 Hi, I'm Rusty Komori, and this is Beyond the Lines on Think Tech, Hawaii. I was the head coach for the Putahuboys varsity tennis team for 22 years, and we're fortunate to win 22 consecutive state championships. My book Beyond the Lines is about leadership, creating a superior culture of excellence, and finding greatness, which is what this show is all about. My special guest today is an extraordinary leader who is the senior vice president of Island Holdings and the former executive director of our Hawaii High School Athletic Association. And I'm excited that he's running for mayor of Honolulu. He is Keith Amemia, and today we are going beyond politics. Hey, Keith, thanks for joining me on the show today. It's a pleasure. Wow, so you're in your campaign headquarters right now? Yes, I am. Right in the heart of Kakaako. We're excited to be here. It's a great location and a great venue to have my headquarters. Perfect. Keith, tell me about your upbringing and your, you know, just your youth. Sure. I was born and raised on Oahu. I went through public schools through the 10th grade. I finished my 11th and 12th grade years at Punahou, and then I went on to the University of Hawaii. And like a lot of people, I waved through college and law school, taking odds and ends, types of jobs, mowing lawns, mixing cement, cutting wood, working in law offices as a messenger and later as a law clerk. And after I finished law school, I started practicing law for about seven years in two local medium-sized law firms as a commercial litigator. And then I took my position as the executive director of the Hawaii High School Athletic Association where I held that job for 12 years. Wow. So how's your wife, Bonnie, and your son doing? They're doing great. As you probably know, you've met her, my wife Bonnie's an accountant. And our son Chris is a sophomore in college at Claremont McKenna College right outside of Los Angeles. And Bonnie and I have been married 23 years and we live in Paoa. You guys have a fantastic family and Keith, I know you since 1998 when you became executive director of the HHSAA and you're amazing as the executive director and I don't know how you did it dealing with all the players, parents, coaches, I mean everything. But how was that experience for you? It was a really gratifying experience. I learned a lot, I grew a lot, and I worked with a lot of great people. I tell people it was probably the most political non-political job in the state as you know Rusty. It's a good experience and background to have. If I'm fortunate enough to become mayor, you're dealing with many constituencies across the state, many communities. I mean I've been all across the islands visiting all the 95 high schools that make up the HHSAA. I got to learn and meet people from every community I learned of their challenges and issues including the fact that many of them are struggling to make ends meet. That's a big reason why I'm running for mayor to see what I can do to help working class families and all families in general to just make a better life or lives for themselves throughout the community. Well I've seen you in action and you've seen me in action through all those years and what I loved about you Keith is you have an extraordinary gift to inspire people, to really bring people together and to get things done. I want to ask you, what is your secret to doing that? Well I had a lot of good mentors and leaders that taught me to be compassionate and to pay it forward and to be grateful for what you've received. So as I kind of alluded to earlier, I mean I saw a lot of good people who are struggling whether it's families who kids can't afford to buy cleats, they have to hand it down to several brothers and by the time it's down to the third brother he's wearing a shoe that's two sizes too small wrapped up with duct tape or families who can barely put food on the table. So those kind of experiences move me. I also learned that it's important to be selfless, to not have an agenda, to communicate with people. That's something that's being lost in politics today, a lack of communication or an unwillingness to collaborate and work together. I want to bring those skill sets to the city to improve our government for everyone. Well, you know after your tenure at the HHSAA, you know a few years ago they brought you into the loop of trying to help the ILH and OIA football situation where they can compete against each other and no one ever thought that that would ever happen but you made that happen. How did you do that? Well it takes a lot of hard work and perseverance and again it's coming with no agenda other than to do what's best for the greater good of the community. I think I was able to foster trust amongst the leagues and the communities through my tenure at the Hawaii High School Athletic Association and so when you have trust and credibility and you have no agenda other than to work out the best compromise for everyone involved, you can produce some pretty amazing results. I know a lot of people thought it was impossible to bring the public and private schools on Oahu back together again to play football after 48 years but I'm pretty stubborn and have a will to get the job done no matter what it takes, something that you're good at as well as a successful high school tennis coach and so I was fortunate to get the job done with the help of a lot of people. And Keith, I just want people to know that just within our tennis situation with the boys and girls varsity tennis, I mean there's so many challenges that you have to deal with and that's just one small part and when you bring in football, basketball, volleyball, track, wrestling, golf, all of these sports, I mean there's a huge spectrum that you were dealing with that a lot of people don't realize how hard a situation you were in. Yeah, you're jungling a lot of balls at one time but what helps is you surround yourself with good people with the same philosophy and