LIHU‘E — As Kaua‘i temporarily opts-out of the Safe Travels pre-travel testing program, Mayor Derek Kawakami offered some insight into his reasoning.
Rule 23 puts Kaua‘i on a short-term moratorium on allowing travelers to bypass a two-week quarantine with a negative COVID-19 pre-test effective Wednesday, Dec. 2.
“We understand that a return to a mandatory quarantine will severely impact our visitor industry and those businesses that rely on our visitor industry,” Kawakami said Monday. “We have created many rules and guidelines over the course of the past seven months, and this particular decision was the most difficult.”
Kawakami requested the opt-out early last week, citing a surge of infections due to travel among visitors and residents, as well as community spread, and a spike in cases on the Mainland. The county has seen a two-week trend of cases increase by over 43%, he said.
Prior to the Safe Travels implementation, Kawakami pointed to Kaua‘i’s 61 cumulative cases. In the last six weeks, the county had an additional 70 cases. Monday, the county did not report any new cases.
“With several vaccines close to being approved and distributed, we cannot allow our community to become sick now. While the economic impact of the quarantine is severe, the economic impact of sickness and a subsequent shutdown would be much worse,” Kawakami said. “A healthy economy requires a healthy community, so we will continue to push the health and safety of our residents first and foremost.”
Kawakami has made two similar requests to Gov. David Ige to implement a post-arrival test, the most recent with a mandatory three-day quarantine. Since that was not approved, Kawakami requested the opt-out.
“Our preference has and continues to be implementing a mandatory post-travel test with a shorter quarantine period,” Kawakami said. “However, that request was denied and without that option, we had little choice but to take a temporary pause from the single pre-test travel program until the national incidence of disease is stabilized.”
The temporary opt-out, however, has some residents banding together against it, including the Kaua‘i Chamber of Commerce, which mobilized its cohort of over 400 small businesses to write to Ige against the opt-out.
One online petition floating around, “Demand that Governor Ige Rescind His Approval of Kaua‘i Requiring Another 14 Day Quarantine,” had over 2,500 signatures as of Monday afternoon. Some comments mention a lack of assistance, suffering small businesses and questioning the legality of the quarantine.
Starting Wednesday, travelers must quarantine, negative pre-test or not when arriving on Kaua‘i. Residents, as well as visitors, may spend their two-weeks at private residences. However, in accordance with a past order, visitors may not stay in transient vacation or short-term rentals, like those found on Airbnb or VRBO. Visitors are also not allowed to rent cars until after the 14-day quarantine.
Travelers may also stay at an “Enhanced Movement Quarantine,” or resort bubble, property. Guests have use of on-site amenities, like golf courses, spas and dining facilities. Stays at these locations are monitored with tracking bracelets that if tampered with would alert security.
Participating bubbles include Cliffs at Princeville, Hilton Garden Inn, Koa Kea, Kukuiula and Timbers, with three other properties pending application approval, according to the county. To be part of this program, resorts must have safety protocols for each service or activity offered by a hotel, as well as employee-safety measures, provide personal protective equipment, airport shuttle services for travelers, and designated isolation areas.
Travelers can also stay at other hotels or motels but would be limited to their room. All food or supplies would need to be delivered to the door.
The Kaua‘i Police Department, assisted by the Hawai‘i National Guard, are currently tracking about 1,500 people in travel-related quarantine, the county reported Monday.
A modified quarantine program for interisland travelers is still in effect for essential workers and other “special circumstances,” which can be found on the Kaua‘i Emergency Management Agency website at kauai.gov/COVID-19.
https://apple.news/A-LZx1fT6SWCOweUfKir0vw
Suck it up- this is the land of aloha `aina. If you don’t like caring for ALL the people of Kauai, go back where money is king. That’s not here. Good on you Derek.
Derek, I hope you have another plan other than this? We’re patiently waiting, for now.
Zero cases yesterday. Two case average for the last week. No one in the hospital. Maybe Josh Green is right and the Safe Travel plan IS working. If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.
If you don’t like the mayor’s decision, get off the island.
What happened to the land of the free and home of the brave!
If you are sick stay home. If you feel vulnerable you should quarantine. Everyone else should be free to live.
