Editorial: HTA leadership will face challenges

The Hawaii Tourism Authority is poised to fill three top leadership posts this month. The new leaders will have their work cut out for them.

HTA has been going through a rough patch lately. The Legislature cut the authority’s budget by $13 million in May. Current CEO and President George Szigeti will leave Oct. 31, after the HTA board voted to fire him. Besides a new CEO, the board will need to hire a chief administrative officer and a vice president for marketing and product.

All this at a time when visitor arrival and spending numbers had been soaring. In fact, it took Hurricane Lane and the Kilauea eruption to slow down tourism growth in August. That’s a lot for HTA’s new leaders to chew on.

Remains of South Korean soldiers returned

Last week, dozens of flag-draped wooden boxes were carefully placed in a Republic of Korea aircraft in a hangar at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam. One was ceremoniously transferred from the Oahu-based Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency to the United Nations to South Korea.

The sets of remains of fallen South Korean soldiers who fought alongside U.S. troops in the 1950-53 Korean War were part of recoveries made by the accounting agency in North Korea between 1996 and 2005 — before the missions stopped due to North Korean nuclear provocation. Here’s hoping that the Republic of Korea will successfully identify their heroes.