Editor’s Scratchpad
Ian Lind, a former Star-Bulletin reporter, has raised a question of journalistic ethics that may interest readers. On his Web site, Lind suggested on Monday that this writer had a conflict of interest in publishing an editorial favoring the Hawaiian Electric Industries' position on a power line running over the Waahila Ridge above St. Louis Heights. The facts are these: An answer at
the end of the lineIn 1997, when I was a freelance writer, I joined the board of directors of HEI Power Corp., a subsidiary of HEI that was seeking business in Asia. I knew little about business or electric power but had spent 10 years as a foreign correspondent in Asia and more studying and writing about it. Immediately after I was hired as editorial director of the new Star-Bulletin, I resigned from HEIPC to avoid both a conflict and the appearance of a conflict of interest.
When the issue of the power line came up, I recused myself, declining to write editorials on that subject to preclude the appearance of conflict, even though HEIPC had no connection with the question at hand. I explained this to a representative of Malama o Manoa, which opposes the power line, and to a spokesman for Hawaiian Electric. A colleague wrote the editorial in question; my part as editor was limited to asking him to clarify a point or two.
--Richard Halloran Richard Halloran is Editorial section editor.
He can be reached by e-mail at rhalloran@starbulletin.com