And if you feel fine, but are carrying Covid without knowing, is it still OK to socialize at a restaurant?
Nice to see the Royal Hawaiian and Turtle Bay open up today and things getting back to normal.
This was an impulsive, tempestuous, immature decision by Mr. Kawakami. He didn’t get his way with the second test so he used the mini surge in new cases (now likely over) to justify getting his way.
There are currently ZERO cases hospitalized. SO obviously there is no danger to the medical system on Kauai becoming overrun with Covid cases.
There were ZERO new cases yesterday brining the 7 day average down to 1.9 cases per day. So Mr. Kawakami deemed it necessary to effectively shut the tourism industry down again, over the holiday season no less, because there were an average of 1.9 new cases over the last seven days. For a comparison, that’s the equivalent of 9000 new cases a day on the entire mainland.
Mr. Kawakami states that he understands that the renewed quarantine requirement will severely impact the tourism industry. Does he really ? Because Mr. Kawakami has sacrificed nothing during this pandemic. The Mayor, his entire council and all the Health Department decision influencers involved, have received their entire paychecks with all their perks such as health insurance and paid vacations throughout this entire difficult time.
Small business owners have either already lost their business, or, after hanging on for months, with little or no income, will do so soon because of one man’s poorly thought-out, immature, non fact based decision.
Yesterday there were ZERO new cases reported on our island, today there are ZERO cases hospitalized and tomorrow Mr. Kawakami’s edict will shut down the island’s tourism industry once again creating ZERO income for many small business on Kauai.
I have ZERO respect for him.
Stay strong mayor k! The chamber’s of commerce HAVE gotten their way and now Covid is spiking on Kauai. On the mainland, these “economy first” people have gotten their chance and utterly destroyed the American landscape in places like Arizona or South Dakota. Businesses don’t have a priority during a pandemic. And it was clear that even when Kauai was “fully open” less than 1/2 of the visitors were coming. Not enough to sustain business. The mainland is on fire! We need to stay safe until the vaccine starts to change the equation.
I support mayor Kawakami.
I do too! It’s a hard job, we voted for him because we trust him to do Kauai right! Nothing but Respect for DK!
I support our Mayor K.
I’m a small business owner and a Kauai resident and now stuck on the mainland because of the 11th hour change or face a 2 week quarantine. What about getting your residents home who relied on the tier system when they left, please?
So, instead of staying put on the island for 2 weeks, you’re staying put indefinitely off island? OK.
Mayor Kawakami,
You did the right thing. This will unfortunately become apparent to more people as we watch the rest of the country and Hawaii over the next two months. A difficult decision, because it does involve real hardship and suffering for some of the Kauai community. But I believe you are correct that it will mitigate even greater suffering for all of Kauai, and position us for an earlier return to a healthy and prosperous community.
Now we need to address the short term consequences of the economic impact on those dependent on tourism, and develop a long term program for decreasing our dependence on tourism.
We need to put a science based proposal before the governor to open the island to travelers. Interestingly, the proposal by the informal group of Kauai physicians and citizens (including JoAnn Yukimura and Mike Schwartz) last spring and summer has just been validated by the CDC. A two test system with the last test after 5 to 7 days of quarantine would detect greater than 95 to 99% of the cases. This would bring us back into the level that effective contact tracing would be possible. Had we implemented this as recommended last Summer, we would have opened without pause or setback. There would have been a manageable level of infection in the community and a predictable, safe level of tourism in an environment that would have been attractive to tourists . People would have happily paid a premium to vacation somewhere where COVID is under control, and subsequently the travel restrictions don’t frequently and unpredictably change.
We need to care for one another. Wear a mask, socially distance, practice good hygiene and minimize social contact for the next 4- 6 weeks, and we can go back to living a relatively normal life on the island.
Mahalo Dr Jim
Your ideas are clear and correct. We need to be patient and follow the guidelines of a safe opening . Those opposed to this decision by our mayor, based on scientific principals, will be grateful once they realize that Kauai will recover and be stronger than before. I am disappointed that the Chamber is not coming up with solutions rather than opposing this decision. And it bears repeating… a visitor with the virus cannot fly or drive away as on the mainland.
