HTA Releases President & CEO Szigeti

George D. Szigeti. File photo.

The Hawai‘i Tourism Authority (HTA) has announced that their board voted unanimously on Thursday, June 28, 2018, to release President and CEO George Szigeti “without cause.”

Szigeti has held the position since 2015 in a contract that was suppose to run through 2020. The board stressed that it was not a firing, and said Szigeti will remain on the job until Oct. 31, 2018.

The HTA’s decision to part ways with Szigeti comes just months after HTA was criticized for its practices in an audit from the State of Hawai‘i in February.

Among other things, the audit said, “We found that HTA’s semi-autonomy and its exemption from the State Procurement Code has led the authority to be less accountable and less prepared, with operations that lack the rigor necessary to adequately manage and oversee its contracts, to ensure that procurement is conducted fairly, appropriately, and in the state’s best interest, and to address the statutory reduction of the limit on administrative expenses. Also, as the authority’s staffing has evolved over the years, we found that its policies and procedures have become outdated, no longer reflecting the reality of its current organizational structure.”