HB 029: When Will Hawaii Reopen Tourism?

Bryan Murphy 0:00

On this episode of Hawaii's Best we're talking about the current reopening efforts in Hawaii. And what you need to know right now. So let's go

Hawaii's Best 0:11

Hello, ha Welcome to Hawaii's Best podcast, learn the story behind Hawaii's Best experiences, influencers and businesses. Discover everything that makes Hawaii the Aloha state. And now your host, Brian Murphy.

Bryan Murphy 0:27

Aloha and welcome to Hawaii's Best where we help prepare you for your next trip to Hawaii. I'm your host, Brian Murphy, the owner of Hawaii's Best and I just want to say thank you so much for joining me today. on our blog and on this podcast. We offer travel guys tips and cultural insights to get the most out of your stay on the islands when we also get to hear the stories from the people behind Hawaii's Best experiences, businesses and influencers. So sit back and relax. Let's explore Hawaii together. To make sure you never miss one of our episodes. Be sure to take one One second and hit that subscribe button. This episode of Hawaii's Best is sponsored by material CBD material believes that CBD should be available to all those in need at an affordable price. If you haven't heard of CBD CBD commonly is used to address anxiety, and even insomnia. CBD may also be an option for treating those with chronic pain so they get 15% off your first purchase with material go to live Hawaii's Best calm slash CBD that's live Hawaii's best.com slash CBD, promo code Hawaii for 15% off.

Like I mentioned today we are talking all about when will Hawaii reopen to specifically travel? And that's probably one of the top questions that we get on our Instagram page. At Hawaii's Best and on our blog. Live Hawaii's Best calm is one When will Hawaii reopen to travel? As you may or may not know, my family and I we live in Southern California and we actually had a trip planned for this past March and obviously that got postponed. And we're looking at rebooking for this October. Seeing how things go and looks like it'll be pretty good to be able to go in and October, maybe like me, you had your plans get canceled or postponed and I feel Yeah, and it's it's totally a bummer. But today I want to talk about kind of the other side of Coronavirus as we're coming out of this thing and what reopening looks like in Hawaii. So I'm going to talk a little bit about what is currently happening locally for reopening the state and also what the plans are for reopening for out of state visitors. I realized that thinking about Hawaii or booking a trip to Hawaii may be the last thing on your mind. I know that many of us have been impacted all of us have been impacted by The Coronavirus in some way or somehow and but we've all been impacted uniquely and many people have lost their jobs. A lot of people in Hawaii have lost their jobs and maybe you've lost your job. And I just want to say My heart goes out to you. If that is you, maybe you're dreaming of Hawaii right now. And that kind of gets you through this moment. And I just want to say, I'm with you. And I want to talk a little bit more about what the state of Hawaii is doing right now in this reopening, like probably where you're at in the world is slowly reopening. However, even though it's considered part of the United States, it is in a unique position where it's so isolated. Hawaii and Alaska are actually working together on a plan of what reopening might look like for those out of state. But here's what we do know as some of the local news and movement happening on the islands. As of June 9 2020, I wanted to wait as long as I could to be able to get this out to you and but it's still developing each week, each day really is kind of changing. And honestly, these last two and a half months, I haven't really known what to talk about them. We haven't released an episode since March like late March, or something like that. So forgive me if I'm a little off my game here. I do have some amazing episodes that are that were already recorded, that I'm going to be releasing in the next few weeks to kind of get you excited about traveling back to who I also have a couple interviews lined up here pretty quickly with some local officials that will give us some very clear and distinct actionable plans of what reopening the state of tourism looks like in Hawaii. This is more of an update of what is going on on Island and some plans that Officials are looking towards what reopening the state might look like. So as of today, June 9 2020 really the biggest news was announced by the governor of Hawaii that the inner Island quarantine. The 14 day quarantine will be lifted starting June 16. In our island travel, that's Island Island. There's been a 14 day quarantine which is the same quarantine as those traveling from outside of the state. So if you were living in LA, and you're traveling to Hawaii right now, you would have to do a 14 day quarantine.

