Latest / The One Oʻahu Podcast with Mayor Rick Blangiardi / Mayor Blangiardi on the holiday season, HNL 311, and the 2025 Hawai'i Bowl

Transcript

Mayor Blangiardi on the holiday season, HNL 311, and the 2025 Hawai'i Bowl · The One Oʻahu Podcast with Mayor Rick Blangiardi

0:14
Welcome to the One Oahu podcast.
0:16
I'm your host, Brandi Higa, and today is Thursday, December 11th, 2025.
0:21
We're back this week with Mayor Rick Blangiardi for the final time.
0:25
Why is it the final five?
0:27
Well, you know, we've said
0:29
when we've done this throughout the year how quickly the weeks seem to pass.
0:33
I swear,
0:35
this fastest year of my life.
0:37
As I sit here and look at you, brandi, there's a Christmas tree behind you and I.
0:40
And we've been in the Christmas mode for the last couple of weeks.
0:43
We've had five parades last week, and the Hale's been decorated.
0:47
It really is just this.
0:49
This has been an amazing year and one that I'm really proud of.
0:53
I feel like we really shifted gears
0:55
and we can talk about that today, but it's just amazing,
0:59
how fast time goes by and and you know, the 25 has been a good year.
1:03
Well, with that said, you know,
1:04
the last time we sat down with you, we haven't talked about Thanksgiving.
1:08
Like you mentioned, you've walked in a bunch of parades where each year.
1:11
So let's catch up.
1:12
Okay.
1:13
How did you spend Thanksgiving and what stood out to you?
1:16
Well, Thanksgiving, we start off in the morning
1:19
doing something I really feel privileged and really enjoy.
1:21
And it's very.
1:22
In fact, I think after I may, I'm still going to go
1:24
do it is to go over at the Salvation Army at the Blaisdell.
1:27
And, we had a packed house this year.
1:30
And, you know,
1:31
you stand there and a receiving line, you know, meet each one coming through.
1:35
Although this year we had so many people, they divided a subsidy
1:37
quite meet everybody.
1:40
But, you look at the people who come in there
1:43
and you really feel like, boy, this is going to be great for them.
1:46
You know, they look like they haven't had that kind of a meal in a very,
1:49
very long time. But you can see how hard life is.
1:52
You just look at the faces, number of people in wheelchairs, other people
1:55
who are physically handicapped, being assisted by other people.
1:59
You know, it really,
2:01
it really is the people who are down and down and down
2:04
in the situation, down in life and be able to do something like that.
2:07
And the food is so good.
2:08
They do such a good job and there's lots of volunteers there.
2:11
We had hundreds of volunteers to
2:13
to really, you know, fill up that whole place
2:15
and try to get food to people expeditiously.
2:17
But, you know, they were so polite, you know, we had to make some short
2:21
speeches in the beginning, but you could tell
2:23
they're so appreciative of being there by their response.
2:26
And and honestly, you just see all this.
2:28
You walk around, you see the smiles on their faces.
2:31
And I think in that moment, in the spirit of what Thanksgiving is about you,
2:35
you give people more than the food, their dignity and for me,
2:43
I actually get a little emotional about that stuff.
2:45
That to me is, really powerful.
2:48
And so that's so I started the day and then,
2:52
I'm I'm joking because I know we didn't have a parade,
2:54
but it felt like that kind of a little bit of football.
2:57
But then we hosted my wife and I, we hosted 11,
3:01
ten people plus us 12, at the house for Thanksgiving.
3:05
And it really was very, very nice. I didn't do it.
3:07
I used to do the cooking once upon a time, you know, I used to buy
3:10
the turkey, brined the turkey, talk to the turkey, stuffed the turkey.
3:13
I did all of that.
3:14
I haven't done that in a number of years.
3:16
And especially since I've become mayor.
3:18
But it was a very meaningful holiday.
3:21
I want to put my head
3:21
on a pillow that night, getting ready for the quick shift into Christmas.
3:25
I felt like it was a good Thanksgiving, and it was.
3:27
As I said earlier, there's a lot to be thankful for.
3:30
And look at I. I'm not Pollyanna.
3:32
I know life is tough. That's exactly what we're talking about.
3:34
The challenges are seemingly feel greater than ever before.
3:37
And you think about the way this year started off with Ali Amano.
3:40
It's not like we haven't had our challenges.
3:43
I just have just such great confidence in our team, you know,
3:47
and and in full knowledge that,
3:51
you know, we, are getting a lot of stuff done.
3:54
I know the work that's going on.
3:56
It's hard to say all of that.
3:57
You know, sometimes it manifests when we send out
3:59
press releases, sort of like at the moment or after the fact.
