 Welcome to Restaurants Hawaii on Think Tech Hawaii. Cheryl Matsuoka here, Hawaii Restaurant Association Executive Director. I would like to introduce Hawaii Restaurant Associations Executive Assistant, Siobhan Garcia. Hi, Siobhan. Hi, Cheryl. Thank you. Yes, I wanted to introduce our guest today, Ashley Leel. She is the General Manager of Fleetwoods on Front Street in Lahinatown. Welcome, Ashley. Welcome. Today, we answer all the questions around Maui's Mayor, Victorino, around the safer outside program. And there are some lingering questions and Hawaii Restaurant Associations always a resource for our visiting guests who are arriving to our beautiful island of Maui and our local community and our restaurateurs. As our visitors arrive, many of them will be visiting from states that don't have masks, mandates, or proof of vaccine mandates, as we do here on Oahu and Maui. So Maui's Mayor, Victorino, introduced safer outside program shortly after the announcement of Oahu's Safe Access program. So effective September 15th under Maui's program, customers over the age of 12 must provide proof of vaccination when visiting an indoor food establishment. So welcome, Ashley. Thank you for joining us today from famous Front Street in Lahinatown, Maui. Thanks for having me. According to Mayor Victorino's safer outside program, we saw that viral video in New York where the hostess, she requested to see patrons vaccination cards and three females physically assaulted her. So Ashley, what have our restaurants on Maui, the host and hostess's experience when asking to see a patron's COVID vaccination card? Well, we're just about to hit a week since this mandate was effective. So, you know, I think at this point, people are expecting it. Our visitors are more used to it. But the first few days were definitely a challenge. I think in general, a lot of our guest services staff, our host and hostessing staff are younger. For us, we have, you know, hostesses that are still in high school. So we actually hired an outside company, a security company to stand with them outside and make sure that they're protected. Not that we were expecting any violence or anything like that. But just to have a little bit more presence at the door. And I think that, you know, it's been, it's been very challenging. And we're lucky that we had a heads up with all of the mandates. We're able to make these preparations. And so far with for us, everyone has been very well behaved and even excited to show their vaccination cards. They're wearing them around their necks in laminates, and they want to show you. They're very proud of them. That's awesome. You know, we've had the same experience here on Oahu. So Ashley is on our Hawaii Restaurant Association Board of Directors. She is a director and our Maui representative. We have three over there on Maui. So it's really great that we get to find out what exactly is going on over there in the beautiful island of Maui. And it's great to hear that people are willing and happy and proud like a badge, you know, to show that they've been vaccinated. So that's really great news. So now what are the requirements for the unvaccinated guests? Because Ashley, we know that there's still a population. When I looked at the amount of vaccinated over on that island in that chart, there's still a large number of people unvaccinated on Maui. So what is the requirements for unvaccinated guests in our Maui restaurants? So over in Maui, our unvaccinated guests need to dine outdoors or they're able to get takeout or if you have drive-thru services, anything like that, but they just cannot be dining indoors. Exactly. And you know, a wahu doesn't have that option. So for us on the island of a wahu, if it's an unvaccinated guest, then they can have the takeout or drive-thru option. So that's great. At least some of the restaurants on Maui, many of the restaurants on Maui do have outdoor seating. So that's a great thing, right? And you do too over on Fleetwoods. Yes. Luckily for us, we have a very large rooftop where everyone, you know, a lot of people want to be anyways. So we're able to accommodate unvaccinated and vaccinated alike up there on a first come, first serve basis. Nice. Nice. So on one of the other adjustments that Mayor Victorino also stated is the gathering size for the groups must be five indoors and 10 people outdoors. So now restaurants are operating at a 50% indoor capacity. So tell me, Ashley, how has this new requirement affected Maui's restaurants revenue? Definitely has. You know, there's a lot of groups that are traveling together right now out here to Maui. And so it's hard for them to understand, you know, when they're traveling together, how come they can't sit together? And, you know, we do our best to call all of our guests when this went into effect and let them know beforehand so that, you know, it's not a surprise when they get here and they can make arrangements about who's going to sit with who and how they want to do this. The 50% capacity I think is challenging as well for a lot of businesses, especially ones that take reservations because you do need to cancel them, those reservations and, you know, trying to build loyalty within your guests, cancelling reservations on someone's beloved vacation is tough. It's really, really tough. We do our best to try to fit them wherever we can within our time constraints and capacity constraints. But yeah, it's taken a lot of preparation for sure. Well, it sounds like you have a really great communications with your patrons and you, you know, call their cell phones and update them on what's happening, especially when we have new emergency mandates that go into effect after they've already made a plan when they're coming to Hawaii, Maui, Oahu for their vacation or their celebration, whatever it may be. So now let's switch over. That's all about the guests. Is there anything else I should know about the guest experiences over on Maui, Ashley, before we move on to employees? Well, I suppose the last mandate that was put in place is that we have to