An ethics complaint against Hawaii County Council Chairman Dru Kanuha pending since September remains unresolved after a 2-2 vote Tuesday by the county Board of Ethics, with one board member abstaining.
The complaint alleges Kanuha acted improperly when he accepted $536 in airfare from the Honolulu-based Coalition for a Tobacco-Free Hawaii on Sept. 11, 2014, and Nov. 10, 2014, prior to a bill he introduced to ban electronic cigarettes anywhere conventional tobacco cigarettes are banned. The resolution was introduced Oct. 14, 2014, and passed Dec. 11 that year.
The complaint, filed by Irie Hawaii Smoke Shops owner Mariner Revell, describes the two flights to Honolulu as gifts from lobbyists trying to influence Kanuha’s vote.
The full five-member board met Tuesday in the council chambers in Hilo, with Chairwoman Ku Kahakalau and Vice Chairman Kenneth Goodenow voting to dismiss the complaint, board members Douglass Adams and Rick Robinson voting to uphold it, and member Darnel “Pili” Kalele recusing herself from the vote.
It was the first meeting for Kalele since her appointment. She, like Kanuha, is from Kona.
During a break, she said she abstained from voting because she knows Kanuha.
“I was hoping this would be resolved,” Kanuha said after the vote.
Deputy Corporation Counsel J Yoshimoto said it’s up to Kahakalau to decide whether to continue hearing Revell’s complaint in future board meetings. The next meeting is scheduled for May 10, but it’s unclear if the deadlock on the complaint will be resolved.
“At this point, I don’t know,” Kahakalau said when asked if she’d schedule another vote on the complaint.
Kanuha disclosed the acceptance of the airfare from the coalition prior to the June 30 deadline last year. The disclosure form said one round trip was for a “policy stakeholder meeting” in which Kanuha was given an award by the group as “Legislator of the Year.” The other was a leadership training session for a legislative aide.
This is the second time Revell has brought an ethics complaint against Kanuha. Kanuha was cleared last March of a complaint alleging he violated the “fair treatment” provision of the county’s ethics code for meeting with the coalition but not Revell before Kanuha introduced a bill, which has since become law, to raise the age to purchase tobacco products and e-cigarettes, even those containing no nicotine, from 18 to 21.
Revell also charged the Coalition for a Tobacco-Free Hawaii failed to register with the County Clerk’s office as a lobbyist. They have since registered.
“The point is, lobbyists were favored over the public,” Revell told the board during Tuesday’s meeting.
“My whole frustration was, when the whole 21 bill went down … these people couldn’t answer half of my questions,” he testified. “Why couldn’t I have e-cigs that have no nicotine and sell them to people who are 18 and 20? Their answer was, ‘Because tests have shown there’s nicotine in no-nicotine e-cigs.’
“… Come test any of my (products) that has ‘zero’ on it and if it has nicotine in it, I will shut my business down.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.