”Overview”
Pursuant to Section 23-13, Hawaii Revised Statutes, our office conducted a
management and financial audit of the Hawaii Tourism Authority’s major contracts. A major contractor is one awarded a contract or agreement in excess of $15 million. Three contractors met this criteria: Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau (HVCB), SMG, and the National Football League. We focused exclusively on the two marketing contracts valued at $151.7 million with the Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau, by far the largest of the three contractors.
We found that inadequate oversight by the authority provided HVCB with a blank
check to spend state funds for self-serving purposes. For example, we found that HVCB increased the compensation of its state-funded employees by 42 percent over the past three years