 I'm Marcia Joyner and we are navigating the journey. And today, today we are visiting with one of my dear, dear friends. And for those of you that have been with me for the last four years, you know we only deal with very good friends. So today is representative John Mizuno, who is the vice speaker of the Hawaii State Legislature. Aloha John. Thank you so much for being with us. It's always a pleasure. I was just talking to John to make sure that I had my memory right. We first met in 2006 when he was running for this office and we decided to support him even though I didn't know who he was, but I wanted that we didn't care for his opponent. So the way to keep the karma clean was to support this young man that we didn't know, but he was such a nice young man that we decided we would support John. And so he's been a dear friend ever since. So that was 2006. So that's a long time. And we've been through lots of bills and lots of ups and downs together. So John, welcome. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you. And the feelings are likewise mutual. Thank you so much for having me today. Yes, and what I would like to talk to John about is we just had an election and we have new people coming into the legislature. So John, you wanna talk about what it means what the new session is going to be, who the new people are that are coming into the session. So let's start with that now that we just had an election. Who is it, how many new people you have? Gosh, I apologize. I don't have that, start with me, but we do have a lot of new people. We had a caucus and they all introduced themselves and it's a diverse group, younger group, very, very young group, outstanding individuals. They're chomping at the bit to go and so we're very excited to have them, but I think it's gonna be a very interesting session coming up, especially I admit the pandemic. Yeah, well, now that brings us to today, the pandemic. Now, the Capitol, is it still closed? Is the Capitol still closed? Yes, going back to your question, I'm sorry, Marshal Rose. Don't really just hit me. We have eight new incoming freshmen legislate. Which is a good size numbers. That's why I apologize, but yes, just that factoid, eight new incoming freshmen legislators to the house. Going back to your current question, yes, the Capitol is still closed and we don't anticipate the legislature or the Capitol being opened during the session, again, because of the pandemic. So because of health concerns, the Capitol will probably remain closed throughout the legislative session. That's gonna be from January, all the way to the end of April, first weekend in May. So will we be able to zoom and watch what's going on? How will that work? How do we, those of us that feel the need to participate, how does that work? Right, and you've participated in a number of hearings and briefings in the past and so that's not new. We will continue to have briefings and hearings on the bills. It's gonna be virtual. I believe they're working out an agreement with YouTube. And so, we're gonna be doing Zoom and YouTube to have these hearings and briefings. So it will be not exactly business as usual, but we're gonna try to keep it similar to what we've done in the past, albeit virtually because of the, again, the pandemic and health concerns. Now, let's talk about, if I, well, I'm not gonna do this, but if I decided I wanted a bill, if, because I'm in East Honolulu and we call ourselves East Honolulu Democrats, if we wanted to propose a bill, we can no longer just come down there and asked you or any other legislator, say, here, this is what we want. How would we do it now that we can't just walk in and out and go to... The best way in which a joiner would be to email that legislator that you have in mind to be the champion or sponsor of your bill and then follow up with a call because sometimes emails are gone through, sometimes we'll get 300, 400 emails a day. We might miss it. So on two things, email the bill request to your champion legislator and then give him or her a call saying, by the way, did you get my email? Would you be able to introduce the spill for me? Can you have it drafted by your attorneys? And that should do the trick. The reason I ask is that last year, you had 3,000 bills, which is unbelievable. And there's no reason to think you won't have even more this year or at least the same amount, especially since you have new people and new people campaign on this is what they want and their community says, yes, that's what we want. So I have to think that these new people will and their communities will bring new bills. This is why I'm asking the process because I'm certain this is gonna happen. And then the next part of that same question is how in the world, the 51 people deal with 3,000 bills a session? Good, excellent question. And good points, good points, mage. For 2021, we're gonna scale it back significantly. So I anticipate we're not gonna see the same allotment of bills that we had years past because we're very pandemic centric. We're gonna focus on getting our people out of this predicament, making sure we've got the vaccinations to people, continue to make sure we have thermal screener scanning and screeners at the airport, protection for all people. And so this is really going to focus on COVID-19 and the pandemic and how we get our economy back on track safely. With that said, that's gonna reduce the bill count because what's gonna happen now is a lot of the bills that we're focused on would be just geared to COVID-19 reduction protection and getting our economy back on track. Because the state is in extreme deficit, we don't anticipate the members introducing appropriation bills, money bills. If any money bills come up, it would be by the leadership of either of both the Senate