public, I am voting to delete.
RAY: All in favor of deleting, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: We're recording all of this, Jason, if you want to check the record
afterwards.
Any other proposals for deletions before we go through?
SANTANGELO: Mr. Chairman, just one little3 statement for clarification. In deleting
these — we've deleted quite a few things here, and I think it's good for the record to
show that a lot of this came up because people brought it forward and we wanted to
give it a fair and open hearing. And this may well be the result of that fair and open
hearing. So anyway, that's my explanation for going against some of these things.
RAY: Thank you. I think I've stated on numerous occasions that nobody
really engages the process until they have something concrete in front of them. But we
erred in that direction to put it out there even though we knew there'd be a number of
changes.
First off, non-partisan elections — And so we're voting on the proposed amendments
as we have previously voted on and established language around. So I'd like to
entertain a motion, and then if someone would like to propose an amendment, we'll
take that. So, can I have a motion to approve the non-partisan elections?
HERKES: So moved.
RAY: Second?
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
IRVINE: Discussion. It came to my attention, after reading through this I
didn't realize when we put this in that we were following, I think, City and County
26
wording on this which means that someone can be elected in a Special Election at the
same time as we hold our Primary Elections. Maui County wording, on the same thing,
provides that if there are only two people running in a winner -take -all election, they
would both go onto the ballot at the time of the General Election, when we have like
15% more people actually voting, and I would really like to see us use the Maui County
language instead of the Honolulu County. It changes things a bit, but I do have a copy
here of the Maui County, that we all have had for a while. But I would move that we
insert that rather than the City and County of Honolulu, in the interest of allowing more
people to vote.
RAY: So are you moving that as an amendment?
IRVINE: Yes.
RAY: Do we have a second?
HERKES: Well, did we have a motion on the floor?
SANTANGELO: We're amending the motion so you need to second it.
HERKES: I'll second.
RAY: Discussion on the proposed amendment.
• SANTANGELO: If I'm to understand, Sue, then the intent of this — more voters, but
the intent is that in a General there will be people running for all offices.
•
IRVINE: Yes.
HERKES: No? Chris is shaking his head.
YUEN: I think, if I'm hearing you correctly, if only two file, then that race is
not decided at the Primary at all, and they both go on to the General. And if there are
three or more running, and one person in the Primary gets the 50% plus one vote, then
that's pau and you're elected outright.
HERKES: In the Primary?
IRVINE: I don't think so.
HERKES: So that means we're back to where we started from.
YUEN: No, it's a little bit different because the way it was voted on when
we first did this was that if you got 50% plus one in the — we'll call it the Primary for
simplicity; it's not really the Primary.
27
HERKES: In the first election.
YUEN: In the first election, or the Primary, if you got 50% plus one, you're
• elected outright, and you don't count blank or spoiled ballots. So, the way it was voted
on the first time, if there are only two people running, unless they tie, guarantee
somebody's going to be elected outright at the first election. The way Maui does it is if
there are only two people running for the office, they skip the first election and they run
them off in the General, and I thought that was what the motion was because that's the
way Maui works. But in Maui, and in the way that we had discussed earlier, if there are
three or more running, and somebody gets 50% plus one out of those three, then
they're elected outright in the first election and you don't go on.
HERKES: And that takes them out of the second election, however. It takes
both people out of the second election.
YUEN: That does take it out of the second.
HERKES: Well, it takes all three, but you're not even taking two into the
second election, the top two.
YUEN: . Right. You can do it, that you always take the top two into the
second election. That's not been what has been discussed.
HERKES: Nobody does that now.
• YUEN: Right. Let me look at Maui's again to make absolutely sure, but I'm
pretty sure that that's not the way they do it in Maui.
HERKES: Sue's point was a good point, that more people vote in the General
Election. You have less candidates running in the General Election.
IRVINE: The bottom paragraph talks about ties in the Primary.
SANTANGELO: But we could go back to what we just deleted too. That's that
situation when you have three or more running, very seldom would you have someone
get a majority vote.
IRVINE: Yes.
HERKES: Well, getting 50%, yes.
YUEN: Maui is as I discussed it, and if you — No, I'm sorry. Sue is correct.
If there are three or more, they automatically take two into the General. So, if we want
to call that, there's three different ways of doing it.
SANTANGELO: Adding expense.
28
IRVINE: I just think people -
YUEN: So I then need to ask if Sue wants to make the amendment so that
• you automatically take two into the General — you take the top two into the General, or
do you want to only pass two automatically into the General, if .there are only two
running?
IRVINE:
General?
What if there's only two running? Why don't they just go into the
YUEN: That's the way Maui does it.
HERKES:
vote on how?
They will. Mr. Ray, do we want to vote on non-partisan and then
SANTANGELO: That's what we're doing. No, you have to do it this way.
RAY: We have to amend it if we are, and then vote on the motion as
amended, if it is.
YUEN: Let me clarify this. I'm sorry. The way Maui does it is that if there
are only two running, you don't have an election at all in the Primary. They both run off
in the General and the winner wins in the General. If there are three or more running,
they do have an election in the Primary, but the top two go over into the General.
SANTANGELO: Regardless of one getting a majority?
YUEN: Regardless of one getting the 50% plus one. The way the City and
County does it is the way that was voted on by the Commission the first time through
which is that if you get the 50% plus one, no matter how many are running, if you get
that in the first, or Primary, election, you don't have a race in the second election. If
nobody gets 50% plus one, then the top two go over into the General Election.
RAY: So, does everybody understand the amendment? The amendment
is to vote, basically, as Chris just described, as Sue introduced the method that's in the
Maui County Charter. Okay, we're going to vote.
BESS: No, I'm unclear. Can you state what's in the Maui County Charter
again? What's on the table here.
YUEN: And let me just say one more thing. The way I read Maui, I think
their Mayor is still a partisan and their Council is non-partisan, just to throw different
wrinkle in there. But what I understand the motion to be, like we had done, we were
going to go all non-partisan. The amendment is that if there are only two candidates
running for a particular office, that those two candidates will not appear in the first
election and they will automatically go to the General, and then the winner wins in the
29
General. If there are three or more candidates running for a particular office, they will
be voted on in the first election, and the top two will always go on to the General to be
run off, no matter how many more votes one gets than the other.
SANTANGELO: I'm going to speak against the amendment simply because, again,
there's been an awful lot of discussion about money, and I know the 15%, and Sue, we
both know that in a Presidential election, you get a lot more voters. It goes up and
down, and it's really up to the voters to get off their can. And having been through
these elections, I know what it's like to go through a Primary and then a General, and if
the solution is there, if there's,a majority winner which is what we haven't had in a while
for a lot of things, in the Primary then let it be and I would vote against this amendment
and go for the original as we had it. And that's simply a friendly suggestion though.
RAY:
hand.
Further discussion? All in favor of the amendment, raise your right
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Herkes, Irvine, Kurozawa.
RAY: Opposed?
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Alonzo, Bess, Higashi, Ray, Santangelo,
Yoshiyama.
RAY: Okay, the amendment fails to carry. We're at the main motion in
regard to a non-partisan election as we had originally voted on, and I think everybody
•. understands that. Yes sir, you'd like to speak to the main motion?
YOSHIYAMA: No, I want to make an amendment. I'd like to propose an
amendment that we delete our proposed Section (e) relating to at -large Council
election.
IRVINE: Second.
RAY: All in favor of that amendment, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
SANTANGELO: I'd like to speak to the main motion, just real quick. As a
Republican, I've had my Party beat me to death on not supporting non-partisan, and
frankly, that's probably why I am supporting it. Having served this County, and along
with you, John, as a Republican, I felt like that had very little to do with what I was as
an elected official. I felt like once you're elected, you are there to serve all the people:
Whether they voted or not; whether they're registered or not; whether they're male,
female, child or adult; on a County level. On a State and a Federal level, you're dealing
in some very different territory that's really working in our lives on a different level, but
County, or the services, it's a different type of quality of life, and I firmly believe that
30
partisan politics has no place in it, and I, therefore, support that for that reason.
RAY: Ms. Herkes.
HERKES: I'm a member of a recognized Party that's also against non-
partisan elections, but I am going to vote in favor of it and, during this discussion, I've
read a lot of stuff on it. I know it's the most popular form in the United States, and all
that stuff, but I've been especially interested to watch my reaction in the mayoral race
in Honolulu. That is not two Democrats running against each other. It's two people
running against each other. A very highly visible campaign, very hard fought, and I
haven't heard the word Democrat' once. I've heard Mufi Hanneman running against
Jeremy Harris, and I like that. I really like that. That gives me a chance to really look at
them on their qualifications. I can't vote for either one of them, but it's been an
interesting process for me to look at that.
RAY: Any other?
IRVINE: I'd just like to say I'm going to vote against this amendment. I'm not
a member of a Party like some of the rest of you, but I have come to the conclusion,
after listening to testimony and doing a lot of reading, and thinking about it, that it really
isn't a bad idea to have somebody stand on a platform that indicates their basic
philosophy that, even on a County level, there are different ways of handling things that
have to do with basic philosophy, such as the Green Party. National Parties need
grassroots support and it starts at the County level. I just have a feeling that there may
ID
be a correlation between non-partisanship and lack of participation in elections at this
time nationally, and I'm just going to vote against it.
RAY:
your right hand.
Other testimony? All in favor of the non-partisan elections, raise
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Alonzo, Bess, Herkes, Higashi, Kurozawa, Ray,
Santangelo, Yoshiyama.
RAY: Opposed.
HANDS RAISED: Commissioner Irvine.
RAY: Show one opposed.
Moving on to the County Managing Director proposal. Do I have a motion to
approve?
BESS: I move that we accept the language as proposed except that in our
last meeting, we provided for the Office of Management. Is that correct? Rather than
Department of Management?
31
RAY: I don't believe so. We discussed it.
