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Housing official says
city employees trusted
Kahapea’s expertise

By Debra Barayuga
Star-Bulletin

He was well respected for his expertise in relocations and had successfully completed other projects before. Besides, there was no reason not to trust him.

So city employees didn't question then-property management chief Michael Kahapea about claims for payment submitted for the relocation of commercial tenants to make way for the Ewa Villages revitalization project.

"I trusted him, I relied on his expertise and did not question it," said Randall Wong, head of community-based development under the city Housing Department whose responsibility was to sign off on claim vouchers submitted to the city for payment to movers.

Kahapea is on trial for allegedly stealing about $5.6 million from the Ewa Villages relocation funds by submitting bogus invoices from moving companies created by friends and family for work that was never done or was done at overinflated costs.

Don Wilkerson, attorney for Kahapea, has said Kahapea is being targeted because he kept pointing out hazardous waste on the Ewa Villages site to superiors, even taking an environmental class at his own expense, and still much of the waste remains to this day.

"Kahapea essentially kept blowing the whistle on this and complaining we gotta do something and after that, all this comes down on him," Wilkerson said, during a break in the trial. The trial resumes tomorrow. Wilkerson has said Mayor Jeremy Harris and supervisors are responsible for the relocation fund growing from $1.2 million in 1992 to $6.3 million.

Wong yesterday said he worked with Kahapea on several successful relocation projects in the late 1980s, including West Loch and the Chinatown redevelopment.

Wong said he did not personally verify whether the moving work was done because it was Kahapea's responsibility. He would not have signed the claims vouchers if he knew the documents were falsified or the moving work not done.

Wong said he assumed the moving work was done because the invoices attached to the claims vouchers indicated the work was done, and because Kahapea's signature was on the forms recommending approval of the claim. By affixing his signature to the claims forms, Kahapea was certifying that the claim conformed with state laws governing relocation payments to individuals or companies displaced by government.

Wong said he noticed a certain handful of movers were responsible for the moves but Kahapea told him those companies did a lot of business in the area, were better equipped for commercial moves and could expedite the work.

Wong also testified that while he directed Kahapea to clean up the Ewa Villages site and authorized him to rehabilitate homes so residents could move into them temporarily, he did not give permission to Kahapea to use relocation money to clean up hazardous waste or for any other purpose other than the Ewa Villages relocations.

Under questioning by Wilkerson, Wong said Kahapea did point out pipes that allegedly contained asbestos at the Ewa Village site and helped remove fertilizer tanks.

But additional testing and a mitigation plan to clean up the hazardous waste was never done because the city has not yet determined what it will do with the site, Wong said.

Also yesterday, Helen Hong, an account clerk assigned to Housing and Community Development, said she began expediting paperwork involving payments for the Ewa Villages project in 1996 or 1997 at the request of Kahapea and fair housing officer Norman Tam, who was assisting him in handling the relocations.

Hong said she was not responsible for ensuring the information on the paperwork was correct, only to ensure that the claims were accompanied by required documents and that they contained the proper signatures.

Nothing in the paperwork raised any suspicions because the paperwork was "in order," she said.

Tam generally would call her to find out when the check would be ready, she said. Sometimes, either Tam or Kahapea would meet her at City Hall, where she would pick up the check and hand it over to them so they could take it back to the moving companies on their weekly trips to Ewa Village.

Tam died New Year's Eve of an apparent heart attack.