 with Senator Sharon Moriwaki here on Think Tech on Community Matters. And here she is. She's joining us on Zoom. Welcome to the show, Senator Sharon Moriwaki. Thank you, Jay Fidel. It's always wonderful to be on the show with you and to have time to chat. We like having you and we certainly like chatting. So let's kind of take a look at the world for a minute. You know, it strikes me that you're a sitting legislator. And, you know, given what's happened in Congress and in other states, a sitting legislator is more important to me than used to be. I see you as the protection of our democracy. I see you as somebody who thinks of me every day and tries to figure out what I want as a constituent, as somebody who, you know, you are working for. You are changing our society, changing the law and state and making life better for me. And you are a very, very important person. You're more important than you ever were. How about that? That's, that's, that is giving me too much credit. I do try, I do try to represent you, Jay, and others in our state, and try to protect your interests. There's a lot going on. The world, Ukraine, with sea level rise, climate change, all around the world, and pretty much disarray, I would say. I don't know if there's any place in the world. I think we're the calmest, although we don't think that we're the calmest in the world, best place still to live in the world. But there are problems. And I hear and see every day that I try to address, and singlehandedly, not even the entire legislature can solve all those problems. It really does take a community. And I think you and me, Jay, we thought we could solve all the problems. One thing it's been clear is that, you know, a representative or a senator in Congress used to be responsible for his or her own district or state. And then, you know, you see so much in the newspapers and in the public conversation, the national public conversation, asking you to support somebody in another state, another jurisdiction. And you realize that in every representative, every senator in Congress is really responsible for the whole country. You have to see it that way. And I suggest to you, and I like your thought about it, is that in the state of Hawaii, and in every state, it's not so much that you are representing the people in your geographical district. However, that has been gerrymandered, you know. But you are representing, you know, the whole state. And of course, those people, you want them to vote for you next time around in November. Of course, and you've, you know, you've got to feel them and speak to them and represent them in their, in their initiatives and their demands and desires. But you do, as in Congress, you do represent the whole state. And you've got to think about benefiting the whole state and working with other legislators to do just that. And that's it's not the same as it was, say, 10 or 20 years ago. Am I right? I don't know how it was 10 or 20 years ago. But I do know that, that life is more complex. Not only do we represent the state or our district, but that it really is commingled with the federal and what happens in the federal level as well, as you saw during the pandemic, I think this, as I say, the silver lining of the pandemic is it opened our eyes, it opened up our eyes to what's happening all across the country, but also all across the state. And we're seeing that there's a lot of kicking the can down the road, not really being nimble enough, not being responsive enough as a government state and counties to the needs of our people. And so I think that we all represent our own district. Of course, as you said, we get elected by the people who are in our district. So that is number one, for us to look at whether this pothole is fixed or that home is encampment is addressed, or whether this road is is fixed. But beyond that, beyond helping each individual in our district who has a problem connect up to the appropriate service, there is statewide policies statewide funding to make our state better. In all regards, whether it's lower education, higher education, the prisons, to the Department of Health, even the tax department looking at what impacts all of the state, and especially our district. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I've been following you in your first term as a senator, getting your your newsletters, which are really interesting and, and helpful. And you began seems to me thinking back, beginning of your term with this notion, that we really had to care for each other. You said that and you've been saying that. And nobody says that. Not everybody said that. And we know on the mainland, they, they don't say it. And if they say it, you don't believe them. But caring for each other seems to me to be the fundamental aspect of a democracy. It's the social compact of living together in this place, and always trying to help the other guy. There's something biblical about it. But it's also a statement of patriotism and democracy. How do you feel about it these days, after talking about it for your first term? No, I'm always very optimistic. I, I do meet people who are nasty. They don't like what you do. And they, they call you corrupt or they call you other names. They, they are, they are in themselves angry. But I don't let that bother me. I think that we all shouldn't let that bother us. I look at caring for each other, not just as a cliche term, but it's really something that we grew up with. And in those years when we grew up, we all knew our neighbors and neighbors knew us, they would scold us if he traveled on their, their plants. You know, they, they really cared about us being good citizens. And these days, we're afraid to do that. And I don't think we should be. I met some people who were complaining about the homeless, they're afraid that if they spoke out, they would come and slash their tires or something worse. But that's the only way our community or society lives is to say, you're misbehaving, and we've got to do something about it. And the more that we look aside, the larger the encampment gets that the heavier and more serious the crime gets. So I think this caring for each other really needs to be taken to heart that each of us caring for ourselves, our neighbors, our community really is what going, it's what's going to make Hawaii the