A MAN, A PLAN, A DEBACLE- RAPOZO: After decades of problems keeping the rain off the Kilauea Gym floor, the Director of the Kaua`i Parks and Recreation (P&R) Department, Lenny Rapozo, has finally come up with what many in the administration are calling a "brilliant" multi-pronged approach to fixing the structure which includes covering the current leaky roof with pili grass and moving the whole building 90 degrees to aviod the wet, easterly winds.
"A pili grass roof was good enough for the ancient Hawaiians so it should be good enough for us" said Rapozo, "especially if it's not raining."
The roof has never in human memory actually kept water out- which is thought by many in the Buildings Division of the Department of Public Works to be the main function of a roof- despite 137 attempts to replace it based on 373 different consultants' plans.
Rapozo also had a plan for the leaky door that faces into the rainy trade winds.
"We have hundreds of balloons and dozens of tanks of helium left over from the mayor's last campaign so we can just fill them up and float the building. And the beauty of it is that we can use all those political appointees and mayoral-approved civil servants who owe their jobs to him to turn the whole building, moving the door to a more desirable orientation... whichever way, after trial and error, that turns out to be."
According to Rapozo his own recent research has apparently shown that the current structure sits on the footprint and is a renovated version of the ancient "Kilauea Himanekium" where "pre-western-contact kanaka would go for drink beer." But, Rapozo said he discovered that during a 19th century renovation the building was inadvertently spun around sideways by witches, who were brought over for just such jobs by missionaries who were seeking to allow the structure to receive bigger shipments of bibles they could exchange for surrounding farms and home-sites.
"We're excited by the discovery" said Rapozo whose engineering expertise goes back to his days at Kapa`a High School where he lettered in "Pick-up Sticks" and "Tiddlywinks." He also studied basket-weaving, a skill he said may prove useful in the pili roofing project.
"I think I've got something here that nobody else could- or would- have come up with," Rapozo boasted with a straight face.
There are also plans to replace the wooden basketball floor with concrete and then put down lauhala mats in order to absorb any rainwater in case the pili grass leaks. "But the mats are only for when it rains because no one plays basketball in the rain anyway," said Rapozo. "Besides, the plan is all up here," Rapozo said pointing to his head "so we can save money on design consultants if the pili grass has to be replaced. Since everyone is used to paying over and over for consultants every year or so, we have an unending source of funding for the project, 'cause grass stay cheap, eh?"
Rapozo did not at first indicate where the cheap pili grass would come from since it is an all but extinct species but when asked of his plans for future recreational projects Rapozo said he's thinking of a Youth Program where students grow can pili grass on county land, then sell the product to the county for other roofing projects.
His boss, Mayor Bernard Carvalho applauded Rapozo's ingenuity. "That's why I hired him- since he has no expertise in any one particular area, he tends to think, not just outside the box but outside the entire realm of human endeavor and experience."
Rapozo also talked about- but didn't explain- either using the remaining balloons and helium to actually move Moran Pond at Lydgate or filling the balloons with the mud that now befouls the once popular swimming pools after a previous Rapozian plan to dredge the pools want awry... for some unfathomable reason.
"Then maybe the mud balloons will just float away," he said wistfully
Council Chair Jay Furfaro was cautiously enthusiastic over the plan saying "it wouldn't be the absolute stupidest thing we've ever approved- but it'd be close."
Councilperson JoAnn Yukimura was apparently skeptical but said she would have to see the plans in writing before she could really comment and recommend a thorough study of the project.
But Councilmember Mel Rapozo was both for it and against it, making sure that he didn't state a position until he figured out what the political implications were.
Blogger Andy Parx but did manage to wake up long enough to backhandedly mumble an ambiguous complement saying "it sound just like something Lenny would come up with since no one in the county is smarter or more suited to his job than he is."
Showing posts with label Lenny Rapozo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lenny Rapozo. Show all posts
Monday, August 27, 2012
Friday, April 27, 2012
OF SEWERS AND SKEWERS
OF SEWERS AND SKEWERS: The characterization of Kaua`i County government as an open cesspool has been more than appropriate for as long as we can remember. Sometime we feel like our function in life over the past few decades has been to observe the surface and provide commentary on the largest and smelliest of the visible and odoriferous of contents--the "turd de jour" if you will.
But there is one exemplary piece of excrement that seems to resurface with regularity: the gold-plated, iconic fecality of the re-re-re-roofing of the Kilauea Gym.
When we saw it on the county council agenda a few weeks back we assumed our recent cataract surgery had been a failure. Surely the leakiest roof in the west had been fixed "once and for all" the last time it was fixed "once and for all."
That was back in 2003 when, after at least two previous attempts at stopping the perennial waterfall that flooded the basketball court with every precipitation, the county hired an independent consultant to watch over the other consultants that watched over the buildings division that watched over the Public Works Department that watched over the contractor that built the roof that covered the house that built Jack-sh*t.
The first re-roofing was done after Hurricane `Iniki knocked off the original one- which we can remember leaking in the 70s. But that "new" roof stopped fulfilling it's function (if it ever "filled" it in the first place as some old-timers speculate) as soon as the FEMA warranty ran out after two years in 1999, Council Chair Jay Furfaro told the assembled last Wednesday. Attempts at fixing it, including first patching it followed by a brilliant scheme to build a roof covering the leaky roof, finally culminated in the county getting, well, Jacked-up, as we described above
Actually back when it had only been re-roofed twice it had become so archetypical of Department of Public Works' (DPW) incompetency that it was the key factor in various schemes by the council to "launch and investigation" into DPW under Charter section 3.17- the only provision in the guiding county document that allows the council to "interfere" in the functions of the administration.
The matter appeared on the council agenda repeatedly. This was during the "fog" years when a thick layer of snooze-inducing, mumbling whispers from DPW engineers and assorted functionaries routinely caused the council to react like Dorothy and her crew entering the poppy fields upon their first glimpse of Oz.
After hagglin' and stragglin'- mostly over how to proceed with an "investigation" thus allowing stonewalling by councilmembers, especially those who routinely addressed DPW officials as "my good friend"- it all culminated in a charter amendment setting up the Office of the County Auditor.
The Auditor, who serves at the pleasure and under the direction of the council, has actually completed an audit of the "re-roofing" of the Kilauea Gym. But it was published before the current leak was discovered during the recent big rains in March. And nobody really knows what it says because it doesn't seem to be posted at the Auditor's page on the county web site.
But guess what? The DPW- specifically the buildings division which is the place that building projects are overseen- has "handed off" the Kilauea Gym to the newly created Department of Parks and Recreation overseen by the usually stumblin' and bumblin' Lenny Rapozo, whose main qualification for the job was that he managed the campaign of Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. in the last election.
But never fear. Even though shovels of money have been poured into past efforts, the latest answer to the musical question, "Who'll Stop The Rain?" is "Lenny," who says he has $120,000 floating around in his budget to hire (drum roll please) another consultant--one who this time will certainly figure out what to do about the the fact that the old man has apparently been snoring while it's raining and pouring.
Oh yeah, we forgot, turns out the front door of the gym also leaks when it rains hard because not only was the entire gym designed improperly with the door facing windward (the direction from which rain usually comes) but there is no "awning" or "eave" over the door and apparently the door is not water tight either. So the rain comes through the door and the floor is now "cupping" where the rain has blown in and pooled.
Oh, and the "warranty" on the labor on the current roof? Wouldn't you know it, darn the luck. it's just run out because somehow, despite the fact that there had been nothing but problems with the leaky roof for decades, the county failed to obtain a "lifetime" warranty.
It would seem that if there is indeed another "design flaw" someone- perhaps the contractors and/or consultants- should be held responsible. But of course the county will most likely only be able to prove this if we hire outside attorneys, and that would probably cost ten times what a new roof would cost.
The council has instructed Rapozo to report back in July. That should give us plenty of time to get a new pair of binoculars and a set of top-of-the-line nose plugs. We'll leave it to the council to purchase diving equipment- that's why they get the big bucks.
But there is one exemplary piece of excrement that seems to resurface with regularity: the gold-plated, iconic fecality of the re-re-re-roofing of the Kilauea Gym.
When we saw it on the county council agenda a few weeks back we assumed our recent cataract surgery had been a failure. Surely the leakiest roof in the west had been fixed "once and for all" the last time it was fixed "once and for all."
That was back in 2003 when, after at least two previous attempts at stopping the perennial waterfall that flooded the basketball court with every precipitation, the county hired an independent consultant to watch over the other consultants that watched over the buildings division that watched over the Public Works Department that watched over the contractor that built the roof that covered the house that built Jack-sh*t.
The first re-roofing was done after Hurricane `Iniki knocked off the original one- which we can remember leaking in the 70s. But that "new" roof stopped fulfilling it's function (if it ever "filled" it in the first place as some old-timers speculate) as soon as the FEMA warranty ran out after two years in 1999, Council Chair Jay Furfaro told the assembled last Wednesday. Attempts at fixing it, including first patching it followed by a brilliant scheme to build a roof covering the leaky roof, finally culminated in the county getting, well, Jacked-up, as we described above
Actually back when it had only been re-roofed twice it had become so archetypical of Department of Public Works' (DPW) incompetency that it was the key factor in various schemes by the council to "launch and investigation" into DPW under Charter section 3.17- the only provision in the guiding county document that allows the council to "interfere" in the functions of the administration.
The matter appeared on the council agenda repeatedly. This was during the "fog" years when a thick layer of snooze-inducing, mumbling whispers from DPW engineers and assorted functionaries routinely caused the council to react like Dorothy and her crew entering the poppy fields upon their first glimpse of Oz.
After hagglin' and stragglin'- mostly over how to proceed with an "investigation" thus allowing stonewalling by councilmembers, especially those who routinely addressed DPW officials as "my good friend"- it all culminated in a charter amendment setting up the Office of the County Auditor.
The Auditor, who serves at the pleasure and under the direction of the council, has actually completed an audit of the "re-roofing" of the Kilauea Gym. But it was published before the current leak was discovered during the recent big rains in March. And nobody really knows what it says because it doesn't seem to be posted at the Auditor's page on the county web site.
But guess what? The DPW- specifically the buildings division which is the place that building projects are overseen- has "handed off" the Kilauea Gym to the newly created Department of Parks and Recreation overseen by the usually stumblin' and bumblin' Lenny Rapozo, whose main qualification for the job was that he managed the campaign of Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. in the last election.
But never fear. Even though shovels of money have been poured into past efforts, the latest answer to the musical question, "Who'll Stop The Rain?" is "Lenny," who says he has $120,000 floating around in his budget to hire (drum roll please) another consultant--one who this time will certainly figure out what to do about the the fact that the old man has apparently been snoring while it's raining and pouring.
Oh yeah, we forgot, turns out the front door of the gym also leaks when it rains hard because not only was the entire gym designed improperly with the door facing windward (the direction from which rain usually comes) but there is no "awning" or "eave" over the door and apparently the door is not water tight either. So the rain comes through the door and the floor is now "cupping" where the rain has blown in and pooled.
Oh, and the "warranty" on the labor on the current roof? Wouldn't you know it, darn the luck. it's just run out because somehow, despite the fact that there had been nothing but problems with the leaky roof for decades, the county failed to obtain a "lifetime" warranty.
It would seem that if there is indeed another "design flaw" someone- perhaps the contractors and/or consultants- should be held responsible. But of course the county will most likely only be able to prove this if we hire outside attorneys, and that would probably cost ten times what a new roof would cost.
The council has instructed Rapozo to report back in July. That should give us plenty of time to get a new pair of binoculars and a set of top-of-the-line nose plugs. We'll leave it to the council to purchase diving equipment- that's why they get the big bucks.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
IT'S NEWS TO ME
IT'S NEWS TO ME: It only took a decade or so, which anywhere else might be seen as a snail's pace. But here on Kaua`i when it "only" takes a dozen to get the government follow the law your first thought is that it's miraculous that they complied at all.