and the House. They will recommend some of the money bills that we might be taking a look at, as well as a governor. But keep in mind, because we're in a deficit, you're not gonna see new programs in addition, another big thing, I would say this respectfully, we're not gonna probably see any GIAs released at gratin AIDS because deficit, we can't do anything. And that's where we might see some difficulty and some of the nonprofits being significantly hurt because there's no help this year from the 2021 from the legislature. But now, while we're talking about this and the budget, I know that's not your department, but because we don't have the tax, we don't have the transit accommodation money from the hotels, what are we gonna do with the budget? Or is that an unfair question to ask you? No, no, it's not. You know, I don't have a crystal ball, but I will say this, we need to be very nimble in 2021 and do all we can. So I would recommend pulling more federal funds down. For example, SNAP, formerly food stamps, we get about half a billion dollars in federal funds and that's pure federal monies. There's no state monies attached to that, but for every $1.80 we get in SNAP monies, I'm sorry, for every $1, we get in federal SNAP monies to the state, it generates to the economy a $1.80. So almost two to one match if you think about that. So we'd probably recommend more SNAP monies to the state because there are gonna be more people in need, of course, because of the pandemic. Next, you may wanna look at or anticipate some revenue-generating bills and people do not like taxes. I get that, I understand. It doesn't matter how Republican people do not like taxes. You may see some taxes, for example, gasoline tax, you may see some syntax come up, syntax on tobacco and vaping products in addition to maybe a syntax on alcohol and sugary drinks. These were not popular ideas in the past and they're not gonna be popular now, but with the state needing to fill its coffers because we just don't have money, the revenue-generating bills might definitely come up and I don't know how positive we are about passing them. One thing that's good though, it was talked about extensively by our caucus, the general excise tax, can we raise it to help social programs? We actually took the position that that's regressive, it's gonna hurt our people more than help. So we don't anticipate passing an increase to the general excise tax just to let you know. Well, there's one that comes up every year and that's tax on food. That might be regressive because again, we have people that are... People are hungry, yeah. Hungry, lost their job, they're trying to get money just for groceries for their families. So yeah, that's probably gonna be off the table also. Well, let's talk about what's going on today. You have the KK caucus. What is going on? Because the young people are growing up and having to do school from home and all of these things. While we're talking about youngsters, there's 22,000 people on Oahu that live in districts that do not have internet connection and that they don't have carriers that whoever knows why, but they don't. And so we've got children, young people who need internet because of their schools do this at home. What are we doing for them? And this is your caucus, KK caucus, yeah. Yeah, we really wanted to use the money from we believe the second stimulus check was coming. Didn't happen, but we were hopeful that a second stimulus check will come in the upcoming session. If it does indeed comes, we're gonna work. We've got a group of legislators that wanna earmark a significant amount of that money to get kids the iPads they need so they can be connected to their school. For the most part, the middle class and upper class kids, it's not a problem because they all have iPads, cell phones, computers. I mean, they have access. So that's not a problem. The lower income kids don't and that's where we see the disparity and that's why we're trying to get some of the monies for this group of kids. I'm sorry, I didn't make it clear. It's not that they don't have the computers, it's that they don't have the internet connection. And it seems to me that as big a spectrum is there's no reason that everybody isn't connected. Right, keep in mind, in addition to computers, cell phones or what have you, you need to have the hotspots and each hotspot's gonna cost some money. So we've been working with public housing and spectrum, spectrum has provided some donations but we're still extremely short. And so that's, in order to get those hotspots and if they don't have a computer to get them computers, it's gonna cost money. And that's where we're looking for the second stimulus check. I don't know how much money the state can provide on its own, but that is a big question coming up for 2021. Well, now Senator Schatz's office had a bill last year. I don't know where it went. And that was to wire rule America. And you know, we have a large part of Hawaii is ruled. And I don't know what happened to that bill but that was a lot of money. Yeah, it's unfortunate but there's politics, not only in Congress but at the state capital too. And unfortunately, although the bills have merit, sometimes they don't pass kind of based on the majority of a certain house and, you know, so Schatz is good. He's got really good ideas. His bills are really good. We're very supportive. However, it's very difficult to pass anything out in the Congress and US Senate, very difficult. Well, but he's a sweetheart, so you ought to talk to him because, you know, when you say rule, most people don't think of Hawaii as rule. All they think of is Waikiki, you know? And so it's hard for them to think that there are places in Hawaii that are ruled. Agreed, agreed. And some of those people are the hardest