paradise Aloha State that we all claim is ours. So that's a long way of saying, I still believe that caring for each other. And that's my theme. And I'm going to stick to that story. Well, I think that I think that runs very deep in Hawaii. And, you know, to touch on that to encourage that to find that as a fundamental principle in our lives together is really important. And I appreciate that you take that position and you and you say that it's it's it is you matter of fact, you know, I went to have my license renewed today. And in the city, licensed division, you know, and I must say that the people there were so nice and so kind. And so it was not bureaucratic at all. It was efficient. But it was not bureaucratic. And I say, well, that's that's nice. This is an example of engaging with government in a really positive way, where everybody wants to do the right thing, the helpful thing. I mean, it doesn't always happen like that. No, Jay, what what I think is that we so much complain that we expect government not to be nice, not to be helpful. And you get what you expect, right? So I think that by our psyche changing, that government is supposed to be good, supposed to be helpful, you expect it of the person sitting across from you at the at the DMV, or or whatever, even Department of Planning and Permitting, that, you know, you smile, they smile back, you say, Hi, can you help me? I expect you to help me. Thank you. It try it. Anyway, get a different response than going in gruff and mad and expecting them to be nasty or slow. Well, let me let me observe that you are really on the ground, you know, when you ran originally, you were, you were walking the walk, you're doing the daily walk, knock on the door, what have you, all that stuff. But you have to stop doing that. You still talk to people. Talking to people to me is another fundamental point. You raised it a minute ago, that you have to actually engage. And you really can't we collectively cannot function as a, when you call it a community, a working community, a kind, caring community, unless, unless we walk, walk around and talk to people. And it's hard to do that in a complex society. Very hard to do it in a COVID society. And but you have continued to do that. And I really believe in that. And I think that will, that will save us, you know, we need more people to do that. You must have been challenged over the past couple of years. Because you want, you know, as soon as you got elected, bingo, COVID didn't stop you at all. Well, the thing, the thing is that, that I was, I promised to have these chats, you know, go on the community, sit down, talk with your neighbors, you know, like a coffee pot you passed away, and you tell me your problems, and I see if I can solve it, or at least help a little. And it stopped with pandemic. And, and if you recall, in March of 2020, the legislature was really grappling and with the administration, we were going back and forth and how they would be much more responsive, more nimble, addressing these problems that were really new to us, and not the usual same old same old bureaucracy. And it took a long while for the administration to start talking to his people, communicate. And during that time, the Senate COVID committee, we had a special committee looking just at how government should how state government should operate. And that's when we started looking at getting information and any which way we can crossing the street over to the Department of Health and seeing if they really are doing contact tracing. All of that time, I got messages, emails from from my community saying, you know, what's happening? Here's my problem. And here's my problem. And here's I can't get through to unemployment insurance. So with that, a lot of what I learned in the special COVID committee, I would transfer into a newsletter. And sometimes they were every day. And it tapered off over time. But but it was to give any bit of information that we got from the Senate committee and shared it. And so many people really appreciated that because nothing was coming out of the governor's office, nothing, nothing. So that started the conversation via email through these messages that I would send out once a day, once a week. Now it's once a week, because people have gotten accustomed to it as a way of kind of getting what's happening in the district that I've continued that so being encouraged also. I mean, yes, it's an it's informational, of course, but it's also, you know, we're here. We're here, we're functioning. And we are thinking about you. This is this is what I was talking about before. And this is what we want from government, among other things. Yeah, so so so I've used the email as the vehicle because we couldn't get out there. I think next year, when we can congregate again, much more safely, or people feel safe and congregating. I'll start up the chats where we can meet in person. But I think the email has been, I think effective. People like it to continue. So we are doing it as much as we can. We put in state and city, whatever is happening in the community. Well, you know, I don't think people in general realize how much our world here in Hawaii has changed over the past almost three years of COVID. I mean, our economy has been effective, including the hospitality industry, including restaurants, you know, they have suffered terribly. And retail in general suffered. I mean, people sooner buy something from Amazon, then then go to the shopping center and buy there. That's just the reality. And then we have, you know, the these problems, social problems, problem, you know, economic problems for the disadvantaged problems in the way our communities and society works, the caring part, you know, has been stressed and challenged over the past three years. And that includes government. And so, you know, we are really, may I say, in a new time. And so I think it's very important to recognize that you're going for another another term as a senator in another world. You know, and I'm not sure that the changes are over yet. And they may continue. And so this is really a challenging time for people like you, everybody to ledge, certainly for the governor, Senate governor, and every public official, it can't be business as usual. Do you agree? I agree. I wholeheartedly agree. I, I think the term the