Republican Maui Candidates July 2000 – a bunch of interesting looks at people back in 2000 talking politics on Maui. At 1:20 in, see, by example, once and future Mayor ALAN ARAKAWA. Also, Charmaine Tavares, future mayor, Jan Yagi Buen… many more
Summary of the Video Transcript (Political Candidate Forum and Community Meeting)
[00:03 → 05:53] Introduction and Candidate Presentations
- The video opens with a musical introduction and transitions into political candidate introductions for the U.S. House of Representatives District 2 and other local offices in Maui County, Hawaii.
- Jim Donovan, a Certified Public Accountant running for U.S. House District 2, emphasizes the importance of tax laws being written by those who understand taxes. He serves as Architectural Control Chairman of Kohala Ranch on the Big Island and is an NCAA umpire. Donovan stresses the need for tax code simplification and better federal support for neighbor islands.
- Russ Francis, announcing his candidacy for the same congressional district, highlights the need for change in Maui County and promises accessibility and accountability to constituents through town hall meetings and public forums.
- John Carroll, running for U.S. Senate, stresses the need for significant change from state to federal levels, focusing on economic recovery and education. Carroll has legal and military backgrounds, a commercial pilot career, and has served in the Hawaii State Legislature.
- Other candidates briefly introduce themselves, including a newcomer running for the 10th State House seat.
[06:43 → 17:57] Republican Party Overview and Philosophy
- Terry Craven, President of the Maui League of Republican Women, welcomes attendees and introduces the event’s structure: a blessing, pledge, and national anthem.
- Jan Shishido, new county chairman of the Maui Republican Party, expresses enthusiasm about the candidates and the Republican movement’s effort to educate young people and recruit candidates.
- Travis Thompson, Maui’s first National Republican Committee Man, delivers a keynote emphasizing the Republican Party platform:
- Advocacy for individual liberty, equal opportunity, and minimal government interference.
- Opposition to government overreach in retirement, education, and investment decisions.
- Stress on grassroots involvement and new leadership to effect change in Hawaii.
- Thompson references the Republican Oath, emphasizing government’s role to serve people only in areas where individuals cannot effectively do so themselves, and underscores the importance of local governance.
[17:57 → 32:19] Candidate Speeches on Tax Policy, Education, and Economic Reform
- Chris Halpert, the only elected Republican House member from Maui, emphasizes early support for candidates and the importance of grassroots campaigning, including direct mail and door-to-door efforts.
- John Carroll (Senate candidate) highlights his extensive qualifications and bipartisan appeal. He stresses the need for better education funding and criticizes the current lack of local accessibility of incumbent Senator Daniel Akaka.
- Jim Donovan discusses the complexity of the Internal Revenue Code, pledging to:
- Simplify tax laws.
- End government agencies’ profit motives that unfairly compete with private businesses.
- Ensure fair federal funding for all Hawaiian islands, especially for infrastructure like interstate roads beyond Oahu.
- Donovan calls for financial support, volunteer engagement, and public awareness to challenge incumbent Patsy Mink, whom he views as vulnerable.
- Donovan critiques Mink’s opposition to tax reforms such as the marriage tax penalty repeal, presenting himself as a more business-friendly alternative.
[32:19 → 50:12] Campaign Challenges, Small Business Concerns, and the Jones Act
- The candidates discuss challenges facing small businesses, including excessive regulatory compliance costs, limited health coverage for part-time workers, and burdensome government interference.
- Travis Thompson highlights how these challenges threaten the survival and succession of small businesses in Hawaii.
- The Jones Act is criticized for raising shipping costs and limiting economic viability due to restrictions on foreign vessels transporting goods between U.S. ports, particularly impacting Hawaii’s isolated market.
- Donovan and Carroll both pledge to advocate for changes to the Jones Act and other outdated laws to reduce costs and increase competitiveness.
- Carroll underscores the importance of reviewing and reforming old legislation that no longer fits current economic realities.
- Donovan stresses that despite tax law complexities, taxes are necessary to fund civilization but should be fair and efficiently administered.
[50:12 → 01:05:12] Political Climate, Campaign Strategy, and Public Engagement
- Candidates express frustration with entrenched political power, lack of accountability, and career politicians who prioritize special interests over constituents.
- Donovan notes Mink’s minimal local presence and accessibility issues.
- The need for grassroots support, financial contributions, and active campaigning is repeatedly emphasized by all candidates and party leaders.
- Russ Francis shares his personal background as a former professional football player, emphasizing resilience and readiness to fight political opposition.
- Candidates encourage voters to openly support Republican candidates despite the historically Democratic dominance in Hawaii, noting a changing political climate more receptive to Republican ideas.
- Voter polls suggest a potential shift in favor of Republicans in some races, increasing optimism for electoral success.
[01:05:12 → 01:13:44] House Candidates and Education Issues
- Kika Best, a newcomer to politics and a businessman, introduces himself as a candidate for the state house. He expresses a desire to bring a business perspective to government, emphasizing regulatory reform and investment in youth education.
- Kika is a single father and part-owner of Maui Disposal, a family business.
- Concerns are raised about Hawaii’s public education system, particularly regarding homeschooling:
- Homeschoolers in Hawaii receive a GED rather than a high school diploma, unlike other states.
- This creates disadvantages for homeschooled students in college admissions and public recognition.
- Candidates acknowledge the need for legislative attention to homeschooling policies and broader education reform.
- The increasing number of homeschooling families indicates widespread dissatisfaction with public schools.
[01:13:44 → 01:30:42] County Council Candidates and Local Governance Vision
- Alan Tashido, running for the 5th Senate District, is introduced and shares his journey from reluctant candidate to active participant, encouraged by Republican leaders. He has county government experience and strong community ties.
- Emphasis is placed on the need for change in Hawaii’s one-party dominated political system, which has led to high taxes, low wages, and poor public services.
- Candidates highlight corruption scandals, lack of governmental accountability, and a disconnect between elected officials and citizens.
- They urge voters to support Republicans to restore vision, leadership, and community focus.
- Georgina Kawamura, candidate for Lanai County Council, stresses her fiscal expertise as a former budget director and her commitment to transparency in government spending.
- Steve Warren, candidate for South Maui County Council, shares his personal story of hard work and community service. He pledges to be accessible, responsive, and dedicated to improving education and job diversity.
- Warren highlights his role in launching a new high-tech high school on Maui and advocates for community partnership in education.
- Candidates underscore the difficulties of county governance, including working with multiple council members and balancing competing interests.
- The forum closes with an appeal for voter engagement, unity, and belief in the potential for positive change.
Key Themes and Insights
- Tax Reform and Economic Policy: Strong focus on simplifying tax laws, ending unfair government competition with private business, and advocating for equitable federal funding for all Hawaiian islands.
- Education Reform: Widespread concern over public education quality and homeschooling policies; candidates propose increased funding, resource support, and legislative attention.
- Small Business Support: Recognition of regulatory burdens and taxation as significant challenges threatening small business viability in Hawaii.
- Political Change and Accountability: Candidates position themselves as alternatives to entrenched career politicians, emphasizing grassroots involvement, transparency, and local accessibility.
- Jones Act Reform: Identified as a major economic barrier for Hawaii, with calls for legislative changes to reduce shipping costs and encourage trade.
- Community Engagement: Candidates stress the importance of voter participation, financial support, and volunteerism to overcome Democratic dominance in the state.
- Republican Party’s Role: Portrayed as the party of individual liberty, responsibility, and economic opportunity, seeking to rebuild its presence and influence in Hawaii.
Quantitative and Comparative Data Table
| Topic | Data/Details | Source Segment |
|---|---|---|
| Internal Revenue Code size | Grown dramatically over 30 years; calls for rewriting over 5 years | Jim Donovan [31:11 → 32:19] |
| Teacher pay comparison | Teachers earn $3,000-$4,000/month vs. starting airline engineer $5,500/month | John Carroll [28:45 → 29:17] |
| Maui League of Republican Women | 53 members (growing), part of 110,000 nationwide Republican women | Terry Craven [13:10 → 13:58] |
| Junior Achievement program | Grew from 200 children to 9,600 children, 410 volunteers, and 410 teachers under Steve Warren | Steve Warren [01:46:41 → 01:47:20] |
| Poll numbers (Senate race) | 44%-50% support for Republican candidate vs. 26% for incumbent Daniel Akaka | Russ Francis [44:31 → 45:04] |
Conclusion
This video documents a vibrant political forum hosted by the Maui League of Republican Women featuring Republican candidates for federal, state, and local offices in Maui County. The candidates present detailed policy positions focused on economic reform, tax simplification, education improvement, and government accountability. The forum reveals a sense of renewed energy within the local Republican Party, a call for grassroots activism, and a shared belief that meaningful political change is possible in Hawaii’s traditionally Democratic landscape. Key issues such as the Jones Act, small business challenges, and education reform unify the candidates’ platforms, while personal stories emphasize dedication and readiness to serve the community.
