Mufi Hannemann joins Spotlight Hawaii

spotlighting hawaii's leaders we want to bring in governor david good morning mr mayor lieutenant governor good morning thanks so much for joining us mayor derek kawakami thank you so much senator for being here spotlighting the issues where is the virus right now in our community how much is this overall going to cost the state how are you responding to the community's concerns talk about the level of citations that you guys are writing spotlight hawaii with yunji de nies and ryan kalei-suji on the digital platforms of the honolulu star advertiser this episode of spotlight hawaii is brought to you by long's drugs and good morning thanks so much for tuning in on this monday morning the first monday of may i'm ryan kalei-suji live in los angeles with the university of white men's volleyball team as they compete in the national international championship yanji denise of course is back home in honolulu and yunji this morning we are focusing on tourism in our islands that's right and our interview is well timed because the person who is our guest today actually is featured prominently in two articles in the paper talking about waikiki and some of the challenges in that neighborhood we're joined this morning by mufi hanuman president and ceo of the hawaii lodging and tourism association thanks for being here monday monday we can never get through an interview without a song and why don't we start with one right good to be with you it's good to see you let's talk about those articles that are in the paper today talking about some of the challenges when it comes to waikiki and crime what are your concerns about what we've seen in the last few weeks well are definitely seeing effect from the beginning of the year an increase in crime in waikiki both crimes that have been uh filed though with police reports on violent crimes uh since uh the beginning of the year uh we've had nearly uh 431 police reports on violent crimes and property crimes in the month of april uh was also about 550. so definitely crime is on the increase and it's a natural occurrence if you will whenever visitors start to come back uh the folks that are are into these type of uh heinous crimes and the like uh will go congregate and will go to where they feel that uh there could be preying on victims and the like and that's exactly what has happened which is why we have called uh to bring together uh the important stakeholders the prosecutor's office the police department uh and the langari administration uh to work with us we've had an ongoing coalition that we've had over the past several years uh whenever we detect uh something uh that needs attention on a collaborative basis made up of our organization hlta the waikiki improvement association the waikiki business improvement district hawaii hotel visitor uh industry security association uh and the um vash that's headed up by uh jessica lonnie rich and other business sectors and so uh this is an attempt for us to just not talk about the problem or just be content that we can have government solve all our problems we want to be part of the solution and that's this attempt that we're going to do here we're really interested in what a program is called the weed and seed program which has worked very well throughout the years in these potential hot spots or places where crime is occurring and congregating uh glandularity administration and prosecutor arm have instituted in chinatown they've had an amazing success record there and so we're anxious to see this particular initiative come to waikiki we understand they may have to go and shore up some of the efforts done in the past uh in ewa and the waipahu area but sooner rather than later we'd like to see it coming to waikiki you know we've had prosecutor am on this program and talked specifically about some of the things that are happening in waikiki and expanding that program to waikiki and one of the things that he said is that they were going to look over time at some of the data to ensure that this is not an isolated instance that this is something that continues to be a problem but also he noted that there was a lot that needs to be done on the seed side that of course they can weed and they can continue to beef up enforcement but it's going to also rely on the the seeding aspect of it what are your thoughts about how to you know implement something of this large scale to ensure its success with these partners that you mentioned well i've had some uh i have some history with this because when i was mayor uh we did weed and seed in waipahu and eva and so forth so with that kind of background uh and the fact that our business owners are our residents strong support from the uh waikiki neighborhood board our business owners uh the folks that work in and around waikiki we all want to come together and and figure out what's the best way uh to see these programs one of the groups that i'd like to engage very early on and we've already talked to her is a debbie spencer chun's group with the adult friends for youth they definitely have to be a part of it and then we like to reach out to the surrounding schools in this area here find out what we can do on a proactive basis and not just be reactive about it so we understand that prosecutor arm has a process but we also feel that we don't have to study the problem it exists it's not a one-time situation it's going to occur those of us who have been in and around the visiting industry know that this is an occurrence that every visitor arrival start to increase crime