 And welcome to the state of the state of Hawaii on think tank Hawaii. It's live streaming network series. I'm your host Stephanie stole Dalton. I'm sure you've noticed there are many signs about about town indicating the Honolulu city and county mayor's race is on. And it is accelerating rating to the point of recognizing finalists. Today we have one of the finalists right here. I'm pleased to introduce city council member for district one Kimberly pine who was in her first race for mayor mayor. Welcome Kim. And thank you for joining think tech today to share more specifically, presumably about your campaign and your goals and aspirations. And may I call you Kim for our conversation. Of course. On the last time you graciously participated on the show. It was early in the year and early in the campaign. And it was also pre COVID-19 time. Well, times have certainly changed. You though have succeeded many, many times on the campaign trail. And even, even though this is your first run for mayor, but you've got a great track record. But given the times we are in the playing field seems more level for all the candidates, because no one has got in such crisis times as this now and nor have they managed under the sad losses and brutal effects of a pandemic. So this prompts my first question to you is how has the emergence of COVID-19 influenced you or changed your campaign and your priorities for serving as mayor of City County. Well, we announced pretty much earlier in the year that we're considering, of course, running for mayor, but I'll be honest with you, I'm the only elected official that's running for this mayor seat right now and so the crisis was was so big that I just stopped it was just impossible to help thousands and thousands and thousands of people without just stopping. And I just felt that it was inappropriate to campaign while people were suffering and they're still suffering now just that you almost have to campaign now because the vote is coming up. And so we didn't really start campaigning until the first week of June when we had to make the final announcement. But at the same time, we're still half of my time is still being used to help my constituents especially and now people all over the island because they're meeting me they're asking me to help them with their issues like trying to get their unemployment benefits some people still have not gotten their unemployment benefits. People who are independent contractors have not got their unemployment benefits despite the governor announcing that they will be considered for benefits many months ago. I'm talking to people that have $0 in their bank account, and they're like him how do I pay rent how do I get food, and it's not just one person. It's hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people that I'm talking to. And of course I had some of the highest cases of COVID in my district and so we were also battling health issues, people afraid spreading it to each other and so the anxiety level is still very high for different things right now and so I would have to say I'm not completely campaigning like I would have in a non COVID period normally an elected official will take some time off. We're pretty much still serving every single day and helping people and hopefully if we have time we're campaigning to and so my team is really stretched then but we're very inspired because when we are talking to people out there we are motivated more than ever knowing that we are the right team to go into the mayor's office because we really all come from the working class I'm running against millionaires and these famous politicians who this really is a business for them right they get in. They wore their friend contracts their family members get these contracts and this is a business but for me I'm a mom, I'm a working class mom that wants government to work for the regular person and so that's really what we bring to the table and have done during this campaign and then also during the pandemic. Well you're you're in the front row. The impact. That is horrific really to have to deal with that every day so thank you and thank you staff how wonderful for the people that are assisted I and I know you can't even do them all I can't even ask about that. But hopefully, well, somehow Hawaii will embrace it all. You know you said that you are the only candidate that is currently in public service, but you've also said that this has allowed you to study the complexities of governing for quite a while I think I've heard something like six or seven years something like that and enough to know how to do the mayor's job very well. Now, would you share an example of the kind of government complexity that you would have, you know, been looking at for quite a while or trying to process or, or grasp in certain ways, a little bit about that to us and and then how you think that prepares you for dealing with the coven 19 situation. Well, I have an additional job being the representative of the second city in Kapolei. So I'm also not just doing my city council job but I'm building a second city as an executive, deciding how which streets we connect how the sewer lines are going to be put in where the job centers are going to be attracting new businesses and convincing them to come to my district to really truly create a second city and I'll give you an example. So when Hawaii Medical West just shut down, all of a sudden many years ago 400 people this is more Queens Medical Center West is now we had a huge tragedy, because 400 of my own constituents were out of work right away. And so we, of course, went into emergency status and we did everything we could to get an employment benefits for these people and