Squabble puts bouts in doubt

If Ralph Martin doesn't fight, nobody will.

The Hawaii State Boxing Commission refused to vote on the reinstatement of the local boxing committee president's promoter's license yesterday, leaving tonight's state Junior Olympics scheduled for 7 at Palolo Gym in doubt.

Martin said yesterday that he fully intends to have the show tonight and Junior Olympic chairman Bruce Kawano agreed.

"We got kids here from the Big Island and Maui," Kawano said. "They all paid to get here and I'm not going to be the one to deny them the opportunity to compete for a state championship."

The matter is out of the commission's hands until its next meeting, which has not been scheduled yet. The state's regulated industries complaints office said it has pending complaints against Martin's USA Boxing Hawaii but declined to say whether it planned on sending an investigator to the event.

"If they want to burn me, they want to have fun, they can go ahead," Ralph Martin said. "But my bottom line is to keep the kids participating. How can I crush the kids like that? I can't."

Martin has been without a license since January, when the commission deferred his renewal until he was reinstated by the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs and turned in all of his paperwork. Martin showed up to yesterday's meeting with all of that accomplished but quickly learned that there would be more to do.

Commissioner Bobby Lee initiated the issue when he said that he would have a hard time voting to grant Martin's license because the LBC held an event without being licensed in January and that Martin didn't inform the commission of a lawsuit between he and Wahiawa's Carl Phillips regarding Martin's alleged denial of fights to Phillips' athletes.

"I cannot in good faith approve something that is contrary to our rules," Bobby Lee said. "They have engaged in illegal activity and I can't condone that for fear of it happening again."

After much discussion, Lee asked the chairman to put the matter to rest with a vote and Della Martin made the motion to vote to reinstate Ralph Martin's promoter's license.

Della Martin made the motion, leaving it up to either Bobby Lee or Henry Sasaki to second it. Both commissioners refused to do so, with Sasaki saying that he has reservations. Lee said later that he didn't second the vote because of a personal code that prohibits him from calling a vote only to vote against it. Commissioner Herbert Minn, who has long said that he will not vote on anything that would keep the kids from fighting, was not present.

Commission chair Willes Lee later asked both commissioners what it would take to get a second to the motion, only to have Bobby Lee reply that he was not certain, and Sasaki to only say that he was apprehensive. Bobby Lee said earlier in the meeting that only a change of personnel at the LBC would ease his mind enough to grant a license, but was able to retract the statement when no vote was taken.

So Ralph Martin is left to decide whether to scrap the event -- and amateur boxing in the state altogether -- until he can comply with the commission's demands or allow the show to go on and deal with the consequences afterward. The problem is, the commission couldn't tell him what he needs to do to get back in its good graces.

"Last meeting they told us to do something and we did it," Ralph Martin said. "Now they come up with even more reasons to hurt the kids. To add another reason is an unfair issue and their personal attacks on me will never end."

Martin said the show will go on, believing that the commission is taking out its differences with him on the athletes. He also said he's willing to accept any punishment as long as his athletes can continue to compete. The commission has deferred Martin's license before, but has always taken care to do it in periods when it would not jeopardize a tournament. That ended this year after working around the tournaments in each of the last two years.

The state's Golden Gloves tournament was canceled this year because the organization didn't want to break a state law by holding an event while the local boxing committee was not registered. The commission -- which only began regulating amateurs when Willes Lee took over in 2004 -- says the law requires it to regulate amateurs and any harm that comes to athletes is unfortunate but necessary.

"We trust the athletes to train hard and the athletes trust us to protect them by following the rules and the laws of the state," Willes Lee said. "If (Martin's) license is not granted, it is not what we have done, it is what the LBC has done."