 Think Tech Hawaii. Civil engagement lives here. Aloha and welcome to Hawaii Together on the Think Tech Hawaii broadcast network. I'm Kilii Akina, and although I'm a trustee in the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, which is an elective position, the views you hear from me and my guests today are completely our own individually, which means we're going to be able to say some interesting things, and we don't represent any organization. My guest today is trustee Roana Akina, who has been on the board of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs for about 28 years. I don't need to tell anyone who's watching recently that the OHA has been in the news lately. Not necessarily in a way we'd like to be. We'd love to be in the news to talk about all of the great things that OHA is doing for the Native Hawaiian people, and they are great things. But unfortunately, OHA has been in the news because of intense scrutiny of its finances, both internally and externally, and its management practices. Well, someone who has been calling for a review of OHA's finances for a very long time is with me today. She's known for her outspoken views in terms of standing up and saying things that may not be popular, but calling nonetheless for transparency and for accountability at the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Her name, trustee Roana Akina, is known throughout the state. I'm so delighted that she's with us today. We're going to talk about the recent scathing state audit of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and other insights that she has for us. Please welcome to the program trustee Roana Akina. Roana. Aloha. Thank you, Julie E. for having me. I'm so delighted that you're here with me. You know, it's no secret that when we first met, we were debating against each other. We were running against each other. But I have to say this, I have found you to be a tremendous ally and colleague, especially in terms of calling for accountability and for transparency at OHA. Thanks for the role that you play. Thank you. Thank you. It's great to be appreciated. You know, many people ask me, why do you stay? Why do you take all the hits, you know? And I said, well, every year I keep hoping in my Christmas list, someone will give me a bulletproof vest. God knows I have enough bullet holes in my back. You certainly have been courageous, but you've been with the Office of Wine Affairs for the betterment of the Native Hawaiian people. And maybe you could tell our viewers what exactly OHA is supposed to be doing and why you're in it. Well, you know, OHA's first election was 1980. In 1978, they were created by the Constitutional Convention. And I was a co-chair for one of the first candidates, Rod Burgess. And so I believed in the office and the process and worked very hard to get him elected. There was 110 people running for nine seats. And I was very happy when Rod got in. He was a millionaire when he got in and he died a pauper by giving so much of his life to this cause. And there were many, many people who gave so much of themselves to this cause. And it was to Hawaiians, it was about justice, about all of the lands that were taken without compensation. And finally, there was a process by which, through OHA, they could get some compensation. So I believed in the office and the concept. And in 1990, 10 years after the first election, I ran for a vacant seat. And I've been on the board ever since. Now you're talking about funds that go through the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. And you've been very involved in trying to see that those funds are actually used for the purposes that OHA was established for. What are those purposes? Why does OHA exist? Well, you know, according to the Constitution, we've written into the state constitution in Chapter 10. And what it says is that OHA exists for the betterment of the conditions of Native Hawaiians. That's a huge mandate, because it means health, it means education, it means housing, it means everything. And so at first, OHA didn't have the money, and it was very hard to try to achieve all those things. When I became a trustee in 1990, in 1991, we settled a claim with the state through the Waihei administration. And got the first $120 million that was owed to OHA. We invested it, and by the year 2000, we had $200 million. So, you know, we did our best, and I thought we did a better job than the state in managing our monies. Now you've seen tremendous growth of the organization. You've actually been part of it in terms of increasing its asset base. And as you say, it has been about the business of bettering the conditions of Native Hawaiians. That's right. But zoom ahead to 2017 and 2018. We're under tremendous scrutiny now. The state audit has come out talking about the use of the funds. What was your impression when the recent state audit came out? Well, I knew it wasn't going to be good. I told you in 2017 and January and February when I was the chair, and said, if we didn't clean up our own house, there was going to be a lot to pay here. And as you know, several of our trustees refuse to listen. Well, in fact, not to cut you off, but just to echo what you said here. Quite recently, you were featured in the Honolulu Star Advertiser in an op-ed in which you said, basically, you've been telling us about this audit, or not the audit itself, but you've been telling us about the condition of OAH for quite a while, and the audit merely validates what you've been saying. That's right. And what is it that you have been saying, Roina? Well, you know, you have different trustees that come in every four years. Actually, every two, you have a chance to get into a race. But I think most of the change came about 10 years ago. And the chair then was Hanani Apolliona. And that's when we saw the most change, because she was chair for almost nine years. And it's all about the votes politically. So if you have five votes, you can stay the chair, no matter how bad you are. And it was disappointing, because, like I said, at the year 2000, we had $400 