The same thing was happening for those who live on safety live on Maui and you wanted to travel to a wahoo to even you know, visit some friends or family. There was a 14 day quarantine and effect well that's going to be lifted for inner Island travel. Also some encouraging news is that movie theaters, gems, bars and other things establishments will be allowed to reopen on June 19. Wherever you're out in the world, or if you live in the US. That's an encouraging news because like I mentioned, we live in Southern California. And we haven't heard anything about movie theaters being opened up or, or gyms or bars or anything like that. Right now we have dine in, just opened up in our state. But that's some encouraging news for Hawaii. Also, Hawaii State Parks will start to reopen in phases on July 1. So like I mentioned in the very first episode that I did, when this pandemic started back in, in March, and even on our Instagram page, the main thing is that Hawaii gets well first and your local economy and your local state, your county, your city, that becomes priority. And right now what we're seeing in Hawaii is that Things have been opening up these past few weeks past a month really. And it's been a success in that Hawaii is moving forward in their reopening efforts in their in their plans. So that's encouraging, because that means as we get through this reopening plan, tourism is on that plan. And that's really the next phase in this reopening effort in Hawaii is what is tourism going to look like? What is out of state travel going to look like going to the islands. We really should know more of that in the next week or two. But what I do want to say and I just really wanted to get this this episode out there to give you an update on where Hawaii is at as far as moving forward through this reopening plan. But I do want to emphasize that if you are thinking about traveling to Hawaii, like right now, in June, there still is this mandatory 14 day quarantine in effect The governor has not lifted yet. So my god is that once we see the local economy starting to grow and starting to heal, as this inner Island kind of quarantine ban has been lifted, the conversation will be shifted and has already been shifted towards what is tourism look like moving forward, it's in my opinion that looking towards, I would say, mid to late fall is probably a good indicator of being able to travel to Hawaii or it feels a little less restrictive because the people who get on the first plane once this travel ban has been lifted, there's still gonna be a lot of hoops to jump through, if you will, traveling to why and maybe for you that's like I don't care how many hoops I have to jump through. I just want to be on Island and that's totally fine and totally cool. But you got to respect the rules because protecting the islands and protecting Land. Dinah is super important in the people. So we want to be respectful of that when we travel back to the islands and the weeks to come, we're going to talk a little bit about what that means to travel responsibly in, in respect to going to Hawaii, and wherever you're at in the world, wherever you're going to be traveling to. So I would say probably September, October, November are going to start there are going to be some restrictions, I would assume, but are going to start feeling a little bit more normal, whatever that means. Right. So in regards to travel and tourism, I want to share with you some facts and I pulled some data from 2017 and in 2017 alone. According to the state government data, there were over 9.4 million visitors to the Hawaiian Islands. They spent over $16 billion

