Doane will remain A&B's president and chief executive officer. Additionally, board member Walter A. Dods, Jr. was appointed lead independent director, also effective at A&B's 2006 annual meeting.

Doane was named president and chief executive officer of A&B in October 1998. He joined the company in 1991 as executive vice president and chief operating officer of A&B-Hawaii, Inc., at the time A&B's property management and development and food products subsidiary. Previously, he was chief operating officer of The Shidler Group, and prior to that, Doane was group vice president of IU International Corporation, former parent company of C. Brewer.

Dods is chairman of BancWest Corporation and one of its main subsidiaries, First Hawaiian Bank. He has served on A&B's board of directors since 1989 and, at the end of 2004, retired as chief executive officer of BancWest and First Hawaiian Bank.

Hawai'i County to auction $50 million in bonds

Hawai'i County plans to take bids from investment banks on $50 million of bonds, the state's first public borrower in almost a decade to seek lower debt costs through an auction.

The county's decision bucks the trend in the $2 trillion municipal bond market, where most of the time borrowers select Wall Street bankers to arrange bond sales. While such sellers argue that they benefit from bankers' expertise, some academic studies have concluded that taking bids in an auction is a less expensive way to borrow for projects such as schools and roads.

"There's no reason in the world not to do a competitive sale," said Gary Kitahata, the financial adviser on the Hawai'i transaction. "It's a clean, straightforward process."

The last time a seller of tax-exempt bonds in Hawai'i allowed its borrowing costs to be set in an auction was in 1997. Hawai'i County hasn't sold bonds competitively since 1996, choosing instead to hire a bank ahead of time to arrange the sale and negotiate fees and terms.