billion. When Hanani became chair, she named Oz Stender as the budget chair. And we lost almost $100 million within a year and a half. And we never made up that money. And then things began to change. From five committees, we went to two. And there was a power grab for just three trustees and the administrator to control all of OAH. Then you saw all of the programs disappearing that we were sponsoring. We had a housing program. We had a health program. We had an education program. We had all these different programs that just disappeared. Disappeared out of our budgets. We were told we were now going to just donate monies to various organizations who could do a better job than we were doing. And that's what started the downward spiral of OAH, really. What I hear you saying is that there's a long-term, maybe decade-long or longer, context to the scaling results that were presented in the recent state audit. And what I hear you saying is that behind the scenes, it's not been management best practices, but it's rather been politics, internal politics. Do you think that that is continuing today? Yes, yes. And, of course, you're on board, so you know. There's the president chair, Collette Machado, who's in league with the president administrator. You see nowhere, going nowhere. She took over after I was the chair, and we've gone nowhere in one year. We have the Kakaako Makai property sitting there for three years. We haven't developed a thing. Economic development is the future. And if we don't start developing our lands and doing something to earn money, our well will run dry. And then when you have trustees and an administrator who spend money like drunken sailors, then you're in real trouble. And, you know, there are a lot of things going on when two people, the chair and the administrator, can control things. A lot of things can happen that even other trustees are not aware of until it's too late. Now let's go to the state audit that was just released by Les Condo, the state auditor. Right. And there's been some criticism that that audit has received by others. Some have claimed that since the money doesn't originate with the state legislature, the state legislator has no business sending an auditor to take a look at how it's spent. But I think that you and I agree and recognize that OHA's monies are special. They come from the seeded lands. Right. But let me ask you this question. Does the state still have a proper role in making sure that elected officials are spending it correctly? Ethically, of course they do. And fiduciarily, the attorney general's office has oversight over OHA. Should OHA's spending be subject to the review of the state ethics commission, the procurement agency and other groups? I don't know if the state ethics commission should have anything to do with it because if you look at what the state ethics rules are, it's mostly conflict of interest in using your position in ways that you shouldn't. And yes, OHA, in some of those categories, are very culpable. However, the use of our funds should not be the concern of the ethics commission unless, you know, there's some laws that are broken. And in that case, it's the attorney general's office that needs to look at that. Well, whoever is looking at it, there are certain best practices that a trust needs to follow. Yes, absolutely. And based upon those best practices, whether they are administered by state agencies or by the mere practice of how a trust should be managed, what did OHA do in terms of this state audit? Well, the state audit was scathing. But out of 22 bullets, I think 21 had to do with this administrator and his staff and how they were using the trust funds, moving it, as you and I have talked about, into different categories so that monies could be moved without trustees realizing that these monies are used. And how do you go $14 million over budget or $13 million over budget? And be able to explain that away. Well, let's talk about some of those things that you're raising. You mentioned a $14 million figure. The state audit covered the years of 2015 to 2016 and looked at the way OHA administered its grants. And during that period of time, it gave about $7 million in grants through a very proper, fair and rigorous process. But the auditor was concerned because there seemed to be a backdoor way during that period of time to give away $14 million twice as much. What do you think about that? Well, I think that in another investigation, I mean, we're going to look at the LLCs. You know for a year that before I left the chairmanship that I wanted to make sure that we were going to audit our LLCs, which had not been audited for 10 years. And we got so much black. We still have the flack. It's taken us one whole year to get a qualified vendor to actually do the audit on the LLCs. And what has happened, and I think the auditor pointed some of that out in the audit, where the administration was going through some of the LLCs to get funds to fund the grants that were not being funded directly through our grant process. Other funds were used through different categories under trustees, which we didn't know about. Well, let me just cue our audience in a little bit over here. You mentioned another investigation by which you were referring to the independent audit commissioned by the trustees back in 2017, in which they said, we're going to do more than the state does. We're going to look specifically for fraud, waste, and abuse. And what you mentioned was that one of the areas we're going to examine are these LLCs, which happen to be companies that OHA has set up in order to carry out its business. But there are some concerns about it. Now, we can't talk about all of that publicly right now, Rowena, but what are some of the concerns that have been on record that you have about the LLCs? Well, I've always been concerned. And why they need to be audited? They definitely need to be audited, because the trustees only get a report maybe twice a year on how those LLCs are doing. But you see, under the LLCs, one of the LLCs is Waimea. We know that Waimea is doing very