also parallels that growth so we want to get out in front of it and we certainly want to work with him uh work with the blanchardi administration work with the honolulu police department we know that hbd through one of their key uh majors has said he welcomes uh weed and seed into waikiki so uh this is where we'd like for all of this to go and if we can be helpful uh to prosecutor and his office to ensure that there's a program that he knows that once it's out there with his neck out on the line to ensure to be successful we want to make him successful because ultimately at the end of the day it will benefit residents visitors and workers in and around waikiki and let's keep this in mind you know waikiki is such a big uh area in terms of its magnitude with respect to whatever happens with tourism and the like if we make a major uh improvement we make a major dent in the increase in crimes that we see here then that sends a message out to the rest of the state because we've also heard that it's also on the increase in places like maui property time is going up there burglaries are going up there and again it parallels the growth in visitors so we kind of want to see a coordinated effort at the state level perhaps replicating what we're doing on a very proactive basis here uh in what is always considered our crown jewel two square miles here on oahu where uh thousands of people work live and play every day you know you mentioned hpd and i'm interested to know what your conversations have been like with that agency given their their shortage of police officers shopo's been on this program and said that there just aren't enough beat cops basically to patrol up all the neighborhoods i wonder if you see that in waikiki and what impact you think the officer shortage is contributing to this issue well errol chief has really the police chief has really done a wonderful job in dialoguing with us we understand i know that all too well about police staffing shortages and the like and that's why on a community basis if we can step up what we're doing here to help we have a wonderful program our ambassadors program that's run by the waikiki business improvement district if we can get the citizens to participate more uh to be the eyes and ears what have you whatever that we can do to shore up that deficiency because that decision is outside of our purview that really is a budgetary issue with the council uh with with the mayor's office and then ultimately uh for the hpd to be able to have a process that goes through and as they train these officers uh and they're ready to step into the ranks there we're not gonna lose them or we lose them after a year or so and they go elsewhere so it's an ongoing challenge and we understand that but i've always said the biggest priority in any municipal budget should be public safety uh and if that is followed then certainly the excess revenues now that they're starting to receive uh at the county and state level because tourism numbers are coming back which means more money is going to the get more thd is collected we have no problem that those monies are set aside because they have a strong nexus to the hospitality industry to hire more police officers what do you think overall that this may also do to the impact of just marketing hawaii as a not only a tourist destination but a safe one at that you know whenever there are these headlines that come out there uh some of them making national news that people may see how do you think this may impact the overall marketing strategy of marketing hawaii to visitors that may be trying to come to hawaii and ensuring a safe visit ryan that's an excellent point pre-pandemic we work very hard to establish a reputation that we're one of the safest places to come and visit whether you're going to encounter a man-made or a natural disaster complementing our excellent first-line responses responders at the county level of course is the fact that we have uh the joint pacific military command here uh that we've often called upon uh to help us in some of these situations that have occurred so we cannot lose that reputation and you're right all it takes is one headline back in the mid 90s i was on the honolulu city council and i recall a japanese the japan council general uh upon reacting to a crime against one of the japanese visits he said if we didn't do a better job at protecting visitors here they basically are not going to come to hawaii anymore so that's when we first gathered this public safety coalition that i'm talking about that i'm driving now from the private sector i was a council member and we got out in front of that issue to make sure uh that japan and and anyone traveling here from throughout the continent to the united states would understand that we take that very seriously so now we've done a great job doing the pandemic to say this is a healthy place to come and visit we had some of the strictest rules to get in to visit the state of hawaii people didn't like that they didn't like the safe travels program but by and large it worked it made sure that people come here could sense that hey hawaii really takes it seriously and so uh i don't want to make headway in that regard that you know as we welcome people back and there's still some angst out there about the ongoing concern about the kovit strains of clovida that now we lose ground on the public safety front so this is why we want to get out in front of this issue here because you're right it will hurt marketing if they feel they can go someplace else to get their sun sand surf