Rail project departures give agency an obstacle

When Jesse Souki leaves the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation on Wednesday, he’ll be the latest in a string of about a dozen prominent personnel to leave a rail agency that’s grappling with vacancies and high turnover.

Souki, a Maui-raised attorney with extensive background in land-use issues, has served just more than a year as HART’s director of planning, permitting and right-of-way.

In his relatively short tenure (Souki’s predecessor was at HART for more than four years), he’s helped to guide the agency’s property-acquisition efforts and policies during a tenuous time for the cash-strapped rail project. HART still lacks the cash to build into the heart of town, but it’s purchasing land there nonetheless in hopes that it secures those funds.

He’ll become the Hawaii Community Development Association’s new executive director Thursday. So far, HART doesn’t have a replacement director lined up, but Morris Atta, HART’s deputy director for right-of-way, will help shoulder the work, according to an agency spokesman.

“My interest is more in the planning, community outreach, community development, and that’s not going to be as much of a part of HART anymore under the new organization,” Souki said Wednesday. He was referring to a new charter amendment that moves rail’s operations from HART to the city’s Department of Transportation Services.

“This is an opportunity to work on what I like,” Souki added moments after the HCDA board approved his hiring.

Meanwhile, rail leaders have acknowledged in recent weeks that they’ve struggled to hire and retain the expert staff needed to oversee a “gargantuan” transit project, particularly as its construction nears town and grows more complex.

“We really do have to fix the staffing problem,” HART Acting Executive Director Brennon Morioka said at a Nov. 10 rail board of directors meeting.

Part of that problem, Morioka said, is that HART, as a public agency, often can’t offer candidates the same competitive salaries that the private sector does. HART has to get approval from the city’s Human Resources Department first for the salaries it wants to offer — and sometimes HR rejects those proposals, he added.

“If you don’t fairly compensate these people, not only are we not getting qualified people, but we become a revolving door — and that has proven to be the case in the history of this organization,” HART board Vice Chairman Terrence Lee said at the Nov. 10 meeting.

“And every time you lose a person and you have to rehire someone else, you’ve got to retrain them,” Lee continued. “It’s extremely inefficient. You take resources away from upper management that should be focused on more important things, and then it becomes a never-ending cycle.”

Souki earned somewhere between $102,000 and $170,000 annually at HART, based on his job classification, according to a HART spokesman. HCDA reports he’ll earn a little more than $125,000 as that agency’s executive director.

Since 2015 HART has also seen turnover in agency directors handling design and construction, operation and maintenance, property acquisitions, contract procurement, finance and public communications. Its embattled former executive director, Dan Grabauskas, resigned in August under an agreement with the HART board.

The agency’s new interim executive director, Krishniah Murthy, is slated to start Dec. 5. Because the board directly hires and handles the executive director’s contract, Murthy’s $400,000 salary — the largest in the city — is not subject to the same HR scrutiny, Morioka said.

Furthermore, the agency reports that it is understaffed and that it needs to boost its ranks to keep up with all the oversight work facing rail. HART aims to fill some 13 vacancies and 16 new positions starting next summer to keep up, Morioka said.

HART budgeted some $55,000 for overtime in last year’s budget — but it wound up logging about $300,000 instead, according to Chief Financial Officer Diane Arakaki.

Board member Terri Fujii expressed concerns that some HART employees could be nearing burnout — and that could prompt more departures and make the staffing challenges even tougher.

Morioka told the board earlier this month that HART has started a “dialogue” about how it might increase compensation offers to hire and retain optimal staff. That will likely involve getting salary exemptions from city leaders, he added.

“If we don’t provide (Murthy) with a support team that are qualified, have the experience to properly oversee this project and manage it, we can’t succeed,” Lee said.