 politics in Hawaii with Dennis Isaki on Think Thai Hawaii. Today we'll be speaking with Ikaika Anderson. Ikaika means strong in Hawaiian. Dustin Michael, also known as Ikaika Anderson, is best known as being the chair of the Honolulu City Council, who recently resigned and is now with the Plasters and Mason Junior. His family members with me and Anderson were both in public office. Ikaika, welcome to Think Thai Hawaii. Please tell us a little about yourself and why you are in politics. Aloha Dennis. First of all, I'd like to thank you folks very much for having me on Think Tech today and allowing me the opportunity to talk story with you for a bit. As you mentioned, my name is Ikaika Anderson. I am the former chair of the Honolulu City Council. I served on the council for a little more than 11 years, served for a year and a half as council chairman, served for six years as council vice chairman, and for a little more than six years as the council's zoning and planning chairman, where I was the architect of the transit-oriented development land use policy, as well as overall land use policy for the council. In addition to that, Dennis, I am also a father of four children. My oldest daughter, Tiani, is 20. She is happily married to Mikkel, who is a cryptologist in US Naval Intelligence. My oldest son, Justin, is a senior at Kaiser High School and my twins, son Caleb and daughter Kylie, are 11 years old and at New Valley Middle School. Okay, what do you miss the most about being on the city council, especially being the chair? I miss most about being on the council. People I served and the colleagues that I worked with, Dennis, I had the amazing opportunity to work with a great group of colleagues, including Ann Kobayashi, Tommy Waters, Brandon Elefante, Ron Menor, Ernie Martin, Todd Apo over the years. I also had the most amazing staff that any elected official could ever. You know, Dennis, any elected official is really only as good as the staff that they have. Mine was truly the best. My chief of staff, Andrew Malahoff, I knew for more than 35 years. He and I went to middle school together. Alan Teccero, my deputy chief of staff, I knew for about the same amount of time. Francisco Figuero, I've known for more than 25 years. So that really gave me the opportunity for me to know my staff and for my staff to know me and for us all to be comfortable with one another. And as I said earlier, really an elected official is only as good as their staff. I'm also a caregiver to my grandparents. I was raised by my grandparents, Whitney Anderson, former state legislator, serving in both the house and the Senate for a total of 20 years. And my grandmother, Hanny Anderson, who was an executive in the local airline and travel industry for more than 40 years. And my pop is going to be 90 in December. My tutu will be 87 in January. I assist my mom and my stepfather in taking my grandparents to their doctor appointments to do shopping or I'll do it for them to pick up their medications and also to be here to assist with their daily living. Dennis, I'm very fortunate. My family and I are very fortunate. My children and I share property with my grandparents. So they live right across the lawn from us. You open my front door and walk across the lawn and I'm on my grandparents porch. So my children have the opportunity to eat dinner with their great grandparents almost every day, which is also given my cakey a very solid opportunity, which really isn't afforded to all that many to get to spend quality time with their great grandparents. I believe when I saw you on Maui, was it Whitney with you? Yes. She had Richard Minotoya's service. Yes. My grandfather had been friends with Richard Minotoya and former State Senator Joe Tanaka for a number of years. As you know, Richard Minotoya served staff for former Senator Tanaka for a number of years. So we had the opportunity to be friends with both of those gentlemen. Prior to being the chair, you're the chair of the council, you're the chair of the transportation and planning committee, which leads us to the rail. So what is your take on the rail right now? Right before I left the council, Dennis, I introduced a proposed charter amendment to abolish the Honolulu authority for rapid transportation. I just feel that Hart has outlived its usefulness and its purpose and that Honolulu's elected official, the nine member of Honolulu City Council and the mayor are in better positions to complete rail's construction. Hart largely is unanswerable to anyone after their appointment. I would surmise to say, Dennis, that if I were to walk into a local restaurant on Oahu today, pick a location and ask folks to name me five Hart board members, most folks wouldn't be able to do it. Additionally, when there's an issue with rail and the general public wants to contact someone from the Hart Board, in addition to not knowing who to contact, even if they're able to reach someone, these folks really aren't directly accountable to the public as your elected official is. So I felt that it would be best to return the construction management of Hart to the council and to the mayor. So at least someone who's directly accountable or a group of people who are directly accountable to the general public would be charged with finishing up the project. The Hart Chair, Polin Hanapusa, was just on a show with Yanji Denise and Rain Tsuji and she claimed that the estimated budget shortfall of 3.5 billion was wrong and perhaps only 2 billion. It downplayed the other negatives and they thought on that. You're going to hear members being given from the Hart Board, from the Hart staff, as to exactly what the shortfall is, as well as the reasonings for the shortfalls. Again, if we have the elected officials be charged with finishing this project, I just feel that the accountability really stops on the desks of elected officials anyway. But right now Honolulu's Charter has the authority for finishing the project or not up to the Honolulu authority for rapid transportation, Board