BESS: All right. I move that we accept the language as proposed with the
amendment of Office of Management rather than Department of Management.
HIGASHI: Second.
SANTANGELO: Point of order, Mr. Chairman.
RAY: Yes, I think we need to move the motion forward first.
BESS: All right, I'II move.
SANTANGELO: Second.
BESS: I'd like to move to amend the title of the Department of
Management and change that to Office of Management.
HIGASHI:
IRVINE:
thing?
BESS:
• IRVINE:
•
Second.
Steve, can you give us your reasoning. Is this the Civil Service
Pardon me?
Is this Civil Service?
BESS: No, it's not based on Civil Service. It's just that I know that we
received a lot of testimony saying are we creating another department here, and is this
an increase in government. And maybe it makes it more palatable to the public, and
that's why I'm suggesting that that be the case.
RAY: Other discussion? Marni.
HERKES: There's no language in here on outcomes and measurement of
performance. There's evaluation. It may be a little late to bring that up now. I really,
kind of, missed — it, kind of, went over my head that we need some outcomes
measurements.
IRVINE: Actually, I think that whole Section (d) there is absolutely
incomprehensible.
HERKES: Yes.
IRVINE: Verbosity. It comes out of City and County, I think, whereas Maui
just uses the first sentence saying 'evaluate the management and performance of each
32
agency', period. That's all they say. I think we could work on the wording in there,
eliminating a lot of the evaluation and analysis. An evaluation to me presupposes an
analysis has been done.
SANTANGELO: Mr. Chairman, I raise a point of —
IRVINE: We're not talking on the issue.
SANTANGELO: We're, kind of, out of order here. We're dealing with a motion and
think we need to deal with that amendment, and then go to the next one because
parliamentary really comes in here. So, personal privilege. Thank you.
RAY: Steve, so you're amendment is just specifically —
BESS: Merely with regard to title.
RAY: So, Office of Management.
BESS: Office of Management rather than Department.
RAY: And then under 6-1.1, then there would be an Office of
Management. Also, Chris, will you refresh our memory in regard to the requirements.
Didn't we also vote to eliminate that last -
• YUEN: Well, yes. When this was originally voted on, this language about
the professional experience in art and science of management, I put that in by mistake.
The Commission had actually voted not to have that in there, so that's the status.
HERKES: Is that a little personal privilege by the lawyer?
RAY: So, does everybody understand? The motion does not include
that.
IRVINE: The art and science.
RAY: Right.
HERKES: In this motion, are we voting on additional changes? Additional
change, agency heads, executive powers, on the next page?
BESS: No, that's separate. Right?
HERKES: Is that separate?
IRVINE: I think that would happen if we voted this in. Right? Isn't that why
we have -
33
a
HERKES: No, it's qualifications of department heads. And that's why I want
to know if this is all in the same
BESS: I understood that I was only dealing with the first page. Can we
vote on the amendment?
IRVINE: We do need to vote on the amendment, right? My question is
we've got a department of this, department of that, but maybe this would be fine to be
an office, although I like consistency.
BESS: I really was responding to the public input.
RAY: Gary.
YOSHIYAMA: I agree with the intent of the motion. I want to know is there any
effect of changing that single word, from department to office, other than what Steve put
out as the intent.
RAY: Chris.
YUEN: I don't think it's different from Civil Service point of view. I think the
effect of this is still to create a separate executive agency.
YOSHIYAMA: Okay, thank you.
SANTANGELO: One of the things that does effect it, though, is in department
heads, they are appointed by the Mayor and they're confirmed by the Council. Now, in
this case, we were trying to get this Managing Director to be appointed by the Mayor,
but confirmed by the Council, wherein the case now as it is in our Charter, the Mayor
hires his or her Managing Director. So there are privileges and procedures different in
a patronage vs. a department, and I just would like clarification on that.
RAY: My understanding is that it wouldn't change 6-1.2. The Managing
Director would still be appointed by the Mayor and confirmed by the Council.
SANTANGELO: So, we're writing that into this as part of that amendment.
RAY: Right, that's my understanding.
SANTANGELO: And the other question that came up with departments was staffing.
On the other hand, this Managing Director, once confirmed, is going to serve at the
pleasure of the Mayor anyway.
HERKES: Point of personal privilege. Does that have anything to do with the
motion?
34
SANTANGELO: Yes, we're dealing with departments. Besides being antagonistic,
we're dealing with department head, right?
HERKES: We're dealing with the Office of Management.
SANTANGELO: No, the motion is to drop `department', Marni.
RAY: I think that's a valid line of reasoning to know if by changing it to
the Office of Management vs. the Department of Management, that if that would have
any material effect on how this office, or department, would function. I think we need to
understand that.
HERKES: And Chris's answer was?
YUEN: No.
HERKES: Thank you.
BESS: One of the things that has been brought up in a number of our
meetings is that we really want to try to strengthen the Managing Director's position,
and I think the title, by calling it Office of Management, distinguishes it from .other
departments, and raises it to another status. I want people to look at the Managing
Director's Office as being much different than it is today.
IDRAY: Does everybody understand that? Okay.
HERKES: Stephen's motion is just for one page.
RAY: Right. I'm just going through that.
•
HERKES: Okay. What are you looking at the other page for, then? Let's
deal with one page because I've got lots of things to say on changes.
RAY: Let's vote on Mr. Bess' motion. All in favor, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: That motion carries. Do we have other amendments?
HERKES: Do you want a change for (d) now; `evaluate the management and
performance of each executive agency, including the extent to which and the efficiency
with which its operating and capital program and budget have been implemented'? I've
got some wording.
RAY: Let me ask our counsel that. Can we work on that or do we have to
finalize that language this evening?
35
YUEN: I don't think it's necessary to absolutely finalize the language this
evening. I'd always expected that we would vote this evening on what we were going
to do and then we could tinker with exact language. The major substantive changes
that were being proposed with the Managing Director were: to give the Managing
Director a separate department, which is now going to be called an office; provide for
Council confirmation, that's a significant substantive change; place all agencies of the
County under the Managing Director in the table of organization rather than just
Department of Public Works and Department of Parks and Recreation. If the
Commission votes to make those changes th'en we can come up with what the exact
language would be at a later time. But, to the extent that people know what they want
to do right now, then we can do it now and save ourselves some work later.
RAY: I'd rather work on it a little bit.
IRVINE: I think that's fine but I really think (d) needs some work.
RAY: Yes, we understand that.
IRVINE: Okay.
RAY: That's what we were just talking about. Are there other
amendments then, other than working on the language in (d). If not, all in favor, raise
your right hand.
• HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Opposed. I want to call a five minute recess.
RECESSED The Chairman called a recess at 6:55 p.m.
RECONVENED The meeting reconvened at 7:03 p.m.
•
RAY: I'd like to reconvene the meeting. We're at amendment number 4
on the agenda, the Fire Commission, and I believe we have some minor suggested
changes to that.
HERKES:
changes?
So John, what are we doing, the executive powers? Additional
RAY: This is on the Fire Commission item. We had several changes.
We have informally agreed to make the Commission nine members and representative
of the nine Council districts. That's probably the most substantive change. And then
we also had language in regard to emergency services. Do you have that exact
language there, Chris?
IRVINE: It was rather than medical services, to put emergency or just plain
36
services.
HERKES: We had emergency and rescue personnel too.
YUEN: I think the basic idea was to just say emergency services rather
than emergency medical or emergency rescue, and that'll cover it.
RAY: Do we need a separate motion for the nine member?
YUEN: Somebody could make a motion for all the changes in a group.
There were two other things that were discussed at the last meeting as far as changes.
One was my suggestion that I had said that this new department would have `any other
related functions that may be assigned to it by ordinance'. I wanted to take the word
`related' out so that if the Council wanted to give them another function, they didn't
have a debate about whether it was related or not to the other functions and leave it up
to them not to do something stupid. And then there was a suggestion — there wasn't
votes taken on this, but there was discussion about taking out the word `advisory' to the
Commission and saying that it can have — the only powers that are specified in the
Charter are to advise. But if the Council wanted to give it other powers, we would add
a clause that says `any other powers and responsibilities assigned by law'.
IRVINE:
Management.
Chris, I think you're on the Department of Environmental
• YUEN: Oh, I am. I'm sorry.
IRVINE: I'm sorry.
YUEN: No, you're completely right.
HERKES: John, I have that we added, or it was suggested, retired fire person
and emergency. Did we not add that? Is that something that's still out there?
IRVINE: No we did not discuss it anymore. But we did discuss, under 6-4.2,
the bottom line, we were told has poor English and we agreed that we'd say, in that last
sentence there, 'in order to achieve this purpose, the Fire Department shall operate in
accordance with the following' rather than have that 'be conducted'.
HERKES: Right.
BESS: Yes.
HERKES: `Shall be managed in accordance'.
IRVINE: I said `operate in accordance', but if you want to `manage it in
accordance', that's all right too.
37
HERKES: 'Operate's fine. Tom Beach had, I thought, some excellent
comments in the letter that we got from him tonight. One of the ones was that the Fire
Chief must be allowed to respond to the statement of reasons before being removed by
• a quorum of this Commission. It doesn't say anywhere in here, or I couldn't find it,
where how many it takes to remove the Fire Chief.
YUEN: It would follow the general rule in the Charter which is that a
majority of all the members to which the Commission is entitled are required to take any
valid action. There's a blanket statement in Article XIII of the Charter on that. So if you
had the nine members, it would take five votes to remove, and five votes to appoint the
new one, as well.
BESS: With regard to the 6-4.5, I'm going to change from where I was last
meeting. The language that you provided in Department of Environmental Services
with regard to members; `consisting of nine members who shall be appointed by the
Mayor and confirmed by the Council, one member shall be a resident of each Council
district', we need to put that language in 6-4.5 rather than `broadly representative of the
community'?
RAY: Yes, I think we had agreed to do that.