When a long list of nominees for various boards and commissions were scheduled for interviews a week ago Tuesday we had little hope of seeing them on television. After all, it took over five year of complaining on our part to even get the Office of Information Practices (OIP) to tell the council to end the practice of holding the interviews in secret executive sessions and then another few years for the paternalistic then-Council Chair, Kaipo Asing, to actually comply.
But it took still a few more years before the council allowed the interviews to be video-recorded claiming they didn't have the money to do so- even though they paid to caption and televise up to an hour a week of those "grip and grin" certificates and awards that they present to auntie and uncle every time they sneeze and to every sports team that came in anywhere but last in Honolulu... especially around election time.
Now, after some dribs and drabs of individual interviews interspersed with council meetings over the last year or so, the yearly appointments- and more importantly reappointments- of a slew of board and commission members was actually televised last week.
And guess what? It actually produced news of sorts, although you wouldn't know it from perusing the local newspaper, probably because you had to actually be paying attention to both the interviews and the way government works around here to find it.
The biggest news came from outspoken Planning Commissioner Jay Kimura who has ascended to chair this year. Kimura is the one who, when you watch the planning commission meetings, is continually shaking his head in disbelief over the fact that transient vacation rentals (TVRs) can be put on agricultural lands in the first place, denouncing the way the permits for all types of TVRs are approved willy-nilly regardless of compliance with the law and generally kvetching about the lack of enforcement of TVR regulations for both existing permit holders and those for who have been rejected but continue to operate.
The news is that anyone who was wondering at the time exactly what happened in executive session when former Planning Director Ian Costa left his post under investigation by the FBI can wonder no more whether he resigned or was actually fired by the planning commission.
Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. was certainly circumspect about the circumstances, probably because he has since "hired" Costa- or at least told his former campaign manager Director of the Department of Parks and Recreation Lenny Rapozo to hire Costa- as a deputy director under Rapozo.
During Kimura's questioning Councilmember Tim Bynum directly asked Kimura "during your tenure the planning director changed. That was a decision of the board, correct?"
Kimura simply answered "Yes."
Bynum continued the questioning as to whether Kimura was happy with the new Director, former Deputy County Attorney Mike Dahilig, to which Kimura replied that he would "rather keep my opinion to myself," even though his disgust with Dahilig's lack of enforcement and lax attitude toward TVR permitting in general hasn't been very well disguised at planning commission meetings.
But now we do know that Costa was fired- as if there was really any doubt until now in the minds of any but the most rabid of Carvalho sycophants. Oh- that and, according to Rapozo, the "fact" that state attorney general is "going over the approved 'TVRs on ag land' permits"... whatever that means.
Another bit of major news is that Board and Commission Director John Isobe has "retired" and been replaced by former state House Representative from 1992-1993, Paula Ishii Morikami (D-12th District) who is apparently now the latest politically-connected apparatchik to join the Carvalho administration.
Isobe's "retirement" has yet to be formally announced but it came up during the interview with former District Court Judge Calvin Morishige who has been nominated to be on the Kaua`i Board of Ethics.
One bit of news of sorts that Morishige made was to say, in response to questions from Councilmember Mel Rapozo, that his opinion was that county attorneys who advise boards and commissions actually do just that and only that- advise them.
"Their opinion is only their opinion- the decision is up to the board," he told the council.
Now anywhere else in the world this would not be news. But under the Carvalho administration, County Attorney Al Castillo’s opinions are to be followed blindly by all. And if they are not, board and commission members have been threatened with the withholding of county representation should they be sued for their official actions, according to a lengthy discourse on the subject by Rapozo.
This has been especially true with the Ethics Board where commissioners have actually battled deputy county attorneys to get them to change their written opinion rather than make a ruling that would treat their advise as, well, advice as opposed to a dictum.
There was probably more news but it was really hard to stay awake through all the fawning and phoney praise for both the nominees and Carvalho for his wonderful choices... alternating with the occasional grinning through gritted teeth by both councilmembers and appointees, holding back what they really wanted to say.
It kind of makes you wonder what "news" might have come up behind closed doors for all those years where they didn't have to watch what they were saying. But then again current councilmembers are new at this "conducting the public’s' business in public" stuff, especially when it comes to having to interact with those who have seen the corruption of the Carvalho administration up close and personal and then allowing them to discuss it on TV.
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(Sorry for any flubs today- our editor's computer is down.)
When a long list of nominees for various boards and commissions were scheduled for interviews a week ago Tuesday we had little hope of seeing them on television. After all, it took over five year of complaining on our part to even get the Office of Information Practices (OIP) to tell the council to end the practice of holding the interviews in secret executive sessions and then another few years for the paternalistic then-Council Chair, Kaipo Asing, to actually comply.
But it took still a few more years before the council allowed the interviews to be video-recorded claiming they didn't have the money to do so- even though they paid to caption and televise up to an hour a week of those "grip and grin" certificates and awards that they present to auntie and uncle every time they sneeze and to every sports team that came in anywhere but last in Honolulu... especially around election time.
Now, after some dribs and drabs of individual interviews interspersed with council meetings over the last year or so, the yearly appointments- and more importantly reappointments- of a slew of board and commission members was actually televised last week.
And guess what? It actually produced news of sorts, although you wouldn't know it from perusing the local newspaper, probably because you had to actually be paying attention to both the interviews and the way government works around here to find it.
The biggest news came from outspoken Planning Commissioner Jay Kimura who has ascended to chair this year. Kimura is the one who, when you watch the planning commission meetings, is continually shaking his head in disbelief over the fact that transient vacation rentals (TVRs) can be put on agricultural lands in the first place, denouncing the way the permits for all types of TVRs are approved willy-nilly regardless of compliance with the law and generally kvetching about the lack of enforcement of TVR regulations for both existing permit holders and those for who have been rejected but continue to operate.
The news is that anyone who was wondering at the time exactly what happened in executive session when former Planning Director Ian Costa left his post under investigation by the FBI can wonder no more whether he resigned or was actually fired by the planning commission.
Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. was certainly circumspect about the circumstances, probably because he has since "hired" Costa- or at least told his former campaign manager Director of the Department of Parks and Recreation Lenny Rapozo to hire Costa- as a deputy director under Rapozo.
During Kimura's questioning Councilmember Tim Bynum directly asked Kimura "during your tenure the planning director changed. That was a decision of the board, correct?"
Kimura simply answered "Yes."
Bynum continued the questioning as to whether Kimura was happy with the new Director, former Deputy County Attorney Mike Dahilig, to which Kimura replied that he would "rather keep my opinion to myself," even though his disgust with Dahilig's lack of enforcement and lax attitude toward TVR permitting in general hasn't been very well disguised at planning commission meetings.
But now we do know that Costa was fired- as if there was really any doubt until now in the minds of any but the most rabid of Carvalho sycophants. Oh- that and, according to Rapozo, the "fact" that state attorney general is "going over the approved 'TVRs on ag land' permits"... whatever that means.
Another bit of major news is that Board and Commission Director John Isobe has "retired" and been replaced by former state House Representative from 1992-1993, Paula Ishii Morikami (D-12th District) who is apparently now the latest politically-connected apparatchik to join the Carvalho administration.
Isobe's "retirement" has yet to be formally announced but it came up during the interview with former District Court Judge Calvin Morishige who has been nominated to be on the Kaua`i Board of Ethics.
One bit of news of sorts that Morishige made was to say, in response to questions from Councilmember Mel Rapozo, that his opinion was that county attorneys who advise boards and commissions actually do just that and only that- advise them.
"Their opinion is only their opinion- the decision is up to the board," he told the council.
Now anywhere else in the world this would not be news. But under the Carvalho administration, County Attorney Al Castillo’s opinions are to be followed blindly by all. And if they are not, board and commission members have been threatened with the withholding of county representation should they be sued for their official actions, according to a lengthy discourse on the subject by Rapozo.
This has been especially true with the Ethics Board where commissioners have actually battled deputy county attorneys to get them to change their written opinion rather than make a ruling that would treat their advise as, well, advice as opposed to a dictum.
There was probably more news but it was really hard to stay awake through all the fawning and phoney praise for both the nominees and Carvalho for his wonderful choices... alternating with the occasional grinning through gritted teeth by both councilmembers and appointees, holding back what they really wanted to say.
It kind of makes you wonder what "news" might have come up behind closed doors for all those years where they didn't have to watch what they were saying. But then again current councilmembers are new at this "conducting the public’s' business in public" stuff, especially when it comes to having to interact with those who have seen the corruption of the Carvalho administration up close and personal and then allowing them to discuss it on TV.
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(Sorry for any flubs today- our editor's computer is down.)
Thursday, September 15, 2011
HOOK, LINE AND STINKER
HOOK, LINE AND STINKER: During the last month we've used the bill (#2149) to allow camping at Lydgate Park as a kind of case study of the long-practiced and well-honed dance of the headless chickens used by the last three Kaua`i administrations- especially in the Department of Public Works (DPW) and the now spun-off Department of Parks and Recreation (DP&R)- to run out the clock on county council oversight of various and sundry mismanagement schhemes.
But the manner in which DP&R Director Lenny Rapozo's final "rope-a-dope" performance yielded a split decision in favor of the bill's passage last Wednesday, gave a whole meaning to "don't ask me- I'm only in charge here."
Of course Rapozo's use of "the fog" and the "I not here" method of administrative oversight could not have been accomplished without council allies willing to look the other way at the misrepresentations and outright lies as well as the lack of any semblance of competency of Rapozo and his underlings.
After months of non-answers to "the eight questions" that had been repeatedly asked, in writing, of Rapozo, the bill was moved out of committee to the full council where last Wednesday despite the fact that there were amendments pending and it was no where near ready for a vote... something that has inflamed Chair Jay Furfaro's hair on many an occasion in the past.
Rapozo appeared after handing in the alleged answers just that morning, claiming he never had the questions- many of which had been sent in writing months ago- until the previous Friday. And, much to Furfaro's chagrin, they hadn’t even been distributed to councilmembers yet.
The old bait and switch made an appearance too. Seems the originator of "the fog" himself, perennial county appointee Ian Costa who now serves as Rapozo's deputy, had unexpectedly shown up instead of Rapozo the week before with Rapozo conveniently on the mainland, allowing Rapozo to claim he had no idea what had happened the previous week.
As we've previously described, it's a classic move Costa developed during the year-long "Developers Gone Wild," grubbing and grading hearings before the council in the 90's which exposed the early misdeeds of Jimmy Pflueger preceding the deadly Ka Loko Dam break for which Pflueger is scheduled to stand trial for murder later this or next year.
The session began with Council Chair Jay Furfaro waving around what a real plan would look like, taken from a Virginia Beach Virginia campground saying "can you kokua me... this is what I'm looking for Lenny."
The questions dealt with almost everything imaginable from lack of a sufficient number of toilets to insufficient staffing for maintenance and security and were seemingly at least partially a result of there being no written plan to make sure the professed "work-class facility" would even be run in an organized and coherent manager.
But try as he might, Furfaro could not get a commitment from Rapozo to put together such a plan by the time camping was scheduled to begin, 60 days after the passage of the bill.
Finally after twenty minutes of trying to get such a commitment from Rapozo, Furfaro demonstrated the council's archetypical part in the avoidance scheme by declaring Rapozo's "no" to be a "yes."
Of course the run-around can't properly function without an administration shill. The role was made for Councilmember Tim Bynum whose "don't confuse me with the facts" rhetoric, previously honed on the issue of the bike path, consisted of declaring the questions to have been answered already- whether they were or not- and calling all criticism of the not-ready-for-prime-time "plan" to be too "meticulous."
This left an opening for Councilmember Mel Rapozo to perform one of his classic ape-like chest beating routines consisting of lines like "That's our job, to be meticulous... guilty as charged."
But perhaps the most Kafkaesque scene in the melodrama played out over the issue of the "fishermen" who have traditionally frequented the area since, well, forever.
As championed by Councilperson Kipukai Kuali`i the council went back and forth, working to make sure fishers could go to the campground and essentially camp out while fishing without really being official campers.
