When Frank Bright was fired from his job at Big Brothers Big Sisters Hawaii in 2018, he filed a complaint at the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission alleging employment discrimination.

Four years later, Bright’s complaint still hasn’t been resolved. In fact, it hasn’t even been investigated.

Bright’s case is part of a backlog of more than 300 cases that the state agency is grappling with after years of underfunding and understaffing.

When the pandemic hit, the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission had just four investigators but was hoping to increase its staff to get back to earlier staffing levels. A pandemic hiring freeze prevented that from happening.

That changed last year, when the Hawaii Legislature restored funding for the division to hire new investigators and the state lifted its hiring freeze in July.

But a slow hiring process meant that even with the 2022 session in full swing, no one has yet filled those new investigator positions.

Bill Hoshijo, executive director of the agency, said that the commission is on the cusp of extending offers to applicants and bringing them on board.

But it will still take investigators time to dig out of the backlog, which includes hundreds of old cases, including 25 filed in 2018 and one filed in 2017.

The wait has been frustrating for Bright who struggled with unemployment after losing his job at the Hawaii nonprofit.

“This is ridiculous,” Bright said. “I don’t want someone else to go through what I’ve been through.”

He received a voicemail from a commission staffer last week saying if more investigators are hired, his case might be assigned an investigator six months from now.

“It’s been a long ride and I can’t believe it’s been four years and I’m still going,” Bright said.

Hoshijo said he couldn’t comment on Bright’s specific case.

Dennis Brown, chief executive officer and president of Big Brothers Big Sisters Hawaii, said that the nonprofit can’t comment on the case either because it’s still active.

The Civil Rights Commission hasn’t made any determination as to whether Bright’s case has merit as the investigation hasn’t been completed.

A Longtime Issue

The Hawaii Civil Rights Commission has always had a backlog, Hoshijo said. When the office was created, the federal Department of Labor transferred about 240 open cases to the agency even before it had received any staff.

The pandemic hasn’t actually increased the size of the backlog. On Jan. 23, 2020, there were 332 cases under investigation or pending investigation at the agency. On Jan. 21, 2022, there were 318.

Hoshijo suspects that’s because fewer people have filed cases over the past couple of years. The office was closed during the state’s initial pandemic shutdown, which temporarily prevented people from filing complaints since there’s no online filing option. Other challenges like language barriers make it hard for people to submit complaints, Hoshijo said.

But the pandemic has worsened the backlog in the sense that the cases are older, which makes them harder to investigate and resolve.

More than 31% of the cases are at least two years old. More than 45% of all cases are at least 18 months old and 58% of all cases are more than a year old.

A lot of the cases that are older are more complex as well, Hoshijo said.

State law says the agency’s executive director “shall issue a determination of whether or not there is reasonable cause to believe that an unlawful discriminatory practice has occurred” within 180 days unless the commission grants an extension.

The commission generally approves those extensions, Hoshijo said. More than 77% of the agency’s cases are older than six months according to data from Jan. 21.

“It’s impracticable to complete investigations within 180 days,” Hoshijo said.

One major reason is the lack of staffing. The commission has been at 50% staffing since before the pandemic. Gov. David Ige’s pandemic hiring freeze prevented the hiring of additional investigators.

That freeze was lifted last summer and the state posted job listings for new investigators in October. Hoshijo received a list of candidates in December and conducted interviews in January. He is hopeful he will be able to hire them this month.

“Going from 50% staffing for a couple of years to full staffing at the level we’re budgeted for will be a big step,” he said. “Last year the Legislature did its part by restoring our budget.”

“Now it’s up to us to put that to work. We’re looking forward to the challenge,” he continued. But “it’s not something that we’re going to turn around overnight.”