$250,000 SETTLEMENT IN “DOE V COK” EEOC CASE BEGAN WITH ALLEGED ‘02 ASSAULT BY COUNTY CLERK NAKAMURA UPON COUNCIL’S DEPUTY COUNTY ATTORNEY
“DOE” ILLEGALLY IDED AS HANSON-SUEOKA BY CA CASTILLO, WHO FIRED HER IN ‘08
by Andy Parx
(PNN) -- The $250,000 settlement of a “hostile/violent work environment” Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) complaint identified only as “Jane Doe vs. County of Kaua`i” was actually a complaint filed by former Deputy County Attorney Margaret Hanson-Sueoka according to records illegally revealed by County Attorney Al Castillo.
The case apparently goes back to early 2002 during the waning days of Mayor Maryanne Kusaka’s administration but the precipitating incident occurred, not in administration offices where the county attorney’s offices are housed but in the “workplace” of council services.
According to numerous council services employees, past reporters and “regulars” at council meetings at the time, then and present County Clerk Peter Nakamura allegedly “beat up” Hanson-Sueoka, who was at the time his “girlfriend”, causing Hanson to seek a restraining order against Nakamura.
Though some alleged that at the time Nakamura was actually arrested others claim that he was not, with some of those saying that this was due to his position and Hanson-Sueoka’s refusal to press charges due to fear of repercussions on her job situation. Almost all however agreed in maintaining that Hanson had obtained a protective restraining order against Nakamura after telling people she was assaulted by him.
Although the county clerk heads the “council services” office and runs every aspect of council doings including hiring and firing of personnel, technically Hanson-Sueoka’s boss was the county attorney although the attorney assigned to the council often works closely and under the supervision of the county clerk.
But EEOC law also covers those that, while technically are not “superiors, but those that act as such.
An examination of county records and newspaper articles indicates Hanson-Sueoka was soon terminated from her plum assignment as attorney for the council and, when the Bryan Baptiste administration took over in December of 2002, she was retained as a deputy in new CA Lani Nakazawa’s office but assigned to attend various long and often boring and routine board and commission meetings to provide attorney advice.
Hanson-Sueoka remained with the office when Nakazawa left and was replaced by CA Matthew Pyun, and was the main county attorney involved in the infamous removal from office of Police Commission Chair Michael Ching- as well as the cover-up of the hearing judge’s full report exonerating Ching- and the resulting politically motivated firing of Police Chief KC Lum.
But when Bernard Carvalho was elected as mayor in 2008 and appointed Castillo, Hanson was fired for no stated reason, although her EEOC case presumably maintains it was retaliatory for whistle-blowing for past the incidents.
The EEOC complaint was filed after Hanson-Sueoka’s firing by Castillo and confirmation of the $250,000 award- along with the confirmation that it was a hostile/violent workplace compliant- came at least week’s council meeting as part of a presentation by Councilpersons Lani Kawahara and Tim Bynum on the pervasive disregard for sexual harassment and hostile work environment laws by the county.
At the meeting the pair cited the “Jane Doe” case and that of Kristan Hirakawa- a case detailed by PNN over the past year- saying cases against the county are rarely if ever even investigated and that harassers are apparently never disciplined much less fired even after judgments against the county.
The incident in 2002 was the talk of the county building at the time including among councilmembers who were called into executive session to discuss personnel issues within council services although none would confirm publicly that the subject was Nakamura who remains on the job today despite the settlement.
Though the incident occurred during the time when then Councilperson Ron Kouchi was the chair of the council after the 2002 election- where he ran and lost in a bid to be mayor- current Chair Kaipo Asing took over and has remained chair ever since okaying, along with the rest of the council, various settlements for harassment of county employees as well as reappointing Nakamura as county clerk every two years.
Though EEOC cases are, by federal law, to be kept confidential, after firing Hanson-Sueoka Castillo twice revealed that indeed she was the EEOC plaintiff, the first time on the council agenda for April 22, 2009 where he requested executive session (ES) 382 which read in part,
the Office of the County Attorney requests an executive session with the Council to provide the Council a briefing on Margaret H. Sueoka v. County of Kaua`i, EEOC Charge No. 486-2009-00268 and/or related matters and/or subsequent legal proceedings resulting in any way from this matter.
Then, even after a rejected request from PNN to examine the EEOC case files- where we were told by the CA’s office that federal law maintains strict confidentiality for EEOC complaints, superseding the state sunshine law- in a local newspaper article on August 28, 2009 about the $3 million that has been spent on outside counsel to defend lawsuits against the county, reporter Michael Levine wrote:
“Since I’ve been here, the only (lawsuit) that is mine is the Sueoka case, and that’s one where we really didn’t have a choice,” Castillo said, in reference to an equal employment opportunity claim filed against the county by former Deputy County Attorney Margaret Sueoka. He said having a staff attorney handle the case could constitute a conflict of interest.
But recently all references on council agendas to the Hanson-Sueoka case were noted as “Jane Doe vs. County of Kaua`i” although both the recent postings and the one for April of 2009 referred to the same “Charge number”, 486-2009-00268.
Talk regarding the original incident when Nakamura was alleged to have “beat up” Hanson- who has since married and changed her name to Sueoka- was pervasive at the county building in 2002 when PNN was actively covering weekly council meetings and, while more than a dozen people repeated the story about Nakamura and Hanson, PNN has not been able to confirm the incidents through documentation.
It should be noted that this report was compiled after speaking to many knowledgeable sources both in 2002 and this week and after a review of our notes from that era. It is the best available rendering of the truth of what has occurred in this case. All undocumented allegation are just that- undocumented allegations.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Sueoka. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Sueoka. Sort by date Show all posts
Monday, October 18, 2010
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
(PNN) COUNCIL TO SPEND $50,000 TO DEFEND SUEOKA EEOC CHARGE
Former long time Deputy County Attorney Margaret Sueoka has filed an EEOC complaint that has resulted in a case against the county that is apparently serious enough that the county attorney’s office is asking the council for 50,000 to defend the charge.
The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has substantiated the claim to the extent that they have filed a “charge” and given the case a number (486-2009-00268) but any detailed information is “not available to anyone except to parties” of the case according to an EEOC intake representative and, at least preliminarily, the state according to Amy Esaki current First Deputy CA for the county.
Esaki said after briefly checking with the state Office of Information Practices (OIP) the county’s position is that any further information is, at least for now, protected at the state level by HRS section 92F-14, claiming that the privacy issues involved outweigh the public interest in releasing the charges made by Sueoka.
PNN was unable to contact Sueoka and there is no number listed for her name.
Sueoka was apparently fired sometime during the change of administration and resultant change in county attorneys presumably by either Esaki, who was interim CA, or by current CA Al Castillo. Sueoka was sworn in on December 1 with the rest of the deputy CA’s.
Esaki said she couldn’t comment or provide any details surrounding the firing. even the fact that Sueoka was terminated, although the EEOC charge apparently verifies that.
It is unknown what the basis of the charge is although usually the EEOC deals with cases of discrimination against a “protected class” such as in race, gender or age bias.
Though no information on the specifics exist, some political insiders have speculated that Sueoka was fired due to the various controversial opinions she wrote, advice she gave and cases she pursued when she worked for former CA’s Lani Nakazawa and Matthew Pyun.
Nakazawa and Pyun initiated a widely criticized and unprecedented era of secrecy in the CA’s office as PNN has detailed in past reports, claiming that the CA’s only function was to serve the administration and council and that all official opinions rendered were the sole possession of those to whom they were issued and that only those so advised could release them to the public.
Previously, although county law is silent on the matter, most CA written opinions were considered public record, as state law requires of attorneys general’s opinions.
It has been revealed in various public session of boards and commissions including those of the council, that Sueoka, along with Nakazawa, had written the opinion that bans public release by the CA’s office and removed any public component to the CA office’s duties.
In addition, it has been revealed at meetings that she penned many of the advisory opinions that seemed to fly in the face of exiting laws and regulations. But since they were secret, no one could challenge them on the particulars.
Sueoka was instrumental in the apparent railroading of former police chief KC Lum by the Board of Ethics (BOE)- at the council and mayor’s behest- serving as the long time legal advisor of the beleaguered BOE. She also apparently wrote the still-secret opinion that allowed violations of the prohibitions in section 20.02(D) of the county charter that PNN’s investigatory three part series detailed this and last week.
Based on some of Castillo’s words and actions at various meetings over the past month or so he has been in office it is thought – or at least hoped- by many county government observers that he will be reversing many of Sueoka’s, Pyun’s and Nakazawa’s opinions.
Castillo has been observed with shocked expressions, eye rolling and head shaking upon observing the consequences of the apparent misconceptions of law, as stated by members of the various bodies (including the county council and BOE), based on Sueoka’s legal advice.
He has also given verbal indications that a potential change in policy is in the works at some of those meetings.
Both Esaki and Castillo are new to the CA’s office, Castillo coming from private practice after a stint in the prosecutor’s office in the 90’s and Esaki coming from council services where she served as a legal analyst for many years.
Both are considered to be “straight shooters” by various sources who have worked with them over the years although it cannot be verified if any of this was in any way behind the firing of Sueoka.
According to sources both are primed to clean up the CA’s office and repair its severely tarnished reputation, built through the years by issuing opinions that served the reported paternalistic and secretive efforts of Kaua`i County Council Chair Kaipo Asing and the administration of former Mayor Bryan Baptiste.
The CA’s office has also been under fire for the inordinate number of cases referred to “special counsel”- a small cabal of outside Honolulu attorneys who seem to most political observers and government watchdogs almost incapable of winning a case
That has cost the county millions in attorneys’ fees and more in settlements, much to councilmembers’ vocal chagrin.
Though the particulars of the Sueoka case are confidential to non-parties according to the EEOC itself, the public interest vs. private concerns may be less inviolable if it can be shown that there is a great public interest in releasing the details of the case.
Esaki said she presented the specific case to the OIP- the body that administrates the Uniform Information Practices Act or UIPA (HRS 92F) and the Sunshine Law (HRS 92 Section 1)- but attorney Linden Joesting of OIP, who spoke to Esaki, said that her counsel was just “advice over the phone” based on “preliminary information” and was not to be taken as a formal ruling as to whether the public interest in this case might outweigh Sueoka’s privacy interest of.
Joesting said she had not seen anything in writing but said that if we made a formal written request for the record of the case from the county and were denied she would be able to make, if not a formal ruling at least more than a preliminary one.
PNN will be filing that request tomorrow with the CA’s office and has been promised the denial will be expedited.
Joesting also indicated that it all might depend on EEOC rules on releasing the case file about which she didn’t have enough information to determine if there were strict or situational-dependent prohibitions against public release of the documents regarding the case.
This is not the first recent case of an EEOC charge. As PNN reported in December Kaua`i Bus driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin has filed suit against the Kaua`i Department of Transportation- specifically Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo- for gender discrimination after the county refused to answer or even, according to her suit, investigate an EEOC complaint. The council also appropriated $50,000 at the time to defend that case.
Rapozo, a holdover from the Baptiste administration, is the wife of now Parks and Recreation Department head Lenny Rapozo who served as current Mayor Bernard Carvalho’s campaign manager in the fall 2008 campaign for mayor.
The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has substantiated the claim to the extent that they have filed a “charge” and given the case a number (486-2009-00268) but any detailed information is “not available to anyone except to parties” of the case according to an EEOC intake representative and, at least preliminarily, the state according to Amy Esaki current First Deputy CA for the county.
Esaki said after briefly checking with the state Office of Information Practices (OIP) the county’s position is that any further information is, at least for now, protected at the state level by HRS section 92F-14, claiming that the privacy issues involved outweigh the public interest in releasing the charges made by Sueoka.
PNN was unable to contact Sueoka and there is no number listed for her name.
Sueoka was apparently fired sometime during the change of administration and resultant change in county attorneys presumably by either Esaki, who was interim CA, or by current CA Al Castillo. Sueoka was sworn in on December 1 with the rest of the deputy CA’s.
Esaki said she couldn’t comment or provide any details surrounding the firing. even the fact that Sueoka was terminated, although the EEOC charge apparently verifies that.
It is unknown what the basis of the charge is although usually the EEOC deals with cases of discrimination against a “protected class” such as in race, gender or age bias.
Though no information on the specifics exist, some political insiders have speculated that Sueoka was fired due to the various controversial opinions she wrote, advice she gave and cases she pursued when she worked for former CA’s Lani Nakazawa and Matthew Pyun.
Nakazawa and Pyun initiated a widely criticized and unprecedented era of secrecy in the CA’s office as PNN has detailed in past reports, claiming that the CA’s only function was to serve the administration and council and that all official opinions rendered were the sole possession of those to whom they were issued and that only those so advised could release them to the public.
Previously, although county law is silent on the matter, most CA written opinions were considered public record, as state law requires of attorneys general’s opinions.
It has been revealed in various public session of boards and commissions including those of the council, that Sueoka, along with Nakazawa, had written the opinion that bans public release by the CA’s office and removed any public component to the CA office’s duties.
In addition, it has been revealed at meetings that she penned many of the advisory opinions that seemed to fly in the face of exiting laws and regulations. But since they were secret, no one could challenge them on the particulars.
Sueoka was instrumental in the apparent railroading of former police chief KC Lum by the Board of Ethics (BOE)- at the council and mayor’s behest- serving as the long time legal advisor of the beleaguered BOE. She also apparently wrote the still-secret opinion that allowed violations of the prohibitions in section 20.02(D) of the county charter that PNN’s investigatory three part series detailed this and last week.
Based on some of Castillo’s words and actions at various meetings over the past month or so he has been in office it is thought – or at least hoped- by many county government observers that he will be reversing many of Sueoka’s, Pyun’s and Nakazawa’s opinions.
Castillo has been observed with shocked expressions, eye rolling and head shaking upon observing the consequences of the apparent misconceptions of law, as stated by members of the various bodies (including the county council and BOE), based on Sueoka’s legal advice.
He has also given verbal indications that a potential change in policy is in the works at some of those meetings.
Both Esaki and Castillo are new to the CA’s office, Castillo coming from private practice after a stint in the prosecutor’s office in the 90’s and Esaki coming from council services where she served as a legal analyst for many years.
Both are considered to be “straight shooters” by various sources who have worked with them over the years although it cannot be verified if any of this was in any way behind the firing of Sueoka.
