A recent editorial about the Office of Hawaiian Affairs began with the observation that the departure of CEO Kamana‘o Crabbe signals an opportunity for the agency to end chronic disputes between trustees and its administration (“OHA has chance to reform itself,” Star-Advertiser, Our View, June 11). The result of the years of dysfunction finds OHA struggling to navigate an unfriendly sea of public opinion, a divided beneficiary community, low ratings from important state legislators, and a cautiously uneasy relationship with the state administration.

While Crabbe’s departure may seem an opportunity for smoother sailing, I observe that he was not the only cause for the continuous state of contentiousness. The trustees-Crabbe sword fights were peppered by shifting realignments of trustees in a kaleidoscope of tribalism.

So while hope rises that Crabbe’s exit will lead to smoother sailing, the latest brouhaha involving the breach by OHA Trustee Keli‘i Akina of a sealed-lips policy once an official vote is taken, is a probable sign that even with Crabbe’s exit, the tribalism will continue to roll.

It has been 41 years since OHA was forged in the fire of a Constitutional Convention.

The people of Hawaii, by their launch of OHA through a public vote, extended an unprecedented opportunity to Hawaiians, under state law, to carve out a model of self-determination largely independent of being directly accountable to the state Legislature or the governor’s office. The only public policy expectation I sensed from both perches of higher authority at the time was that whatever model of self-determination OHA pursued, it would be sensitive to what the impact of the model would be on the rest of Hawaii. That is, in seeking self-determination, OHA would not do anything to diminish the pursuit of quality growth opportunities that would lift all of Hawaii.

The Mauna Kea Thirty Meter Telescope controversy is an example of such a crossroad. OHA’s poorly disguised support of the protesters’ questionable claims of cultural injury, as measured against the once-in-a-lifetime global leadership opportunity for Hawaii in the field of astronomy, is an example.

With OHA’s creation in 1978, I stood with other Hawaiian leaders of the era, inclusive of Hawaii’s congressional delegation, state Legislature and governor, with great hopes that OHA would lead us to a Hawaiian future characterized by a restored sense of ancestral dignity while lifting the lives of the thousands of beneficiaries. There was also an unspoken hope that OHA would emerge with a model of reconciliation and self-determination that would yield a residual impact that raised the quality of life for all Hawaii. That vision has been elusive at best.

The permitted independence of OHA from the reins of legislative and gubernatorial authority has been misread by OHA as permission to govern in a vacuum of public responsibility to the rest of Hawaii. The fact is that the ultimate trust responsibility for “ … the betterment of conditions of Native Hawaiians,” which includes the existence of OHA, squarely remains with the state of Hawaii as embodied in the Hawaii Admissions Act as a pivotal condition of statehood. If OHA continues to waver in carrying out the privilege of its responsibility much longer, the failure of the governor and state Legislature to intervene would compound the breach of trust.

There is no deliberate hostility intended toward OHA, its trustees or Kamana‘o Crabbe. I take responsibility for my own complicity in the governing dysfunction while among OHA’s ranks from 2010 to 2018. I only hope that the new configuration of trustee alignment since the 2018 elections will circumvent any denial of the desperate need for OHA to completely reconfigure its governance model and make some strategic course corrections with the expressed intent to overhaul the OHA strategic plan.

Peter Apo is president of The Peter Apo Company, LLC, a Hawaiian values-based management strategies consulting firm. His elective service has included being an Office of Hawaiian Affairs trustess as well as a state legislator.