IRVINE: Right.
BESS: Okay. We use different kinds of language, but after reading
• through this thing again, this language that you drafted, Chris, on Environmental takes
care of we want them to be a resident, as well as coming from each of the Council
districts, and that's what this language does. That's not always the case in other
Commission language when we're requiring each of the members come each of the
Council districts, but it doesn't necessarily say they have to be residents. But anyway,
I'm just saying I like the language.
•
HIGASHI: And it should be uniform.
BESS: And it should be uniform throughout.
RAY: Okay. Is somebody prepared to make a motion that includes all the
things that we seem to have just agreed on?
BESS: Can I just say one more thing, John? This is in keeping with trying
to beef up the power of the Managing Director, and just how important he is as far as
administrative function. On 6-4.6; powers, duties and functions, this would require the
Fire Commission to submit an annual report to the Mayor and the Council. I think it
would be a good idea for us to say that they submit annual reports to the Managing
Director, comma, Mayor and the Council.
HERKES: Or maybe just the Managing Director and the Council.
38
SANTANGELO: We'd better put the Mayor in there.
HERKES: We're really going to have the Mayor cutting ribbons here.
RAY: How about `submit an annual report to the Mayor, the Managing
Director, and the Council'? I mean, the Mayor is the Chief Executive Officer.
BESS: That's fine. Okay.
RAY: Can anybody sum all that up in one magic motion?
HERKES: I'll try, and then what I leave out, you guys amend it. 6-4.2
Statement of Policy in the last line, `Fire Department shall be operated in accordance
with the following'.
IRVINE: `Shall operate'.
HERKES: And in that 6-4.2 also, `emergency services' instead of `emergency
rescue' on the third line. And in 6-4.4 powers, duties and functions, (b) Train, equip,
maintain and supervise the force of firefighting and emergency -service personnel'. And
in 6-4.5 Fire Commission, `five' should be changed to `nine', and the wording inserted
from the Environmental Services Policy Statement on appointment of members. And
on 6-4.6 powers, duties and functions, (e) `Submit an annual report to the Mayor,
Managing Director and the Council'.
RAY: Do I have a second?
IRVINE: Second. Well done.
RAY: Discussion. All in favor, raise your right hand.
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: It's listed as Department of Environmental Services, so I think we're
looking at the Department of Environmental Management.
SANTANGELO: We changed that to Management already.
RAY: So, it would be the Department of Environmental Management;
taking out the word `advisory', 6-5.1; and 6-5.3, taking out the word `related' in the last
sentence. Is there anything else?
IRVINE: In 6-5.2, `the director will be appointed by Mayor, confirmed by
Council, removed by the Mayor. The director shall have had a minimum of five years
administrative experience' is the way we said it at this point. Because we are talking
about other Department Heads having a little more specific, or higher, requisite —
39
HERKES: Qualifications.
IRVINE: Qualifications, thank you, I thought we might add 'have a minimum
• five years administrative and environmental expertise' or 'administrative experience in
related fields'.
HIGASHI: 'In related fields'. I buy that.
IRVINE: I figured Roland would say that. That sounds fine, 'in related
fields'.
HIGASHI: Second.
RAY: Any other? Chris.
YUEN: If the intent is so that the Council could give the Commission other
powers in the future, then you should add a sentence saying, at the end of the section
involving the Commission, it would say and any other powers and functions as may be
prescribed by ordinance.'
SANTANGELO: But that would be a different amendment, wouldn't it?
HERKES: 'Any other functions', 'any other powers'?
IRVINE: The last sentence of Environmental Commission, you said to add
'such other powers as `
SANTANGELO: I thought it was, kind of, a done deal already.
IRVINE: We put it in last time but we didn't make any motions last time.
YUEN: There was nothing actually voted on. All this was just discussed. If
you're taking out 'advisory' from the Commission because you want to have the
possibility that they would have some real authority later, given to it by the Council,
then we need to stick in something that gives the Council the authority to do that.
SANTANGELO: So her motion wouldn't be just to add that prerequisite to the
Director, but also add that? That would be one motion?
YUEN: I thought you were formulating a motion that was covering
everything at once.
IRVINE: We were to add that at the very end of this. We were going to add
`shall have such other powers as granted', I think maybe, 'by the Council'. I hadn't
seen the minutes, whatever you said. Is that correct?
40
SANTANGELO: By ordinance' or —
IRVINE: `As provided by ordinance'.
• YUEN: "As provided by ordinance'.
IRVINE: Yes, okay. That was it.
IRVINE: Yes, I did see that word. I have discussed a couple of times, I've
brought in a couple of statements, a first draft and then a second draft which a lot of
you got e-mailed yesterday, but some people just got today when we walked in. It was
the statement of policy that would, I think, be placed between Section 6-5.1 and 6-5.2.
Wherever it's appropriate, either at the very beginning or maybe there. The
Department of Environmental Management is established to protect, preserve, and
enhance our environment by promoting the wise management of our waste for the
benefit of current and future generations. The Department will pursue strategies that
promote environmentally sensitive landfill diversion, wastewater management, and non
point source pollution mitigation.'
HERKES:
to handle this?
Do you want a motion on that policy statement, or how do you want
IRVINE: Well, I'm moving that we add that.
• HERKES: But can you move the whole thing at once?
IRVINE: I did say there also that —
RAY: I think we've got a little bit too much on the table here. I don't
understand what this statement of policy says. It doesn't make any sense to me, so I'd
like to look at that separately from the other motion.
IRVINE: Okay. I put it out a month or two ago in, sort of, this form.
RAY: It just seems like, kind of —
SANTANGELO: We're doing a lot of friendly things and that's not necessarily
considered friendly. That, to me, requires more discussion by itself.
IRVINE: I had the feeling we were trying to get some policy statements into
here, and that's why I —
SANTANGELO: But let's take the ones you're doing that are all friendly and we
agreed to, and this can be a separate one.
IRVINE: Okay.
41
RAY: Can somebody state the motion that has included everything but
this first, and let's get that on the table and then we can discuss this separately?
IRVINE: Sure, I'II do that. Okay, I'd like to move that we put out `Department
of Environmental Management' rather than `Services'; removing from Section 6-5.1
`advisory' in front of Environmental, it would now be Management Commission; in
Section 6-5.2, we would add, at the end, 'in a related field'; under 6-5.3, we would
remove the word `related' in the last line and any other — remove `related functions as
prescribed by ordinance'; Section 6-5.4, it would become the Environmental
Management Commission and added to the very last line 'and shall have such other
powers as granted by ordinance'.
RAY: Do I have a second on that motion?
SANTANGELO: Second.
RAY: And now, Sue, do you want to amend that?
YUEN: No, why don't you just vote on it and then deal with the policy
statement.
HERKES: No, let's pass this first.
IRVINE: Vote on this and then we were —
• RAY: Okay.
SANTANGELO: If we vote on this, aren't we, kind of, done?
i
YUEN: No, then deal with the policy — she wants to add a policy — I
thought people were not comfortable with the policy statement and they wanted to vote
on—
SANTANGELO: But the motion would be to incorporate that into this and the motion
right now - okay, whatever.
YUEN: . No, you can vote on doing it like this and then she can make a
motion. to add the policy statement.
IRVINE: Okay.
YOSHIYAMA: . I've got a question here. I guess I want to address the mandatory
nature of this reorganization, so my question, and is it appropriate to talk about this
now, or after this vote?
IRVINE: Better talk about it now. How would you make it non -mandatory?
42
•
•
YOSHIYAMA: I think at the last meeting I asked the question how quickly does
this have to be acted upon, or implemented. I still have that concern. I'm concerned
with transition, or need we address ourselves with transition. I guess it's, kind of,
related.
IRVINE: It's just part of Public Works that's going to be spinning off, and the
transition would be that the incoming Mayor would appoint someone to manage that
section as a separate department, as far as I can see.
YOSHIYAMA: Well, that's why. I don't know if it's that simple. That's the question
that I have, and I don't want us to say you've got to do it without — Should we be
providing some transitional language in there, like we do on the Fire Commission? It's
just a question. I don't want to throw something out there and it's hanging, and it
causes a bunch of problems. I'm in agreement with this department. It's just are we
doing it in an orderly fashion? That's what I'm concerned about.
HERKES: I think I remember discussions that we had that we thought that this
was a really good idea. But it might be something that the Council needed to pass an
ordinance and the Mayor needs to give it some powers, and the Mayor needs to buy
into it, and so the language should give a lot of leeway because it is a new department.
It was something we felt was really important because environmental management is
important to us, and it was a statement that we were going to make that environmental
management is important. So we put it in the Charter but we didn't mandate it, and I
can understand your concern. I'm not sure how to solve it.
IRVINE: Mr. Boucher, of Solid Waste, and Jiro Sumada — every testimony
we've had from the engineers and department have said good idea.
RAY: Wait. Marni, we have mandated it in this language — 'it shall'. So it
is mandated in this language. There's no question about —
HERKES:
month.
We don't have any time on it. It doesn't have to be, like, next
RAY: Okay, and that's what Gary brought up, yes. But we have
mandated it. But Gary's question is are we leaving it unaddressed and might that
create a problem. John.
SANTANGELO: The fear would be that if we mandate this, then how much foot
dragging, or whatever, went on. And so then it raises the question do we need to put a
specific implementation, it will be implemented by a certain time, be it a two year
period, or an eight year period, or a ten year period. Or do we just leave it up to the
Administration? Once the people vote this in as an amendment for the Charter, it
seems that legally they have to move forward in some sort of a methodical manner, and
that's what I would ask counsel.
43
RAY: Just a situation that comes to mind — LESA Legislation, which was
mandated in 1976 is something that's brought up every year and, apparently, because
it is brought up and it is still being discussed —
IRVINE: We can also vote people out of office if they —
RAY: No, but that's a very concrete example.
