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STAR-ADVERTISER / June 2017
Ford Fuchigami, who has served as a principal advisor to Gov. David Ige since November 2017, is returning to the state Department of Transportation to take a civil service job. He is shown here at a news conference in 2017 when he was the DOT director.
Ford Fuchigami, who has served as a principal advisor to Gov. David Ige since November 2017, is returning to the state Department of Transportation to take a civil service job.
Fuchigami will serve as the administrative services officer for DOT’s Airports Division beginning June 1 where he will earn a salary of $150,000 a year, according to information from DOT spokesman Tim Sakahara and the governor’s office.
Fuchigami is currently Ige’s administrative director. In recent months, he has essentially served as the governor’s chief of staff.
Fuchigami spent more than three decades in the hospitality, healthcare and laundry industries before being appointed by former Gov. Neil Abercrombie in 2011 as deputy director for DOT’s Airports Division. He began serving as DOT’s director in May 2014. He also served as DOT director under Ige before becoming a top advisor to the governor.
Fuchigami didn’t immediately respond to an inquiry about his new job and didn’t respond to media questions earlier this month about why he was leaving the governor’s office.
Sakahara said that Fuchigami was one of seven qualified applicants for DOT’s administrative services officer position.
The job generally includes management of an agency’s finances, capital improvement projects and personnel, as well as oversight of policies and procedures, according to a position description provided by DOT.
Ige has not named a replacement for Fuchigami. His former chief of staff Mike McCartney left this year after the governor appointed him as director of the state’s Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.
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