 to ThinkTech on Spectrum OC16, Hawaii's weekly newscast on things in matter-to-tech and Hawaii. I'm Jay Fidel. And I'm Keisha King. In our show this time, we'll review the most recent top five ThinkTech talk shows and staff pick. We'll check out the elements of the best of the best and get a handle on the public issues and the guests involved. Our ThinkTech talk show offerings are very diverse and their coverage is also very diverse, covering things you might never have otherwise known. Every week, ThinkTech chooses its top five ThinkTech talk shows from the week before, based on the number of views each of them has had on the internet. For this week, the winning shows are as follows. Number one from the series Beyond the Lines, hosted by Rusty Kamori. It was called Retired Police Chief Lee Donahue, Beyond Law Enforcement. Rusty spoke with Lee about his career as a police officer and his success as Honolulu's chief of police. Lee shared valuable insights about leadership, creating a culture of excellence and dealing with life's challenges. Back in the early 1980s, Chief Maimu Nakamura sent me to Japan to learn about the Koban system. Koban system is a system used by the Japanese police where they have what they call police boxes, strategically placed throughout the city. And they have a light over the station. So if you see the light, you can go and get help there. So we were sent to study that. And the Japanese had done their research on me and they knew that I was involved in martial arts. So every station that I went to, they took me to the dojo and they would put on a demonstration. But I learned there that the police officers, to be a police officer in Japan, graduate from the academy, you have to have your black belt in either Judo or Kendo by the time you graduate. So with that, when they get assigned to their different stations, they would invite the kids in from the community to learn Judo or Kendo. And this was their way of building the rapport with the kids, teaching them character, self-discipline, and as well as making them just good community members. What are some of the principles and some of the things you have the kids recite? We have 16 bylaws in it. We, everyone has to recite a bylaw. And they're simple bylaws that we live by. One of them is never use any profane language. And I think that's important and we tell the kids that. As I say, if there's one thing that disturbs me is if I'm walking through a shopping center and there's a group of young people and they're using profanity and it's just disturbing, you know? I would want my students to be good, decent people and know the difference between right and wrong. What are some of the other interesting things that you have them recite on a daily basis? Well, we have never say in one house what you hear in another. Never speak ill of the absent. Good. Never abuse these arts or use them for self-gain. You know, those are some of the real interesting. And protect the innocent, forgive the ignorant and tame only the wild. However, let us tame ourselves first before we tame the wild. Number two, from the series at the Crossroads hosted by me, Keisha King, it was called Virginia Beach Mass Shooting, Connections to Hawaii and Beyond with guests Peter Carlyle and Dr. James Allen. Peter Carlyle and Dr. James Allen remembered those lost at the recent shooting in Virginia Beach. You know, we're having a tough discussion about the mass shooting that took place both here in Hawaii as it relates to the one in Virginia Beach, but I could also say the one in Las Vegas, so the one in Miami, Florida. Like, why is this happening so often now? Well, you wonder whether or not constantly seeing this type of thing over and over again has some impact. But it has to be shown over and over again for reasons of security. And that's one of the things that we need to be very much aware of in terms of making sure that if we have an opportunity to keep some place more secure, then we take advantage of that. No, wait, no, I disagree. I'm hearing what you're saying. We need more security. What type of security? We cannot have security at every single job. And what if the security is the first person killed? I mean, you know, we screen people. I used to work as a director of human resources. We do a background check. We have these psychological tests that we have people go through to get a job, even at a place like retail, Ross, you have to complete a psychological test. What more security do we need that would prevent mass murder? The, what we do in terms of security is now it's enhanced. And we make things secure by screening type methods. So we screen people as they go in and out of a courthouse. We screen people when they are moving through certain areas. And we need to have those types of abilities to essentially try to preclude people from committing these types of crimes. Again, I'm all over the place for that because now in Virginia Beach, we're talking about a municipal center. We're talking about an employee who has already passed every screening