 Mark Schlaufe, the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Law Across the Sea program. Today we're going to stay in Hawaii and talk with Keith Amemia. Keith is a candidate for Lieutenant Governor of the state of Hawaii. I wanted to ask Keith questions that were outside the box, outside the normal questions he gets during a campaign. Because I think outside the box questions allow a candidate to share his wisdom, his manal, with voters, and allows voters to get a deeper insight into the candidate's personal experiences and views. Welcome, Keith. How are you? Thank you very much for being my guest today and being willing to take my out-of-the-box question. Aloha, Mark. Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure to be on your program. All right, well, let's get started. As you know, I have been a lawyer. That's what I did for, well, going on 50 years. You were a lawyer for a few years and I got a couple questions out of the box for you. Why did you become a lawyer and why did you give up your career as a lawyer? I became a lawyer because my family had a history of many of my relatives, my father, and others going to law school. So it was something I naturally thought about doing after college. I also thought that being an attorney would open doors to other job opportunities, even outside the practice of law, like it or not. Law permeates every aspect of our society, including in terms of jobs out there, and that it's always handy to have a legal background, legal experience in no matter what job you choose to pursue. I was a commercial or business litigation attorney for seven years and I don't regret it one bit. It was invaluable in terms of the experience I learned, advocacy skills, learning the value of hard work, long hours, pressure under tough situations, appearing before a judge, representing your clients, writing skills, and just overall long-term strategic planning skills. So it was a great background for me in terms of the other things I pursued afterwards. I left the practice of law because although I enjoyed litigation, I wasn't sure I wanted to do that the rest of my life. And somewhat out of the blue, the opportunity to become the executive director of the Hawaii High School Athletic Association was presented to me and I decided to take a leap of faith and totally switch professions and and take that opportunity at the age of 32 and the rest they say is history. Okay, so and being a lawyer may have helped you get that job, but let me ask you a question. Now I mean you have a son in college and what would you tell him about becoming a lawyer if he was thinking of that? I mean would you tell your son the legal profession is something that would be good for him or what would you say to your son? I would tell him if that's something you're interested then go for it but be prepared for three more years of school, three more years of difficult schooling. Law school was tough, was rigorous and full of pressure but if that's really what you want to pursue then do it. But remember that you don't have to be an attorney your whole career, that it can open a lot of doors like it has for me. So if that's something you're truly interested then please pursue it and you know his his mom and dad will support him all the way. So yeah, so you're basically telling your son to follow his bliss, do what he wants to do and you're not telling him that you have to do this because your dad did it or your family has a history of lawyers although he probably knows that. Yeah, he probably knows that but yeah certainly I don't want him to do it just because his father and other relatives are attorneys. He has to have that passion, that drive and that applies for anything you pursue in life. Without the passion and purpose you're just not going to enjoy it and you won't be successful. Okay, now you mentioned being executive director of Hawaii High School Athletic Association. You were that for quite a few years but I wanted to kind of ask you questions. I mean that's sports. So how did I mean what role has sports played in your life besides that? I mean were you involved in sports before that or and where does sports go from from there in your life or what do you see sports as? So I always played sports from a very young age we went from football to basketball to baseball and I just did it throughout my youth. I always enjoyed sports. I wasn't the best at it believe it or not everyone assumes because I ran the High School Athletic Association. There must have been some you know high school and college superstar actually far from it but I tell people that I'm a perfect example of the value of high school sports. You don't have to be a star to learn and grow from it. You know I learned a lot of life skills playing sports that that have benefited me in my adult life. I'm a firm believer that sports teaches you foundational skillsets like the value of hard work, the value of teamwork, of accountability, of discipline, of even sportsmanship that in life you're going to win some you're going to lose some and you're going to have to learn how to handle it especially if you lose you have to learn that things aren't always going to go your way and you need to pick up yourself dust yourself off and keep forging ahead and feeling sorry for yourself is is not productive and no one cares and you need to do it all on your own and and learn to persevere. So sports to me is very valuable and it was underscored when I ran high school sports in many situations especially from from middle income or or lower income families I mean sports was a way out sports was a way to to go beyond high school it was an opportunity