ThinkTek Hawaii, civil engagement lives here. Okay, and welcome to another edition of Hawaii in Uniform, I'm your host Calvin Griffin. And for those of you who may or may not have seen the program before here, we deal with veterans' military information. And we also show the interaction between the veterans and the military with the local community. We're going to hit the ground running this morning. We have two special guests. One is Pastor Bill Payne and also we have Mr. Rod Boucher who's going to join us in a few minutes. But for right now, Pastor Bill, I mean Pastor Payne, good afternoon or good morning. How are you doing today? Yes, good morning Calvin. I'm doing fantastic. Thank you for having me on your show. Great, yeah. I just want to let you know, the viewing audience know what organization you're with and you're with the, I'm sorry, with the Seventh Day Adventist? Yes, yes. Okay. I am the pastor for the Honolulu Central Seventh Day Adventist Church. Right. I know that there's something coming up, but there's a lot of activities out there to help the veterans in many different ways. But in August, there's something that's coming up that I understand that you want to let the community know what's going on. And you can tell us a little bit about that, sir. Yes. Thank you for the opportunity to share this. I was looking for a way in which we can serve our veterans as well as our homeless community. Those who are underinsured and uninsured. And this idea of doing a free clinic was brought to me. And this free clinic includes dental, medical, and vision. And so we know that it's difficult for our veterans to receive dental care because it's so expensive and many of them do not pay to get that done. And so this is one area that we are able to serve them. We know that the medical, they're able to go and get and sometimes vision as well. But this is a program that we wanted to do for veterans as well as our homeless population. Those are uninsured and underinsured. So we are going to set up about 15 dental stations where extraction will be taken place, cleaning will be taken place. And we are partnering with local dentists as well as some will be coming in from mainland. The organization that we're doing this with is called AMEN, Adventist Medical Network, Evangelism Network, I'm sorry, Adventist Medical Evangelism Network. And they have done this in American Samoa. They've done it on different places in mainland. They have serviced over 30,000 people. And it is a networking of doctors, dentists, optometrists, nurses, and local people who want to serve the community. All right. I know that you put out a call for volunteers in the medical field. Can you tell us a little bit more about that, sir? Yes. So we have a website that medical people, dentists, doctors, nurses, and optometrists can go on and they can register. And by registering, we do want them to register. By registering, then they will be protected under the liability insurance policy that we have. And so it's a malpractice coverage. But the website is www.amenfreeclinics.org. And if they go on that website, they can register as a volunteer. And they will look at the Honolulu location and they will see that on that website. And they can go through and do their registration. So that is amenfreeclinics.org. And so we're looking for people who are willing to be counselors, willing to translate, people who are social workers, people who want to do some counseling, lifestyle counselors. And also ministers and clergy. We invite anyone and everyone to come by. We're looking at 250, 300 people per day. And we want to service these individuals as best as we possibly can. And this is over four days. This will be August 23, which is a Thursday, and 24, a Friday, and then 26 and 27, which is a Sunday and Monday. Besides medical personnel, what other volunteers do you need? People like interpreters, people, individuals who are bilingual, that would help assist? We do have a large, let's say, a Micronesian community. We have a good Spanish community. We have different places, of course, here in Hawaii. We have a beautiful mix of Polynesian people and Japanese and Korean. And so we do invite anyone who have that need and who to come. And so we'll need, if they do not speak English really well, then we would need to have interpreters. So if they're those who want to come by and they dedicate four hours, or maybe a full day, we're going to be open from eight to four, and we just wanted to serve. Also, the Salvation Army will be bringing their big truck with donations, with items that people can peruse through and get clothing and different things that they might need. We have in the Hawaii vision, they're going to be bringing their big truck and their vision center. They're going to be here, and there are others who serve the veterans. We're going to have a number of booths set up where as people are waiting to be served or they have been served, they can walk around and go to different places where they can get additional services. Great. Okay. Pastor, what we're going to do, we're going to do a follow-up program on this, help to get the information out. Of course, you have a lot of different sources that are willing to help. But we'll be back in touch with you if you'd like to come and join us on a program. We'd love to have you. But for right now, could you just give us your number one more time? And so our viewers can give me calls to see what they can help to assist. My office number is<PHONE_NUMBER>. And the website to go on is www.amenpreclinics.org. Great. Okay. Well, Pastor, thank you very much. Of course, it's going to help a lot of people out. And it just, of course, goes to show the spirit of giving here in the state of Hawaii, and also those who are helping to support our military and veterans. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Mr. Griffin, and we look forward to seeing you soon. Great. Okay. Give them a call. There's so much to be done over here. Thanks. Spirit of Aloha as well, and good and all that good stuff in here. Speaking of Aloha. Aloha. Rodney. Thank you for coming on the program. Thank you for having me.  A little bit about yourself in here. I know that you're a former military also. Yes. 24 years in the Navy, retired Master Chief. Took me from ships, submarines, NATO, special operations, naval special operations support. And then I had my last three and a half years here on beautiful Oahu, and met my wife, and that sealed the deal on staying here. Okay. Here on the program, Leo, would you talk about trying to enlighten people to some of the things that the veterans and the military are involved in as far as with the communities? And of course, the one big thing that you're involved in is with the Red Cross and also with the CERT program, which is the Community Emergency Response Team. Could you tell my viewers a little bit about that and how they could benefit from your knowledge? The Red Cross is everywhere. The Hawaii State Chapter has been very active. I've been involved with the Red Cross for my entire career, working as a water safety lifeguard, and then also my day job as communications electronics for the Navy. We were always involved with the Red Cross. That led me into here when I decided to stay here. I got more involved with the Red Cross working at the shelters that we open up for hurricanes, natural disasters, or whatever. And then now logistically, we're shipping a lot of stuff off to the big island that they need in support, of which I wanted to thank you for being there yesterday and loading in your sweat equity. It's a first aid kit. You might have needed it yesterday. But today it's for helping us yesterday load up a container that is being shipped off to the big island for their support for the Red Cross over there. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it. The Red Cross led me into CERT, which is Community Emergency Response Team Training, which was discussed before. And it is involved with giving people enough knowledge base to help themselves in reference to them and their families first, as much knowledge as possible ahead of time. Then you help your community as best as you can and you build your teams off of that. There are multiple teams of volunteers in the community. Many of them are military veterans. We discussed a little bit more about the schools, the Manoa and UH West Oahu's student veterans. But the CERT program is something that everybody can get involved. It's free. It's 20 to 22 hours of training that is given via the Department of Emergency Management CERT teams. I'm one of the Leeward coordinators and then there's other coordinators throughout the island of Oahu as well as for the other islands, which are active on Kauai and the Big Island now due to the situations with the flooding and the lava flows in the earthquakes. I know one thing that's coming up right now, RIMPAC, which happens every two years. So you're involved in that also and also with the CERT teams coming on as role players as far as with the victims. The RIMPAC exercise has been very generous as far as the medical side, the medical reserve core, something that ties into the past or earlier. And we're working with the Leeward CERT program as well as the Windward CERT program. We're working with RIMPAC. They're going to provide Medevac for some of our survivors, our role players, our CERT team members. We're going to have exercises at different parks. And we're going to do a CERT triage of our medical survivors. And then the Medevacs come in and take them to the location for RIMPAC. They'll further triage and support them. And then they'll be brought back to our communities, whether Windward and Eva. And then we'll finish out the exercise with them. That's on July 12th. And the public is welcome to come and observe. To catch all, it's from 06 to 0800 in the morning. So it's before traffic, it's too bad. And if you want more information, I can provide you the information for that. About the CERT program, there's, within limits, there's no, within reasonable limits. As far as age, because there's many different skill sets that are needed. Could you talk a little bit about that also as far as... What we try to tell people or what's part of the mandate is there's a job for everybody that's available. You don't have to be within a certain age group. You don't have to be, it's available for ADA, American Disabilities Act, disabilities. Everybody can have a job in it. You might not be going through a door to help survivors in search and rescue. But you can be helping with the logistics, the administration side of making, keeping track and helping survivors. And that's what CERT does. We're there to help our community. And we primarily are there to help our families and ourselves first, take care of ourselves and our family first. Then you go ahead and help your community, your neighborhoods. And that's what the CERT teams do. They do provide some information in some pamphlets and stuff that are available on Honolulu.gov backslash d-e-m. Lots of good information. It talks about where the CERT training is being held throughout the island of Oahu and of which you've participated and graduated yourself. You survived the CERT training. Speaking of surviving, we're going to have to take a short break. We'll come back. We'll continue. And like CERT is getting as much information as we can about the program. Stay tuned to Hawaii Uniform. We'll be back soon. Hello, everyone. Think Tech Hawaii is broadcasting in Japanese. Hello, Hawaii. I'm Kosto Kunisue Ikari. I'm broadcasting from 2 p.m. every Monday. I'm broadcasting from the Japanese community, the Japanese community in Hawaii, for useful information, news, and stuff like that. Hello, Hawaii. I'm broadcasting from 2 p.m. every