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The Honolulu Advertiser

Posted on: Friday, January 17, 2003

Child support system reviewed

Advertiser staff and news services

A study has found three root causes that inhibit the state Child Support Enforcement Agency from achieving its mission and goals, state Auditor Marion Higa said.

The consultant study cited lack of focus on strategic definition, lack of full exploitation of system capabilities and deficiencies in training, Higa said Wednesday.

Experio Solutions was hired as the consultant to conduct a comprehensive study of the agency and the automated child support enforcement system.

Among other things, the consultant found the effectiveness of the system called "KEIKI" is limited by the way it is designed and used by the agency, Higa said.

Experio Solutions found that KEIKI has capabilities that aren't being fully exploited by the agency and that the agency isn't making full use of data to support management, planning and operational control, she said.

One portion of the study found telephone customer support continued to be unacceptable, Higa said.

Less than 60 percent of callers entered the telephone queue to be connected with an agency representative and less than 50 percent eventually talked to a representative, she said.

"As with any customer-oriented business, the (Child Support Enforcement Agency) will strive to establish and maintain a high level of customer support," CSEA administrator Arnold Enoki said in response to the study.

"We will use the audit to assist us in achieving agency objectives ... and we understand that many of the people we serve rely on the job that we do; to them we are committed to excellence," Attorney General Mark Bennett said.

Bennett said he was pleased the auditor acknowledged that the agency has made headway since its last audit in 1999, but he recognized that further improvement is necessary and said he is committed to addressing the challenges cited in the report.

"The work we do is, first and foremost, to benefit our keiki. We cannot lose sight of that fact," he said. "We will use the audit to assist us in achieving agency objectives ... and we understand that many of the people we serve rely on the job that we do; to them we are committed to excellence."

In October, Honolulu Circuit Judge Sabrina McKenna gave the Child Support Enforcement Agency until March 31 to account for more than $3.5 million in uncashed child-support checks.

In a 52-page decision, McKenna agreed with state lawyers that the state agency is meeting its obligations in getting child support payment checks out on time.

But McKenna ruled the agency has a fiduciary duty to the children entitled to child support payments and to their custodial parents to account for all the money the agency has collected since 1986.

The ruling followed a two-week, jury-waived trial in September on a class-action lawsuit.

The Associated Press and Advertiser staff writer Treena Shapiro contributed to this report.