Audit spurs
criminal probeThe Attorney General's Office
is investigating issues raised at the
Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau
The state Attorney General's Office has opened a criminal review into points raised by the critical audit of the Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau.
The criminal justice unit of the Attorney General's Office is looking into the matter, said Linden Joesting, a deputy attorney general. Joesting declined to say what aspects of the audit are being probed, because it's an internal matter.
The Hawaii Tourism Authority asked the Attorney General's Office to review findings of the state audit, which was released last week. The audit faulted the authority for lax oversight of the bureau's $151.7 million in state contracts to market Hawaii to travelers. The authority was created in 1998 to contract with the Hawaii visitors bureau, a private agency funded mainly by taxpayer dollars.
On Thursday, bureau officials admitted the organization had done some things wrong, none intentionally. Tony Vericella, president and chief executive of the visitors bureau, said he had paid back $670 in state-funded personal expenses, and apologized.
The bureau said it never should have paid invoices forwarded by Joe Blanco, Gov. Ben Cayetano's tech czar, which bureau Chairman Tony Guerrero described as "wrong, wrong, wrong." The audit questioned the arrangement as a way of evading the state procurement code. Blanco denies the accusation.
The bureau will no longer allow Japan Airlines to pay for the benefits of bureau Vice President Kiyoshi Mukumoto, which the audit said carried the appearance of a conflict of interest.
And the bureau said that, if it could do things over again, it would have put a Taiwan promotional contract out to bid, rather than awarding it to a company run by Wei-Wei Ojiri, who was a bureau vice president at the time. The bureau said Ojiri had technically resigned before the contract was awarded to her company.
Guerrero could not be reached for comment yesterday.