well, Waimea Valley. The other one, the other three, one is no longer functioning. And the other two come under an LLC and whose manager recently wrote a piece in a paper. That we know very little about. And what she does report to us is not everything that's going on. While it's partially funded by federal monies, it's also financed by OHA. Okay. So I'm going to stop here for our break, but it sounds like you're talking about the fiduciary duty of trustees to know where every dollar is spent. That's right, exactly. And let's pick up on that as we take a short break. I'm Chili Akinah on Hawaii Together. We're on the Think Tech Hawaii Broadcast Network with Rowena Akana of OHA, talking about the audit of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Don't go away. I'm Jay Fidel, Think Tech. Think Tech loves energy. I'm the host of Mina, Marco, and Me, which is Mina Morita, former chair of the PUC, former legislator, and Energy Dynamics, a consulting organization in energy. Marco Mangostorf is the CEO of Provision Solar in Hilo. Every two weeks, we talk about energy, everything about energy. Come around and watch us. We're on at noon on Mondays, every two weeks on Think Tech. Aloha. How come he gets to go in? He's a service dog. Well, I could get a vest, too. You're not even a service dog. He's trained to assist his owner. Well, I can do whatever he can do. Wow, did he just open the door? Yep. I can't do that. I can't do that, either. He's trained for over two years to become a service dog. Man, I wish I could be a service dog. Well, welcome back. Thanks for staying with us. You're on the Think Tech Hawaii Broadcast Network, watching Hawaii Together. I'm Kaylee Akinah. One of my favorite sayings is a pule kakou, and that means let's pray kakou together with one another. And as you know, I've coined a phrase called a hana kakou, which is very similar. It means a hana. Let's work together. A hana kakou. Not against each other, but let's build a better economy, society, and government, working together, because divided there's nothing we can do, but united nothing can stop us. I think that spirit of working together is something that the Office of Hawaiian Affairs embodies when it's working at its best, and that's what's brought Trustee Rowena, Akana, and myself together, that although at times politically we've had differences, we have a greater good in mind that we share with one another, and that's the betterment of the Native Hawaiian people. And I have to tell you she's passionate about that. We're going to talk a little bit more about the recent OHA audit and how it's viewed by someone who's in a position of fiduciary trust, a trustee. Rowena, we were talking about this audit, and there's certainly more than enough blame to go around in different quarters for it, but as one President of the United States said, the buck stops here. The trustees have a very special role in making sure that whoever is in the organization is managing these monies totally correctly. Right. Exactly. What are your thoughts about this which we call fiduciary responsibility? Well, every trustee is responsible for their fiduciary duties, and unlike other elected officials, people don't understand that the OHA trustees can be sued in their individual capacity, unlike other elected people, like the city council or the state representatives, et cetera, they cannot be sued. They're indemnified by the state. But because we manage a trust, we can be held personally responsible, and that has always made me think about the liability of our decisions. And while I've cautioned the trustees over and over again, it's either their mind is in la la land or they don't care. I don't know what it is. Or maybe they think they're invincible and nothing's going to happen to them. But to me, the irresponsible attitude is what's costing us this awful audit. And I think it's shameful. But the administrator is also held to that. That responsibility of fiduciary duties. And when you say administrator, you're talking about the current CEO of the office. Exactly, Mr. Crabb. And one of the things that I hear you pointing out is that although the audit itself, the state audit demonstrated that multi-millions of dollars had questions about them in terms of the control that the administration had over them, that ultimately it's the trustees who have to be responsible for the administrator. That's right. You've called for some strong medicine in responding to the audit. What do you think needs to be done in order to get oh-ha? He needs to be fired. There's no question. There's no question. But, you know, as we discussed earlier about the politics, you know that there are at least three trustees fighting against that. And, you know, when I was the chair, I took his contract and wanted it reviewed by the court because I still believe that his contract was not legal. And I fought very hard for that because no one that does the things that this person has done in this office would ever be kept in a position that he holds, whether in the private sector or in the state sector. And it's almost criminal that some of our trustees won't take action. What do you have to say to people who say it's not solely the administrator's fault and ultimately the trustees have shared in the blame and therefore they are in no position to criticize or in any way challenge the CEO? Would you accept that or what would you say? Absolutely not. As you know, we have five members of the board now that would like to see the termination of this person. However, the state constitution says that we can hire with five votes, but it takes six votes to fire. It's ludicrous. It's absolutely ludicrous. So what does that mean? Does that mean that this person can go on and do even maybe even criminal acts and we can't fire this person? That's ridiculous. That is ridiculous. Well, Rowena, you are on record in being outspoken at the very least in terms of what you think needs to be done. And that's one of the things that sometimes brings some criticism of yourself, but you're passionate at the very least. Well, I'm truthful. If