everything that we could to get them food and financial assistance but also what we did next as we started the first hire job there, where we help these people to find jobs close to home. And since then, we've done one every year and we've helped 6000 people get jobs close to home so it's really looking at the bigger picture of how do you help someone live a better life here on in this city. And so 6000 people who used to drive the town every day for two to four hours a day now that's how much it takes for us Lee would rather than residents would get to town. You know, now I've created a life for them, where they just drive down the street one woman who used to go to all Moana from, from, from a Makakilo every day for 20 years she said Kim and she got a job at a new hotel that I helped bring in. Down the street in the city of Kapolei she says Kim for the first time in 20 years, I get to have dinner and watch the sunset with my husband. Tell you how your type of leadership has helped better my life and all these others. And so when I talk about the complicated system of government. It's nothing like the state capital. The state capital is kind of like this abyss of philosophies right you see you debate the philosophy of how to debate educated child right and where as a city it's everything that works and doesn't work it's like is your park working for me where things fixed and a lot of times when I first got in it was like no. There's a sewer's work to the transportation systems work it's it's very different it's very on hand a hands on very different from state government or federal government. So when it comes to businesses and so I'm amazed that there's two candidates can I'm Mia and blond Jerry think that they can just bring their business experience to government. They're used to seeing for example, okay we're not making money in this division so we're just going to cut that whole division. So when you come to the city, you're going to say we're not making money in this division so let's just get rid of all the lifeguards and all the ambulances right you can't do that in in government this is not a business this government fulfills what businesses cannot. And, and they're used to just saying, this is my decision, we're going to go for it, but in government, if you want to change anything in the budget, you have to have five public hearings on it. But in addition to that, you have to have all these different meetings with all different departments go back into the community, and then from the mayor's office propose a decision to the city council and the city council has to go through five public hearings. So the final budget is not what that executive dictator said he wants to do. It's something in between that the public decided together and had input on very different than a business. That's very clear. That's the complexity issue I noticed that you use that word and one of your, maybe it was the interview I was looking at some of your, your videos and and I thought that's an interesting word to use for the city government. And now I understand a lot better what you meant and of course it's not just networking, but I mean in their rules okay so that is very helpful. So now I had said also to tie it into COVID-19 I think it's obvious how that connects given the requirements to network and bring in multi dimensional views and, and that sort of thing but I also wanted to ask you about that concerns you expressed about rail and I am you were saying that it's a system that you thought was too big for a small town like Honolulu. I noticed that and then it also presented too large a temptation for miscreants and looking the other way in the face of all of that. Contracting and money flow etc. So you said you also received reports and there are federal concerns about irregularities in the projects contract. I wanted to ask me, you know as the mayor what what as you actually are the mayor. So alternatives would you study or attempt to you fix that the project. Okay, you know I assume, in other words projecting yourself into it. So, just so I'm clear so in 2005 when I was in the House of Representatives I voted against the funding mechanism to go ahead and start the real project and the reason I voted against it is because first moving into the legislature says I need a 1% general exercise tax increase to go directly to the rail project to build it on time on budget, and everything will be completely paid for when we're done with that this will be first project in the history of Hawaii, everything will be paid for when we're finished. Of course, I had great suspicions about that because three months later, after he introduces to the legislature he said he said, Oh, we just need 0.5%. So we don't need the whole 1% and sounds like did the project cost get cut in half, just overnight. Where are your cost projections. How did you come up with this cost does it include all utility lines and our needs include rail cars and and no one gave me any answers and of course the answer we know today is no it didn't include utility relocations did not include rail car costs which is a huge cost within the project didn't include debt service or contingency funds should mistakes happen and so from the get go the numbers to the project was just a sham and I had that hunch in 2005 even though I told that it was suicide for me to vote against it as a leeward representative. I knew that I would be attacked and it was the hardest reelection after that, but I was elected by my constituents to tell the truth. And to let them know the truth and so unfortunately everything that I said back then where I had concerns came true. And so now when I say I believe that our town is too