 Aloha. Welcome to Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers. I'm your host, Carl Kempany. We will be transitioning to a new series. This series is going to be called Politics in Hawaii, where we will be addressing all of the various important issues that face our people and our islands. So please join us each week as we discuss with all of our guests. There will be the people, there will be politicians, there will be opinions editors, there will be people across the board from all sides of the political spectrum to have comment and help us learn a bit more about what is going on and what our politicians are doing, maybe what they should do as well. So please join us for that. So for today's episode we're going to be focusing this episode specifically on what is that stake for the Oahu County mayoral race. So to really help us explore this conversation a bit, please help me welcome our guests. Today's guests we have Mr. Todd Simmons, Opinions Editor for Honolulu Civil Beat, and we have Mr. Michael Goloju who, several titles, chair of LGBT Caucus, as well as a member of the Democratic Party of Hawaii. Welcome to the show guys. Thank you. Thank you. So okay, let's let's jump in a little bit. Let's, okay, so Todd, Opinions Editor from Honolulu Civil Beat, you focus a bit with Facebook politics page. Tell us about what you do there and how that how that really comes together. So I remember the editorial board, I write editorials in an occasional column here and there, and our focus is really exclusively on Oahu, the city and county of Honolulu, and we occasionally comment on state and federal races. Some federal politics are involved in that too, but really our focus is almost exclusively local, and that gives us I think a pretty strong day-to-day insight into what's happening in Hawaii, particularly here on this island. Yeah, yeah. So is this investigative? Is it how do you come about? Our website is investigative and public policy and nature almost exclusively. We don't do lifestyles. We don't do sports. We don't do some of the other errat that you see in other media, but we do focus in on the meat and potatoes that we think people really ought to be concerned about issues that have to do with the way that their government works with the ways the city and county and state do or do not work. And the real problems and challenges that we have to tackle to live successfully here in Paradise. Well, that's excellent. I know that I enjoy it. Certainly the Facebook page as well as the show. Thank you. So with that, again, thank you for joining the show. And Michael, tell us about your role within the Democratic Party of Hawaii and some of what you're trying to achieve with that. My role as the LGBT Caucus Chair is we're the largest and oldest political organization that deals specifically with LGBT rights issues with daily education, advocacy, and trying to make sure that the rights that we have made so far are not eroded. It's encapsulated within the Democratic Party. We are an official arm of the Party, so we have to live and die by all the rules and regulations within the Party. But we make sure that we advocate for everybody along the spectrum within the LGBTQ community and prove that we weren't done with marriage as we move forward into transgender issues, as well as advocating for elected officials and candidates in the primaries as well in the general elections as we move to make sure that we get people elected that will support and advocate for the LGBTQ community. And that is allowed within the Caucus structure? Yes, it is. Okay. That's an important piece because I know that there are lines, right? There's some aspects that the Party can do something versus others and you have to make sure to not cross those lines sometimes. During the primary, we can't endorse, but for the general election, we can. And we educate our members, educate the general public about the differences between some Democrats because there are Democrats within the Party that support LGBTQ rights and across the board. They not only support or advocates for our community, but unfortunately, there are those since we are the Party of the Big Ten and we actually take that literally that we do have people that are in the Party that do not support or advocate for the LGBTQ community. Yeah, and I would that's actually an important conversation maybe for another episode as we go deeper into that. I like to refer to the idea that it's not just LGBTQ rights, they're human rights, right? So we can stick with it. We know where Hillary is on that stuff too. Anyway, this is one caveat that I want to put on this is though everyone here at the table, I believe certainly myself and Michael are are Democrats. One thing I want to make clear as far as this series is concerned is we are open and we are willing and we want various opinions from all sides to be able to come and participate and give us input on what is happening throughout our islands and what can and should be done from various perspectives and viewpoints. So I do want to make that clear. It's we all are in the same boat, the same islands. We need to make sure that we're working together in order to achieve the goals that suit us all best to help us achieve those goals. So okay. Thank you so much for reasonable introduction with that. Alright, so this whole episode today is going to be more focused on if not entirely focused on what is at stake in our current mayoral Oahu County mayoral race. So we currently have incumbent Mayor Kirk Caldwell running against after the primary I'm running against Charles Dijoux. One thing that gets lost in this is because we've got someone who's a strong Democrat running against someone who's a strong Republican, but this is a nonpartisan seat. Isn't it intended to be a nonpartisan seat? And at