you ask me a question, you're going to get the answer. Let's go back to the state audit. Was there something that jumped out at you as particularly egregious perhaps with the grants or some kind of expenditure that really is something that just shouldn't really be tolerated at all? Well, I think it's self-explanatory when an auditor points out that here is a person that is allowed to give a $25,000 grant, but instead gives a $50,000 and then goes on to give $100,000 on the same grant and then go all the way up to $250,000. That is not just irresponsible. That is almost impossible to imagine. You're talking about examples of exceeding expenditure authority. That's right. Not getting an OK from the Board of Trustees. And he said publicly, this is where I challenge him, he said publicly that all the grants given out, all the money given out at OHA, the trustees have agreed to. That is definitely not true. Now you have been on record talking about the budgeting process at OHA, how a biennial budget is brought before the Board of Trustees, how they approve it. Doesn't that make the trustees, as some would argue, responsible for everything that gets spent in the organization, just as guilty as the people who actually carry out the budget? The Board is guilty of not making this administrator do a line item budget or something like it so that in that budget process we can see where every penny is going. Allowing him to present lump sum budgets in categories is a menu for it to go awry because they can spend it any way they like. So what I hear you saying is that budgets have been passed over the past several years in which the actual performance of those categories isn't really examined carefully enough or at a level of detail enough to let the trustees know whether the money is being spent and accounted for properly. Is that what you're saying? That's exactly what I'm saying. Was that always the case or has that recently become the case? No, that was not the case before. And here's what used to happen in a budget process, including in grants, that each division would bring to the Board of Trustees and it wouldn't just be one meeting. We would have a whole week of budget meetings and each division would bring their budget to the Board of Trustees and propose an amount that they needed for the following year. And in that proposal would be what they intend to spend the money on and if they were continuing a program they would have to tell us what the outcome was of the previous year and is it worth spending more money on it this year and so on. That all stopped. There's no presentation to the Board anymore about how the divisions are really doing and how the monies are being spent and we just handed a budget and now it's to pass. In other words, you're saying that the Board of Trustees doesn't exercise sufficient oversight of the administration in the expenditure of the funds. It takes, as you know, we're like the City Council, we have nine members, so five votes can do anything. So we need five trustees to say, oh no, Administrator, you will not do this. Each division will come before the Board and present their budget and we will tell you if this is okay or not and this has not happened by the trustees and that's why you have only three committees where three people control the Board. So these internal problems, political problems are the real cause of what's going on so this allows the Administrator to continue whether it's a he or she or whatever to continue doing what they do and it does have to fall on the feet of trustees. It does and if the trustees lack the political will to do something about that, each one who refuses to do something about that should be held responsible, equally responsible as the Administrator. So you're saying not only that the trustees are responsible ultimately for all that is spent in Oha, but they're the ones who can't sit back and simply let it continue. They cannot. How can you be a responsible trustee and allow that to go on? Especially in the case of grants, the past four audits now, that goes 12 years. Every four years we're audited by the state. Four audits, three audits in a row that I can remember all criticize the grants. Well, Roana, we've come to the end of our program and what I really want to ask you is where Oha is going now? Are you hopeful or are you deeply troubled? Do you think there's something we can say to the people at this point that can be encouraging? Well, I'd like to say this. I'm an optimist. Otherwise I wouldn't be there this long because it certainly isn't the money. And when I was first elected, we didn't get paid. So everything, and that's why it hurts me personally, that everything we have at Oha now, we worked hard. You know, I'm the only one left on the board that came there without pay. We used to get $50 a meeting. We didn't have secretaries. We didn't have aides. We didn't have anything. We didn't even have money. And so to see people just squander the money the way they have is a personal affront to me. And to all the people that came before me who worked so hard to build this agency, it's personally hurtful. We have many constituents and benefactors, stakeholders of Oha. Any citizen of the state of Hawaii in some way or another is affected by and affects Oha. In the last 30 seconds or so, what would you say to the people? In fact, take a look at camera number four right over there and engage the public. I would say, let's give Oha another chance. And in this next election, choose wisely the candidates. Since everybody in the state can vote, vote for the candidates that you know something about. Don't just put anybody in office because this makes a huge difference. Know your candidate and give us a chance. We have an opportunity to build on the future for future Hawaiians. Oha is only 30 years old, and I think there's much room for growth. So thank you for having me. Very good. Well, Trustee Roan Alakana, thank you for your mana'o. Appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you for your service and being on the program today. Aloha. Aloha. Thank you.