Volcanic Ash: Lieutenant governor needs a real job or save us the big salary

Gov. David Ige has been out of state for the last week celebrating his re-election with his family.

Also out of state during part of that time was Lt. Gov. Doug Chin, leaving Attorney General Russell Suzuki to serve as acting governor, a scenario that has occurred multiple times since Chin became lieutenant governor after Shan Tsutsui’s resignation in January.

Suzuki also served as acting governor during most of Ige’s family vacation in August, when Chin was traveling too, and Budget Director Laurel Johnston took the reins in February as Chin traveled while Ige attended a National Governors Association meeting.

In September 2017, it was Chin as then-attorney general who did a stint as acting governor because Tsutsui was unavailable while Ige attended a climate change summit in New York.

It raises the question of why we need a lieutenant governor, a $150,000 job with a big suite of offices on the fifth floor of the Capitol, if he or she needn’t be around to fulfill the only significant constitutional responsibility of the office — filling in for an absent governor.

Hawaii LGs have struggled to find meaningful roles since statehood. They come into office with grand plans, only to find themselves toiling at the governor’s whim with assignments that are often menial.

Three LGs — James Kea­loha, Tom Gill and Jean King — clashed with their governors and quit to run against them. Nelson Doi ran for Honolulu mayor out of boredom and Tsutsui became so frustrated by Ige’s refusal to use him that he quit mid-term to become a lobbyist.

George Ariyoshi, John Waihee, Ben Cayetano, Mazie Hirono and Brian Schatz did their time as LG relatively quietly and were rewarded with eventual ascension to governor or U.S. senator, but four to eight years of subservience and little responsibility is hardly good preparation for top leadership.

Hawaii LGs say they perform a secretary of state function, but not really.

Since the LG was long ago stripped of election oversight, the only ministerial functions are minor matters like name changes and document maintenance.

The 47 states that have real secretaries of state — 35 of them elected — give the office major constitutional responsibilities such as running elections, keeping state records and archives, professional licensing, business registration, corporate filings and oversight of lobbyists and political campaign finances.

If Lt. Gov.-elect Josh Green wants to make a difference, he should convene a working group to conceive a real job description for the office, with meaningful constitutional responsibilities independent from the governor, and sell it to the Legislature and voters as a constitutional amendment.

If we can’t sensibly reinvent the job, we should abolish the lieutenant governor and leave filling in for absent governors to the attorney general or budget director, who get the duty much of the time anyway.

Reach David Shapiro at volcanicash@gmail.com.