some level, you have to wonder why anybody would want it right now because the difficulty factor is so severe going forward. Whoever wins this is going to be immediately tested on trying to find a way forward for the Honolulu Rail project and trying to obtain the additional funding that would be required to complete that route to fruition or some maybe slightly shorter portion of that route. That's enough. But there are also other big challenges around homelessness and home insecurity around the cost of living around rental issues around the infrastructure of Honolulu and City and County of Honolulu. So there's a lot to do. And you know, even for the next mayor, whether it's the incumbent or the challenger, this rail project will be nowhere near fruition by the time they leave office. So in some ways, it'll be, you know, a heavy lift for not a lot of thanks at the end of it too. So it hats off at least to both of these gentlemen for running, because this is a very tough job that they're both pursuing. Yeah, it definitely is. And we hear more about the Oahu mayor. Certainly Oahu has the largest population than most of us here live on Oahu. So there's a lot more focus there. There are other islands and all of the nearby islands have their own mayors. They've got contested races. And it's all very interesting as well. But because you mentioned the rail, and you mentioned homelessness, and you mentioned cost of living. Well, the highest cost of living and the highest rate of homelessness and the costs of the rail impact the entire state. And that's all primarily about Oahu. The rail is 100% Oahu. And if there's going to be additional costs, if there's going to be, we're going to have to figure out how we're going to pay for it. If we're going to go to the general public once again and say, well, we have to raise taxes again, right? We always have to hear about raising taxes to pay for something. The entire state ends up having to pay for that. So well, you know, important to clarify there, I think that the GT surcharge that's paying most of the rail project cost, at least to date, and beyond what the federal government is obligated to pay through the FTA, really is based on what's assessed on Oahu. The other islands might have their own GT surcharge that might be levied for other purposes, but the one funding the rail project is assessed only here. To the degree, though, that they're coming to Oahu or doing business with Oahu, buying services goods, and other things that would fall under that tax, then they would also be paying some share of the rail project cost. Sure. I do want to disagree with you on the fact that there's only, and only benefits of Oahu, because the transit-oriented development, the GT that's going to be paid on that and all the development along the rail line goes into the general fund, and the state therefore benefits it, the entire state benefits. We do a lot of heavy lifting here on Oahu. All the money that's being spent on the rail project, the people that are coming, getting jobs, and going on spending their paychecks here, every tax they spend, every GT, every time they go buy something, the GT is assessed on them, and that goes into the general fund, and that benefits everybody across the state. That's an important point to make there, so when people come over here, also when people come over here from the neighbor islands, when the rail's up and running, they're not going to have to rent a car, if they're coming here for business, they hop on it, go downtown, do what they need to do, and head back to the airport, or heads out to Kapolei area, and so this is going to be where we say a future ferry. Yes. That can bring, yeah, that's what throwing that out. Keep up the line. For some, for some, not everyone is in agreement. We'd like to ride that ferry. Yeah. I would like there, personally, I think it would be important discussion to continue and to have not just an inter-island ferry, but also an intra-island. And I have to say that our civil beat readers have responded exactly that way. I think that the great majority of them would like to see some different mode of transportation alternative beyond what they have now for the airlines exist to go to neighbor islands and vice versa. It's very frustrating to them that that didn't happen when it might have several years ago, but they're also, I think, equally strong in saying that there have to be proper environmental assessments and an increase done that would allow that to take place. And so there's some balancing there, of course. Exactly, and we see that happen over and over and over again. Whatever side of TMT you happen to be on, the questions come about, well, was it done correctly, and how was it done, and what wasn't done. And those are the technicalities that oftentimes can sink something, which is what happened to the super ferry. So, all right, well, let's bring that back to with all of that. For the mayoral race, if we're talking about, and I've been hearing for, I don't know, months about Caldwell Pro Rail, Dijoux anti-rail, but that isn't really what's going to happen. Well, not anymore. The feds have stepped in, and if Dijoux had done his homework before jumping into this race, he would have known what was at stake, and he would have known what the requirements were. I knew, and I'm not even running for office, that I knew what the FTE wanted, and the feds were going to expect from us. And he has gone from one different program to another different idea what to do with the rail project. And the feds have said all along, this is what we're paying for, this is what we want. And for him to come in and he thinks somebody who's been in Congress would understand that, that the feds aren't going to mess around with what we promised them. And so for him to say, okay, we're