“Prior to the Safe Travels implementation, Kawakami pointed to Kaua‘i’s 61 cumulative cases. In the last six weeks, the county had an additional 70 cases. Monday, the county did not report any new cases”.
Problems with the mayor’s logic –
On MONDAY the opt out had not even started yet.
On TUESDAY the people coming in will not even be required to have a negative test, unlike the other islands. Families are still interacting with their person who travelled. Community spread will still occur. Community spread is responsible for over 90% of Kauai’s positive cases.
“…we had little choice but to take a temporary pause from the single pre-test travel program until the national incidence of disease is stabilized.”
In other words, Mayor Kawakami, you are effectively shutting down the Kauai visitor industry for all the prime winter visitor months, after a summer season of naught.
Where can myself and my family and everyone else we know greatly impacted by this economic guillotine sign the referenced petition? And is anyone floating the idea of a civil lawsuit against Mayor Kawakami?
Desperation in desperate people demands desperate measures.
Kawakami defended the people of the island. But the “bubble” doesn’t make sense. Burst bubbles please, we are so close to vaccine.
Old Ige might be on his way out of public service, but that’s no excuse for his spineless, fence-straddling brand of governing that has utterly ruined Hawaii since Covid hit us. Seeing Mayor Kawakami finally take a stand against the wealthy business and tourism-industry interests who have been pressuring him since spring to totally open up the island again (which he nonsensically did this past autumn, costing some people their lives) is what real leadership looks like. Thank you, Mayor, and please don’t buckle under pressure again. Kauai does not need tourism – the hotels and airlines just want you to think we do.
You’re neglecting the bigger picture here. Kawakami is not in the pocket of tourism. He’s backed by grove farm and developers. A healthy economy makes it hard to buy commercial real estate below market value. I’ll gladly admit I was wrong in the future if that may be. But see which financial interests are benefiting.
Here is a link to the online petition referenced in this article. Almost 4000 signatures thus far and rising rapidly.
https://www.change.org/p/david-ige-demand-that-governor-ige-rescind-his-approval-of-kauai-requiring-another-14-day-quarantine?signed=true
Please have empathy for the many, many people impacted by the new shut down of Kauai and the loss of tourist dollar income. The devastation of our economic driver will eventually impact our entire community whether or not everyone realizes that.
Please sign it, and share it on Facebook.
“Please have empathy for the many, many people impacted by the new shut down of Kauai and the loss of tourist dollar income.”
Oh, won’t someone think of the poor millionaires!
Cry me a river, @kauaiboy, no life is worth some businessman’s bottom line. And if you have a problem with that, you can take your hotel or snorkel rental shop or time-share scam to Waikiki or wherever Covid is killing people by the dozens daily.
Good riddance!
Susan, do you have any idea how hurtful your comments are to many? Many businesses rely on visitor dollars, both directly and indirectly, not just the largest helicopter tour and boat companies. Do you think the owners of a business like Da Crack in Poipu, which serves both residents and visitors, are millionaires? Businesses like that have been crushed by the drop in visitor traffic. People are on the brink of losing everything – these aren’t millionaires who have tons of money to weather the storm. When you talk gleefully of the death of the visitor industry, keep in mind that those of us who serve both residents and visitors who face losing everything are not faceless millionaires. We are more often than not people who were just getting by okay before Covid and who now face losing our entire life savings, while becoming indentured servants to commercial landlords, working seven days a week to lose money just so we can try to pay what we owe them and hopefully not go bankrupt. We’re your neighbors, we’re people who are often dedicated volunteers, who give to the community, and who just want to get by. That doesn’t mean we want reopening with no care for public health. But to have the rug pulled out from under you when you just barely scraped through the first quarantine period is rough in a way I don’t think you understand.
Let me guess, Susan. you are wealthy and you may be retired. You own stock, so your net worth has increased during Covid times. You may be one if the “poor millionaires”. You voted for tRump. You do not care that the small business owner on Kauai is about to lose his business and may lose his home. You are a sad excuse for a human.
My family will just cancel our trip to Kauai in January. We were going to spend 12 days on the island as we did last year but with two babies in tow can’t quarantine at Marriotts that are not on the bubble list, have no restaurants and on top of that you can’t even rent a car but it’s ok to get in an Uber with a stranger.