small. It's too small in a sense that how heart was developed and created under the Hanuman administration. It was to make heart separate. It means I have no oversight. The mayor has no oversight in terms of like our power according to the law that they created to create heart. So what I was saying is too many people were looking the other way when bad things were happening. And I know this because staff would call me lower level staff would call me and I remember one time I was about to meet this one important engineer overlooking the project he says Kim, they aren't following any of the laws. They aren't following procurement law they're giving they're giving contracts be illegally, and they're using small loopholes to explain themselves to doing these things like, for example, they will extend a contract to someone I've given another additional job to a contractor, when they're supposed to actually put that new job out for procurement to go in a fair process so these are just examples and I remember I was supposed to meet with this one engineer. And he got fired the next day, and then he had to go get some mental health help because he was so distraught he had a ton of kids and he had to pay his bills and find another job and went to the mainland. I have so many examples of different employees getting fired or their contract not renewed shortly after they brought up a lot of concerns and of course, what the council then did seeing all these irregularities ourselves. We did the first audit, which of course led to another audit and then the federal FBI investigation so it's really they also believe that there's irregularities impossible criminal behavior. So it's not just me saying this but now I have a federal entity that's saying the same thing. So being that we already built most of it right or half of it. What do you do if we do proceed right now we don't have money because of COVID it's just a reality and you have to be honest with people about it. So they know what to expect in the future but should we have money in the future. The demand is mirror that that we have federal investigation investigators there every day within the staff apart to make sure that all the laws are followed. And that will ensure an open honest transparent type of government and building that we really need in this project right now. So you would need to see a change in in the context of the work I mean having the FBI and the feds there a lot. You're talking about small town, like Honolulu being just not, not, not organized for the kind of oversight that you need to run these contracts and to look after all the modifications and the change order. Those sorts of things that open up these miscreants opportunities I suppose that's one way but anyway, I think that's that's an interesting story. Kim and then what about if we don't I mean my next question is actually about the budget and the decimated condition of it to the billions and all of the needs that we have as a result of the shut down economy. I know that you know you've talked about investing in the economy. What really does, what really does that mean. I mean, I, what, maybe I'll just stop with that. What does that mean to invest in the economy when you've got a huge deficit like that. You're assuming huge enormously expensive projects like rail and then not to mention human needs. You have to set money aside to fix the problem, not just survive the problem. And I think in any type of tragedies that we've had or shortfalls that we've had in the past. We have to look to survive from the problem because this problem was caused in Hawaii by over tourism when I say problem, the, the crash of the economy in Hawaii, no other state is suffering the way we are, because no other state put all of their eggs in one in terms of making tourism the leader of our economy and such a large part of our economy. So, for all the cares I can money that came from the federal government. What I have proposed is half of that carries back and it's almost $400 million. Half of that, of course, go to surviving this moment, making sure people are fed, making sure that they have enough money to pay rent or or their mortgage or that they have food over their head right and then a quarter of that. What's with that. Not very much money, actually. It's not very much money, but it's enough for now. Right, we're going to have another stimulus very soon. We haven't even spent like a quarter of the money. The, the state, however, has over a billion point for according to brand chats with four billion I haven't seen the breakdown of that. The state has a lot more, and I'm suggesting the same formula to them. And for the city and the state, the mayors, as well as the governor to work together to make sure we're not doubling things and we should just be uniting all of our money. The next quarter should be to beefing up our health care system. Right, and making sure that we're safe we have test trackers we have we have isolation areas and buildings people can go to the separate families. And then the next quarter should be to be investing into getting us out of this, or we making us resilient and making sure this never happens again so that will be for new economies to work on. I wanted to ask about your, you're addressing the issue of the state having a lot of money and of course they have many expenses to but and deficits to. But how do you, how do you see yourself in that that problem solving with the state as the mayor that what do you bring to that that really can make a difference because it seems like that is going to be a source is the state not the only but that is a source of funding that maybe hasn't been tapped much in the past as it needs to be