YUEN: We talked about this a little bit, and there really isn't a great way to
solve the foot dragging problem. I don't think there's a great way to do it. .It does have
to be implemented. It's supposed to be implemented. If this gets passed by the voters
in it's present form, anybody can read it and the Council's supposed to sit there and, as
an early order of business, they have to do a new position classification plan, and the
positions are going to be moved into this new department, and this is all supposed to
go ahead and happen. If they don't do it, they're violating the Charter, which they're
supposed to follow. If you put in a time limit — If you said they should do it in two years,
is it any different than if you didn't say how long they should take to do it? I don't know
that that really makes that much difference. To say you shall do it in two years and
they don't do it, then well, they haven't done it. The same thing now if you didn't say
how long they should take to do it, they're supposed to do it. So, I don't know that
much is gained by setting a deadline for making it happen. The other part of Gary's
question, I think, is not just the time line, but is there something transitional that we can
say in the meantime. I would expect that the transition issues are the things that would
be dealt with in the actual reorganization when they go to the Council. Because just
doing this does not move the position in itself, just saying it in the Charter, because
we're not reaching into the department and yanking the positions out. It still does have
to be implemented and that's where the transition is going to take place.
HERKES: And that's really where we come in. That's where the voters come
in. That's where the residents of the County come in. That's where we can push our
Mayor and our Council to implement this, if we have it in the Charter. It's hard to push
them if you don't have it in the Charter. But if you have it in the Charter, it's up to us to
implement it, and I know, John, LESA is out there and that's up to us too.
YUEN: I think immediately the Mayor can make the appointment of the
Director and can appoint the Commission, and then there's just a technical thing that
has to happen as far as certain positions are going to be moved out of the Department
of Public Works, and there's an amendment to his Position Classification Plan.
YOSHIYAMA: I think I just reminded myself of something. It was a creation of a
Data Processing Department, right? So, okay, I'm okay.
YUEN: It worked, right?
YOSHIYAMA: It worked.
44
RAY: Are we ready to vote?
YOSHIYAMA: It's working.
YUEN: Let me ask about that. Did they pass a follow-up ordinance to
move the positions into the Data Processing?
YOSHIYAMA: I don't recall.
YUEN: It wasn't a big humbug, though.
YOSHIYAMA: Yes, okay.
SANTANGELO: And the point is, if they don't implement it, we only need a hundred
signatures.
HERKES: That's right, we can impeach them all.
RAY: Okay, are we ready to vote on the motion? All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Motion passes. Now, I guess, we're going to discuss separately
Sue's language in regard to adding a statement of policy language.
IRVINE: Please.
HERKES: I move we accept the statement of policy for the Environmental
Services. How about a second?
KUROZAWA: Second.
IRVINE: Well, I moved, you seconded?
HERKES: No, Daryl seconded.
SANTANGELO: It's a nice policy but we put a Commission in there, and we haven't
even got the Department in place, and I feel it's inappropriate and wouldn't support that
at this time. I think the Commission's going to look at that. They're going to work with
them, and I think we're just trying to do the work way ahead of time. I understand the
motivation behind it, but my idea is that we're trying to put some expertise in an area to
deal with a very technical problem, and the policy gets out in some areas that I'm not
comfortable with at this time. So, I speak against it.
RAY: Other testimony?
45
IRVINE: I'd like to just respond to that. I do think this is actually quite a
broad statement. `Promote environmentally sensitive landfill diversion'. Can somebody
argue with that?
RAY: I don't know what it means.
BESS: I don't know what diversion means?
IRVINE: Landfill diversion? You don't know what it means?
HERKES: Recycling.
IRVINE: Environmentally sensitive. That was suggested to me by Mr.
Boucher, who said non -environmentally sensitive, to him, would maybe be trying to
nuke all our solid waste, or something. That would be, kind of, a poor solution to
getting rid of our dumps.
RAY: Well, that's his interpretation.
IRVINE:
sensitive —
Yes, that's his interpretation, but let's try — okay — Environmentally
PRANKE: Don't dump your garbage in the ocean.
IRVINE: That sort of thing. It is open to interpretation, right, but I was trying
to think of a worse case scenario, but I guess if you want to nuke the garbage, that's —
HIGASHI: I think it's nice language but I think to be consistent, we don't have
a policy statement in each part of our Charter so I'd like to have the Commission =
HERKES,: We're going to have.
IRVINE: I was hoping we would.
HERKES: We're going to work toward it.
HIGASHI: At this point we don't have so I want to be consistent.
SANTANGELO: And it occurs to me that in the implementation, if you have
something that can cause, maybe, some division, it could be counterproductive in trying
to set up something. And again, I go back to the Commission. I thought we put the
Commission there to be nine people from nine districts that were going to help advise
this and create policy, and create that kind of thing.
RAY: My feeling is we're making a very strong statement by putting this
on the ballot, to create a separate Department of Environmental Management. I don't
46
know, to me, this is just flowery fluff.
IRVINE: It comes from the State of Washington.
RAY: It just bothers me and I don't know exactly why, but it just doesn't
seem consistent with the way we're doing other things in the Charter. I think, like
said, by the fact that we're suggesting creating a whole new department focusing on
these issues, that's a very strong statement.
HERKES: I think that we've taken some heat because we're creating a whole
new department, even though we're diverting positions from other departments rather
than hiring new people.
RAY: ' And I think what John was saying is you might take more heat if
you put this statement in.
HERKES: I might take a lot personally, you're right. But I think also that in
that creation of a new department, we have an opportunity to start a trend of providing
policy statements for each department, as we're qualifying Department Managers.
would like to see policy statements for each department. We may not get them in this
particular Charter change, but we certainly can work with our Council people to have
them implemented one by one. And as we're doing a new department, this is the time
to do this.
IRVINE: Okay, I've got an idea, folks. What if we just said `The Department
of Environmental Management is established to protect, preserve, and enhance our
environment by promoting the wise management of our waste —
HERKES:
IRVINE:
Period.
Period. Maybe management in there.
BESS: You could even shorten it even further by just saying `established
to protect, preserve, and enhance our environment.'
IRVINE:
BESS:
IRVINE:
Okay. It's mostly dealing with waste, but —
Well, and then it goes on to say what you're talking about.
Does that become more palatable?
RAY: That's not what this department is. You're, like, saying this is the
environmental do -good department to protect our environment.
IRVINE: No I'm not. It's to manage our waste, yes.
47
RAY: This is a Public Works Department to handle solid waste,
wastewater and maybe some other things.
IRVINE: All this language comes from Portland, or San Luis Obispo, or San
Diego, or a couple of other places where I looked it up. And this is the kind of
statements they make about their solid waste management areas. But, if we don't want
to have a statement of policy, that's fine by me.
HERKES: It's not really fine by you.
IRVINE: That's true, it's not.
HERKES: Don't lie about it. We're going to vote against it but —
KUROZAWA: I just want to make a quick statement. I actually support what Sue -
- I think, in philosophy, I see what Sue's trying to get at, and I think, especially, since
we're trying .to set up a new department, we should give them a statement of policy to
tell them what we want them to do. For example, when we set up the Fire Commission,
if you look at our last proposal, we have a statement of policy in there, what we want
the Commission to do. So, I think it would make some sense for us to give them some
guidelines. We can make it very general, but I think not to say anything would just —
mean, what's the sense. We should actually tell them what we want them to try to do.
And if the ultimate goal in the future is to look at the environment, then we should at
least consider that.
RAY: John.
SANTANGELO: When Sue brought up some of the other ones, I don't know how
they got in there. Was that through a Charter Amendment? I really feel uncomfortable
with this in part of a Charter Amendment. Again, Sue, I supported you very much in
this, and that Commission especially, and I feel the mechanisms are there. But if you'll
look, one of the shortest statements in the Charter is the Public Works. It's a nuts and
bolts kind of thing. There's a lot of nuts and bolts in this solid waste, this wastewater,
and in how we divert it, and I think with the Commission in place, getting this thing
there, and then having a Mayor and a Council have to work together to implement this,
the less barriers and the less that we put in there — and have a little faith that we put in
place the mechanisms that will bring that forward. When you mention these other
counties, was that what was put through a Charter Amendment, or was that something
that was brought in over an evolutionary period in implementing a department? So,
speak strongly against it for that reason, although I support the spirit completely. I'm
done.
RAY: First thing we've got to identify what's being proposed, because
we've talked about the full version and, I think the non point source pollution mitigation
is a problem.
48
HERKES: And I will withdraw my motion. Daryl will you withdraw your
second?
KUROZAWA: Yes.
RAY: That's for the full statement?
HERKES: For the full statement.
RAY: Okay, so, Sue do you want to —
IRVINE: Yes, I'd like to move that we put The Department of Environmental
Management is established to protect, preserve and enhance our environment by
promoting the wise management of our waste.' I think we'll leave waste in there,
think we're dealing with waste. That's what we're talking about. All sorts.
RAY: Yes, .I agree. So, 'The Department of Environmental Management
is established to protect, preserve and enhance our environment by promoting the wise
management of our waste' period. We do we have second?
HERKES: Second.
HIGASHI: Sue, are you proposing that this be 6-5.1, to start with that?
IRVINE: I don't know whether it's 1 or 2, wherever they get placed. I was
looking at the Fire Department. It would be 2 because, Fire, we put organization first,
`There shall be a Fire Department', and then statement of policy, so that would be what
I suggest. Just to let people know, I haven't a clue why we have an R&D Department,
because it doesn't say in there why or what their mandate is, and I think it would be
nice.
RAY:
hand.
Are we ready to vote on the motion? All in favor, raise your right
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
IRVINE: Oh my God, thank you.
RAY: We were just scaring you. Moving on.
Holdover of Boards and Commissions. I don't think we have any additional
language to this. Can I have a motion to approve?
ALONZO:
RAY:
•
So moved.
Second?
