20 for the Next 20: Josh Wisch, Holomua Collective
He brings extensive experience in law and government to a new role as the nonprofit’s president and executive director, advocating for working families.
Josh Wisch
President and Executive Director, Holomua Collective
Josh Wisch has a dream– a thriving Hawai‘i working class – that was initially driven by watching his parents work multiple jobs in rural Ohio just to make ends meet.
“At one point, they were working four jobs between the two of them,” he says.
He first advocated for policy change in high school as part of a student group pushing a tax levy so teachers could get a pay raise.
“We got ourselves on local TV, interviewed in local newspapers, put a ‘Pass the Tax Levy’ float in the homecoming parade, and had a massive rally in the high school gym the night before the election.”
The tax levy passed by just 44 votes. “I saw you actually can make a difference in politics, and every vote really does matter.”
He met his wife, Malia, who is from Kailua on O‘ahu, while studying public policy and management at Carnegie Mellon University. After Wisch graduated from law school at Georgetown University in 2002, they moved to Kailua.
He worked at two law firms but transitioned to campaigning for state politicians whose values mirrored his own. He initially met his friend Josh Green in 2004, when Green was first running for state representative on Hawai‘i Island and Wisch supported his campaign.
“Josh and I hit it off immediately,” says Green, now the governor. “We quickly discovered that he went to Carnegie Mellon the same years that I was there during my medical training. He often jokes that we’re two Joshes from Pittsburgh, obsessed with the Steelers.”
Wisch spent a decade in state government, including as special assistant to the attorney general and deputy director of the Department of Taxation, then served as executive director of ACLU Hawai‘i.
In 2022, he became the first president and executive director of Holomua Collective, a nonprofit committed to making Hawai’i more affordable for working families.
“We’ve started holding what we call ‘Demystifying Government’ sessions,” says Wisch, to give people a better understanding of how government works so more people can get involved in local politics.
It’s also working to create a more accurate picture of a livable salary in Hawai‘i when you account for the cost of local housing, food, health care and other factors – how local people actually cope.
Green says, “Holomua Collective is very focused on advocating for local families. It goes right to the heart of our needs, which is making sure people can afford to live and have homes here.”