Timestamped Transcript
04:51
believe that the tax laws should be written by people who truly understand taxes and that’s one of the reasons that i decided to run for united states congress you know uh here in maui we are so used to seeing people coming from all over the world here are you from maui or from oahu uh i live on the big island yeah yes in fact i’m the architectural control chairman of kohala ranch a large subdivision over on the big island i’m also a uh an ncaa umpire and as the as the umpire i want you to
05:23
remember that the ump’s decision is final come this fall patsy mink is out well we welcome seeing you here you know if you come back to maui i’ll be happy to sit and we can have a more significant interview and uh let the people of maui know who you are well thank you very much i look forward to doing that all righty let’s go ahead and have a good time sounds great okay aloha everyone russ francis joining you today to announce my candidacy for the second congressional district which of course
05:53
includes maui county just want to let you know that i’ll be coming into your neighborhoods look forward to talking with you i will make myself available for any questions or any groups of people you’d like to put together i think we can all say with a great deal of certainty it’s time for a change great russ uh we’re going to go in and have a good time but i know that the people of maui would love to have you come back one time when you’re back if you’d like to sit with me and we’ll have a more
06:17
at length interview that would be great maybe we can uh recruit some people to come and ask questions from whatever we’ll have i have a challenge for you and everybody at public access tv let’s put together a good size or multiple good size town hall meetings where we can get the people together of maui county whether it’s here on the island of our molokai and lanai let’s get together and see what their concerns are answer their questions and find out ways that we can finally be
06:43
accessible and accountable to the people of maui county that’s a good challenge in fact i think here we’re ready for you over at the tv station we have a lot of available call-in shows with audience participation that would be a natural i look forward to it let’s book it real good okay here on maui first time i came to this island was to play football in pune at an exhibition game green and white came back in 1949. that was when the old airfield was there and aloha was called tpa i think trans-pacific airlines so
07:15
it’s a real pleasure to be back on this gorgeous island and enjoying your marvelous hospitality here hello you’re welcome and you’re john carroll aren’t you that’s correct yeah i’m running for united states senate you’re running against probably running against dan akaka and i feel very very strongly that we need significant change from the ground up from the state house right through the u.s senate before we’re going to get the kinds of changes that we need in this economy
07:40
we’re talking about right now that there are there that there is a recovery but the only recovery we’re getting is the wash off from the prosperity that the other 49 states are enjoying that recovery has not hit here and if anybody tells you different go down to the store fronts and see how many upper leafs are up for sale and then take a look at the foreclosures and the bankruptcies sad news but we can change it jim jones came here as our new coach when when uh was losing every game and he made a big
08:08
difference and i believe that i can make that same kind of a difference in the u.s senate thank you very much oh you’re welcome and uh when you come back to maui the next time please make sure to stop by public access television and we’ll be sure to have a little time to get you on the air and share more with the people terrific we thank you very much oh you’re welcome aloha [Music] hello my name is i’m running for the 10th uh state house seat recently vacated by david morihara and i look forward to meeting everyone
08:48
and looking forward to our great election year well we look forward to seeing more of you kika best of luck in this campaign season as a veteran of a couple of uh races i know that it’s a lot of fun you get to meet a lot of people and share a lot of ideas i hope the people of maui appreciate what it takes to run i really congratulate you for the redemption to get out there and run thanks jason you will all right [Music] we have some exciting candidates to listen to tonight they’re going to make a change in maui
09:31
in the state and the country so we gotta get started here [Music] i’m terry craven the president of the maui league and i would like to welcome you here tonight this is again a real pleasure to have you all here to support our republican candidates and before we get started what we’re going to do is have a blessing um then we’re going to have the pledge and then we’re going to have the star spangled banner so if everyone will please stand and patty peterson our past president and our vp
10:04
of teenage republicans will give the blessing [Music] thank you father we come before you tonight we give you praise and thanksgiving father for just being who you are we thank you lord for bringing everyone here safely we thank you lord for taking them home safely we ask that you bless this food bless our time together we thank you lord that you give us much wisdom and discernment we thank you lord for favor all the way around with you praise and glory and we thank you for this evening in jesus name amen
10:41
now um we’re going to have a pledge led by um [Music] and leia aloha mcnamara and they are with the teenage republicans maui and now um one of our own joanne johnson is going to sing the star-spangled van [Music] twilight’s rescue whose brought stripes and bright stars through the parallels [Music] bursting in [Music] and the [Music] free very beautiful everyone please be seated and what we’re going to have mark come and escort the tables to the buffet so i’m here all again [Music]
13:10
[Applause] again i’m terry craven and on behalf of our 53 and growing members of the maui league of republican women we want to welcome you here tonight this is one of our important things that we do republican women have we have over 110 000 women across the nation and every county and every state of this country and our goals are to educate and inform the public on the issues to recruit candidates and to elect republicans so this evening is one of the most important things that we do um and one of the things of keeping
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us informed about the issues and the people we thought it would be important for everyone here to know our party leaders and with that we would like to introduce to you our new county chairman jan shishito since she would like to say a few words to you [Music] good evening everyone it’s so exciting to see all of you tonight and it’s so exciting to just feel the energy in here i’m just excited about seeing the candidates i congratulate you i wish that i wish you the best of luck and i want to thank the maui legal
14:43
republican women you folks are doing a great job terry and i thank you and everyone is working so hard together and it feels real good and it’s good to see all the tars here thanks and you know it’s important that we continue to educate our young ones we need to get them going on knowing the process knowing the um issues because we do this for them so again thank you for being here tonight and i’m looking forward to a neat and exciting evening i don’t know if most of you know this
15:33
but jan is a teacher a real teacher who belongs to a teacher’s human [Music] to be our county chairman next we’d like to introduce you to a man that i don’t know most of you know he’s been very busy in the background raising lots of money for our candidates and our party and it’s made a really big difference and he is maui’s first national committee chairman and that is travis thompson thank you my name is travis and um i’m the actually national committee man elected
16:16
after the convention the day after we have a meeting from 8 30 to 11 30 and i hope that confirms it and we’ll be able to get on with working as hard as we can for the state of hawaii first i’d like to thank the now illegal republican women terry cream he’s done a great job of organizing his public forum with republican candidates we are here on the eve of the party coming together to nominate the next president and the vice president of the united states for the top political positions
16:45
that’s going to be distribution to somebody else this is the beginning of the most important political season for national for state for local candidates within our state we have a solid well-reasoned platform from a section dealing with even senior citizens if you get the chance to read it and i see it’s on everybody’s desk we have a platform to be proud of and will provide us with the outline for success our party as you know is the party of the open door ours of the party of liberty
17:17
the party of equality of opportunity for all and favoritism for none our party has confidence in each person’s ability to make decisions in contrast with another party that wants government to make decisions for you about retirement about schools and about your investments we believe in individual responsibility versus government and the bureaucracy dictating actions this belief is apparent at the national level at the state level at the grassroots we believe in the individual if you have a chance visit the website
17:57
gopconvention.com in i found last night when i was looking through republican oath it is as follows i believe that the proper function of government is to do for the people those things that have to be done but cannot be done or cannot be done as well by the individuals and the most effective government is the government closest to the people you here who are running for office are going to change the course of hawaii’s history it is time for change it is time for new leadership it is time for hawaii and its people to
18:33
take their place in the sun led by candidates who care a newer era is beginning one candidate just by running and competing will make a difference i am proud to be a republican i’m proud to be here with you who are running for office thank you [Applause] i asked him to give us a general patent speech and i think that was it so i definitely agree with what he had to say um next we’re going to have our one elected house member here on maui he’s very literally he needs more people to help him
19:17
in the house and that’s chris halpert thank you very much thank you and i want to thank the league of republican women this event tonight is excellent i want to thank the republican women for having consistently and persistently supported republican candidates over the years if i could for background i the first time that i campaigned for a republican candidate was in 1974 and campaigned for nine candidates before i ever ran myself also as a member of the republican party or district chair in 1977 and
20:05
the republican convention the state republican convention was held up maui that year and had the opportunity to go as many of you know the republican party has had its ups and downs the county party but the republican women the league of republican women have persistently and consistently supported candidates and it’s been so important it was important for my success and important for a lot of us allen i’m sure would acknowledge it and uh charmaine perhaps it’s it’s good to acknowledge
20:41
that one of the high points of the republican party on maui was in the late 80s early 90s helen kristen del rub ran the republican party on maui and they were republican women and this year we’re going to have a knockdown here a winning year jan shishido republican women so appropriately i was asked to speak about the importance of early support we we’re coming close to the deadline for filing for nominations next week we’ll know who the whole field will be it is certainly time to start now to
21:29
help our candidates it’s been said political theorists say that half of the electorate make up their minds who they’re going to vote for in the last three weeks before the general election and perhaps that’s true but certainly the decisions that they make in the booth or in the last three weeks are based on the work that has gone before on the exposure that the candidates have had ahead of time in the issues in uh actually touching people in the field whether it’s door-to-door old time or any of the various campaign