According to sources both are primed to clean up the CA’s office and repair its severely tarnished reputation, built through the years by issuing opinions that served the reported paternalistic and secretive efforts of Kaua`i County Council Chair Kaipo Asing and the administration of former Mayor Bryan Baptiste.
The CA’s office has also been under fire for the inordinate number of cases referred to “special counsel”- a small cabal of outside Honolulu attorneys who seem to most political observers and government watchdogs almost incapable of winning a case
That has cost the county millions in attorneys’ fees and more in settlements, much to councilmembers’ vocal chagrin.
Though the particulars of the Sueoka case are confidential to non-parties according to the EEOC itself, the public interest vs. private concerns may be less inviolable if it can be shown that there is a great public interest in releasing the details of the case.
Esaki said she presented the specific case to the OIP- the body that administrates the Uniform Information Practices Act or UIPA (HRS 92F) and the Sunshine Law (HRS 92 Section 1)- but attorney Linden Joesting of OIP, who spoke to Esaki, said that her counsel was just “advice over the phone” based on “preliminary information” and was not to be taken as a formal ruling as to whether the public interest in this case might outweigh Sueoka’s privacy interest of.
Joesting said she had not seen anything in writing but said that if we made a formal written request for the record of the case from the county and were denied she would be able to make, if not a formal ruling at least more than a preliminary one.
PNN will be filing that request tomorrow with the CA’s office and has been promised the denial will be expedited.
Joesting also indicated that it all might depend on EEOC rules on releasing the case file about which she didn’t have enough information to determine if there were strict or situational-dependent prohibitions against public release of the documents regarding the case.
This is not the first recent case of an EEOC charge. As PNN reported in December Kaua`i Bus driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin has filed suit against the Kaua`i Department of Transportation- specifically Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo- for gender discrimination after the county refused to answer or even, according to her suit, investigate an EEOC complaint. The council also appropriated $50,000 at the time to defend that case.
Rapozo, a holdover from the Baptiste administration, is the wife of now Parks and Recreation Department head Lenny Rapozo who served as current Mayor Bernard Carvalho’s campaign manager in the fall 2008 campaign for mayor.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
KIBBLES AND BITS
KIBBLES AND BITS: The push to revive HB 444, establishing civil unions, is on with three, count ‘em three, emails from activists arriving with petitions under Senate Rule 67, not in our usual yahoo email account but in the gotwindmills(at)gmail inbox listed only at the bottom of our “right rail”, showing the work that’s going into the effort.
One link was for a sheet you can print out and circulate and another is for signing it electronically.
The petitions got some play from Honolulu Advertiser capitol reporter Derrick DePledge, not in an article but in his blog. which contained a link to the electronic petition web site.
But the scrupulously “objective” DePledge didn’t count on the electronic fingerprints the internet often provides because the link he provided was apparently lifted from the site after he personally signed it with “Signed by: D. DePledge [Your address]” at the bottom of the linked page and a note saying “If you are not D. DePledge, click here” where the sign-in portion appears.
-----------
It seems like follow-up Tuesday and although it was stated over and over at last Wednesday’s council meeting that there would be a written plan available “by tomorrow” (last Thursday) for flushing a million county dollars down the rat-hole of Kaua`i tourism “marketing”- as we described last Friday- a request for the supposedly detailed strategy at council services yesterday elicited some scratched heads and only a re-regurgitation of the one-page appropriation bill
So far no one seems to care, even those who need the services that will be cut in next year’s budget. Perhaps it’s because those that whine about government spending are commonly the self-same types who populate the board rooms at the hotel plantations, whose bottom line is all that will benefit most from the corporate welfare.
---------
We still have not received our promised “expedited" rejection of our request for the particulars of apparently fired deputy County Attorney Margaret Sueoka’s discrimination suit against the county allowing us to file with the state to declare the public interest in the case more important than Sueoka’s privacy.
But we were struck that, unless you were a reader of our news article last week or the agenda for last Wednesday’s meeting, her name would not be known to you.
Seems that when the agenda item was read aloud to appropriate the $50,000 to fight the EEOC charge, along with another for an executive session where the real decision to spend it was made, the name of the litigant was glaringly omitted, depriving the home viewing public the specificity that the sunshine law requires of the agenda items themselves if not the public reading of them.
We’ve heard through sources- although we still cannot confirm it through new County Attorney Al Castillo, who apparently was the one who fired Sueoka since she was still working for the county attorney’s office until he came on board- that our speculation that Sueoka was canned for her past work and a “difference in philosophy” and not due to her gender, race or any other “protected class” status, was pretty much right on target. We’ll keep you informed.
-------
We certainly don’t have an exclusive beat in uncovering county corruption although it might seem so when perusing the “all fluff all the time pages” local newspaper.
If you haven’t seen it take a gander at Joan Conrow’s bombshell as an adjunct to a Kaua`i People piece she wrote on Uncle Bernard Mahuiki, the trash-master at the Hanalei Transfer station.
Unfit for the local paper’s wholly owned freebie, mid-week advertising-throwaway, Joan relegated the real news to her Kaua`i Eclectic blog where she wrote in prose so disarmingly charming and folksy you might have missed the significance of what you were reading
( Mahuiki) said he was given a list of guys — cronies of county bosses — who shouldn’t be asked for their pre-paid tickets to dump commercial waste because they were getting freebies. In that case, he told them, I won't ask for anyone’s tickets. Oh, you can’t do that, he was told. I can and I will, he replied. Either everybody pays or nobody pays.Folks often think that really big money changes hands in back room deals and friendly favors. But a lot of times, it’s pretty manini, like $10 or $20 bucks a day in waived dumping charges. Still, as Uncle Bernard noted, that does add up over time.
Just how much info does the FBI need for it’s investigation we reported last December?
-----------
Finally check out right-wing, yet strangely also sometimes intelligently written Big Island blogger Aaron Stene and his post regarding our defense of State Rep. Joe Bertram’s fear of the “thought police” taking over by prosecuting “imaginary crimes” where alleged on-line child predators are prosecuted for soliciting, not actual children but, cops posing as children.
Stene calls our defense “disgusting” and as we predicted tries to paint the issue as one of Bertram- and us- being pro-child molesting instead of one of punishing people for their thoughts and ignoring the substitution of expedient yet unconstitutional measures in supplanting the good yet difficult police work that identification and surveillance would entail... as do others who commented on the piece.
Stene asks “Andy, I guess you haven't seen Chris Hansen's To Catch a Predator.” Yes we have, speaking of disgusting....
There’s nothing wrong with surveiling a suspect when probable cause exists to think they will commit an actual crime and doing so until he or she actually attempts one. But there is in entrapping that individual. The only thing disgusting is the thought that some- be they sick or otherwise- don’t deserve and in fact have the same rights as everyone else.
It isn’t just child predators, drug dealers and terrorists that are caught in these new laws that the current anti-civil rights US. Supreme Court claims trump your rights in the name of providing for the catch-all safety and welfare of the nation.
Lately protest groups and activists have been caught up in roundups of those who have committed no crime but have thought about committing non-violent civil disobedience such as occurred during the Republican Convention last summer.
---------
Well, go Rangers... and take the Knicks with you.
One link was for a sheet you can print out and circulate and another is for signing it electronically.
The petitions got some play from Honolulu Advertiser capitol reporter Derrick DePledge, not in an article but in his blog. which contained a link to the electronic petition web site.
But the scrupulously “objective” DePledge didn’t count on the electronic fingerprints the internet often provides because the link he provided was apparently lifted from the site after he personally signed it with “Signed by: D. DePledge [Your address]” at the bottom of the linked page and a note saying “If you are not D. DePledge, click here” where the sign-in portion appears.
-----------
It seems like follow-up Tuesday and although it was stated over and over at last Wednesday’s council meeting that there would be a written plan available “by tomorrow” (last Thursday) for flushing a million county dollars down the rat-hole of Kaua`i tourism “marketing”- as we described last Friday- a request for the supposedly detailed strategy at council services yesterday elicited some scratched heads and only a re-regurgitation of the one-page appropriation bill
So far no one seems to care, even those who need the services that will be cut in next year’s budget. Perhaps it’s because those that whine about government spending are commonly the self-same types who populate the board rooms at the hotel plantations, whose bottom line is all that will benefit most from the corporate welfare.
---------
We still have not received our promised “expedited" rejection of our request for the particulars of apparently fired deputy County Attorney Margaret Sueoka’s discrimination suit against the county allowing us to file with the state to declare the public interest in the case more important than Sueoka’s privacy.
But we were struck that, unless you were a reader of our news article last week or the agenda for last Wednesday’s meeting, her name would not be known to you.
Seems that when the agenda item was read aloud to appropriate the $50,000 to fight the EEOC charge, along with another for an executive session where the real decision to spend it was made, the name of the litigant was glaringly omitted, depriving the home viewing public the specificity that the sunshine law requires of the agenda items themselves if not the public reading of them.
We’ve heard through sources- although we still cannot confirm it through new County Attorney Al Castillo, who apparently was the one who fired Sueoka since she was still working for the county attorney’s office until he came on board- that our speculation that Sueoka was canned for her past work and a “difference in philosophy” and not due to her gender, race or any other “protected class” status, was pretty much right on target. We’ll keep you informed.
-------
We certainly don’t have an exclusive beat in uncovering county corruption although it might seem so when perusing the “all fluff all the time pages” local newspaper.
If you haven’t seen it take a gander at Joan Conrow’s bombshell as an adjunct to a Kaua`i People piece she wrote on Uncle Bernard Mahuiki, the trash-master at the Hanalei Transfer station.
Unfit for the local paper’s wholly owned freebie, mid-week advertising-throwaway, Joan relegated the real news to her Kaua`i Eclectic blog where she wrote in prose so disarmingly charming and folksy you might have missed the significance of what you were reading
( Mahuiki) said he was given a list of guys — cronies of county bosses — who shouldn’t be asked for their pre-paid tickets to dump commercial waste because they were getting freebies. In that case, he told them, I won't ask for anyone’s tickets. Oh, you can’t do that, he was told. I can and I will, he replied. Either everybody pays or nobody pays.Folks often think that really big money changes hands in back room deals and friendly favors. But a lot of times, it’s pretty manini, like $10 or $20 bucks a day in waived dumping charges. Still, as Uncle Bernard noted, that does add up over time.
Just how much info does the FBI need for it’s investigation we reported last December?
-----------
Finally check out right-wing, yet strangely also sometimes intelligently written Big Island blogger Aaron Stene and his post regarding our defense of State Rep. Joe Bertram’s fear of the “thought police” taking over by prosecuting “imaginary crimes” where alleged on-line child predators are prosecuted for soliciting, not actual children but, cops posing as children.
Stene calls our defense “disgusting” and as we predicted tries to paint the issue as one of Bertram- and us- being pro-child molesting instead of one of punishing people for their thoughts and ignoring the substitution of expedient yet unconstitutional measures in supplanting the good yet difficult police work that identification and surveillance would entail... as do others who commented on the piece.
Stene asks “Andy, I guess you haven't seen Chris Hansen's To Catch a Predator.” Yes we have, speaking of disgusting....
There’s nothing wrong with surveiling a suspect when probable cause exists to think they will commit an actual crime and doing so until he or she actually attempts one. But there is in entrapping that individual. The only thing disgusting is the thought that some- be they sick or otherwise- don’t deserve and in fact have the same rights as everyone else.
It isn’t just child predators, drug dealers and terrorists that are caught in these new laws that the current anti-civil rights US. Supreme Court claims trump your rights in the name of providing for the catch-all safety and welfare of the nation.
Lately protest groups and activists have been caught up in roundups of those who have committed no crime but have thought about committing non-violent civil disobedience such as occurred during the Republican Convention last summer.
---------
Well, go Rangers... and take the Knicks with you.
Monday, August 23, 2010
(PNN) COUNTY SECRETLY SETTLES HIRAKAWA SEX DISCRIMINATION SUIT FOR $450,000
COUNTY SECRETLY SETTLES HIRAKAWA SEX DISCRIMINATION SUIT FOR $450,000
(PNN) -- PNN has learned that the County of Kaua`i has settled the sexual harassment lawsuit brought by Kristan C. Hirakawa and has paid her $450,000.
According to a reliable source who asked not to be identified, the check has been cut yet there has been no announcement and there is no record of the settlement which was apparently approved by the county council in an executive session at their July 27 meeting.
Hirakawa sued the county for a second time after winning her first suit against the Kaua`i Police Department and being reassigned to the liquor department where she was once again a victim of gender discrimination resulting in the current settlement, as PNN has exclusively reported.
Although settlements are public records according to the Office of Information Practices (OIP) the “recap memo” for the July 27 council meeting shows no settlement vote was taken in open session.
The agenda item, Executive Session (ES) 458, says it was held “for the purposes of deliberating, deciding, and authorizing a proposed settlement in the case of Kristan C. Hirakawa v. County of Kaua`i”.
According to OIP Opinion 89-10 regarding settlement agreements “(o)nce the litigation is concluded...all the settlement agreements must be publicly available.”
However OIP Opinion 03-07 regarding voting in executive meetings says that
Votes taken in executive meetings need not be disclosed to the public because the Sunshine Law allows minutes of executive meetings to be withheld so long as their publication would defeat the lawful purpose of the executive meeting, but no longer. Once disclosure of votes taken in executive meetings does not defeat the lawful purpose of holding an executive meeting, the votes should be disclosed.
A request for clarification was sent yesterday to OIP asking whether a lawsuit settlement vote must be taken in open session with the terms disclosed and, if not, how the public is supposed to know about the settlement. No answer was received by press time.
Also on the July 27 agenda was ES 256 which was held “for the purposes of deliberating, deciding, and authorizing a proposed settlement in the case of Jane Doe v. County of Kaua`i, EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) Charge No. 37-B-2009-00620 and FEPA NO. K-15516”.
There is no record of any settlement of this case although as PNN reported there are multiple EEOC complaints against the county including one by former deputy county attorney Margaret Hanson Sueoka was mistakenly revealed by the county in June of 2009.
EEOC complaints are confidential according to federal law which supersedes the state sunshine law.
Although a source close to council services has told PNN that the Sueoka case has been settled there is no record of the settlement.
According to law, the EEOC must give the go-ahead in order for an employment discrimination suit to be brought in circuit court.
Also outstanding is the case of Kathleen Ah Quin against the county transportation agency which the council apparently voted to fight with an appropriation of money for outside council on June 9.