going to put buses on it, never going to happen. We're going to do this, we're going to do that. We promised them steel on steel rail from Kapolei to Alamoana. And that was the project. And so for him to come in and say, oh, I'm now in favor of rail, well, you should have always been if you were going to run for mayor of Honolulu. Should have recognized that. Recognized that. It tells me as an individual, he was never prepared to be mayor when he got into this race. And so he didn't do his homework. So that being, so yeah, that narrative has changed from anti-rail. And the interesting thing about that is it's kind of how politics works, right? He stepped up onto the stage, he found a couple of issues that was going to rally a bunch of people. He actually, as a Republican, has pulled together a number of Democrats. Now again, it's nonpartisan. However, he has pulled together a number of Democrats to get behind him and support his campaign. But these are the Democrats that were anti-rail at all times. And these are the people that have filed lawsuits time and time again that helped. When they talk about the overruns and whatnot, they think this happened in a vacuum and it all happened because of what the Caldwell administration has done or because of heart. And it's not, they take any of their own actions into effect. That they are the ones that helped add to the delays which cost, the cost overruns which have cost added to the cost. So they're like, oh, not us, we're not mayor. It's all him. You know, in some ways it's kind of inconsequential as to who was for it, who was against it because immediately what happens now after November 8th is the FDA is evaluating whether the interim options that the city and county of Honolulu put forward along with Hart to say, here's what we might do to complete this project. Does it, will this, you know, go a long way toward meeting what you want to see out of the project? We're expecting here by the end of the year from the FDA on whether they will allow for another maybe six months for city and county to try to work with the state legislature and others in the community to find a way forward to fund the rest of the rail project. So that's, that's an incredible set of things that's going to have to happen over a period of no longer than eight months. And so whoever wins this seed is going to have to do a lot of work and a lot of convincing, a lot of arm twisting to allow this project to go forward if it is to go forward. Well, without there being serious penalties that we would then have to take back. Serious penalties in terms of having to pay back 1.5 billion to the feds and probably being unable to complete the project without that. Exactly, exactly. So we'll jump right back in that in one minute. We have to take a quick little break. So again, thank you for joining us. This is Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers. This is our new series, Politics in Hawaii. I'm your host, Carl Campania and we'll see you in one minute. Thank you. Good afternoon. Howard Wiig, Cold Green, ThinkTechHawaii.com. I appear on Mondays at 3 o'clock and my gig is energy efficiency doing more with less. It's the most cost effective way that we in Hawaii are going to achieve 100% clean energy by the year 2045. I look forward to being with you. Aloha. Aloha everyone. I'm Maria Mera and I'm here to invite you to my bilingual show Viva Hawaii every other Monday at 3 p.m. We are here to show you news, issues and events local and around the world. Join me. Hello, this is Martin de Spang. I want to get you get excited about my new show which is Humane Architecture for Hawaii and Beyond. We're going to broadcast on Tuesdays 5 p.m. here on ThinkTech Hawaii. Aloha, welcome back to ThinkTech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers, the Politics in Hawaii series. Again, help me welcome our guests, Mr. Todd Simmons and Mr. Michael Galoio. We're talking today about what is at stake for the mayoral race on Oahu. We've got incumbent mayor Kurt Caldwell running against the challenger, Charles Dejeu. And there's a number of issues where they are different. And though this is a nonpartisan, there are actually our partisan concerns to be dealt with. So we were just talking about rail. So let's jump real quick back into rail and then we're going to go into a couple of other things from there. So as far as rail is concerned, one of the things, one of the comments there was that it's going to get built anyway. And we heard from the beginning of the Dejeu campaign that he was against it and he was going to shut it down. Well, he couldn't. And if he would have done his homework because he was suggesting he would have realized that wasn't a real option. Well, okay, he's had to transition back into well, okay, we're going to build it. So his current thing is what I've heard and I'd like to hear your thoughts on this. If there's anything new or any other thoughts about this is his current thing is yes, we're going to build it. But you know what, I'm going to do it better than Caldwell was doing it. So back to the future, right? Yeah, exactly. Theme that we heard from 2012. I will say that stopping the project does not seem to be something that the public supports. No, not at all. Our civil beat poll, which we released last week showed that 61% of our respondents in this poll of Oahu voters supported the project being completed, being built to its original plan and having the entire entire 20-mile route completed. At the same time, only 14% were happy with the way that the project has been executed so far. So I think for anyone to come in and say we want to stop work, we don't want to finish this, we want to miniaturize it somehow, may not, you know, they may run into a buzz saw in terms of public opinion on that, but clearly the voters