of Directors and the staff. Really, this decision should return to the elected officials in Honolulu and let them be held accountable for those decisions that they make. Right now, a lot of them are held accountable, but they don't have the jurisdiction to make the decision. In the past, one problem I've done now that one was the the problem with the shim. I asked Bill Brennan at a meeting once about it that he don't play it saying it was like the space thing on the toilet seat cover. I mean, I think it's a big difference. Now they have problem with real frogs as they call it or something. Yes, as well as the tracks. Yeah. So you see a state getting more involved in giving them more money or besides giving them more money? The state has gotten more involved in appointing non-voting members to the transit authority. But again, Dennis, the accountability of any of these members, whether they be from the appointed from the state, legislature from the city council or from the mayor, still not directly accountable to the public. And as I mentioned earlier, the issue is really on the desks of the nine council members and the mayor. I think it's time to have those folks then have the authority as well to deal with that issue directly that's on their desk. That's really the only way to do it. Abolish heart and allow the decision making to occur at the city council level and at the mayoral level. Yeah, thanks. Well, that's who could go on for talking about the rail. Anyway, you know, we're kind of tied into the rail. You get housing. Well, one of the things that you discuss and the children, one of your photos, you're questioning some condos since they're going to be, was it to sell people in China? If foreign developer came to Honolulu a few years ago, proposing a new development. And when this developer first came to Honolulu, the developer promised to utilize a local general contractor who would in turn hire local labor and use local suppliers. That developer then reneged on that promise to the people of Honolulu and to the Honolulu city council by firing the general contractor, the local general contractor, and then proposing to bring in foreign labor. And at that point, I publicly told that developer to take their money, take their project and beat it go home. Because it's going to be tolerated here in Honolulu. And he had told me that in other areas outside the country as well as on the mainland where he had done business, it was cheaper to do business. And my response to him was, well, good, then go do your project wherever you did your projects in the past. But you're not going to come here to Honolulu and lie to our people and lie to our government after you get your approvals. We're not going to stand that. Some folks didn't like what I said or the way that I put it. But Dennis, I've always been upfront when I'm asked a question and brutally honest. Sometimes my staff members would even cringe when I give an answer to a question. But if you ask me a question every time you're going to get an honest answer, may not be the one you want, but I'm always going to give you an honest answer. That's the only way I know how to do it. So what happened to that developer? His project is still in limbo. Still in limbo, still not finished. Oh, I mean, it's under construction? Not even. My understanding is the developer is looking to sell the property. It's one of the senators went to Singapore and came back and say, you know, we're going to copy them. So everybody talking about the Singapore model of housing and, you know, especially with the transit or the housing and stuff. What do you think about that? I do like the concept. I believe that in order to provide more workforce housing under the United States housing and urban development of income guidelines and family guidelines that we're going to need to build denser, if that's even a word, but we need to increase density. Really, that's what transit oriented development or TOD allows. It allows us as government to increase density around the public transit stations. It allows us to go higher and it also allows us to increase floor density. Really, Dennis, I think that is part of the should I strongly believe that's part of the solution to workforce housing is increasing density around our public transit stations. I would also propose that to help our homeless population that we look more towards the Kohale concept. Roughly two years ago, I worked with Lieutenant Governor Josh Green and a Waimanalo Puna anti Blanche McMillian to bring to fruition one of the first, if not the first, Kohale projects in the state in Waimanalo. And what we did is we brought together dozens of people who were living homeless outside of Waimanalo Beach Park and transitioned them into housing on a state-owned property where an ancient McMillian held a lease to. I identified anti Blanche as a community leader who held that lease. And then we went and worked with Lieutenant Governor Josh Green who convinced the State Department of Land and Natural Resources to allow the project to move forward and to happen on DLNR own land. So really, that's a shining example of what happened when you have different branches of government come together. And Josh and I were able to bring forward the non-profit sector, the labor sector, as well as the non-profit and the faith-based sectors to provide this housing opportunity. And as proof that this can be copied, Dennis, there was a blessing just recently, I believe it was yesterday in fact, in West Oahu, out in Kuala Lumpur, of a very similar project that came to fruition with the help of homemade, with the help of the Lieutenant Governor, and with the help of the labor community as well as the community. Yeah, I'm glad you and everybody are doing a lot in that section. However, with the median price of home being about a million dollars, like the middle class, working class, having a hard time getting houses. And I think we need more help there. We certainly do need more help there. And likewise, I believe the