NOW YOU DON'T SEE IT, NOW YOU STILL DON'T SEE IT

NOW YOU DON'T SEE IT, NOW YOU STILL DON'T SEE IT: We realize that criticizing the council today may be one of those "no good deeds goes unpunished" type of things. After all, it only took a decade and half to get the paperwork for council agenda items posted on-line after the promise had been made to get it done "tout suite."


So today we have an excuse for our usual "but we digress" style.

Legendary local Kaua`i newspaper Editor Jean Holmes tells the story of how, when the paper's founder Charlie Fern hired her from the Howard County Times in Maryland, he assigned her to cover the Kaua`i County Council.

"When I walked in they practically had to put their pants on" she used to say of the colorful, equally legendary (albeit for different reasons) cast of council characters who had never seen a woman in the council chambers, much less a "lady reporter."

When we first attended a meeting in the pre-television days, not much had changed except that a different cast of characters were perturbed, this time at a haole hippie being in their midst.

Proceedings came to a screeching halt but after a bit of "who the heck are you and what are you here for?" then-County Clerk "Bunji" Shimomura (are we even close to the correct name and or spelling of either?) informed them, much to their astonishment, that indeed they had to allow members of the public- even this apparent wild man- to observe them in action.

But TV changed things. Dragged kicking and screaming into the 1990's, public access TV put council proceedings under the public microscope, albeit in fits and starts with officials finding ways to delay and indeed at times suspend cablecasts until almost 2000.

Around the same time, something called the "internet" was burgeoning and it took a mammoth effort to just get the weekly agendas posted at "kauai.com"- the domain purchased by then-Mayor Maryanne Kusaka, despite the fact that governments already had "dot gov" domains reserved exclusively for them.

By then, as a regular, we had gotten used to the cat and mouse game that interested members of the public, like the notorious "nitpickers"- and even reporters- were required to play, especially when it came to obtaining the aforementioned paperwork. The most annoying flaming hoop was the one called "how can you ask for it by name if you don't know it exists?". The OIP wasn't exactly accessible those days- even with a long distance call there was no "attorney of the day"- so we got pretty much got only what they wanted us to get.

But then suddenly, with the ascension of Ron Kouchi to Council Chair and Republican Kusaka in the mayor’s seat, revealing administration scandals- from, gem-gate to red-Chrysler-gate- became Kouchi's favorite game and the paperwork- especially the juicy stuff- began flowing on a more regular basis.

But there was a catch- although by the early 2000's the council's agendas began to be posted on-line the associated paperwork was available only at Council Services desk. Of course the game in those days was that agendas for the then-Thursday meetings came out as or after the doors to Council Services were locked for the weekend- with the required six days notice for meetings conveniently reduced to three beginning Monday at 9 a.m.

Than meant the already small window got smaller still and required a trip to Lihu`e to boot.

So, with the turn of the century began our quixotic century quest to get that paperwork posted on-line. But so too started the paternalistic reign of Chair Kaipo "it's not public information until I say it's public information... and the OIP can 'bite me'" Asing.

You get the idea. For ten years councilmembers promised posting of documents would begin post haste. Eventually though, not only Asing but even those self-same councilmembers- now having seen who was politically buttering their Portuguese Sweet Bread- were suddenly silent on the issue.

Without those documents by the way, the community would probably never know about the slew of sexual harassment cases which we only found out about because the suit was included- perhaps accidentally- in the "packet." Previous to that we had to be handed papers cloak and dagger style by anonymous sources- one time literally under a toilet stall.

Of course the main problem now is that although the paperwork is available- not at the council's page of the county web site but through "Granicus," a huge mainland company that is contracted to produce and "webcast" the meetings- it is not available in a "text" format but as a "scanned" file.


That means that someone trying to use any of the paperwork to testify- or for any reason like informing others- cannot simply "lift" the text from the file but must re-type it.

