The Hawaii Green Infrastructure Authority named its fourth executive director Friday.
Gwen Yamamoto Lau is heading the failed $150 million state loan program for renewable energy following the resignation of former Executive Director Tara Young in September after less than a year on the job.
HGIA is the office responsible for overseeing a loan program known as Green Energy Market Securitization, or GEMS, intended to help low-income residents own rooftop solar energy systems. The 2-year-old GEMS program has come under fire for lending out only a tiny fraction of its funds.
State lawmakers approved GEMS in 2013 and raised $150 million in a November 2014 bond sale with a goal of lending all the money for solar and other renewable-energy systems by November 2016. But only a dozen have been installed with loans totaling just $385,000.
Hawaii electrical ratepayers pay the interest on the bonds and expenses related to issuing and managing the bonds through the “Green Infrastructure Fee” on their monthly bills. Ratepayers have paid a total of about $27.9 million for the GEMS program.
Yamamoto Lau joined HGIA as managing director in May with more than 30 years of management experience in commercial, credit union banking and community development financing.
Before that she was senior vice president and chief lending officer for HawaiiUSA Federal Credit Union and president of the Hawaii Community Reinvestment Corp., where she worked on affordable housing and community and economic development.
“I look forward to working with the HGIA board, program partners and stakeholders to effectively deploy GEMS capital enabling ratepayers to lower their energy costs and contribute towards Hawaii’s 100 percent clean energy goals,” she said in a news release.
ON THE MOVE
>> Mahealani Richardson is an anchor/reporter on Hawaii News Now. As of Jan. 26 she will anchor on KGMB/KHNL at 6 p.m. and co-anchor with Keahi Tucker at the 6:30 p.m. KFVE newscasts. Richardson previously served as a director of communications and marketing at Shriners Hospitals for Children and hosted “Insights” on PBS Hawaii. She received an Edward R. Murrow Award for her news documentary “War With Iraq, Through the Eyes of Hawaii’s Keiki.”
>> Sharon Yoshida is the new director of finance at Goodsill Anderson Quinn & Stifel. Her responsibilities are to manage the accounting and finance functions of the firm, including financial and management reporting, collections, accounts receivable, accounts payable as well as banking relationships. Yoshida has served in various industries such as real estate, public accounting, banking, health care and legal services.