4:02
But we,
4:02
you know, when you're in it and you see the stuff and you feel the momentum
4:06
and you see the wheels moving, if you will, you know what's ahead.
4:09
It's very exciting.
4:09
I'm very I'm very confident about the year ahead.
4:12
Yeah.
4:13
I mean, I've been with you
4:14
in this administration from day one and there's
4:16
there's not a lot of opportunities where so many people come to shake your hand
4:20
like they do on Thanksgiving.
4:22
But like you said, this year was a little different
4:24
and this was far more than just a meal.
4:26
This was the first time I saw so many people hug you.
4:28
Yeah.
4:29
People that you didn't know came up to you and hugged you.
4:32
Yeah.
4:34
Yeah.
4:35
It's it's like that, you know, as I said, you give people the dignity
4:38
and show them some respect and so appreciative.
4:41
And I think these are people who who get very little.
4:44
And as a result of that, probably ask for very little,
4:47
trying to just survive.
4:49
And this is where I was raised.
4:50
It's about as powerful as it gets, you know,
4:52
I think feeding people used to say that when I was on the food bank
4:56
for all those years is I don't think there's
4:57
anything more noble than to feed somebody who's really hungry.
5:00
But you get into a situation like that on a holiday, and you allow them to feel
5:04
like they're having a holiday, in addition to everything else that's going on
5:08
in the way they're treated.
5:08
Because actually the Salvation Army, they make sure
5:10
and volunteer all the volunteers.
5:12
I, I want to give a shout out, I don't know any of them, maybe a couple. I
5:16
those people come with the right
5:17
frame of mind, you know, they really were they're in a similar mind,
5:21
you know, to to make these people feel as good as they could.
5:24
Let that kind of outpouring of, of, of love and respect
5:29
is, you know, it's just it's it's very powerful.
5:32
That's I think that's the spirit of the holiday, you know.
5:35
And so that's really a nice thing and a shout out to the Salvation Army.
5:38
I mean, there are partners in this, but these, you know, these folks,
5:43
are genuine as far as in caring
5:46
for people and can't do anything but respect that.
5:49
So it's all good. Yeah.
5:50
But like you said, kind of a quick turn in 24 hours to celebrate Christmas
5:55
with the opening ceremony for Honolulu City Lights.
5:58
Well, actually, you know, the day before we put the star in the tree,
6:01
which is unusual, is on present because Thanksgiving came so late this year.
6:04
So we kind of were having Christmas and Thanksgiving.
6:07
So cheers.
6:08
Even though I think we carved out Thanksgiving
6:09
and everything we just discussed in some way.
6:11
But here we were, we had the Christmas tree
6:13
competition downstairs, which was really robust this year.
6:16
I mean, I think every year we've been here,
6:19
it seems like it's getting more and more competitive and kind of fun.
6:22
I think that's really good for the
6:23
for the various departments that compete with each other.
6:26
But the end result was the probably looks beautiful.
6:30
And add to that.
6:31
So so we do this Thanksgiving and next, you know, like I said, we turn around
6:35
and we're doing a parade and it's Christmas all of a sudden in Hawaii. Kai.
6:40
Sorry. Morning.
6:42
Oh, and, where we're from, I went from Happy Thanksgiving.
6:47
You know, my house and all the other people were greeting.
6:50
And those receiving wise to say Merry Christmas seemingly within hours
6:53
of each other. But that's what happened.
6:56
Like you mentioned, you did top the tree, though,
6:57
and this year you did so with our City employee of the year, Kevin Kelly, on.
7:01
Yeah, the fire department.
7:03
Yeah. So I'll tell you about him.
7:04
Well, the thing about Kevin is he's twice as big as me. Yes.
7:07
The first thing he you know, I used to think I was kind of a big guy.
7:11
I felt
7:13
I felt really small.
7:16
In fact, we took a picture together.
7:17
Everybody said, wow, how big is that guy?
7:19
You know, but, he's a he's a massive human being.
7:22
He looks like you'd be an all star, you know, all pro starting tackle for you.
7:26
Name the team in the NFL.
7:28
Great personality.
7:30
And I've known Kevin anyway.
7:33
And I'm really very pleased to see him because you have
7:36
a man of that size or whatever, but also very good, good people.
7:40
And, kind of, and a very, very good firefighter.
7:44
So, yeah, it was it was great.
7:46
That was great.
7:48
I felt I felt really secure up there with him.
7:50
I feel like I could have leaned out.
7:52
He could help me with and and stretched as far as I could.
7:55
I wasn't worried about necessarily.
7:56
I, you know, they hook you up, not falling out.
7:59
Although I have to tell you,
8:00
when you go for that bucket, you see all the eyes on you.
8:02
I feel a little bit like maybe it's a little bit
8:04
like people who go to a NASCAR race, like wait for the crash or something.
