Hawaii Tourism Authority Fires CEO George Szigeti

The Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) board announced Thursday it unanimously voted to fire president and CEO George Szigeti without cause.

According to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, Szigeti will remain as CEO through October 31 and will receive a severance of six months pay the day after his departure. Szigeti’s contract was originally through 2020 with an annual salary of $297,675.

HTA Chairman Rick Fried said the board wanted to go in a new direction and Szigeti revealed the decision was mutual. The firing of Szigeti was the latest in a series of staff member departures, including several key players in the tourism industry.

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“One of the major reasons that we are doing this is the difficulty in the current political climate and the difficulty in keeping our budget through the Senate,” Fried told the Star-Advertiser. “There also was some concern from some of the stakeholders in the broader tourism industry, although some were fine with him, about his institutional knowledge of tourism.”

It has been a time of transition for the HTA, with the government cutting the agency’s budget by $13 million in May and the departures of chief operating officer Randy Baldemor and chief marketing officer Leslie Dance.

Fried is also uncertain about his position with the HTA after Hawaii Governor David Ige withdrew his nomination to extend Fried’s term, which expires July 1. As for Szigeti’s future, he said he will be taking time to enjoy his family after a busy three years leading the HTA.

“I’ll be taking a deep breath. I haven’t been able to do that in three years,” Szigeti told the Star-Advertiser. “This team has really accomplished a lot; 2016 and 2017 were supposed to be flat to down. Instead, we hit all the numbers. The challenge for the next CEO will be how to balance the numbers with managing the destination.”