Monday. Hello, everyone. I'm Kosto Kunisue Ikari. Aloha. I'm broadcasting from 2 p.m. every Monday. I'm broadcasting from 2 p.m. on Mondays every two weeks on Think Tech. Aloha. You're back with Hawaii Uniform. I'm your host Calvin Griffin. We have Mr. Rodney Boucher, with the CERT team and also with the Red Cross, who's enlightening us on what's happening in the community and how you can join them to make things better. I know one of the things that stress is preparedness the different government programs, even with FEMA, the Red Cross, and also with Homeland Security. That's one thing they do stress as far as being prepared for the unexpected, you know. And one thing here in Hawaii with the different, you know, the melting pot, as you would call it, whatever it is, you know, we do have a lot of people that do want to give back, and so we need many different cultures, cultures, and speaking of which, I'm quite sure, like I said, with all the different activities going on and the different languages, I guess you do also look for or recruit people who are multilingual? Yes, Jeff. Absolutely. Yeah. What you discussed previously, we work with the Foreign Language Service, which is here in Honolulu. They provide linguistic translation skills. They've been to our cert training, and they've provided us with facets to help develop the different language barriers or break down the barriers so that the training can continue in other people's normal language if English is not their first language or second language. What we do try to do, I'm a volunteer with the Eva Emergency Preparedness Committee, and we started back in 2011 when a wind shear effect took down all our power in Ava Beach for, in some cases, 48, 72, 96 hours, and that created a vacuum as far as need. And what we did, we worked with the Department of Emergency Management, and we did with the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, and we come up with different things. The main thing is you make a plan, you build a kit, and you stay informed. When you make a plan, we ask people to make an emergency plan. This is available at that site at honolulu.gov.dem, and it's available throughout different agencies, HawaiiEmergencyManagement.gov, as well. And that's what it does. It gives you a chance to make a plan where you have all your contacts for all your family. People at work, people at school, people at home, people in transit. So you write down all the information. You write down where, if you have an emergency at home, where do you meet? Outside the home, away from the danger. If you're spread throughout the island, then you go and you have a certain focal point. It talks about the fact that the cell phones will probably be inundated, which they were last year for the tropical storms, as well as even sooner, as far as what's happened with the big island, et cetera. So we talk about having an out-of-state contact that you can work with, which happened to us with the earthquake on the big island back in 2006, I believe, and it knocked out power here. I was on a Hawaiian air flight stuck on the rampart. My wife was in baggage claim for five hours. We communicated through my sister in Arizona, because even though we were 200 yards apart or less, we couldn't talk to each other. So it's very important to build that plan and practice that plan as the other part of that. A lot of people, unfortunately, are not really aware of what could happen when communication goes down. It's very stressful. And I know earlier you mentioned about being part of a search team, which you want to do is take care of your family first. The thing is, it's not being selfish. The thing is alleviating the stress on those who are trained to try to go ahead and serve the others in the community. But I think that one of the things is that with the, again, being prepared, because some of us are maybe fortunate enough to be able to have different storage, emergency things on hand anyhow, but for those who are not, what it is when you are prepared with your family and yourself and you have those things on hand, is less of a stress on the system when people who really can do need it anyhow. We are on an island of over a million plus, including our visitors when they come in. There is very functionality now that I've been dealing with some logistics issues. It's very hard for me to think about having enough supplies that last for any long-duration situation. The situation in Kauai or the Big Island are the perfect examples this year of what can happen and what you need to build on. We ask people to have two weeks of preparedness items and you start with one day's item with one person. To deal that, you have to plan for water and food and you work off of that. If I do one person per gallon of water, this container holds six gallons. It's 50 pounds when it's full and there's certain things you want to do to make sure, but you can put tap water in it, fill it up and that's your six day supply for one person. If you have two, three, four people in your family, you need to plan for that against the timeline of instead of six days, you might have three days. If you have enough of these containers, you don't need to go out and buy cases and cases and cases of bottled water. But if that's what you do, that's what you do. The thing in reference to being prepared is you make sure that you and your family are safe first. When your family feels safe, if you are gone and you feel satisfied that the air can support themselves, that is the key issue in what everything we do, whether it's Red Cross, they say the same thing as CERT does, as any Hawaii EMA, Hawaii Emergency Management, Previous Civil Defense or FEMA, they always say that you have to take care of your family first. One thing about enlightening or informing people, the sooner you train them, the better often. I know that you, before, make sure we have enough time to talk about this, there are programs geared towards the younger groups like children or pre, well, not preschool, but actually, there is not so much preschool, but in, we do presentations to cake eat at the different schools. And one of my favorite jokes is that I bring this out. This is the front pages within a phone book. And the question always comes up from the kids is, what's a phone book? In today's world, social media-wise, it's different. But for the people that still remember what a phone book is, the information is there, and if you still get a phone book, then please take it and use it and be aware of it, that it's disaster preparedness guide. It has a lot of good information, contacts, emails, phone lines, and where to call for more information. It's always available. We do a lot of programs with the Red Cross. They have Red Cross clubs. And CERT is also doing that within high schools. We work with the JROTCs, the different civic clubs within schools, so that they build their knowledge. If we've learned, or at least I have learned, that if you deal with the children first, the young adults, they will get their parents involved. And that goes into what happens when we have our, when EVA has their preparedness fair on September 8th, if I can plug it. September 8th, Saturday, we have a EVA, get ready EVA preparedness fair. And we will be giving away thousands of dollars of preparedness items, courtesy of our sponsors and our grants. We're a non-profit, and they allow us to give this stuff out for free as well as give the training circumstances. Like the CERT training, Red Cross, CPR, AED training that comes up. We navigate through all the different agencies, and especially Red Cross and Hawaii Heart Foundation, to give out these different training cycles. And one of those is all the stuff is always available online as well to deal with things. There are some great manuals, booklets that are available throughout the community. Hawaii Electric has a great preparedness guide. I'll bring it out here shortly. But this is the homeowner's handbook that the UHC grant publicizes. It's online, it's available online, social media, as well as UHC grant. Or UHManoa.edu, and you can link to there. But we saved $400, my wife and I saved $400, using that book to put hurricane clips on our roof to our wall foundation. And once we justified that and showed it and they came out and verified it, we saved $400 on our home insurance. Which is very fundamentally something that everybody should and can look at. Because we immediately used the $400, but it's still good to have that claim to be. As far as preparedness, one thing, I just got to ask this dumb question. With all the visitors that come over here, do you work with the hotels or the tourist industry, like say, to enlighten them to what they need to do, to make sure that, again, that there's not an over where the local populace or the response is not overburdened by the visitors that are here? Yes, throughout the visitors association, they have a committee that deals with preparedness. Of which they were very active, dealing with the Kauai floods. And now with the Big Island. They're working with the hotel industries throughout there. And they work very closely with us through CERT, but primarily through the Department of Emergency Management and the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency. They have a membership into these, both organizations. So that we know that our volunteers, our visitors, are coming here to enjoy themselves. They might not necessarily be coming with 14 day supply or awareness other than hitting the beach or whatever their activities are. So each hotel, the vast majority of hotels, provide this information on their broadcast channels. As well as written information on their doors as well as in their complex as their rooms. And it's always available. And many of the hotels have upgraded since Tropical Scor-Zell. And the circumstances we had from 2016. So it's very beneficial that our hotel industry is working very proactively with the different agencies and community groups. Right. And I would like to say that part of those community groups is our neighborhood boards. Through Oahu specifically, I was a member for five years. And it's very beneficial to have your elected representatives be involved in preparedness. And many of them are. And I'm very thankful for those. Great. Okay, we're getting down to the wire. We got less than a minute in the house. So I give you a chance to go ahead. The contact numbers you want to put out again. Right. If you go to honolulu.gov backslash d-e-m at the website provides a vast majority of information that you that I've put out here, including making a plan. You build your kit information and how to stay informed. And that could be just a little AM FM radio that can be plugged into whatever you need to do. Or it can be your social media contacts outlets. Good. Okay. We'll do a follow-up and quite sure you've got other ways of getting the word out there. But of course, here at Think Tech, we try to do what we can to be more community minded anyhow. But I want to thank you for coming on the program. Definitely. And like I said, you check into the different programs. And I want to thank you for your time. I know you're very busy with the situation and the why.  Well, you were involved with that very much yesterday. And how are you back? Very minimal. I'm fine. If I may, a shout out to the American Red Cross. If you go to that website or just Google American Red Cross, you'll find more information if you wish to volunteer, which the Red Cross always needs volunteers, specifically within your own communities. Okay. We're down to the wire. I think we've got about five seconds left. So we're doing that period of time. Thank you for coming on the program. Thank you for viewing in. Thank you. And God bless until that time.


