Changing of the guard

“I’m looking for a team that’s got my kind of energy, that’s connected to the community.”

Kimo Alameda — a political newcomer who took a decisive victory over incumbent Mayor Mitch Roth in the election Tuesday and will become Hawaii County’s chief executive on Dec. 2 — said Wednesday that finding and assembling that team will be a priority.

The 55-year-old Alameda holds a doctorate in counseling psychology. The former CEO of Bay Clinic, he’s served as the leader of the Fentanyl Task Force. He also was executive of the county’s Office of Aging under former mayors Harry Kim and the late Billy Kenoi.

When all the votes were in, Alameda beat Roth 44,087 to 35,518, or 55.4% to 44.6%.

“We were surprised,” Roth said Wednesday of his opponent’s victory. “We expected the night to go differently, but it is what it is.”

Roth had the larger campaign war chest, by more than $100,000, and had spent more than $75,000 more than the challenger.

Alameda, however, had the backing of the two major public workers unions, the white-collar Hawaii Government Employees Association and the blue-collar United Public Workers, who endorsed the challenger because Roth wouldn’t authorize COVID-19 hazard pay for public workers during the pandemic, citing fiscal grounds.

The 60-year-old Roth thinks that’s a major factor in the election outcome, adding that he’s in arbitration with the unions and has made settlement offers to both.

“I look back and that, and I think the right thing to do was what we did,” he said. “You know, I could’ve very easily given into the unions from the very beginning, and I probably would’ve had their support, and I probably would’ve gotten elected. But, ethically, I didn’t feel that was the right thing to do. I mean, if I had done that, I probably could’ve taken 80 grand, myself.”

“Congratulations to him,” Roth continued. “I’m really happy with the work that our team has done over the last four years. I hold my head up high with no regrets. We’ve actually achieved quite a bit, and we’re leaving this office a lot better than where we found it.”

Colin Moore, a University of Hawaii at Manoa political scientist, said he’s not surprised Alameda won, but he’s a bit surprised by the margin of victory.

“I really had a feeling he was going to win,” Moore said. “He had two big things going for him. He was the change candidate, and he had the support of some of the most important establishment interests — the public sector unions. I anticipated that those two things would be enough to put him over the edge.”

Alameda said after coming in second to Roth by almost 5,000 votes in the Primary Election, he and his campaign team huddled up and made “a halftime strategy change.”

“We had to have a stronger West Hawaii presence, so we went knocking on doors, the old-fashioned way,” Alameda said. “We started handing out brochures and talking to people, just one on one. I think that helped us.

“We took it back to the old school, the grassroots. People don’t know me that much on that side, and I was afraid that if I was to lose it, it would be in House Districts 6, 7 and 8.”

Moore said Alameda, who announced his intention to become mayor more than a year ago, “ran a really smart campaign.”

“He got out early. He was organized before the primary,” Moore said. “And he also did something that I thought was pretty clever. There’s a lot of Roth supporters in Kona, and he went after them. He made the issue of geographic disparity a central part of the campaign. I think part of the part of the strategy was to draw away some of these perhaps more natural Roth voters into his camp.

“And it paid off.”

Roth said he’s proud of the strides he and his team made to lay the groundwork for more affordable housing and working to uncomplicate a Byzantine county building permitting system.

“I think people may not have understood what we’ve done, taking our numbers in affordable housing in the pipeline from 1,243 (units) to over 8,100,” Roth said.

Asked how many of those affordable housing units have actually been built, the mayor replied “a couple of hundred.”

“But if you look over the last four years, we’ve issued more permits than any other county in the state,” Roth said. “We did more than Maui and Kauai combined. We’ve done a lot of single-family homes. What people don’t understand oftentimes is, yes, they’re in the pipeline — and if you don’t get them in the pipeline, they don’t get built in the future. I think it’s a good thing that when the next administration comes in, we have those projects ready.”

Roth said he called Alameda and “told him I want him to understand the projects we have in the pipeline — especially things like wastewater, where we’re dealing with attorneys and the federal government.”

“I want to make sure that he’s successful, talking to him about the projects that we have. Because at the end of the day, we want him to succeed for everybody,” Roth said.

Moore said he thinks Roth was “on the right track in making permitting faster, reducing barriers to building housing.”

“I think a lot of the economic consensus is that it’s a supply-side issue, that we need more housing, and we need to make it easier to build housing,” Moore said. “And I think that’s something Roth was managing, but it’s easier said than done.

“Maybe Alameda will be able to move a little faster. I think he’ll benefit from some of the changes Roth was already making.”

Alameda said he also wants a smooth transition and described it as “almost like a juggling act.”

“First, I’ve got to see how the Finance Department organizes the budget,” he said. “How it plays out, what’s left, and what kind of grants we’ve got coming in. I want a good understanding of that budget.

“And will hazard pay be settled before we get into office? I’m not sure. But I want to know the questions I had at debates. Where did the COVID money go? How much is it going to cost to fix Keaukaha wastewater? What other lawsuits do we have pending?”

The mayor-elect said he’ll also be meeting with the County Council and the interfaith community “to get a good sense of the pulse of the island, and kind of go from there.”

As for Roth, who was the elected county prosecutor for eight years before becoming mayor, and a deputy prosecutor before that, he’s looking at his options for life after being the county’s chief executive.

“I’m able to retire but think I’m still too young to retire,” he said. “I may get my (law license) activated. I’m on inactive status. I do want to take some time and get some relaxation in. I’ve been going 60, 70 hours a week, seven days a week for so long, I’m not sure how I’ll do relaxation.”

Roth suffered a major heart attack and was hospitalized for 11 days shortly after becoming mayor. He’s lost a noticeable amount of weight and said he’s changed his diet and feels good.

“I look back and I feel really good about my career, the things we’ve been able to do, things that we’ve done in this office,” he said. “Things I’ve done in the prosecutor’s office, both as the prosecutor and as a deputy. Things I’ve done for this county. I feel no regrets.

“It was a good run. I can walk away and hold my head high about the things I was able to accomplish.”

Alameda, county Prosecutor Kelden Waltjen, who won reelection unopposed in the primaries, and all nine council members will be sworn in to their new terms of office at noon on Dec. 2.

According to County Clerk Jon Henricks, the inauguration will take place at the West Hawaii Civic Center in Kailua-Kona.

Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.