It may be his gregarious sense of humor that endears people to Peter Carlisle, but the mayor elect has promised his leadership style is not about making the people of the City and County of Honolulu comfortable.

Carlisle, who was elected with 38.7 percent of the vote in a special mayoral election Saturday, has been telling voters since he began campaigning that the state of the city is nothing to laugh about. Now that he’s on his way to Honolulu Hale — he’s set to be sworn in Oct. 8 — Oahu residents will see just how tough the former prosecutor can be.

Carlisle’s gripes about the City and County of Honolulu are numerous: The financial situation is a mess. There’s not enough transparency. Furloughs unnecessarily protect a “selfish” work force from layoffs. The city has to better position itself to foot the bill on billions of dollars in federally mandated sewage infrastructure upgrades. The list goes on.

The way Carlisle characterizes the myriad municipal issues he aims to solve harkens back to his decades of legal experience.

“One of the things that we do when we get into the courtroom is we swear in the witness,” Carlisle said in an appearance with Civil Beat on KHVH radio last week. “We ask them to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And I think that’s sort of what we need in government.”

After 14 years as Honolulu prosecutor, he also has a tendency to evoke some of the grittier language associated with law enforcement. The federally mandated sewage consent decree represents a “gun to our heads,” he’ll say, holding his index finger to his temple like it’s the muzzle of a weapon. In the first public forum for mayoral candidates in July, Carlisle talked about needing voters’ “blood, sweat and tears,” to improve Honolulu.

In Carlisle’s world, people get what they deserve. He often uses the words “unequivocal” and “absolute.” To Carlisle, it’s simple: “If we’re ever going to have real transparency in government, we’re going to have to make absolutely dead certain that the person at the helm is giving you all the facts.”

But until now, Carlisle has said he can’t give people all the facts because he doesn’t have them himself. As soon as he takes office, and even during the transitional period before he takes office, he said he’ll familiarize himself with the state of city operations and spending. Only then, he says, will he be positioned to act on the principles that got him elected.

Carlisle presents himself as action-oriented, and says — as someone without some of the deep-rooted political ties that are cultivated after years in other elected offices — he’s not afraid to make unpopular decisions. For example, he has been vocal about his disdain for the way public unions operate.

“The problem with public sector unions is that there’s no incentive for them to privatize and there’s no incentive to get any particular thing other than a bloating government,” Carlisle said. “If you allow those people to rule the nest, then you’re going to have the same types of problems that you’ve got right now.”

In addition to examining the city’s relationship with unions, Carlisle said he’ll also said consider cutting city workers pay, or eliminating jobs as a way to end furloughs.

“If you have to reduce the work force, you do it,” Carlisle said in the radio debate on the Rick Hamada show. “If you have to go to the collective bargaining agreements and fight harder, you do it. You do not run scared of a public union because you think you need the union vote to get re-elected.”

What remains to be seen on a professional level is how the relationships he’s forged as prosecutor, such as with the police department, will play out when he becomes mayor.

“He won’t be afraid to make unpopular decisions,” his daughter Aspen said in an August phone interview. “He really doesn’t care what people think. He doesn’t even care what I think! He is going to do what he wants to do if he thinks it’s right.”

Aspen, a law student in Kentucky, said watching her father’s career as a prosecutor inspired her to study law. Her college-aged brother Benson is also pursuing a legal education. Aspen describes her father as “very protective,” and his household rules as strict, saying he required her to have a curfew even when she was home visiting from college.

“We had to do chores, we had to make our beds every day,” Aspen said. “He likes a really organized house and a really clean house.”
 
His wife, Judy Carlisle, has said despite her husband’s tough persona, he’s actually a bit of a softie.

“It’s hard to see past his crusty exterior,” Judy Carlise said, “But he loves animals, and he loves old movies. The black-and-white ones, he’ll sit and watch those. He’ll watch the same one 20 times.”

When it comes to leadership, though, Carlisle is anything but passive. Carlisle said he’s actively working on how “restrain the temper,” and keep his aggressive reactive tendencies in check.

“Because you’re a prosecutor, when somebody attacks you, the immediate reaction is to attack back,” Carlisle said in the radio forum. “That’s not a functional way to run the city … I think people are sick of that. I think people really want somebody who will take the high road.”

Carlisle acknowledged that such a focus entails a collaborative approach to leadership. Ultimately, though, he still sees himself as the man in charge.

“I’ll take advice,” Carlisle said. “But the person who will make the final decision will be me.”