A $1,219.69 surfboard at a Honolulu store, $1,909.47 worth of equipment at a Kailua-Kona bike shop and $78.27 in sportswear from a Honolulu Quiksilver shop were among personal purchases Mayor Billy Kenoi made on his county charge card since being
A $1,219.69 surfboard at a Honolulu store, $1,909.47 worth of equipment at a Kailua-Kona bike shop and $78.27 in sportswear from a Honolulu Quiksilver shop were among personal purchases Mayor Billy Kenoi made on his county charge card since being elected mayor in 2008.
All of the charges were reimbursed or credited back on the card, according to documents provided today by the county Finance Department.
In addition, Kenoi on Tuesday paid the county $7,503.90 in charges and interest attributed to purchases from 2009 to the present that he says were charged in conjunction with official county business. He paid for them in order to err on the side of caution, he said.
“I wanted to make complete reimbursement of any charges on my pCard so the residents, the taxpayers don’t have any difficulty understanding if it was official or personal,” Kenoi said.
The payments and records release follow a West Hawaii Today story on Sunday that revealed that Kenoi had used his county-issued credit card to charge $892 at a Honolulu hostess bar.
Reaction was swift on the newspaper’s site and in social media, with county residents weighing in to support the mayor, denounce the spending, and, of course, make a lot of jokes and humorous memes at his expense.
An abashed Kenoi said he is henceforth restricting the use of the card strictly for travel-related expenses.
He planned a 4 p.m. media conference Wednesday in Honolulu to publicly apologize.
See Thursday’s Hawaii Tribune-Herald for an expanded version of this story.