8:08
I feel like people are.
8:09
Are you going, is he going to fall out?
8:11
It's that kind of sensation, you know?
8:13
But we were able to get up there.
8:14
It actually got the got it on base quickly this time.
8:17
Yeah. Really quick.
8:18
We just nailed it, I think.
8:20
So that was good.
8:21
But, yeah, Kevin was great, and I was, I was really pleased.
8:24
He wanted to come up in the bucket with me.
8:26
Yeah.
8:27
Your daughter and her family came for a holiday.
8:29
The city lights this year. How special was it? It's very,
8:33
I don't see enough of my daughter.
8:36
You know, she's my baby.
8:37
She's 40 years old with four girls.
8:40
Ten, six, four and two.
8:43
I, you know, you watch your child become a woman.
8:47
And all those other episodes that she went through just growing up.
8:50
Right.
8:50
And now you see her in the prime of her
8:52
life, mothering four girls, which is no small task.
8:56
I only had one her, and watched her last week in utter amazement at,
9:01
how her girls are coming along and her mothering, if you will, and all of that.
9:06
But to have them come to City Lights and have them,
9:09
and I want to thank so many people, you know, participate.
9:11
First of all, I had Laura on the stage with me to help light the tree.
9:14
And I know Noah and her just sitting next to me
9:17
on that was, you know, I know for her made her feel very proud.
9:20
But they're in the front row of the four girls and her husband
9:22
all looking up adoringly, like, look at mom, you know?
9:26
And then when all of that was done, we were able to go back
9:30
because we had to get into the parade and get whisked on these,
9:34
these ATVs, you know, down with the lights go on,
9:38
and the police and whatever down the side streets, some of which were shut off.
9:41
So weren't they were cutting crew, they were holding up traffic
9:44
that it of itself was, you know.
9:45
Yeah. As a little kid. That's so cool. Yeah.
9:47
They were like like like I know the whole thing was so surreal for them.
9:52
And then when we got to the parade, which was a great parade, it always is.
9:56
They.
9:56
Mike Gangel I've had the trains this year
9:58
and they had reserved a, you know, a, cabin for, for them.
10:02
And so all six of them were able to get in this and ride in that parade.
10:07
And it's amazing.
10:08
Even the two year old was like, I know you took pictures.
10:11
And I really appreciate that. Was waving the whole time.
10:13
And I know that.
10:14
I mean, I know the kids have never been in the parade before.
10:19
I know enough about their lives now.
10:20
They're so young as opposed to watching parades.
10:23
And I think that also in and of itself,
10:25
especially a Christmas parade, and especially that one,
10:28
which is so much fun and intimate because the people are literally
10:31
on top of you, because the narrowness of the streets,
10:34
it doesn't really open up till we hit Bishop Street.
10:35
It gets a little bit wide coming there.
10:38
And my daughter, to her credit, because she's followed on Instagram
10:41
where she can see this,
10:42
where she, you know, and one of these days you have to teach me how to look at it.
10:46
I have no idea what you people put on there, but I think that any thing
10:51
that they thought what might happen could happen, did.
10:55
And and that added so much to it all for me,
10:59
to have family here and be able to do that.
11:01
We recently launched our channel 311 app.
11:04
You talk all the time about taking the city into the future.
11:07
Why was that so significant?
11:09
Well, you know, first of all,
11:10
you know, it's kind of an extension of a lot of things here in a sense,
11:14
why we've done town halls, 29 of them, in the last several years.
11:17
I do a weekly radio show.
11:19
We try to be as transparent as we possibly can and reaching out to the people.
11:23
And I've said often on that radio show,
11:25
sometimes people call in with small problems. We get small wins.
11:28
We can address something because there's just so much
11:30
right in all of our neighborhoods and all those places.
11:33
This is that on steroids.
11:35
This is, you know, any resident anywhere can let us know about, you know,
11:40
something that needs fixing, if you will, for want of a better way
11:44
or a concern or whatever that was already in place.
11:47
But why I'm so proud of this is it wasn't working well.
11:50
The concept sounded great.
11:52
It's like a good plan, badly executed, you know?
11:55
And thanks to Brian McKee, his leadership and the team over there,
11:58
they took a good concept.
11:59
It was being badly executed.
12:01
And we're paying an outside vendor
12:03
hundreds of thousands of dollars to do that.
12:05
And it wasn't working.
12:06
The concept was good, but it wasn't working.
12:08
They took that and said, no, we can make it work.
12:11
And they kind of revised the whole thing, built it from the ground up,
12:13
and we don't have to pay a consultant anymore.
12:15
And now made it very user friendly, including
12:18
if people were willing to put down their email addresses, a response back,
12:22
which is the other part of it. People would send that stuff in.