It is also probably a violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) because the "voice recognition" software used by the visually-challenged will not work with a "picture" of the piece of paper- which is what is essentially what is being used by the county, which apparently supplies Granicus with the files.

Of course some of the paperwork either wasn't created in text or doesn't lend itself to text such as maps or graphs or the like. But there is what is called "Optical Recognition" software which is widely used these days to convert a scanned picture of the words into a "text file." Although errors may be contained in the conversion, going back and comparing it with the original is certainly preferable having to "key in" a 5,000 word document or even a 100-word quote.

Of course we complain because we do this all the time- take documents and post them in text. We have a friend (yes- we do have a few despite being a recovering asshole-a-holic) who has been very generous with his/her time in doing conversions for us. But the county could do this once, for everybody... after all they say they've had to create a new full-time position just to post the already available paperwork.

Scanning and posting around 25- 50 pages apparently takes 40 hours a week. Guess they had to look for an available slug because there wasn't a competent tortoise or snail on the civil service list (sorry- nothing personal, just personnel).

We just discovered the availability of the files today so we don't know yet when the documents will be posted each week (why do we suspect they won't be available when the agenda is ready- usually on Thursdays- but rather as late as they can get away with?.. maybe because we've been dealing with these guys for almost 30 years).

We're not sure who is responsible for the postings- given that "new" Council Chair Jay Furfaro has been on the job for 15 months now without change and brand new County Clerk Ricky Watenabe has been on the job for only about a month or so, we suspect that it is Ricky's doing... especially since Rick has been one of the only senior staffers in council services who has not just made himself available but actually never lied through his teeth to us or evaded our questions and/or requests, lo these decades.

Anyway there's still some stuff missing like committee reports, some communications, legal documents (a real biggie as to digging out news) and even a resolution and a bill for second reading (meaning "ready for final passage") as well as of course whatever is available for executive sessions- another document treasure trove which, many times, is where court filings of lawsuits may be available since they are public records.

So yes- it is a "what have you done for me lately" type of thing. Maybe we should make like the local newspaper... sit down, shut up and say "thanks for the crumbs massah"

All we can say is "put your pants on ladies and gentlemen of the council, there are woman and kids- and wildly rabid reporters- watching.

FERC YOU

FERC YOU: Anyone surprised at the FERC KIUC debacle wave your electricity bill in the air.

Okay- you can go back to sleep now. Because unless you were under the proverbial rock for the past decade you must have been fast asleep to be shocked at anything "this co-op" does.

Since day one when barnacle-on-the-butt-of-Kaua`i Gregg Gardiner convinced a group of good old boys and girls and Democratic Party bosses to pay way too much for the liability that was Citizen’s Electric- and stick the resultant debt on the backs of the island working people- the hew and cry of warnings has been a loud if ineffective undercurrent of stomach churning rage from rate payers.

"We're all for a co-op- just not THIS co-op" was the slogan of the original "nitpickers" whose moniker was proudly taken from former Mayor Marianne Kusaka's attempt to denigrate the effort that saved members $50 million and should have brought the price down by another hundred million.

But the makeup of the board was a who's who of the then, two factions of the Democratic Party- the old guard represented by aging, "442nd" party boss Turk Tokita vs the new guard of then-former Mayor and then-out-of-politics progressive JoAnn Yukimura.

And when the bylaws and rules were forced down the throats of members in an all-or-nothing vote- removing the promised precepts of the Sunshine law and giving all power to the board- the course was set for today's dictatorial decision-making by a handful of the power elite.

With today's news from Pacific Business News (via the local newspaper) that William Tam, deputy director for water at DLNR said that "the state does not want Hawai‘i's (sic) in-stream flow standards to be decided by a federal agency in Washington D.C. that does not have any experience with or understand Hawai‘i’s streams" and the announcement of an effort from anti-FREC forces leader Adam Asquith to get signatures to a full page ad fully explaining all that's insanely stupid about going through the feds, the tide seems to be turning- that despite the "that's my story and I'm stickin' to it" stance of the stumble-bums on the KIUC board.