answer is looking for government own property so that we can remove the highest hurdle to workforce housing, which is the cost of land. And then in a similar effort as was done with the Kauhali projects, you bring forth the labor community, the non-profit community, as well as the faith-based community to be able to provide the services and to bring the housing into existence. That's really what's needed. And it's proven, Dennis, that that formula works. I believe it was early 1990s. I was with the HFDC and we did a lot of housing using that similar method. You're part native Hawaiian and went to Kamehameha schools, right? Yes, I am a Kamehameha school graduate. So how do you see the HHL and overall helping the Hawaiians? I would like to see the Department of Hawaiian Homeland do more rental housing. I know that with the leases being a dollar a year for 99 years allows for the homes to be affordable by most standards. But many native Hawaiians for whatever reason cannot qualify for a mortgage, whether it be due to credit issues or income issues. Many cannot qualify for a mortgage, but they could cert qualify for home rental program and home rental assistance. I would ask the Department of Hawaiian Homeland to look at properties in the transit-oriented development or TOD districts around the mass transit stations and look to build vertical there. That's a model that I believe could work. And as a native Hawaiian myself, I would ask the governor if I elected lieutenant governor for a very active role in working with the Hawaiian community to decide upon who the next director of the Department of Hawaiian Homeland and the chair of the Hawaiian Homes Commission would be. Partnering with self-help housing corp or have it that for humanity seems to help over here on Kauai. Certainly has. Certainly has. But I would like to see the Department of Hawaiian Homeland put some more effort into rental housing. I think that's a solid component to providing additional homes for DHHL beneficiaries. I'm not saying it's not being done, but I believe that the Department needs to put more emphasis on rental housing, really need to put more emphasis on rental housing. And to do that, we need a director who understands development and knows how to bring various development partners together and understand how to acquire additional lands. You touch upon it. The lieutenant governor doesn't have any specific responsibility, I think. And you're not a doctor, so you kind of get daily reports. So it's good that you're talking about housing or in the work of housing, which is much needed. Okay, moving on to tourism. I spoke to a hotel in Waikiki and their occupancy is down and expected to get worse this year before it gets better. Everyone says we need the tourist money and we need a balance. So what do you say to that? I believe that the lieutenant governor's office can work with the next governor on visitor industry management. I'm the only candidate running for lieutenant governor who has any direct experience in visitor industry management. More than 10 years ago, when I first joined the Honolulu City Council, the Winner-Tawahou community that elected me was screaming for someone at some level of government to manage the visitor industry. We had an overabundance of commercial activities that took over some of our beach parks and had also flooded into the Winner-Tawahou community, Kailua Waimanalo in particular. After talking to our community, what I proposed wasn't cancelling the industry or telling the visitor industry to leave. We didn't do any of that. What we did is we told the visitor industry, while we're not telling you to leave, we are going to manage how you come into our community and how you utilize our natural resources. So for starters, the Honolulu City Council decided that no commercial activities would be allowed at any beach park in Kailua. I asked the ordinance to do that. Then through a handshake agreement with the largest commercial landowner in Kailua at that time, I got the landowner to agree that their commercially-owned properties where they were legally allowed to conduct visitor commercial activities on would no longer be done by them and instead would take place only at the large parking lot at the former Macy site. And that handshake agreement, Dennis, is still in effect today. So while you do have visitors coming to Kailua Beach Park, coming into Kailua and even to Waimanalo for Kailua, folks are going to get on a bus. That tour bus is going to take them to the former Macy's lot. Folks are going to get off there. They're going to patronize our local bike rental shops. They're also going to utilize our city bus services to get to where they want to go. Some folks are going to rent rental cars and come in on their own. What this has resulted in is our beach park parking lots being available to the residents of Honolulu who pay for those services. And I believe that that model could certainly be applied on a larger scale. Look at Maui County. The Maui County Council is already proposing a ban on any new permits being issued in resort areas. And that type of activity is going to continue from local governments until and unless some governmental entity gets together to manage the visitor industry. I did it in Kailua in Winridawahu and I can do it again as Lieutenant Governor. I have a proven track record on that. Okay. Let's talk about getting the visitors more involved in cultural things in the visitor industry management. What do you know about that? There are a number of opportunities especially through ecotourism to get visitors more involved and I would hold I do wholeheartedly support that but at the same time government needs to realize that we cannot as a community, as a Hawaii community bring more than 10 million visitors into our islands anymore and believe that we're still going to be able to sustain all of our natural resources. Cannot. It's just not possible to do. And it's also worth knowing that with a little more than 10 million visitors, state