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It's easy to be depressed and I decided to try to do a show on how not to be depressed because I don't want you to be depressed. Life is too short to be depressed about these things. You got to know what's going on in the world and you got to be willing to fight it in whatever way you can and most of us don't have a lot we can do to fight it. But we have some, you know, whether you listen to the show or you share it or you support the show or you you write letters or you tweet or you do some stuff on Facebook. There's a way in which every one of you can fight and I know many of you do fight and that's great. But that's just one very narrow dimension of life. You don't want to just fight for your survival. You don't want to just fight against the evil and by the way your chances of actually making a change, your chances of actually having an impact on the next election, on the direction the country goes, are small. In the short run we have no influence. In the long run I think we do but in the short run we have no influence. So what do you do? How do you not get depressed? Well I've said this often on the show but it is worth repeating over and over and over and over again because it's worth repeating because it's true and because people people don't seem to take it seriously. The things in life you cannot control and the things in life you can and you've got to separate the two and you've got to realize what is controllable and what is not.  You don't have a big impact. So yes, activism is good. I ran said you know fighting for the future is living in it today.  I think the time for not fighting is over. It's survival mode so you have to fight. So one way in which you can feel better about yourself, your life, your presence on this planet is to fight the bad guys. But again you have to realize that the bad guys is pretty much everybody. Fight evil wherever you see it. So but realize that the impact you're going to have there is minimal to non-existent in the short run. And then try to scope out and it's not a bad idea to make a list.  Yes, the political circumstances impact that. If you're in lockdown, they certainly impacted a lot, but even then from a day-to-day, minute-by-minute basis, you get to control what you do with your time, what you do with your life. So make a list of all those things and then start acting in the areas where you have control over your life. Start acting in ways that maximize your well-being. Maximize your happiness, maximize your ability to pursue your values. I'll give you one example that's related to politics. Some of you live in pretty shitty places.  The world is falling apart around me. No jobs, high unemployment. The world is literally falling apart where you live. This might be in parts of New York right now. It might be Chicago or Detroit or Minneapolis right now. It might be anywhere in California, Los Angeles or San Francisco. So one of the things you should and can do is move. Move. Now I'm not saying you have to move. I'm not saying you should move. But I'm saying you have to, if you value your life, consider moving. Make a list. Pluses and minuses of living in Chicago. And if the minus is not outnumbered, but if the minus is a heavier, a more substantial, a more threatening, a more damaging to your life, then the pluses, you know, maybe families close by or that's where your current job is. But if the minus is a heavier, then move. One of the beautiful things, amazing things about America, one of the things I love about the United States of America is that it's big. Size in some things in life does matter. And the fact that the United States is big matters.  You can move to a completely different place with a completely different vibe, a completely different environment. If you live in Chicago, not only does the weather suck, but there are riots in the streets. If you live in Minneapolis, they're about to dismantle the police. Get out of there. Even if you live in the suburbs of Minneapolis, you know, and if you like the cold, I don't, but if you like the cold, then move to Wisconsin. I don't know, move somewhere that's more rational than Minneapolis. Move somewhere that's just at the margin, better than Chicago. If weather's not that important to you or if you hate the cold like me, then there's some amazing places to move to. You can move to Texas. I mean, people make fun of Texas. Texas is a wonderful place. It's beautiful. There's tons of stuff to do. The people are amazingly friendly. The weather is, except for the summer, is actually pretty good. And the level of freedom is much higher. You don't see the level of destruction, the level of rioting that you see in some cities in America in Texas. Even left the cities like Austin, they're not dismantling the police. And with regard to response to coronavirus, Texas responded much better, still badly, but much better than many other states. So move. Austin is amazing. Houston, you have to really tolerate humidity. San Antonio is even pretty. And Dallas is amazing. Move to Florida. Florida. If you love the beach, you can't go wrong. Move to Tennessee. Memphis or Nashville. The area around Nashville is beautiful, plenty of places to live. And that's, and if you live in California, why are you paying so much taxes? I mean, California is an amazing place. Again, you have to do the plus and the minuses.  Why are you still there? And if you're paying huge amount of taxes in California, I get the weather. There's no place on planet Earth that has better weather than California, particularly Southern California. I get the culture. I get the vibe. I love California. And yet, it's out of control.  It's supposed to be a place that respects science.  So both Arizona is much freer, lower taxes, some beautiful places in Arizona, and some lower taxes and lots of different climates. You can go, you know, Northern Arizona, where it's colder, and you can go Southern Arizona, where it's really, really, really, really hot, but dry. You can go to Nevada, or I don't understand anybody who lives in Nevada, but you can go to Nevada, not pay state taxes, at least. I mean, there are lots and lots and lots of options. It's a big country. You can find anything you want. Just because you were born somewhere doesn't mean that's where you need to stay. Just because you've lived somewhere 20 years doesn't mean that's where you want to stay. You've always got to be selfish. You've got to constantly think about what is good for me. Where will I be happiest? Where can I live the best life that I can? And right now, in the world in which we live right now, place seems to matter. Place seems to matter. Some places are nuttier than others. The madness is out there. It's in the culture and it's going to spread. So you might not be safe for long, but at least for the time that you have, that we all have, to be safe, be in a place where you can really be safe. So take control of your life, in other words. Somebody says, Amy, pick up sleeping California. I live California. Everybody can leave California. I love a lot of people who live in California.  Practice. You know, Sam Harris is very popular and very successful and made a lot of money. A lot of money with his meditation app. And the whole idea of meditation. He's made meditation really, really cool. I don't do meditation. I don't get meditation. That's fine. But I've got nothing against meditation. But what I'm encouraging you to do is deeper than meditation. It's more important than meditation. Spend real time every week thinking about how to make your life better. Thinking about the things you control in your environment and how to make them better.  If you get to the point, you know, where you're old, I don't know, you're in the 80s and you look back. There's nothing, nothing I can think of that's sadder than looking back on your life and saying, I wasted it. I didn't do what I wanted to do. I didn't live up to my expectations. I let the political reality cause me to be depressed for decades. And I, I just was depressed. The vast areas of your life you have control, including where you live. And you might come to the conclusion you want to leave the United States. That is not heavisy. There might come a time where you figure that, I don't know, New Zealand is better. Australia, or, I don't know, Georgia, the country, Tbilisi, is better and you move. That needs to be part of your consideration. And that relates to the politics, the environment in which you live. Find an environment that's more, and you know, you don't have to make a decision.  And that's the second thing. Career is in your control. Where you live is in your control. So it's career. Career in a sense is more important than where you live. But again, in the world in which we live right now, maybe, maybe where you live becomes very important because literally your life is where your life, just physically, you're being threatened. So yeah, somebody says, vote with your feet. Yeah, vote with your feet. But think about your career. Step back. Most of us decide on a career at a certain point. Get on a treadmill and go for it. And it's good. Once a year, once a month, once a week to ask the question, is this really what I want to do? Is this the path I want to take in life?  Will I look back and be satisfied with my life? Is this good? Is this good for me? Be selfish in every aspect of your life. So you should think about what you're doing right now. What career you have right now? Is this the career you want? And if it is, go full out. Go for it. Engage with it. Make the most of it. Be the best that you could be in it. Immerse yourself in it. Now, again, even there, there might be a circumstance where, because of the politics, you can't. Well, find a way to do it. Find a way to get it done. I don't know.  