 This is Think Tech Hawai'i, Community Matters here. Hello, Howard Wigg, Code Green, Think Tech Hawai'i, my honorable and soon-to-be-famous guest today is Josh Stanborough, the Chief Resilience Officer for City and County of Honolulu. Welcome to the club, Josh. Thanks. Thanks for having me, Howard. And your title says Resilience Officer, and I can't imagine why that would be the case. Let's see. We've got Puerto Rico, we've got South Florida, we've got Houston, and in something, two areas that just recently didn't make the news was Central America. They had a huge, huge tropical depression there, mudslides, people killed, and I just saw that Vietnam, Vietnam had a great big typhoon. I believe it was 56 people killed, just in the last few days. Yeah. And one that you left off the list is Northern California, and the fires there, actually, I grew up in Northern California and grew up on an apple orchard there. We had 80 acres, and we actually lost our place and our house, along with 300 other homes in our neighborhood to a forest fire back in the 90s, and at the time, you sort of think, well, bad luck, and it got started on accident, and it was kind of bad winds and everything, and now when you look back over that arc of warming summers and bigger fires and bigger fires, we were really, I think, probably one of the early victims of climate change, and this sort of escalating heat, escalating wind speeds. And prolonged drought conditions. Yeah. Create that tinder, and so we're really seeing more extreme weather events, but we're also seeing them happen faster and faster. So resilience is really the name of the game. How do we really structure our infrastructure and our societal systems in the most sort of robust way, because we know it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. We're going to encounter some of these, just like Maria in Puerto Rico, what's our ability to bounce back, and in the parlance of the resilient cities actually bounce forward. So when you have something like that happen, can you take and incorporate and learn from that and build back in a smarter way than you were built before, so that you're actually more resilient after the impact than before? I saw where Tokyo has now built the world's most sophisticated and huge drainage system in anticipation of, I guess, most of downtown Tokyo just getting, I don't know, two, three feet of water. What do you do with it? Well, you drain it with this huge system. Yes, and I mean, those are things that we're going to have to be looking at here where our storm drains were built, obviously, for a certain level of sea level, right? And so what we think of is what we call outfalls now, stormwater outfalls, at some point when those sea levels rise, they actually become infalls. And so what we need to be careful as we move forward and as we plan new communities, as we rebuild infrastructure, are we looking out over the horizon long enough to make sure that that infrastructure for the term of its useful life is actually serving the purpose that, you know, taking stormwater and getting it into the ocean instead of flooding in areas. And these are hard, big problems. There's no real easy solutions for these. Well, look, especially at Houston, it was three, four, five days later, you still saw people in rowboats going down the streets. The water just couldn't go anywhere. Yeah. I mean, in the Netherlands, they actually, I mean, where they have been working under sea level for a very long time, they have a saying and says, you know, you can't win in a war against water. Water is, you know, it goes wherever it wants to go and it stays where it wants to stay. And so, you know, as we move forward, we're really having to think about how do you design things so that you're designing for that longer term goal in mind. In the case of Houston, as you mentioned, you know, the way that they developed in areas that should have been that they knew were flood prone and in other areas that, you know, used to absorb the rain, then that all becomes water that doesn't have a place to go and it's just going to wind up somewhere and sitting at that lowest point. And so, you know, how do we design infrastructure to make sure that we avoid that? That's really what the Hunter Resilience Cities Network is all about. And less people, I'm sure that our, I know our audience is very, very sophisticated, but if there are any doubting Thomases out there, I would remind everybody what happened, what was it three years ago? We had the confluence of rising sea level, extremely warm air, and one cyclone or typhoon coming at us after one after another. One actually hit Ka'u on the big island and fortunately the mountain absorbed it. But we didn't know until the last days and some would go north, some would go south. Upstairs was looking after us, that's for darn sure, but I think that somebody was also saying, knock, knock, knock, consciousness, this is going to happen to you. Yeah, that was 2015 and 2015, it was an El Nino year and when you put together, we have a slide that we use in some of our presentations that shows all the different hurricanes in that year and there's this tiny little blue clear space where the Hawaiian Islands sit, the one place that didn't get hit. And so it's really interesting, working with the other 100 resilient cities, in our cohort is Miami and New Orleans and other Gulf Coast states, cities. And what they say is, in some ways it's tough in Hawaii because a near-miss in Hawaii by a hurricane is a complete mess, right? I mean it just goes over the ocean, nobody feels it, nobody's the worst of the way, a near-miss to New Orleans, it's hitting Alabama, it's hitting their cousins in Houston and so they know every year they're being reminded about how intense these are, how strong these are, how devastating they can be and they can see the example of hitting, it may not hit them but it's hitting somebody they can see and know and touch and feel. When we get a near-miss, there's no hit. We get some heavy rain and that's about it. Right, and so our ability to remain vigilant in the face of those sort of capers over time because I think we lose some muscle memory about really how devastating and unique it was and how bad it could be. Humans respond to crises, that's about it. I speak from my own field but you mentioned a hundred cities, what's all this about a hundred cities here? It's really interesting, so the Rockefeller Foundation when they turned a hundred years old five years ago, for their hundredth anniversary they launched this entirely new program called the 100 Resilient