22:05
activities direct mail one of the strong points of republican women have helped our candidates with putting out direct mail i can’t emphasize enough how important that is and how important it is to start now we have the opportunity to win votes every day we can win votes today for our candidates that will reap the rewards on november 17th this is the group to do it you’ve been great for as long as i’ve been paying attention to it and i’m counting on a good year this year thank you thank you very much
22:56
are we going to speak sitting down okay we’re ready our kitchen timer my name is john carroll i’m running for united states senate and i was interested in the remarks of mr halpert earlier talking about women it seems that and the efforts that they make to to make our our lives and our government as good as as it is and certainly their efforts to make it so much better are clearly in evidence here tonight but i’m reminded that god picked a young man and he said you know you’ve been so
24:19
good that i feel that i should give you any wish that you asked for so the fella says look i’d like to get a bridge from san francisco to hawaii so i can drive out there anytime i want so god says well i’m almighty god and i can do that but i wish you think about the amount of steel that’s going to go in i have 80 foot waves huge depth out there and we can do this but isn’t there something else and he said well if i could understand the inner workings of a woman’s mind i think that would be very efficient and
24:51
god says you want two lanes or four lanes [Music] that’s don’t know me i have been in hawaii a long time in fact the first first football game that i played in the state was right over there near pune the airport used to be there at that time tommy kalakato was my coach came down there eating my first mango and i’ve been here pretty much since other than for military time and going away to law school i have been very fortunate in the state it’s extraordinarily blessed really i’ve
25:32
been a practicing attorney i’ve had a 32-year career as a commercial as captain for hawaiian airlines had considerable time in the military by 34 years as both the fighter pilot judge advocate and so forth and in addition to that i’m also currently chairman of the board of a company that supplies pilots 747 and dc-10 pilots of japan airlines we have offices in sydney australia tokyo san francisco and hawaii so i come to this race not unprepared oh and in addition by the way i also served
26:07
ten years in the state legislature here court terms in the house and one term in the senate before i go on with that i lay that groundwork so that you’ll know that i come here not unqualified to do the job that i seek now the current climate in this state is such that i’ve never seen before i first ran for office for u.s congress in 1966 and believe me i heard my shares gil silva can probably tell you of the you know i wish you luck well you know i’m a democrat you never vote for republicans and i
26:42
congratulate and well i shouldn’t really congratulate but i only give my condolences to every one of the republican candidates in here because you’ve got an awful lot of work to do we’ve got a huge amount of past prejudice to overcome but looking at the qualifications and the vigor and the you know just plain good looks of the people that we have running i’m really really delighted i say that both as a as a candidate and as a former party chairman also before i go on i really want to
27:11
thank mrs craven and maui league of republican women for letting us come here tonight and speak to each of you it’s marvelous to see this many republicans out this early and i just hope that you will take her advice and get involved with campaigns and if you can to give money which really is what most of the campaigns run on and i urge each one of the candidates to do the door-to-door go to the shopping centers get your signs out and get out and meet the people because you yourself talking to these other
27:44
people is the way you’re going to get the vote the race that i have is against senator daniel akaka he’s been up there 26 years he’s a very very nice man i don’t think anybody’s going to win a personality contest against him and he comes from a wonderful family you know abraham akaka his brothers are well known he’s deceased now but he was a very very wonderful minister here and he comes he’s strong on hawaiian issues and so forth but right now we’ve got to have somebody in the u.s
28:16
senate who’s really worried about all the people in the state of hawaii and the number one problem we have here is our current level of education we’ve got hard-working teachers they’re underpaid the classroom teacher ratio is really poor it needs to be changed we need to get more money down to the schools down to the classroom level and to the libraries and that is able to be done because of what the republicans have done in congress that is to put the bloc grants down but we get about
28:45
a very large proportion siphoned off by the doe in this state and it doesn’t get down there our teachers for instance make about three to four thousand dollars a month on average my company the cheapest seat that we have by an engineer the starting pay is like 55 40 per month this is to sit back there balance the fuel to make a couple of radio calls and then go home there’s there’s no there’s no way you can balance those two and yet the one ends up starting out with probably more than most of them can make
29:17
by the time they’ve been there 20 years with a master’s degree is that one minute thank you okay next is jim donovan running for u.s house district two against nancy mink thank you terry craven and thank you to the maui league of republican women for inviting me here this evening my name is jim donovan uh as terry mentioned i’m a candidate for the united states house of representatives in district two and i’m a certified public accountant i’m also the architectural control chairman of kohala ranch over on the big
30:06
island and i’m by in addition i’m an ncaa baseball umpire in fact when when joanne did her wonderful rendition of the national anthem today i was i almost stood up and said play ball you know i can’t help that as a certified public accountant i’m a firm believer that the tax laws ought to be written by people who understand taxes and unfortunately over the last 30 years or so the internal revenue code has grown from this size to about this side side with a lot of nonsense in there
30:42
there are some people who want to just throw the code away but some of the provisions that are there are there for darn good reason some complexities make sense others don’t and i think i have the type of mind the experience the exposure to determine which things are important and which things are not and that’s the main reason i decided to run i’m not a career politician i just happen to be one who has that particular specialty and and on april 20th maybe you know this on april 20th
31:11
the congress passed legislation calling for the internal revenue code to be rewritten over the next five years and i think i can do an excellent job of assisting and driving the rewriting of the internal revenue code i feel in the best qualified candidate to do this i think i read well i believe i write well uh i noticed that we had the platform out on the table everybody has that i was one of the authors of the of the county hawaii platform and of the state of hawaii platform and i i can happily say that i run for office
31:48
with pride on this on this platform i’m not going to talk about taxes too much because i know tax is a terrible terribly boring subject and uh and and it’s really something that we don’t get terribly excited about except that remember that when you look at it in the in the terms of your take-home pay the amount that’s left over taxes is really a pretty expensive thing in fact we pay more for taxes than we do for our mortgage payments our car payments and and other things and so even though taxes
32:19
is unpleasant to you just go ahead and cast your vote from jim dobbin and you’ll know somebody is in there who can do the job for you we don’t have to feel helpless we don’t have to feel apathy toward taxes we can do something and i believe i can uh be instrumental in that effort so i’m going to make three promises to you tonight and i’m going to also ask you to do three things my three promises are these one i’m going to do my best to make a real simplification of the tax laws secondly
32:53
i’m going to help put an end to the profit motive within government agencies this is something that isn’t looked at too often but you know you go to the post office you see they’re selling they’re selling uh phone cards and they’re selling t-shirts and they’re selling office supplies yet the the merchant down the street pays taxes pays rent and so forth and can’t compete well unfairly with that unfair uh post office that’s doing business that they shouldn’t be doing
33:19
the the third thing i’m going to promise you is that i will strive to make sure that hawaii all of hawaii not just honolulu gets a fair shake from the federal government we need more money into the interstate roads the interstate road money needs to be spent here in hawaii i know on the big island and here in maui we don’t even have any four-lane highways and of course most of that money that was used on the mainland was done in the 1950s when we had the interstate highway commission we only have the h1h2 and h3 over on
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oahu and the rest of the state has been neglected and i’m going to make sure that hawaii is not treated as a second class citizen state here are the three promises i want from you and probably the belt thing before i get them out i want to i want you to take the initiative because terry said take the initiative to be sure that it’s not just mainland money that buys your congressional seat i’m asking your finance for your financial support it’s a challenging race i’ve got to go around
34:21
all the islands airfare hotel so forth i’ve covered most of the costs i need to cover my my cost of my television advertising and that’s where i need some help other thing i’m going to ask for you whether or not you can help financially is i’m going to ask you to roll up your sleeves i’m going to ask you to join the donovan caravan the theme of my campaign i’ve got bumper stickers i’ve got signs back there i’d welcome anybody to take take the items that are there and i’d
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sure love it if you would fill out one of those forms say yes jim i can distribute a dozen or more signs around the the district for you the third thing i’m going to ask you to do is a really easy one to go to my website it’s jim dot it’s www.jim.donova.net and if you’ll take a look at that i think you’ll see some dark good reasons i do talk about taxes in greater depth actually have some of the literature on the back table that you can take today and i track all the legislation at the
35:17
federal level and then i talk about how patsy me voted on it how i would vote on it and then you can be the judge as to whether you think i’m qualified for uh for your vote you know passing mixed days are numbered we’re in a democrat state but i’ll tell you i raised all the signatures for my to be to appear on the ballot i raised them in downtown hilo and i only had two people who said to me gosh jim we’re going to vote for passing me we can’t do it so i think her days are numbered
35:50
and whether i prevail in the primary or my opponent i think we all agree that the umpire’s decision is final come november taxi mink is out thank you okay next is also running for [Music] congressional district number two good evening hello well not only are we opposing each other in the primary but i didn’t get a lot of referees and umpires too well [Music] i also don’t know if mr donovan has thought about this when he fixes the tax code that all cps are out of the job we’ll go to a
36:42
flat tax actually though if you win you’ll have the job in washington you have to worry about that i want to talk to you tonight first of all thank you for the lay thank you for the delicious food thank you for taking your time to come out this evening both the young people here that joined us this evening people have been involved in the republican party for many many years new coverage people are interested people are excited because this is a historic opportunity for all of us this is when things will be turned