to attend college to have college paid for you and so you know I'm a I was always a big believer in the value of sports I became an even bigger believer in the value of sports when I ran the HHSA for 12 years. I saw the profound impact that playing sports had on tens of thousands of young men and women who played high school sports here in Hawaii. It also unifies the community that's another thing sports goes beyond just the individual athletes but I've seen the power of sports especially when our public high schools win state championships whether it's Kono Waena in girls basketball or Kahuku in football or many years back Molokai in baseball. When those schools win sports it rallies the community it excites them and it just brings a huge source of pride throughout the community that that propels the student athletes and the entire community to strive and and try to get ahead in life. Well you mentioned girls sports what needs to be done for girls sports that's come up a lot in the news also and including recently about locker rooms that type of stuff. What what needs to be done for girls sports in Hawaii now? Well I mean clearly more money needs to be allocated to girls facilities I mean we've seen and heard of the lawsuit filed by Campbell High School parents about the disparity in facilities for boys versus girls but you know really it's incumbent on the legislature it's been frankly a failure of the legislature to properly fund girls sports for the past 10 20 years these problems have existed for a long time people like to blame the Department of Education but people have to understand the Department of Education gets its funding from the legislature they don't have their own source of funding they are at the mercy of the legislature and so it's great that a lot of our high schools are getting increased funding for their for their female student athletes but it's way overdue and I don't know why it didn't happen earlier now during my tenure certainly I can't take all the credit but I'm proud of the fact I was part of a a renaissance if you will of girls sports during my tenure we added many sports for girls that didn't exist before starting with girls wrestling we were the we were the first state in the country to to create a sport for girls uh interesting previously girls had to compete with the boys in wrestling and obviously there's a lot of challenges and difficulties and inequities in requiring girls to compete against boys I'm proud of the fact that um we were the first we we grew quickly uh other states have adopted girls wrestling it eventually became an Olympic sport and Clarissa Chun from Roosevelt High School was a state champion and then became a medalist in the Olympics in women's wrestling we also added during my tenure golf as a girls sport girls water pole girls judo girls canoe paddling the listings goes on we also added a division two component so that our smaller schools can participate and and by the end of my tenure we more than doubled the amount of girls state tournaments and more than doubled the amount of girls participating uh in high school sports in Hawaii and I'm very proud of that I didn't know that I wasn't aware of that and and that's good because it it brings all the families together too as you mentioned earlier and it brings the kids some pride and some ability to to compete now you you know you you've held several jobs and and there's been some recent talk about elected officials holding second jobs what's your position on that well uh each case is different and I frankly haven't thought about it too deeply but I do know that um uh there was a law recently passed I believe that that prohibits the governor and mayors from from holding a second job I support that I don't know how a mayor or governor would have time to have a second job uh and I wouldn't want them to have a second job I mean being a governor or mayor is is two three four maybe even five jobs at once I mean it's almost an impossible task in and of itself so I support that frankly I don't know if you even need to have a law for that but now that we do that's great it's codified it's it's made clear that you can't hold a second job but I don't know why any of them would even think about having a second job and then it also in a lot of cases eliminates the risk of a conflict of interest uh in those situations you know where the employer that you're working a side job with has has business before the state or a county it just eliminates that that conflict of interest situation hey well yeah all right uh I I understand that and uh we'll we'll have to see where that goes with respect to other elected officials also now you were in a race very close race for mayor of Honolulu uh what did you learn from your mayoral campaign well I tell you what running a second time uh I want I don't want to use the word easy because it's not easy running for a statewide office but you learn a lot this uh the second time around you learn a lot from what you did or didn't do the first time around but the main takeaway I have from running for mayor excuse me two years ago is that people want change it's no accident I don't think that the top two uh place finishers in the mayoral primary election two years ago were first time candidates were newcomers people um are dissatisfied with career politicians they don't have faith in them they don't have confidence in them and they want people who will bring legitimate change and like in the mayoral campaign and like in my current lieutenant governor campaign that's one of the things I'll bring to the lieutenant governor position I'll bring change I'll bring new ideas innovation