And that includes the original three opponents- Carol Bain, Ben Sullivan and Jan TenBruggencate who were elected to be the voice of reason but who now, reportedly, have switched sides.

What the board seems to have forgotten are the lessons of another recent debacle- the ill-conceived and supremely bungled Superferry and the resultant battle.

The reason why, shockingly, the people of Kaua`i seemed to oppose the big bad boat was not the boat itself but for the way it usurped the processes that, although usually ineffective, are at least supposedly there to protect us from deregulatory invasion from Washington D.C. and Honolulu.

Just as the feds and state conspired to remove the environmental assessment and impact statement process for the Superferry, once again a bunch of power mongers have decided to allow a federal process to negate the unique water rights and management laws that have been carefully developed over decades in Hawai`i.

Then when challenged the powerful wielded their power to lie and deceive in such a blatant way that nobody failed to get the "sit down and shut up" message that General Linda Lingle and her unified command threw in the faces of those who usually, unless riled up by a lack of respect, act like sheeple.

And now though few understand the ins and outs of water usage, citizens feel the same kind of "like it or lump it" missive coming from elected officials who fail to get the message that their arrogance, not the project, is the becoming the issue.

Though it's too early to tell the rising tide of indignation over the attempted FERC KIUC sleight-of-hand indicates that the same kind of outrage that swept the island over the Superferry fiasco might just be at hand.

Because, as "this co-op" circles the wagons, the natives are getting restless.

LOOK OUT KID, THEY KEEP IT ALL HID

LOOK OUT KID, THEY KEEP IT ALL HID: During the decade or so we regularly attended council meetings there were generally three sets of attendees.

First were governmental apparatchiks who slept in the back, if possible under the air conditioner, until called on by the council.

Then there were the great unwashed- the clueless who wandered in because they heard something was up or they took a wrong turn at the elections office.

Finally there were the regulars- aka nitpickers- and the reporters who generally sat around acting like the unruly kids in the back or the classroom kibitzing, whispering, giggling, passing notes, chewing gum and generally making a mockery of the whole thing.

But they always had something that the others two groups lacked- a copy of the agenda.

The administration people didn’t really need one. They know what they’d been summoned for.

But for the great uninitiated novices sometime we’d grab a stack and walk amongst them calling “Program- getcha program heah. Can’t tell your bill without a program- program heah.”

The truth is that even with a “program” many were often left shaking their heads, unable to follow the meeting and find their issue before it whisked by, by which time it was too late and they were left asking “wha-wha-wha just happened?”

For those who try to follow the proceedings on TV it’s even worse. As “Esatiene” wrote today in the comment section of a totally unrelated article in the local newspaper:

Watching the HOIKE Channel a few days ago i was saddened to see our elected officals skim over financial "bills" and passing them as fast as possible w/ no mention how the money will be earmaked. Sewage and Wailua (county workers' private) Golf Course, was a combined $300,000 of taxpayors money. The county council looked like a table of thieves in a den distributing stolen loot (all sic).

And it’s no wonder. Rather than actually having to read many measures the council rules state:

RULE NO. 3-OFFICERS AND THEIR DUTIES

(c) County Clerk. It shall be the duty of the County Clerk or an authorized representative, in addition to those duties prescribed by law:

(1) To read bills, resolutions, and other matters to the Council, if so required (emphasis added);

And for bills and resolutions the rules say

RULE NO. 10-GENERAL PROVISIONS REGARDING BILLS, RESOLUTIONS, MOTIONS AND AMENDMENTS

(h) Full oral readings of bills and resolutions are hereby waived and may be by title and/or number only unless a full reading is requested by any of the members present (empasis added).

As Esatiene noted many bills go through their four required appearances- going through the first reading, the public hearing, the committee meeting and the final reading- and are passed with nary a word other than the perfunctory reading by the clerk of the minimalist information already on the agenda.