Of course the task was impossible on its face. How do you allow people to stay overnight in the campground, in their tents, as long as they leave their fishing poles stuck in the sand with the line in the water- as described by Kuali`i- and then distinguish who is actually camping without a permit and who is simply fishing.
The council has been asking Lenny Rapozo- and Costa- for the actual metes and bounds of the camping area rather than providing the cruddy little map with dotted lines that had been made part of the bill. Mel Rapozo- an ex-cop- described the absurdity of the prosecution going to court with such a map and how any good attorney could raise enough questions to make it unenforceable.
The answer apparently was simply, as stated by many, that the standard was "we know who is camping and who is fishing."
Oh great. The island isn't sufficiently wracked with charges of "reverse racism" by the increasing number of uptight, malahini mainlanders who can't distinguish between the word "haole" as used descriptively and the more provocative "stupid f-ing haole." Now we have an area where the line between campers and fishermen is going to be- at least in their eyes- as much a factor of the shade of their skin as anything else.
County Attorney Al Castillo didn't really help by hemming and hawing and finally maintaining that it didn't matter what the law said as long as there was "sufficient notice" in the form of signage to tell the users what made a fisherman a fisherman and what made a camper a camper.
As if.
Finally, the answer was to be as ambiguous as possible and the council inserted language that allows "fishermen" to "fish" any place in the campgrounds where there isn't an actual designated camp site.
However all this probably doesn't matter one whit because, it was revealed, the county's park rangers are never there between 10:30 p.m. and 4 a.m. leaving enforcement of the unenforceable provision an academic matter anyway.
The bill passed with Kuali`i and Mel Rapozo voting against it and now it's up to the DP&R to promulgate administrative rules- which promise to be as vague as the bill- in the next two months and decide which parts of the campground to "open for camping" with no real idea of what is going to happen, in a classic Kaua`i County "ready, fire, aim" manner.
But whatever happens you can bet dollars to donuts that we haven't heard the end of the seven-year saga, especially when the first "you're not fishing, you're camping- I can tell by the color of your skin" ticket is issued.
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Note- We're working with a new editor whose schedule is malleable so, although we intend to keep to the 1 p.m. press time, there may be days when it is decidedly later.
But the manner in which DP&R Director Lenny Rapozo's final "rope-a-dope" performance yielded a split decision in favor of the bill's passage last Wednesday, gave a whole meaning to "don't ask me- I'm only in charge here."
Of course Rapozo's use of "the fog" and the "I not here" method of administrative oversight could not have been accomplished without council allies willing to look the other way at the misrepresentations and outright lies as well as the lack of any semblance of competency of Rapozo and his underlings.
After months of non-answers to "the eight questions" that had been repeatedly asked, in writing, of Rapozo, the bill was moved out of committee to the full council where last Wednesday despite the fact that there were amendments pending and it was no where near ready for a vote... something that has inflamed Chair Jay Furfaro's hair on many an occasion in the past.
Rapozo appeared after handing in the alleged answers just that morning, claiming he never had the questions- many of which had been sent in writing months ago- until the previous Friday. And, much to Furfaro's chagrin, they hadn’t even been distributed to councilmembers yet.
The old bait and switch made an appearance too. Seems the originator of "the fog" himself, perennial county appointee Ian Costa who now serves as Rapozo's deputy, had unexpectedly shown up instead of Rapozo the week before with Rapozo conveniently on the mainland, allowing Rapozo to claim he had no idea what had happened the previous week.
As we've previously described, it's a classic move Costa developed during the year-long "Developers Gone Wild," grubbing and grading hearings before the council in the 90's which exposed the early misdeeds of Jimmy Pflueger preceding the deadly Ka Loko Dam break for which Pflueger is scheduled to stand trial for murder later this or next year.
The session began with Council Chair Jay Furfaro waving around what a real plan would look like, taken from a Virginia Beach Virginia campground saying "can you kokua me... this is what I'm looking for Lenny."
The questions dealt with almost everything imaginable from lack of a sufficient number of toilets to insufficient staffing for maintenance and security and were seemingly at least partially a result of there being no written plan to make sure the professed "work-class facility" would even be run in an organized and coherent manager.
But try as he might, Furfaro could not get a commitment from Rapozo to put together such a plan by the time camping was scheduled to begin, 60 days after the passage of the bill.
Finally after twenty minutes of trying to get such a commitment from Rapozo, Furfaro demonstrated the council's archetypical part in the avoidance scheme by declaring Rapozo's "no" to be a "yes."
Of course the run-around can't properly function without an administration shill. The role was made for Councilmember Tim Bynum whose "don't confuse me with the facts" rhetoric, previously honed on the issue of the bike path, consisted of declaring the questions to have been answered already- whether they were or not- and calling all criticism of the not-ready-for-prime-time "plan" to be too "meticulous."
This left an opening for Councilmember Mel Rapozo to perform one of his classic ape-like chest beating routines consisting of lines like "That's our job, to be meticulous... guilty as charged."
But perhaps the most Kafkaesque scene in the melodrama played out over the issue of the "fishermen" who have traditionally frequented the area since, well, forever.
As championed by Councilperson Kipukai Kuali`i the council went back and forth, working to make sure fishers could go to the campground and essentially camp out while fishing without really being official campers.
Of course the task was impossible on its face. How do you allow people to stay overnight in the campground, in their tents, as long as they leave their fishing poles stuck in the sand with the line in the water- as described by Kuali`i- and then distinguish who is actually camping without a permit and who is simply fishing.
The council has been asking Lenny Rapozo- and Costa- for the actual metes and bounds of the camping area rather than providing the cruddy little map with dotted lines that had been made part of the bill. Mel Rapozo- an ex-cop- described the absurdity of the prosecution going to court with such a map and how any good attorney could raise enough questions to make it unenforceable.
The answer apparently was simply, as stated by many, that the standard was "we know who is camping and who is fishing."
Oh great. The island isn't sufficiently wracked with charges of "reverse racism" by the increasing number of uptight, malahini mainlanders who can't distinguish between the word "haole" as used descriptively and the more provocative "stupid f-ing haole." Now we have an area where the line between campers and fishermen is going to be- at least in their eyes- as much a factor of the shade of their skin as anything else.
County Attorney Al Castillo didn't really help by hemming and hawing and finally maintaining that it didn't matter what the law said as long as there was "sufficient notice" in the form of signage to tell the users what made a fisherman a fisherman and what made a camper a camper.
As if.
Finally, the answer was to be as ambiguous as possible and the council inserted language that allows "fishermen" to "fish" any place in the campgrounds where there isn't an actual designated camp site.
However all this probably doesn't matter one whit because, it was revealed, the county's park rangers are never there between 10:30 p.m. and 4 a.m. leaving enforcement of the unenforceable provision an academic matter anyway.
The bill passed with Kuali`i and Mel Rapozo voting against it and now it's up to the DP&R to promulgate administrative rules- which promise to be as vague as the bill- in the next two months and decide which parts of the campground to "open for camping" with no real idea of what is going to happen, in a classic Kaua`i County "ready, fire, aim" manner.
But whatever happens you can bet dollars to donuts that we haven't heard the end of the seven-year saga, especially when the first "you're not fishing, you're camping- I can tell by the color of your skin" ticket is issued.
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Note- We're working with a new editor whose schedule is malleable so, although we intend to keep to the 1 p.m. press time, there may be days when it is decidedly later.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
PERMITS? WE DON'T NEED NO STINKIN' PERMITS
PERMITS? WE DON'T NEED NO STINKIN' PERMITS: It's hard to know what goes on between those "world class" ears of Councilmember Dickie Chang sometimes but his attempt last Wednesday to defend the administration's vision of Lydgate Park didn't do much to help matters.
At last week's committee meeting council watchdog Ken Taylor delivered a scathing attack on the Department of Parks and Recreation's (P&R) contention that the camping facility described in Bill 2149 would be "world class" despite the lack of bathrooms and other facilities along with insufficient training, supervision and equipment- not to mention numbers of park maintenance workers- to keep it clean and safe.
Without mentioning P&R's head, Lenny Rapozo, or his deputy Ian Costa, Taylor made the mistake of saying that "where I come from" or anywhere else in the world for that matter, the department's leadership would be fired for the present conditions in the area even before camping is offered to visitors as a "first class" camping experience.
Chang's "rebuttal" was jaw-dropping, telling Taylor that "local people are not that hard to please," continuing with an implied and thinly-disguised racially-charged rant telling Taylor how local people don't want to hear "where I come from."
We can only surmise that in Chang's mind "local people" apparently enjoy bathrooms with perennially stuffed up toilets and sewage-tainted standing water, along with overflowing trash cans.
T'ank you massah fo' any small kindness. Just give us an ocean and a fishing pole and we's as happy as pigs in s**t, eh Dickie?
Well at least one "local" was more than offended.
In a letter to the editor in today's local newspaper our friend Camellia Ditch-Crosby of Lawa`i wrote directly to "Mr. Chang" saying:
We don’t know what locals you are talking to that say they are not hard to please regarding the parks’ condition because most of our `ohana and friends are not pleased at all.
It’s the worst condition it’s been in the 65+ years we’ve lived here. We are seven generations on Kaua`i. Yes, the lawn has been cut short and raked, but the bathrooms are filthy. The Kapa`a restroom, next to the police substation is a good example. The Po`ipu, Salt Pond and Nawiliwili restrooms too.
Some of my ‘ohana said the volunteers are now taking charge of cleaning and painting the pavilions and restrooms. Why? Please don’t generalize and say locals are not hard to please; that’s not true. We want to know where our tax dollars are being spent. Or are we going backwards and eventually the county will be using “out houses” the way we grew up.
The fact is that "local people" don't need an official "campground" to spend a couple of days at the beach. But we're all damn tired of disgusting bathrooms and the lack of enough toilets that's resulted from the county's creation of "beach parks" and then promoting them to visitors.
We as a community have to decide whether we want to keep creating "parks" and installing facilities at formerly "wild" places, making what used to be "local" spots suddenly attractive to visitors. Because then we not only essentially lose the ability to just pick up and camp there without permits but, as taxpayers, we have to pay for the resulting need to keep the places clean.
The "south Lydgate" area where the proposed campground sits is just such an place. If it weren't for Councilmember Kipukai Kuali`i demanding an amendment to define the campground area so that theoretically beach "fishing" could still take place, we'd have lost it entirely... although it's a crap shoot as to what will happen when the park ranger comes across a family that has just shown up, sans permit, and set up for a night of fishing on the beach- just outside the "official" campgrounds where tourists are paying $25 a night.
The schizophrenic vision of the "world class" facility with, according to Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura, design flaws that cause the ponding in the showers and bathrooms is not just a product of the usually muddled thinking Chang exhibits. The rest of the councilmembers present also voted to move the bill to the full council while Kuali`i and Councilmember Mel Rapozo- who have tried to hold Lenny Rapozo's and Costa's feet to the fire on the bill- were away on council business.
Despite the fact that nothing has changed since the bill was shelved years ago it will certainly pass next Wednesday. And then we'll have lost another beach due to the actions of the "park" developers- aka, the "world class" imbeciles in elective county office.
At last week's committee meeting council watchdog Ken Taylor delivered a scathing attack on the Department of Parks and Recreation's (P&R) contention that the camping facility described in Bill 2149 would be "world class" despite the lack of bathrooms and other facilities along with insufficient training, supervision and equipment- not to mention numbers of park maintenance workers- to keep it clean and safe.
Without mentioning P&R's head, Lenny Rapozo, or his deputy Ian Costa, Taylor made the mistake of saying that "where I come from" or anywhere else in the world for that matter, the department's leadership would be fired for the present conditions in the area even before camping is offered to visitors as a "first class" camping experience.
Chang's "rebuttal" was jaw-dropping, telling Taylor that "local people are not that hard to please," continuing with an implied and thinly-disguised racially-charged rant telling Taylor how local people don't want to hear "where I come from."
