Ban on outside work for City Council proposed

Two Honolulu City Council leaders have put forward two pieces of legislation that, if approved, would both strictly prohibit any outside employment or financial gain beyond an elective Council seat.

Council Chair Tommy Waters and Vice Chair Esther Kia‘aina on Thursday co-introduced Resolution 109 — a proposed amendment to the Honolulu City Charter, effectively the city’s constitution — to formally prevent a Council member from maintaining any outside employment, having any controlling interest in a business or receiving any salary, wage, allowance, stipend or profit from an outside business interest while working as a public servant.

As drafted, the proposed charter amendment is targeted toward the 2024 general election ballot and, if approved by voters, would take effect Jan. 1, 2025.

The pair also together introduced Bill 33, which would, by a vote of the Council, become an ordinance and be nearly identical in its intent to Resolution 109, except this new law would begin Jan. 1, a year ahead of Resolution 109’s voter-­approved charter amendment.

Both the bill and resolution would allow any Council member with “a controlling interest in a business and does not wish to divest himself or herself of that interest, in order to comply … the council member may transfer the interest to a blind trust within sixty-one days of election or appointment.” A blind trust is a trust agreement where neither the person who establishes the trust nor the beneficiaries have any control or influence over, or knowledge of, the assets in the trust.

“As elected officials, it is our duty to prioritize the needs of the community above outside interests. Council members should not have divided interests, and these measures are intended to increase public trust by eliminating outside employment,” Waters said in a written statement. “In the past, there have been a number of ethical violations, and these measures are intended to address that.”

Introduction of the twin legislation follows the Honolulu Salary Commission’s adoption of pay hikes for the city’s top elected and appointed officials, including the City Council.

As adopted on April 25, the annual salary for the Council chair — the seat that leads the nine-member panel — would rise to $123,288 from $76,968, a 60.2% jump, while an individual Council member’s salary would get a 64.4% pay bump to $113,304, up from $68,904.

But two days after the Salary Commission’s decision, Council members Augie Tulba and Andria Tupola co-introduced their own resolutions — 81 and 82, respectively — that, if approved, would either wholly or partially nix the Salary Commission’s adopted salary schedule for the 2024 fiscal year as well as any new pay hikes for Council members. To date, neither resolution has been scheduled to be reviewed and discussed at a Council meeting.

On Monday, Waters — who previously expressed support for these Council pay hikes, claiming the higher salaries would attract talented, future leadership to local government — could not be reached for immediate comment regarding Resolution 109 or Bill 33.

However, Kia‘aina responded to questions about the legislation and how it might affect current Council members, many of whom work other jobs.

“I don’t know how many council members have outside employment, I have heard members mention outside work from time to time and have read media reports on it, but don’t know what the current situation is of any of the other members,” Kia‘aina told the Honolulu Star-­Advertiser via email. “The time commitment and significance of my work as (a) council member requires a significant investment of my time and so after about two years as a council member, I ended my outside employment. So, I am currently not employed outside of the City Council.”

According to the Council’s required disclosure of financial interest forms submitted to the city in January, many of the current Council members are employed beyond their public-servant roles.

Of the six who served in 2022, only Council member Radiant Cordero reported no outside income on her financial disclosure.

In 2022, Waters earned between $50,000 and $99,999 as a private attorney, while Kia‘aina and Tupola made similar amounts from consulting work, the forms state. Council member Calvin Say collected between $20,000 and $49,998 from business ventures, and Tulba earned the same range as a radio personality.

New Council members — Tyler Dos Santos-Tam, Val Okimoto and Matt Weyer — reported outside incomes for the year 2022 as well.

Dos Santos-Tam reported earning between $100,000 to $149,000 while working as a private communications consultant. Since taking office, Dos Santos-­Tam told the Star-­Advertiser, he’s stopped working as a consultant.

“So it’s effectively ‘closed’ or ‘inactive,’” he said via email.

For 2022, Okimoto reported income as a former state House representative, and Weyer reported his income as a current city planner with the Department of Community Services — both of their respective outside incomes ranging from $50,000 to $99,000.

According to Kia‘aina, if the latest round of legislation is passed, penalties for working outside the Council may be imposed.

“For example, I understand that Revised Ordinances of Honolulu section 1-3.1 provides for fines and penalties in cases where there is a violation of the charter or ordinances,” Kia‘aina said.

Still, Council member Tulba told the Star-­Advertiser this week that the idea of accepting a pay raise in order to do the job of a public servant while many other people on the island are hurting financially was a wrongheaded idea.

“So you’re justifying the fact that you’ve got to pay me double so you can trust me more,” Tulba said. “What you’re saying to the public is the last 100 years the City Council never did a good job because they were working part time. You know, people are not stupid, people are not dumb. … I say let’s start taking care of the bottom before we start taking care of the people on the top.”

Saying he would not accept the pending Council pay raise for himself, Tulba said Waters’ and Kia‘aina’s new legislation to ban outside employment was only a “distraction.”

“The real issue is the 64%; that’s what people are complaining about,” he said. “You can hide behind the Salary Commission or even this … that you can make this a full-time job. … People didn’t vote for a Salary Commission; they voted for us to represent their voice.”

Meanwhile, according to their joint written statement, both Waters and Kia‘aina “encourage the public to testify on this important issue” at the full Council meeting on June 7.