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around i’d like to thank a few people who have offered a lot of support if only encouragement at times when things are it’s it’s tough boring isle down as jim mentioned i’d like to thank terry craven for all the help she’s given us here when we’ve asked for it to come over to maui rides to the airport from mohanna on short notice we’re not behind the music festival i’d also like to thank jan shishido for the courage that she’s showing uh it is not easy to be a republican in
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the state i work for the department of business and economic development i was in the governor’s cabinet working with the enemy as it were i’ve been in an independent all my life the governor knew that when he appointed me and i’m here to tell you that people like jan shishido show a lot of courage when they move forward to announce not only are they republican but they’re leaders in the republican movement so both mr mr shishido my applause to you also and that is a primary battleground for
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me and that’s education and everybody’s mentioned it we’ll hear more about it and i’m not going to speak much tonight because i know i have reading food everybody wants to go to sleep so we’ll get through with this very quickly but mainly to thank people for the help and the encouragement and the advice that they’ve shown mr travis thompson has been a critical member um i guess a small small group of people mr and mrs thompson really because they come together uh to help this campaign
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in a very tangible way not just financially as travis has gone on to reach out in this community to ask for contributions for campaigns for all republicans for all republicans just not me but for everybody but also just the you know he’s there the quiet support we come over to meet with folks uh whether it’s business or whether it’s residential whoever it is and travis thompson is there and he will be representing us at the national convention in philadelphia and we are lucky to have them both travis and mrs
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assange representative chris halford is a guy that every time i went to see him or saw and ran into him at the legislature when i was working for dbed as a guy that’s just sort of a can do attitude let’s get going what are you waiting for get out of my way if you can’t move forward then move to the side leave following it out of the way i admire his quiet strength where he comes up he says listen you need help when you come to maui give me a call and we will be chris we’ll be spending a lot more time on
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maui we’ll be looking forward to your support and we look forward to your leadership thank you thank you very much mr chris alford i also want to thank the other candidates john carroll james donovan kika chris allen joanne georgina charmaine steve all of you here this evening we’re we’re all involved in this we’re all in this together we’re all taking time out of our lives we’re all going to get beat up but in 14 years of national football vote every time i got knocked down i got back up as
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long as i was conscious there were a few times where you know a little fuzzy but i can tell you as a small business person after spending those years in the national football league um we are up against a group of people that don’t have any rules they don’t play buddy moves there’s no sportsmanship involved here so we’re going to take out the gloves they’ve already started attacking our campaign well i guarantee you that we know how to fight back and we’ll do that just by
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hard and honest earnest work and i commit that to you as your candidate for the second congressional district thank you very much [Applause] one last thing i really do appreciate the reception that you’ve given my little boy over here who’s now starting to nod out ryan mackenzie francis it’s his fifth birthday today and terry thank you gil thank you for getting the cake and for the people here that prepared the cake the candles and everything else it’s a special neighborhood i just
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couldn’t leave him home on his birthday happy birthday okay now it’s your time to ask our candidates questions each candidate gets two questions so if anyone has something they would like to ask these three gentlemen please come up right now and we’ll let you do it no questions oh my goodness okay that’s it you’re great all of you guys are great so okay well sure we’ll set the timer for two minutes okay um all right what i wanted to say is that um for all of you candidates who are out
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there right now this climate is different than i’ve ever seen in my whole life and the way i want to put this to you is that for years there just was no there was an inertia of bodies you know what they call bodies not in motion i forget physics but right now every place i’ve won and i’ve been on every island now except well i haven’t been to kauai but i have been on maui and the other island you know oahu quite a bit and state fairs all around down in macaulay areas that i used to represent before
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but people are now saying oh thank goodness we’re glad you’re going to we’re glad there’s a change coming up we’ve got to have change our children are gone the grandchildren are gone so when you go out don’t be embarrassed about being a republican for a long time people would run as republican they wouldn’t put an r on the front of their uh their brochures because it was like a kind of a immediate down for you if you did it the climate is right you’ve got to have a good positive
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message about what you intend to do you don’t need to end up talking about i’m saying this because there’s so many candidates here and i think it’s something that they can use as they go forward with this and i was very happy to see that we’ve got russ and mr donovan here together because they’re both very very well qualified guys and uh it’s it’s tremendous to see such well qualified candidates coming out but they as i said earlier they all need the money they all need the support they
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need to sign holders the house the house people and gilso and other people this room can tell you so i would urge you really to think about this as not what we’re going to do our best but we are going to win we can’t win and we will win this race that i’m in now they took the poll on dan and kokom and it’s against nobody just as a republican and the poll was done by star bulletin and channel nbc station channel 8 i believe and against 26 say they will will favorably consider republican 18 or excuse me 16 percent
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say 18 say they will want a talk out with another with a republican six percent undecided so going into this race my opponent by the way at g douglas in the primary so far and uh we’re going in there really looking at a 44 to 50 position so we can win this race but we’ve got to have the wherewithal to do it so i’m going to ask everybody in this room including jim donovan and chris francis to to help me win that race and i think if we do well in that senate race it’s going to flow down to everybody else
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that’s running as a republican last point i know my time’s almost up but linda legal very badly needs to fill every single one of our house seats and house races uh with somebody who’s competent and i know she’s looking for two and particularly joe tsuki so i would really hope if you can push anybody out of the weeds and get them to go i know there’s some financial help there and we need to get those people in anyway i thank everybody for coming in and i’m sorry i couldn’t have a
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more well-tailored speech that’s perfect um jim and russ would you like a two-minute follow-up [Music] uh in my opinion one of the one of the real key things and during our economy is small business and this is to both uh to russell to jim um you know if you’re against patsy make and everything i’ve seen she’s not been a very positive source what do you think you would do in comparison what she’s done relative to helping get our small businesses moving and here within the state of
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hawaii [Music] i was talking earlier about when i was up there and i started running short of time because i was talking about the fact that that patsy mink really is losing her base of support and i think that that i have her on the run at this point and let me let me point out why i believe that we had a vote in congress a couple months ago dealing with this so-called marriage tax penalty and this is one of the areas when i spoke earlier and i said the internal revenue code has grown like topsy and some of the
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provisions in the code are complexities that make darn good sense but others don’t actually once upon a time we had this thing’s called schedule w maybe some of you remember a few years back when we had that that actually dealt with the marriage tax penalty well while passing meek was in office we had that problem solved and then in the interest of simplification by people who don’t know what they’re doing they got rid of the schedule w now this year in the 2000 we’ve been revisiting this
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if this issue called the marriage tax penalty now patsy nick voted against it and if you go to my website i i specify the legislation another version of that came before the house a few days ago uh in the interim i had spoken to patsy mink invited her to go to my website where i critiqued her on that and several other issues and i noticed particularly in the areas of tax issues she realizes that if she faces me in the general election i’m going to beat her up on some of these points she voted for it this time around
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uh coming up and and so i think that she’s taking a good hard look at the points that i’m making particularly relative uh to business i do believe that the the heart of america is small business and i i believe that a lot of the and there’s the bell i’ll just finish the thought i believe a lot of the the my my attitude toward economics and taxes are interrelated i call it taxonomics i talk about it in the literature on the back and on the back table and then on my website as well
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russ it’s your turn travis in reference to the question about small business we need to cut the red tape release the strike of hold we have a small business it costs small business i’m not saying anything that’s a surprise that you know in this room because there are many small business people here owners or managers or work in a small business it costs more to comply with all these agency regulations than it does to conduct business and that’s wrong because of it we have temporary employees 19 and a half hours
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a week no medical coverage for our families it’s the ripple that keeps going out and covering more and more families every day more and more of these small businesses are going under the ones that aren’t going under are barely hanging on and they’ll be they won’t be around for very long we see it with families moving our children don’t come back to work and then when you survive all of this if you’re clever enough and good enough to survive the taxation and the cost of compliance and the regulations
