Finding the definition of a compromise is easy; figuring out how to reach a compromise is not.
The case in point is the University of Hawaii at Hilo’s College of Pharmacy.
It needs money and so does most of the rest of the university system.
The college, now called the Daniel K. Inouye College of Pharmacy, was the brain-child of one of UH’s most talented lobbyists: former UH at Hilo President Rose Tseng. In her 12 years at Hilo, Tseng had a hand in developing much of the Hilo campus.
Tseng, the first Asian-American woman to run a four-year degree-granting U.S. university, had an easy time convincing the late U.S. Sen. Inouye to help with pharmacy school funding because it dovetailed with one of Inouye’s best ideas.
Inouye and former Gov. John A. Burns always wanted to spread both the population and the wealth among all the islands, to balance and encourage growth by creating major educational institutions on all the islands.
Enter the College of Pharmacy, which is attractive to both smart local kids and out-of-state students. It was a good idea waiting to be built.
And that is the problem: After graduating two classes of 90 students each, the school needs a real home, a building dedicated to, and suitable for, the college.
Today it is housed in a scattering of buildings around town. The various boards and panels of accreditation have cleared it for full accreditation except "physical facilities."
A consultant to the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education, Max Ray, wrote the school last week saying it was "noncompliant."
"Unless immediate attention is given to the need for improvement in the … physical facilities, the University will need to take a hard look at whether it can maintain a viable pharmacy program," Ray warned.
The other side of the story is that state Rep. Isaac Choy, chairman of the state House Higher Education Committee, is saying "no more money for buildings, until UH fixes what it has."
Choy is on solid ground with his stand against new buildings, because a tour through UH-Manoa is more like a walk through a parking lot of overturned, rusting, unemptied Dumpsters, than a leafy college campus. The place is a mess.
UH is running a maintenance backlog of $461 million, with future needs of $512 million, according to one estimate.
Choy said what bothers him is that the UH and the Abercrombie administration switched $33 million in funds dedicated to fixing safety code and health and safety repairs, to the Hilo College of Pharmacy.
"I don’t want to kill the school or harm the kids, but the priority has to be that the health and safety violations are addressed," Choy said in an interview.
Politicians, Choy complained, love to have their picture taken at the dedication of a new building, but nobody cares about standing next to the plumber when a new urinal is installed in a just-repaired bathroom.
"Look, I am not against the College of Pharmacy, but I’m not going to compromise until the building code and health and safety issues are done," Choy said.
Meanwhile, the UH is upping its lobbying game to get the needed funding for a decidedly worthwhile project. Choy has been visited by every member of the House’s Hawaii island delegation, but he is sticking to his contention that rusted stairs, unlit hallways and broken ventilation systems trump new buildings.
So far the state House agrees with Choy, the Senate with UH.
If there is to be a compromise, it has to be discovered by Friday’s state budget deadline.
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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.