12:25
Nothing ever happened.
12:26
They figured like a waste of time, right? Was no.
12:28
So the fact that this thing now has become two way, if you will,
12:33
it also will coalesce, coordinate
12:36
if there's multiple things on one thing to help pinpoint,
12:39
you could actually get in there and detailed mapping.
12:42
So sometimes I, I know, I know from the radio shows people call in
12:46
and they'll say something and of those are going to say where is that.
12:49
Can you, you know, that kind of thing.
12:50
And so I'm so proud of that, that they took something
12:54
that was a good concept, not being well executed and said, no,
12:57
we can make this a great concept, well executed.
13:01
And I think that's where we are right now.
13:02
It's just all brand new happening.
13:03
I don't know, I haven't gotten any updates or whatever, but I think the end result
13:07
is what I'm really hopeful for is this will allow us to be more efficient.
13:11
You know, I was in the back yards the other day.
13:13
Welcome you guys.
13:14
I was on holiday Monday morning to welcome them.
13:17
And one of the things we talked about, one of the guys that they acknowledged
13:21
is Gino Bono, and my mom is a good director
13:25
and, deputy director of facilities and maintenance.
13:28
They hired 60 people this year and I gave 30 promotion.
13:31
So now my goal for them was 90.
13:34
They got to 60.
13:35
It's not an easy job market and gave up 30 promotions.
13:38
And we're going to continue hiring.
13:40
I'm proud of that because those guys you go to a big show in the morning
13:45
and these guys are in their work clothes and you look at who's there.
13:48
He's a hard guy. I mean, these guys work hard.
13:50
You know, they clean the street, they do all this stuff.
13:53
That kind of work is exhausting to begin with.
13:56
Once upon a time, when I was a young man, I did work like that.
13:58
And crazy summer jobs and everything else, you know, to, you know and realize
14:03
at the end of the day, you've really worked
14:06
well when they were short staffed.
14:08
A lot of things happen, right?
14:09
One stuff doesn't get to, they can't get to stuff.
14:12
There's that feeling of overwhelm if they're going out and cruising,
14:15
they know they need 1 or 2 more guys
14:17
that wouldn't really help them, but they don't have that.
14:19
And that went on for an extended period of time.
14:22
You know, it's tough, you know, especially when you're working hard physically.
14:25
So we're not there yet.
14:28
But we've come a long way because that's 60 this past year is on.
14:31
You know we lost some. There's some in and out.
14:33
But you know, we hired a bunch a year before
14:36
I mean, so we're trying to fully staff up
14:40
our facilities and maintenance to kind of correlate, if you will,
14:43
that we're not going to get to every year because it's so massive, right?
14:46
I mean, the city, so many different things.
14:49
But it's going to
14:50
allow us to be more effective and better serve the public.
14:53
And so we're not hiding behind any excuses.
14:56
Well, we don't have the budget. You know, we can.
14:57
We've made hiring a priority.
14:59
We've made streamlining the HR process a priority.
15:02
And this is true in Parks and Rec and elsewhere.
15:05
I mean, we've really beefed up our parks direct staffs to to try to take better
15:08
care of the 305 parks we have out there and the pools and all the other stuff.
15:13
So we're trying to hire people,
15:15
create manpower, if you will, to do those kinds of jobs.
15:19
Really, quite honestly, that goes to paving paving streets
15:22
and everything else that goes right into what people see and they feel.
15:26
And I think that, the feedback I get is not that
15:30
I get that much feedback, but I think, you know, directly from people.
15:33
But from time to time, I'm always appreciative of that, of that
15:37
random compliment when somebody says, wow, the guys actually came out and fix.
15:41
It's almost like in disbelief, right?
15:43
And so that's what we're trying to do, is build that capability into our workforce
15:48
where we can address it.
15:49
So the 311 thing really dovetails into that beautifully,
15:52
because you can also establish priorities sometimes, you know,
15:55
I mean these guys oftentimes are having to react
16:00
not respond sometimes to emergency situations,
16:02
whether they're flooding or different things like that.
16:04
You know, it's always that kind of a deal.
16:06
This gives them a chance to maybe plan out their work patterns better
16:10
and be able to address things and, and get to locations
16:13
with the proper manpower, proper equipment and all that stuff.
16:16
So I just think it's the evolution of stuff.
16:18
But I love the fact we can embrace technology much.
16:21
As for us and how we serve, but for the public to feel this, it means
16:25
and that's going to carry over to DMV and what we're doing there.
16:29
We've already made a lot of progress with respect to licensing.
16:31
We got things to work through with respect to registrations that is coming.
16:35
That's happening
16:36
with going through a complete revamp of I have to be candid with you.
