Hawaii Has Lost a Media Icon, Emme Tomimbang Burns, Dies at 73

by Edwin Quinabo

Emme Tomimbang Burns, a veteran broadcast journalist, passed away while undergoing open heart surgery at the Queen’s Medical Center on Feb. 19, 2024.

Considered by many as a trailblazer for women and the Filipino community, Emme paved the way for a new era of greater diversity in local Hawaii media.  The media icon’s career spanned decades – her face and voice recognizable as she’s broadcasted news and interviews at various TV and radio stations.

Emme was also an entrepreneur with her own production company, Emme Tomimbang Multi-Media Enterprises. She produced the popular Emme’s Island Moments that had a run for more than 20 years. By the time that program was launched, Emme was already a household name, which helped her to attract sponsors and land inspiring guests to interview.

Her many highly visible projects over the decades cemented her as a local celebrity. When the name Emme was mentioned as a project participant, everyone knew it to mean it was Emme Tomimbang.

In the Filipino community when Emme got involved in a project, it was like a living, walking breathing institution coming to help your cause. Her participation was a magnet that drew sponsors and other highly visible leaders to projects.

In journalism, Emme helped shepherd and inspire new generations of young journalists and she gave helpful tips to veteran journalists new to Hawaii.

Annalisa Burgos, a local journalist and anchor, met Emme soon after moving to Hawaii in 2019 while working on a story for KITV, a special on civil rights.  Her colleagues suggested she interview Emme as a long-time community advocate. She was introduced to Emme by mutual friends. “When we met, we talked story about her career as a prominent Filipina anchor/reporter in Hawaii and our family connections to the Philippines,” Burgos told the Hawaii Filipino Chronicle.

Burgos said Emme was kind and nurturing. “She gave advice to me — a recent transplant — for getting to know the islands and meeting new people.”

Caroline Julian-Freitas, a former assignment editor and news producer at various local TV stations, told the Filipino Chronicle, “As a little girl, I remember seeing Emme reporting on the local TV station. I enjoyed her delivery, storytelling and skillfulness as a journalist. Emme was one of the firsts who represented our community to a broader audience.  She was highly respected by all communities in Hawaii. She was a role model to the Filipino community as one of the firsts who became successful in an industry where there were very few Filipinos.”

Tomimbang, or known to most as just Emme, was a force of philanthropic causes. She was the widow of the late Supreme Court of Appeals Chief Judge James S. Burns, son of the Hawaii Governor John A Burns, after whom the UH Medical school is named (JABSOM).

JABSOM said Emme established endowments and scholarships. She honored the Kahanamoku legacy with scholarships for Native Hawaiian students and created the Burns-Tomimbang scholarship for JABSOM medical students committed to serving the Filipino community.

Dr. Lee Buenconsejo-Lum, interim dean at JABSOM, described Tomimbang Burns as “a huge supporter” of the school. “She was always working so hard to give opportunities to our kids from underrepresented communities,” said Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum.

Chief Justice of the Hawaii Supreme Court Mark Recktenwald said in a statement that Tomimbang Burns was “a force of nature. From her work in the media to her support of the medical school, her warmth and passion energized all who came in contact with her.”

Her gift of storytelling and contributions to the community garnered admiration and respect from Hawaii politicians.  Gov. Josh Green said “Emme told stories from her heart.  She tackled some tough subjects as a broadcast journalist, but also shared stories of compelling island people.”

U.S. Senator Brian Schatz said in a statement to the Filipino Chronicle, “I join people across Hawai‘i in mourning the loss of my friend and beloved local broadcaster, Emme Tomimbang Burns. Emme was a fixture of Hawai‘i TV and radio for decades and devoted her later years to expanding opportunities in medicine and journalism for students, particularly in the Filipino and Native Hawaiian communities. She will be dearly missed – but her impact across the state will live on.”

U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono wrote on X, formerly Twitter, “A talented journalist and beloved community leader, my friend Emme Tomimbang Burns helped tell the stories of Hawaii for decades.

Bennette Misalucha, a former state senator and journalist, has been friends with Emme for more than 30 years. Emme is the godmother of her daughter Danille.  She told the Filipino Chronicle, “Emme was the first Filipino American to sit at an anchor chair in the entire United States.  It heralded that we, as a community, now belonged; that we had arrived in this new land, that we have now called ‘home.’  It was not just the fact that Emme opened doors for those who came after her, but she kept the door open for those that followed.

“She was always interested when there was a new Filipino face in TV news, and she made it a point to counsel them.  Emme was good at what she did.  She was respected and well loved,” Misalucha said.

Nestor Garcia, a former Honolulu City Council member and journalist, told the Filipino Chronicle, “As Emme the person, I remember her as someone who was gracious and kind, willing to go out of her way to help you, whether helping to promote a great cause, or making the time to offer helpful and thoughtful advice.

“As Emme the journalist, she had the talent to somehow get her interview subjects to share something about themselves that they would otherwise not share with anyone else but would do so for Emme and her audience. That is the mark of a master storyteller.”

Emme’s ability to get those she interviewed to feel comfortable and share information is a gift that the late journalist Barbara Walters was able to do, said Olivia Holm, a former Hawaii resident now living in California. “I got news of Emme’s passing on social media. I grew up watching Emme on TV and always thought she was the Filipina Barbara Walters in Hawaii. Emme was an inspiration not only to journalists, but all Filipinas growing up in the 1980s.”