I'll bring a community mindedness that doesn't exist with our current elected officials who are too good holding to lobbyists and other special interest groups I take what I learned when I ran high school sports across the state I've been to all 98 high schools across the state I've been in every community I work directly with them even after I ran high school sports I stayed in touch with all the communities across our state I know the leaders I know their issues and I know I can work together with them to solve the many problems and challenges facing them today okay well let's you know let's talk about a broader question that's in the news a lot and involves some of the things you just talked about how would you deal with guns especially automatic rifles like AR-15s in the United States I mean let's assume you you know you had some say in that what how would you deal well fortunately we live in a state where we have some of the strictest gun control laws around but having said that you know we we must remain vigilant we must make sure that our laws continue to safeguard the general public as a whole in terms of assault rifles or high capacity magazines I see no place for them in a civilized orderly orderly society I think they should be and need to be banned on a on a national level but here locally again we need to keep reviewing our laws we need to keep making sure that they're effective basically to get guns out of the hands of people who have no business holding or possessing a firearm one of the things that I keep pushing on a broader level but including in terms of gun safety and gun control is more mental health treatment services in Hawaii we're lacking that it's clearly an issue affecting many of those who are homeless across our state and so I I think that not only will it address homelessness it'll also minimize and hopefully avoid the mass casualties that we've been seeing on the mainland obviously many of these people if not all of them are in need of mental health services and and weren't getting them and so I'm a huge advocate of increasing mental health services statewide okay let me ask you a few quick questions is there anything Hawaii can do to help Ukraine or Ukrainians Hawaii the state I'm sure there is but you know that's to me more of a federal issue better handled on a national level in DC obviously we can do smaller scale things like providing aid to the to the to the people of Ukraine whether it's you know community donations or clothing or money or the like we can also do our part if there are any Ukrainians if we're allowed to to take them in and allow them a much safer place than in their home country at least for now there's there's a lot of different ways but from a larger standpoint a more broad based standpoint I defer to the our federal government as to how they best help the people of Ukraine okay well I we're outside the box a little bit that's where are you on abortion rights I'm pro-choice you know and and I'm concerned about what seems to be an imminent decision by the US Supreme Court undermining the current role versus Wade law that that's in our books that's another issue just like gun control that we need to remain vigilant and and you know not be complacent to ensure that that pro-choice is still the stance that we take across the state now having said that there's still more that we can do irrespective of any change in the Roe v Wade decision like providing more abortion services and rights we still lack them in rural areas we still lack them on a sufficient basis on our neighbor islands so we still have more to do despite the fact that we're a strong pro-choice state in our country okay now here's a question that I get I hear all the time the cost of gas how can we what can we do about the cost of gas lowering it in Hawaii well you know the longer we're beholden to to fossil fossil fuels you know there's there's not that much we can do more and frankly I mean I switched to electric you know I still pay more probably to to charge my car because electricity rates are surely going to go up because of the higher costs of gas but we need to move quicker and more expeditiously towards 100 renewable energy I mean we need to get off our dependence on fossil fuels in Hawaii and we have no excuse frankly to not be 100 renewable energy we're one of the best places in the world in terms of having every source of renewable energy at our disposal whether it's solar wind hydro geothermal and biomass and let's just move much quicker so that we are no longer dependent on the whims of outside forces in terms of the impact on fuel prices here okay I want to ask you you know we we live in Hawaii Hawaii has its own history its own stories is there a favorite story that you have about Hawaii and its history that you could share with us well there's a lot of favorite stories I have but the one most recently that that comes to mind is the life story of Duke Kahanamoku I mean he was a fascinating human being he was a tremendous ambassador for our state he brought a lot of pride and glory through his Olympic accomplishments but he also was a great waterman here at home he was a great lifeguard who saved many lives and he was also you know someone who embodied the aloha spirit which we're sometimes lacking or we need much more of in society today and then I would also dovetail that with a more our modern version of Duke Kahanamoku and that's Karissa Moore Karissa Moore is another ambassador that embodies everything that is right and great about the state of Hawaii and all of us she's accomplished she's obviously she's the current world surfing champion she was the winner of