City Council District 6 candidate Christopher Wong discusses the issues
HONOLULU—There are now 10 candidates for Honolulu City Council District 6, as of the Office of Elections Candidate Report on July 23. The Hawaii Independent submitted the same list of questions to each of the 10 candidates. Responses will be published in the order in which they are received.
District 6 is comprised of a portion of Makiki, Downtown Honolulu, Punchbowl, Liliha, Pauoa Valley, Nuuanu, Alewa Heights, Papakolea, Kalihi Valley, and a portion of greater Kalihi.
Candidate Christopher Wong is a member of the Kalihi Valley Neighborhood Board and is active in public service efforts with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and Kalihi Weed and Seed, among others. He is a recipient of the 2010 Pacific Business News Forty Under 40 Award, recognizing the achievements of those under the age of 40 in business and community service.
What do you feel is the single most important issue you will face as a Councilmember if elected?
The Council should place more emphasis on the budget, not just when it comes up to vote. Until we have a balanced budget and the crisis resolved—people are furloughed, quality of life reduced, we are in a crisis—each member should be actively exploring new ways to balance the budget for efficient operation of city services.
The citizens of Honolulu cannot afford for the Council and any of its elected leaders to carry on as they have done in the past. Placing debt and burden on our keiki and the next generation is not a solution to the issues plaguing us now, but rather a cloak over the real issues. We have to identify new solutions that will take the burden off of the keiki and off of ourselves. Not later, but now.
What would you change in the way that issue is being handled by the Council presently?
I am aiming to bring new perspective, outside-of-the-box thinking to all issues and challenges on the Council. How I would handle balancing the budget is to first audit City departments to attain a firm, measurable grasp on our situation, then work to reduce expenses by streamlining services to create efficient departments—reserving furloughs as a last resort—and by possibly initiating additional fees as opposed to taxes.
An inherent characteristic of taxes is that everyone pays regardless of whether they utilize the service offered or not. The higher taxes go, the less people and businesses are likely to afford.
Fees are directly associated with the service provided; emphasizing fees as City income ensures that cost incurred will only be paid by those who are utilizing the service, as opposed to those who pay and do not utilize the service.
This allows for the opportunity to lower taxes to levels that will be more affordable to a greater amount of people to alleviate pressure on property owners and businesses with cost-savings translating into lowered costs for doing business in an already over-taxed environment.
What is another important issue in your District?
The deterioration of infrastructure and basic City services such as transportation infrastructure and bulk item pick-up for example. Over the past year, my neighbors and I have had to personally pick up some bulk items to drop off at the landfill for my elderly neighbors along Kalihi Street due to the temporary halt in bulk item pick up (it has since resumed). However, this is not the first time bulk item pick up has been placed on hold, or has missed items for pick up. These basic city services cannot be put on pause for convenience and must remain consistent towards the goal of consistency and efficiency.
This is just one example. Others are potholes plaguing the roads throughout neighborhoods. In my lifelong residency here in the district, I can tell you of several roads (especially main roads) that have yet to be paved. They are in disarray and one in particular—due to initial design—is somewhat unsafe for pedestrians and drivers due to blind spots in the curves.
We need to place emphasis back on basic City services—the necessities—that deal with public health, safety, infrastructure, and existing services. When deciding to allocate our limited city resources to rail construction or to improving basic City services and infrastructure, rail is equivalent to a luxury; one that we simply cannot afford at this time.
I propose placing emphasis back on the necessities and ensuring that these services are done well. We need to analyze and streamline services, to make them more efficient, timely and consistent to benefit us all right now.
What is different about your approach to that issue?
To create solutions. It is always easiest to simplify, analyze, and prioritize the issues and options available based on what resources are readily available. The complexities of the issues tend to get wrapped up in the minds of office holders and career politicians. It is best to stick to the fundamentals that not everything can get done at one time; with the question being, what can we do right now, within our means, that would benefit us all over the short-term, in a step in the direction of the long-term?
Simply put, it’s a matter of choosing what to do right now without placing our keiki and the future generations of our families into deeper debt. The ends do not justify the means. No project or plan exists that is worth lowering the quality of life for any of us.
Who is your largest campaign contributor?
Individuals dedicated to a better and brighter future have been this campaign’s largest contributors. I do not believe in special interests and feel that we are not beholden to anyone except the citizens of Honolulu.
What’s your strategy in dealing with the “homeless”?
I do not believe in the “out of sight, out of mind” approach the now former-mayor utilized. I have volunteered with organizations including the Next Step Homeless Shelter at Kakaako, Institute for Human Services, and the River Street Mission and feel that the best approach for the “homeless” is not via government.