Many times those notices seem to be intentionally sketchy so as not to peak anyone’s interest.

And it’s worse for “communications” especially those that don’t require approval. They aren’t even read but rather listed, by communication number, and “received” for the record, never to be heard- or heard from- again.

Not only aren’t they discussed, anyone watching the proceedings doesn’t even know they exist.

And while some are fairly innocuous, many contain vital information that is being communicated to the council- and presumably the public- including all sorts of administration reports, audits and other information.

It was only through people questioning the “reports” from the personnel department- ones listed for receipt by number only with a bunch of other communications- that the practice of downgrading budgeted positions so as to allow administration-favored applicants to get a skilled job (and to be taught “on the job”) came to light a couple of years ago... although it has seemingly died for lack of interest by the council since then.

It’s all too convenient for councilmembers who are seeking political cover to controversial subjects.

Even when the subject isn’t contentious it gives the impression that something is being hidden. Councilmembers who wonder why the public doesn’t trust them and is always calling them “secretive” and even “corrupt” need look no further that this practice to figure out at least one thing they can do about it.

As for bills and resolutions most of the times the actual “meat” of the bill or reason for the reso are short and sweet. But most of the time, unless a councilmember or a member of the public says something they fly on by under the radar unexplained and many times undebated.

So why do we mention it?

Because when the new council sub-committee recently designated to look at the council rules meets, one of the only things suggested so far is to hide things further.

Not only is there no plan to change the rules to require that they at least give a public explanation as to what each measure is about, they have proposed that those communication designated for “receipt” and even some routine “approvals” be moved to what is being called a “consense calendar” where, in one fell swoop, without even acknowledgment of each communication number as is now the practice, they will be dispatched at the beginning of the meeting.

For those attending the meetings now it’s hard enough if they want to speak on one of these “matters for receipt.”

They must listen carefully to the clerk mumble the number and jump up and frantically wave their hand so the chair sees them and then, to the dirty looks from councilmembers angry that they must endure three extra minutes at the meeting, sheepishly apologize for interrupting the “zoom agenda” with their testimony.

We’ll be looking at some other rules over the next few weeks as the sub-committee meetings get underway. But we can only hope that the review of the rules isn’t used as an excuse to pare down the public’s participation in the process- a matter that seems to get plenty of lip service but is thrown under the bus when the rubber meets the road.


---------

UPDATE/CORRECTION: In our January 6 post regarding President Obama’s Kailua vacation rental and a story in the on-line newspaper “Civil Beat” about how the agreement with the owner apparently violated the City and County of Honolulu’s ban on rentals for less than 30 days, we suggested that it might also violate the state ban on vacation rentals in the state conservation district.

While, as this map (pdf) of Kaua`i state districting shows, much of the coastal area on Kaua`i is in the state “conservation” district, that is not so in Honolulu where, as this map (pdf) shows, much of the coast is districted “urban.

This screen shot of a google map along side the relevant section of the state district boundary map- with point “A” on the google map indicating the 57-A Kailuana Place address where the president stayed- shows that the house in question is in the urban, not the conservation district.

Thanks to Civil Beat’s Mike Levine for setting us straight and providing the screen shot and map links.

We regret any confusion resulting from our incorrect presumption.

PAY THE LADY

PAY THE LADY: The news that a federal grand jury has indicted Kaua`i Island Utilities Co-op (KIUC) for what the Honolulu Star Bulletin reports are “nine counts of violating the Endangered Species Act and 10 counts of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act between June 2005 and December 2009” may be “stunning news” to some.

But not to the original "nitpickers" who cited the liability involving the lack of compliance with federal endangered species laws in calling for a severely reduced price when the politically- and some alleged monetarily- connected original members of the co-op board bought the company from Citizen’s Electric at an exorbitant price in the early ‘00’s.