so tourism makes up about 21% of the state. economy with many of Hawaii's largest industries revolving around the constant flow of tourists. And that's probably no surprise to you. Because of that. Hawaii unemployment rate is currently at 22.3%. And that is because so many people who call Hawaii home work within the hospitality industry in Hawaii in talking about America, Hawaii is the second highest when it comes to unemployment rate second highest in the nation last month, and that's just behind Nevada, and you could probably fill in the blanks on why Nevada has been hit pretty hard because of Las Vegas, obviously, the ninth Island if you didn't know that. So it's in everyone's best interest to come up with a plan a safe plan that safely welcomes back visitors who are out of state as I mentioned at the top This show materia CBD has been a product that I've been using for for quite a while I'll probably almost a year and it has helped with those moments of anxiety. It's also helped with being able to fall asleep a little bit more comfortably and below stay asleep at med Terra they offer their CBD through a wide variety through gummies through through oil through even cream my wife, she uses their their roll on application and it helps with her her neck. She's been in quite a few car accidents and it helps with her with her stiffness in her neck and her flexibility and her pain management and in that so if you've never checked out a CBD product, these are THC free. You can read all about their lab results and their testing On their website, you can go to live Hawaii's best.com slash CBD. And enter the code Hawaii for 15% off your first order. So that's live Hawaii's best.com slash CBD, promo code Hawaii for 15% off Hawaii's Best we are members of the Hawaii's visitor and convention Bureau. And I wanted to share some of the facts, the latest facts right now just as the last couple days surrounding travel from out of state to Hawaii, and this is you know, directly from the governor's office. And a lot of this is subject to change as well to I'm sure where you're at a lot of local officials have lifted things, put things in place, maybe your governor if you live in the States, they've implemented changes pretty quickly or they've rolled out certain requirements in a certain way. So a lot of this is subject to change, but as of right now, June 9, there's still a 14 day quarantine for all passengers arriving from out of state through June 30 2020. I just want to read this statement straight from the governor's office and what they what they said here is all individuals, both residents and visitors arriving from out of state to Hawaii through June 30 2020 are still subject to mandatory 14 day self quarantine. The mandate applies to all arrivals at state airport, including private and commercial aircrafts. All arriving passengers are required to initial and sign this order confirming they are aware of the 14 day quarantine and acknowledging they understand violating the order is a criminal offence and subject to a $5,000 fine and or a year in present. A period of self quarantine begins at the time of entry into the state and last 14 days or the duration of the person This time and Hawaii, whichever is shorter. This order goes on to say as of June 1, the governor has announced that the 14 day mandatory self quarantine for inter Island travel will be lifted as of June 16. The governor also stated that, quote, reopening travel for inner island on June 16, will allow us to refine our systems and processes. It will allow us to plan thoughtfully for the reopening of our economy for Trans Pacific travel. So if we were to read between the lines on that a little bit, this reopening of inner Island travel is kind of step one into opening up travel to to out of state. So based on how that goes June 16, I think we're looking at probably, I would say a July. This is just me speculating. I have no facts on this. Probably a mid July or late July open up to out of state traffic. In addition to this order, and I know this is probably dry information, but I did some research for you, and I just want you to know kind of what the facts are. But also within this order, the Department of Transportation will require a thermal screening at the airport. So taking your temperature for everyone traveling into Ireland, they will also require travelers to fill out a form that will ask of their health related information, which will assist the state in tracking and responding to new COVID-19 cases. And if you care to know here's a little bit more kind of nitty gritty in this report of what they're looking for travelers maybe prohibited from boarding a flight if they have an elevated temperature above 100.4 degrees, that's 100.4 not not point five, or point three that's 100.4.

They refuse to complete the mandatory form or they are on the 14 day quarantine list prohibiting them from flying So as the nitty gritty and kind of a little bit dry honestly, for to be real, that this conversation was I hope that it helps inform you where Hawaii currently is in the conversation about reopening to out of state travelers. So if you're really curious and you really want to stay up to date, you really want to know like, what is new news, you can first subscribe to this podcast. And that'll just help you stay up to date for when the next episode gets released. You can follow us on Instagram at Hawaii's Best constantly posting over there and and give you some updates about what is happening as far as the reopening to tourism is concerned in Hawaii. Well I hope this episode gave you a better understanding of where Hawaii currently is at and their reopening efforts. And if it brought you value or you were informed, or you just like Hawaii I want to just invite you to again to subscribe and if you've been listening for a while, if you wouldn't mind is taking 10 seconds and leaving a rating and review. Wherever you consuming this if your podcast platform allows for that, that helps people who love Hawaii just like you be able to find this conversation and I truly, truly appreciate your time and your effort and just taking those 1015 seconds to do that. So thank you so much for considering to do that. And until next time, be well, Aloha.

Hawaii's Best 17:38

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