Follow the links above for details of these lawsuits and complaints.
(PNN) -- PNN has learned that the County of Kaua`i has settled the sexual harassment lawsuit brought by Kristan C. Hirakawa and has paid her $450,000.
According to a reliable source who asked not to be identified, the check has been cut yet there has been no announcement and there is no record of the settlement which was apparently approved by the county council in an executive session at their July 27 meeting.
Hirakawa sued the county for a second time after winning her first suit against the Kaua`i Police Department and being reassigned to the liquor department where she was once again a victim of gender discrimination resulting in the current settlement, as PNN has exclusively reported.
Although settlements are public records according to the Office of Information Practices (OIP) the “recap memo” for the July 27 council meeting shows no settlement vote was taken in open session.
The agenda item, Executive Session (ES) 458, says it was held “for the purposes of deliberating, deciding, and authorizing a proposed settlement in the case of Kristan C. Hirakawa v. County of Kaua`i”.
According to OIP Opinion 89-10 regarding settlement agreements “(o)nce the litigation is concluded...all the settlement agreements must be publicly available.”
However OIP Opinion 03-07 regarding voting in executive meetings says that
Votes taken in executive meetings need not be disclosed to the public because the Sunshine Law allows minutes of executive meetings to be withheld so long as their publication would defeat the lawful purpose of the executive meeting, but no longer. Once disclosure of votes taken in executive meetings does not defeat the lawful purpose of holding an executive meeting, the votes should be disclosed.
A request for clarification was sent yesterday to OIP asking whether a lawsuit settlement vote must be taken in open session with the terms disclosed and, if not, how the public is supposed to know about the settlement. No answer was received by press time.
Also on the July 27 agenda was ES 256 which was held “for the purposes of deliberating, deciding, and authorizing a proposed settlement in the case of Jane Doe v. County of Kaua`i, EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) Charge No. 37-B-2009-00620 and FEPA NO. K-15516”.
There is no record of any settlement of this case although as PNN reported there are multiple EEOC complaints against the county including one by former deputy county attorney Margaret Hanson Sueoka was mistakenly revealed by the county in June of 2009.
EEOC complaints are confidential according to federal law which supersedes the state sunshine law.
Although a source close to council services has told PNN that the Sueoka case has been settled there is no record of the settlement.
According to law, the EEOC must give the go-ahead in order for an employment discrimination suit to be brought in circuit court.
Also outstanding is the case of Kathleen Ah Quin against the county transportation agency which the council apparently voted to fight with an appropriation of money for outside council on June 9.
Follow the links above for details of these lawsuits and complaints.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
KEEPING THE DARK AS DARK AS CAN BE:
KEEPING THE DARK AS DARK AS CAN BE: The illegal conspiracy between Council Chair Kaipo Asing, County Clerk Peter Nakamura and various county attorneys to methodically violate the sunshine law has been the well documented in this space during the past year and a half.
Lately it’s only gotten worse with the description of agenda items containing less and less of the specific information required by law, leaving out key details, especially those that might raise an eyebrow or two or find their way into this space.
Sometimes the actual reading of the agenda item at the meeting- the first most of the viewing public has heard of the matter- lacks even the specificity the printed agenda contains, especially when we’ve picked apart and highlighted some of the more outrageous items.
Most recently when we picked up on a discrimination complaint filed with the national EEOC by former county attorney Margaret Hanson Sueoka, although the EEOC and Sueoka were mentioned on the official agenda neither was mentioned in the reading of the executive session item appropriating money to fight the claim.
None of this could be done without the benevolence of the county attorney (CA) whose function has morphed in the last decade from having a public component to merely being the attorney representing the council and administration. Opinions upon which those in public service rely never see the light of day any more- or didn’t until a recent vote by the Board of Ethics (BOE) to release one.
The county attorney is hired and presumably fired by the council and the administration together according to the county charter. But a resolution from the Salary Commission up for council approval at today’s council meeting seeks to remove the council as a whole from evaluating the county attorney for purposes of determining his or her salary and give that power to the council chair and mayor alone.
And of course the change, written into the details of the resolution and not in the multiple “whereas’”, is not listed on the agenda item either.
The agenda item reads
C 2009-194 Communication (04/28/2009) from Virginia Kapali, Chairperson, Kaua`i Salary Commission, transmitting for Council information, Resolution No. 2009-01, relating to the salaries of certain officers and employees of the County of Kaua`i which was adopted by the Salary Commission at its April 28, 2009 meeting, and recommending amendments to the Kaua`i County Code related to salaries of certain officers, the County Council, and Council Services employees.
And in the list of whereas’ it says
Whereas the Commission further desires to minimize confusion by eliminating inconstancies between the provisions contained in the Kaua`i County Code and any Salary Commission resolutions approved by the County.
Sound pretty innocuous- just some “housekeeping” changes, eh?
The effect is to cut members of the council out of the equation and currently that serves to silence council “dissidents” Lani Kawahara and Tim Bynum from their crusade to open up the council’s doings to the disinfectant of Sunshine.
As PNN reported last month Kawahara has simply sought to have all the public information that the council gets every week be available to the public on-line rather than having them printed out on reams of paper and distributed only to those willing to drive to Lihu`e and specifically request all the accompanying paper work that goes with each agenda item.
Kawahara is so frustrated she has threatened to take the paperwork, re-scan it (since they won’t make electronic versions available to her) and post them on a web site independent of the county or council services.
As has been reported here and in the pages of the local paper Bynum has been engaged for years- all in vain- in a campaign to open the pages of county attorney opinions to public scrutiny and has been blocked by Asing and Nakamura at every juncture.
That could not have been done without the acquiescence and direction of the last three county attorneys who at first stopped the council from simply voting to release the opinions as they had in the past until they put in place a standard procedure for doing that.
This allowed Asing to block the introduction of such a resolution for about a year and when Bynum pushed harder, eventually with Kawahara on his side, Asing and the CA said that they needed to wait until a county-wide policy was put in place for a standard way for all boards and commissions to release the opinions.
Although the recent BOE opinion was released, that was done in the face of a “request” from the CA to hold off until this long awaited policy is drawn up and approved by all of the boards and commissions- a process that could take years.
The salaries of appointed officials like the CA are set in a “range” according to the County Code 3-2.1, all dependant on an evaluation of the “appointing authority”.
Even if a salary is set at say $107,335 a year like that of the new county auditor- which is set in the salary commission’s resolution pursuant to the new charter amendment passed last November- it could be much lower at the discretion of the person appointing the new auditor, based on a standard evaluation form to be provided by the director of the Department of Personal.
But whereas the current ordinance reads “(t)he county attorney’s salary shall be evaluated by the mayor and the council” the proposed ordnance deletes that and substitutes “the county attorney’s performance shall be conducted (sic) through an equally weighed evaluation that shall be jointly administered by the mayor and the council chairperson”.
Though it may seem like a minor change since the council chair serves at the pleasure of the majority of the council, in the case of Asing, who apparently abuses his discretionary power at every chance, it’s a change that only consolidates the power of the minotaur with another blind alley in the undersea labyrinth that squelches dissidents and allows him to “do what’s wrong as long as he can”.
---------
(We’ve been asked recently “what’s all this minotaur stuff?” We were going to link again to the video of the Minotaur Song by the Incredible String Band we previously posted but it apparently has been removed from youtube by the poster. But never fear- someone has done a new and improved full length version linked below. )
(If you are one of our email subscribers click here).
Lately it’s only gotten worse with the description of agenda items containing less and less of the specific information required by law, leaving out key details, especially those that might raise an eyebrow or two or find their way into this space.
Sometimes the actual reading of the agenda item at the meeting- the first most of the viewing public has heard of the matter- lacks even the specificity the printed agenda contains, especially when we’ve picked apart and highlighted some of the more outrageous items.
Most recently when we picked up on a discrimination complaint filed with the national EEOC by former county attorney Margaret Hanson Sueoka, although the EEOC and Sueoka were mentioned on the official agenda neither was mentioned in the reading of the executive session item appropriating money to fight the claim.
None of this could be done without the benevolence of the county attorney (CA) whose function has morphed in the last decade from having a public component to merely being the attorney representing the council and administration. Opinions upon which those in public service rely never see the light of day any more- or didn’t until a recent vote by the Board of Ethics (BOE) to release one.
The county attorney is hired and presumably fired by the council and the administration together according to the county charter. But a resolution from the Salary Commission up for council approval at today’s council meeting seeks to remove the council as a whole from evaluating the county attorney for purposes of determining his or her salary and give that power to the council chair and mayor alone.
And of course the change, written into the details of the resolution and not in the multiple “whereas’”, is not listed on the agenda item either.
The agenda item reads
C 2009-194 Communication (04/28/2009) from Virginia Kapali, Chairperson, Kaua`i Salary Commission, transmitting for Council information, Resolution No. 2009-01, relating to the salaries of certain officers and employees of the County of Kaua`i which was adopted by the Salary Commission at its April 28, 2009 meeting, and recommending amendments to the Kaua`i County Code related to salaries of certain officers, the County Council, and Council Services employees.
And in the list of whereas’ it says
Whereas the Commission further desires to minimize confusion by eliminating inconstancies between the provisions contained in the Kaua`i County Code and any Salary Commission resolutions approved by the County.
Sound pretty innocuous- just some “housekeeping” changes, eh?
The effect is to cut members of the council out of the equation and currently that serves to silence council “dissidents” Lani Kawahara and Tim Bynum from their crusade to open up the council’s doings to the disinfectant of Sunshine.
As PNN reported last month Kawahara has simply sought to have all the public information that the council gets every week be available to the public on-line rather than having them printed out on reams of paper and distributed only to those willing to drive to Lihu`e and specifically request all the accompanying paper work that goes with each agenda item.
Kawahara is so frustrated she has threatened to take the paperwork, re-scan it (since they won’t make electronic versions available to her) and post them on a web site independent of the county or council services.
As has been reported here and in the pages of the local paper Bynum has been engaged for years- all in vain- in a campaign to open the pages of county attorney opinions to public scrutiny and has been blocked by Asing and Nakamura at every juncture.
That could not have been done without the acquiescence and direction of the last three county attorneys who at first stopped the council from simply voting to release the opinions as they had in the past until they put in place a standard procedure for doing that.
This allowed Asing to block the introduction of such a resolution for about a year and when Bynum pushed harder, eventually with Kawahara on his side, Asing and the CA said that they needed to wait until a county-wide policy was put in place for a standard way for all boards and commissions to release the opinions.
Although the recent BOE opinion was released, that was done in the face of a “request” from the CA to hold off until this long awaited policy is drawn up and approved by all of the boards and commissions- a process that could take years.
The salaries of appointed officials like the CA are set in a “range” according to the County Code 3-2.1, all dependant on an evaluation of the “appointing authority”.
Even if a salary is set at say $107,335 a year like that of the new county auditor- which is set in the salary commission’s resolution pursuant to the new charter amendment passed last November- it could be much lower at the discretion of the person appointing the new auditor, based on a standard evaluation form to be provided by the director of the Department of Personal.
But whereas the current ordinance reads “(t)he county attorney’s salary shall be evaluated by the mayor and the council” the proposed ordnance deletes that and substitutes “the county attorney’s performance shall be conducted (sic) through an equally weighed evaluation that shall be jointly administered by the mayor and the council chairperson”.
Though it may seem like a minor change since the council chair serves at the pleasure of the majority of the council, in the case of Asing, who apparently abuses his discretionary power at every chance, it’s a change that only consolidates the power of the minotaur with another blind alley in the undersea labyrinth that squelches dissidents and allows him to “do what’s wrong as long as he can”.
---------
(We’ve been asked recently “what’s all this minotaur stuff?” We were going to link again to the video of the Minotaur Song by the Incredible String Band we previously posted but it apparently has been removed from youtube by the poster. But never fear- someone has done a new and improved full length version linked below. )
(If you are one of our email subscribers click here).
Monday, May 18, 2009
A LITTLE LIGHT DOG WAGGING
A LITTLE LIGHT DOG WAGGING: Last Thursday the Kaua`i Board of Ethics (BOE) finally and unexpectedly released the county attorney opinion that had apparently caused them to ignore the plain reading of the ethics section of the county charter in favor of the subordinate county code provisions on ethics
It confirms the suspicions we expressed in our three part series on the “Unethical Culture” (see left rail) of the BOE- that somehow, despite a strict ban in the charter on county officials- including board and commission (B&Cs) members- appearing on behalf of private interests before other B&Cs, the opinion lets the tail wag the dog by giving legitimacy to provisions of subservient law that seek to contradict the charter.
And indeed in the second paragraph of the opinion it says
Section 20.02(D) of the Charter reads: "No officer or employee of the county shall appear in behalf of private interests before any county board, commission or agency." On its face, this language appears to be a complete prohibition, preventing any officer or employee from acting for the benefit of any private interest before a county agency, board or commission.
But the next sentence is key to the disconnect, penned by former Deputy CA Margaret Sueoka who, perhaps not so coincidentally, was recently fired by Castillo and has filed a discrimination complaint against the county over the firing.
She wrote:
The language of the Code elaborates upon the Charter provision, and identifies more specifically those types of conduct which would constitute conflicts of interest
And there lies one of the “fatal flaws” apparently cited by BOE member Paul Weil, according to Michael Levine’s article on the meeting in the local paper.
The language of the “code” or ordinance, does not “elaborate” on the charter- which is what an ordinance is supposed to do- but rather, at best is silent on the charter provision and if applied, would contradict the charter.
As we discussed on our three part series Section 3-1.7 of the county code details many specific conflict of interest situations that are strictly prohibited. But the code specifically says these are based on Charter Section 20.01 which bans acts to confer special benefits on one’s self or others among other things.
In fact the code does not even mention 20.02(D) specifically anywhere, leaving unaddressed the matters brought up by what Sueoka admitted is a strict prohibition,.
The opinion seeks to use the state constitution and out-of-state court rulings to say that the charter and code must be read together and while that is true it’s the relevant sections of each that must be read together.
It would sort of be like reading a strict charter prohibition on robbing banks and saying because it isn’t addressed in the dog leash ordinance, bank robbery is ok.
But, even of there were a confluence of the specific conflicts in the code and the strict prohibitions of the charter, just because there are specifically described “conflict of interest” prohibitions in the code does not make the code a complete list of actions banned in the charter and in fact that contention is never made in the code.
