An unusually high number of state House members — Rep. Chris Todd counts “at least” 14 out of 51 — are juggling long days and often long nights this legislative session while raising infants and elementary school-age children, sometimes inside the state Capitol itself.
The challenges of balancing work with family time provides a daily reminder of the need to do more to help struggling families just like themselves, most of whom are now new committee chairs and House leaders.
“It’s been a blessing when you have co-workers that are also managing a high stress and a long-hour job with being a parent and a spouse,” said Todd (D, Hilo-Keaau-Ainaloa), the new, 37-year-old House majority caucus leader.
“We’re able to share common experiences, and all of our kids have become close friends.”
His daughter, a 6-year-old first grader in Hilo, joins Todd at the Capitol when he knows other colleagues will be bringing in their children — especially the daughter of fellow Hawaii island Rep. Kirstin Kahaloa (D, Captain Cook-Kealakekua-Kailua-Kona), who chairs the House Agriculture and Food Systems Committee.
The parents have their own support group text chain they call “The Capitol Kids.”
They often use it to lean on one another for emergency child care or for nuts-and-bolts parenting questions such as “How much money does the tooth fairy give in your house?” said new House Vice Speaker Linda Ichiyama, 39, who has an 8-year-old second grade son and a 6-year-old first grade daughter.
When other House members bring their children to the Capitol, Ichiyama said, colleagues chime in on the Capitol Kids text chain to “help each other out by going to the Cookie Corner or saying, ‘You need a box of crayons?’”
House Minority Caucus Leader Lauren Matsumoto (R, Mililani-Waipio Acres-Mililani Mauka), 37, has not been invited to join the Capitol Kids text chain as leader of the opposition party.
But Matsumoto, now in her 13th legislative session, shares their experience as the mother of 7-year-old first grader Noah and 5-year-old preschooler Noelle, who are growing up knowing no other family routine, Matsumoto said.
Noelle was born on Christmas Day, just three weeks before the start of that year’s legislative session.
House members are not allowed sick leave or maternity leave.
So Matsumoto appreciated that then-House Speaker Scott Saiki excused Matsumoto from the early days of the session and, especially, for making a point of noting with an asterisk in the official record that her excuse was due to “maternity” and not for some frivolous reason “like a cruise to the Bahamas,” she said.
Matsumoto now makes time each week to coach her children’s jiu jitsu, soccer and jump rope club practices Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, followed by games on Saturdays.
Working with kids her children’s ages and interacting with their parents serve as “a constant reminder” of what they’re all going through and the need for the state to do more to help, Matsumoto said.
She was born into a life of public service.
Matsumoto’s 95-year-old grandmother, Suzanne Peterson, was Hawaii’s first female agriculture director under Democratic Govs. George Ariyoshi and John Wahiee.
Her father, Michael Cheape, 64, taught public school in Nanakuli.
Matsumoto’s husband, Honolulu firefighter Scott Matsumoto, works in the Mililani Mauka fire station.
Their son, Noah, seems to be following the family path.
“By the time my son was 2, he could tell you the three branches of government and the two chambers of the Legislature,” Matsumoto said. “I don’t know how many 2-year-olds could do that. … This is all they’ve ever known. This is all my family’s ever known.”
Outside of her role as a state legislator, Matsumoto faces the same challenges as other parents of young children.
“Nobody was even talking about preschool, and now it’s one of the main things people (in the Legislature) are focusing on,” she said. “I’m No. 50 on the waitlist, and it costs $2,500 per month per child. That’s a mortgage. So I’m glad that we’re paying attention to those kinds of issues now.”
Several of the Capitol Kids spent their spring break last week playing with one another in and out of their parents’ Capitol offices in between joining their parents in committee hearings or popping in and out of kid-friendly offices like Rep. Darius Kila’s.
He has no children of his own, but welcomes them in for snacks.
The kids’ presence at the Capitol often provides welcome reminders about why Capitol staff and legislators sacrifice family time searching for ways to make living in high-priced Hawaii a little easier.
In between a long night Thursday positioning bills for what’s known as the “second lateral filing,” House staff and parents organized a scavenger hunt that had children scouring the relatively empty, five-story Capitol building in search of hidden toys.
Reality hits hard
Luke Evslin thought he knew the commitment he had gotten himself into when Gov. Josh Green appointed him after the 2023 legislative session had already begun to replace Kauai Rep. James Tokioka, who now leads the state Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism in Green’s Cabinet.
But the reality for Evslin hit hard just moments before he was sworn into the House for the first time.
Evslin (D, Wailua-Lihue) had thought he could fly back and forth to Kauai in the middle of each week to at least spend one night at home with wife Sokchea and their son, now 6-year-old Levi, and daughter Finley, who’s now 8.
But Evslin was told to ask Hawaii island Rep. David Tarnas (D, Hawi-Waimea-Waikoloa) whether he was realistic about commuting between a neighbor island and the Capitol.
On his first morning on the House floor in 2023, just minutes before he was to be sworn in to office, Tarnas came up to introduce himself to Evslin, who was with his wife, and parents, Lee and Monica.
