MIN CHC 1989-04-26 - Laserfiche WebLink

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(Verbatim begins. ) BETHEA: Yes , just . . . subject to any objections from the members , my intention is to ask Mr. Yuen to make himself available to answer any questions that the commission might have. And then after you ask him whatever questions , in accordance with the rules and as permitted , and I . . . this is what happened at the last part of our meeting, we can go into executive session and discuss the candidacy. And then any vote that we take will be taken at an open meeting. If there ' s no objections , that would be the procedure that the Chair suggests in this regard. Hearing no objections , Mr. Yuen, are you willing to step up to the microphone? Mr. Yuen is available for any question that you might have about his background or his ability to serve as the attorney for this commission. Would anybody like to raise any particu- lar issues or raise any particular questions at this time? Yes. CUSHNIE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Hello , Mr . Yuen. Mr. Yuen and I have worked together for some Family Court business and I was surprised to see here that one of our paragraphs from Mr. Bethea' s memo of April 17th (Attachment A) was that there may be possible concerns over Mr. Yuen' s quali . . . in certain controversial community issues. And I have not known Mr . Yuen to be associated with controversial issues , so I 'm asking him, if it ' s appropriate, what might we be questioned about if there were any concerns? Are there some controversial issues that you ' re associated with? YUEN: Well , I 'd say certainly I 've been working for a number of land-use related issues . I 've been working part of the last couple of years to try to preserve an area in Kona, Makalawena, and the adjoining areas. I suppose you could call that controversial but I think everybody wanted to be for it , but I . . . it could be. . . it could be called. . . they could call it controversial. And I expect that in my. . . I would expect that I 'm going to continue to do this sort of thing. Perhaps the best way to talk about how this would relate to my work with the commission would be to talk about how I see my role with the commission. I think, if I were selected , I think the commission' s attorney, really the attorney for any governmental body, is . . .the proper role is like your mechanic for your car. Your mechanic is responsible for making sure that your car runs but not for telling you where to drive it. And that ' s how I see the role of the attorney for the commission. I don' t see my involvement in other kinds of issues as playing a role and kind of advice. . . the kind of legal advice I would give to the commission if I were selected. 257