Also on Thursday the BOE called on Castillo to look at the opinion with an eye toward “withdrawing it, affirming it, or modifying it” according to Levine’s article. But it appears our hopes for an honest legal look at the provisions from Castillo might have been dashed if comments from Castillo are indicative of his intentions.
Instead of addressing the legal ramification of the plain reading of 20.02(D) and the existing CA opinion Castillo seems infatuated with the political ramifications.
He’s quoted by Levine as saying
“What does this legal mumbo jumbo mean?” Castillo said when discussing the issue less than an hour before the board released the opinion. “To me, what this means is, to read Section 20.02 by itself would give an unwarranted chilling effect to contributing members of our society who desire to volunteer their time and their expertise to help this county become a better place.”
In the interview, (BOE Member and Food Bank ED Judith)Lenthall said it was not fair that she be expected to give up the rights of a private citizen, including the right, for example, to challenge a property tax assessment.
That “right” as we said before is not being challenged by anyone. What is being challenged in a complaint filed by fellow BOE member Rolf Bieber is the privilege of sitting on a county board that may in fact sit in judgment of a county councilperson while she is also asking the council for money for the Food Bank.
“That’s where I drew the line regarding the absurdity of just sticking to 20.02,” Castillo said. “That’s why we’re saying that the County Charter and the County Code should be read in conjunction because to do otherwise would create absurd results.”
It appears that Castillo is buying into the tail “wagging the dog” interpretations by saying that because the law has results that are perhaps politically uncomfortable, it is up to him to issue a quasi-judicial “opinion” to correct that “absurdity” rather than doing it legislatively- by ordinance if possible or by changing the charter.
The reason for this attempt to hijack the political process may be that last fall the citizens were asked to exempt board and commission members from the onus of 20.02(D) but that measure was soundly defeated.
After the citing of the legal need to read the code and charter together the opinion goes on to make one of its more absurd arguments regarding “intent”.
It cites the charters of Maui and Hawai`i counties saying
as we can see from the Charters of Maui and the Big Island, the effect of reading our Charter and Code provisions together is to achieve the same basic scope as those of the Charters of these other Counties.
This is a another “fatal flaw”, coming from a 1976 letter from then CA Michael Belles as the council debated and later passed Sect. 3 of the county code.
The flaw becomes immediately apparent because it then quotes the charters of those others counties which are substantially different from ours on Kaua`i. Theirs start out with the same type of prohibitions as 20.02(D) but go on to say
An officer serving the county without compensation, however, may appear for compensation in behalf of private interests before county agencies other than the one on which the officer serves and other than those agencies that have the power to review the actions of the agency on which the officer serves or to act on the same subject matter as the agency on which the officer serves.
If the intent in the Kaua`i Charter was to do that they obviously would have done it- and could easily have done it as the other counties did. The fact that they didn’t include the language shows if anything a desire for a higher ethical standard than the other counties.
Perhaps by wrongly reading some intent that wasn’t there the council that passed the code on Kaua`i sought to make believe that provision was in the charter. But wishing doesn’t make them suddenly appear in the charter- only an illusionist can do that.
An email that arrived today from BOE watchdog Horace Stoessel states it clearly and unambiguously
He states:
Like the charters of Maui and Big Island , the Kaua’i County Charter prohibits members of government from appearing in behalf of private interests before County agencies. But whereas the other charters exempt members of boards and commissions from having to comply with the prohibition, our Charter Section 20.02D does not exempt them.
Last year the Charter Commission proposed exempting board/commission members from having to comply with 20.02D. The voters rejected the proposed charter amendment.
No matter how much Castillo- and apparently last year’s Charter Commission- wishes that the Kaua`i Charter read differently the strict prohibition remains in place today and will for at least the next year and a half.
The code addresses only specific concrete conflicts of interest that are specifically banned and then, as it states, based only on the “special favors” provisions in 20.01 of the charter. Nowhere does it say it is an exclusive list and nowhere does it address the prohibitions of 20.02(D) which are included to ensure Kaua`i officials conduct business with the highest possible level of ethics.
20.02(D) is signed to avoid even the appearance of the type of impropriety that could result in a tit-for-tat approval by a member of one B&C, of a request from a member of another B&C- who would then presumably be tempted to turn around and approve the request of a member of the first B&C.
The Kaua`i provision is specifically to remove those temptations.
County attorney options have as close to the effective weight of an actual judicial ruling as one can get. All county entities are expected to abide by them as if they were case law and indeed can lose protections against lawsuits if they don’t.
They become the de facto “law of the land” and can only be challenged by going to an actual judge or having them reversed by, most likely, a subsequent CA.
It is the responsibility of the county attorney to opine only on the law and to separate out the political considerations and notify the political entities that the have two choices- to either change or abide by the law as it stands.
It is not the bailiwick of the County Attorney to make those political decisions for elected officials by attempting to read into the law what should be or what they would like to see in the law.
That right is reserved for the political apparatus of the county- the council and mayor.
Castillo would do well to remember the fact that 99% of the residents of Kaua`i would never have the types of conflicts that people like the Bieber-complaints-cited Lenthall, Mark Hubbard and Lorna Nishimitsu because 99% of Kaua`i residents never appear “on behalf of” others before county entities and only occasionally if at all, appear as themselves.
The availability of that 99% for county service is the blind spot in Castillo’s claim that the law, as it stands, yields “absurd results”. Indeed it is the opposite of absurd- it denotes the highest of ethical standards are expected of those that serve the county.
Castillo’s “absurdity” claim is valid only if one is intent on supplanting government by the people and- more importantly OF the people- with a handful of revolving-door, paternalistic oligarchs.
It confirms the suspicions we expressed in our three part series on the “Unethical Culture” (see left rail) of the BOE- that somehow, despite a strict ban in the charter on county officials- including board and commission (B&Cs) members- appearing on behalf of private interests before other B&Cs, the opinion lets the tail wag the dog by giving legitimacy to provisions of subservient law that seek to contradict the charter.
And indeed in the second paragraph of the opinion it says
Section 20.02(D) of the Charter reads: "No officer or employee of the county shall appear in behalf of private interests before any county board, commission or agency." On its face, this language appears to be a complete prohibition, preventing any officer or employee from acting for the benefit of any private interest before a county agency, board or commission.
But the next sentence is key to the disconnect, penned by former Deputy CA Margaret Sueoka who, perhaps not so coincidentally, was recently fired by Castillo and has filed a discrimination complaint against the county over the firing.
She wrote:
The language of the Code elaborates upon the Charter provision, and identifies more specifically those types of conduct which would constitute conflicts of interest
And there lies one of the “fatal flaws” apparently cited by BOE member Paul Weil, according to Michael Levine’s article on the meeting in the local paper.
The language of the “code” or ordinance, does not “elaborate” on the charter- which is what an ordinance is supposed to do- but rather, at best is silent on the charter provision and if applied, would contradict the charter.
As we discussed on our three part series Section 3-1.7 of the county code details many specific conflict of interest situations that are strictly prohibited. But the code specifically says these are based on Charter Section 20.01 which bans acts to confer special benefits on one’s self or others among other things.
In fact the code does not even mention 20.02(D) specifically anywhere, leaving unaddressed the matters brought up by what Sueoka admitted is a strict prohibition,.
The opinion seeks to use the state constitution and out-of-state court rulings to say that the charter and code must be read together and while that is true it’s the relevant sections of each that must be read together.
It would sort of be like reading a strict charter prohibition on robbing banks and saying because it isn’t addressed in the dog leash ordinance, bank robbery is ok.
But, even of there were a confluence of the specific conflicts in the code and the strict prohibitions of the charter, just because there are specifically described “conflict of interest” prohibitions in the code does not make the code a complete list of actions banned in the charter and in fact that contention is never made in the code.
Also on Thursday the BOE called on Castillo to look at the opinion with an eye toward “withdrawing it, affirming it, or modifying it” according to Levine’s article. But it appears our hopes for an honest legal look at the provisions from Castillo might have been dashed if comments from Castillo are indicative of his intentions.
Instead of addressing the legal ramification of the plain reading of 20.02(D) and the existing CA opinion Castillo seems infatuated with the political ramifications.
He’s quoted by Levine as saying
“What does this legal mumbo jumbo mean?” Castillo said when discussing the issue less than an hour before the board released the opinion. “To me, what this means is, to read Section 20.02 by itself would give an unwarranted chilling effect to contributing members of our society who desire to volunteer their time and their expertise to help this county become a better place.”
In the interview, (BOE Member and Food Bank ED Judith)Lenthall said it was not fair that she be expected to give up the rights of a private citizen, including the right, for example, to challenge a property tax assessment.
That “right” as we said before is not being challenged by anyone. What is being challenged in a complaint filed by fellow BOE member Rolf Bieber is the privilege of sitting on a county board that may in fact sit in judgment of a county councilperson while she is also asking the council for money for the Food Bank.
“That’s where I drew the line regarding the absurdity of just sticking to 20.02,” Castillo said. “That’s why we’re saying that the County Charter and the County Code should be read in conjunction because to do otherwise would create absurd results.”
It appears that Castillo is buying into the tail “wagging the dog” interpretations by saying that because the law has results that are perhaps politically uncomfortable, it is up to him to issue a quasi-judicial “opinion” to correct that “absurdity” rather than doing it legislatively- by ordinance if possible or by changing the charter.
The reason for this attempt to hijack the political process may be that last fall the citizens were asked to exempt board and commission members from the onus of 20.02(D) but that measure was soundly defeated.
After the citing of the legal need to read the code and charter together the opinion goes on to make one of its more absurd arguments regarding “intent”.
It cites the charters of Maui and Hawai`i counties saying
as we can see from the Charters of Maui and the Big Island, the effect of reading our Charter and Code provisions together is to achieve the same basic scope as those of the Charters of these other Counties.
This is a another “fatal flaw”, coming from a 1976 letter from then CA Michael Belles as the council debated and later passed Sect. 3 of the county code.
The flaw becomes immediately apparent because it then quotes the charters of those others counties which are substantially different from ours on Kaua`i. Theirs start out with the same type of prohibitions as 20.02(D) but go on to say
An officer serving the county without compensation, however, may appear for compensation in behalf of private interests before county agencies other than the one on which the officer serves and other than those agencies that have the power to review the actions of the agency on which the officer serves or to act on the same subject matter as the agency on which the officer serves.
If the intent in the Kaua`i Charter was to do that they obviously would have done it- and could easily have done it as the other counties did. The fact that they didn’t include the language shows if anything a desire for a higher ethical standard than the other counties.
Perhaps by wrongly reading some intent that wasn’t there the council that passed the code on Kaua`i sought to make believe that provision was in the charter. But wishing doesn’t make them suddenly appear in the charter- only an illusionist can do that.
An email that arrived today from BOE watchdog Horace Stoessel states it clearly and unambiguously
He states:
Like the charters of Maui and Big Island , the Kaua’i County Charter prohibits members of government from appearing in behalf of private interests before County agencies. But whereas the other charters exempt members of boards and commissions from having to comply with the prohibition, our Charter Section 20.02D does not exempt them.
Last year the Charter Commission proposed exempting board/commission members from having to comply with 20.02D. The voters rejected the proposed charter amendment.
No matter how much Castillo- and apparently last year’s Charter Commission- wishes that the Kaua`i Charter read differently the strict prohibition remains in place today and will for at least the next year and a half.
The code addresses only specific concrete conflicts of interest that are specifically banned and then, as it states, based only on the “special favors” provisions in 20.01 of the charter. Nowhere does it say it is an exclusive list and nowhere does it address the prohibitions of 20.02(D) which are included to ensure Kaua`i officials conduct business with the highest possible level of ethics.
20.02(D) is signed to avoid even the appearance of the type of impropriety that could result in a tit-for-tat approval by a member of one B&C, of a request from a member of another B&C- who would then presumably be tempted to turn around and approve the request of a member of the first B&C.
The Kaua`i provision is specifically to remove those temptations.
County attorney options have as close to the effective weight of an actual judicial ruling as one can get. All county entities are expected to abide by them as if they were case law and indeed can lose protections against lawsuits if they don’t.
They become the de facto “law of the land” and can only be challenged by going to an actual judge or having them reversed by, most likely, a subsequent CA.
It is the responsibility of the county attorney to opine only on the law and to separate out the political considerations and notify the political entities that the have two choices- to either change or abide by the law as it stands.
It is not the bailiwick of the County Attorney to make those political decisions for elected officials by attempting to read into the law what should be or what they would like to see in the law.
That right is reserved for the political apparatus of the county- the council and mayor.
Castillo would do well to remember the fact that 99% of the residents of Kaua`i would never have the types of conflicts that people like the Bieber-complaints-cited Lenthall, Mark Hubbard and Lorna Nishimitsu because 99% of Kaua`i residents never appear “on behalf of” others before county entities and only occasionally if at all, appear as themselves.
The availability of that 99% for county service is the blind spot in Castillo’s claim that the law, as it stands, yields “absurd results”. Indeed it is the opposite of absurd- it denotes the highest of ethical standards are expected of those that serve the county.
Castillo’s “absurdity” claim is valid only if one is intent on supplanting government by the people and- more importantly OF the people- with a handful of revolving-door, paternalistic oligarchs.
Monday, December 7, 2009
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
R-E-S-P-E-C-T: The “old boys club” on Kaua`i is certainly not the province of a single gender anymore. The phrase is merely an anachronistic remnant of he days when only boys would and could be boys.
Today, regardless of gender, any jerkwad who has the self-initiative to step forward and “wrestle with the pigs” for a few years- developing a reputation for being willing to do and say just about anything to defend the privilege of the higher-ups by deflecting and absorbing the not-so-outrageous slings and arrows of public outrage at their future cronies' corruption- can live the dream of a becoming a “made man”- or woman... a mid-level “untouchable” as activist Ray Chuan used to call them.
But that doesn’t mean that they or their benefactors don’t still live in the dark ages when it comes to the on-the-job treatment of women- especially those that don’t respect the system that protects the protected and spits out dissidence.
A year ago this week we reported on the lawsuit of “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin who has sued the Kaua`i Transpiration Agency- specifically, Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo- for what appears to be a pervasive hostile atmosphere toward women at the agency.
As we wrote at the time:
Just as appalling as the actual discrimination is the fact the lawsuit was filed only because a year went by after Ah Quin’s filing of Hawai`i Civil Rights Commission (HCRC) and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) complaints without any attempt by the county to respond or even attempt to investigate the charges.
