Picture this: It's a big bank — one of the biggest — and the push that's on is even bigger.

The urgent task: Unload securities whose $330 billion market is about to tank.

Among the eager and painfully ill-informed customers: the state of Hawaii. The state is told the student loan auction-rate securities are almost as good as cash and just about as liquid, so it bites hard — nearly a billion dollars worth. Now the market for these securities is nowhere to be found and the state is caught in the worst cash crunch since the Great Depression.

We don't know what the practical impact of this will be. We do know that if we tried to sell these securities tomorrow, the state would lose about $250 million.

An independent draft audit to examine the issues has been done for the state auditor. It is not complete or public, and it's too early to tell if the state's investment in auction-rate securities will tighten our cash flow, exacerbate our bond ratings or worsen our financial situation.

These are very important matters. But rather than answer the tough questions — How did this happen? What is the impact of tying up this amount of money? Where is the oversight? How do we prevent this in the future? — the governor took aim at the auditor, calling her unprofessional, among other things. This was disappointing because personal attacks stop us from getting to what matters the most: solutions.

Looking forward, we need to ensure that there is sufficient oversight so that nothing like this ever happens again. We have a Department of Budget and Finance that makes decisions about where to put taxpayer money — amounting to billions of dollars — with very little independent oversight. The hard-working people in this department are given vague statutory guidelines and are not necessarily trained in highly specialized securities areas. We need to make sure that the decision-makers in charge of this have adequate training and third-party review.

Just as important, we need government leaders who do not react to problems by pointing fingers at others, diverting attention from the real job, which is solving hard problems and protecting the public's interest. Whether it's Furlough Fridays, labor negotiations, rail transit or unemployment insurance, blame-shifting just doesn't get it done.

The times ahead will test us. We need sound fiscal management and a culture in government that at its root is problem-solving. The first question for leaders when confronted with a problem should be “;How do we fix it?”; not “;Who is to blame?”;

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Brian Schatz, former Democratic Party of Hawaii chairman and a former state representative, is running for lieutenant governor.