We can only surmise that in Chang's mind "local people" apparently enjoy bathrooms with perennially stuffed up toilets and sewage-tainted standing water, along with overflowing trash cans.
T'ank you massah fo' any small kindness. Just give us an ocean and a fishing pole and we's as happy as pigs in s**t, eh Dickie?
Well at least one "local" was more than offended.
In a letter to the editor in today's local newspaper our friend Camellia Ditch-Crosby of Lawa`i wrote directly to "Mr. Chang" saying:
We don’t know what locals you are talking to that say they are not hard to please regarding the parks’ condition because most of our `ohana and friends are not pleased at all.
It’s the worst condition it’s been in the 65+ years we’ve lived here. We are seven generations on Kaua`i. Yes, the lawn has been cut short and raked, but the bathrooms are filthy. The Kapa`a restroom, next to the police substation is a good example. The Po`ipu, Salt Pond and Nawiliwili restrooms too.
Some of my ‘ohana said the volunteers are now taking charge of cleaning and painting the pavilions and restrooms. Why? Please don’t generalize and say locals are not hard to please; that’s not true. We want to know where our tax dollars are being spent. Or are we going backwards and eventually the county will be using “out houses” the way we grew up.
The fact is that "local people" don't need an official "campground" to spend a couple of days at the beach. But we're all damn tired of disgusting bathrooms and the lack of enough toilets that's resulted from the county's creation of "beach parks" and then promoting them to visitors.
We as a community have to decide whether we want to keep creating "parks" and installing facilities at formerly "wild" places, making what used to be "local" spots suddenly attractive to visitors. Because then we not only essentially lose the ability to just pick up and camp there without permits but, as taxpayers, we have to pay for the resulting need to keep the places clean.
The "south Lydgate" area where the proposed campground sits is just such an place. If it weren't for Councilmember Kipukai Kuali`i demanding an amendment to define the campground area so that theoretically beach "fishing" could still take place, we'd have lost it entirely... although it's a crap shoot as to what will happen when the park ranger comes across a family that has just shown up, sans permit, and set up for a night of fishing on the beach- just outside the "official" campgrounds where tourists are paying $25 a night.
The schizophrenic vision of the "world class" facility with, according to Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura, design flaws that cause the ponding in the showers and bathrooms is not just a product of the usually muddled thinking Chang exhibits. The rest of the councilmembers present also voted to move the bill to the full council while Kuali`i and Councilmember Mel Rapozo- who have tried to hold Lenny Rapozo's and Costa's feet to the fire on the bill- were away on council business.
Despite the fact that nothing has changed since the bill was shelved years ago it will certainly pass next Wednesday. And then we'll have lost another beach due to the actions of the "park" developers- aka, the "world class" imbeciles in elective county office.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES: It's hard to know which is worse lately- Wednesday's befuddled and buffoonish rerun of the previous council Public Works Committee meeting on the Lydgate camping bill or the ill-informed and equally befuddled and buffoonish coverage and editorial of it in the local Kaua'i newspaper.
Two weeks ago we wrote:
The bill was snatched from the jaws of passage out to the full council at last Wednesday's Public Works Committee meeting by Councilperson Mel Rapozo's request for a deferral for two weeks after the rest of the council didn't seem to care about the myriad lies and coverups from Parks and Recreation Department Director Lenny Rapozo.
And the only thing that changed this time was that Rapozo, after promising answers in two weeks, had taken an extremely convenient and unannounced "vacation." And in his stead he sent the island's own roving flack-catcher, Ian "Waldo" Costa.
Like the striped shirted traveler, Costa seems to show up everywhere. Despite being canned from many county positions over the years- ranging from a stint as deputy county engineer during the "Developers Gone Wild" days when he looked the other way at Jimmy Pflueger's grading and grubbing violations, to his recent stint as Planning Director which ended with an FBI investigation and his resignation under fire- Costa is back, this time taking shrapnel for Rapozo over the seemingly inept attempt to get the camping operations going.
Costa is the champion of what council-watchers have called "the fog" which entails speaking in an almost whisper and lulling questioners to sleep with frustratingly vague answers. When pinned, he conveniently is unable to answer but promises that the person who can answer will come by in two weeks... at which time they send a different person who says only Costa or someone else can answer that.
So the most bizarre moment of the meeting had to be a seemingly out of the blue statement from Councilperson Nadine Nakamura who greeted Costa by noting he "happens to be a very good dodge ball player."
Sometimes the set-ups don't even need punchlines.
The meeting itself progressed, as expected, with the same staffing questions we described two weeks ago being the predominant topic of discussion. Despite the fact that the council and administration agree that they want to build a "world class" facility, with the current staffing levels- not to mention the lack of toilets- we're more libel to get third-world class campgrounds.
One new and revealing fact came out at the meeting and that is that the current staffing levels- which were increased when the plans for the campground were first floated in 2005- were based on a consultant’s report that estimated the maximum number of campers at 92- not the 300 the county plans on allowing initially - much less the 700 that could potentially be camping when all 31 campsites are in use.
Add that to the new soccer fields, the bike path and other expansions that weren't accounted for at the time and, according to the union, the current staff can barely keep up with the current usage. The toilets age constantly clogged, according to one councilmember and the trash cans overflow right now- without camping.
Not to mention the caretakers' daily, morning doggie doo pickup since the council decided to allow dogs on that portion of the bike path.
But of course Costa knew nothing about that except that Rapozo was seeming standing pat on the number of workers, despite concerns of the union that making the place "like a hotel" was going to take a lot more people to staff, especially with talk of "concierge service".
Apparently those concierges will be showing the guests to the port-a-potties that, the administration says, are going to have to suffice until new facilities are planned, paid for and constructed.
But even though all these problems were left unaddressed most councilmembers were ready to approve the bill.
What actually caused the deferment- although you wouldn't know from the newspaper coverage or editorial- was a comment from Councilmember Kipukai Kuali`i.
He simply asked Costa about what was going to happen to the slews of local fishers and their families who have frequented the area for decades, if not centuries. Are they now going to be ticketed and fined $100 for bringing their families and setting up their campsite for a night of fishing?
With that the council went bonkers and even though just moments before they seemed poised to pass the bill out of committee it was now back to the drawing board at least to define the boundaries of where the campground actually was- and wasn't- and what to do about the fishing families.
Despite all this we were greeted with an editorial from the newspaper demanding that camping begin "yesterday."
It was bad enough that they claimed that there was now going to be a two month delay when the bill was actually deferred for two weeks. But they apparently are demanding that all 31 campsites be opened immediately- something even the administration knows can't be done with facilitates and staffing at their current levels.
But ignoring those two issues they pooh-poohed any "enforcement" problems, quite possibly because whomever wrote the editorial only read the newspaper's story on the meeting which failed to mention the fishing situation. Or perhaps more likely, because the cultural malahini at the paper have no idea how important fishing- especially at that spot- is to local culture and tradition.
"Ready, fire, aim" has been the Kaua`i governmental mantra that drives real watchdogs crazy. But when the lapdog local paper decides that planning should be a victim of expediency how can we expect any more from our local officials?
Two weeks ago we wrote:
The bill was snatched from the jaws of passage out to the full council at last Wednesday's Public Works Committee meeting by Councilperson Mel Rapozo's request for a deferral for two weeks after the rest of the council didn't seem to care about the myriad lies and coverups from Parks and Recreation Department Director Lenny Rapozo.
And the only thing that changed this time was that Rapozo, after promising answers in two weeks, had taken an extremely convenient and unannounced "vacation." And in his stead he sent the island's own roving flack-catcher, Ian "Waldo" Costa.
Like the striped shirted traveler, Costa seems to show up everywhere. Despite being canned from many county positions over the years- ranging from a stint as deputy county engineer during the "Developers Gone Wild" days when he looked the other way at Jimmy Pflueger's grading and grubbing violations, to his recent stint as Planning Director which ended with an FBI investigation and his resignation under fire- Costa is back, this time taking shrapnel for Rapozo over the seemingly inept attempt to get the camping operations going.
Costa is the champion of what council-watchers have called "the fog" which entails speaking in an almost whisper and lulling questioners to sleep with frustratingly vague answers. When pinned, he conveniently is unable to answer but promises that the person who can answer will come by in two weeks... at which time they send a different person who says only Costa or someone else can answer that.
So the most bizarre moment of the meeting had to be a seemingly out of the blue statement from Councilperson Nadine Nakamura who greeted Costa by noting he "happens to be a very good dodge ball player."
Sometimes the set-ups don't even need punchlines.
The meeting itself progressed, as expected, with the same staffing questions we described two weeks ago being the predominant topic of discussion. Despite the fact that the council and administration agree that they want to build a "world class" facility, with the current staffing levels- not to mention the lack of toilets- we're more libel to get third-world class campgrounds.
One new and revealing fact came out at the meeting and that is that the current staffing levels- which were increased when the plans for the campground were first floated in 2005- were based on a consultant’s report that estimated the maximum number of campers at 92- not the 300 the county plans on allowing initially - much less the 700 that could potentially be camping when all 31 campsites are in use.
Add that to the new soccer fields, the bike path and other expansions that weren't accounted for at the time and, according to the union, the current staff can barely keep up with the current usage. The toilets age constantly clogged, according to one councilmember and the trash cans overflow right now- without camping.
Not to mention the caretakers' daily, morning doggie doo pickup since the council decided to allow dogs on that portion of the bike path.
But of course Costa knew nothing about that except that Rapozo was seeming standing pat on the number of workers, despite concerns of the union that making the place "like a hotel" was going to take a lot more people to staff, especially with talk of "concierge service".
Apparently those concierges will be showing the guests to the port-a-potties that, the administration says, are going to have to suffice until new facilities are planned, paid for and constructed.
But even though all these problems were left unaddressed most councilmembers were ready to approve the bill.
What actually caused the deferment- although you wouldn't know from the newspaper coverage or editorial- was a comment from Councilmember Kipukai Kuali`i.
He simply asked Costa about what was going to happen to the slews of local fishers and their families who have frequented the area for decades, if not centuries. Are they now going to be ticketed and fined $100 for bringing their families and setting up their campsite for a night of fishing?
With that the council went bonkers and even though just moments before they seemed poised to pass the bill out of committee it was now back to the drawing board at least to define the boundaries of where the campground actually was- and wasn't- and what to do about the fishing families.
Despite all this we were greeted with an editorial from the newspaper demanding that camping begin "yesterday."
It was bad enough that they claimed that there was now going to be a two month delay when the bill was actually deferred for two weeks. But they apparently are demanding that all 31 campsites be opened immediately- something even the administration knows can't be done with facilitates and staffing at their current levels.
But ignoring those two issues they pooh-poohed any "enforcement" problems, quite possibly because whomever wrote the editorial only read the newspaper's story on the meeting which failed to mention the fishing situation. Or perhaps more likely, because the cultural malahini at the paper have no idea how important fishing- especially at that spot- is to local culture and tradition.
"Ready, fire, aim" has been the Kaua`i governmental mantra that drives real watchdogs crazy. But when the lapdog local paper decides that planning should be a victim of expediency how can we expect any more from our local officials?
Monday, August 1, 2011
YOU GOTTA BELIEVE- YOU JUST GOTTA
YOU GOTTA BELIEVE- YOU JUST GOTTA: Kaua`i Council Chair Jay Furfaro probably regrets saying many things but none more than his indictment of the county's various administrations- their oft-cited penchant "ready, fire, aim" management.
It's looking like another fiasco is in the making as the council once again considers an eight-year-old bill to re-establish camping at the popular Lydgate Park despite the fact that nothing has really changed- at least for the better- since the bill was shelved back in 2005.
Back in the 70's Lydgate was thought by haoles to actually be spelled "Lid-gate" where mainlanders could easily purchase a "lid" of pakalolo from one of the locals' back-yard "money trees," leading to a wild-west milieu and eventually a murder that ended camping there.