49
SANTANGELO:
RAY:
Second.
Are we ready to vote? All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Ray, Alonzo, Bess, Higashi, Irvine, Kurozawa
Santangelo, Yoshiyama.
RAY:
HANDS RAISED:
RAY:
HERKES:
RAY:
HERKES:
RAY:
Opposed?
Commissioner Herkes.
I'm sorry.
I'm going to oppose it, but that's okay. I can oppose somethings.
So, one vote in opposition, Marni. Is that right?
Yes.
Okay.
IRVINE: I was wondering if we're changing that, and maybe this has to be at
another meeting, but Mr. Wurdeman had said that under 13-4 (g), that Commission
members, right now, are paid. This is all part of Section 13, and he had suggested that
we aren't paid and that we should either take that out, or replace with 'authority to set
Board compensation by ordinance'. I wondered if we wanted to — no? Everybody's just
looking at me.
YUEN:
It's a new subject.
IRVINE: It's not like we could just say this is what we're going to do to
Section 13, which is Boards and Commissions?
SANTANGELO: -This is holdover. This is a specific part of the holdover.
IRVINE:
RAY:
IRVINE:
true that —
RAY:
IRVINE:
some of this trash
•
Just holdover, okay.
That's not anything we've discussed.
Okay, it was just something that he had brought up to us, and it is
He had brought up a number of things that we decided —
Yes. I just thought if we were voting on 13, we could get rid of
in our Charter at the same time.
50
HERKES: This is another one that's caused a lot of confusion, and we had
some testimony tonight that there should be — it wasn't in writing, or I can't find it in
writing, that the Mayor could just write a letter and say he wanted the term to be
extended for 30 days, to the Commission because he couldn't find anybody. And I just
think it's something we don't need to put in here.
RAY:
HERKES:
RAY:
HERKES:
my vote.
RAY:
HERKES:'
HIGASHI:
RAY:
BESS:
Director, on Item (f)
Managing Director',
SANTANGELO:
HERKES:
BESS:
SANTANGELO:
RAY:
HANDS RAISED:
IRVINE:
SANTANGELO:
HERKES:
IRVINE:
We already voted on it.
All right. Go ahead.
And you voted against it.
Okay, I did. You're right, and I'm still against it. I'm not changing
Safety Coordinator.
I move we approve.
Second.
Okay, any discussion? Mr. Bess.
For the same reasons that I spoke to before about Managing
'perform such other duties as may be requested by the Mayor or
and I would move to amend that provision.
Second.
We're taking that out. That's going. That whole section is gone.
All right, that whole section. I'm sorry. I take it batik. Sorry.
I take it back.
Okay, we're voting on the main motion. All in favor?
All Commissioners.
Although it was pointed out to us —
We just voted.
We're through.
No, you guys, wait a minute. The bottom of that page, it said `The
51
Safety Coordinator be abolished'. Somebody tonight, I think, just said should the
Safety Coordinator `position' be abolished when we put it on the ballot. Please.
YUEN: We'll have a meeting to go through the exact ballot language.
want to do a draft and then I want to have the Commission thrash it over so that you'll
all have your input and clean it up so we have a real good comprehensive statement.
SANTANGELO: And, in no way, will we erode the spirit of what we voted on today.
YUEN: Oh, absolutely.
RAY: Department Head Qualifications. We have our existing
language. We have the additions in regard to the Chief Engineer and Head of the
Water Department, including the language requiring the five years of administrative
service. Was there anything else?
IRVINE: Curt Beck, from the Engineering Association, whatever the name of
it is, had said to us that, in general, they are using `licensed' rather than `registered'
engineers at this point. I think, Chris, you're looking blank because it was at the
hearing in Hilo, and you were not there.
KUROZAWA: Actually, I can probably clarify that a little. I spoke to one of the
engineers who's the president of the Society right now, because I was curious whether
this was a National license or a State license, and basically what they're using is a
State license which is a test they take to practice in Hawaii.
RAY: That's why we don't want engineers running these departments.
KUROZAWA: No, no, but — So the point being about whether they're qualified or
not. It's just a piece of paper that they have from the State that they took a test.
HERKES:
mainland.
One of those regulations to keep out those bad boys from the
RAY: So, I guess the question is do we want to change it from
`registered' to `licensed', is that the issue?
HERKES: I need more expertise than — is it Gary? Who's an engineer here?
Who would know? Does Civil Service have that qualification?
YUEN: I can check that out for you, but I would suggest that if you actually
didn't want to change it, that leave it the way it is because I think everybody
understands what it is.
HERKES: Okay.
52
•
•
IRVINE: Okay.
YUEN: As a person, a guy, who's licensed, whatever they call it, in Hawaii.
That's what it means.
IRVINE: I was just trying to be polite to them that have the degrees.
SANTANGELO: But we need a motion, yes?
RAY: Wait a minute. Let's make sure we've got everything included in
this. Is part of this motion moving everything, all the qualifications, in Section 13? So
to complete that, I think we just need to move the Finance Director.
YUEN:
on 15 now?
I'm lost now. I thought that that's 15, all the qualifications. Are we
RAY: Yes, but we also wanted to clean up —
HERKES: We're on 12 and 15.
IRVINE: No, we're on 12, 15 — We canned number 12 actually.
RAY: Excuse me. Wait. We're on 15, Department Head Qualifications,
okay? Is what we're discussing.
HERKES: Those are all in the Charter now under one section, and I know it
probably means we're going to rewrite a whole bunch of the Charter, but to me, it would
be much clearer if they were under each department head qualifications that are in 13
point something, whatever they are.
RAY: 13.3, and that's what I was just bringing up that we discussed at
the last meeting. We've got everything now in this new amendment other than the
Finance Director. Right?
YUEN: Right.
HERKES: So, we would once again have an amendment where the
qualifications are separate from the department?
IRVINE: No, they would go into the departments if we add Finance and
Deputy Finance to number 15 because the other ones are handled. That's my
impression anyway.
YUEN: Right.
HERKES: Okay.
53
IRVINE: And I just want to stress that if I'm wrong, I hope we do whatever
we can to get all of those out of there.
RAY: Roland.
HIGASHI: In regards to the Department of Public Works and Board of Water
Supply, do we move those people into that same category under Department Head
Qualifications?
YUEN: No, I think the suggestion was to keep the qualifications with the
department. And what we're trying to do is actually get rid of that section in Article XIII
by moving everything in Article XIII to the departments. So, the additional
qualifications, that are being proposed to Public Works and Water Supply, would be in
the Public Works and Water Supply sections.
HIGASHI: So the idea was that we were going to keep the registered
engineer and also add in administrative experience in private or public or both.
IRVINE: Yes.
HIGASHI: Is that the intent?
RAY: Yes.
IRVINE: And that we would move that over to Section 15. I mean, we can
vote on all of these at one time?
RAY: That was the idea, yes.
IRVINE: Okay.
HERKES: So moved.
RAY: Do we have a second?
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Steve.
BESS: I have a question just on language here. We have, in some
places, where a Director has five years related experience in the private or public
sector, like in Department of Research and Development. And then in Department of
Parks and Recreation we have it 'or both', we add on. One, that they should be
consistent. Two, I'm not sure that I understand why 'or both' is necessary.
SANTANGELO: Well, two of one and three of another.
54
BESS: So I would suggest that we just. have it all as in Department of
Research and Development.
YUEN:
sector'.
HERKES:
Actually, I don't know that it's necessary to say 'public and private
In a related field, or in related experience?
YUEN: Just say 'in a related field' and then I think anybody would
understand. If you don't say `public or private sector', that's all there is anyway.
They're either public or private sector, as far as I know.
BESS: I agree.
YUEN: So, it simplifies it a little bit. Just say five years experience.
IRVINE: Absolutely. Wonderful idea.
RAY: We have a motion on the floor, seconded.
IRVINE: Steve's motion?
HERKES: No, my motion. So moved to adopt.
RAY: Does everybody understand all the proposed changes? All in
favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Police Commission, number 16. Do we have a motion?
HERKES: Move to approve.
YOSHIYAMA: Second.
RAY: Discussion?
HERKES: I would like a discussion. I'd like to say that the Police Commission
has been changed to follow the Fire Commission because we like the Fire Commission
wording. There was some testimony tonight that it was different, and it really isn't. We
use the policy statement out of the Fire Commission for the Police Commission.
IRVINE: You're right, and I think we have strengthened, with our statement
of policy, this Commission.
BESS: And I know I've stated this before. Again, on language, when we're
55
•
talking about the nine members, the language as stated now on Police Commission
does not state any resident requirement and we're going to use the language that we
used in the Environmental Management Department.
HERKES: Is that a friendly amendment?
BESS: Yes it is.
SANTANGELO: I have a question, Mr. Chairman.
RAY: Go ahead, John.
SANTANGELO: As I understood our discussion of the Police Commission, we were
trying to deal with the ability to have some accountability and oversight of the Chief.
But in that first statement where we say 'review the operation', are we delving into some
deeper water? Are we starting to micro manage? I know we wanted to be able to hire
and fire the Chief. I know we wanted to bring accusations, have him answer them
without a trial, but have the opportunity to answer them. But in here, we have that
where `review the operation of the Police Department and make recommendations to
the Chief'.
IRVINE: Where is that?
SANTANGELO: That was in the summation.
• HERKES: He's reading a summary. He doesn't know where it is.
IRVINE: Oh.
SANTANGELO: I was reading the summary. I don't have the other.
HERKES: And I don't know where it is either.
•
IRVINE: I have to see where it is. I mean, we're getting down to the end
here.
YOSHIYAMA: [e](6), second page.
HERKES: Now, those came out of the City and County of Honolulu,
understand, and they haven't had any problem with it. Is that true? I don't think we
changed a lot of those out of the —
SANTANGELO: Okay, so I raise that question. I don't know that.
HIGASHI: It came out of the Fire Commission.
