The Honolulu City Council has voted to override Mayor Rick Blangiardi’s efforts to restore funding to the city’s Office of Economic Revitalization.
Blangiardi had vetoed parts of the city’s budget bill to restore $2.9 million to the office’s budget, which the council slashed during its budget deliberations. On Wednesday the nine-member council required and managed to get the required six votes to undo the veto.
Those six members — Council Chair Tommy Waters, Budget Committee Chair Val Okimoto and Vice-Chair Scott Nishimoto, and Councilmembers Esther Kiaʻāina, Andria Tupola and Radiant Cordero — also voted to cut OER’s budget during the council’s final budget vote in June.
Their arguments for scaling back funding for the office revolved around concerns over the mayor’s powers and OER’s failure to support Oʻahu’s economy, which was the key finding in a recent city audit.
The audit found that the office, created in 2020 to help the city recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and promote its long-term economic growth, had been given more than $300 million in city, federal and private funds over that time with little to show for it.
Tupola said she had asked the administration in April for even a strategic plan to understand OER’s direction going forward, but had received nothing — suggesting that there continues to be little work being done at the office.
“I feel like there's a disconnect here,” she said Wednesday. “I know what effort looks like, and this is not effort from the staff … All these funds going in, but we have thousands of businesses to help — not just nine, not just 10, not just 11 farmers. So how can we increase that impact? So we want OER to play big.”
Nishimoto said before the vote that it had nothing to do with OER’s performance, but that the veto threatened the balance of power in the city government.
“If we let this go and we let the mayor now add to our budget through veto … we really don't have to make a budget, because he can do whatever he wants — he can reduce it, he can add to it,” Nishimoto said before the vote. “We're basically making ourselves irrelevant. This vote is about whether the council will be a co-equal branch of government with the administration. That is how I see it.”
He said that the mayor’s veto powers allow Blangiardi to cut funding from the budget the council sends to him, but they don’t let him add funding that doesn’t exist.
Outside the six council votes, budget cuts to the agency were largely unpopular.
Blangiardi’s response to the override was scathing, calling the council’s decision “reckless and shortsighted.”
He said OER was an important ally for local businesses, farmers and those recovering from disasters.
He said in a written statement that “no administration can continue delivering services after the Council has intentionally eliminated the people, funding, and infrastructure required to provide them. The responsibility for what happens next rests squarely with those who cast these votes. They made this choice. The people of Oʻahu will live with its consequences.”
Councilmembers Matt Weyer and Tyler Dos Santos-Tam were the only members to vote against the veto override. Weyer in a statement said, “This decision was a complete disregard for the community voices heard at multiple council meetings. While accountability and oversight are important, we cannot expect OER to do more while stripping away the staffing and resources it needs to deliver results.”
Much of the testimony from the public praised the agency's work.
Josh Wisch, executive director for the Holomua Collective, was one of OER's supporters.
While the approved budget doesn’t entirely cut the office’s funding — just under $1 million will go to the office, albeit with more provisions attached to that money — Wisch said that it “functionally eliminates” OER.
“It's the only county agency whose core mission is building a strong economy. It's the only agency solely focused on providing economic opportunity for local families, local small businesses, local farmers,” he said.
Some of those who supported OER reminded the council that the city audit provided recommendations to improve the office, but did not suggest that it should be scrapped altogether.
Budget Chair Okimoto said that, despite media reporting, the budget does allow OER to continue functioning.
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