Then again, consider moving and opening up a restaurant somewhere else. I know it's hard. I know it's challenging. I know you might not have the funds. You might have to work for a while to get them. You might have to borrow more money. I don't like these things are difficult, but you can't give up. You can't give up on your life, on the meaning of your life. So again, make a list. All the things that you have control over. All the things you have control over. And then optimize those things. Optimize where you live. Optimize what your career is and how you engage in that career. Make it the central purpose of your life. Make it what your life about. Take it super seriously. Engage. Be passionate. Go for it. And then think about what you know. Think about the knowledge you have. And whether in order to be happy and successful and flourish in your life, you need to know more things, different things. And go study. I said at the beginning of this lockdown, it's an opportunity to actually go study. Objectivism would be a good thing to study. Read Ayn Rand. Listen to Leonard Peacock. Read Opal. Objectivism philosophy of Ayn Rand. Engage with the ideas. Study them. Make a study of them. Because it will improve your life. Because it'll make your life richer. Because it'll embolden you to be more selfish. Which is the point. So think about studying, learning, broadening your mind. Read books. It's so easy these days. Not to read. But you got to read books. That's where the knowledge of mankind is stored. That's where real wisdom, real knowledge is available. Yeah, podcasts are nice. Podcasts are good. But it's not everything. So expand your mind. Grow your knowledge. You know, one of the things that makes a happy person I think is curiosity. Be curious. Try to understand stuff. Figure stuff out.  We want to know every aspect of what's going on in in Chad, you know, in the autonomous zone in Seattle. Who cares? Who cares? Focus on your mind. Your knowledge. What's available to you. Spend your time reading about history or whatever interests you. Technology, science. Don't obsess about politics. What is under your control? That is the question. And what the content of your mind is certainly, the content of your knowledge is certainly under your control. Expand it. You want to thrive? You want to flourish? No more. Think more. Engage more. But no more. For you. For your own sake. For your own values. For your own life. Figure out what interests you. And if you're not curious, become curious. Start reading about different things. Maybe something will spark an interest. But you've got to be active pursuer of knowledge. Knowledge doesn't just fall into your lap. You've got to actively go out there and pursue it. And not on social media. There's very little knowledge on social media. I've got like 100 books on my Kindle that I'm waiting to read on all kinds of topics. And my biggest problem in life is to know what to focus on because so many things interest me. There's so many things I want to pursue. There's so many things I want to know. There's so many things I'd like to study that focusing on a one or two is the difficult part. Embrace that. Embrace the opportunity that technology has given you to expand your horizons in ways that are unimaginable. Unimaginable. So think about where you live. Think seriously about your career and whether you're taking it seriously and whether it's the right one for you. Expand your knowledge and find people that you like to handle with not online but in the flesh. One of the things that the this lockdown has really made clear to me that while Zoom is amazing, while interaction digitally is great and that you know yes we can do meetings and we can even hang out socially by Zoom and we can do all kinds of things by Zoom that break the sense of lowliness of being stuck in a lockdown. So you know it's great that this is happening in the 21st century. We have all these tools. It still is not like being in person. There's something about being with another person in a physical space that is unique. So find friends. Make friends. They don't have to be aligned on every issue. They don't have to be politically aligned or even philosophically aligned depends on the kind of friendship you want to make. You can have friends to go to a music concert with and different friends to talk philosophy with. They don't have to be the same. Find people who share your values. That's the key that they share your values and that you enjoy. You get something real out of being with them. So go out and find people to hang out with.  Find a lover. Well if you're married hopefully you found them already or if you have a boyfriend or girlfriend. But find somebody to be intimate with. Friendship is great. Romantic love is even better. But be active about it. Don't sit around waiting for it to happen as if just like everything else life will just drop in your lap. Knowledge will just drop in your lap. The right place to live will just drop in your lap. The career will just drop in your lap. No you've got to be active. You've got to pursue. You've got to engage. You've got to think about it. Have a strategy around it and do it and do it. And then something that I've talked about in the past often is surround yourself with beautiful things. Make your environment such that you smile when you walk into your home where you can stop once in a while and look at a painting you've maybe seen a thousand times and see something new in it. And get energy from it and get passion from it. You know I have sculptures all over the place and paintings in the world they don't have to be originals. God I mean if you had had originals nobody could afford them posters. Just posters it's fine. I mean it's a it's a decent quality. Then you get the effect of the painting. Not fully yes having an original is ideal. But don't wait for an original or quality print. Put stuff that's beautiful on your walls. On your counters and have preferences in terms of beauty. One of the things I ran was very strong on was have favorites. Have favorites even if they're just your favorites. Have favorites and pursue them. Pursue them. Make them yours. Make them real. Yeah somebody says I prefer mediocre originals to high quality copies. I don't. I prefer high quality copies to anything mediocre. But fine if that's what you prefer then get mediocre originals. But I am surrounded by high quality copies and very very happy with them if the art is great art. If the art itself is inspiring and what I want on my walls is not just great art I want inspiring art. I want art that makes me go yes pick beautiful things in all aspects. Just try to live in a nice surrounding. Again what's in your control. Maybe you can't have a glorious view out your window. But you can have a glorious view inside your little room. So you can flourish. You can thrive even in a crazy world that we live in. You can do so by doing a few things just to summarize and then I'll do the super chat questions. One is make a list of the things that you can control and that that you can't. Focus your energy on that which you can control. Focus your energy on that which you can change. Engage in politics and philosophical struggle that exists in the world today. Up to a limit limit yourself every day. You want to change the world. That's great. That's part of living a flourishing life. But don't obsess. Don't get depressed. Fight allocate a certain time of your day to fighting and to catching up on the news and that is it and make it short. Spend the rest of your time on hobbies. On art. On reading. On knowledge. On watching a great movie. On listening to great music. On going to a museum. And on your career. On making your life your work life the best that it can be. And achieving something.  What you've done.  Then move. Move as far as you need to in order to be happy. Again you only have one life. Every minute that you have. Every minute that you have you will never have again. So embrace those minutes. Embrace every one of them. Live them to the fullest. It's your life to live. Nobody else's. Nobody else will do the work for you. Nobody else will solve your problems for you. Nobody else will get you out of bed.  Put a book in your hands. You need to do it. And don't delay. Because tomorrow you've wasted all of today. So there's never or not never. It's rare to have an excuse not to do something meaningful with your life. It's very rare that you have an excuse. A reason. A legitimate reason. Not to achieve happiness. Yes the things that can happen to make that impossible. But for most of us still that is not the case. What we need today, what I call the new intellectual, would be any man or woman who is willing to think. Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason. By the intellect. Not by feelings, wishes, whims or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of the stare, cynicism and impotence. And does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist. Using the super chat and I noticed yesterday when I appealed for support for the show many of you stepped forward and actually supported the show for the first time so I'll do it again. Maybe we'll get some more today. If you like what you're hearing, if you appreciate what I'm doing, then I appreciate your support. Those of you who don't yet support the show, please take this opportunity. Go to uranbrookshow.com slash support or go to subscribestar.com uranbrookshow and make a kind of a monthly contribution to keep this going.


