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By Dennis Oda, Star-Bulletin
Marion Kim goes over the scrapbook she kept from her
days of teaching on the Big Island after World War II.
She has fought for 20 years to get pension credits for
her eight months of federal service classifying fingerprints
during the war. "Had I taught elementary school, this
wouldn't have happened," she said. Only the elementary
school teachers were contacted about the credits.

Retired teacher
fights for benefits

Marion Kim did not learn
until after the law expired that
she was entitled to service credits

---

By Treena Shapiro
Star-Bulletin

Marion Kim has made many attempts in eight years to get the state to adjust her retirement benefits to reflect service during World War II years. Each time, she was told no. But she kept trying.

She will have to wait even longer because the state cannot find paperwork to back up her claim.

The retired Waipahu High School math teacher learned in 1979 she was entitled to buy back service credits for the eight months she spent classifying fingerprints after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Since her pension is calculated by the number of years worked, the credits would entitle her to a few extra dollars a month.

The law allowing teachers to buy back the credits expired in 1968, but Kim has made it her mission to prove she should get the credits because she was denied them by the state's oversight.

"The reason is, I just want justice," she said. "It's not so much the money. It's the principle."

Kim, 86, was already four years into her retirement in 1979 before she even heard she could have bought back the credits from former classmates who had already done so. They had received flyers, and the Employees' Retirement System explained the process to them. "I didn't get any," she said. "Why should I be the only one being left out?"

She had planned to become an elementary school teacher and had been a third-grade probationary teacher at Lunalilo Elementary School when the school was flattened during the Pearl Harbor bombing. Since the war closed the schools, Kim and 11 other probationary teachers spent the next eight months processing hundreds of fingerprints a day.

After the war, Kim was sent to the Big Island to teach math, and remained a high school teacher until she retired.

Initially, Kim said, she accepted the state's explanation that it was too late to adjust her benefits. She was busy taking care of her husband, whose 10-year battle with Parkinson's disease depleted the couple's savings.

It was not until 1992 that she really began to fight.

After mentioning at an Oahu Retired Teachers Association board meeting that she had been shortchanged, she was advised that it was not too late.

Over the next eight years, Kim talked to a lot of legislators trying to convince them to pass a bill that would allow her to buy back her credits.

The bill finally passed at the end of the last legislative session, due partly to efforts by her former algebra student, Rep. Lei Ahu Isa.

"She was one of my favorite teachers," Ahu Isa said. They ran into each other on the opening day of the Legislature. "I said, 'We're going to get it passed,'" Ahu Isa said.

When the bill passed, Kim invited all the legislators who had helped her to lunch. Unfortunately, her celebration was premature.

A month later, Gov. Ben Cayetano vetoed the bill, arguing that it was written to benefit a single person. "I was so let down," Kim said.

She got an appointment on Aug. 25 to speak with Cayetano. A half-hour into their meeting, he was on the phone with retirement system Administrator David Shimabukuro, telling him to let her have the credits, Kim said.

Kim Murakawa, the governor's press secretary, said the governor only assured Kim he would make sure Shimabukuro was looking into her claim.

Murakawa said the governor believed Kim was in the right, but the retirement system has a process to follow.

Shimabukuro said his staff has been trying to track down records of Kim's World War II service. "We need documentation to say that she worked during that period," he said.

If the records turn up, they will cut her a check, but Shimabukuro will not say what will happen if his staff fails to turn up any records of Kim's service.

Kim remains confident that justice will prevail, and has been making plans for her initial check -- including church building fund donations and grandchildren's private school tuition -- even though no one knows how much it would be.

"My preference is my children's children," she said. "Education is so important."