 It's Tuesday, it's noon, that means it's time for Moving Hawaii Forward. I'm your host, Tim Apachella. A couple of weeks ago, our show focused on the topic of pedestrian safety. Two city representatives described their efforts to educate both seniors and children how to safely cross the risky streets of Honolulu. In 2015 and 2016, Honolulu was the number one in pedestrian fatalities. How to address such grim statistics and realities has our lawmakers reaching out to communities to identify solutions. We briefly touched on the subject of the newly passed pedestrian law known as Bill 6. This bill has both its supporters and critics. For those who support the law, it's necessary to keep people safe and reverse the numbers of fatalities. For those who hate this new law, it's government overreach into people's lives and it's nothing more than a babysitter or a nanny law. Love it or hate it, the new law will be implemented on October the 25th. As Honolulu is the first major city in the country to pass such a law, you can imagine the comments one sees on the internet about it. We look at the pros and cons of Bill 6 and let you, the audience, decide if this is a good law or not. So before we continue, I encourage everyone to voice their opinion after watching the show either on Think Tech Hawaii Livestream or on Think Tech Hawaii YouTube and you can join us on Twitter at thinktech. So thank you very much for joining us. I am not going to have a guest today. We're just going to discuss this and it's just you and I, just you and I. So let's talk about the bill. What is the bill? Bill 6 says the following, no pedestrians shall cross the street or highway while viewing the mobile electronic device. So what is a mobile electronic device? Well, according to Bill 6, is any handheld or portable electronic equipment capable of providing wireless and or data communication between two or more persons providing amusement, including but not limited to the cellular phone, text messaging device, paging device, personal digital assistant, laptop, computer, and they struck out video equipment. So apparently video equipment isn't part of that. What are the penalties if the law is enforced, which it will be on October the 25th? Well, hang on to your wallets because the first penalty is going to be a grand total of $15 for the infraction. And if you're caught doing it again within a year, that fine is going to soar up to $35. And believe it or not, if you do do it for the third time and you are cited for it, you are going to be fined $75. So $15, that's not a whole lot of money and I guess it's more of an education bill than it is an enforcement bill. I think that's the intent. So who created this bill and why? That would be council member Brandon Elefante and I wanted to have him on the show as a guest but unfortunately he's just really tied up and he's got a lot of things going on. But he was kind enough to respond to some questions that I sent him. So let's understand why this bill was put into place. Let's understand from his standpoint the motivation and why he did it. Remember it wasn't just him. We had seven out of nine council members that approved the bill and then of course Mayor Caldwell actually signed it into effect. So let's take a look at some of the support for this bill and the motivation behind it. So the first question I asked council member Elefante was what was your motivation and reasons to write the bill? And he said Honolulu has the highest rate of pedestrian accidents to our elderly. It ranked 13th as the most dangerous state for pedestrians of all ages from 2010 to 2014. We also have year round good weather and our areas of the island are heavily pedestrian dependent. A member of the community approached me with an idea and I also heard from students in traffic safety groups at IAEA and Waqpahu schools who were also concerned about the behaviors they have witnessed at their schools and in their communities. So he sat down and talked to high school students. I know that he was quoted in the CNN news report on July the 14th and this is what council member Elefante said to CNN. These high school groups were concerned for their peers being distracted while crossing the streets and looking at their phones instead of both ways. So it seems to be that is the kind of the origin or how this whole thing started. I then asked them are you thinking of other pedestrian or safety legislation in the future? And if so what would that be? What are the important legislation items to protect safety that need to be taking place? And he said well not at this time however I do have continued focus on walkability and complete streets as well as pedestrian safety. And then I asked what would you say to those critics of Bill 6 who feel it's unnecessary. And council member Elefante said while it may seem like a, let me start this again. While it may seem like a no duh kind of bill you'd be surprised on how many people do this and are putting their lives at risk. Crossing the street and safety are a shared responsibility between drivers and pedestrians. Crossing the street and safety are paramount. We don't allow distracted drivers and drivers are not allowed to even touch their cell phones. This bill is to prevent distracted walking and make all of us safer. So that's kind of the crux of his motivation behind Bill 6. In the last two months I've been talking to folks and getting their viewpoint. I've heard a wide range of the viewpoint. So here's one viewpoint and this would be my viewpoint. Pedestrians are being killed in the crosswalks. That's true and predominantly as seniors. They're not looking at their cell phones. What's killing our crosswalk, pedestrians in our crosswalk is drivers. 