the inaugural surfing competition in in the summer Olympics in Tokyo last year and so she's another great role model that we should all model ourselves after. You know that's interesting because they kind of fit your sports background too and I can see in you have a surfboard behind you I think too is that your surfboard? I wish it was it's actually Karissa Moore's surfboard she was nice enough to to gift me one of her surfboards and so I proudly display it as a memento from someone I I deeply admire and so yeah it's a Karissa surfboard I own a surfboard it's much bigger because I'm not good at surfing so I need something that's basically a mini boat so I can actually stand on it without falling too often but you know I maybe after the campaign I'll get to surf more I like you but it's been quite busy lately. Yeah I can imagine okay now you know what what does the word ponno mean to you? What do you have a you have a feeling about that the Hawaiian word ponno? Well I'll defer to my native Hawaiian friends as to the exact precise meaning of ponno but you know my understanding about ponno is is is about doing what is right you know and doing the right thing and and I would expand that to you know being mindful of others you know and being or doing things that are for the greater good and just not about yourself you know that's the way I was taught that's the way I try to live my life and that's what I try to impart on my son is is is being right or doing the right thing at all times and it's not always about me it's about us it's about everyone and and to me that's what makes Hawaii special that's what I think in large part is the reason you're living here and raising a family here and raise the family here and that's why my wife and I are here and raising our son. Okay all right I like I like what you just said now we're you're talking about advice to young people and we're facing a lot of tragedies and disappointments nowadays and what what more would you advise a young person about how to deal with these things with these tragedies and disappointments today how what's your advice? Well that life has its ups and downs but we just can't give up it's also important that that younger people in particular participate in in our community participate in in our our democracy and and that's as simple as registering to vote and voting you know there's a lot of people out there and I'm not just saying younger people but people adults as a whole who have a lot of suggestions and a lot of complaints are unhappy with the direction our state is headed but the most important thing you need to do is to vote and get get people you feel best represents you and your communities into office voting turnout has improved in Hawaii but it's a long ways from where we need it to be I mean we need to have everybody participate in voting and and and just get involved and don't throw up your hands and give up I know it's easy to be disillusioned to think that your voice doesn't matter but collectively it really does and that's you know one bit of advice I'd give to younger people is get involved and and and speak up uh and and make yourself heard. Yeah and and it seems like what you're saying about getting involved has a deeper meaning too I mean it it helps people just emotionally and uh with their their mental state I think also to be involved and to and to be talking with people and and that's what you're advocating it's what that's what I hear you say is that right? That's that's correct I mean there's no question when you get involved get out in the communities you you learn so much uh about the issues and challenges facing people and you you you feel compelled to do your part I mean that's a big reason I'm running for office because I've seen in all of our communities across the state over the past 20 some odd years the frustration the concerns the fears that they have about how are they going to make ends meet uh how can they continue on and and and stay and afford to live in Hoy when costs keep going up and up and up with no help from government in sight uh in the long term okay we have about a minute left we've talked about a lot of out of the box stuff do you have any words of wisdom or a favorite quote I love quotes okay uh that inspires you or that you would like to share with us well one quote I like to use and I've heard quite often is to uh much is given much is expected and I've been blessed throughout my life I've had a lot of mentors I've had a lot of people help and guide me along the way and uh I want to do my part to to pay it forward if you will and help the next generation it's important for the viability of any of any high functioning society that that you always prepare for the next generation always try to make you know their life better than than yours was and and I really believe that and I want to do my part to to build a better future for my son and his friends uh and the generations even after him that come okay well yeah and you you feel like you would like to play it forward okay I I and you've received a lot and we live in Hawaii where being just being in Hawaii is a lot to me uh yeah you know I that's how I view it we're fortunate to live in the best place in the world but we're fraying at the edges there's challenges ahead and and we need to take action sooner than later uh and it starts with getting involved in the political process and getting involved in your communities okay well Keith I appreciate you being my guest today uh you know best wishes aloha thanks for having me aloha mark 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 linked in and donate to us at thinktecawaii.com Mahalo