What, dude? It's a huge big mama! Hello everyone and welcome back to a long overdue episode of Hungry Shark World where it has been so long since we played this game, but I've seen comments every now and again in videos saying that there was a new shark added and I was kind of tempted to try and figure out what kind of shark it was and when I saw it I thought to myself hold on a minute haven't we had this shark before so what you're seeing in front of me is the dark magic shark and I had to double check this because back I had to go on my YouTube channel and go hold on a minute wasn't there a shark called like the voodoo shark or something like that that we unlocked that looked like this new one so this is dark magic shark right bear this in mind look how it looks okay now we're gonna go to the newest of newest sharks but something looks very familiar about this shark but it does actually come with its own unique things so if we click on its little information the abyss shark can switch between ice and fire spells by pressing this handy dandy button oh also the abyssal shark can fly anywhere like he's swimming underwater so and no need for a jetpack although maybe the jet pack might speed you up so we'll or even can we put jetpacks on the shark well yeah I think we can okay so you just click the little button and you'll switch to fire or ice I'm not exactly sure what the difference is but we're definitely gonna check that out so we're gonna use this shark also there's a coral update which is quite cool so when you go near a coral you heal it but when you heal the coral you actually get certain bonuses so you can get a growth bonus health from edibles are like bigger and your speed increases the health drain decreases and the final one is that the coral draws in edibles or it sounds weird saying edibles food and traps them because edibles refers to something else alright so we do have a lot of them of pointy so we may as well just boost it like in the past we've done it where oh what we'll do is we'll well you know we'll we'll play with it first and then we'll boost it and see the difference why don't we just boost it to start with you're right however we can only get oh we are too off max where we got max speed that's interesting okay so we'll have a look at that little pets hazard hurts less I like that I like the idea that if we take damage we take less at the same time we could get help we could get some that heals the shark as well so how about we just do that eat eat hazards that could be quite cool blocks damage oh and 20% health for the ocean of submarine so we can get 30% extra health oh heck yeah let's do that what else do we have yes we usually have these so we'll put the put the shield on put the laser on put the recycling cannon on and we can already fly ah so we can't and there are no new costumes to this already we're using two free things we've got 20 gold magnets oh yes that's what we should do gold magnetic magnets is good because when we go to gold rush we get it for free or like they just all come towards us but what is the other one oh this points ah so we could do that or we could get a gold bonus mmm mmm I like the idea we get points and a mega rush as well let's do that right okay now the question is where do we go to now Pacific Islands is kind of pointless because we don't get many points there the Arctic is kind of the same there's no where to really go that you know you really get loads of stuff so I mean if I was really we'll just do we'll do Arabian sea right of course we're doing everything are you ridiculous this is the best place to go oh I should have went the other way oops well fire I don't want oh god I don't know what that does oh there's the coral oh there you go we heal the coral we'll keep our times bonus we'll go this way and hopefully the whale should have appeared I think it depends when you go over certain score that the whale appears but really we should have went up this way first because I think it'll probably spawn in all of the tiger sharks fire spell or we can switch to a nice ice spell or lasers yes we'll heal this one yeah there we go some extra speed wait where's the submarines okay oh wow it's just like a obliterates everything it comes into contact with we're on times three for the ice was about to end oh there we go okay so it's ended there so we can switch to the fireball so what what fireball looks like and oh my god we can literally just float out of the water oh wow five million points already I was looking at my old and oh yeah three fireballs yes oh my god this might be the best shock in the entire game that's kind of impressive all right oh so do you have to stay in the same coral I thought you had to get like different corals oh maybe it is so this kind of works if you want a force field around you that sort of sets off all the mines which is perfect because then we could go to like the place that has loads of my god we are so quick and there are so many oh yeah you can you just need to stay there and you can get all your ever your boosts and stuff that's interesting look at all of these corals this is this is interesting okay so do they last for all of them or oh can we switch to ice and then do ice as well oh you can just break the game and do all right sweet nice break the game break the game the score is 13 million okay that seems like a lot in comparison to what we've got in the past and we really haven't started doing you know the best sort of combos wow okay all of the best things that give the most points or like the helicopter here oh I haven't really spawned yet look at this go we can just fly 108 million oh oh we almost kept the time's bones hold on let's it so if we just stay here we can just constantly heal the coral so now we've got a speed boost health boost there we go so we've got everything so does that mean that it starts draining that okay there was way more corals than I thought it was gonna be there's absolutely loads of them yes there you go I don't know if that's a glitch or maybe if only the fire is working now or something but it looks like the fires only working at it oh no I'm vaporizing things so if you just switch from one to the other you can get them all okay the shark doesn't even have to eat anything everything just gets vaporized even the submarines that you have to hit from a certain angle just instantly get obliterated by this this is awesome yes I don't even know why you need to switch just have a button that does it all are you definitely are slower you I mean you got a fly I don't know if your health drains as much but you don't fall which definitely does speed you up in like the regular game with the regular sharks fire please yes look at my slow bonus it means I'm doing a lot of damage oh my god there's so many corals here like what happens if you heal all the corals oh that'd be interesting you got like a super you got like five billion points that would be cool put a little secret in here oh here we go here we go switch to the ice again oh we haven't we haven't got the ice yet okay right let's go this way oh we got the letter right we could even go this way I mean we are in mega rush so we can go anyway we want to but let us do the ice laser beams lasers so if we had a certain pet it actually speeds up the recovery of the coral reef so which is interesting I quite I like when they do stuff oh no look yeah it does so they ride so it's not like a bonus that all coral reef get it's just a bonus that that call coral reef keeps yeah look at that oh that's interesting so you can sort of have these bubbles that have bonuses and you know maybe you're struggling to survive and you know the like coral reef it gives you that bonus I kind of like it that's nice there's nice I should have been using my my icicles shouldn't I yeah silly me boom let's go get the boost back I want the boost yes although we don't seem that quick even though we've got like fast now I was super fast a second ago right we need to find this other letter letter where are you hold on let me let me just eat all of these first I'm pretty sure there's one that hides around here it's an awkward buggy is not in the route not in my route go to my GPS bar there you go wait wait no I didn't I didn't even go where I wanted to go where's the bit that has all of the other minds it's somewhere here isn't it I'm so confused have I already passed I probably already passed it haven't I okay let's we could use that you know what we could use them up I suppose okay so there's a G there it was over here I wasn't there okay so wait where is the R where are you oh okay okay cool cool cool cool cool now wait where is the other one okay G is in the jellyfish place gotcha gotcha gotcha right as soon as you're slowing down load maybe that's just because oh yes oh does the ice slow me down oh maybe the ice slows me down but the fire gives me a speed boost I guess because if I you know I want to boost into things to destroy them with fireballs right I think although the ice beams are way better because they they destroy everything but then again I don't need to go fast do I because I've got them oh yes oh oh yes kill them all oh my god fireballs of fury oh this is beautiful I love this I like it I like that I get to choose if I want to be slow over I want to be supersonic speed supersonic I don't even know what that song is I know it's a sonic song why would you want to be the ice though when you this is like way quicker means you can get round places way faster you can eat things way quicker as well look at this man oh yes oh my god not since the days of hungry shark on Microsoft PC was this game is fun oh this is awesome I wish I could fire them and they could explode that would be cool right oh god oh Jesus yeah that almost kill me that yeah I need more health jeez I've only got like 30% extra health though right where we need we need to watch out watch out watch out watch out yep there we okay so now not only we're going to be a pistol shot not only we got fireballs but we're about to be massive years oh that's what this is for full speed fireballs it's absolutely ginormous basically invincible oh yes oh we should be able to get like I would I want more than 108 times bonus I want 500 times bonus if I've got all these books going on at the same time that's what I want oh and another mega rush yes we can still get letters right oh yeah there we go there's the speed there's the speed already got one of the letters yes hold on let's go out here oh my god we could last for ages out here this is awesome yes eat them all right there's the whale oh my god well that