Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 27, Number 6, 1 June 2010 — Change is good- or is it? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Change is good- or is it?

Sometimes, even the best of intentions ean go amiss. This past February through April, OHA underwent a massive reorganization. The purpose of the restructuring was to make OHA better able to implement the recently passed 2010-2016 OHA Strategic Plan. While I appreciate all of the hard work that our Administration put into reorganizing OHA, I have the following concerns: (1) COMPLICATED AND CONFUSING: Prior to the

recent reorganization, OHA had a simple structure that was easy to understand. The Board of Trustees set the policy for the Administrator and he would oversee the day-to-day operations of OHA. He had two Deputies helping him, one in charge of beneficiary advocacy and empowerment and another for OHA operations. Now, OHA has been split into three levels. The top level is the Board of Trustees. In the second level, the "Chief Executive Officer" (CEO) oversees the "Chief Operating Officer" (COO) with the help of the "Corporation Counsel" and the "Chief Knowledge Officer." The CEO also directly oversees OHA's nonprofit, Hi'ilei Aloha LLC. In the third level, the COO oversees four "Line of Business" managers that have direct control over their respective divisions. They include: (1) the Resource Management Director/ Chief Fiscal Officer, (2) the Community Relations Director, (3) the Chief Advocate and (4) the Research Director. The new structure has made it difficult for Trustees and their staff to assist our beneficiaries. For example, if someone calls my office and needs help with ceded land maps, do I eall the "Chief Knowledge Officer" or the "Resource Management Director" or the "Research Director?" The answer is the "Research Director." So now, what happens to the unwritten rule that "employees are not to consult with trustees?" (2) OUTSIDE CONSULTANTS:

According to COO, the Administration is planning to conduct a large amount of research so that OHA ean operate based on hard data. Unfortunately, they also plan to contract mueh of this work to outside companies instead of doing it "in-house." Given the many expert managers and advocates that we have hired, such as the "Chief Knowledge Officer," the question is - Why? OHA is paying these new managers generously high salaries (compared to similar state employees)

and I believe they should be doing more to earn it. Trustee Machado's eoneem that OHA may be too "top heavy" at a recent meeting appears to be correct. Also, Hawaiians have been studied to death on almost every subject, whether it's culture, heahh, housing, history, land, legends, rights - you name it and there are studies and books full of data on it. So why are we reinventing the wheel? (3) GRANTS: The Administration is currently revising the new guidelines for approving OHA grants, but there is no word yet on when it will be completed. My eoneem is that the guidelines won't be stringent enough to prevent abuses by certain trustees to "fast-tracking" grants for favored nonprofit organizations. (4) JOB TITLES: Many of the new positions have ridiculous titles that seem to be either too vague or too broad and the staff members who will be responsible for completing the tasks have yet to be eompletely identified to the trustees. We are a Hawaiian governmental agency formed to serve our Hawaiian and native Hawaiian beneficiaries. We are not a private corporation. I believe the titles of the new positions and divisions need to clearly reflect the tasks and duties they are charged with. At present, they make no logical sense at all. My fear is that we are creating layers of bureaucracy that in the end will not produce many benefits for our beneficiaries. See AKANA on page 27

Rūwena Akana TrustEE, At-largE

Continued from page 25 So is this change good? We shall have to wait and see. If you have a comment to share or if you have subjects that you would like to know more about,

please send it to my office or write a letter to the editor of this paper. Aloha pumehana. ■ For more information on important Hawaiian issues, eheek out Trustee Akana 's web site at rowenaakana. org.

AKANA