Then in April we reported on the case of former long time Deputy County Attorney Margaret (Hanson) Sueoka who has filed an EEOC complaint that has so far has resulted in the county attorney’s securing of $50,000 from the council to defend the charge. Her case remains under seal with the county apparently having responded to the EEOC case, unlike when Ah Quin’s case was ignored.
But the county still apparently hasn’t learned to respond to EEOC cases before they become lawsuits- where the specific details are publicly made available- and they apparently still haven’t learned much about responding to on-the-job sexual harassment claims or doing anything to stop them before they begin... much less disciplining the harassers.
These cases and others over the years however pale in comparison to the case of Kristan C. Hirakawa who, in a lawsuit filed in US District Court, alleges that even though she had won her 2001 EEOC case against the county while working for, surprise-surprise the Kaua`i Police Department (KPD), when the county, as required by the settlement, “reassigned” her to the Liquor Commission, she was further harassed at her new job.
The original filing had apparently never seen the light of reporting because EEOC complaints are considered confidential under federal law and are therefore exempt from the state’s sunshine and open records laws. The EEOC does however issue “Right to Sue” letters giving “permission” for a suit to arise from the complaint if the defendant doesn’t “settle” during the EEOC phase as it appears happened in Hirakawa’s current case.
According to the lawsuit filed through her attorneys, former state Attorney General Margery S. Bronster and local attorney Daniel G. Hempey:
(p)reviously, in approximately 2001, Plaintiff was employed as a dispatcher for the Kauai Police Department when she was sexually harassed by a co-worker. Plaintiff filed a Charge of Discrimination with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC"). As a result of the previous case, Plaintiff suffered serious physiological injury due to the sexual harassment, improper response to her legitimate complaint and loss of privacy that was inflicted on her while working in the Kauai Police Department. The matter settled without admitting fault.
Defendant County of Kauai agreed to identify and assist Plaintiff with obtaining another County job as a result of settlement negotiations in the previous case. Ultimately, Plaintiff obtained employment at the Kauai County Liquor Commission.
But that didn’t stop her new supervisor, Dexter Shimatsu, from continuing the typical cycle of sexual harassment followed by retaliation for whistle-blowing or the county’s, not just indifference but, apparently active aiding and abetting of Shimatsu’s actions
According to the suit,
(Hirakawa’s) situation within the Kauai County Liquor Commission remained relentless as the discrimination and harassment increased to the point of disabling her with severe emotional distress. Per doctor's orders, she has stopped working as a result, and remains unable to work in her County job due to the Defendant's failure and/or refusal to properly address the discrimination, harassment and retaliation she has suffered in the workplace.
We could characterize or pick and edit only the highlights of the sordid details but, with no space limitation and the fact that the allegations in the suit paint such a good portrait of Shimatsu and the county’s specific alleged actions- including the county attorney’s office’s alleged failure to investigate the EEOC claim and their decisions to rather fight it without any inquiry- we will print the pertinent section of the “Predicate Facts” contained in the suit.
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Predicate Facts 9-36
The County of Kauai, obviously aware of Plaintiffs previous case and emotional condition, placed her in a workplace with a known sexual harasser as a co-worker and a supervisor with no prior training in sexual harassment law. On information and belief, the County of Kauai has consistently failed to meet its legal obligations to identify and prevent sexual harassment in the workplace.
Upon relocation to the Kauai County Liquor Commission, Plaintiff was immediately subject to offensive conduct on the basis of her sex. Her supervisor, Dexter Shimatsu, made sarcastic comments about sexual harassment to Plaintiff, often alluding to her history of having made a sexual harassment complaint. Shimatsu complained to Plaintiff that he had to order all of the posters [of scantily clad women] removed from the workplace because the "County made me hire you."'
During the course of her employment Plaintiff was often the subject of ridicule, sexual innuendo, sexual emails and insults from her supervisor. Shimatsu called her holistic medical practitioner a "witch doctor", and wrote an email to her saying: Use your common sense...I think you'll stay healthy...Oh yeah, and sleep with your clothes on. You could catch a cold, the flu and get pregnant without your clothes on...all bad ailments.
Shimatsu's demeaning conduct continued. After Plaintiff entered her baby into a contest (which she did not win), Shimatsu left a newspaper clipping of the winning baby in her mail bin where all her co-workers could see it. Above the picture of the winning mother and baby Shimatsu wrote a note saying: I really think the baby won because the mother was cute. With that in mind, you really need to do something about yourself...so your baby can win. Your baby did her part by being cute... it's now up to you.
In May 2007, Shimatsu called Plaintiff into his office to tell her he heard from someone that her boyfriend was getting deployed to the Middle East. He stated, "You should buy your boyfriend a lot of condoms because there are a lot of prostitutes where he'll be stationed." He followed up in an email saying he doesn't think there are really prostitutes there.
At work the sexual harassment was incessant. Shimatsu continued degrading Plaintiff calling her such names as "tonta," meaning slow, dumb or stupid, and "shibai." Shimatsu made insolent comments about Plaintiff when she made a mistake but did not treat her co-workers rudely.
When she requested vacation time to care for her four month-old baby, Shimatsu responded in a memo stating: Your request for Vac/ Ct...was approved after much discussion...Lady, you give me a headache... always asking for special treatment as a female. I kind of feel its sexual harassment and should look into it. I think that's the only way I'm going to get rid of this nasty headache...what you think?
Plaintiff noted that other employees were not subject to insolent comments when asking for time off.
On another occasion, Shimatsu emailed to Plaintiff a photo of an attractive female dressed only in a tiny, diamond studded bikini. Shimatsu typed "You Wish" on the email before sending the email to Plaintiff from his work computer.
Plaintiff was unable to be in such a virulent environment where working meant being in constant dialogue with the perpetrator. She took leave on a disability claim. She sought medical help and counseling because of the harassment and discrimination at the Kauai County Liquor Commission. Under direction of Plaintiffs medical providers, she was not allowed to resume working while the harasser remained there or until the situation had been corrected.
In June of 2007, Plaintiff reported the sexual harassment to the County and sought disability leave from work.
The County did not pay on Plaintiffs disabilities claim and did not separate her from Shimatsu.
The County has failed to properly respond to or address the alleged sexual harassment complaint raised by Plaintiff.
The County broke its own County policy on sexual harassment as promised to Plaintiff and other County employees in a number of respects. First, the County promises that complaints of sexual harassment will be investigated within two weeks time. No timely investigation was done in Plaintiff's case. Secondly, County policy promises that the findings and results of an investigation into a complaint of sexual harassment will be made available to the complainant. The results of any investigation into sexual harassment have still not been made available to Plaintiff. And thirdly, County policy promises that corrective action will be taken when a County employee suffers from sexual harassment. On information and belief, no such corrective action has been taken.
Upon information and belief, the County's policy on sexual harassment in the workplace was intended to comply with applicable law.
Furthermore, the County ignored State and Federal law regarding the matter being pursued. The County instead protected the accused, her supervisor Shimatsu, offering no remedial action to Plaintiff and failing to conduct even a basic investigation for several months.
In many cases, County policy directs employees to report allegations of sexual harassment to the Office of the County Attorney to ensure, among other things, that the County acts in compliance with State and Federal law. However, in this case, the Office of the County Attorney chose to arbitrarily dispute Plaintiff's claim without adequate investigation and contrary to State and Federal law.
Upon information and belief, the County used a woman with no prior training or experience in sexual harassment investigations to perform the investigation of Plaintiffs complaint of sexual harassment.
A few months later, Plaintiff, through counsel, asked the Office of the County Attorney if she could have the results of its investigation(s) in Plaintiff's report of sexual harassment. The request was made pursuant to Haw. Rev. Stat. Ch. 92F et seq. (The Hawaii Public Records Act), but the Office of the County Attorney failed and/or refused to provide the results of the investigation to Plaintiff's attorney.
In August 2007, the County contacted Plaintiff and informed her that an interview was forthcoming, but it wasn't until September 14, 2007 when Ann Wooten, the chosen investigator, interviewed Plaintiff.
On information and belief, the County never asked Shimatsu if the Plaintiffs allegations against him were true.
The investigation was only performed after Plaintiff's disability pay had expired. The County left Plaintiff, a single mother of two, in a precarious financial position because of the delay in investigating her complaint and the lack of corrective action taken.
Plaintiff remains unable to resume working in direct contact with the same supervisor. Her accumulated losses approximate $50,000.00 even after mitigating wages lost by securing lower-paying employment. Her new position pays significantly less than her employment with the County.
The aforesaid events have changed the course of Plaintiff's life and career.
Plaintiff has complied with the administrative procedural requirements for maintaining a civil action for discrimination on the basis of sex and for retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. Plaintiff filed the aforesaid charges with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commissions, and the EEOC has made a determination of cause to believe that the alleged sexual harassment occurred.
On November 13, 2008 the EEOC found that "The Commission's investigation determined that there is reasonable cause to believe that Charging Party was subjected to sexual harassment because of her sex, female."
Thereafter the EEOC issued a "Right to Sue" letter and Plaintiff, and timely filed this action with 90 days of issuance of her Right to Sue letter, issued on March 3, 2009.
At all relevant times herein, the acts of the County were undertaken within the course and scope of Plaintiff's employment.
Today, regardless of gender, any jerkwad who has the self-initiative to step forward and “wrestle with the pigs” for a few years- developing a reputation for being willing to do and say just about anything to defend the privilege of the higher-ups by deflecting and absorbing the not-so-outrageous slings and arrows of public outrage at their future cronies' corruption- can live the dream of a becoming a “made man”- or woman... a mid-level “untouchable” as activist Ray Chuan used to call them.
But that doesn’t mean that they or their benefactors don’t still live in the dark ages when it comes to the on-the-job treatment of women- especially those that don’t respect the system that protects the protected and spits out dissidence.
A year ago this week we reported on the lawsuit of “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin who has sued the Kaua`i Transpiration Agency- specifically, Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo- for what appears to be a pervasive hostile atmosphere toward women at the agency.
As we wrote at the time:
Just as appalling as the actual discrimination is the fact the lawsuit was filed only because a year went by after Ah Quin’s filing of Hawai`i Civil Rights Commission (HCRC) and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) complaints without any attempt by the county to respond or even attempt to investigate the charges.
Then in April we reported on the case of former long time Deputy County Attorney Margaret (Hanson) Sueoka who has filed an EEOC complaint that has so far has resulted in the county attorney’s securing of $50,000 from the council to defend the charge. Her case remains under seal with the county apparently having responded to the EEOC case, unlike when Ah Quin’s case was ignored.
But the county still apparently hasn’t learned to respond to EEOC cases before they become lawsuits- where the specific details are publicly made available- and they apparently still haven’t learned much about responding to on-the-job sexual harassment claims or doing anything to stop them before they begin... much less disciplining the harassers.
These cases and others over the years however pale in comparison to the case of Kristan C. Hirakawa who, in a lawsuit filed in US District Court, alleges that even though she had won her 2001 EEOC case against the county while working for, surprise-surprise the Kaua`i Police Department (KPD), when the county, as required by the settlement, “reassigned” her to the Liquor Commission, she was further harassed at her new job.
The original filing had apparently never seen the light of reporting because EEOC complaints are considered confidential under federal law and are therefore exempt from the state’s sunshine and open records laws. The EEOC does however issue “Right to Sue” letters giving “permission” for a suit to arise from the complaint if the defendant doesn’t “settle” during the EEOC phase as it appears happened in Hirakawa’s current case.
According to the lawsuit filed through her attorneys, former state Attorney General Margery S. Bronster and local attorney Daniel G. Hempey:
(p)reviously, in approximately 2001, Plaintiff was employed as a dispatcher for the Kauai Police Department when she was sexually harassed by a co-worker. Plaintiff filed a Charge of Discrimination with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC"). As a result of the previous case, Plaintiff suffered serious physiological injury due to the sexual harassment, improper response to her legitimate complaint and loss of privacy that was inflicted on her while working in the Kauai Police Department. The matter settled without admitting fault.
Defendant County of Kauai agreed to identify and assist Plaintiff with obtaining another County job as a result of settlement negotiations in the previous case. Ultimately, Plaintiff obtained employment at the Kauai County Liquor Commission.
But that didn’t stop her new supervisor, Dexter Shimatsu, from continuing the typical cycle of sexual harassment followed by retaliation for whistle-blowing or the county’s, not just indifference but, apparently active aiding and abetting of Shimatsu’s actions
According to the suit,
(Hirakawa’s) situation within the Kauai County Liquor Commission remained relentless as the discrimination and harassment increased to the point of disabling her with severe emotional distress. Per doctor's orders, she has stopped working as a result, and remains unable to work in her County job due to the Defendant's failure and/or refusal to properly address the discrimination, harassment and retaliation she has suffered in the workplace.
We could characterize or pick and edit only the highlights of the sordid details but, with no space limitation and the fact that the allegations in the suit paint such a good portrait of Shimatsu and the county’s specific alleged actions- including the county attorney’s office’s alleged failure to investigate the EEOC claim and their decisions to rather fight it without any inquiry- we will print the pertinent section of the “Predicate Facts” contained in the suit.
--------
Predicate Facts 9-36
The County of Kauai, obviously aware of Plaintiffs previous case and emotional condition, placed her in a workplace with a known sexual harasser as a co-worker and a supervisor with no prior training in sexual harassment law. On information and belief, the County of Kauai has consistently failed to meet its legal obligations to identify and prevent sexual harassment in the workplace.
Upon relocation to the Kauai County Liquor Commission, Plaintiff was immediately subject to offensive conduct on the basis of her sex. Her supervisor, Dexter Shimatsu, made sarcastic comments about sexual harassment to Plaintiff, often alluding to her history of having made a sexual harassment complaint. Shimatsu complained to Plaintiff that he had to order all of the posters [of scantily clad women] removed from the workplace because the "County made me hire you."'
During the course of her employment Plaintiff was often the subject of ridicule, sexual innuendo, sexual emails and insults from her supervisor. Shimatsu called her holistic medical practitioner a "witch doctor", and wrote an email to her saying: Use your common sense...I think you'll stay healthy...Oh yeah, and sleep with your clothes on. You could catch a cold, the flu and get pregnant without your clothes on...all bad ailments.
