Asian Bank conference windfall for local business
| • | Advertiser special: ADB in Hawai'i — global issues, local impact |
By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer
The Asian Development Bank conference in Honolulu in May cost city and state taxpayers about $5 million, but local businesses reaped about $15 million in spending by attendees, and the state's image was boosted in ways that can't be quantified, officials say.
"When you put it all together, we really hit a home run," said Robert Fishman, chief executive of the Hawai'i Tourism Authority. "I have a feeling this was a very good investment for taxpayers."
The Honolulu Police Department spent more than $3 million to provide security for the controversial event, about $2.6 million of which was for overtime, Maj. Paul Putzulu said Wednesday.
That figure may still be adjusted and includes $525,000 for riot gear the police department purchased with money from the tourism authority. It does not include the regular salaries of officers who were detailed to the conference but were not on overtime, he said.
The police department has an overall annual salary budget of $130 million, of which nearly $16.4 million is for overtime. Police had estimated that ADB conference security could cost as much as $7 million if protests against the ADB's policies turned unruly and destructive.
"People expected there to be a great deal of violence, but that didn't occur," said Fishman. "Hawai'i had an enormous amount of positive media coverage because of this event. It could have been negative, and it wasn't. The team that put this all together really made Hawai'i very proud."
Police department spokeswoman Michelle Yu said a final figure would be presented to the City Council tomorrow. The total cost to other city agencies was not immediately available, city spokeswoman Carol Costa said through an assistant.
The tourism authority spent about $2.1 million on the event — including $185,000 for security at the Hawai'i Convention Center — said Fishman, but $380,000 of the total was provided by private businesses.
The state is asking the U.S. Treasury Department, which sponsored the conference, to reimburse all security costs, but there is no guarantee that any money will be provided.
The ADB is a multilateral lending institution, based in Manila, which finances development projects throughout Asia. The bank's stated goal is to reduce poverty, and it has been lauded for helping underdeveloped countries modernize. But others criticize the ADB for financing projects that mostly benefit wealthy businesses while displacing indigenous peoples and disrupting traditional lifestyles.
Protest organizers in Hawai'i had insisted for months before the conference that they would remain peaceful during the ADB meetings May 7-11, and they complained that police had turned down many opportunities to discuss their plans in advance.
"Until the very last minute, they were all refused," said Carolyn Hadfield, who helped plan a protest march at the convention center and through Waikiki as the ADB conference began. "There were no secrets. They (city officials) spread an atmosphere of fear in this town, and I think people are really surprised that everything didn't just break loose."
The conference was originally to be in Seattle, but that city rejected the offer because the federal government would not guarantee a reimbursement. Serious riots at a 1999 World Trade Organization summit in Seattle — which Hawai'i had offered to stage — cost the city and surrounding communities about $13 million, and several lawsuits that allege police brutality are pending.
Hawai'i's Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism estimated that people who attended the weeklong ADB conference spent $15 million here on goods and services, said Chris Grandy, a state economist.
Fishman said the conference would have major long-term benefits for Hawai'i as well, by linking local firms with developing nations ready to invest in construction and infrastructure projects such as water purification. The conference also advertised Hawai'i as a destination for major business forums as well as tourism, he said.
"The whole world thinks of Hawai'i as a leisure mode and it's important to diversify that and send the business message out," Fishman said. "That message is very difficult to get out unless you put big money behind it."
But Hadfield called the spending "outrageous" and said the message is a bad one if it is meant to attract the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, or other international financial institutions that some groups harshly criticize as exploiters of the world's poor.
"What he's talking about is the pariahs of the world who can't go anywhere else," she said. "They're not coming here because this is such a great business environment. They're coming here to hide in a containment zone. What kind of security is going to have to be put into place for those organizations in the future?"