and their spirit of allah someplace else and not come to hawaii because we're no longer a safe place to visit let's talk about those rising numbers uh just of tourism overall we know that you said that part of the reason this is happening is because these are crimes of opportunity as visitors start to return how was our spring break relative to what we've seen in years past and what are you expecting for the summer well the spring break went very very well some of our hotels were operating like a 90 occupancy so um uh and what we had to do was was because no one anticipated it but fortunately uh the industry was taking steps to prepare we launched a campaign called macau we are ready we got everybody together to understand that once we open up and we did this in late 2020 that we had to be ready to go uh so uh with with that happening this past spring break i think we were pretty good in terms of making sure that whatever we could do for people to come back and wanted to experience the hawaii that they experienced in previous years uh was not going to be short trip by lack of services and the like also during that time it was very acute the fact that we were experiencing a labor shortage across the board so everybody kind of had to get creative they had to do job fairs they had to figure out how we can motivate people to come back to work especially those who are continuing to think that by staying out of work that uncle sam was still going to send a check that that program was power so having had that experience would basically ramp up sooner rather later i can tell we are ready for the summer we know it's going to be a robust summer uh and so uh everyone is prepared for that um but again when people say that we're already at those numbers pre-19 we're not uh we're still running behind uh numbers uh like 11 behind what we were in 2019 so we're not there yet which is a good thing because i think it's going to take all of us coming together and recognizing what we need to do so that when a visitor comes here they're not going to feel uh that there's not enough workers at the workplace or services are being cut we have to anticipate it's going to happen so that spring break that robust spring break uh vacation for folks that came here was really what i call pre-season practice pre-season training to get us to a point now uh where we're ready to go forward and do all we can to bring people back to work and give them the hours that they're looking for i want to dive a little deeper into that labor shortage because you know what that was one of the concerns we saw those long lines that happened last year uh you know when hawaii reopened so to speak and there was simply not enough workers and we continue to see that labor shortage in multiple industries and occupations throughout the state and really throughout the nation how are the hotels as well as other tourist destinations on island dealing with that have we returned to some of those levels have those positions been filled and overall how do you think that this labor shortage that we're experiencing throughout the country has impacted the uh industry directly in hawaii well let's take housekeeping i mean uh room service yeah uh you know there's always been an ongoing debate uh with some groups in the community that feel that you know daily room service is no longer existing uh pandemic change of that perspective uh whereas now it opt-in rather than an opt-out so uh i don't know of a hotel operating in hawaii that does not provide daily room service if a guest request okay it's there so i really believe that those who try to say that that's not being provided it's there in fact before the pandemic uh that particular policy uh was in effect i remember traveling i never have my room clean daily uh that's because uh you know all i need is a fresh set of towels every day and the like and i think people like that some people want it clean daily and so forth if that happens those adjustments will be made so again we're not at the 2019 levels that some are saying where they're not getting the hours that they need we recognize the quality of the hospitality industry and i'm speaking specifically for the hotels that they have to give them whether it's restaurants being manned uh whether it's valet service being done whatever it is they're all doing their best to ensure that that quality experience exists so everybody's handling a difference obviously for some hotels uh it's an easier challenge to overcome others are still experiencing some difficulties but the one common goal is we want a quality experience wherever that person stays and whether a resort that they or hotels that they try to stay uh at uh at any one of our island uh establishments and the like uh it's very different uh again with with restaurants they're still experiencing some shortages there are longer lines sometimes people get frustrated where they see their open tables uh but yet they're not sitting people as quickly as possible so they're dealing with it and they know that they have to be prepared because of the increasing number of visitors that are going to come same thing with the retail sectors and the likes we have these ongoing dialogues and discussion to ensure that we can get some help in those areas if government is in a position to help uh provide incentives for some of these businesses to compensate for the losses that they have incurred so they can hire folks back more rapidly we're all for that you know one of the frustrations on the resident side was last summer there it just felt