tapped now. The state has actually spent no money. There is you know the, the legislature did do their budget and now it's up to the governor to decide what to do with those monies, except the state put a lot this the state legislature put a lot of the money into the rainy day plan which the governor has no control over but the state legislature does so I'm a little confused of who's going to spend the money how they're going to spend the money but the money's still there. Yeah, yeah, but it's sad it's still there because people are starving and that should a lot of that money should have been released already to help them with a lot of those things but that's another topic. But this is where collaboration what I'm really good at is bringing people who are very different together needs to happen more than ever the mayor and the governor. The legislature the state legislature the city council, we have to really just come together and look at all these different pockets and money where money is needed to bring to bring the money there. Whether it's healthcare, what's human services, transportation, is it daycare, is it just food, is it rental payments mortgage payments. There should be a lot of collaboration between the leaders to make sure that that we are efficiently spending all the money coming in. Those are that that's enormous resource it seems I mean I don't know how much of that is already in play currently I mean I like like you mentioned. Some of these things are there to use tools to use that are not in play at this time, and that would be a part of the skill set you would bring ways to especially having been in those other places of the government to know those kinds of things that as a very encouraging. The other question I wanted to ask about tourism had to do with the ideas and policies you could set or the experiences that you've had. I think you've mentioned that the, the income of the people that work in the tourism industry that I think I've heard you. The opposite of dire in fact that that maybe has kept up somewhat with inflation or that people are compensated already I mean so that we actually we have a workforce that has a compensation that is acceptable I mean everybody wants and would like to give more and maybe they could come but is that what you're saying is that that is kind of set and that there are other things that could be attended to or. No I certainly would like them to have more of because inflation has in the cost of living here is so high and so what I would like to do is make sure that they have better benefits better protections, any, any person that is in their non union hotel, I would say 50, no 60% of them lost their jobs and had no health care benefits at all. Just a few non union hotels gave make sure that people had health care benefits, especially during COVID right and that's a really important thing, but the rest of the employees they had everything cut including their health care. So what I'd like to do for resilience in the future is make sure that money is assigned to help people should this happen again. Now be something that we would require hotels to do to make sure that we have resilience with their workers. That's why I've made fighting for affordable housing and solving homeless issues and, and how to build home housing for the homeless, a top priority because 60% of most working class families go to housing. And that's very high in comparison to America it's really supposed to be 30% of your income goes to housing and then that shows a healthy family income, but I don't know anybody, you know unless you're very wealthy that has that 30% of, you know, going to only housing a lot more and so I really focused on passing on numerous legislation we built or 4,000 affordable housing units with some as low as $500 a month. It was very excited to give a key to a mom who's a domestic violence shelter for two bedroom for her and her kid for $600 a month. I mean, you can't find that in Hawaii and it was a brand new unit that I thought to be built for for low income residents. I had a full time job, but she just suffered a lot of different things and so it's really not just what you make it's how you can create opportunities to lower the cost of living for the people and that's really my specialty. I think about under tourism and the, the, the golden goose in a way of wiki key and all of those multinational hotels that really are not dependent on their, the income from wiki key to keep the whole chain of flow. As mayor, and maybe, maybe Mayor doesn't do so much maybe it's a state thing, but how can they could participate more in the restoration of our community. Is that something that you see as doable or is that not within the purview of this office. They can help in many ways a tourism will come back but of course I'm pushing tourism of the 80s where we had half the number of people here, but the same income. So that meant we, we targeted higher spending tourists. I would like to see the hotels become a good partner and going back to that type of tourism or we really just focus on the high end tourism where people were paid a lot more because their services had to be more because you're, you are taking care of a wealthier population and services were better and then your health care is better also. And so there's a lot of things that have happened in the 80s we used to have a lot of locally owned businesses where they really knew personally a lot of their employees they really had the heart to take care of them. Now you have these investment rates that are owning most of these hotels there's very few local ownerships unless it's like a single tiny hotel. And so you've lost that connection, I would do what I