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•
HERKES: Fire Commission, which came out of the City and County of
Honolulu, which they think has worked really well.
SANTANGELO: Except that, again, firemen don't carry guns, don't arrest people,
and -
IRVINE: Number 9 says `except for the purposes of inquiry, neither the
Commission nor its members shall interfere in anyway with the administrative affairs of
the department', if that mitigates.
SANTANGELO: So, how does 6 help or hinder? That's my question.
KUROZAWA: I think if you recall, when we discussed this first proposal, one of
the issues was to empower the Commission to be able to actually look at the operations
and if you go to 7, to do the annual report to the Mayor, was so they could follow up on
that. So I think that's why this was left in, so they actually did look at the operations
and, in turn, wrote a report to the Mayor to say what was going on. That was months
ago.
SANTANGELO: I understand that. I just, again, raise the question are we leaving
opportunity for micro managing and problems down the road. And if this Commission
feels not, I'll support it, but I have trepidation about that. I don't know how we have not
served the Commission well by removing that.
HERKES: There's one of those statements we'll think about.
SANTANGELO: We're trying to help the Commission and I don't see how we water
that down by removing 6.
HERKES: Actually, we're trying to help us more and have more credibility.
RAY: Gary.
YOSHIYAMA: I would think that in any Commission, be it advisory or otherwise,
would need to review the operations under its jurisdiction.
SANTANGELO: I yield.
RAY: Any other discussion on that? Then I believe Steve wants to add,
under the evaluation, to include the Mayor, the Managing =
BESS: Yes, sure. And [b](2) as well. There's the review of the annual
budget prepared by the Chief of Police and may make recommendations thereon to the
Mayor or Managing Director. Likewise on 7.
RAY: Any other discussion? All in favor?
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HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Water Commission. The things we suggested was changing
Commission to Board and I think that was it.
YUEN: No, the Council membership.
RAY: And the Council membership. One member shall be a resident of
each Council district. -
YUEN: No, I mean — I'm sorry. That was not a change from what had been
voted on. I'm sorry. That was a change from the present Charter.
RAY: The only addition would be changing the name of the Water
Commission to the Water Board to eliminate any misunderstanding with the State
Water Commission.
HERKES: Can I just throw something in here? We said the Chief Engineer.
Are we going to have the Head of the Department of Public Works be the Head of the
Department of Public Works, or are we going to have it the Chief Engineer, even
though they have to be a registered engineer? That has always bothered me because
it really is a Department Head, not an engineer. I think that wording should be
changed.
RAY: Where?
HERKES: The fifth or sixth sentence,. `the Manager of the Department of
Water Supply, the Planning Director and the Chief Engineer of the County'. It really
should be the Head of the Department of Public Works, not the Chief Engineer.
RAY: Well, we've left it. We didn't make that change, so we've left it as
the Chief Engineer, unless we're going to go back and change the —
HERKES: But he's still the Head of the Department of Public Works. Even
though he's an engineer, he's, or she is, the Head of the Department of Public Works.
IRVINE: It might emphasize our management skills rather than engineering
skills in these jobs, to change those. I mean, John, it's no big problem to change them
even though they're engineers.
RAY: So, you're suggesting we change the Public Works Department so
that the Chief Engineer is no longer — so you want to call them one thing in one place
and something different in another?
HERKES: No. I want to call him the Head of the Department of Public Works
wherever he is.
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RAY: So, you want to go back and make a change to the Public Works
Department. That's what it would require.
IRVINE: Under number 15.
HIGASHI: He'd be the Director of Public Works?
HERKES: Yes, Director of Public Works.
IRVINE: Let's go look. Let's see what's there. No, you've got to go to 12.
BESS: Is this an item included in the agenda? Might this be a question
here? What do you think, Chris?
YUEN: It's not included in the agenda, no. It would be best to discuss it
under New Business and vote on it at a subsequent meeting, I would think. If you want
to change the name of the Head of the Department of Public Works.
HERKES:
Engineer.
RAY:
HERKES:
And read all 36 pages and pick out every place where it says Chief
So is this something you want to agendize in the —
Yes.
IRVINE: I certainly wouldn't add any amendment to what we're putting out
for this type of thing.
RAY: Well, that's what you'd have to change. You'd have to change it
under the Organization. You'd have to change the Chief Engineer.
IRVINE: We'd have to change what? What?
RAY: Look at the Public Works, Chapter 2, Department of Public Works.
Organization lists `consisting of a Chief Engineer, 6-2.2, the Chief Engineer. So you'd
have to have an amendment to change that.
IRVINE: I wouldn't go that far, but we could certainly say the Head of the
Department of Public Works here under Department of Water Supply. I mean it's the
same person. It's emphasizing that they're the head of a department, as are those other
people, the Planning Director and the Manager of the —
RAY: I just think you're really confusing people if you go back into that.
SANTANGELO: The title is Chief Engineer. There is no —
59
i
HERKES: But, I want to change the title.
HIGASHI: They're suggesting changing that.
SANTANGELO: You mean going back to Chapter 2 and changing?
HERKES: Yes. We're not going to do it today because Chris said we need to
agendize it for another meeting.
IRVINE: All right. I'm going to retract what I just said. As long as it's Chief
Engineer in there, let's just leave it that way.
RAY: So, we're voting on the Department of Water Supply as written with
one change, change Water Commission to Water Board. All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Salary Commission.
HERKES: I move we adopt.
RAY: I don't think there are any additions to this. Do I have a second?
HIGASHI: Second.
RAY: All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
IRVINE: You know what?
HERKES: No, no, no.
SANTANGELO: Will you get in there before we vote?
IRVINE: I voted but 'the Commission shall consist of nine members, six of
whom shall be representative of the County geographical areas'. Do we want to
change that to the nine Council districts the way we've done everything else?
HERKES: Yes.
RAY: I'm sorry. I thought we had.
SANTANGELO: I thought we had too, in prior discussions.
IRVINE: Well, we haven't so it's time to do it, I guess.
60
HERKES: No, Chris will do it in the wording.
HIGASHI:
language.
I think where we mentioned nine, we would have a standard
BESS: Yes.
HIGASHI: Resident of each district —
IRVINE: All right.
BESS: That's what my understanding is. It's all standard language. We're
going to use the Environmental Services -
YUEN: Okay, so we're going to change this one then? That's what you
want to do? Okay.
IRVINE: Chris, and I was wondering if, instead of that whole sentence
`appointed a director', dah, dah, dah, dah, `shall be established by a Salary
Commission which shall consist of nine members', and then we go `appointed in
accordance with 13-4(b)' and then we say 'they may be removed'. Can't we just say
`consist of nine members', then period. The members shall be appointed and may be
removed in the manner prescribed in Section 13-4(b).' I mean it's the same. It
changes nothing but it does it in two clear sentences.
HERKES: We can deal with that wording.
IRVINE: Later. No?
YUEN: It's better wording.
IRVINE: Yes. So, if we're writing this now, let's do it. Excuse me.
RAY: Cost -of -Government Commission. Steve, do you remember
your discussion in regard to —
BESS: What was suggested in the Waimea meeting was that there's the
Cost -of -Government Commission, and after `consisting of nine members' and I assume
again, that we're going to take care of that they're going to be representative of each
district, but that we would also add 'the Managing Director shall serve as an ex -officio
member of the Commission'.
RAY: And then the other is that the -
BESS: And then the other would be on Item 4, it would `submit a report of
its findings and recommendations to the Mayor, Managing Director, and Council'. And
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then lastly, on the term of the Commission, `no member of a Commission shall have
served as a member of the preceding Commission'. I'm suggesting that that be
stricken.
RAY: And the four-year term.
BESS: Yes.
IRVINE: That's up where it says Cost -of -Government Commission.
YUEN: So it would be appointed every four years at the beginning of the
second year of the Mayoral term. Okay.
RAY: Right.
SANTANGELO: That's a motion, right?
BESS: I move.
SANTANGELO: Second.
RAY: All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY:
That concludes —
YUEN: Could I ask just one thing, to go back to the Salary Commission
and, because you're changing the Salary Commission to nine members, one from each
Council district, now we have to address the transitional question of the terms of the
Commission members who are presently serving because, as the Boards are presently
constituted, you may have two or three people from the same district, and do they get
kicked out with this? And what I put down for the Water Commission is they continue to
serve, regardless of the residency and the district, and every time a seat becomes
vacant, then you have to fill that from an unrepresented district, so you gradually move
to the nine. But, we need to specifically do that for the Salary Commission.
SANTANGELO: Chris, how long do you predict that that would take, say, with the
Water Commission?
YUEN: I don't know how long it would take. It takes five years to get a
complete turnover of the members of the Commission, but I don't know how many are
overlapping in a district right now, and when those particular seats are going to become
vacant. You'd have to look at every seat and try to figure out how long this transition is
going to take. The other way to do it is you've got to decide, well, some of these
people aren't going to be able to serve, or you have to disqualify one or the other. If
62
you have two people in the same district and an unrepresented district, if you don't say
that they can continue on, you're going to have to disqualify them, or you're going to
have to shorten their term, or do something. This needs to be addressed.
SANTANGELO: And I have pretty grave concerns in that area, based that this is a
different department. It's an enterprise department. They have some pretty heavy
responsibilities. And yet, the whole purpose of changing this was if anything needed a
broader base of support and input, it was this Commission, so my only concern is that it
would take a long time because I think there's some people in West Hawaii, and areas
like that, that would be looking for better representation a little quicker.
IRVINE: It doesn't sound really possible though, John. I'd like to move that
we do this in the same manner as Chris suggested, that we let terms expire and then fill
the vacancies with people from unrepresented districts.
HERKES: I second the motion. And if I can speak on it, I think it's in the best
interest of everybody in the County not to have the Water Commission disrupted
because I think it would be disruptive for all of us if we ended up with a whole new
Commission, or if we started removing people. It's just a better way. It's a smoother
way of transition if people get through their Commission terms. Now, they may resign.