be fully closed by 10pm all restaurants and bars. So that's really eliminated an entire, you know, hour or so of revenue as well as, you know, trying to kind of politely push guests out the door by that particular time and again having to call a lot of reservations and say we can't accommodate them at 9pm any longer. There's just not enough time trying to move them around a little bit. So, you know, luckily we try to do this ahead of time again so that there's no surprises. Nice, Ashley. So on the employee vaccination side, full or part-time employees must show proof of vaccination or provide a negative COVID-19 test within the last seven days. So as a whole, you know, many businesses, especially our food service industry, right, we have lots of open positions right now. I don't know about Fleetwoods, but I do know it's been a challenge in other Maui restaurants to get employees and now on top of that, we're asking them to be fully vaccinated or be willing to go through a weekly COVID test. So I do want to give a shout out if anyone's watching and they are on either, you know, any of the islands, if they are looking for a position in the food service industry and they're either vaccinated or they're willing to go through the weekly negative test, they just have to email me at info at HawaiiRestaurant.org, no resumes needed. Just email me and just say, hey, you know, I heard Ashley, I live near Lahaina, I would like to work in the food service industry, and how do I find out more about what positions she has open over there? Just go ahead and email me and I'll be happy to forward your email over to Ashley. Ashley, are the unvaccinated food service employees willing to take this COVID-19 weekly test according to the mandate? Yes, in a word, yes, I think that it was a big surprise to them and, you know, we only had a week to really get everything ready for these mandates to go into place. And so it was a scramble for some people to not only decide what they want to do, but arrange, you know, a test or vaccination. We partnered with Doctors on Call, so we have a staff of health professionals come over and test our staff once weekly. I wanted to make it very easy for them and to give them a little bit more time to decide, you know, what they want to do about becoming fully vaccinated. That's not a decision I can make for them. And so we want to just keep it easy, keep everyone employed and try not to, you know, try to take a little bit of the stress out of the situation. Nice. Well, at least you're creating an option for them. So that's nice. Nice. So I'm going to turn it over to Siobhan. She has a few questions right now. You can take it away, Siobhan. Thank you. Yes, Ashley, I know you just mentioned that you do have options for your employees for testing. Do you happen to have any options or test kits available for your patrons who come maybe unprepared? We don't have test kits available for our guests. In Maui County, how it differs from Oahu is the guests in Maui County cannot provide a negative test for entrance into indoor dining. It is the full vaccination, meaning two weeks after the second dose to be able to dine indoors. Thank you. I think that really clears it up because I think there's some confusion, you know, which would probably lead me to my next question, which is, you know, do you feel that having different mandates from the different counties makes it a little bit more difficult for your patrons to know what the different rules are? Absolutely. I think that, of course, it makes it a little bit more difficult and more confusing. I think it takes research regardless of where you travel right now to know what's happening, where you're going, and you want to know the mandates. And, you know, when we're calling our guests, letting them know they're saying, well, what else is going on there? How's it going? When we're going to Kauai, do you know what's happening there? And, you know, we're filling them in as much as we possibly can because I think it's harder for them to get this information and understand it while dealing with their own state mandates from home. So they only differ a slight bit, which might make it more confusing because they're not completely different. But so far, our guests have been really flexible when they show up when they're saying, okay, so what do I need here? Yeah. You know, I know in the past, before this mandate, there was some issues with people when they come from different states who don't have a mask mandate, and they weren't happy to find out that there is one here. Do you feel that this new mandate has kind of helped alleviate some of those issues? I do. That was a struggle when some states didn't have the mask mandate, which I think some have been put back into place, which is helpful, such as California. But yeah, for a while, you know, I think people were thinking that Kauai was where they could come to be free of COVID-19, and it, you know, was a magical land where it didn't exist and didn't have rules. But of course, we were one of the strictest states in the nation, as far as mandates have gone over these, you know, this past year and a half. So I think that these new ones are more clear and we're not seeing as much of the defiance about mask wearing, which is great. Yeah, that is. It's probably really difficult for you guys to have to, you know, mandate some of these things. But, you know, what do you tell these patrons who come and are unprepared and now are angry, you know, if they come without the reservation, right? And they just show up and what do you tell them? Well, first we try to diffuse the situation as much as possible. We provide masks at the door for anyone who doesn't need them. And we remind them that these are not our businesses' rules. This is the rules of Maui County. And, you know, we're sorry to have been breaking the news to them, but we won't be the only place they see it in their journey here and on their trip. And, you know, we try to offer alternatives as much as possible. You know, if you don't want to wear the