 and welcome to Community Matters my name is Reg Baker and I am the guest host today. We've got a guest today that a lot of people already know about but he's decided to run for office. He is a candidate for the OHA trustee at large Clea Aquina and he's here today to tell us a little bit about OHA and why he's running for office. Good morning. Well good morning Reg, delighted to be on your program. Thanks for having me on board today. Great to have you here. Now you and I have known each other for quite a while and we've done different projects together, we've worked on different things but you know Clea, I don't really know that much about you know your background and I've always been a little embarrassed to ask but can you fill us in? Where are you? I come from a local family that really is a blend of the Chinese and the Hawaiian from the 19th century. A Chinese boy came over and did a very smart thing when he worked on the plantations. He married a Hawaiian lady and we have been a Chinese Hawaiian family ever since and basically I started my career out in Christian ministry, moved to the academic world, was a professor for a while and now I had a public policy group called the Grassroot Institute and that's a very active group. I've seen a lot of the work that you've done. In a lot of ways we're watchdogs. What we try to do is make sure that our government and our economy are operating on fair and good principles. Very good and I guess you know some do and some don't. It's nice to have that watchdog out there. And it's good to work together in your field as an accountant. You've lent a lot of good analysis to our work and I appreciate that. Oh my pleasure. Now you know in addition to Grassroots, which I'm sure keeps you pretty busy. Yes it does. You've decided to run for office. That's right. And you know oh hi everybody's heard of oh hi I think you know it's a pretty common thing that's out there but I don't think as many people totally understand exactly what oh hi is and what it's responsible for and who it's accountable for. So can you explain a little bit absolutely reg reg oh hi means the office of Hawaiian affairs and it's a state government agency whose leaders are elected just like state legislators representatives and senators and it manages resources that the state of Hawaii has put aside to better the native Hawaiian people and that historically came because Hawaii used to be a kingdom with a citizenry and in that transition to the United States the federal government and the state said we're going to take care of some of the needs of the descendants of the citizens and so the office of Hawaiian affairs is responsible for administering that and what that really means is to provide help with housing jobs education and health care for the native Hawaiians. Well that's a lot. It really is because the native Hawaiians make up a very significant part of the population and for example in areas in which there is need such as homelessness native Hawaiians are a very high percentage so one of the benefits of having the office of Hawaiian affairs to everyone is that there's a source of resources to take care of those needs that doesn't then have to come out of the legislature or the tax dollars. Right because it's already been set aside for that purpose. That's right and one of the reasons I'm running is to make sure that it's used for that purpose of meeting the real needs that are there for housing and jobs and education and health care. Well and do you can you share with us a little bit about what Oha does in some of these different areas for example in the education area in the housing and in the health care I mean how active are they and how many people have they helped in these areas. Well the office of Hawaiian affairs certainly has grant programs and uses those grants to help other organizations meet needs for housing jobs education health care and so forth and but that's only part of what the office of Hawaiian affairs does. The most important thing is that the office of Hawaiian affairs protects a Hawaiian trust fund and that comes from the revenues from what we call the seeded lands as well as other sources and their job is to protect that fund grow that fund and use that fund for proper purposes and you know Reg you're an accountant and you look at all of that. We've looked very carefully at that and we found that they're not very good at protecting that fund that they're not good at all at growing that fund and the monies from that trust fund are not being effectively used to meet the needs of Hawaiians and that's something I'd like to change. Yeah well of course I think that's kind of disappointing that they've not been able to make any progress to you know build this fund and make it you know utilize. That's right you know the data shows some things that should be of concern to all citizens in the state native Hawaiians and others and one of them is the last state audit showed that the monies that show going to programs to help the needs of Hawaiians are far too few compared to the actual of the office of wine affairs. The other concern has to do with an audit that has shown that in its $43 million per year budget spending down its $400 million trust fund and it's predicted according to this private audit that in eight to nine years with the kind of spending if it doesn't change that the trustees allow the entire trust fund will be spent and you know that should be alarming to everyone because the concept that would be dire. As you know I'm a CPA and I had a lot of different clients that's right and I have been involved in clients that had large amounts of money and so I can say with some experience to spend down $400 million in eight to ten years isn't easy that takes some effort. It really does you know and it's surprising that they can't really get some traction and start showing some results from from what they're trying to do. That's right one of the things on which they're spending money is something the native Hawaiian people have made it clear they absolutely want and that happens to be the pursuit of what is called federal recognition of the native Hawaiians as an Indian tribe. Ever since 1978 surveys have been taken by the office of wine affairs from 1978 through 2015 commissioned by the office of Hawaiian