By PETER SUR
By PETER SUR
Tribune-Herald staff writer
The Hawaii County Council ran afoul of the state Sunshine Law at its Feb. 15 meeting, the Office of Information Practices found.
The violation came about as a result of an executive session on that day, when lawmakers concurred with the recommendation of the Corporation Counsel regarding the hiring of special counsel for former Elections Office workers who were fired and who have filed claims against the county.
The agenda for the Feb. 15 meeting referred to a “request for executive session regarding claims filed on behalf of Glen Shikuma, Patricia Nakamoto, and Shyla Ayau” and a request to hire special counsel.
What happened at the meeting was that council members voted to hire special counsel for those three, plus a fourth fired employee, Elton Nakagawa, regarding claims, grievances and unemployment.
OIP staff attorney Jennifer Z. Brooks on Thursday advised council staff of the potential violation and followed up by email.
“Although the council cannot change the fact that an apparent violation occurred, the council can essentially ‘cure’ the public impact of the violation by redoing the action that was taken with respect to the fourth person’s claim,” Brooks wrote. “The important thing will be to ensure that this time the public has notice that the council will be considering hiring special counsel for the fourth person’s claim so that interested members of the public can testify on that issue (and so the council members can consider that testimony.”
Council Chairman Dominic Yagong and councilwoman Brenda Ford agreed that the best way to undo the violation was for the council to approve a motion to reconsider their prior approval of an erroneous communication.
Then they wanted to vote down the communication, with the understanding that a revised version would be titled appropriately and introduced at a future meeting.
“We have been inadvertently led into a Sunshine Law violation,” Ford said. Upon reading Brooks’ email in open session, she declared that “this OIP communication means that we are all in breach and we need to rectify the problem.”
Council members, after consulting with Corporation Counsel Lincoln Ashida, struck down the communication, but not before Councilman J Yoshimoto needled the open meetings law for being “a little obtuse or a little archaic.” He called the section of the law that the County Council violated “silly.”
“Mr. (Pete) Hoffmann’s giving me the eye, but it’s the truth. It’s silly,” Yoshimoto said, addressing Ford. “this is one of those things that you overthink. Not you, but OIP.”
Email Peter Sur at psur@hawaiitribune-herald.com.