mask, we're happy to bring something to your car to go. You know, something like that. We try to make it as easy as possible, but we're clear that, you know, you won't be able to go inside. Yeah, it's nice that you're able to offer, you know, other things for them other than just the indoor dining, you know, and that's what's really great is that you already have those prepared for them. So with that, I don't have any other questions. I will turn it back over to Cheryl. Thank you, Ashley. So, Ashley, before I start going on about, I just wanted to get a kind of a landscape point of view from you. Is there anything you'd like to share about either the vaccination mandate, the mask mandate for either patrons or employees before we change the topic to more of a broader, you know, what the restaurants and Maui are going through? Sure, I think it's just important to be flexible and patient as much as possible right now. Mandates in general are a hot button issue and everyone has different opinions and some businesses are taking more of a stance on things. And I think we just need to be very patient and understand that, you know, this industry is really going through a lot with this and we're trying to overcome the challenges as best we can. Exactly. And you know, that's one of the topics I was going to bring up is, you know, right now the penalty and fine is $5,000 to the restaurant if they do not follow the mandate or one year in jail or both. And so the message, you know, to our visitors is exactly what you said Ashley, you know, this is a mandate that was put into effect because of our high COVID cases in our state and trying to get us back to lowering our COVID cases, saving lives and trying to get back to normal. And so, you know, this is not something that the restaurants has asked for this is something that has been put out because of the safety for our community. So please, you know, to our visitors to our community to our guests who are visiting our restaurants, you know, my message is to please be patient, please be kind, you know, during I want to say summer Ashley, when it was like June and July, and there were long lines everywhere. And everybody had to stand in line before they could get into a restaurant and, you know, people were angry, right, they're angry and hungry. So by the time they get up front and they've been waiting in line for me I don't know how long the lines were over at Fleetwoods how long were they. They were very long, we had up to three hour waits when we opened our doors, yeah. Ashley, oh my goodness, so by the time somebody waits in line for three hours, just to have a meal, you know, some asking for our community, our guests and our patrons to please, you know, be kind, be patient, you know, the restaurants are doing the best they can. And under the conditions, the mandates and guidelines that we're given. So you tell me now, you know, I'm interested to know how are the other restaurants over there in Maui doing and especially the Lahaina, the Kana Pali, the, you know, Wailia, how are they doing. I think it's been very challenging. You know, I'm on a group with a lot of Maui restaurant owners and management and we're constantly trying to come up with a game plan all together. You know, what, what is everyone thinking what should we do, how are you doing this and offering up our resources, but in general just like across the nation, you know, the hospitality industry is really, really, you know, trying hard to navigate these times and it's incredibly difficult. You know, aside from healthcare workers, it's one of the more difficult industries to be in at the moment. I know that not all restaurants here in Lahaina have the ability to have outdoor seating and that's a huge challenge for them. And, you know, they're trying to take quality over quantity right now and keep their guests and their staff as safe as possible. And I think that's what we're all trying to do. There's a lot of restaurants here who are choosing to only have outdoor dining and they don't want to have to look at vaccination cards and, you know, everyone's just trying to make the best decision possible for their guests and for what they believe and keeping their staff healthy. So it's, it's a mixed bag, it's a challenging time. And I think I hope that it works and we're out of this sooner, sooner than later. It's not me too, Ashley. You know, I think about how many months we've been in this pandemic and it's just if someone had told me last year, I'd still be dealing with this in September of 2021. I probably wouldn't have believed them right. But, you know, many of the restaurants, even on Oahu and in Kauai has gone only to the takeout model, even though they have dining rooms, they decided not to open the dining rooms. There's a couple of reasons. Number one, you know, staffing, right, and then, you know, the servers and so you make do with the staff that you have. And then number two is, as you mentioned, you know, if they don't have the patronage and the guests coming in, so they say let's just stay with the takeout model. I'm glad to hear though, I mean that you folks have banded together because there's always more power in numbers, right? Everybody can help each other with resources and recommendations. So, other than the food service industry, as always, you know, we look at all of our partners, right, which is the hotels, which is entertainment, how are they doing over on Maui? Again, they're facing the same challenges, but on a much larger scale, at least for the hotels. I know I was, you know, speaking to one of the major hotels up in Papua, and they had partnered as well with Doctors On Call to test their whole staff weekly. You know, and that's a lot of people, so it's taking an incredible amount of coordination. And I think we're all still reeling from being short staffed and the hotels are no exception. As far as entertainment goes, that's a separate issue that the rules are less clear, right? So, musicians need to be vaccinated the same way to play inside, but they're, you know, independent