 Okay, it's five o'clock. It's think tech. It's community matters and guess what? It's the senator Sharon Mori walkie She joins us from the Capitol building the square building not too far away. Hi senator Mori walkie Jay nice to see you nice. See you after all these months. It's true Good I haven't seen you in a while, but if that doesn't mean I don't hear from you I hear from you every day sometimes more than once My am I messaging every day my message out to my community? Yeah, well, you know, I can't remember any elected official That was as ardent as you are about your community about, you know connecting with your community and The day wouldn't be the same if I didn't get your newsletter honestly It's really remarkable. You must have people absolutely love hearing from you and learn by it and You're kind of our neighbor. You're our collective neighbor. That's what you are well, you know, I had monthly chats before and since COVID and and are unable to congregate and my restaurants one of them is still open, but they're closed Which is very sad. I took to emailing my District so that at least we have some connection during this time when we're all Shuttering and shuddering Yeah, I saw that no booze is going to close And I walked my district and so little open and some open and then closing It's this up and down as well in terms of these Emergency proclamations from the governor and from the mayor and people just don't know what to do And it's really tough on businesses because they have to Follow all the protocols and in sanitizing and social distancing They have half the number of Customers so you know you bring back your staff, but you have half as much income coming in so it's really tough I really try to support them as much as I can So yeah, and your district covers Waikiki Which is sort of like one of those it's like Aleppo in Syria, you know And and kakaako too because you know a number of the restaurants have opened up in kakaako And it's really for the community, but but Waikiki is so hard hit. It's it's very very sad So, you know tell us about the session. It was I called it the Swiss cheese session Because it was on again off again. What kind of experience did you have over that session where it was on again off again? It was it was a stressful session. We thought last year was stressful, but this year was very stressful it because we had we had No game plan, you know, there was nothing really to follow as the first ever unprecedented as they say And we we had the idea that we would go because it happened in the last I guess the last week in February. So we had the idea that we would go till about April and we would conduct all the business that we could then and early. But what happened was one of our own Was diagnosed with with COVID. So everybody we had we shuttered right then and that was in March. So much of our work was done remotely. We decided we there was There's faith two phases was the first bunch of money that came down from the feds. We allocated those funds and then we said, Okay, there's another another Phase that's going to come in and we'll come back and we'll we'll look at how we can allocate the funds to make sure that the money got into the community. So most of the bills that were pending and the resolutions pending this before we we recessed really are still pending very little was able to get past all all focus was on On on the pandemic on bills that we need to have to help us through with policies and also The allocation of funds so that it could get out into the community. Yeah Yeah, if you don't it was for a while it was put into the rainy day fund and The consensus was if you leave it there, it'll have to go back to the federal government. So Got to spend it Rainy day fund was was there we put it there because It was untouchable except by the legislature because we were not sure On the first phase that all the funds were going in places where they should be going So we wanted to make sure that if we put it there we would spend that three weeks in between To talk with the community see whether needs were that we would allocate funds where the need was greatest, you know, like unemployment insurance rent assistance And child care support. So all of those Decisions in terms of the allocation of funds was done in this three week period So we didn't want to send the money out and then have it just be misspent or not spent So so Was there any bills? I mean cobit or otherwise that you would have liked to Seen past this year that you know got got deferred by by cobit You know the rent the the real estate investment trust has been something that that um We've been going at it for a number of a number of years and that was passed By the senate and it was over in the house and it passed the first committee and was going to the second committee It was lingering there and you know, I think that as as we look at it That is that would have Taxed all corporations in the state equally and not just giving an exemption for those that are off off off state and and you know when looking at who's making Who's generating the revenues? It is these rates because they really can still charge the rent to their to their To the businesses the small businesses and so forth that are renting from them. They're still charging the rent So there aren't really being hurt as some of these other businesses Those are their tenants that are being shuttered, you know, so that's one that I would have liked to see Pat that we would have been able to generate more income for the state in this time The the the others are the the elder services That that went by the wayside because We had some funds for elder care, but not for the the caregivers. So that went on the wayside There