Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 14, Number 8, 1 August 1997 — Legislative acti9on kilss hopes for fairness [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Legislative acti9on kilss hopes for fairness

Bf Mett$$a Sen, staff attorney with the Nafive Nawaiian Legal Corporation

fhere has heenWumānt confnsion anel misinformation about a legislative bill aimeā at compensating individual Hawaiians for harms they have suffered due to the past actions of the Department of Hawaiian ™ Home Lands. Because Ka Wai Ola o OHA reaches so manv Hawaiiam and because it is imt)ortant that the

liP Wammuh people not be misled, the Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation felt it was important to set the record straight.

In 1991, the Legislature established the Hawaiian Home Lands Trust Individual Claims Review Panel ("Claims Panel"). A neutral body made up of five Hawaiians, the Claims Panel's job is to hear claims from indi1 vidual Hawaiians who were hanued by the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands ("DHHL") between August 21, 1959, andjune 30, 1988, and to recommend to the Legislature whether the individual claimants should receive money compensation and/or corrective action from the State. Since 1993, the Claims Panel has been working to establish a fair and just process and to resolve the claims brought by individual Hawaiians against the State and DHHL. This past Legislative session, the Claims Panel asked for a two-year extension of time so it could complete the over 3,500 claims it has outstanding. In addition, the Legislature was asked to approve the 165 claims whieh the Claims Panel has completed and pay those claimants their recommended money damages. Payment of these first 165 claims would have totaled approximately $6.8 million. The Legislature supported extending the life of the Claims Panel for another two years. But when confronted with having to pay $6.8 million in money damages, the Legislature suddenly got cold feet. Even though the Claims Panel had kept the Legislature informed of what they were doing every step of the way for the last four years, the Legislature suddenly began to question what the Claims Panel had done. One issue that arose was whether "waiting list" claims are valid claims. "Waiting list" claims are those filed by people who felt they suffered a wrong because they have been waiting an unreasonably long time for a homestead. The Claims Panel had determined that waiting list claims are valid claims, deserving of eompensation. About 40%, or 1500, of the claims filed with the Claims Panel are waiting list claims. If the waiting list claims are thrown

out, the amount of money the State will have to pay to the claimants will decrease. The State Attomey General, who was the lawyer for DHHL (and who opposed the claimants in the claims hearing process), and the majority leadership in tlie House of Representatives, including the House Hawaiian Affairs Committee, argued tliat waiting list claims were never meant to be included in the Claims Panel process. They insisted to tlie Ijegislature that the $600 million dollar settlement between DHHL and the State in 1995 compensated people witli waiting list claims. However, this is simply not tme. The $600 million will go directly to DHHL to pay for the cost of infrastructure and the development of more homesteads. But it will not pay one cent to any individual for the costs (e.g., rent, mortgage payments or other housing costs) they have incurred as a result of having to wait for a homestead. In essence, those who wanted to throw out the waiting list claims were saying tliat if you have been waiting for a homestekl for a long time, you • have not suffered, and you are not entitled to compensation for that wait. Ultimately, the Ingislature approved House BU1 1857 regarding the Claims Panel process. The only good thing about the final version of House Bill 1857 is that the Claims Panel's life has been extended for two years. In all other ways, House Bill 1857 is a bad bill for Hawaiians. First, House Bill 1857 gutted the Claims Panel process, and put in its plaee a biased "working group" whieh will decide whether any claims are valid and how mueh, if any, compensation eaeh claimant should receive. The "working group" will be made up of people from the State Office of Budget and Pinanee, llie State Attomey General's office, DHHL, and the Chairperson of the Claims Panel. House Bill 1857 does not allow the claimants or an advocate for the claimants to participate in the working group. Thus, House Bill 1857 enectively throws out

the Claims Panel's 4 1/2 years of work, and leaves it to the State to eieeiele 1) whether the State eommitted any wrongs with respect to an individual claimant, and 2) what kind of compensation the individual is entitled to receive from the State. In addition, under House Bill 1857, tliose 165 claims whieh were completed by the Claims Panel wiU not be paid by the Legislature. lnstead, House Bill 1857 orders the Claims Panel and DHHL to figure out what kind of nonmonetary compensation these claimants may receive. This past legislative session, House Bill 1857 and the individual claims process took a back seat to other Hawaiian bills. I)espite their faithful attendance at hearings, the giving of testimonies, and visiting individual lawmakers, the plight of people affected by H.B. 1857 was almost invisible. What most folks, including the news media and lawmakers, failed to see is that this bill directly affects some 3,000 Hawaiians, many of whom are the most vulnerable of an already disadvantaged group. The individual Hawaiians who filed claims witli the Claims Panel have nowhem else to go to resolve the wrongs they suffered at the hands of the State. The Claims Panel process started out as an independent neutral administrative procedure to address these wrongs. With the passage of the final compromise version of House Bill 1857, the Claims Panel prrxess will become little more than a kangaroo court. The claimants acted in good faith and trusted in the system when they filed their claims with the Panel. They jumped through every legal and administrative hoop thrown at them. Now, after successfully proving their claims to a neutral Panel, they are seeing everything fall apart, simply because the State does not like the results of the Panel's decisions. This is nothing less than

a shameful display of lawmakers breaking promises to suit their own political ends. This is what the Ilawaiian people need to know.

NHLC has represented 90 individuals in the Hawaiian Home Lands Individual Claims Review Panel Process. NHLC has prevailed in 89 percent of its cases. m Miimi»! III III— — iiiimme— m—iimii» nm—a— 1 1 ■ ii 11 ■ —■■e— ■aapi——— —————— 11— ol—M—l——aii—a—«—n—BlMg—gni,