YoU know, that's up to them. I would hope that not too many of them would.
SANTANGELO: In speaking to that, given the plethora of alternatives that we were
presented, and having given plenty of time to each one of them, sarcasm included, one
of the problems is that, and I agree, you need the expertise on this Commission. On
the other hand, if you were to demand that you had too many representatives in one
district, and only one could stay, and that would hurt the Commission, that shows the
imbalance that's in the Commission. And my only question was was there an
alternative, and if there's not, fine, but it didn't seem like we went very far into it.
Otherwise, I'II go along with that. Has there ever been any other way of doing it?
YUEN: The alternatives are only limited to our imagination, but I know
because it's been discussed, with the Water Commission, it does not follow the nine
districts how. There's some imbalance there, so you have to address what do you do,
Unless you're going to let people serve out the term, then you can say if you have two
or more in the Commission from the same district, you can say the one with the shortest
term has to quit; the one with the longest term has to quit; they flip a coin to decide who
has to quit; their terms are shortened by a certain amount of time so that the transition
doesn't take so long. There are a lot of different alternatives. I brought this up
because it's a technical point that when the Commission voted the first time to go to the
nine Council districts as being the membership, we didn't really vote, or consider this.
drafted up the transitional language and stuck it in 17, and 1 mentioned that the
Commission had not voted on it. And now that we've gone with the Salary, I think
probably it would be best since the Commission — I'm not sure we alerted ourselves to
this. This was added on when we voted on the Water Commission, number 17 and I'd
like us now to move to vote and add that on. I think that would be a good idea to take a
63
•
•
vote on how you're going to do that. And then what I brought up was on 18, now with
the Salary Commission, same thing, you have people who are there and assuming that
there are doubling up, or tripling up possibly, in the different Council districts, do you
want to let people serve out their terms and gradually move to the nine single member
districts, or do you want to do some other kind of transition? There are many ways of
doing it, but I've, kind of, outlined the general things you have to consider, the general
things you'd have to do.
RAY: Roland.
HIGASHI: Mr. Chairman, maybe with Sharron's help, she can visit those
departments to see exactly who's serving, where they represent, and when their terms
expiring, and then we can evaluate if there's a problem, or how we can handle the
situation.
IRVINE: Rome wasn't built in a day, and if we have holdover people on a
Commission for a few years, it's not going to jeopardize the County.
HIGASHI: All I'm saying is let's look who's there and how long their terms are.
RAY: So, you're suggesting that we hold off on this vote?
HERKES: What you are going to do?
RAY: Hold off on the vote in terms of —
SANTANGELO: I just mention one more thing. Sue, one thing to be real careful of
is you and I both come from a district that has a predominance of people on it. I mean
we're here on this side, and I think over two-thirds of it come from the East side. And if
there was ever an issue that's important now, it's Water. I don't mind going along with
what you said if I had a fair amount of assurance that there wasn't any other way to do
it better.
IRVINE:
either vote —
Okay. Well, I made a motion and it was seconded, so we have to
RAY: Okay, all in favor?
SANTANGELO: I move to table.
RAY: I think we can —
SANTANGELO: If it gets a second, there's no discussion.
HIGASHI: Second.
64
IRVINE: It got a second.
SANTANGELO: I have a second. It has to go to vote.
• RAY: Okay, all in favor of tabling?
i
HANDS RAISED: Commissioners Alonzo, Bess, Higashi, Ray, Santangelo,
Yoshiyama.
RAY: Okay.
SANTANGELO: What is it?
HERKES: Tabled.
YUEN: I think it was six. Basically you're going to defer the issue. The
vote to table means you want to defer discussion. And do you want Sharron to get a
list of who is on the Water Commission and the Salary Commission now, the length of
their remaining terms, and what Council district they live in?
SANTANGELO: Especially the Water.
HIGASHI: Mr. Chairman, something occurred to me as we voted on the last
department, the Cost -of -Government Commission. We need to attach it to somebody
so they can operate, whether it's the Office of the Mayor or Managing Director, and
some mechanism as to who will, kind of, head this department or who will chair it. Is it
totally independent? How does it work? So I think we need to, kind of, address that.
HERKES: I think it's totally independent.
RAY: Sue, have you got the Maui County Charter there?
IRVINE: What's that, on page 28, or does anybody know?
HERKES: 22. I'm looking at it right now. The Mayor, with the approval of the
Council, appoints a Commission. So I would say it goes under the Mayor. We've finally
given the Mayor something to do besides cut ribbons. John?
HIGASHI:
it someplace.
think we can decide whatever we want but we have to probably fit
YUEN: I think the way it works in Maui, or what's anticipated, is that they
have an organizational meeting and they appoint a Chair. And I think we've decided
that the Managing Director would be an ex -officio member, would actually be the only
person from the regular government that actually sits with them, would be the principal
liaison. And they prepare a report, so, in a way, they would function — Are you asking
65
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for administrative purposes?
HIGASHI: That's right.
YUEN: I think they would work out of the Mayor's Office. We can say that.
You mean for just administrative assistance like stationery, meeting places, and helping
them post notices, and the like?
HIGASHI: Probably right.
YUEN: We could put it in the Charter that it works out of the Mayor's
Office. If we didn't, I think that's where it would function out of.
HERKES: The amendment we voted on says 'the Mayor, with the approval of
the Council'. Now we had some testimony about San Diego, that they just throw names
in a hat, everybody that wants to do it, and they pick the names out of the hat. Is that—
YUEN: I think what Roland is getting at is —
HERKES: Staffing?
YUEN: No, is not who is appointed to it, which is specified as the Mayor,
but I think, for administrative purpose, to where is this attached. Like who provides
staff support for it, and I think that would be worthwhile putting it in the Charter, and
• think logically it would either be the Office of the Managing Director or the Office of the
Mayor would be responsible for providing the staff support. And just to mention, .for
example, like this Charter Commission is not administratively attached to any office,
and the Commissions normally are. So, say for example, the Planning Commission,
they don't have their own employee but they're attached to the Planning Department
and when they have a meeting and the agenda, there's somebody in the Planning
Department who puts all that out for them. So, I think the point is a very good one, that
it's useful to say who they're attached to for administrative purposes. That's what
you're getting at?
HIGASHI: That's correct. Second question is who appoints the
Commissioners?
YUEN: That is specified in what was written. It's the Mayor. Cost -of -
Government Commission is appointed by the Mayor.
SANTANGELO: Where?
YUEN: No?
HIGASHI: Maybe it was an oversight, but I don't see it.
66
HERKES: The Mayor, with the approval of the Council, shall appoint a Cost -
of -Government Commission consisting of nine members in the second year of each
mayoral term.'
IRVINE: However, it does not say where they are administratively.
HERKES: No, but it says appoint. Roland asked who.
SANTANGELO: Where is that? Help us out. Where?
HERKES: Cost -of -Government Commission.
KUROZAWA: Second section.
HERKES: First sentence.
HIGASHI: I don't have the second section here.
HERKES: First sentence, Cost -of -Government Commission.
IRVINE: Second line.
KUROZAWA: Middle of the page.
• HIGASHI: Okay. We can't read too fast. We hadn't reached that point. Okay,
got it. It's past 8 o'clock.
BESS: I was just going to suggest that — I mean, there's a toss up here of
where it should go for administrative purposes between the Mayor and the Managing
Director, and I'm inclined to put it with the Mayor's Office. The Managing Director is
charged with running government efficiently, and what have you, and it could be that if
his staff was the one that was assisting the Commission to make government more
efficient, that there's, kind of, a conflict of interest so that I would think that it would be
best to put in the Mayor's Office.
YUEN: If I could just make a suggestion. I think that the Mayor's Office
does run a number of advisory -type Commissions and the Managing Director's Office
will probably have a much smaller staff, and this would be the only Commission that
they would run. So from that point of view, it would probably be better to have it
administratively with the Mayor's Office. It's really not a policy thing. It's just who
provides secretarial support and does things like call the members up so you would run
that out of the Mayor's Office. They do things like that right now.
RAY:
YUEN:
•
Okay, so what do we need to do to include that?
Maybe make a motion, just say for administrative purposes, that it
67
be attached to the Mayor's Office.
BESS: So moved.
• HERKES: Second.
RAY: All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Okay, moving on to Review and Final Vote of Charter Changes
Suggested in Public Testimony.
SANTANGELO: What about this redevelopment thing? What are we —
RAY: We're getting there.
HERKES: Look at your agenda.
SANTANGELO: Excuse me, I put it away because I want to go home. I've got to go
baking.
•
RAY:
is to —
Number C, the Hawaii Redevelopment Agency. The amendment
YUEN: I have a slightly different language if I could — very slightly. I'll just
read it out loud. The same section, and it deletes the sentence saying 'The status of
the Hawaii Redevelopment Agency shall not be effected by this Charter', and it would
say 'The Hawaii Redevelopment Agency shall be abolished and it's powers, functions,
rules and regulations transferred to the Planning Director on January 1, 2001.' That's
just to give a date rather than it being immediate.
RAY: All in favor?
HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: And then Mandatory West Hawaii Meetings of the County
Council. Do you have anything written there? This would be the under Legislative
Branch, page 3 in our Charter, 3-7 Meetings, the first sentence, 'The County Council', it
says,'shall meet regularly', same sentence, but at the end of the sentence `establish by
rule of the Council', comma, 'but shall meet no less than once quarterly in North or
South Kona'. The idea is to mandate a quarterly meeting in Kona — that the County
Council shall meet no less than once quarterly in the North and South Kona districts.
HERKES: Is that a motion?
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RAY: This is my suggestion, and the reason I'm suggesting this is I think
HERKES: Discussion comes after the motion.
RAY: Well wait, maybe you don't want to move it.
