Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 34, Number 10, 1 ʻOkakopa 2017 — Fiscal Sustainability: Securing the future of OHA [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Fiscal Sustainability: Securing the future of OHA

LEO ELELE TRUSTEE MESSSAGES

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n the gathering of limu, one must not piek the root to ensure that it ean rein-

venate. This practice ean be found throughout our culture and history. This idea that we

must preserve the root, the source, or the principal, is fundamentally Hawaiian. This ideology is inherent to us, taught to us by our ancestors. Our kupuna were the greatest stewards of their resources. Here at the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, the Board of Trustees, executive team, and administration are tasked with the stewardship of the Native Hawaiian Trust Fund, land assets, and other revenues granted to OHA. We have been chosen by

the lahui to uphold the kuleana of ensuring the sustainability of OHA's assets. Like our kupuna who were sustainable and as one of the fiduciaries of OHA, I am proud to share with you some of the aspects of our Fiscal Sustainability Plan (FSP). With the help of our consultant, OHA was able to develop steps necessary to initiate the FSP. It involves the entire organization and requires that we look at OHA from a holistic perspective, There are two areas for improvement that the FSP will address. The first is with our policies, and the second is with our administrative operations. In order for timely and efficient changes to occur, it will take interdisciplinary teams with voices that include the Trustees, executive management, and subject matter experts in the organization. For instance, cross eommunication and open dialogue is critical when OHA attempts to change policies or strategizes on an initiative. When a proposal to amend a policy happens, it ean affect the nature of our other policies. We cannot exclusively propose and amend policies without considering their impacts. One example is attempting to amend our spending policies and ignoring the impacts on our investment policies. According to Committee Report RM I. =

#16-08, OHA is committed to ensuring sprvinps and programs are consistently

available and delivered to our lāhui through fiscally responsible and sustainable spending. The Office will: • Adopt and implement a fiscal sustainability implementation plan. • Provide in it a hnaneial structure that will establish fiscal objectives and result in increases to (1) the value of OHA's assets and endowments and to (2) OHA's capacity to deliver on its vision and mission. • Incorporate in it specific success indicators and report on its

progress at 1 year, 3 years, and 5 years postimplementation. • Incorporate in it a code of ethics applicable to OHA Trustees, Officers, and Employees. For the BOT, we have recently begun the serious deliberation on the areas for whieh our policies ean improve. This is done in concert with the appropriate executive members, and managers who are in their respective roles doing the day-to-day operations. It is important that the subject matter experts and managers are at the table so they ean provide the necessary insights so the Trustees ean develop policies to ensure fiscal sustainability. The Board also adopted officially to use the hnaneial analysis model developed by our consultant to help implement the operational aspects of the FSR It is the hnaneial tool that will help OHA administration to understand any impacts of administrative or operational changes on our hnaneial standing in the short and long term. With the FSP underway, now is the time we look to our past to secure our future. We look to the example of our kupuna and translate their ideology, innovations, and stewardship to our modern context. E mau ana kākou i nā mea waiwai o ka lahui. ■

Carmen "Hulu" Lindsey TrustEE, Maui