were a number of smaller bills. I think the rent supplement bill we had a big bill for rent supplement and and so we put that into the rate the The federal relief fund and the governor at first cut 50 percent but by error Um, we're going to get the whole hundred million dollars But it's still it's still not released and that's what makes me so upset is is that we had rent and mortgage supplement funding from the cares act and that we worked with the community agencies and and both the house and the senate agreed on on this package that Would have gone to a third party Contractor so that it wouldn't get stymied in in government, you know, it would be out in the community and that still hasn't gone out because budget and finance attorney generals Getting their hands on it instead of just letting it go as it was planned by people who are in the know On how you get funds to to people in need. So it's very it's very concerning about what's happening with the administration Um, it's not moving fast enough. It's not moving as if we were in uh An urgent emergency situation Yeah Really frustrated us especially Um, you can see the house and the senate Have been frustrated by the slowness of this administration to act Well, and then of course, uh, you've been following in your newsletters reflect that in detail the The progression to use that word of kovat Um, the infection the infection rate the the lethality of it the effect on the community And there there there have been some uh bad press for the administration in the past week or so Involving You know a failure to test a failure to trace a failure to even hire the people necessary to do those things And I wonder how that plays with the legislature and with the committees that you're on Well, you know, it's nothing new to but I think the house is why I can't speak for the house or for the senate committee We have been harping on the administration for For months now since march april june To get testing up to get contact tracing up Um to look at how we can we can assure that we've got enough people Set up to do the tracing and to contain the virus that we're going out now the governor His first his first proclamation was in early march And we had single digit cases and today Five months later We still don't have the the the system set up for um, how we deal with not only the testing But the whole system of testing and and if you find positive cases you trace all the contacts within 24 To 48 hours of your finding and and when we went and and talked to the nine contact tracers They're investigators, but they're doing contact tracing because they haven't been ramped up That was a couple weeks ago. I think they're making changes now um, we're finding that Some of these people I have a hundred cases. How do you do that? So they're not getting to to they're not tracing and contacting people within the standard, which is 48 hours map It's taking a couple of weeks or even more. So of course that spread is going to be Be be moving out into places that you know, they haven't been yet contacted people So, um, it's it's a very sad state of affairs that during these five months That the department of health has been telling us. Yes, we have the contact tracers We push them to get more so they put two and a half million dollars into the uh budget So they could trace train the tracers And I think The monies were let In june. So by july they had some 400 people train And we said, well, where are they? Well, they Walked through the hiring of these people and then and then department of health said well, you know, even if they're trained We have to now train them. So You're wondering why when they didn't that they were training at uh That they not take their people over and and co-train At one time, you know, so when you hear these kinds of things j You know, it's just very frustrating and we try to help and support the administration but When you get this kind of feedback and you find out that they're not Being forthright with you and they're saying everything is fine, but it's not um, you know, we really we really are starting to you said we had to look for ourselves and and and I have to say for the record that uh, the day before we went over there To department of health We did talk to dr park and we said how many and she said I have 105 we said well, we've heard otherwise in fact, there was a grievance From their contact tracers and hga was was was um investigating So we knew that that there were not 105 some of these people these nine were um, you know having 50 60 100 cases and how can you do that with a with that every day coming in It's you know, it's like a treadmill so So we said well, you know, we're going to come over and see for ourselves We'd like to come over and see it and dr park said oh come any time You know, please come we'd love to have you so we went and then you know the director Of health bruce anderson said, you know, how dare you come the governor said how dare you come? You know, you've got to give us notice and um, it it became More than what it was. We were going over to see okay. What do you have? Where can we support you? You know, like unemployment insurance, you know going over there seeing how how tough it was How do we get people over there to help you? How do we loosen up the bureaucracy to get people there? um, we we went over to ui and uh unemployment insurance and Saw that they had not enough people. We met with uh The human resources department. We said look Find all the people who are working from home not essential workers. No computers Send them over to help unemployment insurance. So from the 24 people they had Uh, you know, we sent people over from the legislature And all of these volunteers went over