[Lavapicker]

Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle gave her state of the State address on Tuesday, January 22nd, and invited representatives from all 24 Hawaii teams to be in attendance. In her speech, broadcast live across the State, she recognized FIRST robotics and our innagural Hawaii regional and mentioned what an outstanding program it is. All the representatives from the teams were asked to stand to receive recognition and applause from the legislators and others in attendance. Afterwards we were all invited up to her office to "talk story" and take pictures. Our Lt. Governor sat with the team at Nationals last year and she attended the kickoff this year. We in Hawaii have been very fortunate to have such support at the highest levels of government.
We were honored to have our representative from the State House, Clift Tsuji, catch a flight home from Oahu the night before and sit with us at 5 am to watch the kickoff on the Big Island. He told us he's committed to helping us sustain our participation and to expand FIRST throughout the State. I hope all of you can challenge your Governors and Government officials to do the same!