hit and they need the most help, especially not only education but when you talk about healthcare, about suicide prevention or stress or mental disorders or addiction. And that's where telehealth might come into play but you're right. Unfortunately, rural areas in Hawaii comprises of a significant amount of landmass and people. And those are the people that are least likely to have adequate access to healthcare and education. So that's a good point. And again, we cannot be city or Oahu centric. We need to focus on all rural areas. And so I agree, but it's not gonna be easy but I agree with you. That is a group that we need to protect and help out. Because, you know, even on the Waianae coast, because of the mountains and the valleys, there are people back there that even if they had the money or whatnot, because of the terrain, they don't get the connection. You know, it's just the way mountains are. Right, no, I totally agree. I totally agree with you. And so we, but you've got the connections, as big a spectrum is, this should not be a problem. We're hopeful. They're advertising 5G, this should not be a problem. Correct. And so the, I've been working with Senator Glenn Wakai on that and he's been rallying some of the members. So we're trying to do all we can to get spectrum to be more on board and be able to provide such access to the hotspots. So this is an ongoing discussion. Again, though, I think unfortunately, it might be a little bit of money involved and that's where we're focused on maybe the federal funds. I don't know how much state funds can come out of the coffers to provide hotspots, but that's gonna be a big discussion. Again, it's gonna be a tough discussion, but an important discussion admin the pandemic and the fact that the state is in dire need of money because we're in an extreme deficit right now. Now tell us about the Kakey Caucus. What is the Kakey Caucus? What do you do? Sure, sure. Historically, this Hawaii was the first state in the nation to actually have a chosen youth day that represents the Kakey as well as the Kakey Caucus. It's the first Sunday in the month of October every year. And so important was that the legislature even passed the second bill to recognize the entire month of October as Kakey Caucus a month for the entire state. And so we put a big premium on our Kakey because we believe our Kakey represents the most important resource in the state of Hawaii. There are future. If we invest in our Kakey, our future's gonna be fine. And so we understand that. The Kakey Caucus is comprised of advocates, the youth themselves, the children youth themselves, as well as lawmakers. And we came up with a package. Now I'm gonna be going over the package with the entire group next week because we're gonna have to probably take some bills out. If you remember, if you recall earlier, I said that appropriation bills are gonna be few if none at all from up. And so the Kakey Caucus, what they do is every year they have a Kakey Caucus summit. And you have usually three groups of kids, maybe eight and under, maybe nine to 15 and maybe 15 on up to 21 or what have you. And they'll come up with the most highly touted topics that they want to see in bills. And it's pretty unique. And every year or so, we'll pass one or two of these bills. And so we go back to the kids, the youth and the children and say, congratulations, your fingerprints are on this bill. So when they say, I'm not 18, I count and vote. We tell them, but your voices do matter. You had a hand in legislation and making a difference. So I can run through the 10 bills we have, keep in mind three or four of them might not make it because of the funding connected to it. But the kids, the kids are great. This is how unique and advanced they are. So here's the rank. So the kids pick protecting the environment number one, that's a top priority. That's great. They want us to have a bill to fund and localize community-based compulsive recycling centers. And that makes sense. Because there's funding mechanism, either we can't introduce it or we might introduce this as a study to see how we can get donations to do this. Because again, the state doesn't have much money. And so the appropriation bills are very difficult. But this is a very good idea. They want to protect the environment. The second bill they had was equality, diversity and safety. They want schools to have quarterly pound home meetings with the superintendent to talk about bullying, discrimination against people of color, handicap status or LGBTQ. I think it's great. So the kids are standing up saying we want this for our schools, our parents and the superintendent and all of us to meet. So I think that's great. The third one they had was also similar to equality, diversity and safety. They really wanted to employ the Department of Education to talk about LGBTQ and issues regarding sex ed. They want to start at fifth grade. This will be, of course, age-appropriate. What a 15-year-old would learn would not be the same as what you're teaching a fifth grader. But this is another one of their priorities. Another priority. Let me interrupt there. Sure. A fifth grader, if they are, they get bullied. For being different. And so it's not just the 15, it's the little ones get bullied for being different. And so it's a good idea to start with the little ones. It is. And this is great that the kids brought this up. So this was their third priority. And, you know, Marshall, you're right. They say that they want it to start as early as fifth grade. And they want this to continue on through high school to encourage open conversation with everyone and the stigma-sized, the concerns with LGBTQ sexual orientation. They don't want the stigma of something negative to be connected to someone just because they have a