Column: Why the Inouye International Airport remains in disrepair

We read with great interest, and perhaps incredulousness, last week’s coverage of United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz’s site visit and tour of United Airlines’ Hawaii operations. He confirmed with media what we as citizens have known for some time: the Daniel K. Inouye International Airport ranks as one of the worst in the nation for just about everything.

Why we are incredulous is that for the last four legislative sessions, the Airports Corporation Bill, which would transfer authority over the state’s airports into the hands of an independent corporation, has failed to pass — again. The bill never made it to a hearing in the House Finance Committee and died there despite well-meaningful efforts to move it along.

As Hawaii Republicans, we represent and champion the tenets of fiscal responsibility. We can’t help but think that all of Hawaii’s citizens and its visitors were poorly represented and horrifically disregarded by a mostly Democratic Legislature that cannot seem to get out of its own way.

The Hawaii Republican Party along with the governor, state Department of Transportation, state Procurement Office and a handful of legislators all approved of the Airports Corporation Bill, known as Senate Bill 666 during this last legislative session, and sponsored by Sen. Lorraine Inouye of the Big Island, a Democrat. If there were normal bipartisanship present in Hawaii’s local government, the outcome could have been much different and more positive for this bill, and ultimately Hawaii.

For all the reasons one can think of, this bill made sense. Why would it then fail in four successive legislative sessions when it had overwhelming support in the executive branch and departmentally? The simple answer is that a single-party governing body such as the Hawaii Legislature has no checks and balances or mechanism to have healthy dissenting debate.

Our Democratically led Legislature takes its cues from special interests. The chief reason the bill has stumbled in its last four iterations is the concern of special interests that a separate corporation may be able to reside and operate outside of the state procurement rules. We see this as perhaps a good thing. The state procurement rules are not wholly bad, but they are cumbersome.

Hawaiian Airlines was also a huge supporter of this effort as it undergoes its own efforts to modernize operations in Hawaii. And now seeing United’s CEO weighing in, making comments such as “I hate to be overdramatic but we’ve got to fix this,” perhaps underscores yet another dysfunction of our legislators to see through their own self-interests over those of the people who elected them, to represent the best interests of their districts and the state as a whole.

The Hawaii Republican Party must bolster its representation in local government to end this track record of substandard performance by a one-party system. We are a party of fiscal responsibility and transparency. We are a party that strives for all Hawaii’s people to have a clear understanding of where their tax dollars are being spent.

We feel the people of Hawaii were ripped off this past session from the opportunity to move our airports forward into this century. The next time you fly home internationally, and get herded onto a 20th-century “Wiki Wiki” bus, ask yourself: Can’t we do better than this? We can.

We will continue to support Sen. Inouye’s efforts as she brings this issue to the forefront for the fifth time, because it is the right thing to do for the people of Hawaii.

Shirlene DelaCruz Santiago Ostrov chairs the Hawaii Republican Party.