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and the oppressive agencies in many cases coming after you because with the complex regulation structure we have you’re in violation just about every day when they come after you it costs you lots of money to fight the osha and larvae or any of the others but if you survive all of that and you want to pass this on to your family the government wants 55 they talk about this benefiting large corporations and wealthy families that’s not true it’s killing our small business and we have to change that thank you
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all right we have um would you like to comment we can do to give us laws there’s no questions we’ll let them have two minutes each and then this is on travis’s question but number one in the in the congress and i’m quite sure that whichever one of these gentlemen wins that seat they’ll do the same but we need to be watchdogs over what’s going on here we have the general excise tax now they made some kind of a flim-flam uh amendment to the to the rules last year but it affects very few people it’s stretched
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out over a six year period and the main uh small businesses that need that that benefit are not going to get it at all the other thing is we need to get an amendment to the jones act so that we can bring in everything that we use here at decent rates the maritime industry in the united states is suffering and we are particularly suffering being this insular state no pipelines no highways no no railroads the ports of san diego wasp los angeles long beach are all seeking foreign shipping trade as long as we
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have the jones act no foreign ships can come in here and go back and forth between us and the united states which makes it impossible really economically not viable our strategic location is such that we should be a trans shipment center for the entire world really for us to be held in the stranglehold of madison and sea land right now is devastating and it puts the cost of everything that we buy from farm implements to feeds to groceries to whatever else at premium levels everything comes in the ships go back
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out empty and that just doubles the cost at the very least we’ve got to get that changed i intend to make that a major issue um and abercrombie will not touch the jones act issue and it’s primarily because of james pfeiffer and his control over over that particular group i intend to be an advocate for that i guess my two minutes is almost done but to give you one good example our people send their cattle for the most part from kawhi high to canada put them on trucks in canada ship them down by truck to
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idaho oregon and california to fatten them and then sell them you tell me what that does to the cost of raising cattle in this state one other revital let’s see alfalfa bales in idaho and fresno california sell between 175 250 of bail the same one in waimea is 18 to 22 dollars oh i guess something to think about oh my i want to go out and vote now okay jim [Music] can i feel more comfortable standing if you don’t mind i’d like to just uh underscore uh things that john said uh uh regarding the jones act now a lot of
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people aren’t knowledgeable as to what this is but basically the jones act came about during the days of deregulation of the trucking industry and it’s really just obsolete law and this is one of the problems that we have with congress and not only uh vault cars i always like looking at the tax area because that’s my area of greatest strength but in all areas congress doesn’t look at legislation that was enacted so many years ago to see if it’s still appropriate i’m sure some of you recall a few months
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ago that congress finally unanimously decided to eliminate the telephone tax that had been used to finance what was it the uh the spanish-american war or something like it was just way way you know 100 years old and i think that we need to constantly look at laws that are on the books to see if they are appropriate any longer i often go back and talk about the internal revenue code and i feel that the 1954 internal revenue code was one of the brightest pieces of legislation and unfortunately congress has has modified that over the
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years and has really messed up what was once a pretty darn good law it wasn’t perfect there are some things that need to be changed in that but to think that we’re going to just take the internal revenue code and throw it away that would be like throwing the baby out with the bath water because after all we do need taxes as unpopular as the subject is we do need taxes because when you stop and think about it that’s how we buy civilization and it’s important that we fund our government but that our
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government only do what government needs to do and make the citizens responsibility for things that are within their power thank you i had to stand up to him i wish i was where he was at this is really very simple to me and i don’t mean to make i know a lot of people work long hours to keep it complex but it’s very simple we have a one party state here we’ve all seen what what the results of that whether you’re in business or not now i come from a pretty simple background i spend 14 years in the
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national football league i fly an airplane every now and then and theory and philosophy is great and studying and research is wonderful and then someone has to take action and we are in dire need of people taking action we need performers we need people who are accountable we need somebody in the second congressional district who actually has their office in the second congressional district mrs mink’s office is in honolulu last time i checked that’s the first congressional district there is now one office representing the
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seat on neighbor island and mrs meek was quoted in the west nine papers saying the reason that there’s no office on may rivals i only have 18 staff members and i need them in washington there’s one person in hong kong there’s no accountability there’s no accessibility and there’s darn sure little dialogue going on small conversation going on regarding our needs our children’s needs our families needs our small business our seniors the list goes on and on and on there’s a
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reason for that the reason is when you have career politicians that have been in office county state of the federalist mrs mink has been since 1956 they owed just a couple of favors and if i learned one thing the department of business and economic development and certainly chris battles this every single day over there special interest special favors is going to my friend now when i started d-bed in 1997 i had 179 000 budget a year and a half later due to generating revenue for this state it was 8 million
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when i left last year was going from 8 million to 12 million there was a criteria for that as we went out to bid for the company that was awarded the contract to administrate the program that i came here to design guess what guess where those dollars are going folks they’re not going to the people that need them most that can benefit the state as a holos as a homeless they’re going to the people that represent to support these people that are career politicians and that has to stop now thank you
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we thank you very much and remember everyone they do have to leave because they have to check or get an airplane jim will be here when our meeting’s over but they will leave all their literature their volunteer forms and envelopes for the contributions i’m sure okay terry can we also request all of us and i speak i think for jim and for john please take a bumper sticker with you please let people know who we are here on your island in your neighborhoods whoever you support but please support
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somebody please take some of the cards out of the bumper stickers and uh we plan on supporting everybody here in monte maui every step of the way thank you it’s even okay to have a russ francis and a jim donovan on the same car thank you very very much okay next is going to be our house uh candidates chris and kika okay good evening my name is i’d like to take a second particular terry craven and jan shashio who called me last night and invited me here on short notice i decided to accept and
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take this opportunity to share my my views and myself with you i’m a newcomer into the political scene i’m young i’m born and raised in hawaii i’ve been living on maui for about five years now i attended the kamehameha schools where i graduated in 1983 and attended university of hawaii for a couple years where i played football for the university of hawaii rainbows for a couple years before i left to raise a family [Music] i decided to run for office i was inspired by by a woman that i have a lot of
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tremendous respect for linda lingle who asked me to run i was never involved in politics until i got involved in her campaign several years ago and through her campaign i’ve met wonderful people like charmaine tavares and travis thompson having arakawa and i’m continuing to meet wonderful people every day that i get more involved into this when i was approached to consider running for office i had to do a lot of soul searching i i’m a single father of two children 11 and 7 years old so obviously
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taking on a task such as this is going to be taxing on my children so i can respect and i really bringing a child to these kinds of events really really hits me because it’s a great education for them they can see new things and things that a lot of children aren’t don’t have the advantage to see i’m not a career politician i’m a businessman i’m part owner of maui disposal [Music] we have the waste needs of mali we’ve been on maui for 30 years since 1969 the same corporation that was
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born back in 1969 is still in operation today and i and i’m i’m lucky to be a part of that then that company um so i’m looking at politics from a business standpoint and i hear what the what the candidates before have mentioned and they all make a lot of sense being a businessman i know that we need some regulatory reform we need to take a look at it we’re we’re top-heavy in government definitely i don’t really want to get into the to the issues too much tonight i basically wanted to introduce
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myself to the party and those of you here present tonight and let you know that i have chosen to step up to the plate i knew it was going to be a hard thing to do on my family on my company because i’m going to spend a lot of time away from my company now but i trust the people there that they’ll make sure things are done when i’m while i’m away but i decided to step up to the plate and and try to make a difference to try to make a change in the community and the best analogy i guess i can come
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up with that kind of put me over the edges is being a couch quarterback i’m sure russ can probably uh he knows what i’m talking about where before you know you you you’re watching a football game at home and you’re sitting on the couch and you it’s easy to criticize while you’re sitting on the sidelines watching but until you actually get in the game and and look at it from a different point of view from the inside out it gives you a different perspective on things and it’s
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i’m excited to try to be part of the process and i just ask for your support i’m sure as time goes on those of you who don’t know me will get to know me will get to know what i’m about and what my beliefs are i am a strong family person i i strongly believe in investing in our youth in education because obviously they are the future of our country and if we don’t instill in them what we want then we’re never going to get to where we want to go so i am not going to probably take out
