Honolulu Fired Building Permit Worker Who Cut Through Delays For A Few People

The city accused a plans examiner of preferential treatment. The employee said she was trying to help permit applicants.

At a time when most Honolulu building permit plans were collecting dust, some applicants got to skip the line.

From 2019 to 2022, building plans examiner Kim Kehrwieder helped certain applicants on dozens, if not hundreds, of occasions, plucking them out of the queue and sparing them costly, monthslong delays, a city investigation found.

While other applications were sitting for an average of six months before a clerk would even pick them up, the city found Kehrwieder prescreened certain building plans in as little as 24 hours after they were submitted, allowing them to move ahead to the code review process.

Some of Kehrwieder’s customers saw her as a Godsend. The ci