contractors. So it brings up a whole, you know, other issues that we're all trying to figure out so that we can provide a great experience for those coming in. Exactly. And it's not only the entertainers, but it's also, you know, in a restaurant, we have many vendors that come in. We have, I'm going to sneeze, sorry. Contractors, Siobhan, can you take this one? Yeah, well, I think to Cheryl's point, you know, there's so many people that help to make that experience, right? What it is. And so there's so many different people who are coming and going from these locations. And, you know, Cheryl, if you want to finish your sentiment there. Yeah, so sorry about that. I got a frog in my throat. So what it is is we also have contractors, suppliers, repair people who come into our restaurants, and they have to also be, right? Ashley, if they're staying for more than 15 minutes, provide their COVID card or a negative vaccination. Correct. And luckily for us, most of their businesses are making their own rules and providing their own mandates just so that they can ensure all of their clients that, you know, everything's being taken care of and everyone's safe on their side. Exactly. So, you know, I always want to let our community know, and especially our patrons, it's restaurants, but it's also all of our vendors, our partners, our suppliers, you know, that get impacted when there are mandates that happen. So we have to also look at, you know, is the refrigeration gentleman or is the, you know, gal that's coming in to serve as one of the, you know, average machines or a delivery person, you know, are they vaccinated or have a negative COVID test within the last seven days. So is there anything else that you want to talk about the vendors, partners, other industry partners before I move on to my next question? I don't think so. Yeah, so, you know, it's like you said, you know, it's all of us, we're all in the same, you know, boat, and so we all need to paddle the same way and support each other. I've seen it happen on all islands where, you know, anything that this pandemic has taught us that we have to band together and be all rolling in that same direction, because it's so vital to all of us, right. We're hoping that eventually this mandate, just like a walk who they announced it yesterday, we've been extended to October 18. So when does the Maui mandate end? Is there an end date? There's not an end date. So on October 15, it's all going to be reevaluated. And I think it just depends on how successful it's been in lowering our case numbers. And our, you know, capacity of the hospitals, and we'll have to see how it goes. Exactly. That's what I heard. I heard there is no end to that mandate. And so it's hard to plan, Ashley, you know, when you're a restaurateur, and you're trying to plan your menu, your staffing, how many reservations you accept, because you don't know what's going to happen. And it's hard to plan a business model around the unknown, right. So many of the businesses, even on Oahu, are just planning to see this emergency order on Oahu. And I've heard the same on Maui, right, that they're just going to keep status quo, 50% occupancy, six foot distancing. We have to be sure to accept the vaccination cards or a negative COVID test. For the employees, for the employees, guess no negative tests, except you have the luxury of having outdoor seating. We're on Oahu, we don't have that. Yeah. Yeah, it's incredible. You have to plan for sure. And, you know, over here, we're just trying to make it day by day. Yes, yes. So we have another few minutes and before we close, I want to give you an opportunity to share anything that you would like to share with our viewers. And many of the viewers are our restaurateurs and our communities of what's going on over there on Maui. Yeah, I think that, you know, these mandates in particular have have caused some some division over here. There was a very large protest this last weekend with thousands and thousands of people over in Kapolei, you know, fighting to have all mandates lifted. You know, it's definitely been a struggle for some to to accept some of these mandates and, you know, for those of us running a business, I think it's just important for everyone to remember that our number one goal is to keep our business open and to keep our staff safe. And, you know, regardless of any personal opinions that we may have, you know, this is our goal. We want to stay here. We want to remain in Lahaina on Front Street. We don't want to have to close and, you know, have to lay off hundreds of employees. Our staff and our people are our number one priority and we're doing, you know, everything we can to put them first. And I think so many businesses here share that same sentiment and, you know, we just have to be flexible and roll with it a little bit and again take it day by day and realize that, you know, as a community, this is a chance for us to come together and really support each other and do the right thing. Beautifully said, Ashley, that's exactly the message that we've been saying from the Hawaii Restaurant Association. So in closing to our patrons, we're looking forward to serving you again in our restaurants and we need your support. You know, even though restaurants had a few busy months during the summer months, all of our visitors have now gone back to school and left and we're in that shoulder period. A few months of back to normal does not make up all of our lost sales in 2020 during COVID-19, when we lost many of our favorite restaurants and we lost a few in Maui. Please support your favorite restaurants by taking out or purchasing a gift card. If you have a birthday or a thank you gift anniversary, think about a restaurant gift card. Now it's when we really need our community support. I'm so proud of the Hawaii Restaurant Association as the voice of Hawaii's restaurants and food service industry. We want to say mahalo and we look forward to dining together again. And thank you so much, Ashley, for joining us today. Thanks, Shabbar. Thank you.