values to get them done in the best interest of our kids and so I was lucky in that regard, I had a lot of people to help me. I'm affirmably building a good team that not one person can do it alone, you know, even in sports. Yes, LeBron James is an amazing player but he can't succeed if the other four people on the court aren't working in concert with him so I'm a firm believer in teamwork, getting people to work together and putting in the work and effort as well. You know that as a tennis coach that you have to work hard, that's the foundation for any success, you know, combined with good values and teamwork and so I applied that philosophy into all the different sports at the HHSAA and we were able to achieve some amazing results together. Well, speaking of teamwork, I mean, you being the senior VP of Island Holdings, I mean, Island Holdings is such a fantastic successful business with so many subsidiary businesses involved with that. I mean, and so, you know, for you being a successful business leader why are you so successful with Island Holdings as well? Well, we have great leadership there and great teamwork. Again, you know, teamwork and hard work applies in any endeavor whether it's sports or business or anything else that you put your mind to and so we have a good team. We try to impart our philosophy and values from the top all the way to the bottom that everyone needs to work together, that no one is more important than the other and when you do that you achieve good results. We also have a philosophy of giving back to the community and we firmly believe that we're only as successful as the community is so when the community is successful, we're successful. That's why Island Holdings and Island Insurance in particular gives back a lot to nonprofits and other worthy causes every year because we firmly believe that we can't do it alone and we want to do our part to make our community better. Keith, you know, I feel very strongly that people, you know, in a governor position or a mayor position, I mean, they need to really fully understand business and to really be able to work and negotiate and you know, that's how you get things done. I'm excited for you running for for mayor and I want to know why you are running for mayor, Keith. Well, it's pretty simple, Rusty. Like a lot of people, I feel, I mean, we need, we need change. We need new leadership. We need a fresh perspective. We need to rebuild trust in the public with respect to government. We need to start by eliminating corruption in government. We need to communicate better from the city and from government to the public. One of the cornerstones of my administration will be to improve communication from day one and that's by creating an office of community engagement. Too many of our controversies that have sprouted up recently, whether it's the Google wind farm or shorewood forest or many others probably started in part because of a lack of communication or trust with government. Just like at the Hawaii High School Athletic Association or at Island Holdings, communication is key. You can never over communicate and we need to genuinely communicate with the public to find out their issues and concerns and try best to address them. That's not happening for whatever reason nowadays and that's leading to a lot of our disputes and controversies. So what are you, what else are you going to focus on with your campaign? Well, in terms of the campaign, just like when I was at the Hawaii High School Athletic Association or any other organization that I've been involved in, I believe in inclusivity and getting as many people from all walks of life involved and so we've done that so far with our campaign. We're excited. We have a lot of new people involved in our campaign that have never been involved in a political campaign that excites me and that's another issue or concern about politics today that too few people are involved. Too many special interest groups have a disproportionate amount of influence in decision making and government and so I'm excited that we have a broad-based campaign team helping me try to get elected to be our next mayor. And Keith, you never, I mean this is your first time, you know, running for office, being involved in politics. So how hard is it, Keith? Oh, it's a lot of hard work but anything worth achieving involves hard work as you know, Rusty. I mean your goal every year going into a tennis season was to win a state championship and hard work is essential and the cornerstone of any success. So I knew it was going to be hard, it is hard but I feel that my team and I are up to the task of winning this campaign. And Keith, you have such great support. I mean such a wide range of support from people across the islands. I mean how does that make you feel when you're visiting with a lot of the people? Well, it's very gratifying. It feels good. It's rewarding to get people to want to help the campaign without even me even asking. And you know, I just am thankful that I've been able to build a lot of relationships throughout my career, especially when I was involved in high school sports. I got to meet, as I said, people from all walks of life, from every single community. I know every community on Oahu well and I think that'll serve me well if I'm elected mayor. I totally agree with you, Keith. We're going to take a quick break and when we come back, we're going to continue going beyond politics. You are watching Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii with my special guest, Keith Amemiya. We will be back in 60 seconds. Hi, I am Yukari Kunisue, host of Konnichiwa Hawaii, Think Tech Hawaii's Japanese program, broadcasting every Monday from 2 p.m. I usually invite a guest in Japanese language community. That's interesting things and I'd like to share stories with you guys. Please tune in and listen to Konnichiwa Hawaii. Aloha, y'all. My name is Mitch Ewan. I'm from the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute and I'm the host of Hawaii, the state of clean energy. We're on every Wednesday at 4 o'clock and we hope that we have interesting guests who talk to us about various energy things that are happening in Hawaii all the way from PV to windmills to hydrogen, most of my heart, electric buses and electric vehicles. So please dial in every Wednesday at 4 o'clock on Hawaii, the state of clean energy. Aloha. Welcome back to Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii. My special guest today is an extraordinary leader, the senior vice president of island holdings and candidate for mayor of Honolulu. He is Keith Amemiah and today we are going beyond politics. Keith, I want to talk to you about homelessness. I mean, that affects all of us here in Hawaii and Lieutenant Governor Josh has made it a priority of his to really, you know, help the homeless situation here and I know that's a big priority and passion for you. Why is that a big priority for you, Keith? Well, as you mentioned, Rusty, homelessness is a problem that affects every community on our island and, you know, it's a complex situation that's not easily solved and I mean, clearly having homelessness or homeless people on the streets doesn't help them. It doesn't help the community at large. So we need to do what we can to, you know, reduce the problem. Again, it's a complex issue, but two ways we can address it are increasing our affordable housing across the island. A lot of our homeless people are on the streets because they simply can't afford a place to rent and pay the monthly bills in order to be in an apartment or condominium or whatever else you have. The other main issue that's that's affecting homelessness is, about 10 years ago, the state greatly reduced the amount of mental health services treatment for people. And I think that's affecting to an extent our homeless population. And as I mentioned to you in the past, it's an issue that's personal to me. My mom suffers from mental illness. And it's it's a daunting, frustrating situation because there's just not a lot of services available for people in her condition. And so the homelessness issue and mental illness in particular is is an issue that's personal to me and a great concern to me. Yeah, I have no doubt that you'll be able to make a huge positive impact if you're mayor, you know, to really help that and many, many other situations that we deal with. Keith, you know, when my book first came out, I talked with you about it. And I want to know what principles in my book do stood out for you the most. There are a lot, but I'd say two of them stood out to me because they're their values or philosophies that I subscribe to each and every day. Number one is the importance of teamwork that no individual can do it alone. Any successful person or organization has a team or, you know, everyone on board, everyone paddling in the same direction, so to speak. And I'm a firm believer that without teamwork, you don't have ultimate success. The other value that I like that you emphasize in your book is the importance of communication. It's really important to communicate both ways and to take the feedback you get to heart and sincerely try to address people's concerns. Once people buy in that you care and that you listen and want to help them, it's a lot easier to resolve any problems that you may have. So I would say those two stand out to me among the many other principles that you've raised in your book. Well, I definitely know that you go beyond the lines and, you know, a huge part of the book too is character. And, you know, you are very authentic, you're very genuine, you're very caring. I mean, you care about other people's well-being. And I think that's such a huge part of why you go beyond the lines and that's why you've been successful. And I have no doubt you're going to continue to be more successful. But what are your thoughts about character and really surrounding your people or surrounding yourself with great people? Well, you have to practice what you preach. And so, and I also believe that if you live by certain values, you tend to attract people with like-minded values. And that's something that I thought served me well when I ran high school sports, when I was at Island Holdings, or, you know, during my current campaign and hopefully in my administration that you need to surround yourself with like-minded people. I also think it's important along those lines, so to speak, to build relationships, that relationships matter, especially in a fairly close-knit community like Hawaii, that you need to branch out your network as much as possible and that you need to treat people with kindness, with integrity, with respect. And if you do that, they will do likewise in return and you can accomplish far more if you treat people with respect and civility. And by the way, that's something that I think is sorely lacking in politics today. I mean, you know, people are not respecting each other or people are not acting with integrity or character. And it's really affecting the political process and ultimately it's hurting everyday citizens. We're not getting the job done for them in politics and we need to soon. Keith, you know, Roosevelt High School Football Stadium has a big beautiful scoreboard now and I'm gonna share something with people that a lot of people don't know about, but you are the one that donated that scoreboard to Roosevelt. What compelled you to do that? Well, I have to do it with my wife as well because she was a partner in that donation, but what compelled me to do that was because I went to a lot of football games at Roosevelt and I was concerned about the condition of the field and the scoreboard. They were sorely in need of replacement. And so what I did was I worked in concert with Roosevelt High School and their principal at the time, Dennis Okama. We collaborated and created a consortium, if you will, of groups and people to raise