OHA 2016 Check Register: Money Flows to Lawyers, LLCs, Insiders and More

by Andrew Walden

Hawai’i Free Press has obtained a copy of the Fiscal Year 2015-16 Office of Hawaiian Affairs check register in response to an open records request.

Bizarrely, OHA provided the complete (except payroll) register with 10 work days of our request, as prescribed by law, without their usual delaying tactics. 

View the Check Register in PDF Format HERE: 2015-16 Check Register  (To search for any amount, date check number or payee, open PDF in Adobe Acrobat and press ‘Control-F’.)  The register totals $35,099,115.28.

Highlights found by searching the register include

• $85,155.28 paid in six checks to PKF Pacific. See: Prosecutor: HART & OHA Auditing Firm Victim of 3-year, $500K Embezzlement Scheme
• $146,149.14 paid in eight checks to Spire. See:  Financial Services: OHA Spire Contract Balloons 760% in Two Years
• $662,090.00 paid in two checks to Hi’ilei Aloha, LLC. See: Lawsuit: OHA Uses Corporations to Sidestep Open Meetings Law, Loot Assets, Line Cronies' Pockets
• $26,226.30 paid in five checks to Hi’ipaka, LLC. See: OHA’s Hidden LLCs: Why Plead Guilty to Stealing $14M?
• $165,969.24 paid in five checks to Stryker-Weiner PR firm.  See: “PR Disaster: Stryker Wiener Behind New OHA Policy Gagging Trustees”  
• $1,850,000.00 paid in three checks to Kanu o Ka Aina PCS.  See: “OHA Chair’s Charter School Gets Seven Times More Than All Other Charters Combined”
• $2,347,999.99 paid in three checks to The Akamai Foundation (Louis Perez).  See: Financial services training for 750 students at 22 schools  ($3,132 from OHA per student).  Investment Fund subsidiary ‘Akamai Capital’ established.  Also got $3.2M from DoE. 
• $1,056,470.00 paid in three checks to WCIT.  See: “Ethics Complaint: OHA Insiders Take Kickbacks from Kakaako Makai Projects”
• $1,049,800.00 in five checks to Native Hawaiian Legal Corp.
• $35,830.84 paid in four checks to the Law College Foundation of the University of Arizona.  See: “STUDY ON THE INTERNATIONAL LAW AND POLICY RELATING TO THE SITUATION OF THE NATIVE HAWAIIAN PEOPLE”

Mystery Money

• $1,520.00 to AOAO 215 N King St.  Hmmmmm.
• $156,000.00 paid in four checks to the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation  Huh?
• $71,344.83 in two checks to Forest Solution, LLC (owned by Michael Saalfeld) See: “Secrecy surrounds Parker Ranch's sale of 3,509 acres to biofuel pioneer”  

Nearly $1.5M to Lawyers

• $701,385.67 to Williams and Connolly to lose before the US Supreme Court in a futile defense of OHA’s policy of spending money on Nai Aupuni.  See: Supreme Court Justice Hands Down Injunction Against Nai Aupuni.
• $416,408.14  paid in 46 checks to McCorriston Miller.
• $279,806.39  paid in 36 checks to Alston Hunt.
• $72,726.18 in eight checks to Sherry Broder, ESQ.
• $13,656.17 paid in five checks to Cades Schutte, LLP.

PDF: 2015-16 Check Register

July 2015: Full Text: After Two Months, OHA Coughs up Check Register (Previous years OHA check registers.)