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my full five minutes but i appreciate this opportunity to to meet all of you and thank you very much spoken but i i do want to say how incredibly impressed i am with kika he’s obviously he’s not a professional politician he got up here and gave him an excellent heartfelt speech and obviously wants to get into the process as a public service and he will have some sacrifice for that for for our benefit i want to mention that that it’s a problem for the party since i’ve been involved in the process
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too you know where do you go to find candidates to run he was asked to run he’s fulfilling the you know where do you go and certainly you know we want to solve the problems of the state of hawaii what is running the state body for people that are professional insider politicians they won’t necessarily put our people and communities first what we as the minority party want to do is go into the communities and say who who is good in our community that cares about our community we’re not
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looking for professional politicians we’re looking for people that can stand up speak well and represent the people and it will put our people and communities first i’m confident that he does that and i’m honored to be able to support him thank okay you now our commission answer period remember each candidate gets two questions um does anyone have a question for our house candidates i do if no one else does um as a mom of a high school senior to be i’m homeschooling her because i’m not
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very happy with the public education system i’m sorry in the state of hawaii and i would like to know how as a homeschooler when our homeschoolers have won the national spelling bees and geography bees why in hawaii can we only get geds and not a diploma for homeschooling especially when our children usually do very well as being health schooled given the state of education here um caught short here that i didn’t realize that home school would not provide a high school diploma and you only get a
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ged which is having a diploma and it’s usually for high school dropouts you know on the mainland you know if the kids want to go into college it does not look good and in some places oh good artar lindsay please stand up can i just ask them my mom with my sister going into ninth grade we’ve had to make some decisions on where to send her because um like i have a friend who’s attending baldwin and it’s his senior year and he’s gone through all three years but he’s not they won’t let him walk or they won’t
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let him graduate because if um he started his sophomore or yeah he started his sophomore year and um if you if you never started going to school like when you were homeschooled if you didn’t start attending a high school at the beginning at a freshman year they’ll hold you back and so he would have had to hold back and he didn’t want to deal with that so he figured he’d just go for educational purposes and use you know use uh the education that they were giving him and all the electives because he was
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into like drama and i think auto mechanics and different things like that so he’d figure he take advantage and yet yeah he can’t receive a diploma and so same with my my sister since she’s also been homeschooled a lot my parents were kind of skeptical about sending her to public school or whatever but yeah she would have to attend this year because they they don’t like allow the transfer of anything like that and i can understand that some people can be skeptical to go about the situation whereas
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well are are the children really learning at home but i’ve seen that 90 of the time the children really do learn and the parents um that enforce it i’ve seen a couple occasions where the people the kids are just slackers and they don’t want to go to school and so the parents participate that and they keep moving home but most of the time there’s there’s different groups there’s two different homeschool groups on maui and the kids really get one-on-one attention but i’m not outside of school at all i
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just i think it’d be good if they worked hand in hand kind of together so it’s kind of a disadvantage i’d like to make a comment on that issue as a business person you tend to take a look at economic indicators to to run your business to make future decisions that will affect your business and i think as as lawmakers and legislators you know if maybe they should take a look at the amount of home schooling that’s going on in the state and if there is a tremendous increase in homeschooling they should ask themselves
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why why why are parents choosing to to home school versus send their children to school is there a problem with our schooling system that’s forcing the parents to school their children at home instead is there distrust in the system is it over overburdened are classes too large i don’t have an answer tonight but i think it’s a good point and something that they should take a look at as far as the number of homeschooling went on anyway it’s really increasing um okay chris did you know the answer to it
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this that the issue has not been you know discussed i was a member of the education committee for four years not in the last two years but this issue is not largely discussed i think part of the problem likely is that there’s not a you know a strong lobby for it you know it’s not an org you know homeschooling isn’t an organized group but certainly homeschooling is a part of educational optionality and if a person completes the curriculum competently they should get a fair shake i agree
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great we need you guys both in the house to work on that because it really is a really important issue to you know people who have families very important home schooling yeah getting becoming popular because our public schools are no good in plain english and the other part of the coin is that we sent john james to seabury it was from eight to ten to and twelve thousand dollars a year last year in his uh junior year and it’s very hard for parents to do and then we had to send we’re sending
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the other one to emanuel luther because she can’t go to a public school because they’re no good and that’s another 3 500 so they have to make 15 000 off the top of the the crack of the nut of the of the income to pay for schooling alone and then we still pay all these absorbent i i agree i when i first moved here to maui five years ago the first item on my agenda was to visit every school on this island because i knew that i had to send my child or my children to one of them or several of them so
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that was the first thing on my agenda and it is a it is a big concern one more point on that the the leadership of the state of hawaii for the last 20 years at least has been promising education second to none and still our our schools land far behind you know the management of our state the neo department of education is just one of the departments that are having problems the management of our state the highest levels of elected and appointed politicians appointed department head is you know really the source of the
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problem and what i believe this group is about is bringing new leadership to the state of woody to bring real uh substantive change to how we do business employment amen lee do you have a new question we’ll start our own timer again it’s a politician’s nightmare get a second speech really we we are relying on you as we have in the past i know you’re going to pull through for us and i believe we’re going to have a successful year and then the state house we’re going to bring home more bacon thank you
01:13:44
thank you very much [Music] okay now we are going to have our county council and we’ll do it in alphabetical order we’ll start with alan and our county council members please and candidates please come up and sign up thank you before we get started with our county council candidates what we would like to have alan tashido talk because he’s going to run for senate i’d like to briefly introduce alan he’s another candidate that has been asked to run i’m competent i’m hopeful that he’s
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going to step up and meet the call he’s a long time concerned citizen of maui contributor to our community service to our community is is you know describes him very well and he knows maui he’s a winner [Applause] thank you chris that kind of describes me i guess you know it actually um it started this early this week when now linda lingle our great uh body chair person now gave me a call at my parents house in honduras and asked me if i would be interested in running for the uh fifth district senate
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race and um i said no but she was very persistent you know in fact for the last three nights she’s been talking to me and every night i said no and going and people ask me are you serious and i say well you know there’s a big part of me that says well that’s not that’s not your bag i mean people were referring to uh professional politicians i’m not sure if there’s a such a word i mean i think we’re all regular people who’s trying to just contribute to the community in the
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best way we can but still you know i don’t i never visualize myself as being a candidate but just a little part of me is growing uh part of it is because and i think linda put it pretty pretty well she said you know and i’m pretty sure some forget who it was mr carroll made mention about the time we are in a very unique situation right now this is an excellent opportunity for the republican party to really make a contribution i think the democrats there are a lot of good democrats i’m not going to say
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because i’m a former democrat i’m more of an independent teacher but i mean i’m not going to say that they’re a bad party i just think that the republican party has so much to contribute and now is the time so i’m really strongly considering before i you know it was no but now i’m almost there my qualifications are going to be no brief it’s kind of appropriate that i’m speaking before the league of republican women and if you look at my qualifications uh you know i i’ve been in the county
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government for for a while it was because of a woman charming is why i went to work for the parks department which is where i work now i mean it was because of her she picked me to go over there and help her so that’s why i was there and then there was another woman linda bingo mayor who picked me to be part of a cabinet i was the deputy director for the department of pakistan recreations for you know the last three years of return and of course the most significant is my wife jan obviously she picked me because i
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married her so how best can i best how can i better describe my qualifications i got picked by three women so i must be qualified residents he should be a very well-known name because he don’t want jude a lot of athletes that put the last name in fact every place i go people ask me are you related to so-and-so and i told charmaine this story she kind of likes it so i thought i’d share it i’m going to end with this so i tell them well if they’re rich talented famous no they’re not related
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[Applause] we need him to run great okay so now we’re going to start with our county and um but this is where we can really find out how we stop sprint towers and heliports in our backyards and really pay attention to what these candidates say because it really does matter to what our community is going to look like in the future thank you very much i would like to also thank the republican women and all of you for participating in being here tonight you know the question always arises why do we run as republicans
