Save Kahului Harbor Vindicated!

The report from the State of Hawai'i auditor vindicates those who maintained that the Superferry was required to do an EIS prior to commencement of services.

The State Auditor tells a damning story of illegal actions and corruption on the part of Gov. Lingle and her administration.

Read it here.

'We found that faced with too little time and opposition from Hawaii Superferry, Inc., the state Department of Transportation abandoned efforts to prepare an environmental review for harbor improvements needed to accommodate the ferry service."

"In the end, the State may have compromised its environmental policy in favor of a private company’s internal deadline. It remains to be seen whether these decisions will cost the State more than its environmental policy."

"Further, the Department of the Attorney General has taken an active role in our audit, which is unique and unprecedented. We have been told that the attorney general, the first deputy attorney general, and at least three deputy attorneys general are actively involved in our audit. The attorney general has denied us access to department records and communications between his deputies and other administration officials on the State’s decision to exempt state harbor improvements relating to ferry service from an environmental review. The attorney general directed his deputies to collect, screen, and cull documents submitted by agencies in response to our request for information, as well as to attend our audit interviews of state current and former employees."

"The Department of the Attorney General has also interceded in our audit interviews of current and former DOT staff. We were told that current and former employees whom we interview would be represented by one or more deputy attorneys general to invoke either the attorney-client communication privilege or executive privilege depending on the
question being asked. Usually, we interview one person at a time. We do not permit other auditee staff to sit in during the interviews because such interference may impact interviewee candor. Although we expressed concern that the presence of the deputy attorneys general might impact the interview, the deputies remained in the room."

"The administration’s withholding of records from the Auditor is in contravention to the law and prevents the Auditor from carrying out her constitutional and statutory audit authority. Finally, we find the administration’s efforts to stymie our audit disingenuous, especially after it agreed to and supported the audit provision in Act 2, SSSLH 2007."