2016 I believe the average I think it was 15 pedestrians that were killed and struck and killed. So I'm not sure that cell phones to seniors is the issue. I'm pretty sure the children aren't looking at cell phones. So there is this demographic of probably about 20 years or younger. Seemed to be those that are walking with cell phones and looking at cell phones while they're crossing the street. I want to read something from ARP. And ARP is an organization set forth to represent seniors. And Barbara Kim Stanton. She's the Hawaii director of ARP and she said on January the 10th, 2017. Our Kapuna really shouldn't have to cross their fingers every time they cross the road and hope they will make it to the other side. That's true. 15% of Hawaii's population is 65 years or older. And the National Complete Streets Coalition states that 40% of our pedestrian deaths in Hawaii are seniors. So I'm not sure this bill actually is going to address the seniors that are being struck by what I think is distracted divers. Drivers are not paying attention. I know there's a law in the books that basically states that you will not even hold or do anything with your cell phone, but it's being ignored. How many times do you look over to the car next to you and you see the driver looking down at the bottom of the steering wheel? Chances are there's a cell phone down there and I doubt very much that the law is, I know there's a lot of citations being issued, but I'm not sure that the law is really cutting back the distracted driver issues and unfortunately our pedestrians are at stake. Two weeks ago I did have a representative from the city and one comment that came from one of the individuals who I interviewed, he said it perfectly, he said, when people cross onto a crosswalk, some pedestrians, they're not looking down at cell phones, but they walk as if there's an invisible bubble over them and that they're completely immune from anything entering into that protective bubble. And I've seen that, one of the terms I came up with is it's almost like the Matadors of New York streets. I just see people with complete confidence and very little awareness as they step off the curb and into the crosswalk and proceed to get to the other side. And it's just totally not aware of cars that may not be paying attention to them and they just walk across oblivious to everything to the left or to the right of them. So it's interesting. There's a group called WalkWise and Lance Ray said, for most seniors, it's a challenge. A 65-year-old, a 70-year-old, an 80-year-old cannot look left or right. The first thing you want to do is look down because you're afraid to fall down. And I think if you watch seniors and you watch them cross, I think that is absolutely true. They're concerned more about tripping and falling than their attention on looking to the left of their shoulder or looking to the right to see what cars are or are not doing. So I think that's the issue right there. And so I'm not sure Bill Six is going to really protect seniors, quite frankly, and certainly I know our children are not looking at cell phones. But it is something that is now a law. And I think what we're going to do is we're going to see how it goes as of October 25th. I spoke this morning with Cora Speck. And Cora is the trauma injury prevention and outreach at Queen's Medical Center. And she unfortunately couldn't make it on the show to be a guest either. But she did say she had very strong feelings about Bill Six. And I asked her on a scale of 1 to 10, how would she rate it? And she said I'd rate it a 1. But she said it's still necessary. And she said, our culture needs to change from emphasizing on pedestrians' needs to change. But it really should be on the driver. And again, it's the driver who's causing the injuries. It's not the pedestrian. So I don't know what the magic wand is, or the correct answer is to enforce driver distraction laws that we have on the books already. It's not a matter of, maybe it is a matter of making them tougher. Perhaps the penalty dollar amount needs to be increased substantially to really emphasize to drivers that being a distracted driver is this not going to be acceptable. And so she also said that we are in this all together. And we all need to be observant as a pedestrian. And I couldn't agree with her more. She raised a really good point though. And one of the reasons why, if there's any reason to support Bill Six, it's the following. A lot of times you have patients who are classified as self-care or no payment, which means they don't have financial means to pay for an expensive medical bill. And as such, when someone gets struck in a crosswalk by a distracted driver or even a driver that hasn't put on the seat belt, there's a cost associated with that action. And the cost is borne by the society. For every patient that goes to Queen's Emergency Center, they're going to receive state of the art