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KITV

Homepage > Honolulu News

Exclusive: Embattled DOT Deputy Quits

Brian Sekiguchi Came Under Fire For Deals,
Ethics

Keoki Kerr KITV4
News

POSTED: 4:03 pm HST August 9, 2010
UPDATED: 9:21 pm HST August 9,
2010

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&nbsp

HONOLULU --

The embattled deputy state transportation director in charge
of airports abruptly stepped down last week with just five days’ notice.

Brian Sekiguchi's management skills and ethics have come under fire
by a key state senator.

For the last seven years, Sekiguchi oversaw 15 airports in the
state, with a multimillion dollar budget and hundreds of employees.
Sekiguchi was paid about $100,000 a year.

He's been under fire for a number of questionable business deals by
the airports division, which is paying more than a $500,000 a year to
sublease this building on Ualena Street near Honolulu Airport that it
already owns.

The state is paying twice as much money to buy half the land it had
planned to purchase to expand the heliport at Lihue Airport on Kauai.

At a July 19 hearing, State Senate Ways and Means Chairwoman Donna
Mercado Kim accused Sekiguchi of taking at least one day of vacation in
April of 2009 without putting in for vacation time.

"I was on vacation, but I did meet with airline officials while I
was on the mainland. And that's something that we try to do sometimes to
kill two birds with one stone," Sekiguchi told Kim’s committee at the
hearing.

His vacation leave form shows just one approved day off: April 9,
2009. However, he admitted he left town the morning before, on April 8.
Then Kim asked Sekiguchi if he accepted free tickets from an airport
vendor for part of his vacation -- to the Augusta, Ga., The Masters golf
tournament:

Sekiguchi: "That is incorrect. I was on personal vacation ... Uh
..."

Kim: "So one of the airport vendors didn't pay for your tickets to
go to The Masters?"

"No they did not," Sekiguchi said.

"So you paid for your own ticket to the Masters?" Mercado asked.

"Yes, I did," Sekiguchi said.

His gift disclosure form shows no gifts from that time period.

Kim said she was not convinced he told the truth.

"There seems to be some improprieties going on regarding your
position and regarding vendors that you have control over," she said.

His boss, Transportation Director Brennon Morioka said, "We at the
department, as well as this administration, takes those kinds of things
very seriously, as well as the perception."

On Monday, Morioka's spokeswoman would only say Sekiguchi offered
his resignation and the DOT accepted it as of Friday, five days after he
announced he was quitting.

Gov. Linda Lingle’s spokesman said she did not ask Sekiguchi to
step down, and he did not give her a reason for his resignation.

KITV4 News left a message at Sekiguchi's home on Monday and with
his former secretary at the Department of Transportation to try to get in
touch with him, but he did not return the phone calls.

Kim has been critical of the Lingle administration for creating a
civil service airports administrator position that had not been authorized
or funded by the Legislature. Kim claimed the job requirements were
written in such a way as to give Sekiguchi an advantage in getting the
job, which would have allowed him to remain working for the state after
the Lingle administration and other political appointees leave office at
the end of the year.

Several other recent incidents have raised questions about the
management of the airports division, which Sekiguchi oversaw.

On Friday, KITV4 News reported a business services supervisor at
Kauai’s Lihue Airport admitted to stealing about $13,000 over at least
four months before being discovered in July. The woman is on
administrative leave while the state attorney general’s office probes the
case.

State DOT Director Brennon Morioka said the state is looking at its
internal controls and protocols to prevent similar schemes in the future.

Even though Lihue Airport handles far fewer passengers and flights
than Kahului and Honolulu airports, it was the only airport in Hawaii to
pay security fines to the Transportation Security Administration for
security lapses between March 2009 and March of this year. Lihue Airport
paid the TSA $75,000 for 15 different security incidents, according to
state DOT records.

On July 27, state Procurement Office administrator Aaron Fujioka
found the state Department of Transportation violated procurement law when
it hired two airport security consultants through Securitas Security
Services USA, an airport security contractor.

The state Airports Division of the DOT has been the subject of an
ongoing probe by Kim’s Senate committee for more than a year. Her
investigation revealed:

The Airports Division is paying more than $500,000 a year to sublease
its own building on Ualena Street near Honolulu International
Airport.

The state is paying twice as much money to buy half the amount of land
it had planned to purchase to expand the heliport area next to Lihue
Airport on Kauai.

A $1.5 million contract approved in 2000 for a high-tech sensor system
to monitor taxis at Honolulu International Airport was supposed to take
less than three years to complete, but the project dragged on for nine
years before being finished.

Parking contracts at neighbor island airports have been on a
month-to-month basis for at least seven years.

The state is failing to charge tenants at Lihue Airport $16,000 a
month in solar power system costs.

Sekiguchi, who lives in Aiea, has been the deputy transportation
director for airports since 2003. Before that, he spent 22 years in the
military construction and engineering field at both the U.S. Navy and the
U.S. Air Force.

At the time of his state appointment seven years ago, he was
resident officer in charge of construction for the Naval Facilities
Engineering Command at Pearl Harbor. At that time, according to a news
release from the governor’s office, he oversaw 650 projects including
construction and environmental work.

Previous Stories:

August 7, 2010: Exclusive: Kauai
Airport Supervisor Admits To Theft

July 7, 2010: State Paying $500K
Annual Rent For Its Own Land

Copyright 2010 by KITV.com All rights reserved. This
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

&nbsp

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