Attendance at Legislative Briefings Is State CD’s Gauge of Public’s Concern over Communications

We’ve already examined Maj. Gen. Robert Lee’s view (here and here) that there were no communications failures after the October 15th earthquakes. The State’s Adjutant General said in a Honolulu Star-Bulletin commentary that what really happened amounted to an “information delay,” not a failure.

CHORE today turns to State Civil Defense’s second in command to examine why he apparently believes the average citizen isn’t all that concerned about emergency communications.

Vice Director Ed Teixeira was a guest on KIPO’s “Town Square” program on February 22 and said the following while answering a question about the lack of public involvement in assessing how to improve emergency communications:

Teixeira: At the beginning of the year, the Legislature had some information briefings, and there was one particular session left open to public comment, and you know, surprisingly, there were maybe about a dozen or so folks with special needs that stuck around. After two days of briefings, and that was the only public representation that was left over on that last hour – people with special needs that were there talking about what they needed from being deaf or hard of hearing or those who just can’t get around, and articulated their needs to us.

Host Beth-Ann Kozlovich: Did that surprise you, that there weren’t more members of the public there?

Teixeira: Yeah, it really did, because as we got into the second day on January 9th in the afternoon, the room selected for the information briefing was pretty crowded, with a lot of faces. And as we approached the 4 o’clock hour though and reconvened, only the folks with special needs were there to talk to us about what they thought we should have.

Be There if You Care

The implication of Teixeira’s remarks is that if the public truly cared about these matters, you would have attended those hearings – staying right to the bitter end.

Leave your job, even fly to Oahu if you’re a neighbor islander and sit through hour upon hour of testimony over two days – that’s what average citizens would have done if you really cared about improving communications to keep your family safe in a crisis.

And maybe that’s what you would do if your job description included what State Civil Defense officials are paid to do – attend endless hours of Capitol hearings.

But you’re not paid to do that, and your inability to be at the Legislature doesn’t mean what Teixeira seems to think it means.

An Inconvenient Truth

State Civil Defense won’t hold public meetings to hear your views at times and places that are convenient to you. The inconvenient truth here is that SCD won’t expose itself to criticism of its communications lapses. Why else would a public agency responsible for public safety during emergencies refuse to meet the public?

We continue to bang away on this topic because there will be future emergencies in which you and I will expect emergency communications to work flawlessly. That didn’t happen in October, and the record of SCD officials’ comments since then suggests they think you are satisfied with their performance.

Again we quote George Santayana: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” And so, too, are we citizens condemned to future communications problems if first responders can’t even acknowledge yesterday’s failures.