Shimatsu's demeaning conduct continued. After Plaintiff entered her baby into a contest (which she did not win), Shimatsu left a newspaper clipping of the winning baby in her mail bin where all her co-workers could see it. Above the picture of the winning mother and baby Shimatsu wrote a note saying: I really think the baby won because the mother was cute. With that in mind, you really need to do something about yourself...so your baby can win. Your baby did her part by being cute... it's now up to you.
In May 2007, Shimatsu called Plaintiff into his office to tell her he heard from someone that her boyfriend was getting deployed to the Middle East. He stated, "You should buy your boyfriend a lot of condoms because there are a lot of prostitutes where he'll be stationed." He followed up in an email saying he doesn't think there are really prostitutes there.
At work the sexual harassment was incessant. Shimatsu continued degrading Plaintiff calling her such names as "tonta," meaning slow, dumb or stupid, and "shibai." Shimatsu made insolent comments about Plaintiff when she made a mistake but did not treat her co-workers rudely.
When she requested vacation time to care for her four month-old baby, Shimatsu responded in a memo stating: Your request for Vac/ Ct...was approved after much discussion...Lady, you give me a headache... always asking for special treatment as a female. I kind of feel its sexual harassment and should look into it. I think that's the only way I'm going to get rid of this nasty headache...what you think?
Plaintiff noted that other employees were not subject to insolent comments when asking for time off.
On another occasion, Shimatsu emailed to Plaintiff a photo of an attractive female dressed only in a tiny, diamond studded bikini. Shimatsu typed "You Wish" on the email before sending the email to Plaintiff from his work computer.
Plaintiff was unable to be in such a virulent environment where working meant being in constant dialogue with the perpetrator. She took leave on a disability claim. She sought medical help and counseling because of the harassment and discrimination at the Kauai County Liquor Commission. Under direction of Plaintiffs medical providers, she was not allowed to resume working while the harasser remained there or until the situation had been corrected.
In June of 2007, Plaintiff reported the sexual harassment to the County and sought disability leave from work.
The County did not pay on Plaintiffs disabilities claim and did not separate her from Shimatsu.
The County has failed to properly respond to or address the alleged sexual harassment complaint raised by Plaintiff.
The County broke its own County policy on sexual harassment as promised to Plaintiff and other County employees in a number of respects. First, the County promises that complaints of sexual harassment will be investigated within two weeks time. No timely investigation was done in Plaintiff's case. Secondly, County policy promises that the findings and results of an investigation into a complaint of sexual harassment will be made available to the complainant. The results of any investigation into sexual harassment have still not been made available to Plaintiff. And thirdly, County policy promises that corrective action will be taken when a County employee suffers from sexual harassment. On information and belief, no such corrective action has been taken.
Upon information and belief, the County's policy on sexual harassment in the workplace was intended to comply with applicable law.
Furthermore, the County ignored State and Federal law regarding the matter being pursued. The County instead protected the accused, her supervisor Shimatsu, offering no remedial action to Plaintiff and failing to conduct even a basic investigation for several months.
In many cases, County policy directs employees to report allegations of sexual harassment to the Office of the County Attorney to ensure, among other things, that the County acts in compliance with State and Federal law. However, in this case, the Office of the County Attorney chose to arbitrarily dispute Plaintiff's claim without adequate investigation and contrary to State and Federal law.
Upon information and belief, the County used a woman with no prior training or experience in sexual harassment investigations to perform the investigation of Plaintiffs complaint of sexual harassment.
A few months later, Plaintiff, through counsel, asked the Office of the County Attorney if she could have the results of its investigation(s) in Plaintiff's report of sexual harassment. The request was made pursuant to Haw. Rev. Stat. Ch. 92F et seq. (The Hawaii Public Records Act), but the Office of the County Attorney failed and/or refused to provide the results of the investigation to Plaintiff's attorney.
In August 2007, the County contacted Plaintiff and informed her that an interview was forthcoming, but it wasn't until September 14, 2007 when Ann Wooten, the chosen investigator, interviewed Plaintiff.
On information and belief, the County never asked Shimatsu if the Plaintiffs allegations against him were true.
The investigation was only performed after Plaintiff's disability pay had expired. The County left Plaintiff, a single mother of two, in a precarious financial position because of the delay in investigating her complaint and the lack of corrective action taken.
Plaintiff remains unable to resume working in direct contact with the same supervisor. Her accumulated losses approximate $50,000.00 even after mitigating wages lost by securing lower-paying employment. Her new position pays significantly less than her employment with the County.
The aforesaid events have changed the course of Plaintiff's life and career.
Plaintiff has complied with the administrative procedural requirements for maintaining a civil action for discrimination on the basis of sex and for retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. Plaintiff filed the aforesaid charges with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commissions, and the EEOC has made a determination of cause to believe that the alleged sexual harassment occurred.
On November 13, 2008 the EEOC found that "The Commission's investigation determined that there is reasonable cause to believe that Charging Party was subjected to sexual harassment because of her sex, female."
Thereafter the EEOC issued a "Right to Sue" letter and Plaintiff, and timely filed this action with 90 days of issuance of her Right to Sue letter, issued on March 3, 2009.
At all relevant times herein, the acts of the County were undertaken within the course and scope of Plaintiff's employment.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
(PNN) FORMER CA TAGUPA’S “BLUNDER” TO COST COUNTY OVER 6K:
FORMER CA TAGUPA’S “BLUNDER” TO COST COUNTY OVER 6K:
(PNN) It’s the perennial question regarding governmental SNAFUs, especially on Kaua`i, one taken advantage of by many a county worker- was it malfeasance, malpractice or simply incompetence?
Case in point an item on today’s council agenda:
C 2009-344 Communication (10/01/2009) from the County Engineer, requesting Council approval to write-off delinquent tipping fees in the amount of $6,044.98 for Eric Taniguchi dba Eric Taniguchi Trucking & Equipment ("Taniguchi") (Account #55445-432027), pursuant to Kaua`i County Code Section 21-9.4, relating to uncollectible delinquent tipping fee accounts (Department of Public Works Solid Waste
Division).
Matters like these seem to pop up on the agenda now and then, mostly for sewer fees that are uncollectible due to things like bankruptcies or simply the fact that it would cost more to sue the delinquent individual than they owe.
But a tipping fee- the money that commercial businesses pay per ton to dump their load in the county landfill? That’s a new one on us.
A look at the paperwork behind the request though shows a story of either the worst bungling incompetence in a long time or an effort by one individual- then Deputy County Attorney James Tagupa- to help Taniguchi get away without paying the $6,044.98 he owes the county.
According to a letter to the council from County Engineer Donald M. Fujimoto with the concurrence of Director of Finance Wallace G Rezentes Jr., it all goes back to May of 2001 when Taniguchi was issued a delinquency letter for $34,704.49 in tipping fees. After a June follow-up letter, in August Taniguchi’s tipping privileges were revoked after the county attorney’s (CA) office unsuccessfully attempted collection.
In September Taniguchi and the county reached a “payment plan” and the suit was dropped but apparently by January 2004 Taniguchi had fallen into delinquency and another plan was formulated to make him pay off $15,986.64 over the next 12 months.
Strangely enough considering the non-payment and default over the previous three plus years, Tagupa recommended that “no collateral be collected, given Taniguchi’s previous record of payment”.
Or non-payment as the case may be.
By November Taniguchi was in default again and was sent a letter by the Solid Waste Division that remained unclaimed and was returned. The County Engineer then asked the CA to file suit against Taniguchi for $3,681.52 and in March 2005 District Court entered a judgment for the county which was recorded with the Bureau of Conveyances against Taniguchi’s assets.
That’s when all the extremely specific facts in the letter turn vague.
For some reason “(a) satisfaction of judgment was filed by Tagupa with the District Court in July 2008 and subsequently with the Bureau (of Conveyances) in August of that year. The filings do not indicate why Tagupa filed the Satisfaction of Judgment” since apparently the judgment was never satisfied, although the letter fails to say this in so many words.
There is also no explanation of the discrepancy between the $3,681.52 that was apparently awarded in court and the $6,044.98 that the council is being asked to write off.
As the letter’s penultimate paragraph says “(a)s a satisfaction of judgment was filed, we are unable to pursue this debt further. Upon recommendation of the county attorney we request the said amount be written off.”
Tagupa no longer works for he county attorney’s office and County Attorney Al Castillo did not return a late morning phone call by press time requesting further information on why Tagupa filed the satisfaction of judgment or whether he was fired for the action.
Others in the CA’s office were apparently terminated when Castillo took over last spring including Margaret Hanson Sueoka who has filed a discrimination action with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) as PNN reported last April.
Many of those hired by Castillo were attorneys that had been apparently fired by new Prosecuting Attorney Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho who was elected last November after serving two terms on the county council.
(PNN) It’s the perennial question regarding governmental SNAFUs, especially on Kaua`i, one taken advantage of by many a county worker- was it malfeasance, malpractice or simply incompetence?
Case in point an item on today’s council agenda:
C 2009-344 Communication (10/01/2009) from the County Engineer, requesting Council approval to write-off delinquent tipping fees in the amount of $6,044.98 for Eric Taniguchi dba Eric Taniguchi Trucking & Equipment ("Taniguchi") (Account #55445-432027), pursuant to Kaua`i County Code Section 21-9.4, relating to uncollectible delinquent tipping fee accounts (Department of Public Works Solid Waste
Division).
Matters like these seem to pop up on the agenda now and then, mostly for sewer fees that are uncollectible due to things like bankruptcies or simply the fact that it would cost more to sue the delinquent individual than they owe.
But a tipping fee- the money that commercial businesses pay per ton to dump their load in the county landfill? That’s a new one on us.
A look at the paperwork behind the request though shows a story of either the worst bungling incompetence in a long time or an effort by one individual- then Deputy County Attorney James Tagupa- to help Taniguchi get away without paying the $6,044.98 he owes the county.
According to a letter to the council from County Engineer Donald M. Fujimoto with the concurrence of Director of Finance Wallace G Rezentes Jr., it all goes back to May of 2001 when Taniguchi was issued a delinquency letter for $34,704.49 in tipping fees. After a June follow-up letter, in August Taniguchi’s tipping privileges were revoked after the county attorney’s (CA) office unsuccessfully attempted collection.
In September Taniguchi and the county reached a “payment plan” and the suit was dropped but apparently by January 2004 Taniguchi had fallen into delinquency and another plan was formulated to make him pay off $15,986.64 over the next 12 months.
Strangely enough considering the non-payment and default over the previous three plus years, Tagupa recommended that “no collateral be collected, given Taniguchi’s previous record of payment”.
Or non-payment as the case may be.
By November Taniguchi was in default again and was sent a letter by the Solid Waste Division that remained unclaimed and was returned. The County Engineer then asked the CA to file suit against Taniguchi for $3,681.52 and in March 2005 District Court entered a judgment for the county which was recorded with the Bureau of Conveyances against Taniguchi’s assets.
That’s when all the extremely specific facts in the letter turn vague.
For some reason “(a) satisfaction of judgment was filed by Tagupa with the District Court in July 2008 and subsequently with the Bureau (of Conveyances) in August of that year. The filings do not indicate why Tagupa filed the Satisfaction of Judgment” since apparently the judgment was never satisfied, although the letter fails to say this in so many words.
There is also no explanation of the discrepancy between the $3,681.52 that was apparently awarded in court and the $6,044.98 that the council is being asked to write off.
As the letter’s penultimate paragraph says “(a)s a satisfaction of judgment was filed, we are unable to pursue this debt further. Upon recommendation of the county attorney we request the said amount be written off.”
Tagupa no longer works for he county attorney’s office and County Attorney Al Castillo did not return a late morning phone call by press time requesting further information on why Tagupa filed the satisfaction of judgment or whether he was fired for the action.
Others in the CA’s office were apparently terminated when Castillo took over last spring including Margaret Hanson Sueoka who has filed a discrimination action with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) as PNN reported last April.
Many of those hired by Castillo were attorneys that had been apparently fired by new Prosecuting Attorney Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho who was elected last November after serving two terms on the county council.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
COURTING DISASTER
COURTING DISASTER: Another day another charge of sexual harassment in government offices on Kaua`i this time at the state judiciary as reported in today’s local newspaper.
While the county has racked up at least three current sexual harassment suits- those of Kristan C. Hirakawa, Kathleen M. Ah Quin and Margaret (Hanson) Sueoka- as well as at least two thus far confidential Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) cases, every time we’ve reported on them we’ve heard from judiciary employees that the county’s penchant for hiring and protecting harassers is nothing compared to that of the state court system on Kaua`i.
So the suit against former Deputy Chief Court Administrator Ernest Barreira, comes as no surprise. The fact that he’s a “former” deputy and was, according to the suit, fired for his actions against Leanne Rosa speaks volumes as to the veracity of her claims as does the presence of a lawsuit which means that she has been granted “a right to sue” by the EEOC and the Hawai`i Civil Rights Commission (HCRC).
But, we thought, at least it’s not the county this time.
Until, that is, we read the penultimate paragraph in the newspaper story:
Barreira said in a brief telephone interview Monday that he is soon to begin a new job with the County of Kaua`i Department of Finance, as a procurement officer.
Are you freakin’ kidding? How many ways is that wrong?
First of all is the obvious liability given the guys history as a serial harasser as the suit alleges, which is exacerbated by the repeated failure of the county to do anything about it’s own complaints as we reported last December. The council has already appropriated untold dollars to fight the current suits and complaints and will probably be on the hook for huge settlements in some if not all of them.
But the question of how this guy got a civil service job in the finance department with a record of being fired and sued for harassment just further confirms the corrupt hiring practices of Malcolm “Mel” Fernandez’s Personnel Services Division as we’ve detailed here, here and here.
Looks like we’ll probably be paying for this too. Aren’t ya glad to be a Kaua`i taxpayer?
While the county has racked up at least three current sexual harassment suits- those of Kristan C. Hirakawa, Kathleen M. Ah Quin and Margaret (Hanson) Sueoka- as well as at least two thus far confidential Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) cases, every time we’ve reported on them we’ve heard from judiciary employees that the county’s penchant for hiring and protecting harassers is nothing compared to that of the state court system on Kaua`i.
So the suit against former Deputy Chief Court Administrator Ernest Barreira, comes as no surprise. The fact that he’s a “former” deputy and was, according to the suit, fired for his actions against Leanne Rosa speaks volumes as to the veracity of her claims as does the presence of a lawsuit which means that she has been granted “a right to sue” by the EEOC and the Hawai`i Civil Rights Commission (HCRC).
