315 state workers on the move

By Karen Blakeman
Advertiser Staff Writer

Employees of the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs are packing up and preparing to move from the Princess Kamamalu building to the old Post Office building, now called the King Kalakaua building, across the street.

The former U.S. Post Office, Custom House and Court Building recently underwent a renovation. Eighty percent of it was then sold to the state for $32.5 million.

The move from the Princess Kamamalu to the King Kalakaua building begins today and will be complete by end of the month. Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser

The Princess Kamamalu building is in need of upgrades and renovations, officials say.

"I've been here so long I'm part of the furniture," said Peggy Lau on Monday. Lau, a legal secretary, will move from her ninth floor cubicle in the Princess Kamamalu building where she has worked for 33 years to a first floor office in King Kalakaua. "I can't believe we're moving; I thought they'd wait until after I retire."

Lau and 315 other state workers, employees of the state's Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs will be out of the building at 1010 Richards St. by Thanksgiving, said William J. Brennan, a spokesman for DCCA.

They'll leave behind the 46-year-old Princess Kamamalu building, its tiled staircase decorated with petroglyph-inspired artwork, and take up residence in the labyrinth-like King Kalakaua, formerly called the U.S. Post Office, Custom House and Court Building, at King and Merchant streets.

The Princess Kamamalu building, which the state purchased from Hawaiian Trust Co. for $2.5 million in 1968, is in need of renovations, said Russ Saito, state comptroller and director of the Department of Accounting and General Services.

"There are a lot of health and safety issues," Saito said: "air conditioning, elevators, asbestos."

The state eventually hopes to fill the building with state workers again, taking them from leased space scattered around the downtown area but has no immediate plans to begin renovation work, he said.

The project is likely to cost more than $12 million dollars, he said.

The King Kalakaua building, which was built in 1920, was recently renovated by Par Development, and 80 percent of it sold to the state for $32.5 million, Saito said.

About 20 percent of the building is scheduled to be retained by the U.S. Post Office, which has facilities in the building's 'ewa wing.

Workers have been building cubicles in Kalakaua's cavernous spaces, some of which have been shrunk by dropped ceilings to accommodate air conditioning. In other rooms, which have been used as courtrooms, the ceilings arched skyward, with gold-trimmed light fixtures the size of Volkswagens hanging from them.

Brennan joked that he would need a map to find his way around.

Lau said her offices would be moved from the Princess Kamamalu building's ninth floor to the first floor of King Kalakaua, beyond the row of arches that encloses the courtyard. The ninth floor offices, once a person managed to navigate the maze of cubicles to a door that opened out to the roof, offered stunning views of Iolani Palace and the downtown area.

The move begins today, with divisions of DCCA moving in one after another. Those divisions will be closed during the moving days. The divisions plan to reopen at 7:45 the morning following their move dates.

Here are the moving days:

• Insurance Division: today, Friday and Monday
• Division of Financial Institutions: Monday and Tuesday
• Office of Administrative Hearings and Division Of Consumer Advocacy: Tuesday and Wednesday
• Cable Television and Director's Office: Wednesday and Nov. 20
• Business Registration: Nov. 20, 21 and 24
• Professional and Vocational Licensing: Nov. 24, 25 and 26

DCCA's Office of Consumer Protection and Regulated Industries Complaints Office are housed in separate offices in the Leiopapa A Kamehameha building on South Beretania Street and will remain at that location.

Reach Karen Blakeman at 535-2430 or kblakeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.