Even the state testing system in place doesn’t always work. Took a test the same time as my wife when planning to travel from Oahu to the Big Island, her test came back within 72 hours (66 hours) and my test came back in five days. That’s not a way to plan a trip.
Hopefully my family can fly over and enjoy another island but being in a hotel room without access to anything and relying on a delivery service to bring food and supplies is not any fun. It’s obvious Kauai doesn’t want visitors so why travel where you’re not wanted. Now where are those brochures on Maui….
Kauai doesn’t want sick people to infect the island. If you don’t have the aloha for that, we’re fine.
No explanation needed, it had to be done. We do not have a large number of ventilators on the island, so if your #21 and there are only 20 on island, your out of luck.
Here’s the thing with ventilators. If you have been paying attention to the recent advances in therapeutic to help treat covid-19 you would know that ventilators are not a preferred method. It’s essentially a death sentence regardless if you have covid or a different respiratory issue. It signals Your body to stop breathing on its own. Making recovery so much harder. So the ventilator argument is a mute point. Try again pal.
In March we had a 2 week shut down so the medical community could prepare. Why is Kauai unprepared? Many other states ordered extra ICU beds and ventilators. They didn’t use them
so they distributed them to other states.
I was told by a Wilcox nurse that any Covid person needing a ventilator would be medivaced to Oahu to receive better care.
Mahalo Mr. Mayor. Thank you for pushing back against Ige and protecting us. As to the Chamber of Commerce and their cohorts, perhaps you should be petitioning Ige to allow us to protect ourselves with our original plan. If he had approved the original plan, we would be open today. Read the blogs on travel to our island, many people are willing to do a short quarantine to come here, and those are the people we want here because they spend at small businesses unlike the $99 airfare people. All travelers are bringing Covid here under Ige and Green’s plan, not just the visitors, and we need our original plan to keep ourselves safe. If Ige wasn’t so stubborn, everything would be going smoothly.
Mayor Kawakami,
You did the right thing. This will unfortunately become apparent to more people as we watch the rest of the country and Hawaii over the next two months. A difficult decision, because it does involve real hardship and suffering for some of the Kauai community. But I believe you are correct that it will mitigate even greater suffering for all of Kauai, and position us for an earlier return to a healthy and prosperous community.
Now we need to address the short term consequences of the economic impact on those dependent on tourism, and develop a long term program for decreasing our dependence on tourism.
We need to put a science based proposal before the governor to open the island to travelers. Interestingly, the proposal by the informal group of Kauai physicians and citizens (including JoAnn Yukimura and Mike Schwartz) last spring and summer has just been validated by the CDC. A two test system with the last test after 5 to 7 days of quarantine would detect greater than 95 to 99% of the cases. This would bring us back into the level that effective contact tracing would be possible. Had we implemented this as recommended last Summer, we would have opened without pause or setback. There would have been a manageable level of infection in the community and a predictable, safe level of tourism in an environment that would have been attractive to tourists . People would have happily paid a premium to vacation somewhere where COVID is under control, and subsequently the travel restrictions don’t frequently and unpredictably change.
We need to care for one another. Wear a mask, socially distance, practice good hygiene and minimize social contact for the next 4- 6 weeks, and we can go back to living a relatively normal life on the island.
I can’t thank Mayor K enough for putting the residents first and opting out since the governor was not open for our 3 day quarantine on arrival pending a 2nd test.
As far as the Chamber of Commerce goes with their reaction to this temporary measure, I have lost respect for them and their lack of consideration for the health of local business employees and the island’s population.
Kauai Chamber of Commerce are cigar-chomping scum who literally only care about ONE thing in this world: occupancy. Go to one of their meetings and listen to these selfish, greedy human-pigs prattle on about their revenue and performance growth and blah blah blah. They would throw their own grandmothers into a pit of Coronavirus if it meant boosting their bottom lines. To them, employees, residents and the working class are utterly expendable, because there will always be some other uneducated, low-income sucker willing to work at their hotel for $8/hour.