But, we thought, at least it’s not the county this time.
Until, that is, we read the penultimate paragraph in the newspaper story:
Barreira said in a brief telephone interview Monday that he is soon to begin a new job with the County of Kaua`i Department of Finance, as a procurement officer.
Are you freakin’ kidding? How many ways is that wrong?
First of all is the obvious liability given the guys history as a serial harasser as the suit alleges, which is exacerbated by the repeated failure of the county to do anything about it’s own complaints as we reported last December. The council has already appropriated untold dollars to fight the current suits and complaints and will probably be on the hook for huge settlements in some if not all of them.
But the question of how this guy got a civil service job in the finance department with a record of being fired and sued for harassment just further confirms the corrupt hiring practices of Malcolm “Mel” Fernandez’s Personnel Services Division as we’ve detailed here, here and here.
Looks like we’ll probably be paying for this too. Aren’t ya glad to be a Kaua`i taxpayer?
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
NOTHING LIKE BEING THERE
NOTHING LIKE BEING THERE: And speaking of getting “quitted” it appears the brief tenure of the worst reporter in the local newspaper’s annuls (yes, even Lester Chang) has ended after a week or so’s absence of the name of Leo Azambuja from the paper’s pages and today’s coverage of yesterday’s council’s organizational meeting by council neophyte Vanessa Van Voorhis.
For the record Editor Nathan Eagle did not return multiple emails seeking information on Azambuja’s job status.
Although the pedestrian coverage appeared adequate we can’t help wonder whether it’s a disease or a habit of the paper’s reporters to use the kind of “lede” that first day J-school students are warned against.
Professor: They know there was a meeting yesterday because you’re writing about it. Pick something that happened there- the most important thing- and put it at the top, in 25 words or less. Then follow the “inverted triangle” format- Don’t report events chronologically but by order of importance.
But speaking of neophytes- at least as far attending or even watching council meetings- Joan Conrow has her own first hand account today.
It’s nice to occasionally have the two newspaper experience on Kaua`i but someone was obviously having a bit of fun with both Van Voorhis and Conrow on the subject of having the meeting open to the public.
As we wrote last week, a few councils have actually done their organizational business in open session. The issue is always whether they appear to have been scripted.
But Van Voorhis wrote that “(o)fficials said the meeting was unprecedented in that it was the first time a Kaua`i County Council held such a caucus open to the public” while Conrow said “in a nod to 'transparency and open government' — words rendered as meaningless as pristine and sustainability — the new County Council did its organizing for the first time in public”.
Oh well. If either decides to attend on a regular basis they’ll get the hang of not believing a word of what they’re hearing and only half of what they’re seeing.
But we were especially taken aback by this quip from Conrow whose malice toward Tim Bynum has been hardly concealed of late:
Tim said he was expecting Councilmembers to have “equal and equitable access to the key documents that are theirs” before going on to say he wants to structure the Council so that decisions made in Executive Session are made public. That way, you see, he won’t have to risk violating executive privilege by leaking them to a certain blogger.
Ah, engaging in libel per se now, eh Joan?
For the record our report on the Margaret Hanson Sueoka suit last month was based on having attended council meetings for many years which enabled us to go back to our notes and decipher the background of the Margaret Hanson EEOC harassment case, without any conversation whatsoever on the subject about it with Bynum.
Seeing recent executive sessions listed to evaluate Nakamura’s performance right after one to consider the Hanson settlement helped tip us off. Then, upon hearing the council’s discussion of the plethora of harassment suits including an oblique reference to a case “right here” in council services- and knowing that deputies in the county attorney’s office serve both the administration and the council- we realized that perhaps Hanson’s suit may not have had anything to do with her experiences with the administration, as we had previously theorized.
Years of leg work- something our bum back prevents us from doing these days- paid off.
We remembered the incident with Nakamura years ago and sure enough when we checked our files from the era, it turned out that it was Hanson that was the deputy county attorney assigned to the council at the time- the one who was harassed by her then-boyfriend County Clerk Peter Nakamura, according to many council regulars and employees of council services at the time.
As they say, we deny the allegation and we deny the alligator- we did not seek, receive nor use any illegally obtained information in our report.
It’s all especially strange considering Conrow’s final statement:
In the end, Tim got what he wanted in terms of committee assignments, and so did JoAnn. The question now is whether they’ll also get something else they want — an executive search firm to find a new County Clerk. Mel and Derek said they like current Clerk Peter Nakamura and Nadine had to recuse herself because he’s her brother-in-law.
I know why Tim doesn’t like Peter, but I’m not sure what JoAnn has against him. I’m pretty sure he had to go through Seven Habits when he was her planning director.....
Maybe that search is because Nakamura’s actions in harassing Hanson cost the county the $250,000.
Actually JoAnn wasn’t enamored with Steve Covey and “The Seven Habits of Truly Disingenuous and Irritating Assholes” when she was mayor. As a matter of fact it was because of her 180 from the micromanaging of where every paperclip went as mayor to seeking to become the consummate politician when the voters threw her out of office, that she turning to Covey.
Funny story here- at the actual first “public” organizational meeting of the council when Yukimura returned to elective office after a hiatus, we actually asked Yukimura whether she was going to support Nakamura’s reappointment and she replied “why wouldn’t I- he was my planning director”... which we always thought to be a strange statement in and of itself because the planning commission appoints the planning director... which of course reinforced her penchant for micromanagement reputation.
So Round and Round the Mulberry Bush they go and it helps to see every council meeting for a decade plus and report on county government for 25 years if you want to be able to tell the monkeys from the weasels.
For the record Editor Nathan Eagle did not return multiple emails seeking information on Azambuja’s job status.
Although the pedestrian coverage appeared adequate we can’t help wonder whether it’s a disease or a habit of the paper’s reporters to use the kind of “lede” that first day J-school students are warned against.
Professor: They know there was a meeting yesterday because you’re writing about it. Pick something that happened there- the most important thing- and put it at the top, in 25 words or less. Then follow the “inverted triangle” format- Don’t report events chronologically but by order of importance.
But speaking of neophytes- at least as far attending or even watching council meetings- Joan Conrow has her own first hand account today.
It’s nice to occasionally have the two newspaper experience on Kaua`i but someone was obviously having a bit of fun with both Van Voorhis and Conrow on the subject of having the meeting open to the public.
As we wrote last week, a few councils have actually done their organizational business in open session. The issue is always whether they appear to have been scripted.
But Van Voorhis wrote that “(o)fficials said the meeting was unprecedented in that it was the first time a Kaua`i County Council held such a caucus open to the public” while Conrow said “in a nod to 'transparency and open government' — words rendered as meaningless as pristine and sustainability — the new County Council did its organizing for the first time in public”.
Oh well. If either decides to attend on a regular basis they’ll get the hang of not believing a word of what they’re hearing and only half of what they’re seeing.
But we were especially taken aback by this quip from Conrow whose malice toward Tim Bynum has been hardly concealed of late:
Tim said he was expecting Councilmembers to have “equal and equitable access to the key documents that are theirs” before going on to say he wants to structure the Council so that decisions made in Executive Session are made public. That way, you see, he won’t have to risk violating executive privilege by leaking them to a certain blogger.
Ah, engaging in libel per se now, eh Joan?
For the record our report on the Margaret Hanson Sueoka suit last month was based on having attended council meetings for many years which enabled us to go back to our notes and decipher the background of the Margaret Hanson EEOC harassment case, without any conversation whatsoever on the subject about it with Bynum.
Seeing recent executive sessions listed to evaluate Nakamura’s performance right after one to consider the Hanson settlement helped tip us off. Then, upon hearing the council’s discussion of the plethora of harassment suits including an oblique reference to a case “right here” in council services- and knowing that deputies in the county attorney’s office serve both the administration and the council- we realized that perhaps Hanson’s suit may not have had anything to do with her experiences with the administration, as we had previously theorized.
Years of leg work- something our bum back prevents us from doing these days- paid off.
We remembered the incident with Nakamura years ago and sure enough when we checked our files from the era, it turned out that it was Hanson that was the deputy county attorney assigned to the council at the time- the one who was harassed by her then-boyfriend County Clerk Peter Nakamura, according to many council regulars and employees of council services at the time.
As they say, we deny the allegation and we deny the alligator- we did not seek, receive nor use any illegally obtained information in our report.
It’s all especially strange considering Conrow’s final statement:
In the end, Tim got what he wanted in terms of committee assignments, and so did JoAnn. The question now is whether they’ll also get something else they want — an executive search firm to find a new County Clerk. Mel and Derek said they like current Clerk Peter Nakamura and Nadine had to recuse herself because he’s her brother-in-law.
I know why Tim doesn’t like Peter, but I’m not sure what JoAnn has against him. I’m pretty sure he had to go through Seven Habits when he was her planning director.....
Maybe that search is because Nakamura’s actions in harassing Hanson cost the county the $250,000.
Actually JoAnn wasn’t enamored with Steve Covey and “The Seven Habits of Truly Disingenuous and Irritating Assholes” when she was mayor. As a matter of fact it was because of her 180 from the micromanaging of where every paperclip went as mayor to seeking to become the consummate politician when the voters threw her out of office, that she turning to Covey.
Funny story here- at the actual first “public” organizational meeting of the council when Yukimura returned to elective office after a hiatus, we actually asked Yukimura whether she was going to support Nakamura’s reappointment and she replied “why wouldn’t I- he was my planning director”... which we always thought to be a strange statement in and of itself because the planning commission appoints the planning director... which of course reinforced her penchant for micromanagement reputation.
So Round and Round the Mulberry Bush they go and it helps to see every council meeting for a decade plus and report on county government for 25 years if you want to be able to tell the monkeys from the weasels.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
LIKE A GLOVE
LIKE A GLOVE: It isn't like it was a surprise when Kauai County Clerk Peter Nakamura* was apparently fired this week.
After all, the first shoe had been dropped over and over throughout the years with allegations that he had cost the county a cool quarter-million in the Margaret Hanson Sueoka harassment suit along with his alleged misdoings in collecting unapproved cash-for-vacation-time from former Chair Kaipo Asing as has been splashed all over the front page of the local newspaper recently.
Not only that but the second shoe had been poised for a gravity-driven trip for months with executive sessions concerning his employ showing up on the council's agenda almost every time they met.
But the fact that Nakamura was offered and accepted a job in the planning department was a bit odd given that the revolving door was wide open for him after his performance as perhaps the best flack-catcher the county has even seen.
We've had a love/hate relationship with Nakamura throughout his tenure. Early in his tenure his penchant for providing information and documents was unique in the county if not the state, where our sunshine law has been cited nationally for being one of the best while showing up among the worst when it comes to how it actually functions.
But that was before the ascendancy of Asing and, in serving the new king, Nakamura of course took to carrying the king's sword which in Asing's case was a heavy instrument indeed.
As per Asing's instructions, Nakamura became the scrooge of public information, fighting with aplomb councilmembers' battles with the Office of Information Practices (OIP)- like the one over the infamous ES-177 that eventually resulted in the recent full de-toothification of the OIP.
Someone that is willing to fall on his sword like that is invaluable in the corporate world and Kaua`i is littered with such former county officials who have found a place in the close knit Kaua`i business community based on their ability to take a bullet for their bosses... people like current Grove Farm VP Mike Tressler who, as Finance Director, parlayed his part in the pogrom that resulted in the removal of former Police Chief KC Lum, into his current high-paying position.
Could it be that Nakamura's claim that he was returning to his first love- planning- actually be true?
Whether or not that's the full explanation, his trip across the street to the administrative offices, while unique, fits quite well into Mayor Bernard Carvalho's scheme for filling positions with "protected" cronies. Anyone who has served with the kind of blind loyalty Nakamura has exhibited over the years can't help but be an asset to Carvalho in a way few if any from the outside can be.
But would Nakamura settle for a position as a lowly planner when lucrative job the business sector beckons? Of course not.
It just so happens that the planning department has a "temporary" director right now- Mike Dahilig who, according to the county charter, is unqualified to take the position permanently. And he has done the job he was sent to do- take over the reins of a department allegedly under FBI investigation and get the feds off their backs... not to mention guiding the difficult and potentially contentious process of passing the all important ordinance that returns scrutiny of tourist accommodation permits from the council back to the planning department in compliance with the so-called citizen-petitioned General Plan charter amendment.
Nakamura- who ironically served as Planning Director under then-Mayor, now-Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura (who apparently was instrumental in his firing)- seems to be the beneficiary of a circumstance that makes his future as planning director all but a formality once the commission acts.
So all's well in the Minotaur’s labyrinth as the bone mill cranks out another bowl of that distinctly Kaua`i-flavored porridge which, while sweet-smelling to the minotaur and his minions, stinks to high heaven to the rest of the island's denizens.
-----
*Correction: We inadvertently left off Peter Nakamura's name in the first paragraph. This on-line version has been corrected. We apologize for the error.
After all, the first shoe had been dropped over and over throughout the years with allegations that he had cost the county a cool quarter-million in the Margaret Hanson Sueoka harassment suit along with his alleged misdoings in collecting unapproved cash-for-vacation-time from former Chair Kaipo Asing as has been splashed all over the front page of the local newspaper recently.
Not only that but the second shoe had been poised for a gravity-driven trip for months with executive sessions concerning his employ showing up on the council's agenda almost every time they met.
But the fact that Nakamura was offered and accepted a job in the planning department was a bit odd given that the revolving door was wide open for him after his performance as perhaps the best flack-catcher the county has even seen.
We've had a love/hate relationship with Nakamura throughout his tenure. Early in his tenure his penchant for providing information and documents was unique in the county if not the state, where our sunshine law has been cited nationally for being one of the best while showing up among the worst when it comes to how it actually functions.
But that was before the ascendancy of Asing and, in serving the new king, Nakamura of course took to carrying the king's sword which in Asing's case was a heavy instrument indeed.
As per Asing's instructions, Nakamura became the scrooge of public information, fighting with aplomb councilmembers' battles with the Office of Information Practices (OIP)- like the one over the infamous ES-177 that eventually resulted in the recent full de-toothification of the OIP.
Someone that is willing to fall on his sword like that is invaluable in the corporate world and Kaua`i is littered with such former county officials who have found a place in the close knit Kaua`i business community based on their ability to take a bullet for their bosses... people like current Grove Farm VP Mike Tressler who, as Finance Director, parlayed his part in the pogrom that resulted in the removal of former Police Chief KC Lum, into his current high-paying position.