It was one of many things- including the potential Superfund cleanup site under the `Ele`ele power plant- that caused some to say that they should have actually paid us to take it off their hands, especially considering the extremely illustrative fact that there were no other buyers at any price on the horizon at the time and Citizen’s was an extremely motivated seller.

They also cited the above-ground rebuild of the grid after Hurricane `Iniki - which Kaua`i ratepayers alone were later forced to bear the cost of- as a kind of double whammy, predicting that it would come back to bite us in the butt when we were forced by the feds to underground them.

That’s part of the reason KIUC has been battling for the last decade to try to get out from under what should never have been “our” financial burden.

KIUC’s statement tries to make it sound like they’ve done every thing in their power to comply saying, according to press reports of a “press release” that does not appear at their web site:

KIUC is deeply disappointed by the Justice Department's decision to file charges in a matter where KIUC has been working diligently for the past decade with every state and federal government agency and other stakeholders to achieve workable solutions to protect endangered Hawaiian seabirds.

Note how it says they’ve been “working diligently... to achieve a workable solution” not to comply since their “workable solution” has been doing nothing but stalling and complaining.

“We told you so” aside, the one thing that stands out here is many of the “screw the birds” comments on the various on-line press accounts from mainland settlers whose usual invader cultural supremacist “screw your host culture” spiel causes them to, on one hand scream about putting a bunch of damned Hawaiian birds ahead of the needs of their ever-expanding need for exponentially increasing consumption, yet on the other bemoan the very supremacy of the federal government that their precious statehood bestows.

The most galling part is that we’ll end up paying to bring the offending poles, power lines, structures and utility owned and operated streetlights into compliance one way or another but, according to the accounts of KIUC’s attorney’s response, only after we spend an inordinate amount of money trying to fight the charges and also defend the suit brought in March by David Henkin, a lawyer for Earthjustice. against KIUC and the St. Regis Hotel in Princeville.

That’s something we can do something about since, even though the decision to fight both the criminal and civil charges has been presented as a done deal, KIUC is a co-op where the electricity consumers supposedly have some say over decisions made by an elected board.

Board members would do well to read what Joan Conrow, who has been on top of the story for many months now, wrote today about possible penalties:

(W)e’re talking fines of up to $50,000 per bird, and KIUC already has acknowledged that its power lines kill 87 adults per year (and t)he law also provides for imprisonment of up to a year.(emphasis added).

It might pay to remind your local co-op board member of both their fiduciary and non-fiduciary responsibilities.

Even if KIUC doesn’t comply just because it’s the right thing to do it might be time to do it to cut the ratepayers’ losses and negotiate a settlement of the fines for what the Earthjustice suit says are an estimated “300 or more birds a year (that) are killed or injured by streetlights and utility wires” as part of a full comprehensive compliance agreement with the Department of Justice.

Otherwise we’ll be paying not just for the undergrounding but potentially millions in legal fees and the full amount of fines since no one is apparently claiming we have a legal leg to stand on.

A TALE OF TWO DOG POUNDS

A TALE OF TWO DOG POUNDS: This weekend’s installment of KPD Blue- “Chapter 10- George Freitas”- beings the long and winding chronology of three police chiefs and, according to Sommer’s narrative the process by which the old boy network, through persistence, secrecy and race-based cronyism finally got their man into office in the person of current Chief Darryl Perry who was “supposed to” get the job when Freitas- an outsider- was forced out.

The book tells the story of how Freitas was replaced by KC Lum- also a mainland outsider, although a KPD lieutenant- who, in a series of machination involving the county council, the police commission and the ethics board, was drummed out on trumped up charges along with the head of the police commission Michael Ching.

Yet unless you’ve read the book you’d never know how, through suppression of documents and illegal secret meetings- and a complicitous press that refused to look at the real documentation- Perry was finally hired as Chief.

Sommer’s documented tale stands as the true story of what happened, as anyone of the “nitpickers” who attended the sessions and saw all the documents leading to Lum’s ouster can attest to.

