"They've asked us to consider it, and we said we'll look at it," he said. "They're acknowledging that there may have been campaign violations by the past board. The new board has come in and wants to start anew, wants to get the past behind them."

Watada said that if there were any transgressions by the previous board, it willpay for the improprieties.

Melvyn Miyagi, a lawyer hired to represent Kamehameha Schools, declined comment on the case. Calls to Kamehameha Schools' government relations and communications offices this week were not returned.

Watada said a settlement would save the state and commission "a lot of money" that would be required to pursue the allegations. The commission has not yet issued any subpoenas as part of the investigation, but that would be necessary if the inquiry continues, he said.

For now, the investigation is continuing, Watada said.

The inquiry began last fall after the state attorney general's office turned over 17 boxes of documents to the commission for review for possible violations of state campaign spending laws.

The attorney general obtained the records during its investigation of Kamehameha Schools/Bishop Estate, now known as Kamehameha Schools. That investigation into the charitable trust for Hawaiian children eventually helped create an entirely new board of trustees.

The boxes included hundreds of depositions and other records, and triggered an inquiry that focused on activities during the 1992, 1994, 1996 and 1998 elections.

Last year Watada said he wasn't sure whether the information in the boxes would lead to civil penalties and fines, criminal charges, or both.

Among other things, Watada has said the records suggest a pattern of involvement by estate employees in political campaigns that apparently was coordinated within the estate.

That included an elaborate system for distributing and tracking tickets to candidate fund-raisers, including a system to distribute tickets to contractors who did business with Kamehameha Schools.

The trust also allegedly dispatched people to wave signs for candidates or help out at campaign functions.

The problem with those activities is they suggest the estate may have been involved in campaigns to the degree that it should have registered as a non-candidate committee and reported its activities to the commission, according to Watada.

However, for the Bishop Estate and Kamehameha Schools to be officially involved in political campaigns might have jeopardized its tax-exempt status as a nonprofit charitable organization.

The estate also spent more than $200,000 on polling in political races, including Senate races where Donna Ikeda, Milton Holt, Whitney Anderson and Marshall Ige were running; and House races involving Terrance Tom, Robert Herkes and Rep. Joe Souki, D-8th (Waiehu-Ma'alaea-Napili).

It isn't known whether the polling data was turned over to the candidates. If it was, that could amount to an illegal campaign contribution.

Any settlement would be subject to approval by the five-member campaign spending commission. Watada said he would oppose any settlement that sealed the records relating to the investigation.