As someone who has come to Kauai yearly for over thirty years, I certainly understand the concerns about quarantining. I am having a difficult time grasping why long term renters of a vrbo (45 days) are being forced to quarantine in a hotel rather than in a residence they have rented. I would think the exposure to hotel employees and other guests could hasten the spread whereas staying in a single family residence for the 14 days and having food delivered would isolate a family and no contact would be made with others. I certainly hope Kauai rethinks this and changes the mandates. I do not want to quarantine at a hotel with a bunch of other guests who could have COVID when I have rented a residence where our family can quarantine alone safely which protects the community. Hopefully there will be some consideration for this idea and changes made to the restrictions.
You really can’t imagine how hard it would be to track compliance with the rules for people staying all over the place, rather than concentrated into a few?
I know a lot of locals and when they’ve returned to the island, the national guard has come to their home a couple of times a day to check on them. Kauai is like a second home to our family and we would comply. Plus in one article it talked about ankle monitors on visitors so that is easy to track. But putting ALL the people in hotels together isn’t the best idea for the spread of COVID. We care about Kauai and would comply and stay at the residence for two weeks. I just think that families renting a home for over thirty days should be allowed to remain in that residence. It is a safe option.
Think of a large ship called the S.S. fully Employed. On it are Public service,
Media, Police, and Politicians. Mayor Kawakami with a bull horn saying “just remember people we are all in this together.” Every one else is in the sea clinging to a small life preserver with lockdown printed on it. The working class is drowning because of a policy for a virus with a 99.97% chance of survival.
Prove your numbers. The CDC and every scientific organization disagree with it.
There are approximately 330 million people in this country. If 330,000 died of Covid-19, that would be one tenth of one percent. So, 99.9% of people have NOT died from Covid-19. And since there are less than 330,000 that have died from it, more than 99.9% have not. Maybe not 99.97%, but pretty darn close. I’d say the numbers speak for themselves. And these numbers are FROM the CDC.
Making up numbers that are disassociated doesn’t help the cause. it makes one look a little looney and desperate.
Do you honestly believe that? If you do, you are just the right type of gullible person Kawanazi is trying to get on his side.
The CDC has said 94% of their listed covid deaths were people that died with covid, not from covid.
Link, please.
My husband and I have been annual visitors to Kaua’i for 11 years, staying an average of 4-5 weeks. My husband is recovering from (a thankfully very mild case of) Covid-19 and I will likely test positive in the next few days. I don’t understand why I have not read anything about those that have recovered and thus have antibodies being able to come to the island without quarantining. Doesn’t it make sense to allow free movement, i.e. no quarantining, for those that have tested positive within the last 3 months, recovered and have now tested negative prior to arrival? In other words, there should be exemptions to Rule 23 for those that cannot become infected not infect others.
That would be because the experts differ on immunity once you have it; some say you might have immunity for a short period of time, some say longer, nobody knows at this point. And were they to find out somehow he was immune, I suppose he could come without you since you apparently haven’t had it.
This had to be done. With the way the trends were going, Kauai was going to need to shut down soon anyway, but we’d have a big enough case load that it would be hard to reverse until the vaccine. Kawakami chose short-term economic pain over death for some residents.
Now the government needs to find the funds to keep people going through this, and needs to get enough vaccine for vulnerable people ASAP such that we can re-open safely.
Remember back in March when we knew very little about Covid-19? Most everyone was willing to cooperate and do whatever was necessary to combat the virus. Many of us thought that two or three weeks would be enough to get this monster under control. 9 months later it seems that the situation is getting worse. Many believe that vaccines and therapeutics will be the solution. I think not. Many people will refuse the vaccine due to the uncertainty of the side effects. And does anyone doubt that new viruses will emerge sooner or later? I support sanity and learning to live and work as safely as possible. How many more months can we live without freedom? Folks, the pandemic is here to stay and more are on their way.
Remember, no one will ever be held accountable to damage this vaccine does. Don’t be the first to reach for the spear.
Derek, I’m sure you’re watching the covid cases on the other islands. When is this new spike supposed to happen there? They had a statewide record low of cases yesterday since August. We are averaging less than two new cases a day. Please give us a timeline as to your plans.
Rumors are flying about a personal, political conflict with Ige. A game of chicken, or maybe call it a Mexican Standoff. Please stamp out this speculation.