The bill was snatched from the jaws of passage out to the full council at last Wednesday's Public Works Committee meeting by Councilperson Mel Rapozo's request for a deferral for two weeks after the rest of the council didn't seem to care about the myriad lies and coverups from Parks and Recreation Department Director Lenny Rapozo.
Lenny Rapozo was aided and abetted by Furfaro who, as usual, put public testimony up front before Rapozo was questioned by the council, making sure that no one but the council itself could point out the naked nature of the emperor.
The biggest dirty little secret of the whole camping at Lydgate venture- other than that virtually no one thinks it's a good idea- is that there is one, count 'em' one, regular men's toilet for the whole campgrounds.
When camping is in full swing it is expected to accommodate up to 400 campers and that doesn't include those using the nearby three soccer fields who are also expected to use the same facilities.
Oh, and by the way, that toilet is broken.
But when council watcher and "nitpicker" Glenn Mickens asked Furfaro about the fact that the number of toilets didn't come anywhere near the state Department of Health (DOH) standards for people-per-potty, Furfaro tried to go into one of his classic misdirectional spiels about how the bathrooms were now American with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant.
When Mickens tried to clarify what he was asking Furfaro threw one of his puffy-chested hissy-fits chiding Mickens for interrupting his non-responsive answer and refusing to not answer further until later in the meeting when no one was there to stop him from not answering.
The obfuscation didn't really get going until Rapozo took the hot seat, but first the United Public Workers union rep told the council that the three workers that were agreed to back in 2003 were no longer sufficient. With the additional soccer fields and the 150% increase in usage of the park now, even without camping they could barely keep the park clean, especially after picking up dog poop from the dog path first thing every morning.
Even worse were their concerns about workers' security and enforcement issues with overnight drinking permitted in county parks, not to mention the location of the park- snuggled between resorts in the middle of the visitor destination area, directly adjacent to the town of Wailua- and the lack of park rangers after 10 p.m.
The bottom line is apparently that Lenny Rapozo won't budge on the number of maintenance workers- an obstacle which councilmembers also tried to play down so the bill could be passed and the increase in cost for running the campgrounds could be dealt with later, no doubt as a "surprise" to the council.
One of the great moments came when Furfaro was finally free to do his "chronology" without Mickens there. First he told the union rep about the ADA compliance of the bathrooms- failing to mention how the whole campground had to be ripped out and rebuilt in '04 under then "Community Assistance" Director, current Mayor Bernard Carvalho.
Carvalho had authorized putting in the ADA campsites without any clearance or even consultation with either the state disabilities board or the mayor's ADA coordinator, whose office was just down the hall from Carvalho's.
The way they were constructed, people would have had to get out of their wheelchairs and crawl on their bellies to get onto the camping platforms, according to testimony at the time.
Furfaro was describing how the now-almost-rebuilt pavilion in the campground had burned down. The union rep asked "when was that?"
Furfaro responded "at night."
Anyway Rapozo was questioned by Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura whose first question was whether the ADA requirements were done and whether they "satisfied (and were) approved" by the DOH.
Rapozo answered that the "retrofits" were "done."
"Done?" asked Yukimura, seeming perhaps to have differing information.
"Well, in process," said Rapozo, who now admitted that they are still doing the "modifications" and, in answer to when they would be done told the assembled that the pavilion would be done "next week" and finally, after further prodding, that the ADA retrofits would be done "soon thereafter."
Following that little tooth-extraction Yukimura continued asking about the DOH requirements to which Rapozo responded that the bathrooms were indeed "clean."
When Yukimura finally asked specifically about the number of toilets per user and whether the DOH had signed off on that, she was confronted by what now has become a classic "Rapozoism."
"I'm gonna say yes," said Rapozo, "because I've gotta believe that when this concept first came," somebody must have checked with DOH and it was "done right."
Finally he admitted, under more questioning, that "the site hasn’t been changed since its inception."
But apparently no one bothered to go back and look at the minutes of the meetings in 2003 when the original bill was passed allowing camping and 2005 when the current bill revising the first one was introduced.
Because the fact that there weren't enough bathrooms was the reason why then Council Chair Kaipo Asing lit his hair on fire, finally "permanently" deferring the bill until that and a bunch of other matters were addressed by the administration of then-Mayor Bryan Baptiste and his "parks" guy, Carvalho.
Another indication of just how clueless Rapozo is came up when they were discussing the state-mandated administrative or "ad" rules that would have to be "promulgated" once the bill was passed under HRS Chapter 91.
During a discussion of whether the three workers currently employed for the park's maintenance were enough, Rapozo once again told the council that "I gotta believe that" the then-administration thought that there were enough for camping.
Then when Yukimura mentioned that the ad rules would require a public hearing, Rapozo actually responded by saying "not these."
Well Kaua`i does have its own way of doing things and in Lenny Rapozoland perhaps HIS ad rules don't require hearings. But in the state of Hawai`i they do.
Finally, as it looked like the bill just might be sent to the full council with the committee's approval Mel Rapozo- no relation- told the council that "there's one toilet and it's broken," calling for a deferral until they asked the DOH to provide, in writing, what the requirements actually were.
That, Mel Rapozo said, is because he remembered back in both '03 and '05 when one of Asing's famous PowerPoint presentations showed DOH documents stating that the bathrooms did not in fact meet the DOH requirements... they didn't even come close.
And that was just for the campgrounds- without the soccer fields or the pavilion which where not included in the original plans.
"That park is not ready for camping" said Mel before asking for and getting a deferral after embarrassing the rest of the councilmembers who previously had been poised to look the other way at all the same problems that had caused the bill to sit in committee for six years.
On Kaua`i if you want to be "made" in county government and be assured that no matter what kind of scandal you’re involved in- even if you're fired from one job for anything from incompetence to malfeasance- you'll always have an appointed job somewhere, you need to show all that you can sit there an lie to the council with "that's my story and I'm sticking to it" aplomb.
Lenny Rapozo's bonefides for appointment were apparently solely that he was Carvalho's campaign manager. But his ready, fire, aim hall of fame performance last Wednesday, has apparently assured us that we'll have him around to entertain us for years to come.
It's looking like another fiasco is in the making as the council once again considers an eight-year-old bill to re-establish camping at the popular Lydgate Park despite the fact that nothing has really changed- at least for the better- since the bill was shelved back in 2005.
Back in the 70's Lydgate was thought by haoles to actually be spelled "Lid-gate" where mainlanders could easily purchase a "lid" of pakalolo from one of the locals' back-yard "money trees," leading to a wild-west milieu and eventually a murder that ended camping there.
The bill was snatched from the jaws of passage out to the full council at last Wednesday's Public Works Committee meeting by Councilperson Mel Rapozo's request for a deferral for two weeks after the rest of the council didn't seem to care about the myriad lies and coverups from Parks and Recreation Department Director Lenny Rapozo.
Lenny Rapozo was aided and abetted by Furfaro who, as usual, put public testimony up front before Rapozo was questioned by the council, making sure that no one but the council itself could point out the naked nature of the emperor.
The biggest dirty little secret of the whole camping at Lydgate venture- other than that virtually no one thinks it's a good idea- is that there is one, count 'em' one, regular men's toilet for the whole campgrounds.
When camping is in full swing it is expected to accommodate up to 400 campers and that doesn't include those using the nearby three soccer fields who are also expected to use the same facilities.
Oh, and by the way, that toilet is broken.
But when council watcher and "nitpicker" Glenn Mickens asked Furfaro about the fact that the number of toilets didn't come anywhere near the state Department of Health (DOH) standards for people-per-potty, Furfaro tried to go into one of his classic misdirectional spiels about how the bathrooms were now American with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant.
When Mickens tried to clarify what he was asking Furfaro threw one of his puffy-chested hissy-fits chiding Mickens for interrupting his non-responsive answer and refusing to not answer further until later in the meeting when no one was there to stop him from not answering.
The obfuscation didn't really get going until Rapozo took the hot seat, but first the United Public Workers union rep told the council that the three workers that were agreed to back in 2003 were no longer sufficient. With the additional soccer fields and the 150% increase in usage of the park now, even without camping they could barely keep the park clean, especially after picking up dog poop from the dog path first thing every morning.
Even worse were their concerns about workers' security and enforcement issues with overnight drinking permitted in county parks, not to mention the location of the park- snuggled between resorts in the middle of the visitor destination area, directly adjacent to the town of Wailua- and the lack of park rangers after 10 p.m.
The bottom line is apparently that Lenny Rapozo won't budge on the number of maintenance workers- an obstacle which councilmembers also tried to play down so the bill could be passed and the increase in cost for running the campgrounds could be dealt with later, no doubt as a "surprise" to the council.
One of the great moments came when Furfaro was finally free to do his "chronology" without Mickens there. First he told the union rep about the ADA compliance of the bathrooms- failing to mention how the whole campground had to be ripped out and rebuilt in '04 under then "Community Assistance" Director, current Mayor Bernard Carvalho.
Carvalho had authorized putting in the ADA campsites without any clearance or even consultation with either the state disabilities board or the mayor's ADA coordinator, whose office was just down the hall from Carvalho's.
The way they were constructed, people would have had to get out of their wheelchairs and crawl on their bellies to get onto the camping platforms, according to testimony at the time.
Furfaro was describing how the now-almost-rebuilt pavilion in the campground had burned down. The union rep asked "when was that?"
Furfaro responded "at night."
Anyway Rapozo was questioned by Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura whose first question was whether the ADA requirements were done and whether they "satisfied (and were) approved" by the DOH.
Rapozo answered that the "retrofits" were "done."
"Done?" asked Yukimura, seeming perhaps to have differing information.
"Well, in process," said Rapozo, who now admitted that they are still doing the "modifications" and, in answer to when they would be done told the assembled that the pavilion would be done "next week" and finally, after further prodding, that the ADA retrofits would be done "soon thereafter."
Following that little tooth-extraction Yukimura continued asking about the DOH requirements to which Rapozo responded that the bathrooms were indeed "clean."
When Yukimura finally asked specifically about the number of toilets per user and whether the DOH had signed off on that, she was confronted by what now has become a classic "Rapozoism."
"I'm gonna say yes," said Rapozo, "because I've gotta believe that when this concept first came," somebody must have checked with DOH and it was "done right."
Finally he admitted, under more questioning, that "the site hasn’t been changed since its inception."
But apparently no one bothered to go back and look at the minutes of the meetings in 2003 when the original bill was passed allowing camping and 2005 when the current bill revising the first one was introduced.
Because the fact that there weren't enough bathrooms was the reason why then Council Chair Kaipo Asing lit his hair on fire, finally "permanently" deferring the bill until that and a bunch of other matters were addressed by the administration of then-Mayor Bryan Baptiste and his "parks" guy, Carvalho.
Another indication of just how clueless Rapozo is came up when they were discussing the state-mandated administrative or "ad" rules that would have to be "promulgated" once the bill was passed under HRS Chapter 91.
During a discussion of whether the three workers currently employed for the park's maintenance were enough, Rapozo once again told the council that "I gotta believe that" the then-administration thought that there were enough for camping.
Then when Yukimura mentioned that the ad rules would require a public hearing, Rapozo actually responded by saying "not these."
Well Kaua`i does have its own way of doing things and in Lenny Rapozoland perhaps HIS ad rules don't require hearings. But in the state of Hawai`i they do.
Finally, as it looked like the bill just might be sent to the full council with the committee's approval Mel Rapozo- no relation- told the council that "there's one toilet and it's broken," calling for a deferral until they asked the DOH to provide, in writing, what the requirements actually were.
That, Mel Rapozo said, is because he remembered back in both '03 and '05 when one of Asing's famous PowerPoint presentations showed DOH documents stating that the bathrooms did not in fact meet the DOH requirements... they didn't even come close.
And that was just for the campgrounds- without the soccer fields or the pavilion which where not included in the original plans.
"That park is not ready for camping" said Mel before asking for and getting a deferral after embarrassing the rest of the councilmembers who previously had been poised to look the other way at all the same problems that had caused the bill to sit in committee for six years.