At one point the council didn’t want to see the real documents from an administrative judge’s determination in the Ching case so much that when nitpicker Richard Stauber tried to give the documents he had obtained to the council to make them part of the record, Chair Kaipo Asing actually demand Stauber take them back. When Stauber refused Asing then purged them from the public record.

The complete set of documents show how the ethics board cherry picked the judges determinations in order to find that Ching exhibited undue favoritism in the commission’s selection of Lum as chief

But Perry’s supporters still cling to the “official” story that somehow he was the one who wronged in the whole process.

Despite the availability of KPD Blue- which can be purchased through Amazon.com and will soon be available at Border’s book store in Lihu`e (watch this space for an announcement when it’s “in”)- this little tidbit appeared in the local newspaper under the regular “Ask the Chief” banner.

Here’s what the Chief had to say in answer to a supposed unsolicited question, presumably from a member of the public unconnected with the force

Q: It’s been almost a year now that you’ve been in office. How have things been going? Was the transition difficult getting back in the groove? And how do you like being back home?

It was obvious to me that you got the raw end of the deal the first time around. Has anyone apologized to you for what the old police commission did?

Jason, Lihue

Apologized? Although there is no evidence that Perry personally had anything to do with the corrupt ouster of Lum, he certainly did nothing to stop it, even as his brother Warren aced as a surrogate in support of Leon Gonsalves during the infamous ”Hop Sing” incident.

Here’s what Perry had to say last Saturday:

KPD long on goals during chief’s first year

A: Things are going as well as can be expected. The first part of your question is easy, the other question touches on very sensitive areas that some individuals would like to forget.

But history is a great teacher, and if we don’t learn from our past, then we will probably repeat it. So I’ll touch a little on the second part but not too much....

After detailing some of his plans for the department, with apparent false modesty Perry passive-aggressively “answered” the second part if “Jason’s” question".

In regards to the second part of your question, concerning the prior selection process and me getting the raw end of deal, I really haven’t given it much thought since being appointed. It appears from individuals who I’ve spoken to on a personal basis that they felt something wasn’t right with the first selection process and that I was not treated fairly.

And the other part of your question: Has anyone apologized to me? No one representing the county of Kaua`i has ever stated publicly or given my family a written apology.

Although I invested a great deal of time, effort and expense in preparing and interviewing for the position, I’m really not sure if I deserve any apology.

When someone applies for a position there is an understanding that he or she may not get selected. So you work hard to prepare, do the best you can, and hope that the process is fair. You can only control what you do; you can’t control what others may do.

Whether the process was tainted is a matter of debate. For my family it’s something we don’t dwell on. We are moving forward toward a brighter future; besides, it’s great to be home, so I don’t have any complaints.

In closing, and it’s only my opinion, if any apology should be had, it should be made to the citizens of the county of Kaua`i and the Kaua`i Police Department, not to me. I’ll leave it at that.

Why the Chief felt the need to re-open and rub salt in the wounds is anyone's guess- perhaps it’s a preemptive strike against the contests of Sommer’s book.

But Sommer and those who are in the know won’t be “leaving it at that” because, if the Chief isn’t sure of he got a raw deal other are sure- and have the documentation to show- that the Lum and Ching got the short end of the stick.

And we predict anyone who reads the facts in KPD Blue won’t leave it at that either..

Sommer’s book follows the story through document and eyewitness accounts. We’ll leave you with a paragraph from the narrative just after Freitas walked away with a generous severance package after agreeing not to lead the parade to court that followed.

Perry was the candidate of the KPD old guard. Lum never was accused of any misconduct in office. Try as they might, Baptiste and the County Council could find nothing to use against him at the Police Commission. But he was forced—by Mayor Baptiste and the County Council (not the Police Commission, the only entity with the legal authority to fire a police chief on Kauai)—to retire on June 7, 2006, with more than three years remaining on his contract.