Honolulu Salaries 2012 — The City’s Big Earners

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UPDATED 4/25/2012 5:15 p.m.

Editor’s Note: This is part of a series exploring Honolulu government salaries. Read previous articles here:

UPDATED Mayor Peter Carlisle may be the guy in charge at Honolulu Hale, but he’s not the best paid. In fact, there are at least 11 city workers who make more than Hizzoner.1

Today, Daniel Grabauskas, the new CEO of the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation has a salary of $245,000. That presumably makes him the city’s highest-paid employee.

As part of our series this week exploring compensation at Honolulu Hale, we’ve assembled a list of the city’s top earners.

At the start of this fiscal year2, the city’s Acting Medical Examiner William Goodhue reigned as the city’s highest-paid employee. But in the months since, Goodhue has retired and the city hired a rail chief at a higher salary.

Civil Beat’s salary database — the one we shared with you Monday — begins with the current fiscal year, listing Goodhue as numero uno and not yet including Grabauskas.

But answering the question of who comes in as the city’s second-highest-paid worker is tricky. That’s because more than half of the 8,467 city employees in our database3 have salary ranges instead of exact salaries. , ranges are all that the city has to disclose for those who are part of collective bargaining units or other non-exempt employees.

The ranges can be quite large. Former rail chief Toru Hamayasu, for example, had a salary somewhere between $89,604 and $149,808, placing him anywhere from the second-highest-paid city employee (after Goodhue) to No. 212.

We do know that there were at least 32 employees that make $110,000 per year, and we know their exact salaries. Here’s that top list of some of the top earners.

Rank Department Title Name Salary
1 Medical Examiner Acting Medical Examiner William W Goodhue $200,016
2 Honolulu Fire Department Fire Chief Kenneth G Silva $136,236
3 Board Of Water Supply Dist Cool Plt Mgr And Oper Robin J. Lerseth $130,000
4 Honolulu Fire Department Fire Deputy Chief Rolland J Harvest $129,936
5 Prosecuting Attorney Prosecuting Attorney Keith M Kaneshiro $129,312
6 Department Of Planning And Permitting Program Administrator Terrance L Ware $129,208
7 Office Of The Managing Director Managing Director Douglas S Chin $120,396
8 Board Of Water Supply Deputy Mgr And Chief Engineer Dean A.  Nakano $120,190
9 Prosecuting Attorney First Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Arminaa Ching $119,376
10 Board Of Water Supply Chief Financial Officer Paul S.  Kikuchi $118,812
11 Board Of Water Supply Chief Human Resources Officer Janice T.  Kemp $118,812
12 Office Of The Mayor Mayor Peter B Carlisle $115,964
13 Office Of The Managing Director Deputy Managing Director Chrystn K Eads $114,114
14 Honolulu Authority For Rapid Transit Assistant Transit Project Officer In-Tae Lee $113,904
15 Budget And Fiscal Services Director Of Budget & Fiscal Services Michael R Hansen $112,428
16 Corporate Counsel Corporation Counsel Robert C Godbey $112,428
17 Customer Service Department Director Of Customer Services Gail Haraguchi $112,428
18 Department Of Community Service Director Of Community Services Samuel E Moku $112,428
19 Department Of Design And Construction Director Of Design & Construction Collins Lam $112,428
20 Department Of Enterprise Services Director Of Enterprise Services Sidney A Quintal $112,428
21 Department Of Facility Maintenance Director & Chief Engineer Westley K Chun $112,428
22 Department Of Human Resources Director Of Human Resources Noel T Ono $112,428
23 Department Of Information Technology Director Of Information Technology Gordon J Bruce $112,428
24 Department Of Parks And Recreation Director Of Parks & Recreation Gary B Cabato $112,428
25 Department Of Planning And Permitting Director Of Planning & Permitting David K Tanoue $112,428
26 Department Of Transportation Services Director Of Transportation Services Wayne Y Yoshioka $112,428
27 Environmental Services Director Of Environmental Services Timothy E Steinberger $112,428
28 Honolulu Legislature City Clerk Bernice Mau $112,428
29 Honolulu Legislature City Auditor Edwin Young $112,427
30 Honolulu Legislature Director Of Council Services Charmaine Doran $112,426
31 Royal Hawaiian Band Bandmaster Clarke L Bright $110,284
32 Prosecuting Attorney Executive Assistant II Carol N Nakamura $110,250

Source: Civil Beat analysis of Honolulu salary data

Goodhue retired in September, though he still works for the city in a case-by-case contract capacity, according to Acting Director/Administrative Services Officer Robert Lee, who’s heading the department in lieu of a medical examiner. You’ll notice numerous other department heads on the top earner list.

But because of the salary ranges, that list is not exhaustive.

There are 169 total employees who might make more than $110,000 — the 32 listed above and 137 others. There are various supervisors and managers whose salaries range from $70,824 to $118,416; battalion fire chiefs whose salaries range from $74,556 to $124,644; engineers and assistant directors who make between $78,072 and $130,536; and more than 40 division chiefs across the city who make between $81,960 and $137,100.

Any of those division chiefs — and seven other leaders with large salary ranges, like Hamayasu — could conceivably be No. 2 in the city, ahead of Fire Chief Ken Silva and behind Goodhue.

More Than Just a Paycheck

Beyond salaries, Hawaii public workers on average get that amount to an additional 60 percent of an employee’s salary. That includes leave benefits of 21 vacation days and 21 sick days a year, health coverage for active and retired employees, and pension benefits.

Hawaii’s 60 percent ratio is higher than the national average. On average, benefits cost state and local governments an additional of an employee’s base pay, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

View the full salary database for city workers:

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