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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN CRCOC 2024/04/16 (2022-2024)Committee on Communications, Reports, and Council Oversight 261' Session West Hawaii Civic Center 74-5044 Ane Keohokalole Highway, Building A Kailua-Kona, Hawaii April 16, 2024 CALL TO The regular meeting of the Committee on Communications, Reports, and ORDER: Council Oversight was called to order at 3:30 p.m., in the Council Chambers, Kailua-Kona, by Ms. Rebecca Villegas, Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Ms. Rebecca Villegas, Chair Ms. Jenn Kagiwada, Vice Chair (via videoconference from Hilo) Ms. Cindy Evans, Member Ms. Michelle M. Galimba, Member Mr. Matt Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, Member (via videoconference from Hilo) Ms. Heather L. Kimball, Member (via videoconference from Hilo) Absent & Excused: Mr. Holeka Goro Inaba, Member STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: COMMUNI- CATIONS: Comm. 795 Motion to Close File: Ms. Ashley L. Kierkiewicz, Member Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Member The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, Statements from the Public on Agenda Items. (There were none.) The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, Communications. PERFORMANCE AUDIT 2024-01: POLICE DEPARTMENT ASSESSMENT OF COMMUNITY SERVICE EXPECTATIONS, MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT AND TRAINING PROGRAMS From County Auditor Tyler J. Benner, dated March 28, 2024, transmitting the above audit report, pursuant to Section 3-18(d)(2) of the Hawaii County Charter. Ms. Evans moved to close file on Comm. 795. Seconded by Ms. Galimba. CHR. VILLEGAS: With that, I'll go ahead and turn it over to our Auditor Benner. Go ahead and introduce yourself, state your name for the record, and we'll dive right in. CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 (Note: At this time, County Auditor Tyler Benner came forward to address the members of the Committee.) MR. BENNER: Aloha, Council Members, my name is Tyler Benner, County Auditor, good to be with you today. We're here to debrief Council on the Audit Report of the Hawaii Police Department (HPD), Assessment of Community Service Expectations, Mental Health Support and Training Programs. The report number is 2024-01, published March 28, 2024. I'm going to guide you through the report as we describe the issues and results. (Note: At this time, County Auditor Tyler J. Benner provided a summary of his report to the members of the Committee. For viewing of the presentation, see the DVD copy of the proceedings on file in the Clerk's Office, or online at http://hawaiicounty.granicus.com. A copy of the presentation is made part of the record, see Comm. 795.) CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Mr. Benner. Wow, you are an incredibly thorough auditor, and you are a really incredible speed reader. MR. BENNER: I'm sorry. CHR. VILLEGAS: No, do not apologize, it's an authentic compliment. Thank you so much for covering so much information in such a short period of time. With that, I'll open up for any questions from my colleagues. Council Member Evans. MS. EVANS: My area of interest —well, I'm going to bring this up, two areas, one is neighborhood watch. So, when you were auditing and looking at programs in these community outreach initiatives, did you ever go out in the field and actually interact with the community? MR. BENNER: No, I didn't go into any of the community meetings themselves, but I did do two community policing ride-alongs, one on the east side and one on the west side. So, I was able to interview those officers at length. Mr. Jelsma on the east side had visited a neighborhood watch group the night before our ride - along, so we know that they're doing it. Both my east and west side ride-alongs; we assisted on the east side with a vehicle that had been abandoned in the neighborhood behind the mall. A child and her father came out and just laid quite a bit of praise on the officer and how much removing those vehicles from their neighborhood was contributing to just the safety of the children not having to step out on the streets, visibility, and just general aesthetics. When we went to the west side of the island, we were greeted at a coffee shop by a young gentleman who was enamored with the community police officers, and when we went downtown on Ali`i Drive, we had the opportunity to interact with a Page 2 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 couple of unhoused individuals. We had a gentleman come up and ask us about locating an animal that he had lost the night before. So, there's really a diverse array of public engagement that these folks are participating in. Both officers ran out of stickers for the children, so I would make that further recommendation that we need to get these officers loaded up with badge stickers for the children. But really, they are doing a lot of really good work. It's being recognized especially on the community policing front. We were happy to be a part of it. MS. EVANS: Okay, thank you. I wanted to bring that up and point out to our Chief that these community engagements, they're just amazing. They're really making a huge difference and whatever the initiatives are, I know that community, whatever support you can give them, stickers, brochures, training, you know, a lot of it is they're out there in their community. Hopefully, they can help alleviate some troubles, right? So, good. I'll yield for now, thank you. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Evans. Council Member Galimba. I just quickly, I'm not sure about the protocol on this but I see Chief Moszkowicz here. So, at some point, Chief, let me know, too, if you'd like to do you think maybe we should let the Chief share? Ok, great. Then he could be opened up for some other questions. Chief, do you have any comments or things you want to share? (Note: At this time, Police Chief Benjamin Moszkowicz came forward to address the members of the Committee.) MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Oh, thank you very much for the opportunity. I'm really just here to support Mr. Benner and his report. I know it's never a settling feeling to either volunteer for or be identified for an audit of any kind, and it's always a little worrisome throwing back the curtain and exposing all of our data and practices to someone. But Mr. Benner and his office have been extremely professional. They have asked us at every step of the process, how can we take this audit process and turn it into something that we can actually use to establish a baseline so that as the department continues to grow, as we continue to fill positions, as we start to impact response times, because we have 70/80 or more officers out there on patrol, what does this baseline look like? And if we can take the future data as sort of a point of reference comparison. So, I guess I can't really say enough about Mr. Benner and his staff. They've done a fabulous job, and the results of the audit were very settling, they tell us a lot of what we already know, but they put numbers and measurables onto some things that we want to keep an eye on. So, I think the audit is a first step in a continual improvement process of the Police Department being able to serve and protect the community even better. Page 3 CRCOC-26 April 1.6, 2024 CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Chief, appreciate that. Council Member Galimba. MS. GALIMBA: Thanks. Thanks, Chief Ben, for that. I guess maybe I just wanted to ask if you could maybe elaborate a little bit more on, I believe it was the first section, which was the original set of data on beat analysis. I think beat analysis and resource utilization go together somewhat, but I wonder if maybe you could elaborate on your current or if there's —I assume that you were saying just now that you were already going in that direction; maybe you could elaborate more on your thoughts on that, especially since we're in budget. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Sure. Good timing. So, our department has been very focused over the last, probably eight to ten months, on renovating the entrance pathway to becoming a police officer in Hawaii County. So, we switched from a once every six months to a continual recruitment process where we can focus on, you know, with County HR (Human Resources) having civil service test every month, doing physical agility test once a month instead of every six months. As a result of that, we have three classes, currently, in our recruit system. We have a class of nine that are getting ready for their very first assignment today, and then we have a class that got hired in November that has 18 people downstairs. I can hear them running by outside my window right now, actually. I had another class of 17 that started April Is' and we're looking at a class that's, I think, currently at 27 applicants for July. So, the changes have done us very good and we have now, in our pipeline sort to speak, this mass of officers that are going to eventually hit the road as solo beat officers. One of the challenges that we look at from the recruiting perspective is the immediacy of returns, right? So, we changed the way we do business in May of last year and suddenly we're accepting online applications 24 hours a day, and we start getting all these applications and this interest to get people through that initial selection process has historically taken us six to seven months. I have now a recruit who just missed the April class who filled out their application in January. So, for people with background checks that are easier for us or our investigators to get through, it has taken us six or seven months and it's down to three or four months. But even then, once people start, it's another six months of intensive classroom training, four months of on -the -road training before they're able to be actually pushed out into your very first solo beat assignment. So, from application to ready to go on the road, to fill a beat as an officer is probably realistically, 14 to 16 months. So, the fact that we have these recruits in the pipeline ready to push out is promising and it's hopefully going to give us some relief in our more rural districts. So, it's also not a surprise. I think Deputy Chief Moller talked to you guys' last week about the staffing shortages that we have, right? So, we're short 1.0 patrol officers in Puna, so think about 10 patrol officers because I run a Page 4 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 24 hour, 7-day a week operation, 10 patrol officers means two officers on a 24-hour basis. So, to have two more officers available in the Puna district all the time, because I can get those 10 spots filled is huge. So, we're missing 10 in Puna, we're missing 10 in Ka'fi, in the Nd'dlehu area, we're missing over 20 in Kona. So, as these recruit classes graduate, and they finish with their FTO (Field Training Officer) and they're starting to actually —we will soon be starting to actually impact those numbers. So, if I can send three extra patrol officers to Kona in September when this group of 18 starts, that's a huge difference, and that helps. Hopefully, what we're expecting is that will start to impact response times because one of the huge challenges that we face on this island is the geography. We have 210,000 people, 200,000 to 210,000 people, visitors and residents, but they're so spread out, and we were talking about police resources and limited geography and limited roadways. To get from the topside of the Puna district to the bottom side, it's not a straight shot, right? So, the idea is the more police officers we have working on a shift, working in patrol, the faster the response times if they're spread out appropriately. So, again, as we start to impact and get closer to the full 484 officers on the road, then I think we have a pause, and we take a look at what has been the impact of this additional staffing to response times, because almost all of the vacant positions that I have are patrol officer positions. There are some that are detectives or administrators, but the vast majority are patrol officer positions. So, once I fill those and we can kind of pause and take a look at, or even in real time with this, you know, the dashboard, be able to look at the impact of response time as those spots fill up. Then, I think it might be time next year, budget cycle to take a look at if it's smart, once those spots are filled, to grow and if we need more officers in the Ocean View area as opposed to the Nd'dlehu area, or if we need more officers in Pdhoa or Kea'au. Then hopefully, a year from now, we'll have all of our spots filled, and we can take a really hard look at that with a fresh set of data and see where we can make further impact with additional resources for the island of Hawaii. Does that make sense? Does that answer your question? MS. GALIMBA: Sorry, yes, it does. Yeah, it does. I was just noticing, in our Finance Committee before this, there was like a transfer of funding from Ka'fi and Kona. So, wages to training. So, you're kind of dynamically adjusting and then windows, those recruits get back and then you can use that there and once those positions are filled up with brand new police officers. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Correct. The positions for the recruits are not funded. So, those are the temporary positions that you folks thankfully gave us a bunch of extra ones to continue to grow about maybe a month or two ago. But the funding for those positions is tied to the vacant positions that I have in patrol, because as Page 5 CRCOC-26 April 1.6, 2024 those people, exactly like you said, as they complete their training and they're ready for their first assignment, then that person is going to go into one of those positions. So, because I have that vacant position funding there, what we're doing is we're drawing it down from those places and moving it to training to cover the salary and benefits for the recruit officers who will eventually and hopefully, fill those spots. MS. GALIMBA: I guess, well this might be going a little bit up far field, but I guess my question is, is that the best way to do it? Maybe we can take that up later on next year or something. But yeah, thanks very much, I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Galimba. Anyone in Hilo? Council Member Kagiwada. MS. KAGIWADA: Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Benner, for your excellent work as usual, and for Chief Moszkowicz for being here. I have two questions related to how our county either collaborates with or works with the state or other counties. One is around the POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) recommendation that we fully implement that quickly and fully. Is the hold up there have to do with the state and where they are at with is? Or how can the county and your department, Chief, help with making sure that the County of Hawaii fully implements POST going forward? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: So, the POST standard would have to be adopted for us to comply with it. So, what we're doing now and what we've done for years, and this is probably one of the reasons why POST has come to Hawaii so late as the last state to kind of look at or adopt the POST standard. Because we're so small and because we have basically four police departments and one kind of state law enforcement entity, major state law enforcement entity, because the community is small and because we've historically had a very good working relationship with each other, the four departments and the state, a lot of our policies now are basically either result of collaboration or Honolulu has something that works really well. So, we borrowed and adopted it slightly to fit our standards and vice versa. So, a lot of the policies that cover these areas that we predict are going to be part of these POST standards are things that we've already collaborated with and we're already kind of doing. But, to Mr. Benner's point and is a very good suggestion, the fact is that a POST certification board would have the authority to make sure that individual officers are following the standard, right, and would make sure to enforce the standards on a state-wide basis. So, I'm not super worried about the oversight of a POST standard board, maybe because I'm pretty sure that most of the standards that we're going to adopt, as a board, are going to be very consistent with what we are doing now, which is guided by CALEA (Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies). Again, Mr. Benner's right, CALEA doesn't tell you how Page 6 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 to do something, it just tells you what you have to do as a minimum, and then each department kind of frames their own idea around that and fits into their policies and procedures. But, because of that and because each of the departments is or has been recently certified by CALEA, we're all kind of already playing from the same sheet of music, if that makes sense. The hold up, realistically, has been the standards board is right now, in fact, we're supposed to do it last month, but it got cancelled again; we're in the process of hiring an administrator who will be kind of that point person to organize all these standards and get things running and established. So, I'm hopeful that happens actually, in a fairly short order. MS. KAGIWADA: And just to clarify, that's a county -level position or a state - level position? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: That's a state -level position. MS. KAGIWADA: Okay. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: The person would work in association with —under the Attorney General's office and work with the law enforcement standards board in establishing law enforcement standards or POST standards. MS. KAGIWADA: Okay. So, does your organization, does your department need any additional support in order to move this forward or really just working with the state at this point? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: It's really working with the state and the Law Enforcement Standards Board. So, they are our representatives. We actually have two where most departments have one. Major Bird, who is a law enforcement representative and that's distinct from my role on the board as one of the four county police chiefs who also gets that chance to serve on the board. So actually, we're very well represented and again, it's just a matter of the state processes playing out to get this person hired to hopefully help us start developing these standards. MS. KAGIWADA: Okay, thank you so much. My second question is just around this recommendation to fonnulate a long-terin, securing a dedicated training facility. Do other counties in our state have this and/or is it possible to share some of this, or does every single county have to have their own? Because my understanding is some of these can be kind of expensive, training facilities, and I don't know if that's a question for Mr. Benner or for you, Chief. MR. BENNER: Well, I could start with the answer and the Chief could definitely chime in if he has something that's probably more informed than I have. I believe Page 7 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 that there is a training facility on Oahu for their Police Department, and I've never been. So, I would let the Chief speak at length on that. But there are training facilities of varying complexity that do leverage resources from a lot of different entities. So, where I come from, there is a regional training center that — a fire tower that combines both police and fire services. It's also set on an oversized park, so they actually have a trifecta between their Parks and Recreation Department, Fire Department, and Police Department in order to, you know, utilize their, in this case, city property to be able to stand up those grounds. I think that we did include some imagery in those training sections where folks in the HPD were at some various sites conducting some drills, some active shooter drills and so forth where you can see that the police are leading charge into the building for an alert. They call it an alert, or active shooter training drill and there are fire fighters that are following in behind them. So, these are the types of cooperative training, the real -world training that they do need to practice with some regularity. MS. KAGIWADA: Chief, did you want to add to that? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Sure. So, the Honolulu Police Department does have their training academy campus, which is kind of separate and distinct from the rest of their patrol operations. Even here in Hilo we have one, of course, training —our training is done here at the Hilo Station. So, I guess the idea to establish a training facility that's separate, first of all, the Police Department is kind of bursting at its seams to begin with in the footprint we have. And as we fill positions and we think about growing, that kind of further exacerbates our space issues in the first place. But to have a vocation or a facility that, if we can find funding for to get built somewhere off campus, especially if we can collocate with Fire and envision it from the beginning to be something that works for Hawaii County, I think is a huge deal. One of the questions I get every other month, and it's only the months that we're in Kona, from the Police Commissioners is, when are we going to have a police recruit class in Kona? So, adding that aspect of travelling from certain areas of the island to the Hilo station and back every day on top of our, it could be an eight -to -ten-hour training day, it involves a lot of physically demanding training, can be very impactful. That's one of the probably challenges of being an entry level police officer. MR. BENNER: And Council Member, I would also just add that we added a word in here that we don't use lightly, which is "consider." We try not to ever use the word "consider" when we make a recommendation because recommendations are supposed to be reasonable, achievable, time bound. So, we recognize that adding this collaboration, major CIP (Capital Improvement Program) potential, that is not something that we can hold a department Page 8 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 accountable to. So, we add this in the hopes that they consider it as part of their long-term strategic planning, and it's not an expectation upon follow-up that we would have any measure upon which that, you know, how much progress have you made towards the CIP? We wouldn't propose that. It's the two recommendations above it that we think are more reasonable and achievable in. terms of making progress. MS. KAGIWADA: Thank you for that clarification, and thank you, Chief, for adding that information. When you were talking, did I hear you say that you're thinking you need two training facilities, one on the Kona side and one on the Hilo side? Is that what you were saying? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: No, the last thought I was going to add is if we can envision one location somewhere that has the ability for people to stay there, right, and we can include some sort of barracks as an optional accommodation for new employees. I think that would go a long way towards allowing us to recruit and retain people from the very beginning. MS. KAGIWADA: Okay. Thank you so much for that information. I guess just my last question would be, and maybe this is to Mr. Benner if you've done some research on this. A training facility like this with barracks for multiple agencies; Fire, Police, stuff like that. For a population of 200,000, is that —like for every 200,000 people would have something like this, or is it because we're an island state where it's hard to get to the other islands that we couldn't necessarily do a shared training facility? I guess that's where I'm going with this. Is it possible to do some shared training facilities, or do we need one just for our island, in your opinion? MR. BENNER: Well, I haven't done the study on the ratio that would necessitate when it needed to be stood up, but what I would say, as I mentioned, I have it back where I'm from. In that case, it's not just a devote training facility, it's an actual in -use fire station on one side and then across the way is in in -use police station across the way, and in between the two is a training facility where they can go out in the back yard, and they can conduct joint training between the two of them. But these are on sight, actively used, used in the course and discharge of their normal daily duties. So, they don't have to look like the army base up on the mountain. MS. KAGIWADA: Okay, thank you. So yeah, looking at wish lists and best practices is always good, but also knowing what we could do or what kind of improvements we can make without, if we don't have the funding, to do the full wish list, that's also good. So, thank you both, appreciate you, and I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Kagiwada. Anyone else in Hilo? Mr. Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. Page 9 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Thank you, Chair, welcome back. Mr. Benner and Chief Moszkowicz, mahalo for you time today. Good questions so far. Thank you for this audit, I think this is very enlightening. Follow-up questions from myself; Mr. Benner's report analyzed the beats that we have across the island, and I really did find this interesting. Given our highest call volumes, priority one and response time numbers and stats, really did point to a need in Puna. Top five highest call volumes by beat, Paradise Park, `Ainaloa, Hawaiian Beaches, Kea`au, Kurtistown, ranking one, two, and number four, respectively. Top five beats highest priority one calls, Paradise Park, `Ainaloa; and response time, Eden Rock and Fern Acres and lower Puna, coming in as one, three, and four. The reason I am calling out those is in the analysis section, our finding, one, "Reassign staff in smaller low -demand beats that might be over-resourced to high -demand beats that might be under-resourced" really does, I think, form a beautiful ability for us to start looking at how we can better serve our areas, even though we are severely under staffed right now, where we have a great need in community. I think the beauty of this report is that you have actually, through data, shown where the needs are based on calls and levels of service; also, a way for us to address it. So, comments on that section from the Chief or Mr. Benner, or both. MR. BENNER: For my part, I would just say that it's more extensive than the table we've added here. We added the top five contributors in each one of those categories, but if any of the other Council Members or the public for that matter, are interested in how their district looks, we do have a dashboard that breaks down every beat as well as the zip codes for this information. So, you can see how it affects your areas specifically. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Thank you, Mr. Benner. To the Chief? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: So, just one thing I would add. So, the district of South Hilo is, by far, the busiest district, but that district is also divided into 29 beats. So, the district of Puna is our second busiest district and it's divided into nine beats. So, we would expect that with the second highest and almost similar call volume in South Hilo, that, divided into nine beats as opposed to 29 beats, each of those beats would have a lot more calls for service. Now, with that and with the fact that Puna continues to grow at such a high rate, that's the first district that, as we start to push out these groups of officers who are ready for their first beat assignment, that's the areas that we're going to push those officers into so that we can get a good look at once we add, in 12 to 15 months, once we've added those 10 additional officers to Puna and Puna is 100 percent staffed according to the positions we have, then we take a look at if we're able to impact that at all; if we're able to split any of those beats into sub Page 10 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 beats and rename them, but that impacts those calls for service and if it impacts the response times. And if it's not, it impacted effectively or efficiently enough then that's when we come to you folks next year at this time and ask for additional Police Officer 11 level positions to further impact those areas by dividing beats and adding resources into those areas. MR. KANEALI'l-KLEINFELDER: Okay, thank you. Following up on that last comment, the response time, the highest priority one calls and response time really did point to Eden Roe and Fern Acres and Ocean View, numbers one, two, and three. This is part of beats and thank you for that information on beats, I actually, didn't know that. But those three beats, having the longest response time, and to no disrespect to our officers, just this is a giant geographical area. I think the infrastructure that we currently have reinforces the lengthy response times to these calls because they have to go to and from the calls from the station that is miles and miles apart. Is that correct? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: That's correct. So, at the beginning of the shift, we assign each officer who is working to a specific beat and it's very, very unlikely that we would ever have a situation where each officer was on their own beat in the first place. Because what happens is, when an event happens in one part of the district, then the resources from that beat go there first. But as with most crimes, if it's a cold property crime, then probably one officer's going to handle that investigation by themselves. But if it's a violent crime and it involves some sort of an arrest, it involves some sort of complicated investigation, then what happens is the officers from the surrounding beats also go to that case to help. So, when we see two officers at a case, that's two beats' worth of officers that are at that case. As that starts to happen and it happens very dynamically throughout the shift, the officers end up in different parts of the district than where they're supposed to originally be assigned to that particular beat. So, the areas that have the highest priority one call times, if you look at them geographically, are on the outskirts of the areas where we can get from one end of the district to the other. So, to me, that's what that data says. If you look at Eden Roe and Fern Acres, those are on outskirt areas geographically of how officers would transit through Puna, and that makes sense why those call times are longer now. There's also a delicate kind of balancing act that we have to do as we look at staffing and increasing staffing and reducing response times, and that is how do we adjust call volume? We can't adjust call volume, sorry, but we can adjust how the officers are deployed. So, if we were to, for example, say, "Hey look, in the overnight hours are lower calls for service so maybe we should take some of those officers off of that shift and put them in this other shift over here where the call volume is a little bit higher." The danger of that is that can have a very real impact to officers' safety. So, have to have officers that are working, enough Page 11. CRCOC-26 April '16, 2024 officers that are working that if something significant happens or the officers need help that they're going to be able to get the help they need to handle whatever situation arises. So, to me, really the end of this conversation is what does it look like when it's full and then what more do we need to impact response times and calls for service in these geographical areas to the point where it's acceptable to the people living in the community? MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Completely agree with you. I've been pushing for a few years now for more of a central station for Fire and Police in Kea`au, and I will not stop saying that until it's built. But numbers like this, the response times, an officer needs, calls for service, really do highlight why it's so important in the Kea`au area. Also noting, too, your highest calls are on Fridays, we were talking about your response times. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: It doesn't surprise me. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Something else I wanted to touch on, it was brought up. We are in the middle of our budget discussions, and looking over trends, one of the trends that was pointed out was the miscellaneous wages and then kind of looking at the way we fund the department as a whole, overtime. But just showing that this incredible usage of miscellaneous wages, budget versus actual, year over year has been really high. How are you addressing that in the current budget? MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Sorry, can you point me to a specific page? MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: This is on page 26 of the audit. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: Okay. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Miscellaneous wages. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: So, what happens is we have a bunch of vacant positions, right, and mostly the vacant positions are assigned to patrol districts at police officer level. These are areas of our operation that we can't understaff to the extent that our staffing would permit. So, for example, because we have a lot of vacancies, the result is that we need to bring people in on overtime to fill the vacancies. We can't, for example, not have seven or eight officers working at one time in Puna. We can't, because somebody calls in sick or somebody else is on vacation, we can't drop to four or three or two. So, we have minimum staffing numbers assigned to each district. So, because we're not fully staffed, once those things happen, people are sick, they're on vacation, they're on military leave, they get injured, we have to pull that staffing from somewhere, and that pulling that staffing from somewhere results in overtime expenses. Page 12 April 16, 2024 Now, is it cheaper to hire a person on regular time to do the job than it is on overtime? Sure, it's 50 percent more expensive to hire somebody on overtime basis, but I'm out of bodies. So, as we —and I've had this conversation being a new department head with the County last year, with County Finance. The way our budget is structured is to provide base pay salary and wages, base pay for all of these vacant positions. But what ends up happening is we end up converting that base pay salary and wages into miscellaneous wages because I don't have the officer from the vacant position to come in and work, so I have to hire a person on overtime. So, my salary and wages number should be much lower than the budget because what I'm actually doing is using that vacant position