different sexual orientation. So I think it's the right step. And I'm glad that the kids are outstanding. This is really outside of the box thinking. And so we applaud them for that. And, you know, not only sexual orientation, but children with handicaps, they get bullied. I've seen people with handicaps, development of disabilities, autism, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. In addition, I see some of our kids of color. I'll tell you, are people from Micronesia. Oh, that's so sad, yeah. Montereylands, they've been treated kind of, you know, almost to the point where there are fights, but sometimes it's difficult. I've seen kids that, yeah, and that's why we need to stop this because it shouldn't be. It needs to be fairness and equality for all. So I'm glad the kids have this. This is how forward thinking they are. And Bill number four, their top four, their fourth priority is a focus on homelessness and housing. They want to try to reduce homelessness and get more affordable housing by 2023. This is a great thing to do. And again, the children and youth decided this is a top priority. So I think it's something we can work with at the legislature and craft the bill for them. Their fifth, and I'm gonna go through their top 10, but their fifth was the focus on health, mind and healthy body, reduce suicide, work about address stress, depression, and other needed items for youth that are struggling. A lot of our youth, they can't, for whatever reason, talk to their parents and so they need better guidance and counseling. And so they're reaching out saying, we need more help. Can we do this? And the answer is yes. So that's a big one. Marcia, you talked about the inner school, online classes and students put that as their top six priority. As far as education, they need to have a system of online classes that they can select to create highly customized schedules, but they need access to that. So that's another one that, that's what you talked about. They've identified it as their number six priority. Number seven is similar to number one, protecting the environment. They wanna make sure that the communities work with the planning commission as they continue to do smart growth to ensure any growth or development is environmentally friendly. So again, environment is one of the top tier issues for the kids. Number eight is similar to number five, health, mind and body health. I'm sorry, healthy mind, healthy body, I apologize. They wanna talk about physical activity, especially admin, the COVID pandemic and how we can allow for better outcomes health-wise by getting more fitness programs in the school. So again, healthy mind, healthy body. Number nine and 10, rounded out. Number nine, again, is with education. They wanna elevate the education in all public schools. They wanna make Hawaiian a core requirement throughout upper education for high schools. So they really put an emphasis on Hawaiian. They want it to be a mandated course to take in high school. And finally. Can I interject? Speaking of language. Oh, gosh, New Valley. New Valley School. Senator Chang. And representative. Oh, why am I drawing a complete blank? Hashem. They are in the process of creating at New Valley Intermediate School. A whole thing of languaging, different languages. Chinese, Japanese, other Asian languages and that it is a baccalaureate process. That's when they finish. And now throughout the school, they have Chinese and Japanese characters on the bathroom doors and throughout the school so that they, not, you know, it's not just something that one school, but they want to do so that these kids can excel throughout the world, to communicate without the world. So that's already in the process. And it shouldn't be just one school. No, I think that's great. What Senator Chang and Representative Hashem are doing, this joint project. I think what happens with a project like that in New Valley is if it shows success, but I'm sure it will, then that would be considered our pilot project. And then we can start to replicate and implement throughout the state. And I would think rural areas too, because again, we've often talked about the rural areas being underrepresented. And so it's a good start. And I think as long as it's successful, we can definitely replicate that eventually statewide. I think so. I think so. We need to, John, if there's, we're almost out of time, which is so bad because I love talking to you anyway. So are there any other things on that list that the young people are interested in? I'm repeating. It won't miss anything? No, no. Homelessness Housing was another one, but it kind of replicates what we said earlier. So that's a list of 10. And that's why I'm so excited because the kids are targeted and they're focused and they got a lot of great ideas. So hopefully we can turn some of these ideas into bills. And the city and county passed a amendment to the charter. And now they have a young people's organize whatever it is. And they are a little older, I think, than your young people. But they now meet with the city council and they are learning how the city works. And it's a marvelous idea. I love it. It's on a ballot. I love it. I voted for it too and it's a great idea. Absolutely. I think we are on the right track because this is a whole new generation, a whole new world opens up now and yesterday is gone. So this is great to see these young people moving forward because this is their time. Totally agree. My game is over. So it's always, always a pleasure being with you. Thank you so much for taking the time to be with us. And we will, you can count on it, be back to talk to you some more as the session moves along. Thank you for having me, Marcia. Appreciate it. I always enjoy working with you. Aloha. And we'll see you next time.