Ex-state Sen. Matsuura
dies of cancer at 64
He lead a special investigation
By Mike Yuen
into state procurement practices
Star-BulletinFormer Democratic state Sen. Richard Matsuura, who led a controversial special investigation into state procurement practices that was tantamount to challenging his own party's establishment, died of cancer early today in Hilo. He was 64. Services are tentatively set for Thursday at New Hope Christian Fellowship in Hilo.
A native of Waialua, Matsuura represented Hilo in the state House for four years and the state Senate for 12 before inoperable pancreatic and liver cancer forced him to resign Jan. 31.
"The state has lost a visionary statesman," said Senate Judiciary Committee Co-Chairman Matt Matsunaga (D, Palolo) this morning. "He was a role model for kids and a champion for good government. His family has lost a loving father and husband. And I have lost a friend, mentor and hero."
Big Island Senator Wayne Metcalf (D, South Hilo) called Matsuura "a man of great vision and dedication."
"He was a man who dared to dream," Metcalf said.
Matsuura frequently compared himself to a samurai warrior, particularly when he headed the Senate's special investigative panel in 1993.
His probe into how then-Gov. John Waihee's administration purchased goods and services did not lead to any criminal indictments. But it did cause the resignation of then-Budget Director Yukio Takemoto, who insisted he did nothing wrong.
The investigation also tightened the state procurement procedure. But legislators and even the state's current governor, Ben Cayetano, have concluded that the changes also made the procurement process more cumbersome and less efficient.
However, the political impact of the probe was significant. Although Waihee's then-attorney general, Robert Marks, declined to follow through on the panel's recommendations, which included a call for a criminal investigation, Waihee ended his final term in office with his image tarnished by a fellow Democrat.
Matsuura was able to persuade his Senate colleagues to give him the reins to a special investigative committee because he suspected that politically connected people were benefiting from government nonbid contracts and investments made by the state pension fund.
"He had very well-defined ideas about right and wrong," said former Senate Republican leader Mary George, who served on Matsuura's investigative committee.
"He wasn't an old boy. You couldn't define him as belonging to a network. He was his own person. It was his own standard that governed his conduct—not a particular network."
Sen. Randy Iwase (D, Mililani), who was also a member of Matsuura's investigative panel, added: "If he believed in something, he was very tenacious. When he took a stand, he took it with great conviction. He never wavered, no matter what was out there."
Matsuura referred to himself as a samurai because of the qualities he saw the feudal Japanese warrior embodying, said Iwase and other lawmakers. Like a samurai, Matsuura believed that loyality, honor and commitment meant more than death, Iwase said.
Matsuura had been part of the power elite under previous Senate regimes. In recent years, with Norman Mizuguchi (D, Aiea) the Senate president, Matsuura was on the outs. He refused to reach an accommodation with Mizuguchi because he felt their differences were too deep.
Matsuura's refusal at times to compromise has led him to be described as hard-headed.
"He has never changed whether in power or out," said Iwase, who joined the Senate in 1990, when Matsuura was still an insider.
Waihee said he and Matsuura were able to maintain a personal relationship even when Matsuura's panel was raising ethical questions about the Waihee administration.
Matsuura saw how technology and telecommunications were changing the world, and he wanted Hawaii to be a part of that. He also sought to find ways to divert water from the wet part of the Big Island to its dry region. He dreamt of finding a way to raise enough mahimahi to feed the world. He also wrote children's books.
Matsuura was a Renaissance man, said Matsunaga.
A defining time in Matsuura's life was the decade, beginning in 1961, that he spent in India as an agricultural missionary for the Methodist church. Preaching the "green revolution," he taught farmers how to grow nutrient-rich soybeans.
An agriculturist by training, Matsuura received a doctorate in horticulture from the University of Minnesota and his undergraduate degree from Oregon State University. He graduated from Waialua High School in 1950.
Matsuura met his wife-to-be in 1954 during a Sunday service at a Japanese Baptist Church in Minneapolis. He was a missionary student at Bethel Seminary in adjacent St. Paul. She was interning at a Minneapolis hospital.
A few hours after the service, he called and asked her for a date. "He was a fast worker," Dr. Ruth Matsuura recalled, chuckling. "He knew what he wanted."
By Easter 1955, four months later, they were engaged. On June 20, 1956, they were married in Dr. Matsuura's hometown of Hanford in central California.
In addition to his wife, Matsuura leaves two daughters, Caroline "Kui" Wong and Marlene Kai, both of Hilo; four sons, Peter Matsuura, Stephen Matsuura, David Matsuura and Andrew Matsuura, all of Hilo; 14 grandchildren, ages 5 months to 11 years; five sisters, Tsurue Masaki, Ruth Tomita, Sue Burrell, Margie Yokoyama and Alice Furuya, all of Oahu; and two brothers, Larry Matsuura of Oahu and Harold Matsuura of Hilo.
Star-Bulletin reporter Jim Witty
contributed to this report.