like there was this influx of visitors and some of them maybe new to hawaii uh didn't really know our ways if you will and the respect was not necessarily there with all the people all of the guests who came uh are you anticipating you know what what are you anticipating for that to be like this summer because that relationship has to work well on both sides otherwise you know it's hard to extend aloha if you're not having respect coming back and i think there were a lot of people who felt like uh it was a different crowd if you will well two things have happened number one i think whether it's the airlines or whether it's hotels we've made that shift to make sure that we we're trying to bring folks here that understand that we don't want them just to come to hawaii and just take from us we want a quality visitor that understands the importance of our culture our environment our legacy so there's a lot of malama programs that are taking place uh within uh these various establishments even the restaurants to encourage that type of visitor secondly the hawaii tourism authority has really made a dramatic shift in in destination marketing management marketing i should say and the legislature understands that in fact they are willing to fund initiatives that addresses that so there's a whole totally different mindset about regenerative tourism in ensuring that the visitor that comes here understands that we don't want them to just take we want them to be quality we want them to give back we want them to appreciate what we're all about so that's happening i've also been a long time advocate for government to do more impact fees i have no problem with that when i was on the council we did the hanama bay uh impact fee back then and this was in the mid 90s where we said we're going to charge visitors to use the bay and we put into a special fund as long as those monies go back to the ongoing preservation of the bay i'm really happy to see that's now become commonplace not just with county parks and attractions but the state has also implemented that in diamond head and allied that's good because the local resident will know that if the visitors are going to use these areas here they're going to also pay for the ongoing maintenance construction repairs what have you and i think another major step forward that government has taken to ensure that quality visitor is the recent bill that was just uh signed into law by mayor matt blangardi dealing with short-term rentals uh in 2019 we had 10.4 million visitors that came here uh about three million or so of them were staying at vacation rentals many of them illegal vacation rentals so we weren't getting that quality visitor was coming here because many times they weren't paying all the taxes and fees that we expect plus of the major impacts it was having in residential neighborhoods so we have a bill now that i totally support and the standpoint is that we're not against uh short-term rentals as long as they are operating in places where they should be operating and they should be operating in resort areas they should be competing uh with the lodging uh community a sector uh and pay the taxes pay the fees uh but they should really be careful about again uh going into neighborhoods uh and because they make it very difficult for a local resident to have the ability to live and reside and rent or possibly own a place in their own residential area so this bill really curtails that it makes it difficult for them to operate in residential neighborhoods which we support those who have a non-conforming certificate that have been existing all these years in those areas as long as they are now registering they're in compliance they're up to date we're fine we're fine with bed and breakfast and the like but i really believe now we have a real sense of purpose and going forward so uh the department of planning and permitting is going to be really under the gun because now they're going to have to enforce all of this they have the next 90 days to come up with the rules and regulations everybody's going to watching them but i think there's a real strong sense of cooperation support there was an eight to one vote on the city council for this to happen uh mayor blanchardi actually introduced that bill and it was supported not just by the hotel sectors but there was widespread support from the community to make this happen and then when it comes to the crime front you know again the community has to really participate in that too we can we can make it harder for criminals to be out on the street we can put in all the seating programs when we do sweden seed but then again what we're seeing more and more is that the folks that are coming into waikiki or other areas are coming from other areas or other neighborhoods or districts outside of oahu so the community has to really buy into that at the end of the day it's the hospitality industry that employs the most people and we keep talking about diversifying away from tourism finding another industry fine let's continue to do that but until we get there uh this is the industry has to bring people back to work keep people working and we have to make it a safe place not just for visitors to come here but for workers to work and for people to live in these areas that are impacted by tourism you know when we're talking about some of the overall numbers and looking at three pandemic numbers and where the projections are going for this summer a lot of people are also saying that the numbers are fairly good with when considering the fact that