affairs in which they have shown that the native Hawaiian people have set at least of their interests and priorities and their their desire is to see money is spent on housing and jobs and education and health care but during the last 20 years Ohaha has spent nearly 50 million dollars on the pursuit of this federal recognition. Reg that money could have been used for the real needs of Hawaiians. Oh my gosh think of all the housing and all of the health care and all the education that that could have provided. Absolutely one of the things that is really not only a tragedy but a scandal is that while Ohaha has been spending this kind of money and there are other ways they're spending if we had a longer show go into that but while Ohaha has been spending this money in a way that is not in accord with its mission and not advancing the native Hawaiian people Hawaiians have gone without their needs met for example there are 27,000 native Hawaiians on the Hawaiian homes waiting list since the inception of that list 30,000 people have died while on the waiting list. It's tragic and the scandal is that the land is there the Hawaiian homelands constitute the third largest land estate here in the state of Hawaii. There's more than enough land to fulfill the needs of those on the waiting list but the problem is financing the infrastructure Ohaha has had that money but here's what was said at a panel discussion of candidates a trustee who has been a veteran trustee said that the Department of Hawaiian homelands is not their kuleana or not their department not their affair because it's a separate government agency you've got the office of Hawaiian affairs and you've got the Department of Hawaiian homelands but you know my point is this Ohaha should at least care about that issue mm-hmm Ohaha from a moral point of view and the constitutional mandate it has to advance the betterment of the Hawaiian people needs to work outside of departmental lines and needs to use its influence to solve that and at the very least try and collaborate a little bit to work together to because the end objective is the same for both groups as to help the Hawaiian community absolutely you know who and I don't want to get too much into pointing fingers but does Ohaha have an oversight I mean does any well they accountable for that's a very interesting question the accountability of the office of Hawaiian affairs is directly to the voting public the voters go to the polls when you go to the primary election and you go to the general election you vote for state legislators you vote for a governor you vote for congressmen you also vote for Ohaha trustees so that's the level of accountability but there's been a problem with that reg 60% of all the voters leave that Ohaha ballot blank my gosh why why would they leave it blank well I think one of the reasons is that native Hawaiians themselves we are the lowest of voters who show up and actually vote so native Hawaiians aren't involved very much there's a great deal of apathy sad to say but in addition to that those who are not native Hawaiians may not be fully aware how important a responsibility it is by law to be voting in the Ohaha election because Ohaha administers assets that the state owns these belong to all the people of Hawaii and Ohaha if we don't hold them accountable can actually interfere with almost every decision you know there's an interesting clause in the state Constitution that says Ohaha in pursuit of its mission can intervene virtually every state agency in the state it's very powerful ultimately people have seen that the Office of Hawaiian Affairs has the capacity to weigh in on every decision in this state involving land air and people now it doesn't mean that it always weighs in positively it can also obstruct what is going on for the greater good and I would say that's one reason that people should get involved in voting for Ohaha the second reason is I believe everyone native Hawaiian or not cares about the native Hawaiians and we want them to have the jobs the economic opportunity the education that they need Ohaha is a great source and it should be spending its money to meet the needs of Hawaiians well in know hypothetically should know what those needs are better than Ohaha I mean they're involved in this every day they should be aware of what needs to be done well absolutely Reg there's some culpability here I'm sorry to say it but you're right no one knows those needs greater than Ohaha and there's a very simple reason Ohaha has spent huge amounts of money on one of the finest research departments of any agency in the state they produce a thick data report every year on the condition of the native Hawaiians usually they use this to go to the legislature to say the Hawaiians are so bad off we need more money so here's the documentation but that research that they do themselves as well as contract out to other research organizations has shown them very clearly what the needs and the wants of the native Hawaiians are and they have not been fulfilling those and that's the roadmap I mean that is exactly what they need to be acting on that that's their list of action points well it's ironic when these surveys show that the native Hawaiians are saying stop spending on political campaigns stop sending spending on federal recognition and instead spend on jobs education housing and health care and that's the mission of Ohaha so what we need our trustees who are going to say we're gonna fulfill the government's stated mission of Ohaha and we're going to also fulfill the will of the people they need to keep the eye on the ball but you know I can't help but think that they're spending the money in going off in areas that are not priority for the Hawaiian community but think of the time and energy that's also committed to it that if that became available to focus on more important issues think of the traction and the momentum they can build absolutely you know reg there's another way in which the monies are being dwindled away not only are they spending the trustees spending on things priorities are within the mission but they're also spending on business that have failed and losing hundreds of millions of dollars in the process of that I don't know where you are in terms of your break but I'd love to tell you