are unhappy with the way this thing has been executed. And some of that, I think, is, again, the sausage-making process. You know, people don't want to know how that sausage is being made. They just want to be able to consume it when it's tasty. Well, the hard part is I make sure it doesn't give them food poisoning. Hopefully, yeah. Exactly. That's any of the metaphor. And there have been so many issues that have come up in regards to the concrete, what type of concrete they were using and crumbling of them. So many challenges that have come up, so many issues that have been demonstrated. Where in that conversation is the mayor responsible? And in what way can Dijoux or Caldwell actually have an impact in how the construction itself proceeds? Very little. And that's thanks to the work that Dijoux did when he was on the city council. He's one of the architects behind Hart. So if he's not happy with Hart, that's his baby come to rest. He's the one that made sure that there was this huge, there was this, the mayor didn't decide who had the contract. So they kept the politics, supposedly kept the politics out of the building of the rail project. So everything he's pointing to that he's not happy about the project are things that he actually had input on. And so if you're looking, now we have to look at the whole project as a whole, go looking back at the FDA and looking at who's going to be able to go to Washington and advocate for us. Who's the FDA going to listen to? Somebody that didn't want the project, didn't know what they were talking about to begin with when he jumped into the race or somebody that's been an advocate for it understands the nooks and crannies has a history and a track record of getting things done. And for us within the LGBT caucus it's been clear for us it's going to be Caldwell. Caldwell's been there, he understands the project to change horses this way down the stream with somebody who has no track record of getting things done and would otherwise be against it. Been against it. And you look at what he did when he was in the legislature. He got basically nothing of his own done when he went to Congress he sided with he put the knife in the back of our first responders when it came to getting their health care. So you have to look at the in totality of the work of the person and the individual granted within the caucus we were limited on who we could support because the Democrat versus Republican even though it's a non-partisan race we're still held by who's a member of our party. So yes, the LGBT caucus did endorse Kirk but we didn't do it wholehearted we didn't do it halfheartedly we brought him in we talked to him and we made sure he Yeah, you didn't use on spec you talked him through. Yeah, we watched him. That's an important message I think for really everyone to understand from caucus to caucus whether it's Democratic Party or not especially when it's a non-partisan office that someone is seeking you're asking the questions you're going through the process and it's not just well you said you're a Democrat so we're gonna go there so okay that's an important thing to point out but okay let's jump let's jump to topics okay the rail is a thing that we can spend an entire episode on I don't want to do that right now because the mayoral race has more than just the rail as we know it's going to be finished in one way or another we just have to figure out how that's going to happen that's one of the challenges now I will jump to something that off air you were mentioning and you just alluded to polls you've recently civil beat has recently done a poll the only poll that we're aware of at the moment there are others please everyone can let us know but the only polls that have been done thus far for the mayoral race is one that civil beat has done and can you tell us about that how it happened what your process was we released our poll and in pieces saw different races and different issues that are big and Honolulu and on the island of Oahu right now what we found in the mayoral race was that Mayor Caldwell has a seven-point lead and this is a 48 to 41 lead that we saw among 832 registered voters who took this poll that has a plus minus of 3.4% so we're well outside the margin of air and I don't think there's any reason of doubt that Mayor Caldwell doesn't have a very comfortable lead in this race right now we might expect that that could grow depending on some of the things that are happening up ballot particularly in the presidential race where we saw evidence in our poll that some of the difficulties that Donald Trump is having as the Republican nominee is cascading down even as far as the Honolulu mayoral race because as we said earlier it's non-partisan but Charles Dejeu a former congressman is well known to be a Republican here and we're seeing some evidence of drag on the mayoral race there this could if it turns into a Hillary route at the presidential level this could turn out to have consequences for Charles Dejeu certainly and we know just to reach nationally for many we know and I was mentioning earlier President Obama has even come to endorse Caldwell I mean Caldwell but he's also been planning he's been at what 120 different down ballot all the way down into state ballot races that he has gone out specifically and endorsed down that level and that isn't normally something that's done certainly by sitting president or anyone at that national level so that's a fascinating thing and we could spend some time talking about that it's a very big deal Ray, you see a presidential candidate a president sitting president take a position in a local race like that yeah but we here at the ultimately caucus are excited to see this kind of thing happen because you asked earlier what's at stake and it's everything everything's at stake in