I am in support of faith-based initiatives to welcome the homeless off the streets and away from small business in Downtown and Chinatown. The challenge is to identify an area conducive to rehabilitation, where a shelter would be most appropriate and where land is currently underutilized (such as Sand Island, or underutilized warehouses free from society’s “temptations”).
My hope is to bring hope through faith, and success through self-respect, self-responsibility, and by embracing self-dignity.
The City does not need to spend more money to expand government to deal with a problem. On the contrary, the City must help the organizations existing today—the non-profits, the churches—that are willing to provide the service, by creating an environment conducive to operation, free from regulation.
What’s your stance on rail? Can Hawaii afford it?
Honolulu is an ever-growing metropolis with the unique characteristics of having a tropical paradise as its backdrop. We live in the most gorgeous place in the world and must make it a priority to preserve its endemic beauty while ensuring our economic prosperity through responsible development.
I am a cautious advocate of rail and have always kept an open mind to its potential. Honolulu as a whole is in a budget crisis; city workers are furloughed and quality of life for every citizen is reduced from what it once was. The money for sustained rail construction and operation is simply not available and we cannot place the burden of cost and debt on the keiki; it simply is not an option.
This does not mean that construction projects aren’t available to return our laborers to work and stimulating industry, it just means that government must work harder, must work together and must work smarter to think of new solutions to secure funds away from over-burdening citizens with taxes.
There isn’t any one solution to ensuring efficient rail construction, nor is there any one solution in ensuring a full and quick economic recovery. However, each goal can be accomplished through exercising multiple options such as the implementation of a fee-based system towards the upkeep of an overall transit authority aimed at streamlining operations between various modes of public transportation; forecasting the value of the “trickledown” effect around areas surrounding proposed rail stations and expediting or providing incentives for improvement projects in those areas; reorganizing current systems of public transportation to ensure proper operation when rail goes live; restructuring construction planning and operation of rail to be more conducive towards the longevity of our city and for the benefit of all future generations within a realistic perspective.
Taxes are not the only option and therefore must not be the only solution selected. Many of these options have been discussed, yet most of the focus has been on rail construction as opposed to the other projects impacted by rail that can be effective now and can contribute to the whole of the solution in smaller increments. Rail by itself is not a solution to transportation, but an overall implementation and synergy of transportation systems will not only help to alleviating Honolulu’s transportation issues, but may also contribute to a more conducive environment for faster economic recovery.
How do we get Hawaii residents active in the elections process?
Throughout this campaign, we have seen involvement by individuals who state that they do not regularly vote. They say that the reason they are turning out to our voter drives, or allowing us to speak with them and their friends and family is because they are concerned and want to help bring change.
My team and I have been successful in reaching out to eligible voters and informing them of the reasons why it is so difficult in this climate to earn a decent wage. We have related to and communicated the struggles most individuals—including us on this campaign—deal with in providing food and shelter for themselves and their families.
Candidates, local, State, and federal government need to be better in reaching out to eligible voters to share the importance and privilege it is to partake in a democratic system of government. In the past, we have been successful with government-driven voter drives and educational programs in the schools. Now, voter registration initiatives seem to have fallen to the wayside in lieu of more pressing or “important” issues.
With the economic climate in the way that it currently is, with the uncertainty of the future, and the steadily lowering quality of life with the steadily rising cost of living; now, more than ever is the time for voters to get involved in democracy.
Democracy is truly a beautiful thing that took the sacrifice of selfless men and women—patriots—to ensure that each one of us has a voice and the right to participate in dictating the course of our district, our aina, and for future generations.
How can we help Hawaii’s small businesses to stay alive during these hard times?
Recently, Hawaii was rated 48 out of 50 by CNBC for the best places to do business, meaning we were just two places from being the worst place in the nation for doing business. Factors attributing to this number ranged from cost of business, cost of living, quality of life, transportation, access to capital and workforce development opportunities, just to name a few.
What I propose is to alleviate pressure on small businesses by lowering property taxes to affordable levels and a methodical scaling back of regulations on business in targeted sectors. Additionally, work hand-in-hand with the State on advocating and passing tax incentives and tax breaks for business initiatives.
Government would best be able to serve businesses by stepping out of the way in most cases. Added regulation is added burden. Businesses don’t need more regulation; rather government needs to deregulate its stringent hold on business operations.
For more information, visit http://www.chrisjwong.com.
See the responses of all District 6 candidates:
Lawrence Fenton 1| 2
Timothy Garry
Shawn Hamamoto 1
Frank Lavoie 1
Carlton Middleton 1
Sesnita Moepono
Dennis Nakasato 1
Tulsi Gabbard Tamayo 1
Robert Vieira 1
Christopher Wong 1