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why don’t we run with the easy way right as democrats if you look around and look at the cabinets you’ll see that where none of us fit the traditional mold what has happened in hawaii is that we have a very top-heavy single party that has for years and years and years had control and they’ve lost their way they’ve lost the vision they’ve lost the leadership ability and they become too self-centered even the chairman of that other party stated that it was printed in the commonwealth
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advertising the party has lost contact with the people the democratic party the ills of the state the ills of the county can be directly taken to that party they’ve been in the leadership position why is it that we have the highest taxes the lowest wages why is it that the state even refuses to negotiate and refuse to negotiate with our top union public workers in upw for five years wouldn’t even negotiate with them and then when the negotiation was settled wouldn’t pay the employees
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because they’ve lost touch with the vision they’ve lost touch with what they would intend to do why is it that our social service programs suffer why is it that our school system our teachers have to teach classes that are too large is because they’ve lost the vision they’ve lost contact with the people that they were supposed to represent and the candidates you have before you the candidates spoke prior to me have been telling you that we need to change the leadership because they have lost
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vision they have become so entrapped in paying the wealthy in being the power of others the ones who wield all that power and discipline that they have lost their way and they’re forgetting the people of the county and our state why is it that you as republican candidates as business people have to fear if you if you publicly support a republican candidate why should you have to say well you know something like you quietly is that a democracy where you have to fear for your beliefs but that is what this state has become
01:22:57
because the people in power have become so corrupt and you see it every year in the newspaper people in power people in the high office the people that have hit in our legislature are going to jail have been indicted for corruption you see it where we are rated last in education not because we don’t have some of the best teachers in the world because i indeed believe we do and my wife will tell you that if i say anything else because she’s a teacher um i may seek me in the yard but i honestly believe that teachers
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really do put in honest effort they try their best and they do the best with what they can but they don’t have the support time and time again issue after issue the same things occur when we went to the county one within the state for the beach liability all we wanted when i was a member of the county council was to have equal protection from suits that the state had equal they wouldn’t do it why because the lawyers that were sitting there were paying for their political campaigns we’re talking they’re sitting right
01:24:13
behind us and telling us why are you bothering the mayors of every island the county council chairman of every island our legal representatives who are all there one member of the committee sits in front of us the chairman the rest walk in and out periodically they don’t even care enough to listen is that the kind of government we want all you have to do is go down and be part of the lobby process and you’ll see how close it’s become how much of a quick it’s become and that needs to be changed
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the philosophy that we have and that we have to have is that we represent the people we represent what is good in the community and we have to take care of our community all of us that are here that are running with representatives we’re trying to get into the position to be able to do the community good and i’m going to ask each and every one of you to dig deep really think about it because they’re going to need a lot of help we all are it’s a real tough race when you’re trying to rest power from
01:25:18
the people who have had it for so long and are unwilling to give it up we’re going to require your help your finances your support you’re going around talking to other people making them understand how critical it is that we take stands for ourselves and our community why we should not have to live in fear why we should not have to be pregnant because we are in the wrong party that is wrong that’s un-american and i believe each and every one of the candidates that are here tonight believes that and that’s why they’re
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willing to make a difference thank you very much aloha i am so proud tonight to stand here terry our maui league republican women has done all of us proud we have done so many wonderful things under her leadership and patty before her and we kind of were operating with a joint group before when we were leader loose for a little while but i believe that what is happening is something that we’ve needed for a long time and i believe that maybe not because i’m a woman but because women tend to have a lot of
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passion we are the ones that are always behind the men pushing them to do everything that we want them to do but not letting them know that they’re doing it and we have the power and the strong beliefs and convictions that hold our families together so who better to lead than the women and i am really proud of the candidates that we have stepping up to the plate throwing their hats on the ring this is a time for me where i have run before i was not successful last time but i believe that i was successful
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in getting my message across which is we need not just change for the sake of change but we need change in a positive direction to bring our community to bring everyone and all the collective talents that we have not just in this room but in all the islands throughout our state that collective energy together instead of working against one another let’s work together we have not had that we have to stop this wrangling where one party wants to do one thing another party wants to do something else and of course the
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republicans always lose because we don’t have enough representation so if that that has not worked and especially not for the benefit of our communities if you believe nothing else if you do nothing else i have always tried to practice this go forward with conviction go forward with a positive message fight for the things that you believe in and fight for the people who you know deserve better than what they’re getting and i know every single person in this room myself included is extremely disappointed with the
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direction that we have been headed in i’m not happy i’m glad that people such as bully and alan and steve and you know charmaine and i and and and there is there she is hiding behind bullies all of us as well as the state candidates and the candidates at the federal level all of them have come out of their comfort zones to come before you and i cannot tell you how scary that is it’s scary for me i’m not a politician either i i really don’t trust them you know no offense to the existing ones
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here but i really don’t believe that they have done well by us or done right by us so why would i want to be one and it is because i believe that the power to change rests with each of us as individuals we each carry that little spark that passion the kids sitting in the back with taurus i’m so glad maui’s the only island that has teenage republicans what’s wrong with oahu we need to motivate we need to galvanize we need to get these people out from their television sets get them
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out in the streets and campaign for things that they believe in to fight for things that they believe in and to do it with conviction for the benefit of all of us it will help everyone i ask for your vote i ask for your support and i most of all ask that you stay with us for the whole entire race whether we win whether we lose just stay with us because right and honor good moral values ethics all of these things which are basic principles the people that are running for office all of those things will prevail i know
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they will i believe in it and i believe you believe in it and i know that we will be a success at whatever we do god bless all of you [Applause] and i don’t have the weight on the agenda because um i didn’t realize you were running i’m very sorry that’s all but okay um i really want to thank you terry penny uh for this um wonderful thing and the modeling of republican women to put this beautiful dinner together and great food and great speeches here i would like to say it now my name is i’m running for
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a council in the south maori district i’ve been on the island since 1972 i arrived at the island of maui on 1962 and came here for a visit when i was a teenager and we’ve had a lot of changes since i want to tell you that um i’ve been working in the community and doing a lot of work and i felt this is time to step up i won the uh make the difference award on the county of maui 1997. my cup of tea is working with a youth nurture them caring for them and see that they move forward within this deal a new kid in the block
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knew coming up and want to work with the idea of not johnny complaining and being the government to to to make sure that there is some changes and i come with really a simple statement that i’m a man of action and a man who really wants to work for the people so i ask for your support in this coming election and thank you very much [Applause] georgina thank you terry and the mommy league of republican women my name is georgina calmura and this afternoon i filed my nomination papers to be a candidate for the lanai seat on
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the maui county council now remember no matter where you live in maui county you do vote for me although i am on manae don’t forget us out there i was born and raised on lanai actually graduated from kamehameha school at maui community college i worked for 24 years in our county government from 1975 to 1999 spending the last 11 years as your budget director now i have i think the only and the distinct pleasure and honor of serving under three mayors i worked for the fourth mayor for four months
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until i decided on a career change which took me back to where i was born and raised back to lanai where i work for the knight company right now so again it was an interesting career change to be back to where i was born and raised took me back to the island of uniqueness unique charm unique people and i don’t know if you all have had the pleasure of being there but one of these days i hope you do come to visit us there now as you can imagine being 11 years as your budget director i prepared a lot of budgets i’m
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very experienced in doing that i know the county’s operations and i can read a financial statement [Music] [Applause] charlie needs help [Music] i want to go and help her on that council so as your council member i want to put my experience to work for the community now having the most experience will not get me elected votes get me elected your votes the votes of your mothers your fathers your sisters your brothers your aunts your uncles your cousins your neighbors tell them all that’s the
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only way we get elected we need your help and again remember we’re elementary but you all vote for me it’s hard it’s as you can imagine i go around talking to people i’m gonna fill the nightly seat on my county council now these are people that have lived here for years and years and they go i can’t vote for you i couldn’t so you know i have to keep reminding you yes you do vote for me you vote for every one of the nine members now in my grassroots efforts and that’s what it is
