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Taking care of those who need help is the Hawaiian way, says former Office of Hawaiian Affairs trustee Adelaide "Frenchy" DeSoto. Trustee’s suit says
OHA denied her
medical aidBy Debra Barayuga
Star-BulletinAnd so it was the way of the Hawaiian state agency to adopt a policy, even before the government began implementing the Americans with Disabilities Act, that provided kakoo for kupuna who needed assistance for medical reasons.
"It was the Hawaiian, proper thing to do," said DeSoto, who suffered her first stroke in 1991 and has since suffered three more -- one of them at a meeting at the University of Hawaii.
Kakoo in Hawaiian refers to help, support -- someone who provides kokua, she said.
In a lawsuit filed yesterday in Circuit Court against OHA, where she served for most of the past 20 years, DeSoto contends that from 1998 to 2000 she was regularly denied kakoo, a violation of her employment contract.
DeSoto said after she suffered her first stroke, doctors told her she should get some help getting to her car or driving to OHA-related activities. She also began needing assistance traveling to the neighbor islands.
The board set aside a portion of the budget each year for kakoo for anyone who needed it, DeSoto said. She wasn't the only one who used kakoo, she said -- former OHA trustees Moses Keale, Abe Aiona and Gladys Brandt also used kakoo.
Her requests for kakoo, she said, were denied by then-chairwoman Rowena Akana, who was one of two administrators who approved the applications. Akana, the complaint said, used her authority to deny her kakoo for personal and political gain.
DeSoto used various people during a three-year period to assist her, including her daughter.
Akana, DeSoto said, didn't want DeSoto's daughter to be her kakoo. "She dictated who can help me."
"I was treated, for whatever reason, with very vicious and vindictive behavior not at all consistent with fairness," she said.
Because OHA refused to pay, DeSoto said she paid for kakoo on her own. She is seeking damages in the amount she said she paid for kakoo.
Trustee Akana and OHA could not be reached for immediate comment.
Office of Hawaiian Affairs
