Ahead of Gov. Josh Green's trip to Chicago for the Democratic National Convention, The Conversation spoke to him Thursday about the political event and the pending legal settlement for victims of the Maui wildfires.
Interview Highlights
On representing Hawaiʻi at the Democratic National Convention
I'm so honored to get to go to the DNC and to support, I think everyone knows, Kamala Harris, our vice president, and Tim Walz, one of my governor colleagues and a dear friend. My family's close to Kamala and Doug and we're excited for her. Everyone else will have their opinions on Election Day, but I'll be at the convention, and I'll be sharing all sorts of things, but speaking as a physician and the head of our delegation from Hawaiʻi, I do want to talk about women's reproductive rights for the 65 million women who are of reproductive age and make the case that that's an important thing to consider when they choose our next president.
On what he wants to emphasize at the convention
I will emphasize, if asked, how the, in this case, the Biden Harris administration really came to Hawaiʻi's aid in our time of need. Over $3 billion has already come to us from the federal government, and another $2 billion is on its way, it appears, to help us recover from the wildfires, and I've had an open channel to the president, to the vice president's team, Homeland Security, FEMA, HUD, I mean, they have been good to the state of Hawaiʻi, and that's important. And the relationships that I have merit my support, for sure. But this is not a partisan thing. I mean, people should know that they stepped up when we had a natural disaster, and they were very professional and very compassionate.
On President Biden's decision not to seek reelection
I knew all along it was highly probable that the president, after the debate performance he had and the fatigue factor of this four-year experience, I knew it was very likely that he would make that decision now that he had come to that space in life. You can argue and talk about whether he should have done it sooner all day long, people have their opinions, also whether he should have ever done it at all because, you know, very few presidents, if any, I think maybe, with the exception of President Johnson who was dealing with the Vietnam War, have ever decided one term was enough. But President Biden was in a unique place, after 40 years in the U.S. Senate and years as a, you know, vice president, to make this decision for the country. And I knew, as I was traveling with family on the mainland, and we had scheduled an event — I knew that it was possible that he would make that decision right in the middle of that trip, and we would pivot very quickly to our trusted vice president, who, by the way, has earned many votes over the years. People say she never had a vote cast for her to become the nominee. That's, of course, nonsense. She was in it to maybe the final four or so the previous time, and then the whole country voted for a ticket which said Biden Harris. So my take on this is Vice President Harris has had tens of millions of people vote for her, and I think that's going to happen again in November.
On the housing situation one year after the August 2023 wildfires on Maui
The debris clearance is now over 99% done for the residential lots, which is amazing. I've also made the commitment to the president that we would get that done. We've started building 1,044 transitional homes, some of which are done, and people have their keys, and that's going to just ramp up like crazy each month. We had 50 houses dedicated over in Kapalua a day or two ago. You know, it's something to behold. So the clearance and, you know, acquiring properties and making sure we're building housing. So the recovery is on its way. The first year was about survival. The second year is about rebuilding our lives and the lives for our friends and family on Maui. ... I'm pretty stunned, in a positive way, that the transitional housing is just leaping up off the ground, and then there's going to be a long-term housing boom because 3,071 families were displaced. Thousands of houses, of course, burned, and now, with the settlement monies getting sorted out, a lot of people are gonna get very significant checks to make the difference between what they got from insurance and what they need. And that's gonna mean a lot more contracts and architect work and construction work. So whatever we lose in tourism, which people have wanted tourism to slow a little, we will gain and then some in rebuilding. And so that's economic, but it's also healing.
On the $4 billion settlement for those affected by the wildfires
At the end of the day, the settlement that I hammered out with all the parties and the mediators really amounted to what people were capable of paying without having to go bankrupt. And if people go bankrupt, whether it's HECO or the county, then there would be very little, if any, resources for our loved ones that lost so much. So the state is contributing modestly, Kamehameha Schools is contributing modestly, and a lot of that money is coming from insurance claims already anyway, but I just fought to prevent anyone from gouging us. And then the one nuance of the settlement, which I want people to understand — so hopefully listeners are hearing this — is that, though the county will pay very little upfront because they didn't have extra resources after paying for a lot of infrastructure, they will be contributing the entirety of what comes from HUD, Housing Urban Development, that disaster money, which we're expecting to be over a billion dollars, and we're grateful to the congressional delegation for going to fight for that. All of that money, all of that money will be going towards infrastructure and housing, making it, you know, not a responsibility of the taxpayers and not a responsibility of any other parties. So it was very challenging to get this far in the settlement, and now things are being finalized, but this will bring a lot of money more quickly and a much higher percentage directly to the families in, you know, in our state. And that is, I hope, something everyone is able to see and appreciate that it just was better for our local people to get their resources now and to heal rather than wait four, five, eight years through trials and appeals and in-fighting and then ultimately settlements. I've learned by watching these other states, and I didn't want to see us make the same mistakes they have.
This story aired on The Conversation on Aug. 15, 2024. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. on HPR-1.