revenues are less with that than they were years ago with less visitors. Why is that? Because I believe today we're attracting the wrong type of visitors. We need to encourage bringing visitors here who are going to spend more money and less of those visitors who are going to spend more money than bringing in more visitors who are going to spend less money. If we can continue to keep Hawaii a good place to live it's going to be a good place to visit but we shouldn't be doing it the other way around. Got to be focused on the residents first. Like you said, focus on the residents but then you get some Kamayana who moved away and they'll become visitors when they come back here. They might not be the really rich ones. I mean you still got to embrace that and same as when we go, we're not the filthy rich visitor elsewhere. So you know there's got to be some balance. You kind of just say only the rich get calm or something like that, right? No, I'm not saying that we would turn into a destination where only the wealthy can come. But when you have a mainland airline coming to do business here offering $200 round trip tickets and we're expecting that we're going to bring more of those visitors in and that they're going to spend the dollars that we need to sustain our economy and at the same time they're not going to ruin what we have. I believe we're sorely mistaken. Not going to happen. Moving on to the topic, Aloha Stadium. What do you think we should do? I do believe that there's room for a housing component at Aloha Stadium. I do agree with former Governor's Kayatano, Waihe'e and Abercrombie that a smaller stadium would work for us. I think a 50,000 seat arena or even a 40,000 seat arena in today's market for Hawaii. If we're focusing on Hawaii primarily is too large. You know, we saw the University of Hawaii retrofit the Qing athletic complex from what it was then planning a smaller footprint before turning it into what it is now in a year, maybe less than a year. If the University is able to do that on that type of a time frame, I'd like to hear what the University believes as far as the feasibility of building a stadium on campus and I'm very interested to hear the University leadership's perspective on whether or not the University has that capacity to do this. I do believe the potential is there and I believe this is an idea that's worth considering. But we're also going to have to have detailed discussions with the legislators representing the monologue community from the state representative to the state senator to the city council member. But I believe that's an idea very worth considering. It would also certainly encourage a lot more student participation in sports. And as a UH alumnus myself, I do believe that college athletics is a huge part of campus life and of college life and college experience. Yeah, I grew up with the whole stadium and more lily. So that was that was the whole one. So we're looking at housing at the existing lower stadium site then. I believe housing there makes sense. A real transit station is proposed to be adjacent to that facility. It makes sense. Multi-use land use development makes sense from retail to residential to some component of sports, if it's feasible, makes sense. But that entire area is right for transit or development. And we should do it there, make sense to do it there. But I do think that affordable housing has to be a component there. You want to encourage people to live, if not at, at the very least, nearby where they work. Perfect opportunity at a lower stadium. Okay, thanks. We don't have much time, but this is a federal act. But what do you think about the Jones Act? I had an opportunity to look at Jones Act policy a few years back. And really, the Jones Act policy is a lot more than just looking at the price of goods. You really need to go back and take a look at the study that the United States government accountability office, the research arm office of Congress did into this issue. You can seek an exemption, but also need to understand when you seek exemptions, the level of service that is scheduled also comes into play and is at risk. With the Jones Act, Hawaii receives scheduled service like clockwork of these ships coming in and going out. So our people are able to get the goods that we need on a timely basis. Without the Jones Act, that scheduling comes into play, according to the government accountability office research. Before I could say, yes, an exemption is great and we should move forward with it. I would need to be made absolutely sure and comfortable that the level of service not going to decrease. Level of service cannot decrease when we're in island state like this. And the prices of shipping goods. Okay, we've only got a short time left. You got any closing statements? Again, I'd like to thank you for the opportunity, Dennis, to talk story with you. I look forward to talking with people across the state. If you look at my campaign, many of the folks supporting me across the state have been involved, primarily at the local government level. These are folks who know their communities, who live in their communities, just like I do. Granted, I served as the chair of the Honolulu City Council, which is the most urban council in the state, but I live in Waimanalo and drove into town every day for work. I understand our rural people. I understand our rural lifestyle. And with me as Lieutenant Governor, nobody across Hawaii is going to feel that they're left alone. I understand all of our residents. And I look forward to being able to talk with people across our state as we move forward. Truly, Dennis, I'm looking forward to making my campaign Hawaii hard and soul. Hey Kaika, thank you for joining us today. Good luck and best wishes to you and your honor. Mahalo Nui. You've been watching politics in Hawaii with Dennis Isaki on Think Tech Hawaii, a 501c3 nonprofit. If you like the show, please tell your friends and help support Think Tech Hawaii and the wonderful staff and volunteers. Mahalo,