test to get hired in the first place. And I remember, I believe I heard a person who was a passerby saying that he saw the gunman walking and thought it was a part of an actual test or a drill. I don't know, but I know in a lot of buildings in Virginia Beach, those types of government buildings, you do have security that you have to go through. There is a wand guy there to check you. So I don't know that that's the answer that more security is the solution. Well, you have to enforce it, in other words. So you have to make sure that you're doing those things that you are supposed to be doing. And if you're not doing that, then you've got to get on board and do it. Number three from the series, Pinoy Power Hawaii, hosted by Emmy Ortega Anderson. It was called Rice Up Farmers, Pinoy Power Hawaii, with guests, Princess Donato, Elvin Lasita, Joseph Duano, James Asso, and Paul Wilson. Emmy spoke with her guests about their inspiration in getting Rice Up started and why and how other Asian countries are interested in following this award-winning way of rice farming. Wow, I'm so excited now, I'm so happy to be able to let the whole world know of this wonderful project that you got going. So tell us about how you got started. I am from the Philippines, I was born in Manila, but grew up in the rural areas of Pampanga since I was a kid. I really wanted to have a way to help our family. So my grandfather, when I grew up with him, he was a farmer, he was a farmer. And he tried his best to work hard, but at the end of the day, he doesn't get the income he deserves, as well as other farmers. So I, from... He had a dream? Yeah, I studied agriculture engineering, which is very rare in Philippines, and then I got a scholarship here in Brigham Young University. Oh, I'm happy with you! Hi! Yeah, and when I came there in 2016, I was hoping... Actually, I was only brought here to Hawaii, which was 88 pesos. 88 pesos? I can't even afford to buy food. Oh, I see. So that's what's left in my pocket. I came here, but I used that inspiration to not only help myself, but our people in Philippines. And now together with our team, we created Rise Up to innovate how farmers deal with agriculture, because we believe that agriculture can really create prosperity in our country. Wow, you've done so much with a span of not even two years, yeah? Oh, yes. My math is right, but it's going three, and you've come a long way, and you are living, you're all living a dream. See what happens when, with some education, a lot of passion in your heart to make a difference, and that's what's happening with you. So, I'm so excited, because you had just gotten back from being recognized for the great deed that you have done. Yeah, a princess can talk more about the Enactus program that we are part of. Okay, princess, you really look like a princess. Oh, thank you. Of Aladdin. Thank you, yes. Well, Enactus, it stands for entrepreneurial action within us. It's an organization that encourages universities, not only in the USA, but around the world, to be part of social entrepreneurship. And so, just last month, we had our nationals for the competition here in the USA, where different universities across the country came, presented their own ideas. They judged us based on the impact that we've done this year. Number four, from the series Hawaii Together, hosted by Joe Kent. It was called Home Sharing Under Attack, Vacation Rentals in Hawaii, with guest Mary LaVoy. Mary explained how lawmakers' plans to crack down on vacation rentals may hurt Hawaii's economy. Joe and Mary gave an update on the status of this legislation. Should they ban the whole vacation rental industry, which would maybe create a bunch of new rentals, or what should they do? No, that won't create a bunch of new rentals, because the people that still room share are still gonna be there. They don't necessarily wanna share that room full-time. Well, what about other things? The economic impact, and we talked a little bit about that, but getting in the weeds here, vacation rentals, they contribute to our economy. And the people who visit those rentals, they go on hikes, and they go to restaurants, and so forth. And if we cut off the market here, then presumably, all that economic activity would leave, is that right? Well, look at North Shore. Can you imagine what's gonna happen in the North Shore? You know how many North Shore people have come in to testify to say, what are we gonna do with all these single moms that want to do the house cleaning and be able to pick up their child at two o'clock? They don't have the opportunity to drive in the Waikiki and work a job in town. They're just gonna create more traffic. They need to work out where they live, and these jobs provide an opportunity for those people to have a better quality of life. They talk about how they fix up their homes, they can pay their mortgage, they can pay their rent. They're even putting some of the homeless people to work, cleaning the yards and doing all kinds of stuff. So it's helping some of the economy, but