was a whale I don't last it for all of uh five milliseconds before it absolutely got demolished okay there we go there's another mega rush that sweet or of gold rush yes okay now we haven't been down by the drill I like I've just completely missed the drill as well fireball for speed yeah there we go oh all of those respond really quick didn't they wow okay I mean is there any need I mean my health would drain a little bit slow I'm not gonna go this way no no no no no we're gonna go we're gonna go up this way because I don't think if I go that way things will have had enough time to respond oh the all was there oh sweet I never forgot that staying at a Disneyland hotel and they had like Timon and Pumba do like a safety thing oh it was brilliant are I would there'll be like one percent of people who actually get that reference but the ones that do I love you yes yes I love all of you though I can't don't play favorites haha no no no that's how we alienate a fireplace James there we go oh beautiful beautiful just squeezed past that yeah I was gonna say that I don't think there would be any I don't think they would have put another one there let's switch the ice right ice that therefore now nothing hurts us at all we're not as quick but you know do we really need to be as quick I don't think so when we laser everything although we don't get to see the megalodon has not spawned here once at all that's very odd let's go in here just in case there's another oh he was the one that heals the the reef right unless that was just a regular bullshod but look it just seems so slow oh I don't like it it feels icky fireballs yes so you can switch between them but it it's not that like it would reset one it's just that there's a certain time limit and you can switch between them but when the time limit runs out the power runs out you're all done I'm just I am trying to figure out what increases my power oh my god this is so good we are just absolutely killing this game we're crushing it yes that's what's good about this I like it I like to eat things oh god our health is however draining super quick oh it should like spawn enemies not just like grab them or levitate into a certain area look most of our coral reefs are like over level ones yes is the tactic oh look that's not even a level one coral reef we could stay here for a second and make it level two yes oh this was already level two oh yeah look at that it's really high level now there's the ultimate coral reef it is a galaxy right okay oh that's the helicopter we're gonna blow up the helicopter yes I was always told the helicopters and boats give you loads of points I'll always remember that from sharky admin back in the day that was like four or five sharky admins ago because they always change oh bless by the time I get to know one the other way it's already been replaced all right here we go fireball's run out that's fine but it's almost oh god hit yeah it's back again right we're gonna have to fly out to find this one what's my highest scorns I bet it's something like 50 billion isn't it or something something we're donkeys oh there we go we're massive again whoa I mean I'm just the best of this I'm just the best of this game yeah I'm just really good at the game it's amazing anyway well let's just eat everything around you yes yes yes right you know what I'm not gonna do I am not now oh hold on I need to get my my power there it is yes I'm not gonna go the way that seems to kill me all the time yes it's good all these coral reefs a little bit higher we're gonna we're gonna cut through this way and then we'll cut back a little bit and then we'll turn tail and come back this way yes oh I like this is we I like this idea I hope they kind of keep it the coral reef thing I mean it's great when they you know we they sort of put things in that are happening happening in real life so the coral reefs are dying around the world and that's due to you know chemical pollution in the waters and just general pollution oh god oh no my elf I'll put the fireballs in there we go oh that was a megalodon though that was a megalodon and the fact that you know I just like that they're included in this because even though this is a game and we're having fun it's sort of a bit of escapism the ocean can't escape unfortunately because while we're playing the game well you know this costs electricity and electricity is made by what a lot of it is fossil fuels what's fossil fuels make it's a pollution where the pollution go in the ocean against the coral reef oh it's lovely so you know we go full circle here but I like it when they do things that you know we can donate to charity maybe we should do something like that we should do like a charity I do like doing charity events it's just like they always seem to come at awkward times when I'm like moving or if something else is already on but heck yeah I like to do a live stream well live streams like the easiest thing to do I suppose when it comes to charity let me do something else mix it up a little bit how about we do a live stream where we swim with sharks and we raise charity oh that'd be brilliant yeah we could stay here yes we're gonna boost health drain oh wow that change in the health drain was oh it does actually make a big difference oh god we are we are getting close to dying getting close to dying getting close to dying don't like it oh there we go there we go we've hit things oh but the coral reef really freaking held there yeah we're going slow I don't know why we're going slow but we're going slow yes the whale the whale I think you know what it is I think we've got to go 100 million years yeah we're gonna go this way we're gonna unlock these uh oh maybe the best thing to oh my god what is that what is this thing what dude it's a huge big mama yes oh my god and even wow that's new I think they've told me what that that thing is and I've completely forgotten what it's called the new boss oh that was sweet no no no no no no no no although it did just it did look like just a big mama with a purple skin on it I don't come here too often so I don't think there's any need to to get these coral reefs up too much oh I like the sound effects it makes when they get another unlock level boom boom boom so is the strategy to you know sort of like get these things unlocked early game maybe maybe oh hold on hold on there might have been a letter in here there might be in a letter there was no letter but it was worth a shot right let's go this way we're in mega rush so we don't have anything to worry about we'll go up this way no letter that way we'll go this way no letter that way okay okay okay okay oh well there you go there's something like that yeah damn keyboards in the way I can't click me sound effects right yes okay fireballs fireballs are good I don't think they drain me of health so that's good wow 160 every time I think I'm making a new record I it just doesn't happen it's oh no by the way you've in the past you've got 10 times at school you're terrible now we'll go down here you know sort of unlock these coral reefs just a little bit there you go oh no this isn't good I need to be with a good coral reef salvation where are you somewhere here yep uh we need another gold rush should go over this way oh look the little coral reef we have we've already got there before how about down here something in here no where are the letters can you only get like mega hungry ones now yeah I really don't see any at all oh that was a lot of that was a lot of good jellyfish yes okay here we go here we go yes yes yeah there's my ultimate coral reefs I love them okay there we go fast speed boom 160 yeah okay there's only one we were missing oh oh look at the all we're an amazing coral reef area here now right let's fly burn all of them yes we I completely forgot I'm gonna place named after me in this game that's so cool that's so nice of them yes but it's in the Arctic and the Arctic doesn't give the best points it's such a shame right maybe maybe there'll be a letter at the top here maybe you never can tell oh there's the plane all right we're still in mega rush still getting all of these come on come on come on yes fireballs I mean this is just way better than the ice if the ice you get slower that means you've got you're gonna eat things not as frequently that's not as good really isn't but this place oh yes yes yes yes doesn't make it better although my health is absolutely draining like there's no tomorrow oh my god Jesus oh god and it's good on this way yes this is good this is good yes all of those coral reefs saved me right like I don't have any boost I'm just getting slower as time goes on how about here yes oh there's the you gone that's it well guys when you saw how good that shark was and what score I should have gone so yeah so on that bombshell I think we're gonna end it there but if you enjoyed the video like and until next time well you've seen a lot and I got nothing from it sweet we'll be joining you later next time hopefully the game won't crash maybe fingers crossed bye


In Panama City, me and my company, we are out here training for deep sea diving. We have the opportunity to put guys on the stage, drop people deeper than we can in Virginia. We have clear, nice, warm waters out here, so it kind of gets us away from the garrison. Helps us with our logistics and planning, along with making sure that we're working up and we're ready for deployment. We're ready to dive deep and salvage something that's dropped or fix something that's broken, search something that needs to be searched.  We've got to keep air, we've got to keep gas getting to them. We've got to keep them safe on the bottom, direct them effectively, and make sure the job is accomplished and we get them home safely. The diving equipment that we're utilizing right now, we have the KM37. We can dive that to up to 300 feet. It's our heavy duty, our big yellow helmet that we use. To get us ready for deployment, we're going through emergency drills for all of our first class divers, our supervisor divers. Basically what they do is they put us in a hole and they tell the entire side, we're going to mess them up.  Everybody operates effectively as a team. There's no one person on the team that feels uneasy about going to somebody else if they need something and everybody knows that they can rely on each other for anything. So if you ask me, are we ready for deployment today? Absolutely, we're ready yesterday. And we're going to knock deployment and anything else the Navy gives us out of the park and anything that the Navy has for us, we're going to accomplish up and beyond.


