Mayor Kirk Caldwell allowed the city’s $2 billion operating budget and related bills to become law without his signature Monday and then criticized the Honolulu City Council and Chairman Ernie Martin of funding pet projects, apparent bureaucracy building, and overstepping their authority.
"As you know the legislative branch is all about policy, and the executive branch is about implementing that policy," Caldwell told reporters at a news conference in his City Hall office. "I am troubled, and I think they are intruding on the executive branch."
Martin told reporters afterward that the Council is doing nothing more than looking out for the best interests of Oahu residents, adding that there continues to be pressure for the city to do more about Oahu’s homeless situation.
"You’re going to have differences of opinion between the legislative and administrative branch," he said.
Reporters asked whether the growingly contentious relationship between Caldwell and Martin is a precursor to the 2016 mayoral election. Caldwell is expected to seek re-election, while Martin, as early as fall 2014, has suggested he wants to run for mayor at some point.
Asked Monday whether he intends to challenge Caldwell for mayor in 2016, which would require him to resign from the Council, he declined to answer the question.
"At this point I’m continuing to do my job as chair of the Council," he said.
Caldwell said he gets along well with most Council members, while Martin said he has a good relationship with most of Caldwell’s department heads.
Now in his third year as mayor, Caldwell has let the operating and capital improvement budgets become law without his approval each time. It’s the second straight year that Caldwell has allowed the Council budget to become law without signing it.
The biggest clash during a relatively controversy-free budget-making season was over a $616,488 appropriation that Caldwell wanted to use to fund the new Office of Strategic Development, which the mayor is hoping will help develop, locate and purchase more affordable housing on Oahu. The Council axed the funding for the seven positions in the office, despite numerous pleas from the administration.
Caldwell on Monday called it disingenuous to reject funding for the office when, through Martin, the Council has hired two new positions designed to help develop policy on homeless issues.
Martin "may argue that we’re creating a bureaucracy — what did they do?" Caldwell asked. "I think they’ve exceeded their authority by adding to their legislative bureaucracy," he said after pointing out that the number of Council staff hired by Martin has doubled to 12 from six since he began leading the Council in June 2011.
"I see a minibureaucracy being built, and I think they’re intruding on the administrative branch when they should be focused on policy," Caldwell said.
The administration doesn’t want to create a bureaucracy, he said, while some other Council members want to re-create a full-fledged housing department, which Oahu residents agreed to do away with through a Honolulu City Charter amendment in the wake of the late-1990s Ewa Villages scandal.
The administration hired three people to create the Office of Strategic Development this past year, using money left over in the budget. During budget hearings, Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi said she didn’t see the need to appropriate the money because the administration managed to find funding for three positions in the office on its own without getting Council approval.
The administration will be able to at least fund the three existing positions, and "as we find more money, we’ll add more staff," the mayor said.
Caldwell also accused the Council of overstepping its powers by increasing the amount in grants-in-aid dollars handed out to Oahu nonprofits.
"We’re right back to pork-barreling," the mayor said. "Just take general fund money and give it to your favorite charity," he said, noting that voters approved creating a process by which one-half of 1 percent of general fund revenues goes to funding grants-in-aid to nonprofits. The city is budgeting $7.9 million in grants while the state, with a much larger budget, is appropriating $8 million for the same purpose, he said.
The mayor then ripped into Council leadership for creating a new deputy city clerk position and then picking Kimberly Ribellia, a former Martin aide, to fill it without opening the job up to other candidates.
Former Clerk Bernice Wong also publicly criticized the way Ribellia was hired.
Who hires the deputy clerk should be up to new City Clerk Glenn Takahashi, Caldwell said.
"They went and created a new deputy city clerk position that was not announced, that was not advertised, that was not made known to anyone," he said.
Martin, who spoke to reporters after Caldwell’s news conference, said that his personal staff has remained at six aides since he’s taken office, the same amount his predecessor had.
Three people have been hired, between 2013 and 2014, to be a protocol/ legislative liaison, a staff support person for boards and commissions, and a public relations officer, Martin said. All three support all nine Council members, as will the two housing/homeless specialists and rail expert budgeted for next year.
The new homeless/housing hires are needed because "from the Council’s perspective, rather than sitting on the sidelines, these two positions hopefully will help us better look and gauge as to what time of services would address this crisis."
Martin said all nine Council members approved the resolution appointing Ribellia, the same resolution that approved Takahashi as chief clerk. The selection committee questioned why Honolulu was the only one of the four counties that did not have a deputy clerk, although it did not formally recommend hiring one in its report, he said. Ribellia was the second-highest-ranking candidate, and all Council members had a chance to deliberate on her selection, the chairman said. "That decision was made by the Council as a whole and not by me individually," Martin said.
Martin disagreed with Caldwell’s position on the Council’s decision to give more money to more nonprofit organizations through its grants-in-aid program. "From the City Council’s perspective, we’ve always been very supportive of the nonprofit community," he said. Given the dire situation of the homeless and others who use social services, "I think we need to invest in our community," he said.