these are mainly us mainland visitors which means that market has increased but there is some worry that when the asia market reopens that there may be this influx that we simply can't handle when counting the increase of mainland visitors and the pent up demand from the asian market what are your thoughts on how hawaii will handle some of these uh japanese travelers that are expected to arrive and how hawaii will overall be able to deal with all of that well first of all uh just because golden week is happening how soon we're not going to see the numbers of golden week pre-pandemic seven to ten thousand japanese visitors a day it's not going to happen if you check the numbers we'll be lucky to get 500 600 if you will it's going to take a while because the japanese government was in a lockdown mode for a long time they had some of the strictest rules of people traveling outs from japan to visit places like hawaii and other areas and when they came back they almost had to automatically quarantine so that shift has taken place where now as long as you are fully vaccinated and have a boost uh you can travel to and from without having to quarantine so that's number one number two it's going to take a while to build up that japanese travel again yes we want to see it come back and yes we're far short of a full economic recovery until international visitors uh return so you won't see that happening this year uh maybe 2023 at the earliest uh of golden week we might see it come back to the one and a half million visitors uh from a total year perspective at least developing that trend going forward but it's a very important market uh i give big props to governor ige who's going to be going to japan uh shortly and that's exactly uh what he should be doing that's a playbook out of what governor ayoshi and governor waihee would do and i was the director of d-bed we would go first to the japanese government thank them for their past support and then asked them to return to hawaii the japanese love hawaii they tend to be the kind of tourists that we like to see come here because they spend uh they circulate they appreciate our cultural heritage uh and at the end of the day they're the model visitor that comes here so uh we want to see them come back we want to see them add to that mix so that we can have a higher quality visitor spender that comes to our community and contribute to our comp economy uh in more ways than one because of their curious nature of appreciating everything that we're about i want to ask you just on a personal note there's been a lot of speculation that kaikahele is going to be giving up his congressional seat perhaps for a run for governor perhaps not have you thought at all about running for cb2 could we see an announcement in the cards you know i'm so focused on what i'm doing now i uh ty is a good friend of mine uh you know he's gonna do what he has to do i personally think that he's doing uh a great service for us for being in in washington uh and he's kind of coming in kind of late but at the end of the day far be it for me to tell someone don't shoot for the stars because i've done that in my political career he's a good man uh certainly i think if he makes that decision to go i know there's going to be a lot of interest but for me personally right now uh i'm really focused in bringing this industry back we've made definite strides uh calls are coming in people are texting but it always happens you know they always think uh you know what's movie you got to do next so far i'm just pleased uh that we are in a good place and i'm pleased to be working with so many of our collaborative partners uh because no longer are we promoting um our our opinions or our our positions from the hotel side strictly as a hotel-centric point of view the airlines are no longer doing it that way we're doing it a very collaborative fashion with retail restaurant airlines ground transportation we're all in this together and i worked very hard to get it to this place here and i want to continue to maintain that going forward but that that's where i stand as of today you know as we wrap up here uh before we let you go i wanted to just kind of ask how the pandemic has really shaped this industry of course we've heard all the things that you had mentioned and things that we've talked about in the past about uh just the development and the change in the way hawaii is being marketed around the globe and and all the measures efforts that are being taken but more from a just a relational standpoint you know we've seen many in the hospital hospitality industry here locally come together through various means through the safe travels program through the various press conferences that have been had at the state capitol how do you think overall that the pandemic has changed the relationship issued on the hospitality side in this integration that you speak of i i said i think it's been wonderful i've always said this every crisis presents an opportunity to do things better and for us in the industry it made us recognize i believe from the hotel sector more than ever that we really need other robust aspects of the economy to also experience good results and that's why i talked about the importance of the retail restaurant attractions transportation ground transportation um the various small businesses uh everyone feeds off tourism and until we find that economic diversification initiative that will replace tourism or come close to supplementing or complementing tourism we still have to figure out how we do this better how we make