Posted on: Tuesday, June 28, 2005

DRIVE TIME

By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Transportation Writer

First, the good news: The city was using the best pothole-patching material available.

That's going to come as a surprise to dozens of DriveTime readers who over the years have suspected otherwise. I've lost count of how many calls and e-mails I had from readers in the past few years convinced that the problem with city roads was the quality of the asphalt we were using.

Now, we've got the definitive word from an official city audit: "The materials used for pothole patching are adequate."

Whew! That's a relief.

So what's the problem? Just about everything else. In fact, out of 24 "best" practices across the nation, Honolulu's Division of Road Maintenance uses two of them. Everything else is subpar, according to the auditor.

Let's start with the nitty-gritty: While the patching material was OK, the patching itself was far from it. You didn't need an audit to tell you that, did you?

People have been driving by for years as city workers threw big heaping helpings of lukewarm asphalt into ruts and holes that were dirty and wet, then bounded off to the next pothole without so much as tamping down the material.

Proper repair calls for cleaning and drying a hole first. At the very least, the report says, the workers should have rolled their truck over the new patch a couple of times.

So, of course, the pothole patches began to come undone almost as soon as they were put down.

Some roadways hadn't had any recorded repairs since about 1960.

But the real problems weren't with the workers. The bigger problems started at the top, with poor funding and poor planning.

Over the past decade, while the city's roads just kept getting worse, officials ignored long-term planning, cut funding, started contracting out most of its work, failed to keep good records, lacked formal policies and generally fell short when compared with other places, the auditor found.

All the while, they were diverting road maintenance workers to set up and tear down the Sunset and Brunch on the Beach events in Waikiki. And that was at a time when 30 percent of the positions in the department were vacant, often because people who were hired there transferred to other city jobs as soon as they were eligible.

To return to the good news, though: City officials say they plan to make changes because of the audit findings. They've already instituted new standards for pothole reporting and patching. It will take years, though, to see if they can change the bigger picture, the one in which the problems started at the top.

Reach Mike Leidemann at 525-5460 or mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com.