16:40
I you know, you know, we do the skip level meetings.
16:42
I've been over there to meet with them.
16:43
I've gone through and we have a very good director and Kim Oshiro over there. And,
16:49
but I've gone through and looked at the archaic systems they're working with.
16:53
You know, as Brian Mickey would say, it was a great director.
16:56
People don't have to suffer like that in their work, you know?
16:59
So I'm excited about that.
17:01
And we're going to continue on that push and I.T
17:04
and manpower from the data we now where we are now.
17:09
So when we walk out of here, because the labor that goes on
17:12
the city is very intensive and as what I've really grown to appreciate,
17:16
and you need people to do that kind of work.
17:20
Similarly, DPP now has SIV
17:23
check the I tool the UTS in your state of the city address.
17:26
But the permit issue kind of all these issues really that you're mentioning
17:30
are issues that took many administrations to create, but you're trying to fix in.
17:35
Yeah.
17:36
You know, I don't know if they create the situations
17:37
or they just didn't do anything about it.
17:39
You know, I think, you know, in the court of, you know, I'm not a lawyer.
17:43
So but, you know, they talk about, tort cases
17:46
and they talk about acts of commission and acts of omission.
17:50
And they always say that the acts of omission
17:52
are far more egregious than the acts of commission.
17:55
Okay. And that's what we're dealing with.
17:56
We're dealing with a lot of stuff that should have been addressed.
17:59
I did a I did a, a show earlier this week, as you saw.
18:03
And, and I referenced it as we have multiple holy grails here.
18:07
I mean, I could say other words, but honestly,
18:09
some of the stuff that we're going after was procurement.
18:12
But the whole thing with HRA, all the things that modernize the city
18:15
and and all the other things like fixing DPP, systemically investing the various
18:20
technology, bringing the challenge of bringing the workforce along with that.
18:24
You know, it's one thing to go out and buy hardware, software, it goes state,
18:29
but you got to take huge leaps with your workforce and that takes time.
18:33
So we've made great progress.
18:36
I open up the show today
18:37
talking with you said, I can see I can see the path forward.
18:40
We know we've got plans.
18:41
So if I were to put up on a matrix on where we our DPP,
18:45
you know, and said, okay, for A22 year matrix of, you know, just a
18:50
where are we from 0 to 100 on the technology
18:54
as far as integration right now we're north of 80% on that.
18:57
And that's shift check.
18:59
Now coming on board moves us further into that.
19:01
So we're we're making we're there.
19:03
The workforce is probably about halfway there, maybe a little bit better.
19:07
The good news is most people are really willing.
19:09
There's just a lot to learn and do.
19:11
So I have confidence that we've invested and we had some hiccups.
19:15
I'm not going to say it.
19:16
You buy technology. Nothing's ever perfect.
19:19
We had some things to work through.
19:20
There were some all that stuff operationally integrate
19:23
from an integration standpoint.
19:24
Anybody who's worked in that field in any endeavor knows that.
19:28
But I have a lot of confidence.
19:30
And look, I stay in touch with probably 9 or 10 of the top developers.
19:35
I know the feedback I'm getting from them, and how much things have improved.
19:39
And because we're involved, you know, in a lot of housing news these days.
19:43
Credit to Kevin O'shay and Kat.
19:44
That's our director and deputy directors of of Housing and Land Management.
19:49
The I
19:50
they came out of the woodwork on their own, the American Institute
19:52
of Architects, to talk about how much things have improved.
19:55
I had the solar industry just in here a couple of weeks ago,
19:58
you know, because they under this time because of what's happening fairly
20:01
with the tax credits and all that, just thanking us because the response
20:05
we have to give them and, you know, 60% of our applications,
20:07
some 16 to 18,000 applications, a year were in solar.
20:11
And now they're they're kind of coming to an end of an era.
20:14
We'll see what happens.
20:15
Solid business is not going to go away.
20:17
Just the tax credit, the urgency that it created, the cost savings and so on.
20:21
And and, you know, they were doing a lot of things have been done.
20:24
So, you know, it's easy to be a cynic.
20:26
It's easy to criticize. Yeah things go wrong.
20:28
But if the spirit is there, if the attitudes there
20:31
and if our efforts are to correct what needed to be corrected
20:34
for was the degree of difficulty was substantive,
20:38
then I think, you know, that's why I sometimes lose patience with people,
20:41
you know, have a little bit of patience. Things are already a lot better.
20:43
Are they perfect yet? No, nobody's claimed to be perfect.
20:46
Are we aiming for what I said at the state of the city last year?
20:50
Our endgame here, knowing full well that people the limit of everybody in
20:54
the past was permits.
20:55
Don't know where they are. The cost of that, all that stuff.
20:58
Because time is money.