new normal was bandied about when we didn't know what we're doing. And, you know, we certainly talked about, Oh, God, we've got to build for a new normal. Well, I don't even think we got close to creating that new normal in a positive way. I think this new administration, I'm very hopeful, the, the both candidates who talk about the future are looking at changing government, you know, everybody depends on government. And I, I don't think government is that dependable. From what I've seen, during the pandemic, the silver lining of the pandemic showed us that government needs to change. People don't like change. And change, we must, because it's a new world, as you say, change, we must are terrible things happen. So, okay, so here we're going into, you know, November, it's less than a month away, it's election day for you. And, you know, I'm just I want to ask what your most important concerns, most important issues are that where you can actually help, I know you're, you're involved in the government operations committee in the Senate, this is very important to make government more efficient, because we want government to be efficient. So I'm interested in your thoughts on that. I'm interested in your thoughts on, you know, on, on, on the homeless and affordable housing, we really cannot afford either a to have people without homes without housing, without housing, they can afford or be that they leave town for the lack of it. We can't afford that. We can shrink the tax base, we have to make a more robust economy to support everybody and we're at great risk, in my view. So what are your thoughts about the most important issues in your platform and for the next four years? I think the number one issue and problem for the state is affordable housing. It is housing, not the standard that that you hear about, you know, 140% of the area median income. No, it's got to be 100% of the area median income, which is the median income and below. It's really for those who are moderately and lower income families that need to live. And they have jobs that they've gotten maybe two, sometimes three, in order to pay the rent. So we need to do something about housing. And we have been grappling with this problem for many, many years, and we have not been able to to come up with good, solid solutions to create the 65,000 housing units that we need by 2025. That's a lot of units. And if we don't have housing, we create the homeless problem. We didn't have homeless problems before, because we had housing, we had jobs that paid enough to pay for your rent, your mortgage. We don't have that now. And so we really, as a government, as a community, need to look at how do we pay for that for those who need a warm hand up? And, and, and make sure that the talent doesn't leave us so that we really become destitute, not only individually, but as a society, as, as a state, we need to care for each other. We need to look at corporate health. We need to look at government health and help the homeless and help those who need housing, get that help. And can't just say, Well, they can't afford it too bad too sad. I mean, I think, I think we have created that the system has created that that we're looking at more and higher salaries for some and everybody else is left behind or they leave. And that's what we're having with one of the only Sun Belt states that are losing population. And we can't have that. We really can't have that if we are going to have a thriving society, thriving state. Yeah, this is an inflection point, isn't it? But some people can't leave, you know, we find that more and more of our shows seem to be dealing with the issue of the seniors, the elderly, from a health point of view, from a financial point of view, from a place in the community point of view. And I know you've been concerned about that in your first term. You've written about it a lot, you've taken steps, you've walked, you've walked the walk, you've knocked the doors you've, you've tried really hard to protect them. How important is it now going forward as we arguably emerge from COVID and to protect the Kupuna? Oh, that's definitely a big, another big problem this day. Everything costs money. And when it costs money, then you tend not to deal with the problem. And if you don't deal with the problem, it gets even costlier. So with our Kupuna, we did put about $50 million just this past session because they needed help. And we saw the nursing homes were not equipped, the foster care homes were not equipped. So even getting the PPEs to them to keep our seniors safe, there was there was no way and many died. And some of them died without seeing their kids because they were isolated, because there was no way of thinking forward that we could use remote that we do now very, very much in a way that helps all of us. But they didn't have the foresight to think of that either. So many died without seeing their kids. And that's a really sad state of affairs. But in addition to that, I just want to make one more comment about about long term care, because they are the most vulnerable in our community, and they have been forgotten. And if they have no family, even if they have family, I just had a case that was was shared with me of a family who whose mother was in a care home. And she was having to sit in her own excrement for six hours, because nobody came to help her. And the person who asked to help said, Oh, she wasn't trained to do that. So that that's unacceptable. body is is in shortage in terms of workers. But the nursing homes being the lowest of the total pole, because the work is the hardest is even more short handed. And so our Puna who are vulnerable and when they need the most care are being forgotten. And this was a Puna who had family think of the person who has no family sitting there vegetating and not getting help. So so we really do have to be a much more caring caring society, where if we have to pay more, we should pay more, because this is that the kind of skilled help we need to care for those who are unable to know, Sharon, you're you're really an unusual legislator. I mean, you come in substantial parts from academia. You were the founder and leader of the energy policy forum, the Hawaii energy policy forum, and you brought together any the whole industry around energy, clean energy, for decades. And, you