Cities and so what they, the president at the time, Ms. Rodin, she wrote a book called The Resilience Dividend and what she posited was as cities increasingly have to face these challenges of the 21st century, especially climate change and the increasing impacts of climate change but also modernization, technological modernization, globalization, economic globalization, if there's ways for the cities to actually do sort of double and triple purpose with their projects, not just addressing one thing but actually addressing several societal benefits with one project, you can realize some savings, fiscal savings and also build your resiliency at the same time and so that's the whole genesis of this 100 Resilient Cities Network. The Rockefeller Foundation set aside funds and they selected 100 cities from around the globe out of 1200 cities that applied and so we're really proud that Honolulu made the grade and was one of those 100 cities and they're investing in our office at the city and county of Honolulu and the Office of Climate Change, Sustainability and Resiliency, they're providing technical assistance and they're really linking us up with the best and brightest ideas from around the globe, from cities that are on that front edge dealing with some of these issues, so for instance Miami, really they're dealing with more sea level rise than we are right now because of the ways that there's actually different levels of sea level rise in different parts of the ocean which is really interesting and unique but they're raising their roadbeds by a foot and a half to two feet already and it's costing big bucks and so some of the learning that they're doing on the front end through the network can help us as we decide how do we respond, how do we react and what's the most efficient, least expensive and most durable ways to do that? You know when you mentioned raising the roadbeds what happened back then and what happens almost every year now is on the windward shore where the road goes the highway goes right along the ocean have to close the the Makai lane and build it back up again and then another storm boom boom boom collapse close the lane again build it back up again so yeah so I mean this is the kind of thing we look around on an island and we see this stuff happening right it's no mystery to us that things are different things are changing I think that's part of the reason why the office of climate change sustainability and resiliency was established by voters last November with you know a nearly 20 point margin and so people you know in Hawaii I think live close to the land they have a sense of you know they have memories of what they went to do to go do whether it's on the ocean or whether it's roads they traversed and the changes and the differences that they're seeing in terms of beach erosion less trade wind days you know we get less trade wind days since the the early 70s they've been going down which is a function of climate change so people know that something's different and I think they voted you know knowing hey we this is a really important issue we've got to address it and you know thanks to mayor Caldwell and you know the leadership of the charter commission to put it in front of voters and then thanks to the mayor and the city council for really doubling down and putting some funds into the office so that we could get a quick start this year immediately following the the vote from the public yeah another area that comes to mind is Mapuna Puna it's notorious for flooding but as I remember correctly the last time it flooded it was more of a mega flood rather than a mini flood yeah so Mapuna Puna is a really interesting area and that's that place where it floods you know historically it was fish ponds and what happened is it had been filled you know during the time where people were reclaiming land and pushing out areas all along the Honolulu waterfront and you're getting settling now from those areas that were filled and you know probably not compacted you know as much as they could have been at the time so you've got rising seas settling land in an area that used to be you know water and it's it's tough to make the physics work in some of these areas and it's going to take some some real you know engineering feats or sort of a repositioning of where where it where do we build where are the right places to build where are the right places to you know allow there's going to be a lot of wetlands reemerging as we as the water table itself rises as sea level rises and the estimates on that you know sort of vary by the scientific study that comes out we've got a great team up at the University of Hawaii Dr. Chip Fletcher and others who follow this religiously and they're keep putting out new statistics that can help provide guidance to us to do better and smarter development. Dr. Fletcher is he's the early early early adopter he's been giving those images of Waikiki for many many years now speaking of which when the first Chinese came here as immigrants that was 1860s I believe they set up rice paddies in what's now Waikiki that tells you something about the elevation of both sea level and the degree of wetness around there rice loves wet yeah so I mean you know that that was wetlands there I mean you think about even in Florida you know almost all of the areas that have been developed there were dredged and filled and and wetlands and so you know there was this assumption at a time previous and it wasn't a wrong assumption I mean at the time you figured you know if you know nothing's going to change so we can develop these patterns and everything's going to be stable and now what we're seeing is you know with the advent of sort of the what the the hollow scene now where we're you know this is the Anthropocene I should say where you know it's humans are changing the very climate that we're in it has ramifications and so all that heat that's being trapped within that blanket that's being knitted every day as we start our cars and we turn on our lights you know there's a thread added to that blanket every day and it keeps a little heat in and what that heat is is energy and so that energy has to express itself and it's expressing itself in these storms that are more violent more rain um and and and just more intense yep and on that very very cheery note we need to take a little break here Howard Wig code green think tech Hawaii Mr. Josh Standboro stand bro back in a minute this is think tech Hawaii raising public awareness my friend mother what the guys you have she's on all the better to see you with my dear what are you doing