On Kaua`i if you want to be "made" in county government and be assured that no matter what kind of scandal you’re involved in- even if you're fired from one job for anything from incompetence to malfeasance- you'll always have an appointed job somewhere, you need to show all that you can sit there an lie to the council with "that's my story and I'm sticking to it" aplomb.
Lenny Rapozo's bonefides for appointment were apparently solely that he was Carvalho's campaign manager. But his ready, fire, aim hall of fame performance last Wednesday, has apparently assured us that we'll have him around to entertain us for years to come.
Monday, July 11, 2011
CRETINS FORM THE BLACK LAGOON
CRETINS FORM THE BLACK LAGOON: It doesn't take an engineer to know that the county's effort to dredge and restore the Morgan's Pond's at Lydgate has resulted in a mammoth mess of suspended silt permeating the once pristine pools.
Perhaps the fact that there wasn't one there at last Wednesday's meeting is why Kaua`i County Council members and administration officials took it upon themselves to decide to do nothing about it and kick the can down the road for at least four months.
But that's what happens when you appoint your otherwise-unqualified, former campaign manager to head up the Parks and Recreation Department- as Mayor Bernard Carvalho did with Lenny Rapozo- and then fail to consult the engineers in the Department of Public Works (DPW) on a project like this.
It's no wonder County Engineer Larry Dill wasn't the the one sent in response to the council's "request... for the Administration to provide the Council with a status report on the Lydgate Pond Restoration Project" and Rapozo showed up- because Dill, who is new to the county, might have told the truth- that the ponds could be screwed up for years due to county ineptitude and negligence in allowing the project to proceed the way it did.
Rapozo tried to paint a picture of a normal result of the project, telling the council that it will only take six months to get rid of the "turbidity"- a fancy word for the mud and muck suspended in the pool- if we "let mother nature take it's course" and do nothing.
But between Rapozo's "don't worry be happy" message he also described what actually happened.
Seems that the idea was to dredge the "sand" that had accumulated over the last almost 50 years and use it to replenish the beach. But instead what happened instead, and "surprised" the county according to Rapozo, was that the "sand" only went about three feet deep and below that was pure silt and muck.
Not only that but the sand itself was so full of trash and mixed with the silt that the state Department of Health won't let them use it on the beach so it sits in a pile now- replete with "coke cans" and "cigarette butts" according to testimony- with no one knowing quite what to do with the mess.
And, according to many who have actually been in the pond, anyone attempting to stand up in it will sink at a foot or more into the bottom "like quicksand," as it was described.
So in other words despite a decade-and-a-half of planning and obtaining the permits no one bothered to take a core sample to see what was there and just assumed it would all be pristine sand, not the garbage-strewn silt-sand mix that was actually present.
The real problem in fixing it is that when they dug up the giant boulders that had fallen into the pool from the barrier "wall" that created the ponds, and piled them back on it, it created a situation where all that 50 years of silt that had come from the adjacent Wailua River mouth and flowed into the ponds is now "sealed in."
And of course it will keep out any sand needed to cover the quicksand.
The Lydgate ponds are, of course, one of the "jewels" of the island- a must see attraction for tourists and a mainstay for local parents and their keiki. It also is- or was- one of the most recommended snorkeling locales in Kapa`a/Wailua where, according to many, the Kapa`a area snorkel rental outlets are still sending their customers.
As a matter of fact the whole mess has resulted in a new activity for many local people- standing around and watching what happens when the tourists- especially those with rented snorkels and fins- come out covered in muck after 30 second dip in the muddy mess.
Apparently the project was done without involvement of the DPW building and engineering divisions and may be one of the reasons why Carvalho has recently ordered all capital improvement projects be run through DPW.
But that won't change the past or clean up the mess at Lydgate, the perusal of which was deferred without action until November by the council.
Meanwhile, for those that claim there's nothing to do on Kaua`i, there's a new show down at Lydgate... watching the pissed-off, muck-caked tourists struggle to free themselves from the quicksand.
Perhaps the fact that there wasn't one there at last Wednesday's meeting is why Kaua`i County Council members and administration officials took it upon themselves to decide to do nothing about it and kick the can down the road for at least four months.
But that's what happens when you appoint your otherwise-unqualified, former campaign manager to head up the Parks and Recreation Department- as Mayor Bernard Carvalho did with Lenny Rapozo- and then fail to consult the engineers in the Department of Public Works (DPW) on a project like this.
It's no wonder County Engineer Larry Dill wasn't the the one sent in response to the council's "request... for the Administration to provide the Council with a status report on the Lydgate Pond Restoration Project" and Rapozo showed up- because Dill, who is new to the county, might have told the truth- that the ponds could be screwed up for years due to county ineptitude and negligence in allowing the project to proceed the way it did.
Rapozo tried to paint a picture of a normal result of the project, telling the council that it will only take six months to get rid of the "turbidity"- a fancy word for the mud and muck suspended in the pool- if we "let mother nature take it's course" and do nothing.
But between Rapozo's "don't worry be happy" message he also described what actually happened.
Seems that the idea was to dredge the "sand" that had accumulated over the last almost 50 years and use it to replenish the beach. But instead what happened instead, and "surprised" the county according to Rapozo, was that the "sand" only went about three feet deep and below that was pure silt and muck.
Not only that but the sand itself was so full of trash and mixed with the silt that the state Department of Health won't let them use it on the beach so it sits in a pile now- replete with "coke cans" and "cigarette butts" according to testimony- with no one knowing quite what to do with the mess.
And, according to many who have actually been in the pond, anyone attempting to stand up in it will sink at a foot or more into the bottom "like quicksand," as it was described.
So in other words despite a decade-and-a-half of planning and obtaining the permits no one bothered to take a core sample to see what was there and just assumed it would all be pristine sand, not the garbage-strewn silt-sand mix that was actually present.
The real problem in fixing it is that when they dug up the giant boulders that had fallen into the pool from the barrier "wall" that created the ponds, and piled them back on it, it created a situation where all that 50 years of silt that had come from the adjacent Wailua River mouth and flowed into the ponds is now "sealed in."
And of course it will keep out any sand needed to cover the quicksand.
The Lydgate ponds are, of course, one of the "jewels" of the island- a must see attraction for tourists and a mainstay for local parents and their keiki. It also is- or was- one of the most recommended snorkeling locales in Kapa`a/Wailua where, according to many, the Kapa`a area snorkel rental outlets are still sending their customers.
As a matter of fact the whole mess has resulted in a new activity for many local people- standing around and watching what happens when the tourists- especially those with rented snorkels and fins- come out covered in muck after 30 second dip in the muddy mess.
Apparently the project was done without involvement of the DPW building and engineering divisions and may be one of the reasons why Carvalho has recently ordered all capital improvement projects be run through DPW.
But that won't change the past or clean up the mess at Lydgate, the perusal of which was deferred without action until November by the council.
Meanwhile, for those that claim there's nothing to do on Kaua`i, there's a new show down at Lydgate... watching the pissed-off, muck-caked tourists struggle to free themselves from the quicksand.
Monday, November 29, 2010
G-MEN AND THE TWO C-MEN
G-MEN AND THE TWO C-MEN: The sudden resignation of Planning Director Ian Costa was apparently forced due to a current FBI investigation of the Kaua`i Planning Department focusing on Costa and his Deputy Imai Aiu.
According to an extremely reliable source close to the investigation, the bureau has been focusing on the planning department in recent weeks. This was also confirmed by a second source independent of the first one.
Anyone who watched the planning commission meeting last Tuesday couldn’t help but be convinced that Costa didn’t simply resign- the measured hesitating speeches, the down-looking faces, the references to a “sad day”, the reassurances by Mayor Bernard Carvalho that “no matter what” there would be “good days ahead for Costa”, even comments from commission members referring to “the situation we’re in” and “the steps we’ve taken.”
Prior to Costa’s “resignation”, at their October 26 meeting the planning commission held an executive session “to discuss matters pertaining to the Planning Director and, if necessary, to consult with the County’s legal counsel... pertain(ing) to the evaluation of the Planning Director.”
The investigation may be related to the cases upon which we reported recently that were brought before the Kaua`i Board of Ethics (BOE).
They involved the practice of department employees of taking outside work that came back to the department for approval. And it wasn’t limited to underlings but extended to Costa himself who was reportedly the subject of a complaint that he did architectural work on projects his department later approved.
Not only is this kind of thing a violation of the local Code of Ethics, if the FBI finds that there was say, a link between their work and the approvals or that the amount of work was not really commensurate with the amount they were paid or even that a kickback scheme existed, indictments could be ahead... not just for the actions themselves but under conspiracy and racketeering laws if it were found to be pervasive in the department.
But aside from the inherent nature of Carvalho’s “ode to cronyism” speech to the commission- in which he pledged to give Costa another job because their “relationship goes back to ‘hanabata’ days” and talked of how “it’s all about the relationships,” his attempt to use his “ex-officio” membership on the planning commission to promote and lobby for Deputy County Attorney Michael Dahilig as interim planning director is a huge ethics violation in and of itself.
Ethics and Sunshine watchdog Rob Abrew made it plain in his testimony before the commission.
The Kaua`i County Charter makes the mayor an “ex-officio”, non-voting member of every county board and commission. And as a member of a board or commission- which is the capacity in which Carvalho wrote he was acting in his letter to the commission- one is not permitted to lobby for a vote except during a duly agendaed and called-to-order meeting. To do so beforehand- and to make sure, as Carvalho did, that everyone saw it when it was printed on the front page of the local newspaper - is a blatant violation of HRS 92.
But that isn’t the worst ethics violation inherent in Carvalho’s request.
Most remember the case of former Police Commissioner Michael Ching who was accused of using his position on the commission to lobby for the hiring of K.C. Lum as police chief.
And although the decision was tainted by a series of manipulations by the BOE and county council to get the result they wanted, that kind of action was found to be a violation of the code of ethics which prohibits the use of one’s position to seek a special favor or benefit for another.
Ching was forced to resign and Lum’s contract was nullified.
How that case differs from the case of Planning Commission “member” Carvalho lobbying for the appointment of Dahilig as interim planning director is anything but apparent.
While details of the FBI investigation are not available just yet, it is known that they have been looking into the possibility of corruption in Kaua`i county government since the end of the Baptiste administration, as revealed by then Councilperson now Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho in an open council session.
She and others in county government revealed that they had been grilled- often for hours at a time- by FBI officials who then opened an office on the island for the first time.
There’s one more interesting note on Costa’s appointment by Carvalho to the post of deputy director of parks and recreation.
Back in the late 90’s then Mayor Maryanne Kusaka attempted to appoint the deputy director of the planning department, even though the county charter specifically calls for the appointment of a department directors who are then to hire and fire his or her own staff.
Then County Attorney Hartwell Blake, in a bizarre opinion, told Kusaka that it was all legal for her to hire the deputy.
That outraged another ethics and sunshine activist, Horace Stoessel, who waged a years-long battle to have the opinion reversed. When Baptiste was elected the first action of his new County Attorney, Lani Nakazawa, was to reverse the opinion.
The Nakazawa opinion stands to this day and would ban Carvalho from hiring a deputy director of parks and recreation.
Of course the Director of Parks and Recreation is one of Carvalho’s closest cronies, his former campaign director Lenny Rapozo so the actual appointment of Costa may be moot. But once again using one's position to secure a special favor or benefit for another- something Carvalho didn’t mince words in admitting he was doing in his testimony before the planning commission- is a violation of the county charter, section 20.02(E).
According to an extremely reliable source close to the investigation, the bureau has been focusing on the planning department in recent weeks. This was also confirmed by a second source independent of the first one.
Anyone who watched the planning commission meeting last Tuesday couldn’t help but be convinced that Costa didn’t simply resign- the measured hesitating speeches, the down-looking faces, the references to a “sad day”, the reassurances by Mayor Bernard Carvalho that “no matter what” there would be “good days ahead for Costa”, even comments from commission members referring to “the situation we’re in” and “the steps we’ve taken.”
