Can you hear me now?
That’s what Hawaii County Council members are asking after years of costly equipment hangups.
The county has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on two audiovisual systems that were supposed to connect the West Hawaii Civic Center with the county building in Hilo.
Four years after buying the system, the county in January finally tried to use it, only to find it doesn’t work properly and one of the warranties already expired.
Meanwhile, County Council members and the public have been beset with shrill audio feedback or on-and-off volume when trying to speak or hear from one location or the other. The problem is magnified when four satellite videoconference sites also tap in.
The problem stems from two different systems being installed during two different projects, county officials say. The county building in Hilo, a $28 million renovation project, was completed in 2010. The West Hawaii Civic Center, a new structure with a $50.5 million price tag, became operational in 2011.
“The Hawaii County building and the West Hawaii Civic Center are two separate buildings and were two separate projects,” said Brandon Gonzales, deputy director of the county Department of Public Works.
The county wasn’t aware of the extent of the problem until County Clerk Stewart Maeda hired in-house staffers in January to replace longtime AV contractor, Hilo-based Out Of The Sea Media Arts. The full council met with the new workers in a 20-minute closed-door session in January that was neither noticed nor open to the public.
Out of the Sea had created a work-around using a traveling AV system, rather than the one installed in the civic center, Maeda said. That was costing the county about $1,000 a month when meetings were hosted in Kona.
“This system has not been used until just January,” Maeda said.
Out of the Sea could not be reached for comment by press time Thursday.
DPW, which routinely retains 5 percent of a project’s cost to distribute incrementally as certain milestones are met, still has not released $1.2 million to the general contractor for the civic center construction.
The subcontractor is Boca Raton, Fla.-based Simplex-Grinnell, supplier of access control, security, fire alarms and AV systems. Project manager Jonathan Lung had not returned a message left on his voicemail Wednesday by press time Thursday.
Hawaii County Corporation Counsel Molly Stebbins said the county and the contractor underwent mediation and now are working on negotiating a settlement on the issue, rather than taking the matter to court.
Gonzales and Maeda have been relatively tight lipped about the problems, but came before a council committee Tuesday when called forward by Hilo Councilman Dennis “Fresh” Onishi. Onishi wanted to know when it will be fixed.
“Probably, within two months, we’ll know what the problem is,” Maeda said.
“There was nothing done during the whole time of the warranty to get it fixed?” Onishi asked.
It’s possible the county will have to throw good money after bad by purchasing new microphones to make the system work properly.
Onishi said after the meeting he still has a lot of questions that he hopes get answered soon.
It’s not known exactly how much the system cost. A 2012 West Hawaii Today article said the West Hawaii Civic Center system cost $1.2 million. Gonzales this week said the cost was about $400,000.
The newspaper has tried to pin it down.
On April 21, the newspaper requested to view contracts and change orders as well as correspondence on the audiovisual equipment issue. DPW responded two months later with an invoice for three hours to search for the records at $10 an hour, plus seven hours to review and segregate the documents for review, at $5 per 15 minutes.
This is despite the fact the county already was in negotiations with the vendor and probably had the paperwork close at hand. The newspaper disagreed with the charges and declined to pay and was subsequently denied access to the documents.
Email Nancy Cook Lauer at ncook-lauer@westhawaiitoday.com.