know, you have a lot of a lot of training, a lot of graduate degrees and all that. And here you decide, you want to bang your head against the wall and legislature. And now you're starting. And now you're deciding that a second time. Why Sharon? What is it? Are you? Yeah, why? Why? Why? I don't know. I think I started I started this career, if you could call it a career, I started the legislature four years ago, because we had no voice in the community. Our our senator really was not seeing us as as important, I guess, in terms of listening to us and seeing the high risers coming up luxury high rise around us and and and saying too bad too sad. And I don't like that. I think that that we pay our legislators, we are the people, and we should be represented. So so he dared me to run. And I ran. And my neighbors felt the same way that we wanted to have a voice a voice in what happens to us other than seeing it in a newspaper. So that started it. But as as you mentioned, Jay energy policy forum, again, it was something where people weren't getting together. Because an important issue, although at that time it wasn't. And pulling people together to see how important is homelessness, another issue that nobody really wanted to deal with, because it's really kind of seems daunting and maybe difficult to do. But again, bringing together the agencies, I really found that all of them are doing a good job in their lane, but a good job. And they all care, they're passionate about what they did in their lane. And all it took was a little bridge with all of them working together that we could come up with a homeless solutions office statewide, that they probably thought wouldn't be done. And we did it in one session, because it's people working together, caring for each other. And just realizing on the homeless issue, for example, that if you looked at what is our major goal in what we're doing, it's not the how many activities in Department of Human Services or how many people we serve in outreach services. It's really how many people have we touched or homeless that we can get to a better place. If that's the goal, everybody bought in, everybody from the police all the way up to corrections, because that is what everybody wants to do. It's just the connectors aren't there. So it's always a challenge for me. But I like that I like the challenge of bringing people together to do the right thing. Likewise, with long term care, that's my newest challenge is bringing together people who serve but need to come together to see that it's really important to deal with the most vulnerable in our community, not the well elderly like you need. Not the people can walk around and have good thoughts and you know, or you know, got good friends and we can enjoy life. It's those at the other end who have decreased capacity. And some of them have no family. And they're stuck. And yet they've contributed a lot to where we are today. And we have to remember that and and be able to deal with that in a way that is humane, that's respectful, that honors those who have done so much for our community. And if we think in that manner, I think we can do a lot more with the elderly. So that's my new challenge. Yeah, and the disadvantage, you know, the reality is, if nobody takes care of them, they become a burden to our society cost a lot of money. And they, you know, they draw down our resources and so forth. But if we make them productive, well, we, we improve the quality of their lives, of our lives, of the burden on government, the burden on our resources that might go somewhere else. And our economy, which, you know, I know you've talked about that a lot. We have to find a way to make everybody productive, so that our economy is better opportunities are better, especially for our young people who are right now thinking about leaving, you know, if we can keep them. Well, what's your story on that? What's your view of it? And I know you've learned a lot in the last four years. I want to hear, you know, how you're going to put those lessons into play in the next four years. I do want to give credit to the ways and means of chair Jonathan de la Cruz. I know that, you know, he's, he's put in a lot of thought in terms of how do we build our economy. And in order to build our economy, we need to have a workforce. We need to have people who are competent or skilled, who are forward looking. And, and in order to have that, you've got to have a glideway, a pathway for the young from when they're in high school, all the way up to, they don't all have to go to college, all certification, every which way that you can become competent in what is needed to build your own career, and also to contribute to our economy. So we've worked on a number of programs that we're funding from the DOE to the community colleges to the labor department. How do we get people much more involved and engaged in learning the competencies, whether it's IT, whether it's agribusiness, whether it's health care, all of these areas that that are, are part and parcel of a thriving economy. And how do we then put the workforce together? It's, it's a training. It's the, the approach when they're younger to give them the opportunities to really expand what they know, what they're interested in connecting those with the adequate training. They don't all have to go to college. They may do whatever they they're interested in. And they may be a time when they need to go to college because that's what they need to do their job. That's when it comes, not when everybody is put into one copy whole, either you do it, and you're not so valuable because you don't do it. And, and we've got to get out of that space. So yeah, I'm excited about the possibilities that we can keep our own, grow our own, make the university a much more vibrant, committed, developing industry to train not only our own, but to bring people here and to have that exchange in a very safe environment. I think it's really important for us to support our university. Amen. We want that. Senator Sharon Moriwaki running in November. I hope I see you before them. But if I don't, I'll see you then. And I'll see you hopefully for another four years. Thank you so much, Sharon. Thank you. Always a pleasure talking with you, Jay. Aloha. Aloha. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.