Could it be that Nakamura's claim that he was returning to his first love- planning- actually be true?
Whether or not that's the full explanation, his trip across the street to the administrative offices, while unique, fits quite well into Mayor Bernard Carvalho's scheme for filling positions with "protected" cronies. Anyone who has served with the kind of blind loyalty Nakamura has exhibited over the years can't help but be an asset to Carvalho in a way few if any from the outside can be.
But would Nakamura settle for a position as a lowly planner when lucrative job the business sector beckons? Of course not.
It just so happens that the planning department has a "temporary" director right now- Mike Dahilig who, according to the county charter, is unqualified to take the position permanently. And he has done the job he was sent to do- take over the reins of a department allegedly under FBI investigation and get the feds off their backs... not to mention guiding the difficult and potentially contentious process of passing the all important ordinance that returns scrutiny of tourist accommodation permits from the council back to the planning department in compliance with the so-called citizen-petitioned General Plan charter amendment.
Nakamura- who ironically served as Planning Director under then-Mayor, now-Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura (who apparently was instrumental in his firing)- seems to be the beneficiary of a circumstance that makes his future as planning director all but a formality once the commission acts.
So all's well in the Minotaur’s labyrinth as the bone mill cranks out another bowl of that distinctly Kaua`i-flavored porridge which, while sweet-smelling to the minotaur and his minions, stinks to high heaven to the rest of the island's denizens.
-----
*Correction: We inadvertently left off Peter Nakamura's name in the first paragraph. This on-line version has been corrected. We apologize for the error.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
DON’T YOU WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD ABOUT IT
DON’T YOU WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD ABOUT IT: The cesspool of sexual harassment in Kaua`i county government is nothing new to our readers.
But worse than the harassment itself and the retaliation, has been the utter lack of attention to the pervasive problem and indeed active attempts to make the growing list of complainants just go away.
Today the county council will, most likely, compound the problem by going into executive session to hear about the cases and then give the okay to the county attorney’s office to fight two of the more prominent lawsuits, those of “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin and former Kaua`i Police Department dispatcher and then Liquor Department employee Kristan C. Hirakawa who now is known as Kristan C Suniga.
Also outstanding is the case of Margaret Hanson Sueoka who has filed a case with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) as we exclusively detailed in June of 2009.
Ah Quin’s case, which we reported in December of 2008 remains the same but Suniga case- which we exhaustively detailed in December of 2009- originally filed in federal district court, has now moved to state circuit court.
And while the original case alleged one of the more nauseating tales of harassment and retaliation – in two different jobs no less- and told of a distinct lack of interest on the part of the county, the new case is, if possible, even more unsettling with details of harassment by the county attorney’s office front and center.
Suniga’s story of harassment began in KPD where she won a different suit and as a result she was moved to the Liquor Department where it didn’t just continue but escalated under her boss Dexter Shimatsu.
Yet that was only the beginning.
According to the suit:
Instead of investigating and remedying Plaintiffs sexual harassment claim, the County instead protected the accused supervisor, Shimatsu, by offering no remedial action to Plaintiff and. failing to conduct even a basic investigation for several months. The County failed to conduct an unbiased investigation to this day.
That’s where the much maligned county attorney’s office came into the picture and, the suit alleges, it compounded the already outrageous treatment of Suniga.
The suit goes on to say:
In many cases, County policy directs employees to report allegations of sexual harassment to the Office of the County Attorney, which is charged with allegedly overseeing an unbiased investigation of the matter. Thus, the Office of the County Attorney is responsible both for the Human Resource function of ensuring independent investigations of complaints of sexual harassment for the protection of county employees, while at the same time the Office of the County Attorney must defend the County against claims of improper sexual harassment in the workplace. In Plaintiff's case, the Office of the County Attorney did not make good on the County's promise of a fair investigation and appropriate corrective action, but instead the Office of the County Attorney, in 2007, used its position of trust and responsibility to investigate Plaintiffs complaint of sexual harassment in an adversarial manner, designed to minimize liability to the County by casting doubt on Plaintiff's character and allegations. 28. In August of 2007, the County contacted Plaintiff and informed her that the County Would conduct a sex) harassment/hostile work place investigation based on Plaintiff's allegations. The County offered Plaintiff the choice of one of three investigators, without disclosing their relative training and experience investigating sexual harassment claims.
Given no information as to each proposed investigator's background, Plaintiff chose Ann Wooton ("Wooton") based on the fact that Wooton was the only female investigator offered by the County.
Wooton is a county-employed grant writer/social worker, with no prior training or experience in sexual harassment investigations. The Office of the County Attorney oversaw an investigation into Plaintiff's complaints that was so biased that the investigator did not even ask Shimatsu the most basic questions such as if he had sent the sexually harassing emails and memoranda Based on this sham of an investigation, Wooton then concluded the investigation by finding, among other things, that Plaintiff's allegations could not be substantiated due to a lack of evidence.
The suit alleges that it took two months for Wooton to even interview Suniga and that even though she was entitled to the results of the investigation under the state’s open records law, “the Office of the County Attorney remarkably responded that the investigation would not be produced because, inter alia, it was prepared in anticipation of litigation”.
As if that wasn’t enough the next episode described in the suit was truly frightening
In the fall of 2008, an unknown individual or individuals hacked into Plaintiffs financial accounts, social networking accounts and various retail merchant accounts. The hacker made unauthorized purchases on Plaintiff's credit cards, and created and posted documents and web-pages online that falsely suggested that Plaintiff was not unable to work for Defendant, but that she was instead making significant money by moonlighting or working for the private sector while she claimed to be suffering from a hostile workplace at the Liquor Department. The hacker(s) took various actions with regard to Plaintiff's accounts, which appear to be designed so as to discredit Plaintiffs claims against the County.
Plaintiff reported the series of unauthorized hacks into her accounts and expenditures on her credit cards to the Kauai Police Department However, on information and belief, the Kauai Police Department (the defendant in Plaintiff's former case) took a report, but otherwise has done nothing to investigate or solve Plaintiff's reports of identity theft. Thereafter, the County sought to use the fabricated documents manufactured by the hacker(s) against Plaintiff.
The suit’s narrative sums up Suniga’s situation by saying:
The County, through the actions of supervisor Shimatsu, the Office of the County Attorney in managing the response to Plaintiffs complaints, and the Kauai Police Department in refusing to respond to her police report, has left Plaintiff, a single mother of two, in a precarious financial position. Plaintiff's mental and physical health has suffered due to the County's action and inactions.
Plaintiff remains unable to resume working in direct contact with Shimatsu.
The aforesaid events have changed the course of Plaintiff's life and career.
Plaintiff has complied with the administrative procedural requirements for maintaining a civil action for discrimination on the basis of sex for retaliation under Haw. Rev. Stat. § 378 et. seq. Plaintiff dual filed the aforesaid charges with the United States EEOC and the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission ("HCRC"). The EEOC made a determination of cause to believe that the alleged sexual harassment occurred. On March 17, 2010 the HCRC issued Plaintiff the notice of right to sue.
On November 13, 2008, the EEOC found that "The Commission's investigation determined that there is reasonable cause to believe that Charging Party was subjected to sexual harassment because of her sex, female."
Plaintiff timely filed this action within 90 days of issuance of her right to sue letter from the HCRC issued on March 17, 2010.
The County retaliated against Plaintiff by: 1) having the Office of the County Attorney direct an incomplete and inadequate investigation into Plaintiff's complaint of sexual harassment; 2) the Kauai Police Department's failure to investigate Plaintiff's complaint that someone hacked into Plaintiffs financial accounts and misappropriated her image and personal accounts; and 3) failing to timely promote Plaintiff from Trainee to Investigator I despite Plaintiff receiving "More Than Satisfactory" ratings from Shimatsu.
Tomorrow, in granting the county attorney’s request for more money to fight rather than settle the two suits, the council will no doubt be adding another misdeed to the list.
----------
We’re taking tomorrow off and possibly taking a long weekend although we may get to post something Friday. If not we’ll be back Monday.
But worse than the harassment itself and the retaliation, has been the utter lack of attention to the pervasive problem and indeed active attempts to make the growing list of complainants just go away.
Today the county council will, most likely, compound the problem by going into executive session to hear about the cases and then give the okay to the county attorney’s office to fight two of the more prominent lawsuits, those of “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin and former Kaua`i Police Department dispatcher and then Liquor Department employee Kristan C. Hirakawa who now is known as Kristan C Suniga.
Also outstanding is the case of Margaret Hanson Sueoka who has filed a case with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) as we exclusively detailed in June of 2009.
Ah Quin’s case, which we reported in December of 2008 remains the same but Suniga case- which we exhaustively detailed in December of 2009- originally filed in federal district court, has now moved to state circuit court.
And while the original case alleged one of the more nauseating tales of harassment and retaliation – in two different jobs no less- and told of a distinct lack of interest on the part of the county, the new case is, if possible, even more unsettling with details of harassment by the county attorney’s office front and center.
Suniga’s story of harassment began in KPD where she won a different suit and as a result she was moved to the Liquor Department where it didn’t just continue but escalated under her boss Dexter Shimatsu.
Yet that was only the beginning.
According to the suit:
Instead of investigating and remedying Plaintiffs sexual harassment claim, the County instead protected the accused supervisor, Shimatsu, by offering no remedial action to Plaintiff and. failing to conduct even a basic investigation for several months. The County failed to conduct an unbiased investigation to this day.
That’s where the much maligned county attorney’s office came into the picture and, the suit alleges, it compounded the already outrageous treatment of Suniga.
The suit goes on to say:
In many cases, County policy directs employees to report allegations of sexual harassment to the Office of the County Attorney, which is charged with allegedly overseeing an unbiased investigation of the matter. Thus, the Office of the County Attorney is responsible both for the Human Resource function of ensuring independent investigations of complaints of sexual harassment for the protection of county employees, while at the same time the Office of the County Attorney must defend the County against claims of improper sexual harassment in the workplace. In Plaintiff's case, the Office of the County Attorney did not make good on the County's promise of a fair investigation and appropriate corrective action, but instead the Office of the County Attorney, in 2007, used its position of trust and responsibility to investigate Plaintiffs complaint of sexual harassment in an adversarial manner, designed to minimize liability to the County by casting doubt on Plaintiff's character and allegations. 28. In August of 2007, the County contacted Plaintiff and informed her that the County Would conduct a sex) harassment/hostile work place investigation based on Plaintiff's allegations. The County offered Plaintiff the choice of one of three investigators, without disclosing their relative training and experience investigating sexual harassment claims.
Given no information as to each proposed investigator's background, Plaintiff chose Ann Wooton ("Wooton") based on the fact that Wooton was the only female investigator offered by the County.
Wooton is a county-employed grant writer/social worker, with no prior training or experience in sexual harassment investigations. The Office of the County Attorney oversaw an investigation into Plaintiff's complaints that was so biased that the investigator did not even ask Shimatsu the most basic questions such as if he had sent the sexually harassing emails and memoranda Based on this sham of an investigation, Wooton then concluded the investigation by finding, among other things, that Plaintiff's allegations could not be substantiated due to a lack of evidence.
The suit alleges that it took two months for Wooton to even interview Suniga and that even though she was entitled to the results of the investigation under the state’s open records law, “the Office of the County Attorney remarkably responded that the investigation would not be produced because, inter alia, it was prepared in anticipation of litigation”.
As if that wasn’t enough the next episode described in the suit was truly frightening
In the fall of 2008, an unknown individual or individuals hacked into Plaintiffs financial accounts, social networking accounts and various retail merchant accounts. The hacker made unauthorized purchases on Plaintiff's credit cards, and created and posted documents and web-pages online that falsely suggested that Plaintiff was not unable to work for Defendant, but that she was instead making significant money by moonlighting or working for the private sector while she claimed to be suffering from a hostile workplace at the Liquor Department. The hacker(s) took various actions with regard to Plaintiff's accounts, which appear to be designed so as to discredit Plaintiffs claims against the County.
Plaintiff reported the series of unauthorized hacks into her accounts and expenditures on her credit cards to the Kauai Police Department However, on information and belief, the Kauai Police Department (the defendant in Plaintiff's former case) took a report, but otherwise has done nothing to investigate or solve Plaintiff's reports of identity theft. Thereafter, the County sought to use the fabricated documents manufactured by the hacker(s) against Plaintiff.
The suit’s narrative sums up Suniga’s situation by saying:
The County, through the actions of supervisor Shimatsu, the Office of the County Attorney in managing the response to Plaintiffs complaints, and the Kauai Police Department in refusing to respond to her police report, has left Plaintiff, a single mother of two, in a precarious financial position. Plaintiff's mental and physical health has suffered due to the County's action and inactions.
Plaintiff remains unable to resume working in direct contact with Shimatsu.
The aforesaid events have changed the course of Plaintiff's life and career.
Plaintiff has complied with the administrative procedural requirements for maintaining a civil action for discrimination on the basis of sex for retaliation under Haw. Rev. Stat. § 378 et. seq. Plaintiff dual filed the aforesaid charges with the United States EEOC and the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission ("HCRC"). The EEOC made a determination of cause to believe that the alleged sexual harassment occurred. On March 17, 2010 the HCRC issued Plaintiff the notice of right to sue.
On November 13, 2008, the EEOC found that "The Commission's investigation determined that there is reasonable cause to believe that Charging Party was subjected to sexual harassment because of her sex, female."
Plaintiff timely filed this action within 90 days of issuance of her right to sue letter from the HCRC issued on March 17, 2010.
The County retaliated against Plaintiff by: 1) having the Office of the County Attorney direct an incomplete and inadequate investigation into Plaintiff's complaint of sexual harassment; 2) the Kauai Police Department's failure to investigate Plaintiff's complaint that someone hacked into Plaintiffs financial accounts and misappropriated her image and personal accounts; and 3) failing to timely promote Plaintiff from Trainee to Investigator I despite Plaintiff receiving "More Than Satisfactory" ratings from Shimatsu.
Tomorrow, in granting the county attorney’s request for more money to fight rather than settle the two suits, the council will no doubt be adding another misdeed to the list.
----------
We’re taking tomorrow off and possibly taking a long weekend although we may get to post something Friday. If not we’ll be back Monday.
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