20:59
And these things, even for a residential homeowner
21:01
who just wants to do a remodel or build a fence or a wall or whatever, that,
21:07
our goal is to be able to say, you can get a permit here,
21:10
whether it's residential, commercial, and any other application that we need
21:13
as fast as anywhere in the country, we're going to get there.
21:16
We're going to get there one before we finish our term.
21:19
I joked, earlier on that thing I did, on spotlight, I said, you know,
21:23
I think I'll throw a parade with I get the Royal Hawaiian Band here.
21:27
I mean, because that's going to be a major achievement because we knew
21:32
we knew that bad enough,
21:34
we came in during Covid, but we knew if we're going to talk about it
21:38
and the impacts economically of Covid,
21:40
but the impact of TPP,
21:45
with respect to its dysfunction at the time
21:48
and what that meant towards giving us any opportunity towards
21:51
an economic recovery was absolutely critical.
21:54
And not the least of which is, you know, the high cost of living we have here.
21:58
Anything we can do to be, think, make more efficient, to keep projects
22:02
and construction going on, and not have unnecessary, costly delays.
22:09
Was really important.
22:11
And, and we're getting that done and I cannot say enough
22:15
about on top of you to your partner Brian Gallagher's or deputy.
22:19
But I've joked about, you know, shouldn't do this
22:22
because he's a very talented, young, smart woman.
22:24
Want to start talking about pound for pound.
22:26
She's tough player.
22:28
But she is I mean,
22:30
and and she's just, determined.
22:33
And I love that.
22:34
You know, I, I said earlier this week, people said, what do you look for?
22:38
You know, when you're hiring people that I talk about, I look for passion.
22:41
You really?
22:41
Because you gotta love what they gotta do.
22:42
Especially if they're taking on a hard assignment.
22:44
I look for authenticity for real people.
22:46
I don't want somebody who could,
22:47
you know, we look for real people who are passionate.
22:50
And then you look for capability.
22:52
And Don certainly brought a great pedigree and, and background.
22:55
She had you know, there are undergraduate and graduate at UCLA in urban planning.
22:59
She got a lot of grief from Hastings.
23:00
She was co-counsel for DBP before, so he had familiarity.
23:05
We're so lucky to have someone like that
23:08
wanting to do this job, knowing full well that for a couple of years,
23:13
several years, it would be a seemingly a thankless job.
23:17
And that's why I've kind of defended her with some of the public criticism
23:21
that's come out,
23:22
some people who just so easy to write negative articles or whatever,
23:25
but even understanding the degree of difficulty
23:28
that somebody was taking on for the good of this place
23:31
and how you internalize that, that's what I feel for our team.
23:35
We talked earlier about internalizing it for the people in the Salvation Army.
23:38
When I see the hard work going on, I see the plans.
23:42
I see the commitment.
23:42
I know the people were here 6 or 7 days a week,
23:45
going home late, all the other things and how they take it upon,
23:48
because I do it with the meetings here and what they're trying to get done.
23:51
You know, I'm not going to anybody cheap shot that.
23:54
You know, I get asked earlier this week what I felt best about this year.
23:57
And I first thing I said to the team, I feel because,
24:01
we got there, I think we've made some adjustments.
24:04
We weren't perfect.
24:05
I think the good news is I feel we've been able to recruit
24:08
and really fill areas where we weren't
24:11
being as effective as we could be with people that could do that.
24:14
So that's across the board.
24:16
And and so when you're coaching, if you will,
24:20
and you feel like there are no missing links and the expectations are up there.
24:24
Okay. And and and you let them know that.
24:26
And the good news is the team that receives that kind of challenge.
24:30
Well, because they all recognize what's at stake.
24:32
And I don't care what the endeavor is, all this stuff
24:35
we just got done talking about facilities and maintenance all the way through,
24:38
you name it, is all really important to this place.
24:42
And that's what I love about, about it.
24:43
I've told everybody,
24:45
no matter how much success they came into these jobs with,
24:47
because most of these people, because that's what we looked for.
24:50
We looked for people with a proven track record of success
24:53
that they understand what success looks like.
24:55
Could they create success?
24:56
Would they have the vision for what could they, you know,
24:59
could they drive their careers to create success, especially in
25:03
a lot of dysfunction is not easy.
25:06
You know, there's a lot of it's it's there's nothing easy about this. So,
25:11
so I, I'm, I'm, I'm confident and,
25:15
their abilities to, to drive, drive to success,
25:18
it's just it's a matter of time and it will bear itself out.
25:22
And I think that in 26 will be even stronger than 25.
25:27
And I talked earlier,
25:27
you know, last year said we're going to shift from planning to execution.
25:31
Yeah. So yeah, it's like that.