a story about that well coincidentally we need to go on a break for just a minute you can go into that right after the break but this is a reg baker I'm hosting community of matters today we've got kulehi Akina who's a candidate for Ohaha trustee at large we're gonna take a short break and we'll be right back Aloha I'm Kaua Lucas host of Hawaii is my mainland here on think-tok Hawaii every Friday at 3 p.m. we address issues and importance for those of us who live here on the most isolated land mass on the planet please come join me Fridays at 3 p.m. Mahalo hi my name is Aaron wills you are watching think tech Hawaii calm I am the host of the show rehabilitation coming soon you can watch us live at think tech Hawaii calm at 11 a.m. on Tuesdays I will see you there hi I'm Stacy Hayashi with a think tech Hawaii show Stacy to the rescue highlighting some of Hawaii's issues you can catch it at think tech Hawaii on Mondays at 11 a.m. Aloha see you then welcome back to community matters I'm here today talking with Kalee Akina who is a candidate for Ohaha trustee at large and we were just getting into some of the different bachelors that all gotten into and Kalee he I was sorry to interrupt but can you expand a little bit on that absolutely Reg as we were talking about where Ohaha has this potential to do so much good for the Hawaiian people and all people but they've been spending away the trust fund they've been spending it on political pursuits and so forth but one of the other ways that trust is being dwindled is by bad business decisions the office of Hawaiian affairs has been attempting to raise revenues and one of the ways in which they did this has to deal with the kakaako development the state of Hawaii owed the office of Hawaiian affairs eight hundred million dollars in back payments from the seated land wow but the office of Hawaiian affairs trustees didn't press to get that full amount of money instead they accepted a piece of property that was valued somewhere between one hundred and two hundred million dollars if it could be fully developed so right at the start they accepted this piece of property at a six hundred million dollar loss to the estate well that's a huge discount it is and the problem is nobody's watching nobody's holding them accountable to any standards for the protection of their trust but then the second thing is the way they manage this deal this property is at kakaako waterfront park if those of you who know ohahu know where the ward center is ward warehouses over there a street from alamuana boulevard we have the old fishermen's war right yes you follow fishermen's wharf along the coast line all the way to the kakaako waterfront park where the john burns medical school that land that thirty one acres belongs now to the office of Hawaiian affairs now if you take a look at that land they've had that for three years and it's just sitting there and the only thing going on there is once in a while they open it up for trucks to do a food court and the office of one affairs sad to say is kicking off native Hawaiians who are homeless on that property the reason it's sitting there is because when the office of Hawaiian affairs got that it was illegal to build high-rise towers on that and that's the only way they were going to get their money they went into this deal thinking they could change the law so they went to the state legislature and they said you can't do it here's what they wanted to do they wanted to build 400 foot towers in a region that was zoned for only 200 foot they wanted to have high-rise towers that were twice the height that was against the law and they couldn't get the law changed and they wanted to build these towers on the ocean side of the alamuana boulevard which would block our view to Honolulu the and that also got turned down so now ohaha is stuck with this land it's a financial failure and they can't develop on it and just that is making a bad decision is that they did it and lost six hundred million dollars at the same time think of the opportunity that that would have presented to have that extra money absolutely not only is this a loss to the native Hawaiian people but failure to meet the needs of the native Hawaiians with these resources means that the cost of taking care of the homeless and others falls on the state taxpayer in addition to that this shows why we need greater transparency greater accountability that you asked me earlier Reg who holds them accountable and I mentioned the most important is the voters voters need to put qualified trustees into office rather than the same trustees year after year and that's why I'm offering myself and I also promote the candidacy of another trustee but in addition to that we have to as citizens recognize this is a state agency and it has to be held right now I just want to clarify one point yes when you go into the voting booth that's right all people have the opportunity to vote for the trustees it's not just Hawaiians I mean it's the entire population that goes to vote they have some influence that's right absolutely for those of you watching who are voters in Hawaii the trustees of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs are your representatives they are managing assets and resources that belong to the people of Hawaii they are fulfilling a mission as state agents they are paid as salaried employees of the state of Hawaii and so every election when you go into the voting booth and you see legislators representatives senators governor and so forth you'll also see office of Hawaiian affairs everybody votes because this is state assets being administered by state administrators and if you don't vote if you skip over that you're really hurting what the oha can do for the community on a statewide basis you know a lot of people who are not native Hawaiians show their tremendous respect by saying you know I don't want to interfere but I'd like to clear up a myth the Office of Hawaiian Affairs isn't the Hawaiian leadership it's not the elite it's not the monarchy it's not the kingdom and so forth it's a service bureau to meet the needs of the population and we as citizens need to make sure that it's doing a it's job but more than that all of the candidates who are in the general election this year have publicly gone on record and