there are people on the North Shore, and I would be remiss if I didn't say that there are some people on the North Shore who don't like vacation rentals and who want it just Hawaii as if we had no vacation rentals. And people say there's too many tourists here and all of that. So how would you respond to that? Well, we are a destination location. We have very little other industries other than small business, the military and tourism. So we need to embrace this travel trend because these visitors will just clearly go elsewhere. I mean, in the United States, it is a $36 billion industry in growing, and this is the way the Millenniums want to travel. They want options in all accommodations, and if we don't offer the accommodations, they'll just clearly go elsewhere. So we either lose the money and destroy the opportunity for the revenue stream, which the revenue streams afford us the opportunity to pay for that noose around our neck rail. It fixes our streets, our infrastructure, our sewers, our parks, our beaches, all the erosion that's going on around the island, but we need that money. And if we don't collect it from the tourists that are happily willing to pay it and locals that are making money that are willing to share that money, if we don't take it from them, the honest truth is they're gonna have to raise everyone's property taxes. Number five from the series Hawaii, State of Clean Energy, hosted by Mitch Ewan. It was called Hydrogen Endgame, the infinity fuel for a sustainable future with guest Matt Moran. The show focused on hydrogen and how it is the ultimate fuel that will ameliorate climate change. So you can look at this to size the various components in your system, like if I have this much wind or I have this much solar, how much hydrogen can I produce or how much can I store? What size of fuel cell do I need? And the bottom line is what's my output here? So why don't you walk us through this slide? Yes, that's exactly right, Mitch. And yeah, so the left-hand side shows you the system model and it shows all the energy and fluid flows. So as you mentioned, it allows you to start to size the system, to design it, to optimize it and to simulate it. So you can basically do all of those upfront things virtually before you start to cut hardware and put the system together. And you've got a good sense of how the system's gonna operate and how to optimize it for your application. So on the far right side, it's kind of the dashboard piece of the system model. You can change the loads that you wanna simulate, where the power's coming from, how much. And then it's got a few graphic snapshots of your distribution of power sources in, your loads and how much you're storing in terms of excess energy that you can use to create hydrogen and store it as energy. And then what's your waste feed and the fluid flows are. So you've got everything kind of there on one screen that to take a look at and you can walk through hours in a day or days in a year or whatever combination you wish and start to really optimize the system for whatever your application is. Right, so it's a really, really effective and useful tool for system design. So let's, go ahead. No, that's fine. I was just gonna say, where's we beginning to apply it in some of the first case studies and now with some of the pilot demonstrations that we're beginning to get some traction on. So I noticed you put up the energy target markets. If you look at those, there's some very large markets that are, we believe are prime for hydrogen introduction. Some of them, most of them actually already have some hydrogen systems in place. There's a lot of room for both growth and improvement in the performance of those systems. So grid and stationary storage, as you mentioned, being able to store some of that renewable energy when it's produced and use it when it's needed, when the renewable energy isn't high enough to meet the demand. You also have micro grid and off-the-grid situation. Again, it stays like a Y in island nations. This starts to become very interesting because you can start to consider isolated systems in a sense, energy systems that are self-sustaining and secure and have a high resiliency. And then the final one is transportation, which actually you see quite a bit of hydrogen introduction already, as you mentioned, you've got cars already on the road there in Hawaii that are driving with fuel cells and hydrogen. And our staff pick from the series At the Crossroads hosted by me, Keisha King. It was called First Time Home Buyer Education 2019, Buying a Home in Hawaii with guest Reina Miyamoto. Buying your first home is very exciting and a bit nerve-wracking. So let's get you started on the right track with the First Time Home Buyer Education 2019. We talked about how to find a course on home ownership. The show also included many helpful hints for first time home buyers. I kind of alluded to it in the home ownership coaching, but it really is based on household size and household income in terms of qualifications. And that can