that they had something like 500 people Then trying to you know get this burden of the 200 thousand cases, which still wasn't enough So the same thing with contact tracing. We said, you know use the convention center do Something that's proactive and bold and get those people there that you need We weren't there to go Over and investigate. We were there to help and it just became I think low not a proportion. We we want to help Yeah As I understand it Bruce Anderson and the governor were not happy that you were there on the other hand Whether you were there to help or just to do oversight Um, you have an absolute right if not a duty to be there and do oversight What is going on here? You know, we're jobs. That's our job That's our not to mention that all of us not not those on the committee But many more of our our colleagues. We're all getting these calls from people You know, why aren't you doing this? Why is this happening? You know, I got I I I was um Tested positive and I was with somebody who tested positive and nobody's calling me and You know, it was it was chaos in the community whereas We're being told we've got it under control um, and that's not right and Worse than that, it's not effective and it leads to more cases and more fatalities Simple as that. We have triple digit Cases every day every day Yeah, yeah Well, it seems to be down a little today unless I missed my guess that it was doing a way over 200 there and Now it's down to less than 200. So that's a the good news thing But but what do you think has to happen here, Sharon? I mean, you're on it. You're on it and you communicate really well with your constituents But what has to happen to for us to get down to a manageable, you know, suppression of the curve Well, I think that the biggest problem is that people are going about and you can be an Is symptomatic carrier, but people are going out and and sure the department of health is is truly I mean it is one of the ways you prevent is you stay in place if you're sick You wash your hands. You sanitize you you mask up You keep your distance when you're in in a congregate settings I mean all those are good and well, but you still need a health system a public health system in place And we don't have that it seems So it's from the time. So so dr. Park's system worked, you know with a small outbreak, you know, you've got But the the testing of this person you see that, you know, they got ill And and so then you do that. Who did you contact with, you know, we have close contact with you go There's 10 people 15 people and you you you find out what the source of it, you know, okay It's gay gig sushi or whatever it was, right? But but this is like hundreds and now we're up to 6600 that were, you know, affected So you've got to have a public health system And so it's the testing and doing more testing Before they they they didn't do as much testing because we didn't have the test kits, but now we have the capability and we have The the consultants and the testing facilities That are already there in place that just give them more funds and get the equipment to test more broadly You test then Then you you you get the cadre of of contact tracers and and get them in in place And so when you get you get an outbreak, you know, you can send people out immediately within 24 to 48 hours You've got people there and you can contain You contain it and so then you don't have this community spread where you don't know where it is And now they're they say oh because of privacy issues. We're not going to tell you where it is So the communities Is scared stiff because they don't know if it's the neighbor next door or somebody in their building When people really should know enough so that they can be aware of what is around them Be much more mindful And everybody can be part of the the solution and so this lack of communication Lack of a system in place lack of transparency How many cases do we have how many hospital beds do we have how many ventilators do we have All of that needs to be a system and it has to be conveyed to the public So we all are in this together really and if department of health is You know doesn't have the capacity for they should tell us You know because the funding is there jay. That's a sad part of this. They had 50 million dollars. We also had cares act money The money is there. It's just the Allocation of the money into places that it can be used immediately And you know these care act monies they go away at the end of the year. So time is clock is ticking So Yeah, I'm sure you saw there were two Long op-ed articles in the last couple of days My doctors epidemiologists over this sort of thing and One of them covered the issue of privacy and said what what is it with the privacy? Nobody wants you to reveal the name of the individuals We just want to know the demographics the neighborhoods. We want to see a breakdown of the data That's not a violation of any privacy so Yeah, and and you know that that there was a report that Said that that We have among all the states We have disclosed only 13 percent of useful information that the public really needs to know about this pandemic and and I think that department of health has a has a A What they call the joint information center they have a group of communications people they have contracted out Millions I think are hundreds of thousands of dollars that they really need to come up with with the plan and they even have A way that that they can let the public know of vital information You know that that that people are all trying to do the right thing It's just not knowing what it is and it changes from day to day We've got a rationale no so, so You know you said that there there were going to be or there are