(AP) – Trustees for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, who for years have been the lowest-paid elected officials in the state despite having vast financial responsibilities, may soon be some of the highest-paid.

The OHA Salary Commission is considering a proposal to boost trustee pay to just over $91,000, a 62% increase over their current $56,000 annual salaries. The chair would make about $100,000 a year, a 50% increase.

If the plan is approved at the commission’s meeting on Wednesday, trustees would get their first raise since 2016, making them better paid than state legislators. The proposals have not received any public opposition so far.

To justify the increases, commission members say they want a more professional board in the future, where trustees no longer work side jobs and instead focus on the office’s mission of improving the lives of Native Hawaiians.

Five of the nine current trustees have other jobs, some earning upward of $100,000 in their outside work, according to financial disclosure forms.

Chairman Kai Kahele is a pilot for Hawaiian Airlines earning at least $250,000 a year. Vice Chairman Keoni Souza earns at least $100,000 as a musician. Trustee Keliʻi Akina makes at least $150,000 as president of the Grassroots Institute, a public policy think-tank.

The decision of the OHA Salary Commission, which operates independently of the trustees, is final unless both the House and Senate reject it by concurrent resolution, a relatively high bar that would require hearings and multiple votes in both chambers.

In a draft salary proposal, the commission wrote that it wanted to give current and future trustees a competitive salary on par with what other elected officials in Hawaiʻi earn annually.

The governor, lieutenant governor, executive branch cabinet members, state lawmakers and judges are also expected to get pay raises this year as a separate state Salary Commission wraps up its work in the coming weeks.

OHA is unique in that, by law, it has its own salary commission, with members appointed by the governor every four years.

The highest-paid OHA trustee, the board chair, currently earns more than $66,000, meaning they earn less than their aides, according to salary data.

“It’s not a whole lot of money,” Trustee Carmen Hulu Lindsey said during a board meeting Thursday. “I almost consider us in the poverty zone.”

Salary commissioners said in a report that new salaries could lead to a more diverse group of candidates, “including those who previously could not afford to serve at the current salary levels.”

Commissioners heard testimony from trustees who said they work no less than 40 hours a week in what is technically considered a part-time position. The trustees control a trust fund valued at nearly $600 million, as well as commercial properties in Honolulu’s Iwilei and Kakaʻako, and other parcels across the islands.

The trustees said that their duties are year-round, unlike state lawmakers who meet for four months of the year and make up to $83,000.

Trustee Kalei Akaka, the former chair of the board’s Beneficiary Advocacy Committee, recently told the salary commission she spends the first half of the year lobbying on Native Hawaiian issues during the legislative session, and must stay up to date on federal issues in Washington, D.C.

Trustees typically hold community meetings between July and December, and assist in responding to emergencies such as the Maui wildfires in 2023.

“We’re in constant communication from a county, state and federal perspective,” Akaka said. “That advocacy is year-round.”

Previous proposals from the salary commission would have given the trustees an even bigger pay increase. A draft proposal for the commission’s Jan. 7 meeting would have set the chair’s pay at $127,000 and trustees at $117,000 a year.

Commissioners came to reduced salary figures by calculating the average compensation for county council members across the state. They also considered the potential public and political backlash that could cause lawmakers to overrule the proposal.

“What is the golden number that won’t be refused so we aren’t stuck with this for another four years?” Commissioner Dennis Rose said during a meeting on Jan. 7.

Under the current proposal, annual trustee pay would rise to nearly $106,000 by 2028, with the board chair earning $116,000.

 

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