care. And as such, if they don't have the means to pay for it, you and I are going to pay for it. So a lot of bills that you see being passed throughout the years, be it seat belt laws or bike safety helmet laws, laws that people think those are babysitting or nanny laws and they shouldn't take place in a society where adults have the right to make their own decisions. Well, the counter argument to that is maybe not. And that's because the cost of taking care of someone with a head injury, not only during the period of them being in the emergency and the ICU and ultimately they're discharged from the hospital, but the cost of care throughout their natural life from that time of that accident to the day they're no longer with us, that cost is astronomical. Particularly if you're a quadriplegic or again you have a traumatic brain injury that will require unbelievable amount of resources to take care of that individual. And again if they don't have an insurance plan, it's you and I as the taxpayer that will bear that responsibility for that patient's care for the rest of their life. Each year the Queen's Medical Center goes to the Hawaii State Legislature and said here's the deficit of funds that we have incurred to take care of those who do not have insurance and do not have the means to pay for the trauma bill. So in my way of thinking of it, Bill 6 could be construed as a babysitting nanny law, but in reality Bill 6 is warranted by the amount of money taxpayers pay for those who do not take responsibility and care for themselves. We're going to go to a commercial break and we'll be back just in a couple of minutes. This is Think Tech Hawaii, Raising Public Awareness. In this crazy world, so far up in the confusion, nothing is making sense for me and there's got to be solutions, how to make a brighter day. Today we're talking about Bill 6, the Pedestrian Crosswalk Cell Phone Bill, and we're here to talk about why it got passed and some of the issues associated with Bill 6. So at the end, I talked about some of the rationale for why maybe this bill is a good idea. Let's talk about some other issues. Let's talk about enforcement. I asked Council Member Elefante, what specific challenges have you been advised by HPD regarding enforcement of Bill 6? And his response is the following. We changed the law from holding a phone to veiling a phone. This is because many people hold their phone and wallet as they cross the street, but they aren't actually using it and looking at it and so they're not distracted. It is the distraction from your surrounding and from the vehicle movements around you. That is the critical component to being safe as you cross the street or roadway. He further said, HPD is not going to do, excuse me, HPD is going to do as much public education as they can. We want people to understand that this is for their safety and to increase situational awareness. So I think that's a good point. I further said, so that when people take responsibility for being safe on the roads, road safety is a shared responsibility for everyone, whether they're a pedestrian, a driver, or a bicyclist. And the last thing I said that, do you have any comments about this bill outside of the questions I've written here? And he said, the bill is not about enforcement, but about awareness, education and safety. The National Highway Safety Administration has noted substantial increases in pedestrians killed using cell phones over the last several years and now specifically track cell phone accident statistics. And that's one of the things that the person from Queens also said is look at the data. So I did look at the data and I have not been able to tell there's a direct correlation between accidents and pedestrians in the crosswalk using cell phones or any electronic device. We clearly have statistics. The National Safety Council in 2016 had 1.6 million crashes and of those 330,000 injuries are from drivers who text. That's a glaring statistic, but that's about drivers. That's not about pedestrians. The council also cited that the age group of distracted drivers is the age group of 20 years or younger, well certainly 20 years to 16. Three types of distracted drivers according to the council are the visually distracted. These are the people that take their eyes off the road, either looking at their cell phone or they're looking at somewhere else or they're looking at their passenger while they're driving. Then we have manual distraction. That's your hands off the wheel driver. It either takes one hand off or both hands off either putting on makeup or grabbing a coffee or perhaps grabbing something to eat or just grabbing the phone and taking a quick look. And then there's the cognitive distracted driver. And that driver tends to be someone who's very, very emotionally distressed, stressed out and their heads just not in the game when they get in that car and they get on the road. We touched upon this type of driver when we discussed about a month ago regarding road rage on our Hawaiian streets. So how can you legislate people that have their heads in the cloud? How can you legislate for people that just aren't based in reality and the reality of being safe and crossing a busy, busy street? And how do you properly legislate that? And I've got a screenshot here for you. You can't. People