invited and urged non-Hawaiians to vote because we recognize that we need good people who care about citizenship involved in the selection of trustees so it's not an offense to Hawaiians at all in fact native Hawaiian leaders are calling upon everyone both Hawaiians and non-Hawaiians to get involved in this most important of elections it's so very crucial to the well-being of the entire state and it affects everyone well and that's a good point is it you know the old saying goes that a rising tide lifts all boats oh absolutely and if we can do whatever we can to help the Hawaiian community get back on its feet and be productive and get educated and have businesses and and get the proper health care I mean that's just going to make things better for everybody in fact Reg that's a wonderful metaphor that by raising the water level of all boats we raise the water level of any individual boat and and this is true take an area where there's an extremely dense population of native Hawaiians the Vianai non-Akule coast where there is really under development a great deal of poverty a lack of industry and so nobody's paying attention to what's going on out there somebody needs to pick up that ball if the office of Hawaiian affairs were simply to carry out its mission and bring about the meeting of human needs and economic revitalization it not only would help all native Hawaiians on the coast it would revitalize the coast so that everyone there Caucasians Japanese Chinese Filipino everybody there would be part of a growing economy and a growing social network a place where needs were being met so the exciting news is this while on one hand I'm calling for reform of OHA for fiscal responsibility and so I have some critical things to say on the other hand I'm saying there's great promise here if we all get involved and vote for good OHA trustees we can reverse their spending trends and help not only native Hawaiians but end up helping the entire state of Hawai'i to flourish yeah it's a very simple concept to grasp I mean you know as you know I've got a little bit of a health care background and the Vianai non-Akule area has always been an underserved area when it comes to health care I can't think except maybe on the big island over on the helo side I can't think of a better place to put a clinic and it doesn't cost that much to set up a clinic and find the positions it would be willing to donate time to go out there and serve that community and that that would be a nominal cost and a perfect project for maybe all how to take a look at you know if the public puts into office trustees who hold OHA to its mission not only will Hawaiians benefit but everyone will benefit from those things that will take place you know that's so if you get elected and you're on the board what are you going to do how are you going to fix all this well you know I'm not going to do it myself this is a tremendous opportunity this election because two years ago a law went into place that put OHA into the primary elections prior to that there would be dozens sometimes of candidates showing up and on the general election list did I think some of you folks out there realize remember when you go to the polls and you see a long list of Hawaiian names and you have to scan down there and say I think he's my cousin or something and so people just left it blank but this year they're going to find something very different because of the primary law they're going to find only two elections for the OHA trustee at large which is statewide that I'm running for and for another island the big island trustee but the thing is everybody can vote for the big island trustee it's just that that candidate has to come from the big island so you'll only find two office of Hawaiian affairs elections and you'll only find two candidates for each and I believe it's very easy to tell the difference between the two there are two candidates that are in office now that have been there one of them for two decades it's a question of whether people want to put back into office the incumbents who've been there a long time responsible for the policies that I've said or they want fresh leadership and it's you know from what I'm hearing it's either status quo or let's make some positive change that's right and we can it's a great opportunity so before answering your question about what I'm going to do I'd like to answer another question if you don't mind how in the world are you going to be able to do anything I mean there are nine trustees that's right so it's not going to be eight against one that's right you're not going to get very much yeah if it were eight against one uh I'd be like our friend Senator Sam Sloan the the lone republican in a fully democrat senate but that's not going to be the case uh there are nine trustees and it takes five to make decisions five constitutes a majority right now of those trustees the incumbents are part of that five majority if those two incumbents lost Haunani Apolliona and the chairman Bob Lindsay if they lost it would open up two seats in the majority and if we were to get well actually it would allow for a new majority because there are some minority candidates I mean minority trustees who don't agree with the majority so there are at least three minority trustees if we get two more in there replacing the old uh majority weak in majority shifts that's right there are two candidates we got about a minute all right I have left so yeah those two candidates available that could change the majority are Kili Akina and Millie Lonnie Trask Millie Lonnie Trask and I both absolutely agree it's time to clean up the fraud waste and abuse and in answer to your question Reg what I do is number one call for a complete audit of the fiscal activity of Ohio and number two I would with the majority stop the spending on the federal recognition political campaign and use it instead to meet job housing education and health care needs thank you very good well Kili it was a pleasure to chat with you today hopefully we can make some changes the sooner the better well thank you and thank you viewers I look forward to your votes in the Ohio election and this is Reg Baker I was the guest host today on community matters I hope this was informative to you I know it was to me aloha until next time