money, that salary and wages money, to pay someone time and a half, which is more expensive. Hence the need for the investment to completely fill the department and then take a look at how that impacts our ability to remain operational. What I would expect will happen is as we get closer to 480 people on the road in 12 to 15 months, that disparity starts to go away. We're spending less on overtime and we're spending less on miscellaneous wages because the resource that we're currently paying someone overtime miscellaneous wages to do, is covered by an actual person who's new who can do that same work on their regular salary time. Does that make sense or am I being too confusing? MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: No, you made perfect sense and that was actually the most, I think a very appropriate answer. Thank you very much, that was very well done, Chief. Thank you. MR. BENNER: Council Member, I'll just add to that, if you look at that overtime table in fiscal year 2018/2019, you see that the budget there was $3 million, actual expenditures was $5.2 (million). Then during COVID (Coronavirus Disease), 2019/2020, it was budgeted down to $688 (thousand) but you see that the actual was $5.2 (million). So, they have a baseline that you can see from this expenditure here that's going to be drawn somewhere between what SHOPO (State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers) requires they do and just maintaining operations. So, that doesn't change whether or not the calls are there, it's really going to be there to just maintain the ability to serve the community on that. So, we need to figure out where —this is why our recommendation isn't that their overtime budget be reduced per se, it's that they integrate daily driven budgeting process to align the fixed and variable cost with the operations accurately because we know that they have a baseline that they'll need to maintain. But if they're going to make changes to incorporate say additional training or make changes in operations that might include cost drivers there in order to accurately anticipate how that will affect their operations, we need to figure out what that baseline is and first get an alignment. Page 13 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 MR. KANEALI'l-KLEINFELDER: Yeah, I completely understand that. I think for the Chief, it's hard, it's a moving target and he's trying to get more officers into positions so he can lessen the overtime. He can't see it until he sees it. Yeah, Mr. Benner, if you can help him achieve that through this audit lens, that would be beautiful, that would be real helpful for the County as a whole. Lastly, my last point is on the beat analysis conclusion, I wanted to highlight this sentence. "Despite these challenges," —everything that we've touched on, you know, calls, response times, everything, "Despite these challenges, clearance rate percentages are competitive with or outperforming national averages for the period review." That speaks directly to the ability of our officers across our island in dealing with everything that they do and maintaining more than par, even above national average responses to all the crimes happening in our community, in giant, geographical areas without appropriate staffing levels. I cannot highlight that sentence enough. It's one small sentence in the middle of this entire document, but it really did highlight how much our folks in the Police Department do. So, thank you. Mr. Benner, well done. Chief, you've got some work to do on getting some recruits in. Make sure they're good people and really appreciate what you're doing to date. Thank you, Chair, I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Mr. Kdneali'l-Klelnfelder. Ms. Evans. Juykylkyffag�r"� CHR. VILLEGAS: Do you have one more question? MS. EVANS: Yes, I have one more question. I talked to you earlier about this about the consistency of staying in touch with the department over this next year because you have all of these recommendations. You said you have now a tracker report that you created. I just wanted a few comments on that, that's what I was 16141#10111.1 MR. BENNER: Thank you for that question. Yes, on our departure website, we maintain a remediation tracker that's been updated to reflect the recommendations that were made to HPD. If HPD wants debriefing of details that underlie the report, we're happy to come in and work with them at any point in time. If they stand up an individual item in pursuit of all the recommendations and they are able to stand up something relatively quickly, we're happy to come in and verify any of those items on a one-to-one basis. So, we're an open book. These folks have been very good about communicating with us, we'll be good about communicating with them and happy to move the needle. Page 14 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 MS. EVANS: So, the tracking report is so the public can see how these recommendations are revolving over time, but does that mean that you have to meet with the Chief on a quarterly basis? MR. BENNER: The recommendation there is the initial recommendation that we made. We stand that up against the department response and what they said they would do. Then when we come back in to do the follow up, we will mark that from, right now, it's pending and then that will move to either implemented, fully implemented, resolved, not applicable, or not implemented. MS. EVANS: And how often will you do your follow up? MR. BENNER: The follow up audit happens after two years. So, we give them two complete budget cycles to move through. MS. EVANS: Okay. Alright, good to know. Thank you. I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Evans. With that, I think we've come to the end. I just want to personally —Mr. Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: I have one more comment, Chair, if I could. CHR. VILLEGAS: Okay, one more. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Thank you. The mental health piece was beautiful. There was an item in there that caught my attention, offering some of our officers the ability to do a one -hour yoga session. I do think a lot about what they eat. You have a lot of small businesses in Hilo that could provide food, finding some good, healthy food options for our officers to utilize versus just getting a quick bite at 7-11, and what would benefit your local businesses as well as provide good food to your officers on shift they'd be more than willing to start that collaboration. If you need help with that, please let me know. MR. MOSZKOWICZ: I will, thank you. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Thank you. CHR. VILLEGAS: Alright, thank you, Council Member Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. Just quickly to wrap up here, thank you for the thoroughness of this audit. Thank you, Chief, for having the courage and being as flexible and vulnerable as you've been in stepping into this new role and then asking for an audit. I see immense wisdom in that for you having this third party set of eyes and ears and perspectives from Mr. Benner and his incredibly capable staff. Page 15 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 I share that gratitude with Council Member Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder for the recognition of the mental health and the longevity that we're looking for from these public servants and our first responders, and that taking care of them as wholistic humans really allows for that resilience and longevity. I think it also — it's been a rough decade for Police Departments and so, I see in this report, a lot of the reflection of the humanity that's there and that in order to connect with our communities we have to support helping them to stay healthy and strong and validated and supported. That is pivotal for any one of us in our lives, let alone those that are on the front lines dealing with some of the most traumatic, devastating, heart wrenching experiences that it's easy for people to be like, "Oh, just call the police, they'll fix it." That's not fair. That's not fair to put on them per se. So, I'm really grateful to see this level of support, and thank you, again, for your leadership and humility to bring this forward, and I am excited to hear that we have these three police academies or classes going through. Community policing in District 7 are a bunch of super heroes and super sheroes, and I am wildly grateful for the work that they do. Also, shout out to our Vice and the incredibly significant impact that they're making on issues of fentanyl. So, we just really, overall, I see incredible, continued improvement in this department, and thank you for your leadership. So, with that, all those in favor of closing file on Communication 795, please say "aye." Vote on Comm. 795: The motion to close file on Comm. 795 was carried by Filed the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Evans, Galimba, Kagiwada, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, Kimball, and Chair Villegas — 6. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Inaba, Kierkiewicz, and Lee Loy - 3. Excused: None. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you so much, Mr. Benner. MR. BENNER: Thank you, Council. CHR. VILLEGAS: With that, we can move on to our next communication. Comm. 811: REQUESTS A "STATE OF THE UNIVERSITY ADDRESS" BY BONNIE IRWIN CHANCELLOR OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI`I AT HILO From Council Member Susan L. K. Lee Loy, dated March 28, 2024. Page 16 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 (Note: Comm. 811.1, from Council Member Susan L. K. Lee Loy dated April 12, 2024 transmitting a PowerPoint presentation for Comm. 811, was circulated.) Motion to Close File: Ms. Kagiwada moved to close file on Comm. 811. Seconded by Ms. Evans. (Note: Comm. 811.1, from Council Member Susan L. K. Lee Loy dated April 12, 2024, transmitting a PowerPoint presentation, was circulated.) CHR. VILLEGAS: With that, we'll go ahead and turn it over. Please go ahead and introduce yourself for the record, and the floor is yours. (Note: At this time, University of Hawaii at Hilo Chancellor Bonnie Irwin came forward and provided a PowerPoint presentation to the members of the Committee. For viewing of the subject presentation, see the DVD copy of the meeting proceedings on file in the Clerk's Office. A copy of the PowerPoint presentation is made a part of the record, see Comm. 811.1.) CHR. VILLEGAS: You did an amazing job. Thank you so much for being so thorough and concise at the same time. Yes. With that, I'll just open it up to any questions from my colleagues. Council Member Evans. MS. EVANS: Yes, it was a wonderful presentation. I have a lot of questions, but I know that I won't ask that many because you and I can meet and continue talking. MS. IRWIN: I was going to say with me today is Amy Kalili, who is our interim Director of University Relations and I'm happy to meet with anybody one-on-one or in small groups. MS. EVANS: Yeah, I would love to keep the discussion, because the discussion, I'd like to take it a little bit away from kind of the overview of what's happening at UH (University of Hawaii) Hilo, more into what can the County, the County Council, Workforce Development Council, the different chambers, the rotary, I mean there are a lot of capacity, I think on this island to support your initiatives and what you do. So, that's my lenses. The County could maybe hire your students or do grant writing with you. We need trained people that we can hire. You know, our Human Resources (HR) people have told us that they can't find people to hire. Well, maybe we should grow our own. So, then the next question I would have for you is can we do some type of, I don't know what you call it, internship career pathway with you and your faculty that really ties into what the Hawaii County government needs? So, I'm just thinking there might be a lot of opportunities there and I'll justdo you want to make a comment? Page 17 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 MS. IRWIN: I'll mention a couple of things. I inadvertently glossed over another piece of the workforce story. So, we have had County HR on our campus. So, they had a meeting with us about a year ago, maybe a little bit more than a year ago. Then when we do our career day, the County had like five tables. We really went into it. You mentioned the chambers also. So, one of the things that we're exploring right now that's kind of the latest trend in higher education, but I think it's also really important, is micro credentials. The community colleges are doing quite a few of them, but UH Hilo I think can add some too. What a micro credential is, is like a two credit to 10 credit something. They can help someone advance in their workplace. So we're currently serving our faculty, kind of get some ideas of our capacity on campus. Then I was talking to the education committee of the Japanese Chamber, we belong to all the chambers on island, and so what we then want to do is by the mechanism of the chambers and from the County, is survey employers and say here are things that we can provide, what are things that you need? Then I go back to the faculty and see how we can do that. Yes, we are definitely expanding internship possibilities, too, because the internship is what really makes the difference. If you look across this island, particularly in natural resource jobs, agencies, so many of our local employees came through UH Hilo and had internships with DLNR (Department of Land and Natural Resources), with USGS (United States Geological Survey), right? That's been a hallmark of ours, but I think we can set those things up with other people on campus. We've been involved in the healthcare convenings across the island as well. So, kind of going sector by sector for having these conversations, but we're definitely interested in and open to working with County. And we're all a little disappointed when we didn't get the Build Back Better Ag grant that the County was leading. But just sitting in that room with ag people from our campus, from Hawaii Community College, Doug Adams was in there, a number of people from CTAHR (College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources) also from Manoa and really working together on something, helped us form some partnerships that we're now trying to build on. MS. EVANS: Okay. Thank you, I'm looking forward to continuing the discussion. One more question has to do with student housing. MS. IRWIN: Yes. MS. EVANS: So, recently, I was in a discussion with some local builders in Hilo and there really is a need for student housing. When you want to bring people from, let's say Hawi or Kapa`au because the distance is so great for them to drive to and from Hilo, having student housing, even for our youth that are here on Page 18 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 island, can make a huge difference. So, can you just say what we're going to do about student housing? MS. IRWIN: So, we're running, right now in our dorms, you know traditional style housing and campus apartments, at about, I think 85 percent occupancy. So, we still have room in campus housing. We also are going to be issuing an RFP (Request for Proposal). We have just on the mauka side of the main campus, Hale Kawili, which is an apartment, and we're looking for a new manager. One of the things we're putting in that RFP is the possibility of expanding that because we find that depending on the student, some like the traditional dorm style living, others really want independence; having their own kitchen. But currently, we have capacity, but we also want to give students the best array of options that we can. We also have students living adjacent to campus in some of the apartment buildings that are fairly close in, so we have housing. As a matter of fact, we also accommodate, as needed, students at Hawaii CC (Community College) who want to live on —they live on the Hilo campus also, in residence halls. It's not many, it's like 15 a year maybe, but we offer that to them to be part of our community. MS. EVANS: Thank you. Thank you very much. I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you very much, Council Member Evans. At this point, in Hilo, anyone? Council Member Kagiwada. MS. KAGIWADA: Thanks, just real quick. Thank you so much for being here, Chancellor, and sharing this information with us. I know that we're long overdue to set up our meeting, so I'll reach out and we should do that soon, okay? I don't have anything else right now. Thank you for this presentation. I yield. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Kimball. MS. KIMBALL: Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Chancellor, really appreciate you being here and providing this presentation. I have got to run out of here for a meeting real quickly but wanted to just ask one question about the percentage of students receiving financial aid that attend UH, challenges with the new rollout of the new FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) process. And just tied to that is just recently, just last week we had a discussion where you were looking at enrollment rates in universities and two of the interventions that came up that I think might be really interesting for us is one, dedicated help with FAFSA and getting that paperwork in. Then the second intervention was just sending all eligible high school students in the area an acceptance letter, because one of the things that this study found that we were looking at was that a number of students don't know that they qualify. Page 19 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 By just sending them an acceptance letter, this was tested in Arizona, there was a significant increase in enrollment. So, just wanted to share that with you, but if you could briefly, just talk about the financial aid aspect with respect to your student distribution. MS. IRWIN: Absolutely. First of all, regarding the kind of automatic admission, UH actually started doing this a couple of years ago. So now, in the fall, every high school senior in this state that qualifies, they get, I think one of three letters. They either get you're qualified for any campus, or you qualify for west Oahu or Hilo or the Community Colleges or just the Community Colleges. So, based on their junior GPA (Grade Point Average), they get a letter that's essentially encouraging them to apply and saying that we will admit you. So, that's one. FAFSA, yes. I mean it's the debacle, right, it's been awful. Everything's been delayed, but the gate is open now. Our campus has been doing FAFSA workshops. When our admission's staff have been going out on the road visiting high schools, they're bringing financial aid counselors with them. They help them do some of these things on site. The Hawaii P-20 has been doing FAFSA workshops. The other thing that happens, FAFSA has to —the federal government had to release the files and then we had to build out something in our system to bring the files into our records. I am very proud of our small but mighty financial aid staff who processed nearly 3,000 applications on the first day. Now, it doesn't mean that all the award letters have gone out. The award letters should be going out by the end of this month, which is probably a month later than we would like. But the word we've been giving to particularly local students is it's not too late. There's aid available. We will help you with the paperwork. Please apply because we are all concerned that the very students who are at risk are those low- income, first -generation students who are already struggling, and we want to make sure that they have every opportunity. So, we're pushing out all that as best we can. MS. KIMBALL: Great, thanks for that, Chancellor. That's wonderful that you've been doing that automatic admission, I wasn't aware of that. So, that's fantastic. I will just close by saying I'm a proud graduate of the TCBES (Tropical Conservation Biology and Environmental Science) program there at UH Hilo; wonderful program, great courses, and of course great faculty. So, thank you for all you do for the university and by that, to our community, mahalo. I yield, Chair. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Kimball. Anyone else in Hilo? MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Yes, please. Page 20 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 CHR. VILLEGAS: Okay, Mr. Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Yeah, thank you for the presentation today, very educational. Quick question for you, what is the average price for tuition for a semester of schooling at UH Hilo? MS. IRWIN: I should have this number memorized. I think —this is embarrassing, I should have this at my fingertips, and I don't. Total cost of attendance, which includes housing, is about $25 (thousand) I believe. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Per semester? MS. IRWIN: No, for a year. I'm sorry, I rarely look at for a semester. So, I think tuition isI'm sorry, I just don't have it at my fingertips. I'd rather send it to you later than give you something wrong. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Okay. MS. IRWIN: Thank you, Amy. Okay, so 12 credit hours per semester is full time and so, tuition per semester is just over $7,000 and then another 500 (dollars) in fees. So, total cost of attendance for an academic year is, yeah, I was pretty close. Living in the dorms is $25,000, but that's for the entire year. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Okay, so an entire year of schooling for a student in here, 25,000 (dollars)? MS. IRWIN: If they live on campus. If they're living with their parents, it's less, but then we kick up transportation costs because they're commuting in. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Okay, and that's with tuition fees, right? MS. IRWIN: Yes. So, that's total cost. So, if you take out the housing piece and just look at tuition and fees, we're looking at about $8,000 a year, and then books and supplies, we estimate another about $1,200. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Okay. I just had a discussion with someone who is from Canada, and they were discussing going to the colleges there. I was going back and forth and my son just went to college and the cost and they asked me what it cost. I said roughly $20,000 a year to go to college. They came back and they were like, "So, for the four years?" I was like, "No, no, no, it's per year." They looked at me and they were like, "So, you're saying it's $20,000 per year?" I was like, "Yes." They were like, "Wow, we pay $20,000 for our entire education." It was just such an eye opener for me because the cost of education, when it gets prohibitive, we see less students enrolling, and we don't get the education that we're looking for in our youth so we can become better adults. Page 21 April 16, 2024 But, if we're not subsidizing at a federal level or a national level, then the kids don't have access to schooling like they do in other countries, and we start to fall behind. So, it really caught me off guard. MS. IRWIN: Yeah, we have the vast majority of our students do qualify for some kind of financial aid and so, we work with them. As I said, the student crisis fund that we have, that's for students who all of a sudden, their car breaks down, and that wasn't in their financial aid package. It didn't anticipate it, so we have a fund that supports those kinds of things as well. UH has not raised tuition in years. So, we are —it's expensive compared to what you hear from other places, but we are still one of the bargains in the U.S. (United States), for whatever that's worth. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: That's worth something. I did go to UH. I went to HCC; I appreciate the education that I received from the two colleges. I did not get my bachelor's degree; I was working towards it before I had kids and I had to go and get a job and do all that kind of stuff, but MS. IRWIN: There's still time. It's never too late. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: It's true. But no, I really do appreciate the presentation. What are your thoughts on the trades? MS. IRWIN: Well, the trades are mostly the purview of Hawaii CC, and the way I see our role in that is I've been watching the students graduate from the trades at Hawaii CC. I was particularly impressed with the new automotive program they have here on the west side where students do part of it in high school and then they only have a year of college. I think the role for UH Hilo, let's say somebody goes through the automotive training. They're earning a good living, everything's great, and they're working in a garage somewhere and the owner of that garage decides to retire or the student or graduate has the opportunity to maybe run the business, then they need some more training in accounting, personnel management, and the business side of this trade. So, I think UH Hilo can be coming in. This is where those micro credentials could be really useful; giving people those opportunities later on in their careers. One of the things we say about a university degree is it's not really training you for your first job, it's training you for your career. Because we find as people move on in their businesses or in their workplace, they sometimes are looking for additional education. But we absolutely need the trades. I've been talking to Chancellor Kazama because my plumber came up to the house and said, "We really need the Community College to do more with plumbing because we have a shortage of plumbers." So, we need them just as much as we need everybody else that we're educating. Page 22 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 So, I think this is where, getting back to Council Member Evans' point where we all kind of look together and where University of Hawaii at Hilo and Hawaii Community College, the combination, how are we best serving? Where are the gaps? What do we still need to provide to make sure that we have an educated workforce of good citizens? MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: I agree. You talked about a, interestingly enough, you talked about what your market was, and I kind of took that as —you know, my wife and I own a small business. When I hear the word "markets," who is your audience, who are your buyers? In that light, the students are your buyers of your services. MS. IRWIN: Yes. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: To you to hear you use the word, "market" was interesting. But yes, as we evolve kind of post pandemic, interesting to see your online usership of programs move towards the trades for some of our kids. Then I'm very interested to see the result of post pandemic education in the K through 12 arena and how that's going to affect the college arena on the back end. MS. IRWIN: Yeah, we're seeing some of those effects. UH Hilo right now, I'd say about 65 percent of our courses have some face-to-face component. We still have more online than we did before the pandemic, but we also have some programs that are predominantly online, one of which is the Administration of Justice program. So, we educate students across the state in Administration of Justice because we can do it online. Our Counseling and Psychology program is predominantly online with two or three visits to the campus over the two years, so we have a mixture and we are kind of studying what works best for which programs and which populations. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: I like that. A lot of folks here that I know who work two or three jobs and are trying to fulfill the rest of their education, you know, someone like me. They're having to balance that with a full schedule of kids, family, work, and if they're not able to do it in person, then the online schooling becomes an amazing opportunity. That also applies to a lot of the folks I know in the trades who work all day but can't get that journeyman license until they complete two years of schooling because there's a recent state law change; not recent, about five or 10 years ago. But that does have an impact on our workers and them stepping up in their careers too. So, I like the online options, those are very helpful. Thank you very much, Chancellor, I appreciate your time. MS. IRWIN: You're welcome. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: I yield, Chair. Page 23 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Mr. Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. Council Member Galimba. MS. GALIMBA: Thank you. Just wanted to thank you for coming here and giving this presentation. I am the Council Member from Ka`u, so, probably buried in the Kea`au, Pdhoa, Ka`u, is probably even worse numbers because of everything but also distance. So, maybe can get together later and see maybe if we can think of some things to help with that. And I just wanted to let you know that you have a big fan in my mother. She like cuts out your columns and gives them to me and my daughter every so often. So, thanks for doing that outreach work, it's really great. MS. IRWIN: I have found that I have a big readership of, as I will say, people of a certain age who still read the newspaper and hard copy and I'm always meeting people who say, "I read your column." But yeah, I would love to talk more about what we can do, and I have been —not only was this long delayed of coming to you to speak, but also I'll admit, I've not been out to all of the high schools yet. I'd very much like to do that. I know two of the superintendents fairly well, but I have not met the one for the Puna district yet, and I need to do that. MS. GALIMBA: Great. We do have some really innovative things going on out there in the Ka`u High, so that would be great if we could meet up there maybe. MS. IRWIN: Yeah, the newish athletic director out there was our women's cross- country coach, so he's been telling me I need to come visit. So, we'll just make it happen. MS. GALIMBA: Awesome. Thank you so much again. MS. IRWIN: You're welcome. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Galimba. Council Member Evans. MS. EVANS: Thank you. I just had to throw in this comment about we're out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and we're part of the Pacific Island community. It kind of just seems that there's so many needs on these islands for wastewater treatment, for tropical agriculture, invasive species, tropical diseases, health diseases. I'm just hoping —my understanding is if you're a research university, which I'm not sure, but if you were tagged as a research university with innovation and research, I just see a lot of big opportunities given we're an island Page 24 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 culture and there's all these other islands that are struggling with this. So, yeah, wastewater and all that. I'm excited, I hope the Council can help you in any way. I'd like to see the numbers go the other direction and get the university back up to 5,000 students. Anyway, the best of luck and was a great presentation. Thank you. MS. IRWIN: Thank you so much. CHR. VILLEGAS: Thank you, Council Member Evans. With that, I'll bring it home really quickly. Thank you for being here today, Chancellor. Thank you for your servant leadership and the support that you provide your teams and staff. Being born and raised here myself and a Konawaena grad, back in the day, it was oh gosh, it was like you're just going to go UH Hilo. You know how it is when you're local and you're not going away, but I have watched that perception drastically change and the reputation of the UH Hilo campus and the incredible staff that you have there. I had the privilege of attending like a cultural and environmental circular economy course there not so long ago and you guys brought in a woman who was a kapa kumu from New Zealand. The two days we spent there with cultural practitioners and people from around the island and the state, and some from around the country, were so powerful and impactful. I just have to compliment you and your team in, it's like taking us forward but it has brought us back to providing the validation and the uplifting and the resurgence of the Hawaiian language and culture and arts and practices in every capacity. It's a game changer, not just for myself and my own reverence, but for our community as a whole and for the rootedness and groundedness of our young people as to where their place is in life and that you don't have to go away. You can get this education here and it is special and the knowledge and wisdom that's ingrained in this place and being perpetuated by your institution is priceless, and it's unique, and it's like nowhere else in the world. So, I just want to thank you personally and professionally for being a part of that transition and humbly admit it for myself, it's my own being a young, dumb teenager. I went to Manoa. I went way far away. That was really far back then, right, but I'm proud that my daughters have both graduated from the UH system and my cousin Just graduated from the Hilo system. So, I'm watching it transition how then our young people participate in our community and the relationships and how relevant it is to what's going on here with our issues and how they can contribute. So, thank you so much for being here today. I remember tuition was $700 a semester for a full load. MS. IRWIN: It's been a while. Page 25 CRCOC-26 April 16, 2024 CHR. VILLEGAS: It's been while, yeah. I graduated in `95 but they also had a program that if you got a 4.0, you got free tuition the next semester. MS. IRWIN: Well, we're looking at some of those as part of our students' success initiatives, those kinds of incentives, I guess. CHR. VILLEGAS: Yeah. MS. IRWIN: I think there's a number of things we can do to try to offset some of those costs. CHR. VILLEGAS: Yeah. I was grateful because I put myself through college as well and worked the whole time, but I didn't have to pay tuition my last two years of college. So, thank you for being here. It's been a long day and afternoon, so we're happy to let you guys go. Please drive safely. MS. IRWIN: Thank you for your patience. You've been here a lot longer than I have today. So, thank you very much, it's our pleasure. CHR. VILLEGAS: Okay, take care. Aloha. With that, can we take a vote on closing file on Communication 811? All those in favor? Vote on Comm. 811: The motion to close file on Comm. 811 was carried by Filed the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Evans, Galimba, Kagiwada, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, and Chair Villegas — 5. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Inaba, Kierkiewicz, Kimball, and Lee Loy — 4. Excused: None. Page 26 CRCOC-26 ADJOURN MENT: Approved: April 16, 2024 CHR. VILLEGAS: With that, we have nothing else on the agenda. CHR. VILLEGAS: We'll see you all back tomorrow. A hui hou (until we meet again). Ms."Rebecca Vifl(Fkas, Chair Communications, Reports, and Council Oversight Committee RV/jm (Date) Page 27