Prior to Costa’s “resignation”, at their October 26 meeting the planning commission held an executive session “to discuss matters pertaining to the Planning Director and, if necessary, to consult with the County’s legal counsel... pertain(ing) to the evaluation of the Planning Director.”
The investigation may be related to the cases upon which we reported recently that were brought before the Kaua`i Board of Ethics (BOE).
They involved the practice of department employees of taking outside work that came back to the department for approval. And it wasn’t limited to underlings but extended to Costa himself who was reportedly the subject of a complaint that he did architectural work on projects his department later approved.
Not only is this kind of thing a violation of the local Code of Ethics, if the FBI finds that there was say, a link between their work and the approvals or that the amount of work was not really commensurate with the amount they were paid or even that a kickback scheme existed, indictments could be ahead... not just for the actions themselves but under conspiracy and racketeering laws if it were found to be pervasive in the department.
But aside from the inherent nature of Carvalho’s “ode to cronyism” speech to the commission- in which he pledged to give Costa another job because their “relationship goes back to ‘hanabata’ days” and talked of how “it’s all about the relationships,” his attempt to use his “ex-officio” membership on the planning commission to promote and lobby for Deputy County Attorney Michael Dahilig as interim planning director is a huge ethics violation in and of itself.
Ethics and Sunshine watchdog Rob Abrew made it plain in his testimony before the commission.
The Kaua`i County Charter makes the mayor an “ex-officio”, non-voting member of every county board and commission. And as a member of a board or commission- which is the capacity in which Carvalho wrote he was acting in his letter to the commission- one is not permitted to lobby for a vote except during a duly agendaed and called-to-order meeting. To do so beforehand- and to make sure, as Carvalho did, that everyone saw it when it was printed on the front page of the local newspaper - is a blatant violation of HRS 92.
But that isn’t the worst ethics violation inherent in Carvalho’s request.
Most remember the case of former Police Commissioner Michael Ching who was accused of using his position on the commission to lobby for the hiring of K.C. Lum as police chief.
And although the decision was tainted by a series of manipulations by the BOE and county council to get the result they wanted, that kind of action was found to be a violation of the code of ethics which prohibits the use of one’s position to seek a special favor or benefit for another.
Ching was forced to resign and Lum’s contract was nullified.
How that case differs from the case of Planning Commission “member” Carvalho lobbying for the appointment of Dahilig as interim planning director is anything but apparent.
While details of the FBI investigation are not available just yet, it is known that they have been looking into the possibility of corruption in Kaua`i county government since the end of the Baptiste administration, as revealed by then Councilperson now Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho in an open council session.
She and others in county government revealed that they had been grilled- often for hours at a time- by FBI officials who then opened an office on the island for the first time.
There’s one more interesting note on Costa’s appointment by Carvalho to the post of deputy director of parks and recreation.
Back in the late 90’s then Mayor Maryanne Kusaka attempted to appoint the deputy director of the planning department, even though the county charter specifically calls for the appointment of a department directors who are then to hire and fire his or her own staff.
Then County Attorney Hartwell Blake, in a bizarre opinion, told Kusaka that it was all legal for her to hire the deputy.
That outraged another ethics and sunshine activist, Horace Stoessel, who waged a years-long battle to have the opinion reversed. When Baptiste was elected the first action of his new County Attorney, Lani Nakazawa, was to reverse the opinion.
The Nakazawa opinion stands to this day and would ban Carvalho from hiring a deputy director of parks and recreation.
Of course the Director of Parks and Recreation is one of Carvalho’s closest cronies, his former campaign director Lenny Rapozo so the actual appointment of Costa may be moot. But once again using one's position to secure a special favor or benefit for another- something Carvalho didn’t mince words in admitting he was doing in his testimony before the planning commission- is a violation of the county charter, section 20.02(E).
Thursday, October 28, 2010
DON’T WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD
DON’T WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD: Will wonders never cease?
The local newspaper’s police beat reporter Paul Curtis actually dared to name Dexter Shimatsu as the harasser of Kristan (Hirakawa) Suniga- a case we detailed last December and have written about many times this year- in today’s paper.
But- and didn’t you know there’d be a but?- instead of finally detailing all the horrors of the case, Curtis spent the bulk of the article concentrating on a minor aspect - the fact that one of the incidents detailed in Hirakawa’s suit happened via email- and trying to therefore crusade for getting the county to stick Shimatsu with the $450,000 settlement (which we first reported earlier this month) due to some on-line county policy Shimatsu signed.
But of course Curtis and his newspaper of record still haven’t reported on harassment suit by “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin to go with the short shrift given the Hirakawa suit.
Gee let’s take a guess at why. Could it be because the alleged harasser in that case- which apparently remains unsettled- happens to be Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo, wife of Lenny Rapozo, head of Department of Parks and Recreation and former campaign manager for Mayor Bernard Carvalho, and whom, we’ve heard over and over from county employees, “runs” the county politically?
That may also explain why the case remains unsettled. It also might explain what we reported in December of 2008.
Just as appalling as the actual discrimination is the fact (Ah Quin’s) 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.
At a special council meeting called at the end of November the County Attorney at the time Matthew Pyun asked the council for $50,000 to hire an outside attorney to respond to the suit.
And outgoing councilpersons Shaylene Iseri Carvalho and Mel Rapozo (no relation) were livid.
“You’ve got to read this” shrieked Iseri waving a copy of the suit over her head. “The County Attorney’s office has not engaged in any investigation (for a year) and now wants to hire an investigator” when there’s only 20 days to respond.
She told the council that she would not use taxpayer money without a commitment to investigate complaints when they are filed, saying she was “disgusted” and how the situation was “typical of the wasteful spending” of the administration and specifically the county attorney’s office.
She also questioned why it would cost $50,000 to respond since the first 20 day response is really a pro-forma type of thing that should rightfully be done “in-house” before hiring an outside attorney if it becomes necessary to defend the suit.
Councilmember Rapozo- who with Iseri voted against the approval of the funds even after the request was amended to $20,000- described how no one with the county ever spoke to any of the employees names in the suit or investigated any of the incidents.
You’ve got to read all the disgusting details of Ah Quin’s harassment to get the flavor of J. Rapozo’s county-protected treatment of women on the job on which she remains.
But getting back to the Hirakawa suit. For those who have forgotten or never read the facts surrounding the suit, the local paper fails to mention a previous settlement received by Hirakawa when she was working for Cutis’ beloved, can-do-no-wrong Kaua`i Police Department.
As Hirakawa’s suit stated
(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.
We’ll end by re-running the full story- the predicate facts as they call them- of Shimatsu’s harassment of Hirakawa according to her suit.
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.
Wow- you made it this far without vomiting on your keyboard.
-------------
We’ll be taking a long weekend. See ya Monday.
The local newspaper’s police beat reporter Paul Curtis actually dared to name Dexter Shimatsu as the harasser of Kristan (Hirakawa) Suniga- a case we detailed last December and have written about many times this year- in today’s paper.
But- and didn’t you know there’d be a but?- instead of finally detailing all the horrors of the case, Curtis spent the bulk of the article concentrating on a minor aspect - the fact that one of the incidents detailed in Hirakawa’s suit happened via email- and trying to therefore crusade for getting the county to stick Shimatsu with the $450,000 settlement (which we first reported earlier this month) due to some on-line county policy Shimatsu signed.
But of course Curtis and his newspaper of record still haven’t reported on harassment suit by “Kaua`i Bus” driver Kathleen M. Ah Quin to go with the short shrift given the Hirakawa suit.
Gee let’s take a guess at why. Could it be because the alleged harasser in that case- which apparently remains unsettled- happens to be Executive on Transportation Janine Rapozo, wife of Lenny Rapozo, head of Department of Parks and Recreation and former campaign manager for Mayor Bernard Carvalho, and whom, we’ve heard over and over from county employees, “runs” the county politically?
That may also explain why the case remains unsettled. It also might explain what we reported in December of 2008.
Just as appalling as the actual discrimination is the fact (Ah Quin’s) 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.
At a special council meeting called at the end of November the County Attorney at the time Matthew Pyun asked the council for $50,000 to hire an outside attorney to respond to the suit.
And outgoing councilpersons Shaylene Iseri Carvalho and Mel Rapozo (no relation) were livid.
“You’ve got to read this” shrieked Iseri waving a copy of the suit over her head. “The County Attorney’s office has not engaged in any investigation (for a year) and now wants to hire an investigator” when there’s only 20 days to respond.
She told the council that she would not use taxpayer money without a commitment to investigate complaints when they are filed, saying she was “disgusted” and how the situation was “typical of the wasteful spending” of the administration and specifically the county attorney’s office.
She also questioned why it would cost $50,000 to respond since the first 20 day response is really a pro-forma type of thing that should rightfully be done “in-house” before hiring an outside attorney if it becomes necessary to defend the suit.
Councilmember Rapozo- who with Iseri voted against the approval of the funds even after the request was amended to $20,000- described how no one with the county ever spoke to any of the employees names in the suit or investigated any of the incidents.
You’ve got to read all the disgusting details of Ah Quin’s harassment to get the flavor of J. Rapozo’s county-protected treatment of women on the job on which she remains.
But getting back to the Hirakawa suit. For those who have forgotten or never read the facts surrounding the suit, the local paper fails to mention a previous settlement received by Hirakawa when she was working for Cutis’ beloved, can-do-no-wrong Kaua`i Police Department.
As Hirakawa’s suit stated
(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.
We’ll end by re-running the full story- the predicate facts as they call them- of Shimatsu’s harassment of Hirakawa according to her suit.
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.
Wow- you made it this far without vomiting on your keyboard.
-------------
We’ll be taking a long weekend. See ya Monday.
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.
Monday, December 22, 2008
BEST PAW FORWARD
BEST PAW FORWARD: Well, one council meeting down and if last Wednesday’s is any indication the next 101 for this council will provide plenty of nap time.
Because for all the talk of change there wasn’t a peep of challenge of anything by anyone.
The biggest controversy was who gushed the most in lavishing undeserved praise of another one of those vapid content-free PowerPoint presentations, this time from new Director of Parks and Recreation Leonard “Lenny” Rapozo,
Rapozo was rewarded with the job despite no expertise or experience in the area, taking over for now-Mayor Bernard Carvalho after qualifying by running Carvalho’s campaign.
The meeting started out with promise when the monthly-minister- whose name we didn’t catch- slyly told a story about the time he ran a red light.
When confronted by his son in his lawlessness, instead of stressing how important a person he was and making excuses like “I had to get to church to deliver my sermon”, he told the boy he’d (pardon the interruption) “try to do better next time”.
If any of the re-elected councilmembers caught the significance or applicability of his parable they didn’t let on.
That was followed by the first indication that this is going to be yet another “go along to get along council” when an executive session was yanked from the end of the agenda and inserted into a mid-morning slot, leaving those who came to speak on other items out in the hall waiting.
Despite pleas from the nitpickers to explain 1) why the council allowed a trick question on the ballot to remove our own Kaua`i Sunshine Law from the county charter, 2) why, if it was removed from the charter, it was still on the agenda and 3) when they could see the now-moot county attorney’s opinion on the matter as proscribed by the state sunshine law- they were, as usual dismissed summarily by Chair Kaipo Asing.
But surprisingly enough the county’s “outside” attorney- only identified as “David” despite the fact he is working for the council, got up and actually lied in trying to “explain to the new council members” how the infamous 3.07(e) provision was rejected by a judge.
The fact is that the charter provision had nothing to do with the infamous ES-177 case.
David- Minkins, we believe his last name is- tried to use a judges ruling specific to ES-177 to give the impression that the judge ruled that the council could do anything they damn well please in secret meetings as long as they cloak it in “attorney client privilege”.