Evslin said he was told to ask Tarnas for advice about how to juggle work as a neighbor island legislator while raising young children.
Tarnas’ response stunned Evslin.
“Don’t do it,” Evslin remembered Tarnas telling him and his family. “Here I am, 15 minutes from getting sworn in, and he’s telling me, ‘Don’t do it’ while my wife was right there.”
Tarnas did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Before he sought his first reelection to the House in 2024, Evslin and his wife had serious talks about whether the sacrifice was worth it.
They ultimately agreed that Evslin would continue to serve “as long as I’m effective — and I am,” he told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser in his office strewn with loose Lego pieces and his kids’ Nintendo Switch devices spread across a table.
He’s particularly proud of a bill he supported during his first session that now allows counties to approve accessory dwelling units on homeowners’ lots to create more affordable housing, especially for families.
When he’s on Oahu during the week, Evslin sleeps in a room in Manoa that he rents from Kahaloa and her husband, Ilihia Gionson.
“We’re not rich by any means,” Evslin said. “And it’s the same for anyone my age. I don’t know how people make it work.”
Evslin and Sokchea own the home they inherited but need to rent out a portion of it to keep up with expenses.
Last week their children spent spring break sleeping with Evslin in the room he rents in Manoa.
Unlike Evslin, Rep. Trish La Chica (D, Waipio-Mililani) — who also was appointed by Green in 2023 before winning election outright in 2024 like Evslin — has never had a family discussion about whether she might give up her legislative career to devote more time to the family, her husband, Cricket, said last week in La Chica’s office surrounded by other Capitol Kids.
Their 5-year-old daughter, Ricki, sat at La Chica’s desk using different-colored crayons to draw a picture of herself and her mom standing on top of a hill.
There’s never been a need to talk about whether La Chica would do something else if it means more time at home, Cricket said.
“She was born for this,” he said.
School life disruption
Two years ago La Chica was outraged after the state Department of Education abruptly canceled school bus routes across the state just days ahead of the school year — only to repeat the cancellations in 2024, disrupting the lives of thousands of schoolchildren and their families on various islands to start the school year.
La Chica responded by introducing legislation in search of permanent solutions.
The latest version of House Bill 862, which she introduced, crossed over to the Senate this session and remains alive.
It would allow smaller vehicles to be used to fill in for canceled bus routes.
During the legislative session, La Chica drops off Ricki and her brother, Foggy, 8, at their individual schools, and Cricket picks them up after school.
La Chica then comes home to cook dinner — or makes plenty of meals in advance during weeks when she’ll be working late, Cricket said.
“I only make adobo,” he said while surrounded by their children and other Capitol Kids.
When the session ends in May — although there’s already early talk of a special session to address the fallout from federal cuts — there are still community meetings and other events at nights and on weekends, along with ongoing research to fix bills that died or other ideas ahead of the next session.
New House Majority Leader Sean Quinlan (D, Waialua-Haleiwa-Punaluu) shares his colleagues’ worries over increasing preschool costs as the father of 6-year-old son Max.
He had been in a preschool that cost $1,600 a month before enrolling in kindergarten this year.
And as a North Shore legislator, Quinlan shares concerns over the need for a reliable and dependable school bus system, as well as the hours stuck in traffic to and from town.
At the age of 42, Quinlan calls himself “the oldest possible millennial,” and worries about the time he spends away from Max.
After becoming House majority leader this session, the demands have only increased.
“I end up feeling guilty all of the time,” Quinlan said.
“I have this sacred obligation to this job that I swore an oath to,” he said. “But what about my kid? Since I’ve become majority leader, he’s noticed that I’m not around as much.”
Ichiyama was just 24, the youngest member of the Legislature, when she took office in 2010.
Many of the other state representatives and senators at the time “were older parents who had lived through parenthood and came to the Legislature after retirement or as second careers,” Ichiyama said.
As a result, she said, hearings would often stretch to 2 a.m.
But there was one role model who stood out and made an impression on Ichiyama.
Then-state Sen. Jill Tokuda, now a member of Congress, regularly showed up at the Capitol with her infant, firstborn son.
Now there are more legislators on the House side doing the same — but with the support of many more colleagues facing the same challenges, Ichiyama said.
Juggling the demands of work and family requires patience and flexibility from her husband, Pono Chong, their children and Ichiyama’s mother, Carole, who regularly helps out.
For her kids, Ichiyama does not take it for granted that they have never known anything else but having their mother focused on public service — even when it means interrupting family time.
“We’ll run into a constituent and they want to talk to me, which means my kids have to wait and listen,” Ichiyama said. “That never turns off. You wear this job wherever you go even though they’re like, ‘Mom, hurry up.’”
“This is a round-the-clock job that affects my family,” she said.
Asked whether she’s ever considered stepping aside to devote more time to her family, Ichiyama — like other parents of young children serving in the House — said, “This is my dream job. This is a job I’ve always wanted. I hope to do this job as long as I can.”