01:35:50
you gotta talk to people get out there talking to everybody down in kahue shopping center shaking their hands of all those that sit in the middle of the shopping center i need all of you obviously to believe in me to believe in my experience and to believe in my passion but you know what’s important for me is that i also have to believe all of you that all of you shape the future of our county that what you have to tell us as council members we need to listen being done with your tax money do you know there is one
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and that’s important that comes from the budget process being able to communicate to our public what’s being done with their tax money i want to do that for all of you i hope you remember me again mothers fathers sisters brothers aunts uncles cousins everyone please remember georgina kawamura mommy [Applause] aloha thank you very much and thank you for putting this on and and you know it’s funny i was telling somebody today if i go to someone’s house before i came to this tonight he
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said where are you going i said well i’m going to this candidate’s forum that is being put on by the i don’t know how we league of republican women and they says oh you’re going to talk to six people don’t there be more candidates than audience and you know there were days when it was like that and i am so thrilled to see that there are 30 to 40 people in this room and 60 60. wow all right [Applause] and this is i think this is indicative of what’s going to happen in the future in mama county and i
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really i’m not a seasoned politician by any chance i’m only finishing up my second term and people just associate with you know one of my relatives i figured that you know i’ve always been a politician and what i did learn from my dad was that i would never be a politician so never say never i’ll warn you now i really am i’m quite almost reckless and speechless that alan tonight what you have said what you have done uh kika bully warren joanne you did before georgina the people who are willing to
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put their lives in a different direction to take on this job which you know from the get-go you’re not gonna be loved by everybody in fact some of you are gonna be hated more than you ever imagined and you’re willing to sacrifice that your life no longer is your own you can never have any peace and quiet unless you’re in your closet everywhere you go people will stop you and say things like well i know you’re not at work but okay so you have to be willing to say that this is what i’m
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putting myself out here for is to get in touch with the people um one of the things i think we have a problem with getting candidates to run as republicans or you get the candidates to run is that you know we’re doing things like stepping to the plate and going to bath and using a lot of this analogy stuff but one of the things we’re not being clear about what plate we’re stepping to and i think a lot of those potential candidates are stepping to buffet line plates instead of home plate
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where you can actually swing a bat and hit a ball and have a result i think that one of the most well two things i say the most difficult job of a council member one is that you have to work with eight other people and that’s probably a very very important one it’s not the most important but i’m looking here at this panel and wouldn’t it be great if these were the city council members when you look at our present console you know just imagine what they look like starting off by the order moving down
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i have the last seat by the way and i had really mixed feelings about steve warren running because if he wins when he wins i have to move over one and i have always wanted that seat to steve i’ll tell you right now i still want my same seat you can take the next one that’s the lighting i get there too but um they’ve had a chance to do whatever they did whatever we did i like dr gina said i definitely need some help there it is very very frustrating to do your homework be up on the issues
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try to get information do research and i have a great staff that does that and one of my staff members is here michael ferris and i know i can also speak for a dollar our officers were next to each other if you drove by the county building at night and see two lights that were on and it was our two offices now i don’t know you might notice when they come to a meeting or and you don’t see this in a council meeting you know which people would get that out of their minds the council meeting is
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the important meeting it is not the community meeting is the important meeting that’s where the deliberation goes on that’s where you find out what people are made of and how stupid they can be i mean really they don’t do their homework the first time they’re seeing an item is when they open the buyer in front of them well i don’t want to go on and on about that kind of stuff but please we’ve had people there that have had a chance to do something and i’m trying to remember what has been
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done but um you know maybe next year i’ll think about it the other task the other thing that the most difficult thing in the council in any council is that you have eight other people to work with eight and out of that eight it takes five to do things sometimes six so whether we feel passionately about something we cannot in our disagreement piss somebody off so that they will say anything you’re in favor of i don’t care what it is i’m not voting with you those are the kinds of things that
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you have to be mediators you have to be ministers you have to be friends drinking buddies bridge players with critics players with whatever you have to know how to get along with people and work with people i am looking forward to the day and i hope it’s this november that we won’t have to figure out how the five votes are going where the alignments are now this year one thing that has been good about this year when there was an eight one vote before you always knew who that one vote was it
01:42:54
was there are several people that are a single vote even behind the single vote sometimes when he’s gone with the other side what is this world coming to but a lot of times that’s happening i think that’s a good indication that people are beginning to think a little more independently and i believe if we have this group at the council that you’ll see much more independent thinking and uh yeah i hope you get out and back these people they’re really putting their lives on the line i can retire
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i don’t need to be a politician i could you know just say forget it so i’m in a perfect position win or lose i’m happy i’m fine but a lot of people have given up a lot i’ve sacrificed a lot to run and i hope that we get behind these folks and really give them a chance to show what they can do thank you charmaine said you know steve you’re at the end of the list that makes you the foundation and i said sharmini you know that’s right i’m a foundation for success my name is steve warren
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i am running for county council for the south maui seat along with my good paddling buddy over here we paddled years ago in the senior masters i want to share with you i’ve heard so many things here today we stand at the forefront of a wonderful opportunity if just a small portion of these came about think of how the world would change think of how much better maui would be and i want to also say it’s going to take your help in order to do this your participation is so important you know i tell everyone that i meet and
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i talk to students about this and i say there are three secrets to success the first one is you show up how many people don’t show up in life happens all the time the second one is you participate 110 percent how many people show up and let others do the work and the third one is very simple you pray you pray as if it all depends on god and you work as if it all depends on you now that’s how i live my life and that’s how we’re going to have to live all our lives if we want to bring about change and i’m
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here to tell you today that i will do everything within my power to help the children and the families on maui my whole life has been about helping children and families i started work out of the eighth grade i started sorting pop bottles in the back of a grocery store a buck and a quarter an hour i worked my way through college sometimes i had three jobs and i’d still be going to school i worked my way up i have done just about every single job you can think of from the dirty jobs to being the
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executive way different ranges and things but what that has given me is a broad spectrum to be able to talk to people to be able to work with all sorts of people now let me tell you a little bit about myself one of the things we’ve talked about is how do you work with people well every single day for the last four years i have worked with hundreds and hundreds of volunteers as director of junior achievement i brought the program along from working with just 200 children then this last year working with 9
01:46:41
600 children and 410 volunteers and 410 teachers and i got to tell you we have some of the best teachers in the world right here on maui but they don’t get the support that they need so let me tell you a little bit about some of the issues that are real concern to me education is a big concern people say look this is not a county council issue but guess what it is these are our children these are our families and if we don’t take charge of it the state has proven that they’re not now there are some things we can do
01:47:20
we can set up resource banks we can set up teacher training we can provide help in the schools we can provide mentors now that’s what we can do now what will that lead to that will lead to job diversity i personally know multiple companies that have turned down value because we don’t have the workforce we don’t have the schools that they want to bring their children into we create better schools we create job diversity i’ve worked for five years to put into high school on maui i’m a
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director with the south maui learning ohana and by july of the year 2001 we will be opening a new high school on maui high tech high school that’s another thing that i do i’m president-elect of the rotary club of kihei sunrise i spend all my time working for the community i won’t make a lot of promises to you simply because of something i heard a while back kerchief once said politicians yeah they’ll promise to build you a bridge even if there isn’t a river and that’s the truth of the matter isn’t
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it but i will promise you this i will always be available i will always return your calls i will always listen to you if you bring up an issue we disagree i will go out and research it and then we’ll sit down and talk again when i’m elected to office i promise this next year to take 120 people to lunch i’m going to take 10 people to lunch every month that i don’t know and i’m going to ask them what are their opinions i will always have an open door you can always reach me and i will be your best friend and maybe
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your worst enemy but i will work my heart out for the children and families of knowledge we have two fundraisers coming up i want you to come over to that table right over there and come and see me and talk about them there this weekend and i need you and your friends to turn out for them thank you very much
