House Panel On State Audits Needs More Time
The investigative committee has received hundreds of new pages of documents to review.
Majority Leader Della Au Belatti on Tuesday said that a final report on two state audits will be delayed until Jan. 27.
Belatti, the chair of the House investigative committee charged with examining audits of the Agribusiness Development Corporation and a special land development fund used by the Department of Land and Natural Resources, said her eight-member panel needs more time to do its work.
Committee members planned to ask House Speaker Scott Saiki to approve the request.
At a brief public meeting Tuesday Belatti said the committee had received an additional 600 new documents on Jan. 13 and 14 as part of a subpoena process issued Jan. 10 to the ADC and auditing firm KMH.
Over 200 of the pages of documents, she said, are from the state Department of Accounting and General Services and concern government contracts.
The committee also received about 100 pages of “substantial responses” to the draft report. While Belatti did not provide details, she said the responses include those from witnesses subpoenaed by the committee — the witnesses include State Auditor Les Kondo — over the course of its work that began in early summer.
The committee had been scheduled to finalize its report Tuesday, one day ahead of the opening of the 2022 legislative session.
The committee is now expected to address procedural matters on Friday, something that has also been delayed.
