Peter Apo: Let Me Set The Record Straight
The Office of Hawaiian Affairs trustee responds to Brett Oppegaard’s recent Reader Rep column in Civil Beat.
Editor’s note: Peter Apo’s Community Voice is in response to Brett Oppegaard’s recent column,听Reader Rep: Dig Deeper Into Peter Apo鈥檚 Misdeeds.
Mr. Oppegaard:
Ethics violations are a civil matter, not criminal, as you stated.听The same beneficiary, who filed the civil lawsuit mentioned above, also filed the complaints to the Hawaii State Ethics Commission.
Although all of the complaints are listed at the beginning of the commission鈥檚 formal report, the actual findings are near the end of the report.听If you read the report, you will notice a significant discrepancy between what the complainant alleged and what the commission actually found.
Yes, Civil Beat did give me the opportunity to speak to its readers about serious, important and complicated native Hawaiian issues and challenges.听Every Civil Beat column I wrote had two posting destinations: Civil Beat was one, and equally important was my Office of Hawaiian Affairs website.
In hindsight, I should have declined the offer to be a paid Civil Beat columnist.听However, I would have done it anyway because I believe that I was making an important contribution to an important public dialogue.听It was never a plot to make money.
My company never benefited from the Thirty Meter Telescope, nor from any OHA project including Kakaako Makai development. Despite the complainant鈥檚 allegations, I was never asked to consult on any OHA project and I never did.
I did forward all of my email to one address for convenience, and the Ethics Commission found that to be a violation.
I thank Civil Beat for caring about the Hawaiian community and giving me opportunities to speak directly to its readers, who are an important core of an engaged and informed public.
I have been writing op-ed columns, essays and various forms of the printed word including topical song lyrics and poetry for 40 years (absent any ghostwriters as claimed by a reader).
My considerable body of work, which largely focuses on Hawaiian politics and culture, tourism and Hawaii鈥檚 economic growth challenges, stands on its own.
And, at 78 years old, I have no intention of stopping.
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