Now changes happening What what what's the nature of those changes and uh, I used a good time to to make those changes because we're still in the middle of it Uh next january when the legislature meets again. Hopefully it will meet again in january Um It may be late and legislation may not be the solution It may it may be kind of a negotiated result with the the oversight that I was talking about So what what kind of changes are happening or could happen now? right now it's it's it's um Trying to to fix the problem of the contact tracing because that's immediately necessary We can't we can't go hobbling around with you know, nine or 10 or 20 or 40 contact tracers when there's this kind of spread so um, so We had recommended that they use the convention center because the unemployment insurance crew is kind of winding down so now you put in the contact tracing crew and and Ramp it up to the 400 that were trained and there's a lot of community support from the hawaii pacific university as well as the university of hawaii Um to to really bring in whoever can help to help and this whole um effort now I I just saw today that there is um A surge testing that they're going to start to doing more widespread testing in the community Which has been really um for me And many others A concern because we could test up to we were told 5 000 a day and we were testing maybe Sometimes not even a thousand a day So I think the testing needs to go up. Um, they did hire a new um Disease it's a disease Investigation branch which oversees the contact tracing investigation contact tracing. Um, Emily roberson And she started I think about three weeks ago She's a faculty or former faculty member from hpu so um Maybe that will help with new eyes fresh look a more public health orientation Hopefully that will work So that's one of the changes just in in terms of of staffing But hopefully she will have the authority To move quickly and do the kinds of things that need to be done To make this a real public health system Yeah, so this is supervising the testing and tracing I take it Yeah, and and so bringing in the new hires and training them 400 I think she's spending her time now at a convention center trying to set up that whole Contact tracing unit. Yeah, what about the information? I'm reminded of an article that appeared in haaretz, which is a an israeli paper out of televive Where they they gave you an example In the paper of how much information The the government is giving to people and it was really something It was the whole enchilada. It was everything. I mean, there are no names, but a lot of information about what was happening in covet That's a parallel situation except You know, we ought to have a parallel information available to us. Is that going to change? Is that on track? You've been urging them to give us that information, you know, again, they're very cautious So everything goes past the attorney general department of health But I think that this whole sphere of hippa and fippa Is is pretty much To me this weighing of individual privacy versus public health interest And we really need to look at the public health interest at this point and the information is not Joe blow living, you know, uh in in one waterfront tower It really is in kakaako, you know, there's this Three or four cases or at this the school in in this area so that people know that they need to know Um, so that they can be much more aware and and if not At least department of health can call all these people in the context and make sure that is contained So that, you know, it really isn't spreading um I had A situation in in my district where and this was an elderly building that they were not told That uh, someone had cove it so they locked everything down not knowing what the situation was not being able to tell anybody that You know, we have cove it or at least it's contained Uh, and so everybody's fearful because the you know, coconut wireless works very well So you might as well say what you can say to protect the interests of everybody else I mean, it's like Not a lot of people are saying well, you know, it's my constitutional right to do whatever I want to do I don't need to do this. It's a hoax Well, so be it, but if masking up is something that's very neighborly and um And and a way to show that you care for your neighbors Then mask up, you know, what's the problem? It really is a matter of community and that's what I think Really needs to be stressed in these times That we are in is that we are a community and we really need to care for each other, you know You've always said that you said that a long time ago And uh, you've been faithful to it and you've been faithful to this issue And I guess I I would ask you I mean you intend to follow this going forward It doesn't sound like you're going to let go of it No, in fact In fact, um, you know the session is over And the covet committee and both the senate and uh speaker psyche on the house side We're continuing to meet because we haven't seen the kind of progress, you know when we quarantined At the airport and we said, okay, we closed loopholes. We closed loopholes with short term rentals We closed loopholes with um enforcement. We closed loopholes with, uh, you know the uber and and the the The car rentals and then we circle back and we're hearing from uh, angela keen and you know the quarantine breakers Oh, that's not happening. There's all of this violation is still going on and hpd is not uh, it's not Enforcing quarantine. Oh boy So, you know, so so if it's not us Then nobody could really say hey, what's happening and and you know at least work with administrations to say these things aren't happening How do we help you make it happen? Yeah, well, I'm so