Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 11, Number 4, 1 April 1994 — OHA must be independent in administering Hawaiian assets [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

OHA must be independent in administering Hawaiian assets

by the Rev. Moses K. Keale, Sr. Trustee, Kaua'i and Ni'ihau OHA has not obtained sovereignty nor do I believe OHA should or eouiā ever seek to obtain sovereignty in or by itself.

When sovereignty comes, it will be in a form whieh the Hawaiian people will choose. OHA should assist this dream to eome true. No one ean tell us exactly when Hawaiians will achieve sovereignty. But for today and

the immediate future, we have a unique ability to make an independent statement and a differenee for our people. OHA ean make a great difference for you and me. Yes, OHA is a state agency, but it is mueh, mueh more than just a state agency.

Over the last 14 years of serving you, I have eome to realize the difference between OHA and all other state agencies. We are the guardian of the Hawaiian people's assets. Eaeh of you are

beneficiaries. OHA is like a big corporation owned by its stockholders and you are the stockholders. We, the trustees, are the directors of this corporation and the offtcers and employees of OHA are the company — serving

you — building and guarding your company, your assets. If this corporation is mismanaged, you lose. If it is managed well, you win. In managing the trust assets, we are independent of state government direction. The only laws regulating our

operations are those whieh apply under the statutes of trust law or those we adopt as policy. These are the same laws whieh govern the establishment and administration of all trusts, publie and private, founded in the State of Hawai'i. The recent state audit pointed out that we have not acted as if we were administering a trust. This is just what I have been saying for over four years! We must take innovative approaches to solving Hawaiian problems. We must be independent in administering our Hawaiian assets. The Native Hawaiian Revolving Loan Fund is a perfect example of innovative programming. We did not give this program to others to administer. We handled it ourselves, thus allowing for all of the loan monies to be given out to the applicants. We absorbed the overhead and did

not pay third parties out of the asset base. This appmaeh resulted in a greater ranger of expertise wiīhin our own staff and more benefits directed to Hawaiian businesses. It was with this in mind that I proposed we form our own banking institution. Our FSLC (finaneial services loan company) assures that the benefits and govemanee of our hard-eamed monetary assets are not given to others to nrofit from.

Recently we signed an agreement with First Hawaiian Bank and the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands to manage and administer a $20 million loan program for Hawaiian Homes beneficiaries. If we had our own FSLC, we could administer this program directly. This is only the first of many more future programs. If we had our own FSLC, we could aeeom-

plish all of these and more while containing our third party costs. It also sends a message to the finaneial community that Hawaiian investments should not be taken for granted. We ean manage our own affairs. We should not parcel out various functions of our office to contractors when it is feasible for us to administer them directly. We are not in the business of supporting other private businesses. It is our duty to directly control, where feasible and permissible, all our functions so that we ean exercise the highest fiduciary responsibility. Next month I will share with you the results of our Grant Thornton report on the FSLC business plan, to demonstrate how this institution ean work for you and me in building a better Hawai'i.