FOCUS
Cayetano team failed to deliver the goods that public demanded
By Gerhard C. Hamm
Retired Honolulu resident
Let's look back at Ben Cayetano's governance. It is not a pretty picture, but it did not need to be that way. He was a capable, strong leader with good political instincts.
Advertiser library photo • April 28, 1999
When I listened to his inaugural speech eight years ago, I was impressed. He sounded forceful and seemed to have a good vision combined with the apparent ability to make it happen. So what happened?
Margery Bronster was one of the few Cayetano Cabinet selections who delivered. She took on the corrupt mess that political appointments had made of what was then the Bishop Estate.
Let's first look at the bright spots. Yes, there were some, although not many.
The brightest: his first attorney general, Marjory Bronster. Selecting her was a stroke of genius.
As someone from the Mainland, she was not infected with the pervasive local custom of what some call the "old-boy network," which actually is obscene cronyism. And being financially independent through marriage, she was not beholden or dependent.
Bronster could take on and clean up the corrupt mess that the old custom of political appointments — not based on ability but as political payoffs — had made of the Bishop Estate.
That cleanup must have affected so many senators that a majority of them did not reconfirm her.
But clean up she did. The trust's present board consists of superbly qualified members.
Another bright light, at least for some time, was Earl Anzai while he was director of finance. He made the right noises about the pervasive influence of some union leaders.
It seemed he was well on the way to making our government more efficient and less beholden to outdated work and benefits rules.
But that did not last.
Advertiser library photo • April 28, 1999
Suddenly he was mute, hardly to be heard from again. When he was appointed attorney general to succeed Bronster, you could tell he did not have his heart in it.
Earl Anzai was hardly heard from after being appointed to replace Margery Bronster as the state attorney general.
From then on, it was downhill with Cayetano's choice of Cabinet members and other appointments.
Let's look at the bottom. The Honolulu Weekly (Aug. 14, 2002) asked readers to identify the worst state department. The winner? The Department of Transportation, with the Department of Education and the Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism as runners-up.
I would reverse this order, naming DBEDT the worst. Not only was its director, Seiji Naya, in charge when our economy sank to the lowest in the country, he was more active at whitewashing than at improving his performance.
Whenever a respectable Mainland publication such as Forbes magazine criticized the sorry state of our economy, Naya put his considerable spinmeister talent to work and tried to explain the facts away: "They don't know our special conditions."
When Cayetano appointed him to a second term, he guaranteed that our economy would stay on the bottom. When Naya returns to the University of Hawai'i, perhaps he can teach his students how not to do things.
Next, the Department of Transportation. What did Cayetano's first transportation chief, Kazu Hayashida, do to reduce our transportation woes? He flew by helicopter over the traffic standstill at the Middle Street interchange on the H-1.
He then astutely observed that "We've got a problem." No kidding!
But he didn't do anything about it. Thousands of motorists get stranded there every day.
I hope he retired close to a golf course so he is spared the dire consequences of his transportation inaction.
Same department. Next in charge: Brian Minaai. Instead of speeding our traffic flow, he slowed it. The despised van scam was his most active pursuit. Why did the people revolt so strongly against the speed cameras? Deep down, they sensed that the government was no longer working for them, but against them.
The intelligence-insulting remarks of the state transportation spokeswoman, Marilyn Kali ("One mile over the speed limit is breaking the law"), did not help the department's image, either.
What did 2,500 state transportation workers (why not 250?) do during those eight years?
Advertiser library photo • May 5, 1997
Let's talk about the employees' retirement system. This pension fund is among the worst performers in the nation. About 95 percent of comparable funds have done better in the long run.
Ben Cayetano picked a winner when he married Honolulu businesswoman Vicky Liu on May 5, 1997.
The governor appointed four of the fund's eight trustees. The other directors did not seem to distinguish themselves one way or the other.
State Auditor Marion Higa has faulted the poor accounting and management practices of virtually every state agency she has investigated.
So was Ben a tough guy for tough times? Maybe.
But he surely did not pick the right people for the tasks they were appointed to.
He also suffered incompetent directors much longer than other governors did.
His Cabinet was the Achilles' heel that did him in. History will probably not look kindly on his failures.
But there is a ray of light: His best choice was his wife, Vicky.
Correction: Susan Chandler was director of the state Department of Human Services in the administration of Gov. Ben Cayetano. The Child Support Enforcement Agency is under the Department of the Attorney General and is not part of the Department of Human Services. Information in a previous veresion of this article contained incorrect information.