be kind of a big range in terms of what the income is for the same household size. So the first thing I'll say is, I think a lot of folks might write themselves off thinking, I'm not going to qualify for home buyer assistance programs because it's only for lower income people, et cetera. But I tell folks, you should check it out because actually the options are varied depending on what's out there. In terms of the home ownership center, we do our best to try and track who offers what type of assistance, whether it's a local bank, a government entity and that sort of thing too. So it could range from a 0% interest, a second mortgage in terms of an assistance. It could be a grant where they actually just give you the money and they don't expect anything in return, which is fantastic. Those are the ones I like. Not as common, but yeah, that could be some of it. And some are more tax related in terms of tax credits. So it can kind of vary. Okay. Now you said over the past 10 years, how long have you all been in existence there? The home ownership center has been here, we're going to be 16 years old actually in October. Sweet 16. That's right. I've been here for 13 of the 16 years. So it's been a fun ride. Yes indeed. I'm sure you've learned a lot and have seen a lot, especially with the way that the market is for home buyers at this time. I know, funny you mentioned the income and how it makes a huge difference. And most people don't think that they qualify. Some think they make too much and some think they make too little to qualify for assistance. But the median income that you need to make here in Hawaii to survive puts us all in a certain bracket that we'd rather not be in at times. So I think it's important for people to know that everyone should at least apply if you're interested in buying a home. At least check it out. Learn about what's available and then make a good decision. Cause some of these buyer assistance programs does do come with requirements in terms of how long you live in the home and those type of things. You can always find the links to these shows in our daily email advisories. If you don't already get our daily email advisories, you can sign up to get them on thinktecawaii.com. These are only samplings from the top five and the staff pick from across our 35 weekly talk shows. There are of course many more. To see these top five and staff pick shows in their entirety, go to thinktecawaii.com or youtube.com slash thinktecawaii. Great diversity, great community, great content at ThinkTech. If you have questions or comments about these or any of our shows, please let us know. And yes, it's okay to share them with your friends and colleagues. Thanks so much for watching our shows and for supporting our efforts at ThinkTech. And now let's check out our ThinkTech schedule of events going forward. ThinkTech broadcast its talk shows live on the internet from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays. Then we broadcast our earlier shows all night long and on the weekends. And some people listen to them all night long and on the weekends. If you missed a show or if you wanna replay or share any of our shows, they're all archived on demand on thinktecawaii.com and YouTube. For our audio stream, go to thinktecawaii.com slash audio and repost all our shows as podcasts on iTunes. Visit thinktecawaii.com for a weekly calendar and live stream and YouTube links. Or better yet, sign up on our email list and get our daily email advisories. ThinkTech has a high tech green screen studio at Pioneer Plaza. If you wanna see it or be part of our live audience or if you wanna participate in our shows, contact shows at thinktecawaii.com. If you wanna pose a question or make a comment during a show call 808-374-2014 and help us raise public awareness on ThinkTech. Go ahead, give us a thumbs up on YouTube or send us a tweet at thinktech.hi. We'd like to know how you feel about the issues and events that affect our lives in these islands and in this country. We wanna stay in touch with you and we'd like you to stay in touch with us. Let's think together. We'll be right back to wrap up this week's edition of ThinkTech. But first, we wanna thank our underwriters. Okay, Kesha, that wraps up this week's edition of ThinkTech. Remember, you can watch ThinkTech on Spectrum OC16 several times every week. Can't get enough of it just like Kesha does. For additional times, check out oc16.tv. For lots more ThinkTech videos and for underwriting and sponsorship opportunities on ThinkTech, visit thinktechhawaii.com. Be a guest or a host, a producer or an intern and help us reach and have an impact on Hawaii. Thanks so much for being part of our ThinkTech family and for supporting our open discussion of tech, energy, diversification and global awareness in Hawaii. And of course, the ongoing search for innovation wherever we can find it. You can watch this show throughout the week and tune in next Sunday evening for our next important ThinkTech episode. I'm Jay Fidel. And I'm Kesha King. Aloha everyone.