(AP) – The selection process for Kamehameha Schools trustees is undergoing its first review since scandals in the 1990s unearthed deep problems with the 140-year old estate created to educate Native Hawaiian children.

Under the current process, a court-appointed panel evaluates trustee candidates and selects three finalists. From there, a state judge chooses the new trustee. Names of the selection committee members are not routinely made public, and the process for recruiting trustees is opaque.

A state probate court and court-appointed special masters have spent the past two years reviewing Kamehameha Schools’ current trustee selection process. The result is a potential new process that would add transparency to the management of one of the largest private trusts in the U.S., with the names of the selection committee being made public and opportunities for public comment.

But alumni want even more significant changes — a selection committee to be composed of teachers, former students and their parents who are beneficiaries of the trust. Trustees have also said they want to be more involved in the selection process.

The trust, worth more than $11 billion, was first established by Bernice Pauahi Bishop, a member of the Hawaiian royal family, in 1883 for the education of Native Hawaiian students.

In addition to schools, the trust owns more than 300,000 acres of land across the islands that includes shopping malls and acres of fallow land that contributed to the devastating fires in Lahaina in 2023.

As it stands now, there’s no requirement that the people tasked with vetting the trustees have any stake in the future of Kamehameha Schools, or that they be Native Hawaiian.

“It’s part of our struggle for self-determination and controlling our own destiny rather than having others control it for us,” said Jan Dill, an alumni who has been calling for changes to the process.

In November, state Circuit Judge Jeannette Castagnetti said she is inclined to grant changes to the appointment process, but so far hasn’t issued a written ruling on what those changes should be.

School officials say they are still waiting for the court’s decision but are grateful for the proposals from beneficiaries and other interested groups.

Princess Pauahi’s will left trustee selection up to the five justices on the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court.

The justices at times appointed people who helped them get into office including, during the 1990s, a former House speaker and Senate president. Some of those figures were trustees during the era detailed in the book “Broken Trust,” which detailed financial mismanagement by Bishop Estate and its trustees.

In 1997, state Supreme Court Chief Justice Ronald Moon and his associate justices decided they would no longer take part in selecting the trustees for the Bishop Estate, as the trust was then known. As part of the fallout from the “Broken Trust” scandals, the estate was put under the watch of court-appointed special masters.

Several years later, the current process was implemented. A seven-member committee makes recommendations to the probate court judge on who should fill vacancies on the board of trustees.

Various groups have called for changes to the selection process over the years.

In 2019, the Legislature weighed in with a resolution calling for more stakeholder engagement in the selection process. Lawmakers wanted to see parents of beneficiaries, alumni, teachers and others in the Native Hawaiian community be appointed to the committees that screens the trustees, but changes weren’t made at that time.

Two years later, the process came under scrutiny again after the screening committee at the time tossed its first list of candidates. The trustees asked the court and a group of special masters to review the selection process in May 2022. They noted that the current process has been in place for 20 years.

“It is prudent to have the trustee selection process reviewed periodically and fine-tuned as necessary to ensure that KS receives the benefit of the best trustee candidates and that transitions of trustees on and off the board can be undertaken effectively,” the trustees wrote in a petition to the court.

In June, the court-appointed special masters issued their report on the selection process. It recommended that the trustees file a notice with the court one year out from an anticipated vacancy, and that the court make public the names and resumes of seven individuals selected to serve on the screening committee.

In addition to being familiar with Pauahi’s will and the strategic vision for Kamehameha Schools, each of the committee members should have experience with a large charitable trust, private school or financial institution. Committee members would interview the trustees, the Kamehameha Schools CEO and former members of the committee of special masters to gain an understanding of the trust and a trustee’s role.

From there, the process would continue much the same with the committee whittling down applicants to a list of three finalists. The public would have the chance to weigh in on the finalists before the court interviews each finalists and selects one.

In a separate filing, the trustees wrote that they believe a majority of the committee should be Native Hawaiian and that at least one should be a Kamehameha alumni. They also believe that candidates should be able to interview trustees to gain an understanding of the institution and their role in overseeing it.

The special masters declined to include those recommendations in their report, saying those issues, as well as others raised by alumni groups, should be taken up in separate petitions to the court.

Alumni groups want to see a process run entirely by stakeholders and handled mostly internally by Kamehameha Schools.

Dill, who is part of a group advocating for changes called Swell the Echo, said the process could be similar to how other large trusts established to benefit Hawaiians, like the Lunalilo Home and Liliʻuokalani Trust, select their trustees.

He and other group members envision a process handled internally with reporting requirements that would let the public know who is on the selection committee and who the trustee candidates are.

The internal committee would also select the finalists, rather than leaving that selection up to the probate court.

“It’s a process driven by the beneficiaries,” Dill said. “That’s what we’re suggesting. That’s what we’re asking for.”

 

Story originally published by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.