enough money so that Roosevelt would have a new synthetic surface field that would be used by football, soccer, marching band and the track and field teams, a new synthetic track and a new auditorium. We got the NFL, the Roosevelt alumni, the legislature and many many others to partner to create a great new athletic facility and auditorium for Roosevelt. And my wife and I felt it was important to do our part and put skin in the game, so to speak. I always believe that if you're gonna ask others to give money or support a cause, you need to do so yourself. And so we were fortunate enough to be able to get a new scoreboard for Roosevelt that's been put to well to great use by all of their teams and the community at large. And we're just happy to do our part to make the new project a reality. That's so awesome of you and Bonnie. I mean that's talking the talk and walking the walk, Keith. And you're also a huge, you helped out to save our sports program. Can you tell me more about that? Yes, that was a fundraising grassroots program that I spearheaded about 10 years ago. If you recall, the state was undergoing a lot of budget cuts throughout government and public education wasn't spared the cuts either. And there was talk or a plan to eliminate JV sports in our public public high schools across the state. And I thought that would have been terrible. It would have been tragic that our younger high school students would no longer have an opportunity to participate in sports. There are so many values and reasons to continue sports or to have sports as you know Rusty as a former high school coach. And I just couldn't let that happen. So like the Roosevelt Project, the Save Our Sports Project was a campaign that enlisted the support of basically the entire state. And we were able to raise money in about three months to the tune of about $1.8 million. And we were able to save JV sports for two years until the state's economy improved. And what also helped was that our legislators and other political leaders realized how important junior varsity sports was to our communities that they made it a point to make sure that JV sports would be funded uh from that year forward no matter what because they knew that they couldn't explore the possibility of cutting it anymore that the public just wouldn't have it. That's just another example right there about you getting things done Keith. And yeah you know we we know that every level of every sports you know development you know from beginners to intermediate to JV to varsity. I mean it all plays a critical role and Keith I know that you care deeply about all students from all islands and because of that I know that you started doing a program where you were housing neighbor island student athletes on Oahu so that they could train with the Oahu athletes but can you tell me more about that? Well my wife and I we saw a need that a lot of our outstanding neighbor island athletes needed an opportunity to better themselves especially from the smaller islands like Molokai and Lanai. It's hard for top-notch athletes on that on those islands to get the competition and training necessary to be the best athlete that they can be. So my wife and I started taking in kids you know younger athletes high school age and let them live with us during the summers and during Christmas and spring break so that they could train on Oahu. We thought that that was another way we could give back to the community and pay it forward so to speak and it was a really gratifying experience. We we got to know the student athletes and their families well. They were a great asset to our family our son is an only child so he had a another sibling if you will joining us in our family and again it's just something that is kind of second nature to us if we see a need we we address it and it was very fulfilling it not only did we help them they helped us because we learned to appreciate what we had and we learned about how life was different for them on on their islands and we couldn't be prouder of them. One of the athletes is Kale Adolfo and she was from Molokai and eventually she was able to earn a scholarship to the University of Hawaii where she played both basketball and volleyball and did well and now she's back on her own Highland. She's a P.E. teacher at Molokai Intermediate School and she's also the varsity girls basketball head coach for the Molokai Lady Farmers team and we couldn't be prouder of her and and and all of her success. Well Keith you know I love hearing all these insights I wish we had an opportunity to do a two hour show with you. I love your insights and I want to thank you for joining me on the show today and for everything that you have done for everyone in Hawaii and hopefully what you can do for as mayor in Hawaii in the future. Well I thank you for your support Rusty and for the opportunity to be on your show and I look forward to the to the current campaign and and you know we're optimistic about our chances of winning because it's about community it's about teamwork it's about us pulling together to make our our lives better especially for those in need like our working class. I'm concerned about our future and our younger generations but yet I'm optimistic that if we give them the support we need we can keep Oahu to be the great city that it is to live, work, play and raise a family and I'm just optimistic about our future again if we pull together and work as a team. Awesome thank you for your time today Keith. Thank you Rusty, thanks for having me and thank you for watching Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii and a special thank you to my clothing sponsor Ilani Incorporated. For more information please visit RustyKomori.com and my book is available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I hope that Keith and I will inspire you to create your own superior culture of excellence and to find your greatness and help others find theirs. Aloha.