glad you're doing that. You know one thing that strikes me sharon And I think it's really relevant Is is that you know, I I stay at home most of the time A lot of people I know you stay at home And we get and we're getting you know used to it to start a new life here It isn't like the old life and we have fond memories Of of time time's gone by But you know, I'm not going to go out unless I feel Confident I I have to develop a whole new sense of confidence and to see those triple digit numbers all the time That doesn't give me confidence Now if I had more information About what was happening I could start developing a kind of personal track on how this is all doing Then I could develop a sense of confidence. That's just me, but I'm I'm not alone I think a lot of people would do the same. So if they saw And they could make their own minds up if they saw the data on the the neighborhoods the demographics all that stuff Um, the stuff that's not being reported Then they could they could develop confidence over time and and if you give them the information Then what you get at the end of the day is is is a reopening Then confidence equals reopening So to me it's a secondary benefit there. It's not just a drill It's if you want to get people to reopen you got to tell them all all these things. Am I right? You are absolutely right. I agree with you a thousand percent And and and I think that people need to recognize that that we're not We're not Targeting anybody it really is and again, it's this mental set that we are a community How do we make ourselves safer? Even the hotels are saying we want to do what's right We don't want to open up until we're really really sure that we're safe So everybody's on board. It's just the enforcement and the Knowing having the information to do what needs to be done And so if we have the information that Whether the the covet is here or there in one school or another that we have the protocol to know how you contain it So you don't shut the whole schools down. You know this classroom or wherever it is that that is a much more targeted Science-based or data-based Um way of sure it's the same thing. It's it's confidence if I'm a parent And I and I'm stuck on the dilemma of whether to send my kid back because nobody is going to force me to do that I'll chain myself to the front door in my house and you know, nobody's going to force me to send my kid back So I have to have confidence and that information could help me develop the confidence Where are we on that? Can you just my last question really is where are we on the schools now? Where are we on the way people feel about the schools? It really is not quite Um together I think the superintendent told us some things and we have been still asking We have senator kidani on our committee and she's very much on top of Hearing from the schools and hearing from the teachers and we all get those comments as well of the fear for not knowing and being having to open up when you're not fully equipped with with protective equipment, you're not fully equipped with with uh, sanitizing equipment not Equipped with how you social distance your classroom if you're getting people back in and especially those Uh, what they call the special ed programs where students need to come back to school These are small classrooms. There's no accommodation on how do you social distance? How do you give them the necessary protective gear? They will need gowns and you know gloves and everything else So it's not really well thought out. So and it's not consistent across the board. Um Some teachers a big issue the other week was telework Some teachers they're all doing social distancing for a week until they they get themselves, you know for maybe even the quarter But until they can learn the system and how they have it really safe for all the kids and the teachers and the staff It's a learning but but you know, I think part of it is not having the protocols in place So hopefully in the next several weeks or months They will learn that that's important to have in place before opening up the schools for everybody to come in Because with with kids, especially the younger ones, you can't keep them apart So they have this concept of a bubble, but you know, that's even that is hard to to really Be able to manage when you've got all the kids running around in it, you know all their energy. So We we also heard that when they bring them in by bus, you know, they're not all messed up and you know it's it they really need to have more protocols and a way to To deal with the the students, especially the younger ones and how they're going to accommodate them so that they really are safe Given their energy You know Answer your question is not quite quite there yet I very much admire and compliment you on doing the oversight and Being part of the senate group that does the oversight and you really have to continue to do that because if you don't do it then nobody will and I'd be very concerned I believe that legislative oversight and i'm learning this from the federal government, obviously Is very important and i'm so glad you're doing it and I really like being your district and getting your your your newsletters and I I would encourage and compliment you on on sending them out It's a it's a real community service that you do You you're an outstanding senator sharon I knew you would be and here you are And then you come on our show and talk about it and I really appreciate that and I hope we can do this again from time to time To learn from you how things are going Of course, of course. It's always it's always a pleasure to come talk to you jay talk with you Senator sharon moriwaki the hawaii state senate. Thank you so much for talking with you