• Audit your tax money • It can be done Audit your tax money Our federal civil rights and each state’s “due process” requires all 7,000-plus local jurisdictions to write down detailed local legal rules, and to apply them without
• Audit your tax money • It can be
done
Audit your tax money
Our federal civil rights and each state’s “due process” requires all 7,000-plus local jurisdictions to write down detailed local legal rules, and to apply them without prejudice equally to all persons.
Boards and commissions fulfill some county civil rights’ requirements. Local legal rules and traditions do not create “due process” or civil rights, they either enforce them or violate them.
I’ll make the incredible leap of faith that for three decades every single Kaua‘i judge, county paid attorney, elected state legislator, county official, supervisor, and manager was either deaf, dumb, and blind or else grossly negligent and incompetent regarding the fact that mandated federal and state requirements for human resources, loss prevention, auditing, etc. change over time. The miraculous leap of faith that not one of them was required by law to know about mandated changes, and that not one of them committed wage and thefts of service frauds for intentional failures to perform their sworn oaths or contracted duties.
The leap of faith that Keep Kaua‘i Kaua‘i is not a political conspiracy by omission and/or commission to commit civil rights violations. The leap of faith that every elected official, department head, and supervisor never knew there are ever-changing HR, LP, and auditing requirements for a county and its enterprises, just like for state and federal enterprises, nonprofits, businesses, and for the millions of dollars in grants the county receives and spends each year. How big a leap of faith is required to believe that every single leader was blind and nobody knew nothing? Don’t the blind leading the blind usually end up in a ditch?
I commend our esteemed retired judge for his many years of public service, but with his self-declared intimate understanding of county politics he is high among the many state and county officials we’ve paid for decades who failed to protect the public and our workforce by calling public notice to, or preventing the decades of “indefensible” civil rights violations we settled out-of-court. The court declared us “indefensible” violators of civil rights, and the retired judge tells us nothing is wrong.
We are violating HR, LP, and auditing requirements’ mandated beginning in the 1970s, but nothing is wrong. A court settlement creates our human resources and loss prevention authority, and it took the public to create an independent public auditor, but nothing is wrong. Our charter has not been modernized since 1969, but nothing is wrong. The respected judge informs us that a “coconut” is required to speak to our true leaders, but nothing is wrong. The collective failures of the post-plantation patronage civics’ system felt on Kaua‘i are illustrated in many recent events and letters to this editor.
Kaua‘i’s esteemed retired judge directs the public’s attention to the possibility that public and county policy is not made at public hearings or meetings, but is delivered by un-named parties holding secret communications with our elected and appointed officials via “coconut wireless.”
Our judge’s opinions regarding these civics’ issues are well documented in his many editorial letters, including that of Feb. 13, when he chastises those without coconut wireless “coconuts” for being uninformed. The judge’s logic concludes that public testimony is irrelevant. It requires a “coconut” to be heard.
Successive administrations’ systemic KKK resistance to change (patterns of behavior), illustrated during the million-dollar civil rights settlement debacle with Chief Lum, continues unabated outside KPD and the institutional resistance to change directly caused the recent million-dollar public loss in settlement costs.
We will surely face more lawsuits if the administration and council continues to fail to grant independent authority where civics’ and our civil rights requires independence. These civil rights lawsuits are in large part due to the “coconut wireless” KKK successes resisting modernizing the charter and ignoring mandated changes in operations.
Mandated changes include independent auditing of our financial activities and services through several mechanisms. Independent authority, safe from political meddling, is legally required for the auditor, HR, loss prevention, and other departments in order for them to effectively do their jobs while protecting our workforce and the public’s pocketbook from more “indefensible” or criminal violations of our civil rights.
If our officials are proud of how they spend our tax money, they would provide audits and sunshine to demonstrate the truth. Do our B&Cs resist or encourage the public to “follow their own tax money”? Do our B&Cs determine the public interest through written rules and public testimony, or from the coconut wireless? Do our B&Cs protect the public interest from self-serving special interests, or protect the special interests from public scrutiny?
It’s small wonder there is controversy regarding this county’s civics’ model, including B&Cs, when the leadership’s operational slogan of Keep Kaua‘i Kaua‘i is synonymous with administrative “technically not illegal” practices that violate workers’ and the public’s civil rights.
Lonnie Sykos, Kapa‘a
It can be done
In these days of worry about educating our youth, congratulations and mahalo to the administration, staff, and school community at Koloa Elementary School — the only school on Kaua‘i to make their federal and state Annual Yearly Progress last year.
Five years ago, this school was on the verge of closure. With strong leadership and dedicated teachers, the students of Koloa/Po‘ipu have thrived and achieved so much. Five years in a row, they have made and exceeded the federal goals — it can be done.
Thanks Deb Lindsay and teachers and staff of Koloa for your strong presence, leadership and love of our keiki.
David Lane, Koloa