25:34
Yeah, I like that you're kind of taken as reflective approach.
25:36
But as we do approach New Year's Eve,
25:38
we also approach the anniversary of that tragedy at Alemanno.
25:42
What's your message to folks this year as we head into these holidays?
25:46
Well, I'm really concerned, you know,
25:48
I don't think we could beg political Joe people into,
25:52
you know, the aerial fireworks is what the issue is.
25:55
You know, it's not about in the carport anymore buying along.
25:58
You know, I can still remember back a number of years ago.
26:01
You go to someone's house on New Year's
26:02
Eve, you drink a beer, and they that thing you hang, you know, fireworks.
26:06
I don't know even how to describe just that long chain of red light.
26:10
Light it off and everybody goes happy.
26:13
That's it.
26:13
Yeah, yeah. And everybody's doing it in the neighborhoods.
26:16
I'm really concerned
26:17
because I know they've confiscated at the docks more than 40 tons this year.
26:22
Okay. Already it is more going on.
26:24
I can't I don't want to talk too much, but I don't want to compromise.
26:27
But that tells me that,
26:30
there was an expectation that, you know, nobody's
26:32
going to pay attention to anything. This stuff is coming in.
26:34
They feel that there's a market for that, right?
26:36
That's a that's a really big red flag for me.
26:38
Even though we've confiscated that contraband, we're going to do everything.
26:42
In fact, later
26:42
today I'm going to be doing a TV show with Chief Eric and Mike Lambert.
26:46
We got a great cooperation on personal cooperation
26:48
with the Department of Transportation on both sides.
26:51
And then between Roddy Vanek and Mike Lambert.
26:54
We're going to have to get into heavy enforcement.
26:56
We're going to be strategic about that.
26:58
This is the we're not going to play any cat.
26:59
Most games about catches catch can I don't want to say more than that, but
27:03
we're just going to beg people and remind people, not just so much on aluminum,
27:08
but we are so prone to, wildfires.
27:13
We're so I go to the West Side all the time.
27:15
You know, that every time I drive out there, I almost say the same thing.
27:18
I look at how dry stuff looks.
27:20
You know, that's a real concern.
27:22
We have a great police department, a fire department, employees.
27:26
We have a lot of resources, but you don't want to have to engage with that.
27:29
And it's really been about the transition from what used to be a cultural thing
27:34
to now these aerial fireworks, which are just out of control.
27:38
In fact, last week when Campbell won the state championship and God bless them,
27:43
you had a lot of aerial fireworks going on.
27:45
Okay.
27:47
And, and that
27:49
tells me that as much as we say, you know, people want to listen
27:54
and we talk a lot about public safety,
27:57
you know, and that always gets heightened when you look at what we had
28:00
just a couple of months ago with the tsunami warning.
28:02
You know, we have an external event is one thing
28:05
that's challenging enough, but I have sort of an internal event.
28:09
You're trying to keep people from hurting themselves in some cases.
28:13
Maybe we don't have another audio mono, but you would never want to think
28:16
that you were party to starting a wildfire that could cost people's lives as well.
28:22
That could be very dangerous,
28:24
or for that matter, destroying other people's property.
28:26
Because this stuff, this stuff is not good for rooftops.
28:29
It's not good for solar panels.
28:30
It could. Such house is on fire.
28:32
We talk about wildfires, could set out.
28:34
There's just a lot of stuff like this.
28:36
We're going to do everything we can.
28:38
We're going to enforce as aggressively as we can, and all we could do is,
28:42
in fact, I'll tell you the other thing, and I think there's going to be a buyback
28:46
they're going to offer, you know, no questions asked.
28:49
But I remember the last time
28:51
that police departments, both the sheriff's office too,
28:54
is that buying that contraband illegal paying for it to say, okay, well,
28:59
this will give you your money back, you know, usually sees contraband, right?
29:03
In this particular case, look, we don't have any loss.
29:05
We're trying to.
29:06
So we're doing everything we possibly can.
29:08
This is just going to have to come down to people being responsible.
29:12
And I pray to God that people haven't.
29:15
I mean, what we learned about erano, this is a bomb in your house.
29:19
If you're storing anything of any kind of whatever.
29:22
I mean, these these are illegal explosives.
29:25
In fact, in the 40 tons of stuff that's been already seized,
29:30
the storage of that is some real concern to and how they're doing that,
29:34
because that is and we've seen that that's happened on Oahu before.
29:38
Where they were kept stuff and people got killed.
29:42
So it's a very dangerous thing we're dealing with.
29:46
And nobody wants to stop people from celebrating.
29:49
But what he wants people to feel, as we talked about here, about the coming year,
29:52
as we as we deal with the challenges in life, hopefully
29:55
instill hope and people we don't want people leaving.
