Hawaii County Signs Contract with Scrap Recycler

Maui County is awarding an $825,000 contract to a Kahului company to deal with junked cars and old appliances in a first step to resolving the ongoing problem of derelicts on roadsides.

The contract award to Kitagawa’s Towing & Transport has drawn a protest from a Molokai businessman who claims Kitagawa’s does not have the necessary permits.

But county officials said Kitagawa’s was the only company with the permits and facilities needed to provide the service of handling junked cars and appliances.

Mike Kitagawa, the operator, said he has two sites in Kahului, both zoned M-2 heavy industrial, that will be involved in the operation to handle, store, crush and dispose of derelicts.

He has Department of Health solid waste permits that will allow him to use the sites to store junked cars and other waste products, he said, while one will be set up with a crusher to turn old cars into 12-inch-high blocks of scrap metal.

Kitagawa said he understands his is the only business that has all necessary permits to conduct a scrap metals salvaging operation on Maui, although he will need to have one permit amended to allow him to use the crusher.

"My operations will be more sound than what Maui has had, and for that reason, the county selected me," he said.

"I own my land and I am going to take care of that land," he said. "It is going to be done the right way environmentally."

A Molokai recycler has filed protests against two county contracts that were awarded to competitors, including the one being given to Kitagawa.

Curtis Crabbe said his company, Omaomao Molokai Inc., should have received the contract to manage and operate Recycle Molokai, because it was the lowest bidder. He filed a protest in December.

County officials said the county awarded the contract to Maui Disposal Inc. because it was the only company to meet experience requirements for the job.

Last week Crabbe also filed a protest over the contract to Kitagawa’s. Crabbe claimed the Kahului company still needed health permits and land-use approvals.

Although normally a formal protest would put the awarding of a county contract on hold, Mayor Alan Arakawa said both contracts would proceed so there would not be a lapse in service at the Recycle Molokai facility and because cars and appliances have been backing up on Maui while they await processing.

The mayor said the Kitagawa’s contract was not exclusive, and Crabbe’s company could still get some of the business if it obtains the necessary permits.

"As other vendors qualify, they can be given consideration and we can work with them," Arakawa said.

He maintained that Kitagawa’s Towing was the only permitted vendor and that Omaomao was not qualified.

The council’s Budget and Finance Committee on Tuesday recommended appropriating $825,000 to fund the auto-disposal contract with Kitagawa’s Towing.

The county’s previous contractor for vehicle disposal stopped providing the service last year after finding it didn’t have the proper health or land use permits. For several months last year, the county continued to handle junked cars, setting up a storage area at the old Waikapu landfill.

But the landfill was not a permitted storage site and the Department of Health ordered the county to stop using it – leaving the county with no options for disposing of old cars.

Kitagawa said he had not yet been formally awarded the contract to handle junked cars and appliances, but said he was issued a purchase order from the county that allowed him to proceed with the service.

While it was premature to say he had received the contract, he said he was expecting to get it since his is the only business that could qualify.

In his complaints, Crabbe also sent a letter to the mayor and other officials accusing the county’s top solid waste official of bid-rigging and extorting gifts.

For the management and operation of Molokai’s main recycling facility, Omaomao bid $620,000, Maui Disposal bid $898,830, and the Molokai-Lanai Soil & Water Conservation District bid $1.5 million to operate the county’s Recycle Molokai facility at the county landfill at Naiwa.

Souza acknowledged in a memo to county finance officials that Omaomao was the lowest bidder, but the contract was awarded to Maui Disposal.

That’s because neither Omaomao nor the conservation district had the experience required by the contract, Souza said in a memo to county finance officials.

Omaomao was incorporated as a company just a few days before it submitted its proposal to the county.

Crabbe argued that he and other individuals with the company had years of experience in waste disposal, and Omaomao should be considered sufficiently qualified. Crabbe previously operated a service for portable toilets and grease-trap pumping on Molokai; his employees and consultants included people who had operated recycling businesses around the state.

Crabbe is general manager of Omaomao; the company is owned by his sons, Kelii and Nohea Crabbe. Maui (Hawaii) News