Susan Pang Gochros recalled that shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, attorney Mark Bennett said he was seriously considering leaving private practice for a public service job. Strong support shown
for 2 Lingle nomineesA Senate panel must OK
the appointees for home lands chief
and state attorney general
By Pat Omandam
pomandam@starbulletin.com
"At the time, I asked Mark why he was considering this option, and he responded: 'It may sound trite, but I feel a compulsion to refocus now and find the way to best serve my community,'" said Gochros, a state Judiciary division chief, in written testimony before the Senate Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs Committee.
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Bennett, Gov. Linda Lingle's nominee for state attorney general, received near-unanimous support at his Senate confirmation hearing yesterday.
"There is no higher calling for a lawyer than public service," Bennett told senators.
Micah Kane, 33, Lingle's designate for chairman of the state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands and the Hawaiian Homes Commission, also received overwhelming testimony yesterday for his confirmation.
Senate Judiciary Chairwoman Colleen Hanabusa (D, Waianae) has recommended their appointments be approved by the panel today and sent to the full 25-member Senate for a confirmation vote.
Hawaii's legal community turned out to support Bennett, 49, whose experience includes work as an assistant U.S. attorney, an adjunct professor of law, a special assistant prosecutor and special deputy attorney general.
He was a partner at the local law firm McCorriston Miller Mukai MacKinnon before taking on the interim attorney general's job last month.
"Mark can be counted on to do the right thing for the right reason," said Peter Carlisle, city prosecutor.
"His willingness to sacrifice a lucrative position in the private sector for public service speaks volumes about his character."
Bennett said he believes the state's legal office can be the best law firm in town, and not just the largest. He's already commissioned a management review of the department by the Conference of Western Attorneys General, expected next week, that will guide him as he makes what he calls "positive and effective" changes.
Bennett wants to implement a system where deputy attorneys general prioritize requests for opinions or advice, which are then tracked for timeliness on a computerized system.
He's also conducting a comprehensive review of staff to evaluate strengths and weaknesses. His plan for the department-operated state Child Support Enforcement Agency includes a strategic planning council or board to guide the agency.
When questioned about last week's eviction of six families from homestead land on the Big Island, which the Attorney General's Office organized, Bennett said the decision to evict kept him up the night before it happened.
But he said the action was necessary and justified.
"I believe that we did our duty," he said. "We did what we had to do."
Hawaiian activist Richard Kinney opposed both Bennett's and Kane's confirmations yesterday because of last week's evictions.
Kane told the panel yesterday there is about a 40 percent delinquency rate when it comes to department-sponsored loans to homesteaders and that must change.
He said his main goals as DHHL director are to "relieve" the 20,000 Hawaiians on the homestead waiting list within five years, support federal recognition for native Hawaiians and to make the department self-sufficient before its $30 million-a-year Hawaiian homelands settlement with the state ends in 11 years.
Kane said one of the quickest ways to put more Hawaiians on homesteads is to develop smaller parcels of available residential lands where 20 to 30 homes can be built at once.
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