First he attempted to try to mash-up and mix-up the case with a request by Walter Lewis and Ray Chuan to see a slew of past executive sessions minutes after the need for secrecy was no longer valid- something provided for in the Sunshine Law.- a case that had nothing to do with ES-177 in which the county sued the Office of Information Practices (OIP) which oversees the Sunshine Law.
The case of ES-177 involved newly elected at the time Councilmember Mel Rapozo when, acceding to OIP, he apparently ranted and raged over a bunch of police department matters that had nothing to do with the agendaed subject matter.
Judge Kathleen Wantanabe’s ruling however was actually very specific to that particular ES transcript saying that any “attorney-client privilege” at the meeting was “inexorably intertwined” with the portions that normally would not be covered- something that Minkins of course did not mention at all.
And the councilmembers- all seven – sat there like bumps on a log and okayed the current request for an ES on a current unrelated lawsuit against the county.
Later the questionable use of asset forfeiture funds we discussed last week- and specifically sent to the council as testimony- wasn’t even mentioned by any of the seven
The uses of the fund for a boat, new badges and a fax machine was approved unanimously without discussion of whether they were “supplemental” in nature as the law for the funds’ use requires.
But this was all a prelude for “the show” when Rapozo, with his deputy Kylan Dela Cruz by his side, whipped out a stack of apparently expensive, spiral-bound booklets, with plastic covers, printed on high quality, almost poster-board like, paper and distributed them to councilmembers before proceeding with their “presentation”.
“Lenny” was introduced with no last name and when Councilmember Tim Bynum asked him to identify himself Rapozo claimed he already had.
Rapozo actually started off trying to get away without doing his PowerPoint presentation and had to be forced to use the glorified overhead projector..
Then believe it or not he started off by saying “On the first page we identified the dog path task force members”.
But this was no mere slip of the tongue like the one that an embarrassed Kaipo Asing used a few months ago to be met with derisive laughter.
He followed it up by describing the next item- “meeting dates... to help us with the enforcement part of the dog path”.
“PowerPoint” presentations for the council have been the coin of the realm for department heads in recent times under the late Mayor Bryan Baptiste, especially Carvalho who used them in order to feign competence, as we discussed a while back.
They obviously figure that the councilmembers are too dumb- or too incompetent themselves- to notice that the content is usually just a bare-bones outline of stuff that would fit on one sheet of paper with no exposition of the specifics of each “point”,
This one though went further, presenting pages of two-per sheet giant color photos of the various signs and other “features” that anyone could see if they visited the path.... none of which explained any specifics.
The first page appeared to have maybe 25 word tops with such outline subjects as “Maintenance” and lines under it saying “trash cans”, “landscape”, “informational signs”, and “dispensers and refills”
That was followed by the only other thing on the page the heading “Enforcement” which was followed by “2 bicycles (stored at Kapa`a Neighborhood center), “3 vehicles” and “hand held radios.”
Actually this brought the only questioning because apparently they took three old police vehicles to use on the non-motorized traffic bike path.
Asing was incredulous because, as anyone in county government knows and he explained, there is a strict policy against using old “retired” police vehicles because they are “high powered” and notorious gas-hogs.
After some other superfluous info with a distinct lack of detail and the “how I spent my summer vacation” picture-show came the most important thing the council had demanded they come up with more than a month ago but never got because Carvalho was too busy running for Mayor- the actual forms for the bureaucratic functioning of the experimental “dog path”- those for writing tickets, signing up volunteers etc.
Problem was that, although they were in that Cadillac of Booklets they weren’t on the actual slide show- er, PowerPoint..
Well with all the gushing from all- and we mean all- the councilmembers you would have thought these geniuses had expanded string theory what with all the oooo’s and ahhhh’s over the presentation.
We’re distinctly disappointed in the new council for starting off on the wrong foot.
The fact is that it becomes increasingly more difficult to stop unethical, even illegal practices once you allow them to happen by not raising your hand to question them.
No one’s asking the newbies to be confrontational but at least ask the questions required of an oversight body when you’re made aware of them.
That’s been the major complaint about the council- even when members of the public legitimately question practices, do research to back it up and testify or submit it to them they’re greeted with “thanks for sharing- all in favor?- next item please”.
In the case of the police requests, the chief was even in the room. And in the case of the prosecutor’s fax machine if she wasn’t there, why not? Certainly when she was a councilperson the new prosecutor, Shaylene Iseri Carvalho would have demanded someone requesting money from the council be there to answer questions.
And accepting shoddy work without asking pertinent - not impertinent- questions is bad enough. But heaping praise instead of deserved criticism can only be seen as a political ploy possibly to secure a place at the corruption table.
Worse is actually voting for the measure that should have gotten more scrutiny without asking the questions the voters expect will be asked.
Once you have complemented people who are doing shoddy work on one matter how do you confront them later?
Some may say “hey- give them a chance- that was just their first meeting”. But that misses the point- that first meeting will set the tone for other 101 over the next two years.
If past is prologue it could be “same old, same old” as the new members especially if instead of sharpening elbows they just use them to make room for themselves in the “look the other way” old boys and girls club.
We’ll see how it goes in January but if last Wednesday was any indication we’re not too hopeful for any change.
Because for all the talk of change there wasn’t a peep of challenge of anything by anyone.
The biggest controversy was who gushed the most in lavishing undeserved praise of another one of those vapid content-free PowerPoint presentations, this time from new Director of Parks and Recreation Leonard “Lenny” Rapozo,
Rapozo was rewarded with the job despite no expertise or experience in the area, taking over for now-Mayor Bernard Carvalho after qualifying by running Carvalho’s campaign.
The meeting started out with promise when the monthly-minister- whose name we didn’t catch- slyly told a story about the time he ran a red light.
When confronted by his son in his lawlessness, instead of stressing how important a person he was and making excuses like “I had to get to church to deliver my sermon”, he told the boy he’d (pardon the interruption) “try to do better next time”.
If any of the re-elected councilmembers caught the significance or applicability of his parable they didn’t let on.
That was followed by the first indication that this is going to be yet another “go along to get along council” when an executive session was yanked from the end of the agenda and inserted into a mid-morning slot, leaving those who came to speak on other items out in the hall waiting.
Despite pleas from the nitpickers to explain 1) why the council allowed a trick question on the ballot to remove our own Kaua`i Sunshine Law from the county charter, 2) why, if it was removed from the charter, it was still on the agenda and 3) when they could see the now-moot county attorney’s opinion on the matter as proscribed by the state sunshine law- they were, as usual dismissed summarily by Chair Kaipo Asing.
But surprisingly enough the county’s “outside” attorney- only identified as “David” despite the fact he is working for the council, got up and actually lied in trying to “explain to the new council members” how the infamous 3.07(e) provision was rejected by a judge.
The fact is that the charter provision had nothing to do with the infamous ES-177 case.
David- Minkins, we believe his last name is- tried to use a judges ruling specific to ES-177 to give the impression that the judge ruled that the council could do anything they damn well please in secret meetings as long as they cloak it in “attorney client privilege”.
First he attempted to try to mash-up and mix-up the case with a request by Walter Lewis and Ray Chuan to see a slew of past executive sessions minutes after the need for secrecy was no longer valid- something provided for in the Sunshine Law.- a case that had nothing to do with ES-177 in which the county sued the Office of Information Practices (OIP) which oversees the Sunshine Law.
The case of ES-177 involved newly elected at the time Councilmember Mel Rapozo when, acceding to OIP, he apparently ranted and raged over a bunch of police department matters that had nothing to do with the agendaed subject matter.
Judge Kathleen Wantanabe’s ruling however was actually very specific to that particular ES transcript saying that any “attorney-client privilege” at the meeting was “inexorably intertwined” with the portions that normally would not be covered- something that Minkins of course did not mention at all.
And the councilmembers- all seven – sat there like bumps on a log and okayed the current request for an ES on a current unrelated lawsuit against the county.
Later the questionable use of asset forfeiture funds we discussed last week- and specifically sent to the council as testimony- wasn’t even mentioned by any of the seven
The uses of the fund for a boat, new badges and a fax machine was approved unanimously without discussion of whether they were “supplemental” in nature as the law for the funds’ use requires.
But this was all a prelude for “the show” when Rapozo, with his deputy Kylan Dela Cruz by his side, whipped out a stack of apparently expensive, spiral-bound booklets, with plastic covers, printed on high quality, almost poster-board like, paper and distributed them to councilmembers before proceeding with their “presentation”.
“Lenny” was introduced with no last name and when Councilmember Tim Bynum asked him to identify himself Rapozo claimed he already had.
Rapozo actually started off trying to get away without doing his PowerPoint presentation and had to be forced to use the glorified overhead projector..
Then believe it or not he started off by saying “On the first page we identified the dog path task force members”.
But this was no mere slip of the tongue like the one that an embarrassed Kaipo Asing used a few months ago to be met with derisive laughter.
He followed it up by describing the next item- “meeting dates... to help us with the enforcement part of the dog path”.
“PowerPoint” presentations for the council have been the coin of the realm for department heads in recent times under the late Mayor Bryan Baptiste, especially Carvalho who used them in order to feign competence, as we discussed a while back.
They obviously figure that the councilmembers are too dumb- or too incompetent themselves- to notice that the content is usually just a bare-bones outline of stuff that would fit on one sheet of paper with no exposition of the specifics of each “point”,
This one though went further, presenting pages of two-per sheet giant color photos of the various signs and other “features” that anyone could see if they visited the path.... none of which explained any specifics.
The first page appeared to have maybe 25 word tops with such outline subjects as “Maintenance” and lines under it saying “trash cans”, “landscape”, “informational signs”, and “dispensers and refills”
That was followed by the only other thing on the page the heading “Enforcement” which was followed by “2 bicycles (stored at Kapa`a Neighborhood center), “3 vehicles” and “hand held radios.”
Actually this brought the only questioning because apparently they took three old police vehicles to use on the non-motorized traffic bike path.
Asing was incredulous because, as anyone in county government knows and he explained, there is a strict policy against using old “retired” police vehicles because they are “high powered” and notorious gas-hogs.
After some other superfluous info with a distinct lack of detail and the “how I spent my summer vacation” picture-show came the most important thing the council had demanded they come up with more than a month ago but never got because Carvalho was too busy running for Mayor- the actual forms for the bureaucratic functioning of the experimental “dog path”- those for writing tickets, signing up volunteers etc.
Problem was that, although they were in that Cadillac of Booklets they weren’t on the actual slide show- er, PowerPoint..
Well with all the gushing from all- and we mean all- the councilmembers you would have thought these geniuses had expanded string theory what with all the oooo’s and ahhhh’s over the presentation.
We’re distinctly disappointed in the new council for starting off on the wrong foot.
The fact is that it becomes increasingly more difficult to stop unethical, even illegal practices once you allow them to happen by not raising your hand to question them.
No one’s asking the newbies to be confrontational but at least ask the questions required of an oversight body when you’re made aware of them.
That’s been the major complaint about the council- even when members of the public legitimately question practices, do research to back it up and testify or submit it to them they’re greeted with “thanks for sharing- all in favor?- next item please”.
In the case of the police requests, the chief was even in the room. And in the case of the prosecutor’s fax machine if she wasn’t there, why not? Certainly when she was a councilperson the new prosecutor, Shaylene Iseri Carvalho would have demanded someone requesting money from the council be there to answer questions.
And accepting shoddy work without asking pertinent - not impertinent- questions is bad enough. But heaping praise instead of deserved criticism can only be seen as a political ploy possibly to secure a place at the corruption table.
Worse is actually voting for the measure that should have gotten more scrutiny without asking the questions the voters expect will be asked.
Once you have complemented people who are doing shoddy work on one matter how do you confront them later?
Some may say “hey- give them a chance- that was just their first meeting”. But that misses the point- that first meeting will set the tone for other 101 over the next two years.
If past is prologue it could be “same old, same old” as the new members especially if instead of sharpening elbows they just use them to make room for themselves in the “look the other way” old boys and girls club.
We’ll see how it goes in January but if last Wednesday was any indication we’re not too hopeful for any change.
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