and welcome to Inside Hawaii Real Estate, a community real estate show dedicated to providing up-to-date information and news to Hawaii home buyers, sellers, and investors. I'm Wotanaka, with my co-host, business partner, and wife, Leonie Lam, a realtor with over 20 years of experience in various leadership roles in the Hawaii real estate industry. Thanks, Will. Will is a full-time realtor, sharing his talents as a lawyer, a law school professor, and the former head of a Hawaii title and escrow company. Together as full-time realtors, we work as a team to bring you the latest in Hawaii real estate. And so the nonprofit Housing Hawaii's Future describes itself as a movement led by young local residents who are going to create opportunities for Hawaii's next generation by ending the workforce housing shortage. We're so fortunate to have Sterling Figa with us today. Sterling is making a huge difference, and he made the choice to pivot his own career and co-found this nonprofit focused on solving the housing crisis in our state.    And I remember in one of the articles, you had mentioned that one fourth of your classmates had actually moved out of state. I mean, that's a concerning figure, you know, for the local residents and family, and you know, we have young kids as well. So definitely want to dig more into that. And really appreciate you for joining our show all the way from Maui, living with his wife and four young kids. You are the executive director of Housing Hawaii's Future. You've been writing for Civil Beat, Hawaii Business Magazine, and you're also a debate coach at Hawaii Pacific University. So welcome, Sterling. Welcome. Thank you both for having me on. Thanks Sterling. So we understand that you folks started this much needed non-profit back in 2021, and that was just a few years ago. So we're wondering, what are the initiatives for Housing Hawaii's Future here in 2024? At Housing Hawaii's Future, our primary focus is on educating the public about housing solutions and helping people understand how they can get city clay engaged. For example, this year we've been focusing on missing middle housing, mixed use development, adaptive reuse as ways that we can make housing affordable by design. As an organization, we want to design housing and communities that are environmentally and economically sustainable. And we focus a lot on millennials and Gen Z because they're the next generation. Millennials or they've started their careers, their families, and Gen Z now are entering the workforce. And we believe that these generations should get civically engaged and advocate for the housing that they need.  They're not quite in the workforce yet, although my son did get a part-time job recently, but you know, they're kind of up and coming. So how do you promote the education? Like what is it that they can kind of, you know, how do they get involved if they were interested or if they wanted to make an impact? The primary way people get involved is by joining the staying movement. So the staying movement pledge we've had more than 2,100 people sign it so far.  And if you look at the trend of housing affordability, our oldest kid is 13 and our youngest is 10 months old. If you fast forward to when they're adults, will they be able to afford to stay on Maui? Probably not at the current rate. And so we believe at Housing Hawaii's future that true sustainability means that our children and grandchildren can afford to stay. So the staying movement is a pledge to stay informed and to stay active to make sure that that's possible. So pledge signers receive regular email updates with information about housing solutions and also with ways that they can get civically engaged. Okay, great. So that's like a great first step, like an entree to get involved. Exactly. It's not, you know, we don't say, okay, you're going to dedicate your whole life to fighting for affordable housing. But if you can sign a pledge, start to get informed, then that's the first rung on the ladder of engagement. And earlier, you know, you had just kind of mentioned mixed use housing and also, was it adaptive? Is that the word you use? Adaptive reuse. Yeah. Adaptive reuse. So maybe we could take it in two parts. Can you just kind of dig a little bit deeper into the mixed use affordable housing and, you know, what that entails and what that looks like? Yeah. So, you know, one of the things that I noticed three years ago when starting this organization is there are all of these words that get thrown around. And a lot of people are intimidated to participate in the conversation because they may not know what mixed use is or what adaptive reuse is. But these things are a lot simpler than they appear. So mixed use just means a community where people have houses, residential uses, businesses, commercial uses, and these things are all accessible to each other. What we did in the United States and in Hawaii for decades after we adopted the automobile was we made single use communities where all of your businesses and commercial uses would be over here and your homes would be over here and you'd have to drive back and forth between the two. But if you go to all of the great cities of the world, think of London, think of Paris, think of Tokyo, they have mixed use communities and small towns all around in the world do too. So on Maui where I am now, if you go to Makawa or Paella, Wailuku, if you go to Lahaina prior to the fire, Lanetti City, these all have mixed uses where commercial uses and residential uses are together which makes the community more accessible but also more vibrant for people that live there. So when you're saying mixed use, I'm thinking kakaako, I'm thinking like Ho'opili, like those kind of communities where I understand where you're going, yeah, okay. Exactly. And I continue on adaptive reuse too. Yeah, exactly. I was going to ask you about that. Yeah, adaptive reuse is just taking existing commercial space like an office building or even an old strip mall and converting that into residential use. And so in urban Honolulu, this has been happening a lot and the core concept there is exactly the same as mixed use, bringing people back into the city. Got it. And so adaptive use, I'm thinking like Maria is like the new one at the Davies Pacific Center where they're taking a certain amount of the floors and converting them into residential because I guess the commercial space is not, they're just doing that. And I think the benefit that they said was because it's a new project but then it's already existing sort of infrastructure. So it's going to be a quicker completion date for the homeowner who's going to purchase there. And then the pricing was pretty good, I thought. And so I guess it can be a win-win. And then I think in some of your past interviews, I thought I read something about even maybe potentially schools could be converted. Would that be an adaptive use? Yes, absolutely. And it's typically not adapting school buildings, but if you think about a school campus, many of our schools around the state have shrinking student populations. And they have these huge campuses that aren't being used. And at the same time, we have a teacher shortage and a big part of the teacher shortage is teachers can't afford housing. So what if you could take some of the land on these school sites that are either shrinking or have already closed and use that land to build workforce housing for teachers, healthcare workers, and for the other essential workers that we need? That is fantastic. Wow. I have not even heard of that before. So this is already, you know, opening my eyes. I mean, I'm learning so much already. And, you know, I think in one of the articles, they talked about close to over 35,000 Hawaii residents have left Hawaii or the last three years. So over 10,000 every year. And, you know, we talked about the high cost of living. And can you talk about any, so right now we're in the thick of the legislative session. And there's all these bills that's out there hard to keep up. But is there anything that kind of stands out to you? So the two bills that we're most interested in are HB 1 to 630, the missing middle housing bill and HB 2090, the mixed use and adaptive reuse bill. So 1630, the missing middle housing bill allows for more units to be built on residential lots, concentrating development where we already have development. And it also allows for building small units on small lots. And the key thing there is for decades, we've built a lot of single family detached homes. And we've built large homes on large lots. Because land is so expensive in Hawaii, this limits home ownership to people that cannot afford a 6,000 7000 square hood lot. If you're a young person starting out or you're a capuna living on a fixed income or retiring, that's not going to be within your affordability. So by creating duplexes, triplexes, one plexus small houses on small lots, you create a housing type that's affordable by design. And that's the missing middle housing. The second bill, HB 2090 would add residential use to commercial zones. So across the state, we have property that is zoned for commercial use. And it's already developed, right? Like so for example, and on Maui, there's the Queen Ka'atum Mountain Shopping Center, which is a mall that is half empty and has a huge parking lot. Nobody's ever there because the mall is kind of dying. Why not take these existing commercial spaces and rezone them to add residential uses so we can have some of that mixed use and adaptive reuse development. And those two bills will help us to make better use of the land that we've already developed our urban land so that we don't need to push out into agricultural land or conservation land. We can just continue to develop affordable housing where there already is development. So for those two bills, you know, as you're kind of tracking on those and, you know, advocating, are you seeing like that it's being received like those could possibly go through or what kind of the temperature that you're seeing for those? I think so. You know, we're at a very critical moment, I believe. We founded Housing Hawaii's Future nearly three years ago. And I've never seen such an enormous grounds for support, not only from legislators, but from members of the community in favor of these bills. For example, when House Bill 1630, the Missing Middle Housing Bill went through, I think there were 72 pages of supportive testimony and only one piece of testimony in opposition to it. Now, of course, there are not my backyard people, Nimbis, who sometimes come out to oppose these measures. But what I've seen is a remarkable show of support from legislators who understand that if we don't make radical changes in the way we do things, we're going to continue losing people. You know, well, your statistics are right. It's about 30,000, but the statistics only track the net outflow. So in actuality, it's closer to 30,000 people that leave every year. It's just a 20,000 people replace them, right? And that's happened for each of the last seven, I think eight years now. We've been losing, you know, millions of thousands of locals every year. And it's really changing the character of our community. And that's one thing, you know, a lot of times when people oppose new housing, they say this expression, they say it will change the character of our community. I always push back and say, well, what about the characters in our community? Because when we lose that tens of thousands of people every year, we're losing these people who are part of Hawaii, you know, who've grown up here, who love this place, but just can't afford to stay here anymore. And that's why we believe we need to build affordable housing so that those people can stay. Wow. And, you know, we've experienced that first time we've been able to help local people come back to Hawaii, which is always such a great feeling. But it's tough, you know, I mean, the cost of living here is, you know, different from in other places on the mainland. And of course, the affordability. So, so thanks for all the work that you're doing. Yeah, if I can chime in, you know, it's not work that I'm doing. The truth is, there are amazing organizations like Hawaii Zoning Atlas, Hawaii IMB, Hulungua Collaborative, the Hawaii Housing Affordability Coalition, AARP, various organizations across the state that