can as mayor to give some type of tax benefits and credits to hotels that recognize the value of our worker here and take good care of them. And perhaps make sure that the ownership is here or at least have an important owner living here part time so they can actually feel close to their their employees. Do you think that that's a significant chunk of the problem or or not I mean is that is that kind of that work a big piece of the need to help the economy. I mean I was thinking that it was I just wanted to know if you think it is or where does it sit there and put in the pieces back together to get the economy thriving again. Well, being able to handle the virus is going to get the economy thriving people aren't going to travel if they think they're going to get the virus and so that's why in March I was the first elected official to say the only way for tourism to survive is that we pre test tourists before they get on a plane. It's not it's not 100% but at least the person sitting in the airplane will feel a little more confident that the person next to them likely doesn't have COVID because they were tested unless you do that people aren't going to fly. You have a lot of different people that you know want to come here but they need to feel safe. For example in 911 we had a huge hit to our tourism because people didn't want to be on a plane that was going to be used for a weapon to destroy a building or kill people. And so it wasn't until the airports and the airplanes helped people to feel safe by adding more security measures and pre checks it's very much the same you pre test people. And then in terms of getting the higher spending tourists that is something that we needed to have a larger conversation within the tourism industry with state and city elected officials as what were we doing back in the 80s that attracted that high interest. Let's go back to that strategy to begin with. Um, has that received much feedback that notion of backing up to more exclusive in you situation here has that I haven't heard. I mean not that I know everything but is that your notion or has people been talking about that. Well, since I've been talking about it I've been talking about it for a year and a half now before COVID even happened and now every American is saying what came out of my mouth a year and a half ago and everyone said I can. We don't need to do that we make so much money we don't care stop attacking tourism and I was I'm not attacking true I just I want my, my beach back. You know you can't eat before COVID you couldn't even go to Kailua without even feeling like you were you were just at a pool at a hotel, it was is very different from when I was a child and then you go to the north shore same thing. And then it was people starting to go to wine I and all these other places that used to be such a beautiful place to go over a calm was just being overtaken and then again as I told you when you look at the financial numbers. We had double the people here crowding all of our areas, making it more expensive for locals to upkeep our roads and our sewers, our bathrooms because they were just being overused by tourists and we had double the people but half the benefit. Well, can if you look to the end of your mayoral term be at one or two. Um, can you share your, your notion of what outcome will be there as you leave the office as you close in the door behind you, what one or two outcomes will actually be in play here in the in Hawaii that you'd like to share. For the working class family, like me, I'm the only working class candidate and running against millionaires and famous people that the least they make is $300,000 a year. I know what it's like to have hardship here as a mom, as a wife is a working class family that I have made it my mission to make a walkable more affordable. We will build those 22,000 units that we need of affordable housing so that people can live comfortably here. I have already helped to build 4,000 in my eight years on the Honolulu City Council. I have to include the thousands that I've helped to to get built in my district when I was in the House of Representatives. I have another 4,000 coming through different pieces of legislation that I passed. Half the affordable housing that I put in motion didn't include a single taxpayer dollar it's all by putting together building formulas that increase density within a building and give some allows a developer make profit. But I say, hey, I want a little bit back for you to build affordable housing for me for free and I want it for 30 years affordability. I perceive us having an incredible health care system where if anyone is sick that we can find out right away if they have a particular virus, who they came in contact with alert those people. And some hey, if you want to isolate from your family. We have these different buildings that used to be hotels and like a key that we've converted to isolation areas or will give you your food your water. What you mean while you isolate from your family so you don't start a cluster in just your area. I envision our roads in beautiful and in an efficient as well as ethical government and a resilient economy. And that is a list of outcomes and I can go on and on. We will look forward to every one of them and it's a low hot time for us now and we'll have to wrap it up. I'm Stephanie so Dalton, this is the state of the state of Hawaii on the thick tech live streaming network series, and we've been talking with Kimberly pine, the candidate, a finalist candidate for Honolulu city and county mayor. Thank you all again in two weeks on the next state of the state of Hawaii and Mahalo for your attention. Stephanie, thank you so much. It's a pleasure.