State hiring despite freeze
By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer
More than 1,400 state jobs were filled during the first six months of a hiring freeze ordered in January by Gov. Linda Lingle to cut spending and help balance the state budget.
Hundreds of positions were exempted from the freeze because they're crucial to operating the state's correctional facilities, Child Protective Services, State Hospital, and classrooms and libraries, said Kathleen Watanabe, director of the Department of Human Resources Development.
Special-education and healthcare jobs required by the Felix consent decree are also exempt.
More than 600 Department of Education positions were filled, the highest number for any state agency. But more than 1,000 non-classroom education jobs stayed vacant.
Positions subject to the freeze are being reviewed by the administration on a case-by-case basis and are filled if the jobs are deemed essential, Watanabe said.
Hundreds have been filled in various departments since January, according to state human resources records.
But nearly 3,500 positions remained empty statewide by June 19, out of 4,912 that were vacant in January, records show. That means roughly one out of four vacancies have been filled.
Of all state departments and offices, Lingle's staff had the highest percentage of vacancies filled by June. Twenty-five slots were plugged of the 31 that were empty in January.
Lingle spokesman Russell Pang said the hiring reflects the governor's need to set up her staff after taking office last December, but that the office is also subject to the freeze.
Lingle has a staff of 66, while the previous administration had 70, he said. A few will be replaced after moving away or taking other positions, but the freeze is in effect, he added.
By type of job, administration appointees had the highest rate of filled vacancies, at 44.8 percent. Managerial jobs had the lowest rate, at 15.2 percent.
The five departments with the highest rates of filled vacancies were Human Services, Human Resources Development, Attorney General, Taxation and Education.
The lowest percentage of filled vacancies was in Lt. Gov. James "Duke" Aiona's office, where just two people were hired for 39 open slots.
Pang said that is because the Legislature cut Lt. Gov. James "Duke" Aiona's office budget but restored $141,000 to his overall budget of $620,006.
State budget director Georgina Kawamura said the freeze would remain in effect until the administration is confident that prudent fiscal discipline is in place.
"It's looking pretty indefinite in regard to how long it will last," she said.
So far, there is no solid estimate on how much money the freeze is saving, Kawamura said. But a review of 3,400 jobs that were empty in June 2002 shows that salaries would have cost the state $82.6 million per year, she said.
But Randy Perreira, deputy executive director of the Hawai'i Government Employees Association, said it's important to realize that the state's workforce is strained.
"The reality has been that the governor has come in with the expectation that employees will be expected to do more with less," Perreira said.
If the freeze lasts much longer, the workforce could become demoralized and less productive, and experienced workers could be driven away, he said.
"A lot of these people of retirement age, if their work life is lousy, they're going to leave," Perreira said. "They'll be replaced by less-experienced people, and there will be a discontinuity of services."
The freeze also applies to temporary positions, which will not be renewed unless absolutely necessary, Kawamura said.
Some temporary positions were not renewed because the work was completed or federal money for the jobs ran out, she said. But it is clear that some temporary workers also lost their jobs to the freeze. Human resources officials could not immediately say how many.
"The governor so far has kept her pledge not to lay off regular civil servants, but we are seeing that some temporary employees are not being renewed," Perreira said.
Dozens of temporary bilingual school assistant positions were due to expire last month but were extended after the Department of Education made a strong case for them.
"They provide extremely important assistance to our foreign-speaking students, and they're very important positions," DOE personnel director Wendell Staszkow said.
Many clerical and record-keeping positions remain frozen, however, raising concerns that the department could be badly hobbled, he said.
"These are positions that don't directly teach kids, but without them it's very hard to operate," he said.
For example, the freeze has led to a backlog of workers compensation claims that need to be processed, Staszkow said. The department has about 20,000 employees, so paperwork related to their employment can back up quickly, he said.
When positions can't be filled, workers who handle other duties must often be borrowed, Staszkow said.
"It's just a continuous circle for us, moving people around to try to get work accomplished," he said. "Our staffing is so lean that any time we have vacancies, it's very difficult for us to do everything we have to do."
Reach Johnny Brannon at jbrannon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8070.
Correction: The Legislature cut Lt. Gov. James "Duke" Aiona's office budget but restored $141,000 to his overall budget of $620,006. An earlier version of this story contained incorrect information.
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