it so that people will understand and appreciate that this is the industry that employs the greatest number of people so that takes a lot of collaboration uh that's making sure that it's not always the hotel's leading sometimes it's retail is going to lead restaurants are going to lead the airlines are going to lead small businesses are going to lead that's how we have to do that going forward so i think that's the lesson of the pandemic that we are truly all of this together and i also say this too that when people can't keep looking at hta uh and kind of playing the blame game with the hawaii tourism authority if we're not getting the right kind of tourists there they're doing a good job of trying to do a destination marketing campaign that makes sure that people understand the importance of our culture when they come here but it's all of us coming together to supplement that effort so we're making giant strides with government now with short-term rentals uh with impact fees i like that now the community too has to come around and be a little more helpful too in this area of crime if we do that then we're going to have an industry here that we can all be proud of uh and say that it's worked for us in the past uh and certainly better days are ahead as we go forward fantastic great to hear from you this morning mufi hanuman president and ceo of the hawaii lodging and tourism association we appreciate all your insights on so many topics this morning well ryan if you've got a couple tickets left man i want to come up there and uh go go rainbow uh yeah well hopefully a lot of fans will be out here there's a lot of hawaii people in l.a and i'm sure there'll be a lot of fans cheering back home as well thanks so much god bless you well very interesting from to hear from him and as we said right at the top his interview was well timed because there there are two big articles in the paper this morning talking about the crime in waikiki and how his agency along with others are working collaboratively to solve it you really heard ryan uh you know basically on every topic this theme of collaboration and wanting to work across the aisle with different partners that don't necessarily traditionally work together but really trying to bring everyone together to make sure that the tourism balance is where it needs to be and also that we eradicate crime in this very very important part of our community yeah and really a comprehensive view of where we're at and where we've come from to really signal the difference of uh how the state and how organizations uh like the one that movie hanuman leads has really evolved through the pandemic and you know he listed off a couple of those uh things whether it be impact fees that we are now seeing more and more of reservations that are needed to go to attractions like diamond head that the state has recently announced as well and then integrating that with bill 41 that was been signed by the mayor to really crack down on those illegal vacation rentals and really confining that to resort areas they believe that they are in a much better position to handle this summer influx that is expected with a pent-up demand of travel which could be a record-breaking year with uh in terms of certain specific destinations that are now finding their way to the island so great to hear an update on what's happening there and just an overall just the as you said collaboration that seems to be happening on all fronts yeah and the missing piece of course with our tourism uh right now are the international visitors the east asian market specifically japan he did note that governor ige is going to japan we'll be asking the governor about his upcoming travel plans on wednesday when he's a guest here uh and it'll be great to see the japanese tourists back you know mufi did say that that those visitors are really the model visitors in our community they spend uh they follow the rules and for the most part uh they are respectful in the ways that people really want when they welcome guests to our to our communities so interesting to get that update also of course the personal political update uh we have to ask because you never do know he did look at his watch and said at least not for now but that doesn't mean not ever so we'll see we'll see where that goes he does sound like though that he has a full plate uh so we'll have to see uh if he dips his toe in that race unlikely but you never know yeah a lot happening on the political front uh but one person who is not seeking any as far as we know is governor ige uh and we'll be talking to him like we said on wednesday a lot of topics that we'll be covering with the governor of course the conclusion of the legislative session what he feels about some of these measures that have been passed by the legislative branch and ideas and thoughts on anything that he may consider vetoing in in his disagreement with some of the things that have moved through the legislature this session as well as getting an update on where we're at with kova19 there's always a lot to talk about uh and the governor is also a very big fan of university of hawaii athletics wouldn't be surprised if we actually see him here on the campus of ucla at some point of hawaii mixes the championship so uh looking forward to continuing to bring this show to you even from the road uh we hope to see you right back here on wednesday at 10 30 for another episode of spotlight hawaii until then take care aloha this episode of spotlight hawaii is brought to you by long's drugs you

2022-05-08 17:25

Other news