In plain words: Contracts the county handed out without open bidding. Sometimes there is a good reason — this page lets you check for yourself.
12 Stones Global · Kilo Aupuni · sole-source watch
Sole-Source & Procurement-Exemption Watch — Maui County
Sole-source means a contract awarded without competition (a HRS 103D-102 exemption). It is legal when justified — and it is exactly the mechanism a Maui official used to steal.
⚠ Why this watch exists. Stewart Stant, former director of Maui County’s Dept. of
Environmental Management, was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for taking ~$2M in bribes to steer
more than $19,000,000 in sole-source contracts and purchase orders to Milton Choy’s H2O Process Systems
(U.S. DOJ). Competition is the safeguard sole-source removes — so sole-source awards are where the risk concentrates.
DOJ ↗
Posted sole-source / exemption notices
Pulled live from the County’s public procurements page. This is what is voluntarily posted —
mostly the Council/legislative branch, often without dollar amounts.
source: mauicounty.us/procurements ↗
The gap — and the lawful way to close it
The dangerous awards (the kind in the Stant case) were executive-branch sole-source contracts —
those are not published in any clean, machine-readable county feed. That opacity is the finding. There is a lawful path to the full record:
- HANDS — Hawaiʻi Awards & Notices Data System (state awards/exemptions): hands.ehawaii.gov
- State Procurement Office exemption + sole-source reports (SPO-001 / SPO-007), HAR 3-120 Exhibit A
- UIPA request (HRS 92F) for the County’s full sole-source / 103D-102 exemption log with vendors, amounts, and dates — public record. Drop the returned data at reports/mauios/sole_source/ and it joins to donor-watch (contract → donor).
Integrity: a sole-source award is not evidence of wrongdoing. This watch shows where to look —
facts and the lawful records path, framed as questions, never accusations.
© 2026 James RCS Langford · 12 Stones Global · all rights reserved
🌺 ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi here is offered with humility and held under community review with ʻŌiwi resources at Maui County. See the glossary →