The cynics will say it don’t matter. Don’t waste your time. The fix is in and they’re all a bunch of crooks anyway.

That my friends is hogwash. Hogwash designed to keep you from taking control of your own government. Hogwash to keep you home, to keep you from showing up to elect true change-makers.

As someone who has served at the County Council level and as a Hawai’i State Senator, I know from personal experience that your vote matters.

Your vote matters and many excellent candidates, true change-makers, are at this very moment running for election to serve you.

They need your vote to win. And we collectively, oh so desperately need them to win. Please do your part and show up.

You will soon begin receiving a primary election ballot in the mail. If needed, visit https://olvr.hawaii.gov to register or update your registration.

Voting could not be any easier. Your ballot comes in the mail, you fill it out and mail it back in the postage paid envelope. That’s it. Duck soup.

Unfortunately in the 2022 Hawai’i primary elections 60% of voters chose to not even open the envelope, check off a few boxes, put it back in the return envelope – and walk it out to the mail box.

513,715 residents literally left their votes on the table, or perhaps the kitchen counter.

Why? I get it that people are busy and disenchanted with government and politicians, but to change things for the better we must show up and vote into office better leaders.

There are excellent candidates out there who can truly help change our government and our world for the better, but we gotta show up and vote for them.

If we don’t show up, we just get the same ole, same ole. It’s a self-fulfilling prophesy and you and I must be the ones to break the cycle.

We can and we must do better.

I’ve written before about the many “change-makers” running for office on every island. For those interested I’ve posted a running list on my blog https://garyhooser.blog/2024/06/23/if-i-lived-in-the-districtvoting-for-the-house/

Electing any one of these change-maker candidates will push the needle in the right direction. Electing a handful could literally change the world as we know it here locally.

Imagine for a moment that Hawaii’s public education system was the best on the planet. Imagine our streets were the safest and truly affordable housing was not just a pipe dream or a bad joke. Think for a second about what is possible if we elected leaders willing to make off-shore investors, and large foreign owned corporations pay their fair share.

Hawai’i can lead and set an example for the world to follow in many areas, but to get there we must lead first at the ballot box. Yep. We gotta show up.

To be clear we don’t need to find and elect 51 new members of the State House of Representatives, nor do we need to throw out all 25 State Senators. We have good people there now, but we need more of them.

Sending even just a handful of new, strong voices to represent us in that big square building can change the conversation, expose the corruption, and bring sunlight and positive change in its place.

We have good, solid, change-maker candidates running – it’s up to us now to show up, vote, and close the deal.

Let’s do this.

Gary Hooser
Former County Councilmember, Hawai’i State Senator and Majority Leader
First published in the Hawai’i Filipino Chronicle.
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