okay cool research says reading from birth accelerates the baby's brain development and you're doing that now oh yeah this is the starting line push this is over you're dead read aloud 15 minutes every child every parent every day Ted Rawson here folks you're a host on where the drone leads our weekly show at noon on Thursdays here on think tech but we talk about drones anything you to do about drones drones remotely piloted aircraft unmanned air christmas whatever you want to call them emerging into Hawaii's economy educational framework and our public life we talk about things associated with the use the misuse uh technology engineering legislation with the local experts as well as people from across the country please join us noon on Thursdays and catch the latest on what's taking place in the world of drones that might affect you welcome back Howard Wig code green think tech Hawaii Mr. Josh Standboro chief resilience officer for the city and county of Honolulu and we're not talking about a very cheerful subject but we all go to the doctor's office once or twice a year for our checkup we take our cars in to get all checked up and I think what you're saying Josh is that the city and county of Honolulu had gosh darned well also get a checkup in terms of rising sea levels and what's coming down the pike here yeah well the whole world needs a checkup but I think we're actually in some ways we're ahead of the game in terms of establishing an office that's focused on climate change and really trying to do the best that we can to to pivot and change and honestly I mean while the the news around the climate is it's not happy news the solutions around it are really happy I mean if we're able to pivot and you know reduce our emissions and increase our quality of life and increase our local food supplies these are all things that cut our climate emissions and make for a better planet but they also make for better healthier kids and and people so I mean I think you know we can look at this two ways we can either look at is wow we have to really make some sacrifices because we're in this pickle or we can look at it as there's multiple benefits to us doing the right thing around climate and it really brings us back to you know honestly a society that you know existed here not that long ago where you had a lot of local food you had people who were pretty resilient you had a lot of you know reliance on on on local sources of power it blows my mind that Hokulea just sailed around the world completely on the Malamahonua voyage on renewable energy and we're still going down to the corner store and not using renewable energy so I mean I think you know these lessons have been sitting around for a long long time and it's just a matter of us you know picking ourselves up and going ahead and tackling it yeah just a little historic side note before or when Captain Cook in the early white merchant marine came in they reported different villages here there and everywhere as they were sailing around the islands and historians estimate that there may have been as many as a half million Hawaiians living on these islands before Captain Cook and another report is that they were really big and really strong and really robust the everd sailor on Captain Cook's ship was maybe five six and his teeth were falling out and he was kind of sickly white and here you got these big robust Hawaiians the point being that they were eating really really well and they couldn't go down to the supermarket and buy food and they had to get it off the land or out of the sea yeah I mean I don't know the numbers but I know that when you look at the lidar images sort of the radar images of the Kohala mountains all the way down what we see now is grassy slopes with cattle grazing on them underneath all of those mountains for miles and miles and miles stretch old rock terraces so I mean there was thousands and thousands of people putting in tons of work to feed an entire society and it's that kind of ingenuity that we need to sort of and hard work honestly so the resilience is really in a better word for resilience maybe it's just grit right so it's that ability to just sort of find a way adapt be flexible and really just grit it out when you have to and work hard to get past these barriers that we that we were encountering so you know sort of that pick yourself up dust yourself off kind of mentality that the strongest cities have and then and honestly it's the strongest societies that have been around that are able to find a where there's a will there's a way that's been the case here in Hawaii before and and I think that that's the case now I think you can tackle this and I'm reminded that Lewis Mumford the famous urban planner and philosopher visited Hawaii in 1938 and he looked at the half filled canal the alawai canal and he said why not extend it all the way to what is now come on a beach as a flood plain drainage area he said in 1938 any any just concretely any thoughts of extending the canal all the way around to help drainage yeah yeah so you know we've inherited a lot of legacy in terms of the built environment you know there is big risks around flooding in that alawai area and you know almost 10% of our GDP is is emerges from that one area of Waikiki so those are areas where we'll need to look at how do we reduce the flood vulnerability for not only that area but for all areas as we get more intense rains under you know as climate changes we actually get longer periods of drought more intense rains when when they do come but we're really interested in knowing what people out there think about our vulnerability and our resilience and so you know as we build our resilient strategy with the help of the 100 Resilient Cities Network and Rockefeller Foundation over this next year we're going out to ask people in the community we're going to every single neighborhood board on the island we're going out I did a talk at Rotary yesterday and in Waikiki and we're going out to as many populations as we can just normal lay folk and different businesses to say what do you what's your perception what do you think we're vulnerable around what do you think our strengths are and where should we focus our attention on on making ourselves more resilient to these types of things and so we've got a survey that we that we're putting out to people and we're hoping that you know many hundreds of folks and thousands of folks actually weigh in with their opinion because it's really important to inform it's a two-way street between you know government and the population and we want to make sure that