will do what they do. And I don't know if there is sufficient legislation that will take effect for those that are not paying attention and they're just like chickens crossing the road, just trying to get to the other side and they'll get there or they won't. I think most people are pretty conscientious when they cross the crosswalk because it's dangerous out here and I think most are very, very concerned about that. I want to play a video here. I went on the street and asked some people just outside our studio what they thought about Bill 6. So we'll put that on for you. Yeah, I think it's too much. OK, tell me why because a lot of people share your thoughts. Yeah, I mean just because you have a cell phone in your hand doesn't mean that you're not paying attention to the light or when it's going to end. Who knows that both of you don't wear a watch? You use your cell phone as your primary source of telling time? Right, but normally we don't want to. Normally we can control the time. We don't like look at the time when we're walking, so. I see the point, like trying to be more safe, but I think I agree to my friend, like if it's like just have a cell phone on hand, just don't give it a ticket, I think that's unfair. Do you think the law should focus more on the driver who's using his cell phone while he's driving? Yeah, I think so because they get to control better than the pedestrian. And a pedestrian doesn't hit a car. A car hits the pedestrian. What would you say would be an improvement to the pedestrian law? What would you suggest? I think if everybody do their part, it would be better. So like people follow, like if it's not working sign, people should not walk in the pedestrian. I think that's pretty much. What do you think? Yeah, I agree with him actually. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, gentlemen, thanks for sharing your thoughts and I appreciate it very much and keep your cell phones in your pocket. Okay, well, that wasn't too atypical of the responses I've gotten on the street. And excuse me, the bottom line is it's gonna be a reality on October 25th. So this did not pass completely with everyone on the city council. There were two people that did not vote for it. One was council member Ernie Martin and one was Ann Kobayashi. And what Ernie Martin said was the following. Given the issues that Honolulu faces, such as the homeless in our rail project having a $3 billion deficit, there are more pressing matters that I prefer for us to focus on. He further said, I've always been careful not to introduce legislation for issues that could be addressed through other means. Teenagers are more influenced by their peers. A social media campaign would probably be more expansive than any legislation we pass. So that's what's his rationale and that's also the rationale I've heard about it from others is that we've got bigger problems here. We've got problems that pale in comparison, particularly with the $3 billion shortfall of rail. And the comments I've heard is, why are we doing this? Well, in defense of bill six, I'll go back to the point that people are being hit. The are being maimed and the medical costs associated with their care to the end of their life is a substantial amount. Thousands, if not a million or more, that we as taxpayers are gonna have to bear the cost of. And the bottom line is we gotta start somewhere. So that's in support, at least coming from me. Mayor Caldwell said on CNN, sometimes I wish there were laws we did not have to pass that perhaps common sense would prevail, but sometimes we lack common sense. Okay, so it's a common sense law bill. So I have to ask the question, because that's just my nature, I just have to ask the question. We have 997,000 peoples on this island. As per the last census, about 405,000 residents in Honolulu proper. Who's we? That statement makes it kind of sound like none of us have common sense. We're in actuality, maybe just a few people don't have common sense. And I go back to the point is can you legislate a whole bag full of laws trying to prevent those who just have little or no common sense. Now again, this bill probably is focusing on younger folks and no one wants to see them hurt. So maybe this will be a reminder to anyone who is younger and can't seem to put the cell phone in their pocket. And perhaps this bill will be a reminder. I hope that this law will actually get to the target market that it is intended to reach. And as you heard from the sponsor of the bill, Councilman Elefante, he talked initially to high school folks. So not gonna pick on high schoolers, but it is a demographic that this law is gonna wanna focus in on. So I can go on, but I got a lot of comments from the internet regarding things that I probably don't even wanna mention because they weren't very kind comments. So I'll ignore that. And I'll just say we'll conclude our discussion. I'd like to hear from you. If you had an opinion about this bill one way or the other, please contact us. We'll show that again. I'd also like to announce that September 5th, I will not be on the show. I'm gonna take a little sabbatical. And we will have Maria Tome. She's gonna fill in for me and carry on Hawaii moving forward. So that is Hawaii moving forward. I'm Tim Apachella and thank you for joining us. We'll see you again. Aloha.