are coming together and realizing that these housing policies are moving us in the right direction. And in addition to these organizations, they're sort of grass tops. What we've seen at Housing Hawaii's future is grassroots support from young people who they're looking forward five and ten years and realizing if they don't take action now, there may not be a future for them here. And what we believe is when everyone is coming together, both our community and our legislative leaders, then we can push for a change that will make things better. Thanks for clarifying that. I mean, it's kind of opening our eyes and hopefully everyone else's tuning in about all the different organizations. And that's great to hear that that things are coming together, you know, organizations are coming together to affect the change that's needed. Absolutely. Yeah. No, this is, yeah, I'm learning so much. And I think one of the most impressive things about, you know, what you're promoting and through your organization and just with, you know, through a collaboration with other organizations is that, you know, when we talk about affordable housing, there's always focus on building, building, you know, there's our low inventory we need to build. But another focus of yours is regulating the low income or affordable rental aspect of it, you know, across the state. So I thought, wow, yeah, I don't think personally, I haven't really heard too much about focus on affordable rentals. Of course, there are affordable rental buildings, but in terms of the regulation, that's a whole new perspective. So could you kind of talk about that? Yeah, there are two key issues. The first thing in terms of building is we have to build the kind of housing that's actually affordable for working families. And the truth is, at this point, a 2000 square foot home on an 8000 square foot lot is just not going to be affordable for most families. If you're talking about new construction, because the land cost is so high and the construction costs are so high. So when we build, we want to be building smaller, more modest units that are appropriate for aging Krapuna or for young families. And that's important because the average household size has shrunk considerably. You know, my grandfather was one of nine children. I don't have nine children. You know, household sizes are smaller. More people are living independently. They're divorced or they've never married or they only have one child. And so we need a lot of smaller household sizes. The second thing you mentioned was the regulations of affordable housing. And the key there is our state and county governments have to ensure that affordable housing is remaining affordable. Oftentimes, affordable housing is only affordable for a set period of time. It could be 50 or 60 years. And then there comes a point where investments need to be made in the property to rehabilitate it and make it up to standard. And at that point, the state and counties have to commit their resources to ensure that that housing can be affordable for another 50 and other 60 years. So there's a real key there, not only to build affordable housing, but a commitment on our government to ensure that it remains affordable. Right. And I know that the governor had made the emergency proclamation about meeting affordable housing and you're part of the work group called Build Beyond Barriers. Can you tell us a little bit about that and how is it going? Yeah. Well, you know, it's an interesting saga that ended with the working group being dissolved. Oh, the governor took what I perceive as extremely bold action. Housing was the number one issue in the gubernatorial race. And Governor Green made it his top priority. And he put his money where his mouth was by creating this working group, the Building Beyond Barriers working group. That group brought together county and state officials who deal with housing. And it also brought nonprofit leaders like the Sierra Club and also Housing Hawaii's future to try and cut through the barriers to affordable housing. Unfortunately, there was a lot of controversy. There were lawsuits. B.J. Penn showed up to one of the meetings and started yelling at the director, Nani Maderos. And so there was a lot of controversy. And the controversy actually masked some of the positive things that came out of the working group. For example, I believe that this legislative session, legislators feel some pressure to actually take action because the governor tried and couldn't get as much accomplished as he would have liked to. But in the process of using the working group, it really shined a light on some of the issues that place. For example, there's a law about school impact fees. So new housing developments have to pay a few thousand dollars per unit in search and districts into a school fund that's used to build new schools. What came out during the working year meetings was this money has been collected for more than a decade and none of it has been spent, which means that all of these affordable housing units were being built and thousands of dollars were being added to the cost of each unit and none of the money was ever spent on schools. And so this legislative session, there's actually bills to eliminate the school impact fee for affordable housing. And I don't think that would have happened if not for the governors working or shining a light on some of these very specific problems that have plagued housing development. As some people have pointed out, we're one of the most regulated states in the country in terms of new housing development. And that regulation adds costs. And so it's not like one regulation adds like $200,000 cost, right? But it's one adds $5,000, another adds $2,000, another adds $7,000. And all of a sudden, you've added hundreds of thousands of dollars. So this legislative session, I see bills like the school impact fee waiver starting to cut back on some of that regulation so that we can build truly affordable housing. How about in terms of just kind of going back to the rental regulation, has there been any discussions or any bills regarding rent control? Would that ever be on the table for Hawaii? There have in the past. I don't think any have ever made it too far in the legislative process. It tends to be fairly controversial. There are some advocates and there are some places where rent control seems to have worked at keeping housing costs down. But there are other places like say, San Francisco or New York City where it seems like in some cases, rent control has made the problem worse. And I think in Hawaii, there's a justifiable hesitancy to adopt a policy like rent control because it might not produce the results that people intend. That makes sense. That's a good point. Yeah. The unintended consequences, right? Of certain regulations. Exactly. Exactly. And it's good that our legislators are cautious when they adopt the policy and consider those unintended consequences. You know, when you talked about the bill, I'm sorry, segwaying back, but I was just thinking about the work group that you were in, you know, with the governor's emergency proclamation that got disbanded and you're talking about the issues that kind of came up. And I'm just wondering, do you have a sense of like, what was behind that? Like, because it all sounds good. I mean, you're working towards making housing more affordable. Everyone knows the issue. So I don't understand why there was such discordance and an issue with it. So I don't know if there's a, I'm not sure. I'm just trying to understand that a little bit. You know, part of the concern came from environmental groups, like Sierra Club and Earth Justice, who were concerned that the working group would allow developers to bypass environmental protections as a completely reasonable concern. Another part of it was just on timing, which was the working group started meeting just around the time of the fires in Lahaina. And everyone was upset and distressed about the fires, really worried about housing. And I think because the legislature was out of session, a lot of that energy was channeled into this working group. And it attracted the attention of some celebrities like BJ Penn, who brought a lot of attention to the working group. And because of how I strung the community was, I think the working group ended up taking the brunt of that with Nani Madeiros, the leader of that working group, receiving death threats and personal harassment that's completely unacceptable. And so I think the governor should be saluted and commended for making the effort and pushing the conversation forward. And now it falls to the legislature to continue that work and pass the policy that will result in durable change. Wow, that is, that's really deep insights. And you really know your stuff.  But just to see, I don't think I fall into that category of Gen Z or millennials, unfortunately. But it's just making me more passionate. And then just really made me think about our kids and their future. You know, in terms of, so there's all these bills, I mean, I just learned about this missing middle housing and adaptive reuse. And in terms of like your vision for the future, is there something that maybe that's not in the current legislative session that you might want to bring forth or any future visions that that you have personally, you know, for the low income or I'm sorry, the affordable housing crisis? You know, the vision fundamentally are cities and communities that are truly accessible for Kupuna, who may have limited mobility for disabled people, for young people who don't want to have to own a car. But more than just the vision of cities at Housing Hawaii's feature, our goal is when we have planning commission meetings or county council meetings or legislative hearings, we want young people to be part of that conversation. Oftentimes, it's only people over the age of 50 who show up. And we believe that change will only come when younger people like ourselves, like our children, learn about the issues, get engaged and advocate for their interests. And so to solve all of these problems, and housing is all one of men, we're going to need many more people to get civically engaged to learn about the issues and take leadership. Yeah, and you know, we talked about as a first step, if someone was interested, they should join the same movement, and then they'll be connected basically. And then they'll be getting updates, and they'll be able to kind of understand. But are there any other ways that you would recommend for someone, an average citizen, whatever generation they might be, you know, that's catching this and is like feeling inspired, and they just want to, you know, get more involved and get more connected, any other suggestions for them? That's a great first step to assign the Stay Movement pledge at Hawaii'sfuture.org slash stay. We provide information about housing solutions and ways to get civically engaged. Second, you can follow us on social media at Hawaii's future. And third, if people are interested in supporting the work we do at Housing Hawaii's Future, we always accept donations at Hawaii'sfuture.org slash donate, or you can feel free to email me, I'm at sterling at Hawaii'sfuture.org. That is awesome. Wow, this was, I mean, I feel like there could be a part two after the legislative, you know, session is over, maybe later this year, but you are fantastic.  So thank you so much for being on our show and sharing your vision. Thank you both for having me and for elevating the work that we're doing. Thank you, Sterling. Thank you so much. Aloha.


What's up everybody? Ricky Carruth here and if you are a real estate agent anywhere close to Salt Lake City I'm coming there July 22nd. I've never been to Salt Lake so this is going to be a real treat for me. I'm coming to motivate, inspire, and give you the strategies you need to take your business to the next level. 2021 is going to be the eighth straight year that I've had closing over a hundred deals as a single agent. Now of course this didn't happen overnight. I've been in real estate since 2002 but I only wish I knew back then what I'm going to share with you July 22nd. Join me Salt Lake as I continue on my mission to reduce the failure rate in the real estate industry. Tickets are absolutely free so register as soon as you can and I'll see you guys soon. Let's go!