by Andrew Walden
UPDATE: Mayor Kenoi’s defense of use of County addresses in campaign raises more questions
With a Hawaii County internal investigation of Internet abuse by employees beginning to heat up as a political issue, perhaps the same people who chose to ignore now-mayor Billy Kenoi’s fundraising on behalf of Mafia murderer Malu Motta will become interested in questions about Kenoi’s possible campaign use of government computers, email accounts, office space, and telephones.
Nancy Cook Lauer in WHT and the Advertiser reports: “Hawaii County Mayor Billy Kenoi acknowledged Friday that his office is investigating ‘very serious’ and possibly illegal abuse of Internet access on county computers. Kenoi said the investigation goes back to January 2008 and includes the potentially illegal use of county computers for political activity, as well as other serious abuses.”
The investigation appears to be focusing on records from the County’s web-use logging software which records the last six months of use of each of the County’s 906 computers.
There may be other sources of information available. For instance the “whois” report for Billy Kenoi’s now-defunct campaign website www.BillyKenoi.com shows the following:
Registrant:
William Kenoi
25 Aupuni St.
Hilo, Hawaii 96720
United States
Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
Domain Name: BILLYKENOI.COM
Created on: 16-Apr-07
Expires on: 16-Apr-09
Last Updated on: 16-Apr-08
Administrative Contact:
Kenoi, William wkenoi@co.hawaii.hi.us
25 Aupuni St.
Hilo, Hawaii 96720
United States
(808) 961-8211
Technical Contact:
Kenoi, William wkenoi@co.hawaii.hi.us
25 Aupuni St.
Hilo, Hawaii 96720
United States
(808) 961-8211
Akamai readers will note that Mr. Kenoi appears to have used his government email address as the contact for his campaign website. Moreover, “25 Aupuni St” is the address of the Hawaii County Building. Kenoi was in 2007 and 2008 an executive assistant to Mayor Kim working out of the mayor's office at the County Building and when renovations began working out of the Mayor's temporary office on Ululani St. Moreover the phone number listed--(808) 961-8211--is the phone number of the Mayor’s Office. This phone number remained in use at both the County Building and on Ululani St.
Kenoi tells Lauer the investigation goes back to January, 2008. The April 16, 2008 update of the registration of BillyKenoi.com would be included in the time period under review.
Lauer quotes Kenoi saying: "We are not going to tolerate this type of behavior," Kenoi said. "We anticipate action will be taken in the future" that could include employee termination and even prosecution.
LINK TO: “Whois” report for BillyKenoi.com
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