the Honolulu mayor's race because the mayor has the most impact on your daily lives and civil rights are that's what I want to find out that's what I want to find out okay so rail is a big thing it's a big topic the horse race part where we actually are with with the polls and so forth but okay as far as what is at stake the issues if we've got a republican in this non-partisan office versus a democrat in this non-partisan office what are the impacts what are they actually going to be able to achieve or potentially attempt to achieve that would be positive or negative on either side so the impacts are okay we've got housing homelessness issue okay so it's a belief it's a value-based belief on how to proceed we've got our weed and seed programs we've got a variety of housing programs housing first that's out there right that that the mayor is trying to and the mayor's office and various agencies within the city and county are trying to address well if we get a new administrator someone in there from from a more republican perspective who doesn't necessarily hold those same values as far as how to take care of people is that the impact that we're worried about is that it does that come in and how does that come in and what are your thoughts on that so talk to you if you've got anything well um you know I think we can transcend to some extent partisan politics when we get to some of these basic quality of life basic community issues and I think homelessness affordable housing and probably at the top of that list everyone is impacted by homelessness on this island everyone encounters homeless individuals sees those encampments sees the difficulties that they're having putting a roof and shelter over their heads it's a problem for business it's a problem for tourism it's a problem for members of the community who you know we're in the midst of a place where there are people who are living on our streets without any other resources available to them likewise in affordable housing the need dramatically outstrips the supply here and we still continue to not see adequate effort being being given to affordable housing some of that is state it's a shared burden between both there's a big stake in there for the state as well as for the city and county these these pieces have begun to work together on some of these issues I think state and local and in better ways over the past couple of years we're still not seeing enough payoff yet so the the the need to increase those efforts is I would I would argue severe but it's how you address those issues and you're going back to the core values of the person and in the and in this case the party and everybody's like oh it's a non-partisan race but you look at who his friends are you look at who does you would point for directors that would have the direct impact in these areas when it comes to social services is he going to bring in another Linda Collier who just decimated DHS while she was there you look at these his friends and who he hangs out with in his buddies these are the people that he's going to be putting in directerships and they're going to have devastating impacts when it comes to how these things are when it comes to addressing homelessness privatization they are a big proponent of that they want to privatize everything how do you privatize homelessness and how you would deal with that how do you prioritize actually help people and when you when your party is the party of no and he won't even say who he voted for tells us a great deal about him as a who he is as a mayor or a candidate and where he's going to stand and what he's looking at and so we have to look at because it's not just the one issue one the one mayor position that we're voting on we're voting on every director and deputy that he appoints across the board that's another important piece to bring these people in Caldwell has one of the most diverse progressive directors I've ever had the privilege of working with I don't work for the city but I do a lot of stuff with the city and my volunteer work and having advocacy and I've had the most pleasure of dealing with this diverse and dynamic group of directors you go back and you look at who lingle had in there and and you have to look at the person and look at what they have and look who their friends are and who they would appoint these positions okay are we we have even another practical more practical dimension to this too and that's that in where this is an area like this that is so profoundly Democrat you practically you increase your chances of efficacy if you're part of that operation and we're we're in a place we're just down the street the senate is about to turn possibly 100% blue possibly we're hopeful which would be which would be fascinating and that will be we'll be back and ask for more funding from the state I would like to have a conversation about that dynamic in another episode so I would welcome you both back unfortunately our time is up I wanted to give you guys last 10 seconds to top three issues most important issues for for the rail race unfortunately we don't have time for that but I think we've covered them we're talking about rail housing homelessness social issues and concerns and those are important things and and then not just that position but who they appoint those are important reasons and important things to consider with that so thank you for joining us this is Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Performers Politics in Hawaii series thank you again for our guests for today both Mr. Todd Simmons and Mr. Michael Gavillion and then always thank you to the staff and crew of Think Tech Hawaii we will see you next week when we'll have Mr. Bill and Armstrong on talking about the role and impact of the neighborhood board system see you next week thank you