And who are the “experts” the County Council and you listened to to make this call? What is their reaction now that cases are falling?
Thank you mayor Kawakami for getting it done .. Don’t bow down to the Tourism industry or the Tvr Folks on the North Shore..
Keep doing what you know is best for all the Island…Not just a Entitled Few.. Mahalo
Boy there sure are a ton of whiny, snivel millionaires (thank you Susan ) out there. You sell tourists crappy trinkets and crummy food knowing no one is coming back anyway and then complain no end when someone dares ask for $15 an hour or asks you to think of everybody (and NOT TO KILL PEOPLE FOR MONEY) all you can do is think about your own scotch tape and scissors store.
If you can’t make it through six months you should have shut down ages ago.
Oh my goodness … how many regular folks can’t make it through 6 months with no income!? Millionaires? Is that who you think is being hurt by this? You are badly mistaken.
The whole idea of the Safe Travels program was to create 1 set of rules for everyone traveling to Hawaii, to keep it simple enough for travelers to follow & safe for Residents. The biggest mistake was leaving Options for Mayors to opt out. Now they all are back to different rules, some of which make no sense at all.
It also seems the Tourists are taking the blunt of the blame when many of the Covid positive travelers has been by Returning Residents & those bouncing from island to island. If you’ve paid attention to some of Lt. Gov conferences “Residents are horrible at wearing masks & social distancing”. I get it, that for a good period of time there were no cases on Kauai, but when tourism started back their habbits didn’t change to reflect an influx of additional people in the environment.
The other rediculousness is these leaders know tourism is their economy. Shutting it down slaps their residents into food lines, $0 income, and dispair. Within hours of Mayor Kawakami’s action Thousands more residents were put out of jobs again. One of the larger hotels just said the hell with it & said they’d be closed at least for the rest of the year. Many landlords of commercial & residential properties have taken it in the chin without rent income for months. Vacation Rental’s have been basically shutdown for 9 months now forking out thousands in HOA Dues & mortgages with only a few weeks of reprieve for some while Inter-island travel was allowed & the few weeks tourism was allowed. Hotels & the Vacation Rental’s had to hold funds rather than pay bills to cover the cancellations that were likely because they had a gut feeling Rules would change or get shut down again. I don’t know how they expect anyone to be able to make a plan with these undetermined lockdown timeframes for their business or family with what money they have left to survive.
These leaders keep saying we’ve got to get away from reliance on Tourism, without a plan to do it. Until they can come up with a valid plan to do that, they’ve got to get their acts together & not cut the noses off of everyone that lives, works or conducts business in their County / State! Not one of these guys have stopped taking their paychecks during this time. If they had maybe feeling a little pain themselves would light a fire to get a real plan working.
I’m not sure where you get the idea that Kauai doesn’t need tourism? You clearly don’t understand economics. Over half of Kauai residents depend on tourism for our livelihood!
Should we be dependent on tourism? I don’t think we should be, but at this point in time, we are. If people want this to change, they can start by buying local and only local as much as possible. Stop giving your money to Amazon! Support local farmers and retailers so we don’t have to depend on tourism and can create new jobs. We could also grow hemp here and develop technology with it. There are so many options but we need to start the shift before we no longer count on tourism to drive our economy.
We have a June 1 2021 to July 15 2021 planned visit to Kauai , with our children and grand children, we all have received our covid vaccine shots with the exception of our 9 yr grandchild, We under stand safety and precautions we have no problem with pretest and even test when you arrive in Kauai. ,But with the bubble resorts with all the extra cost , of test and quarantine bracelets , is way too much . In our state (MICHIGAN ) which was closed completely down . covid test are free and any one can receive a test .at any time. The schools are open ,and following the guide lines set by the CDC our restaurants and bars are open also. One would assume with the vaccine , masks and following the CDC guide lines Kauai could opening up and still be a safe place . Now with the reports of some restaurants saying no to service to visitors , well I guess we can take a hint and cancel our car, and resort, and change our flights . to another island, Which is actually is less costly than the bubble resorts and all the cost associated with them.. We love Kauai and it sadden us to have to do this but when the door closes in your face one should take a hint. Maybe some day Kauai leaders will feel comfortable again and welcome guests . I am in hopes that the business can survive,