HERKES: I want to discuss it.
RAY: I think it would go a long way with just establishing a regular
presence for the County Council in West Hawaii, that folks could count on and interact
in, and it's more than just dealing with day-to-day Council business. It also has to do
with bivic organizations, schools, whatever, being able to go and participate or
experience the County Council, which, practically speaking, they can't do now with the
Council meeting in Hilo. I know the Council meets occasionally in West Hawaii, usually
either public hearings or Planning Committee meetings, but that's really different than
having full Council meetings, and I think this will also lead towards them probably
holding other business in West Hawaii that they wouldn't otherwise. In other words,
scheduling more committee meetings at the same time they bring the staff over. So
that's the intent behind this. Do I have a motion?
HERKES: Yes, I was going to make one before you had the discussion. Yes,
I move we have Council meetings meet no less than one time quarterly in North or
South Kona.
RAY: Do I have a second?
KUROZAWA: Second.
HIGASHI: Kona or West Hawaii?
HERKES: Now can we have the discussion? Do you have any idea how
often the Council has met in the last 12 months in Kona?
RAY: There's a lot of difference between a public hearing —
HERKES: That's why I didn't ask the question how many times they've had a
public hearing. How many times the Council has met.
RAY: I don't think it ever, I would guess. My answer would be zero.
HERKES: Okay.
IRVINE: I think they used to meet around more when they were more at -
large.
69
SANTANGELO: Don't say that.
IRVINE: But I think it's true.
RAY: There may have been some committee meetings, but I don't think
the full Council has met there. Is that what you — just to clarify they do?
HERKES: The full Council has been there at several meetings that I've been
there, but they may have been committee meetings. You're right. I was wondering.
don't know.
RAY: It's a different, more formal, sort of more inclusive process that
just think would be good civic involvement.
IRVINE:
West Hawaii?
RAY:
or whatever.
IRVINE:
know, is Kona
RAY:
Kona.
John, do we need to say North and South Kona, or can we just say
The point is to be in Koha. My point is not in Waimea, not in Ka'u,
What if you just say Kona? I'm just thinking of simplicity. I don't
Kona?
Chris suggested defining it as North-South Kona instead of just
IRVINE: He's a lawyer. But that's all right. I forgive him.
RAY:
couldn't think of any better way, but I was thinking of the central
location where the population base is, which is really the Kailua-Keauhou area, but it's
North-South Kona, was the intent.
SANTANGELO: (indiscernible).
RAY: I don't know. You got anything worthwhile to say?
SANTANGELO: It's another one of those 1 agree with intent'. I'd just like to bring up
some information and some questions, and let us go over it. If there's anything that
got beat up, especially from the Portuguese Chamber, was anything that said bigger
government or more cost. If you take your Council to Kona, you've got your
committees, so you'll be holding your Tuesday committees there also?
RAY: No.
SANTANGELO: So the committees held here and then they'd go over the next day
for the Council meeting.
410 RAY: It could be either way.
70
SANTANGELO: Okay.
RAY:
But it doesn't mandate that the committees are held there.
SANTANGELO: Because the staff involved in committees is a lot greater than
Council because your resource and stuff. I'm just thinking. That would cut it out for me
because if you take your committees, you've got overnight. You've got a lot of people
and you need some staff to help you write some amendments. You've done that
yourself, so, okay. If the intent isn't — You know, it seems to me that it'd be better to
take the whole darn thing but then you're really looking at a big expense.
RAY:
KUROZAWA:
SANTANGELO:.
night.
HERKES:
They could do that.
It's only a two hour drive from here. We drive this way all the time.
No, but Daryl, these guys have gone regularly till 8, 9 o'clock at
Really? And it's now 8:30. Guess who has to drive home?
SANTANGELO: Finishing my statement, because there is some serious costs in
here, and a lot of times we run out to do something and there are consequences. And
what I'm saying is you go regularly late at night, you're taking several vehicles. You
may well be staying overnight, but there's a lot of equipment, a lot of set up. And I'm
just saying it is going to have a cost associated with it, and if it's okay with everybody,
• fine, but there is a cost.
RAY: I think there is going to have a cost associated with it. I don't think
that the Council meetings, on a regular basis, really run that late in the day, so I don't
think you're automatically looking at overnight stays and that type of expense. You
could, but as you well know, those of us who had to travel to East Hawaii often have to
spend the night if they're late meetings, and the Council has to pay those expenses as
well.
HIGASHI:
RAY:
HIGASHI:
HERKES:
RAY:
to West Hawaii.
HIGASHI:
RAY:
We're not going to require them to have it televised —
Of course it'll be televised.
Do they have the staff over there?
Amazing, we have television cameras in West Hawaii.
Our present contractor said he would be more than happy to come
Oh, okay —
Any more discussion? All in favor?
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HANDS RAISED: All Commissioners.
RAY: Was that a no?
HIGASHI: Better raise your hand.
HERKES: Portuguese Chamber's going to get you.
SANTANGELO: They already have. The statement last night was 'what's our
budget? Wasted every penny of it.'
RAY:
Announcements.
BESS:
New Business. No new business.
Hold it. Wait a minute.
RAY: Yes sir?
BESS: I'd like to agendize a couple of — on Liquor and Civil Service
Commission, the idea of providing for nine members on each of our Commissions, and
making it uniform and more representative. I'd like to put that on the agenda so that we
would increase the number of Commission members on both the Liquor Commission
and Civil Service to nine rather than five.
RAY: Is there a State law in regard to —
YUEN: State Law specifies the Civil Service and there's a Hawaiian
Supreme Court decision that said that State Law was Civil Service, who preceded the
County. Liquor, there's a State Law but the County supercedes the State Law on
Liquor, so you can change Liquor to how many you want.
BESS: Okay, I just want to agendize it and we'll talk about it next time.
mean, Civil Service, I'll strike that. But Liquor, let's just let it fly. We'II talk about it.
RAY: Okay. Marni.
HERKES: I want to agendize the Preamble. I have some suggested wording
that I've passed out to everybody. And also the wording for Article XIV, Section 14-1,
under Code of Ethics. I brought that up at the April 1st meeting and wording's in the
minutes, and it's also been passed out to the Commission. So, I'd like to agendize that
also.
RAY:
here on the 31st.
Any other suggestions? We're going to have a special meeting
HERKES: When? John was squeaking his chair. I couldn't hear.
72
IRVINE: The 31St?
RAY: A special meeting in this room on the 31St, May 31st, three weeks
• from now. The reason being I'm going on vacation on the 6th of June; Chris is going on
vacation the 8th of June, so I'd like to get these votes wrapped up, and that's the
soonest we can hold a meeting and meet the public notice requirements.
SANTANGELO: So, what's the date? The 31st.
RAY: So that's three weeks from Wednesday. Three weeks from today.
HERKES: Will we have the wording for the Commission before that meeting,
the wording for the Charter?
•
YUEN: I think I can have the exact wording for everything that was passed
today ready by then. I might be able to have a draft of the ballot language. So we were
going to put the transition on the agenda as well. I don't have an alternative wording
right now for that.
HERKES: So if we did the wording for what we passed today on May 31St, and
the end of June we could finalize what goes on the ballot? When are you guys coming
back? Are you taking a month or two weeks?
RAY: I don't understand your question.
SANTANGELO: Finalize it the 31St
HERKES: I don't think we're going to be ready for all that on the 31st.
YUEN: Well, we may be able to finalize everything on the 31St
HERKES: Okay.
YUEN: Your Board of Ethics, you have the exact language there. The
Preamble, you have the exact language. The Liquor Commission, if you're going to
change it to nine members, that's pretty easy on the language. If you want to adopt
what I'd written for the transition then it's ready to go, but if you want to change it then
we've got to discuss that.
RAY: That meeting will be at 5 o'clock on the 31St. Also this regular
meeting that's scheduled for June 14th, I'II be gone and Chris will be gone as well, so
we need to decide what to do about that. Shall we just cancel it? Okay.
SANTANGELO: So the 31St will not be our last meeting? Okay.
RAY: We have a lot more to discuss, John, in terms of developing our
budgets, and whole strategy for public education and marketing this product.
73
•
•
SANTANGELO: Oh, that's right. Okay.
HIGASHI: But we are getting to the critical part in finishing our work as far as
amendments.
RAY: Yes, I think we could very well be done on the 31St
SANTANGELO: Okay, but we've got other work to do. Okay.
RAY: Yes, so we have to have meetings to decide —
HERKES: Charter Commission's 5 o'clock?
SANTANGELO: Can we do those on a weekday thing because I work in Saturdays,
so it's really eating up a lot of my Saturdays.
IRVINE: I don't think we do —
HERKES: Do we have a Saturday scheduled?
RAY: Do I have a motion to adjourn?
SANTANGELO: So moved.
HIGASHI: Second.
The discussion ended at 8:36 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Sharron Henry
Secretary -Administrative Assistant
74
•
PREAMBLE
WE, THE PEOPLE OF THE COUNTY OF HAWAII, DO HEREBY ADOPT THIS CHARTER
of the County of Hawaii, State of Hawaii. Our goal in adopting this charter is to provide our elected
and appointed officials guidelines by which to govern with proactive management techniques
in order to instill trust and confidence in the integrity of government.
CHARTER COMMIISSION 5/4/00
TO: CHAIR JOHN RAY
FROM: Conunissioner Marni Herkes
•RE: Additions to the Hawaii County Charter
In the minutes of the Charter Commission of Apri11,2000, on page 22, I asked to have wording inserted into the commission draft for
Article XIV, Section 14-1 under Code of Ethics.
Replace Section 14-1 with (from the Maui County Charter):
Elected and appointed officers and employees shall demonstrate by their example
the highest standards of ethical conduct to the end that the public may justifiable
have trust and confidence in the integrity of government.
Could you please add this to the agenda for the full commission to adopt on May 10?
Thank you for your consideration.