Hawaii isn't friendly to business and that has to change, says Stanley Hong.The former Hawaii Visitors Bureau president, who just ended his first week as president of another pro-business membership organization, the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii, says that won't be easy.
But Hong said he believes the reorganized Chamber, with a new strategic plan, can make some inroads and he hopes his legislative experience from nine years as HVB president can help get some laws turned in favor of business.
Legislators and business leaders say they know and like Hong and that if the Chamber can get its act in gear, some real changes might be possible.
Dr. Blake Waterhouse, president of Straub Clinic & Hospital and chairman of the search committee that selected Hong out of dozens of candidates, said Hong was chosen for his local business experience and legislative and community connections.
That experience and those connections were forged in a career that has spanned nearly four decades. Hong started with a stint in the early '60s as a law clerk in the state's Supreme Court. Later in that decade, he served as a legislative assistant to Sen. Hiram Fong. He has also worked for some of the state's most powerful companies, including Theo H. Davies & Co., where he served as a general counsel from 1973 to 1984.
But, by far, his highest profile job was the nine years, from 1984 to 1993, he spent leading the HVB through the state tourism industry's boom years.
Mufi Hannemann, now a city council member, headed the state Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism in the Waihee administration and dealt closely with Hong since DBEDT administered the state's contract that paid the HVB around $20 million a year in public money to promote tourism.
"Stanley's strengths are his people skills and I think in that regard he will be a tremendous benefit to the Chamber," Hannemann said.
State Senate President Norman Mizuguchi, who had a courtesy call from Hong on Friday, said he believes Hong understands local business and is a good representative of it.
"Stanley is local born and raised and has been in the business community for a number of years, so he understands the problems facing the Hawaii economy," Mizuguchi said.
But before he tackles Hawaii's economic problems, Hong said he first has to focus on the Chamber's dwindling membership. From a peak of 2,600 businesses and organizations in 1986, the Chamber has seen membership fall to 2,200 in 1993, just over 2,000 in 1994 and 1,945 at the end of last year.
Counting all the individuals within member companies and groups that are on the mailing list, the Chamber represents fewer than 4,000 people, he said.
Revenues from membership dues slipped from $1.7 million in the year ending June 30, 1993, to $1.5 million in fiscal 1995, said Jim Proctor, Chamber vice president of operations. Businesses pay annual dues ranging from $315 for a one-person operation up to $55,000, depending on the size and type of business.
"Our life's blood is the revenues we derive from the membership," Hong said.
So now he is busy sorting through the mix of committees and programs at the Chamber to decide what should be kept and what should be let go. Most important, he said, he's looking for ways to get the Chamber into a closer two-way communication with its members.
"It has to be membership driven and it has to be responsive to the membership," he said.
And that will mean getting closer to small businesses, who make up 85 percent of the Chamber's membership.
Hong said he is aware of the image in some quarters that the Chamber is run by, and represents, big business. He says it's his job to prove that is not true.
If he's looking for advice on where to take the Chamber, Hong need not look far.
Sam Slom, who runs a rival organization, Small Business Hawaii, said organizations such as his might not be needed if the Chamber had been more small business-oriented in the first place.
J.W.A. "Doc" Buyers, head of C. Brewer & Co. and someone who has served at different times as chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and the HVB, said he'd like to see the Chamber become an effective lobbying force for all business.
"It has fallen far short of the mark for some time now," he said.
Hannemann, meanwhile, says to be more effective the Chamber has to stop being all things to all people and concentrate on advancements for business that it is likely to achieve. "In the past I think they've been all over the place. They need to identify their targets. They can't change the business climate overnight."