we're focusing on the issues that people think are really yeah absolutely I live I'm blessed to live in the back of Manoa on one of the slopes and of course we get some really heavy rains there and knock on wood we have zero water recumulation problems why because the engineers who put that area together did a really good job of drainage but we're the blessed ones there's certainly maybe even in the oh you know it's just speaking of Manoa and many years ago the canal got all clogged up with debris and across Woodlawn Road it got all clogged and the water started coming over I saw an SUV up in a tree right there went right down to Hamilton library in UH and a friend their cousin of mine works there and she said there were people in the basement of Hamilton with of course no expectation of this and the water came gushing in they had to break windows and crawl out the windows yeah yeah I mean this is you know part of you know the these bigger storm events means that some of the infrastructure we've developed actually is incapable of handling it or is undersized and so really that local knowledge is what we're interested in is yeah where are the spots that you see vulnerabilities now before they become huge issues like they did in the in the Manoa flood they had hundreds of millions of dollars of damage and you know and in addition I mean I think it's really interesting to think about your role in that cycle right I mean you're recognizing the place where I live the water sheds off but where does it go and I think we need to be thinking as all citizens I mean we're really all in an island we're all in this together and so if we figure out where it is you know when I do something when I pave my driveway or when I you know take my gutter and put it into the storm drain where does that wind up and what's my impact on folks down more Makai from me is there ways that I can actually play a role in mitigating some of that because we also we're sort of all neighbors to each other on an island you you know let me put in my own personal two cents as you I live in woodland and you wouldn't be surprised to know that I have planted the area as much as I can and 100 percent of the runoff from my roof which is sometimes is a minor flood in itself all goes down to the water table I've designed it like that so that the water trickling down my driveway is just that I'm just a trickle in the heaviest rains but my neighbor has done exactly the opposite pave pave pave everything there is a gusher of water coming down and kind of overwhelming the storm drain so if people were encouraged monetarily incentivize to get as much green space as they could and put what are those paver blocks instead of concrete so that the water absorbs in between them yeah that's just one potential area you multiply that by a hundred thousand times and you've got a pretty good observancy yeah no I mean I think and that's exactly it so those are the kind of solutions that we hope people will pipe up with and we can see you know really where where do people really believe our problems lie and what are the solutions to them so that we can make sure that that our office focuses and and you know we can take back to mayor Caldwell and everybody else who's supporting the mission of this office you know what are the things that we can work on together that will answer the calls of the of the public around where we're vulnerable and what are the solutions to that and that's a great one you know taking charge of you know you're the water that lands on your place and making sure that you're doing you know what's essentially a rain garden yeah that's fantastic yeah and the people know about their local spots and so you're getting input from their local spots I give one report but somebody living down in the center of the valley is going to give an entirely different report right and somebody living in Makiki is going to give it a different report well and different policies you know work in different areas right you get a lot of rain in Manoa so having a rain garden there makes a lot of sense somebody in Eva you know it may not be worth it to have a sort of a monetary incentive or some sort of program because it may be just not be enough rain to make it worth 20 inches a year right so I mean I think that's why in the the challenge here for us is really to be unique and innovative in our approach to these things and really tailor it to the situation and that's why we want to hear people's different lenses and views so on our website at the office bring up that website right now and we can discuss it yeah so we've got an office a website for the office of sustainability our climate change sustainability resiliency it's called resilientawahu.org it's on the screen fantastic so anyone in the public is welcome to go to the website click on the box it says take our survey it takes about 10 minutes it's short and what we're hoping to do is get as many voices as possible to inform our work and really set us in the right direction it'll set the agenda for our resilient strategy and hopefully the strategy for decades to come in the city about making ourselves a strong and sort of resilient against these challenges that you and I have been talking about this this last hour and again we we know about the place where we live we're pretty garshadarn expert in that so by getting that little localized genius and then multiplying it hopefully by a hundred thousand times and then having some kind of kind of computer algorithm to sort it all out no that's exactly what we do have in fact and so the the Rockefeller folks have done this in you know a hundred cities now and so what we do is we feed all that input into a tool that they have and it sort of shows you here's what people are concerned about and their perceptions how well we're doing how not well we're doing here's the solutions that they think are most innovative for their localized area and then maps all that out to say what are the ones that are the lowest hanging fruit that are going to have the most benefit for the most people and you know where should we tackle first so it's really a prioritization tool but it also lets us be really accountable to the public and say hey you know here's your chance to really put in your monotony and help us shape what you know real real live democracy what a what a concept here and now i'm so glad we can end on a cherry note that should give us all great hope we must leave but thank you so much josh stanbro resilient chief resilience officer for city and county of honolulu think take away howard wig see you next time