29:59
We want opportunities to present themselves
30:01
when people feel good about where they live.
30:04
But we want to thwart any of that.
30:06
But this has become endangerment.
30:08
It's reckless.
30:09
It's scary because once you shoot that stuff off,
30:12
or even if you know there's a lot of consequences that.
30:17
Come Christmas Eve, Hawaii
30:19
will be playing kill and the horrible returns home on offer.
30:22
Nick Rolovich, what are you looking forward to most?
30:25
Well, I'm looking forward to winning the $100
30:27
bet I made with a guy named Tom Vogel. Hi.
30:28
Oh, no. With the Berkeley. I was going to say it.
30:31
He called me up with all the bravado and I said, you know, I said, how much?
30:35
Because no points.
30:36
I said, no win or lose.
30:38
So he he picked up 100.
30:40
I haven't been on a game in years. So what can I tell you?
30:44
I should keep this in here.
30:44
Well, it's okay if you put it in.
30:46
This is just a friendly, friendly wager. I.
30:48
I'll take it off my my tax.
30:50
My tax fee charges me for doing my taxes, but no, I,
30:55
I look, I think, we went into the season, you and I, talking about more wins.
30:58
The losses did felt it was going to be Timmy's best year yet.
31:02
You know, eight and four.
31:03
But every game other than probably the Arizona game
31:06
early, they they fought really hard.
31:08
And I'm not saying they didn't fight hard in that game that they just that I think,
31:11
you know, sometimes in the season you have you have a loss like that.
31:15
And it's how you deal with that adversity. Right.
31:17
So it was just part of the process.
31:19
Eight and four open up beating Stanford now going to play Cal.
31:22
You know marquee teams with a local kid was a star quarterback
31:27
with a former head coach who's now had this at least
31:30
the interim opportunity to coach in the game.
31:32
It's storybook.
31:33
It's going to be a great story, even nationally for ESPN.
31:35
I mean, if I was back in the broadcast booth, there's a lot of anecdotal stuff
31:39
to talk about, you know? And so it's fun.
31:41
I think it's going to add a certain dimension.
31:43
So it's finally all of a sudden I feel like the Hawaii Bowl,
31:46
which I was at last year, I went to it
31:48
and now I'm watching two teams, not from Hawaii was not like the greatest thing.
31:52
You know, I don't even recognize the people in the stands.
31:53
You know, it's it's kind of like it was odd, but I was there on a support for it.
31:59
But I'm, I'm, I'm really a look at what's happened in 25
32:02
and 20 has come in that Elliott came in who I was really strong in support
32:06
of being the ad to me, he has a good football season.
32:09
There's been other indicators there.
32:11
And now all of a sudden
32:12
the Hawaii Bowl, which really was on life support locally, candidly speaking.
32:16
I mean, I think it was a lot of a lot of money being bet out there.
32:19
The ESPN ones just dropped this game.
32:21
They didn't want to drop the game, you know, and I and I
32:23
you know, I've talked with them.
32:25
But you know the relevance suddenly now this thing which is such a treat,
32:29
not only is Hawaii returning to play in a post-season bowl game,
32:32
but we've got this incredible sort of rivalry, if you will.
32:36
Or interest,
32:39
this is very cool.
32:40
It's, I'm, I'm pleased because, look, I love the game,
32:43
and I know that the game is so good for this place.
32:46
When things go, when football's going, it's magic, okay?
32:49
And I feel like that's kind of come back.
32:51
And that was just one more positive thing we needed to have happen.
32:55
And it happened some really, really pleased about it, you know.
32:59
And I'm going to win that bet.
33:02
I hope you do. What you do.
33:03
Well I'm here.
33:04
This is the one. Oh podcast.
33:05
So for one final.
33:06
Thought well I look I think this whole thing Brad,
33:09
has been about, feeling thankful and respectful for the year we've had.
33:13
And that extends all the way to everybody who lives here.
33:16
We know, we know that life is not easy,
33:19
and a lot of people sacrifice to stay here.
33:21
And, I just want everybody to,
33:24
you know, enjoy this holiday season with their family and their friends.
33:28
Remember the spirit of the season.
33:30
Keep hope.
33:31
We're doing everything we can to make it better,
33:34
and have a lot of confidence about the road ahead.
33:36
And I just want everybody to feel that way
33:38
about the people responsible for leading the city.
33:40
So Merry Christmas, everybody.
33:43
Opinion.
33:44
And next week we'll sit down with ocean safety Lieutenant
33:46
Ryan Muniz, his four year old son Hunter Moniz,
33:50
and the woman they helped save after she needed CPR on Kaneohe Bay.
33:53
That's next week right here on the One or Who podcast.
33:56
Mahalo for listening. And until next time, Aloha.