Emme made her TV debut in the 1970s. Early in her career, Emme met Barbara Walters and got valuable tips from Walters while in New York. Emme said Barbara told her, “You should be glad you’re doing features; [they’re] happy, glad [stories].”

Emme’s done serious news as well. Years later after meeting with Walters, Emme would go back to New York to do a special after the horror of 9/11. Misalucha said her series on 9/11 NYC and Washington DC survivors are still being talked about. 

“Emme was also the first one to highlight the Hawaii regional cuisine and the chefs Alan Wong and Roy Yamaguchi when she saw the value of ethnic food blended with the traditional fare,” Misalucha said.

Emme not only interviewed Hawaii personalities like navigator Nainoa Thompson — the first Hawaiian to practice the ancient Polynesian art of navigation since the 14th century, having navigated the canoes Hōkūleʻa and the Hawaiʻiloa from Hawaiʻi to other island nations in Polynesia without the aid of western instruments — but she also interviewed national newsmakers like Muhammed Ali and Jane Fonda and international figures like Imelda Marcos.  Emme had connections and profiled famous and not-so-famous people with intriguing stories that many will always remember.

Pioneering days in journalism
In the 1950s and 1960s, news anchors and reporters were predominantly Caucasian men nationally and locally. In the early 1970s, Linda Coble and Barbara Tanabe were the first women anchors on local Hawaii television.

In 1975, Emme debuted her TV career doing weather reports. “I think the diversity of our team [at KITV] showed we could do it and that we were groundbreaking. Before that no local ethnic minorities were on the air. Other stations began following suit. KITV stuck their necks out and were ahead of everyone else in testing the waters and going where no one else had gone,” Tomimbang told A.J. McWhorter, a writer and researcher for local and national media.

Tomimbang said during that time there was also a Hawaiian renaissance of music, comedy and entertainment beginning. “We were all riding the same wave,” said Tomimbang, as local personalities and local broadcast journalists started to become more visible on television.

In 1985, she became KITV’s 10 o’clock co-anchor with Tim Tindall. Tomimbang told McWhorter that she credits then KITV news director Stewart Chiefet for his vision for “island television” back in the 1970s. “Today, look at all the local faces on KITV, the local teams on HNN and KHON. It began with us,” said Tomimbang.

Waters remembered Tomimbang Burns as the only person who welcomed her when she came to Hawaii in 1981 to anchor the KITV news. She told the Star-Advertiser, “The only person who was nice to me was — literally — Emme. Over the years she became my best friend in Hawaii. I can’t imagine a world without her.”

After KITV, Emme moved to KHON Channel 2 where she launched the Morning News as a co-anchor. She later produced independent news features for KHON.

Before television, she hosted a radio show as a teenager on KNDI.

Julian-Freitas said, “As an elementary school student and aspiring broadcast journalist, I remember watching Emme report and deliver the daily news and feeling that…that could be me one day.  Emme was the epitome of success and a trailblazer in a world when there were very few or not any Filipina in Hawaii’s broadcast TV industry. 

“She broke the glass ceiling, opened doors and paved the way for many aspiring Filipina, like me, who wanted to pursue a career in television. I eventually landed a career in TV and have her to thank for making it possible for me and the many generations that followed. I wish I had the honor of meeting her so that I could thank her for her bravery and for being someone who represented our community well.”

Advocate for the Filipino community in Hawaii
To the Filipino community, Emme was admired for her years of advocacy for the Filipino community and culture.

Burgos said, “I would see Emme at Filipino community events and learned more about her work telling the stories of the Filipino diaspora, which was a mission I shared. We became friends and when I moved to Hawaii News Now (HNN) in 2022, I was honored when she told me HNN was lucky to have me and she was proud of my work covering the Filipino community, including my Focus on the Philippines series. She also told me she was a huge fan of HNN’s Sunrise Weekends, which I helped launch in January 2023.

“Emme often called me to share story ideas and comment on stories and interviews I did about the Filipino community. Most recently, she shared her frustrations with the Philippine government’s response to helping the Lahaina wildfire victims — nearly half are Filipino — and asked me to stay on top of the story and cover the community there,” Burgos said.

She elaborates that Emme worked to combat negative perceptions of Filipinos. “Emme and I would reflect on how Filipinos continue to lag compared to other ethnicities with far fewer numbers, when it comes to having a seat in the C-suite and on various boards. We talked about how we as TV journalists could support and inspire Filipinos so they could achieve power and influence.”

Emme spearheaded and embraced various initiatives to benefit the Filipino community. She was a recipient of awards by various Filipino organizations, including receiving the Community Service Award from the FilCom Center, which she helped to raise funds for.  At a gala event “Sharing Memorable Moments with Emme Tomimbang & Friends” to raise funds for the FilCom Center, Emme helped raise more than $150,000.

At the 2013 event, Edmund Aczon, chairman of the FilCom Center board of directors, said “Emme’s stature in the community was able to attract an eclectic group of individuals from celebrities, entertainers, elected, corporate and religious leaders to justices of Hawaii court.”

Emme said that evening, “It was a magical night seeing all my friends in the audience. After all my husband, Jim Burns, and I have been through to survive personal medical challenges, we felt the evening was truly a celebration of life.” In 2011, her husband was diagnosed with throat cancer.  Emme became his chief caregiver. But in 2012 she suffered a brain aneurysm, and he became her caregiver. Burns died from cancer in 2017.

She elaborated, “It’s such an honor and a privilege to support the FilCom Center and bring people who wouldn’t otherwise have ventured to this historic plantation town of Waipahu in order to see this beautiful center inspired by colonial Spanish design.”

During the early stages of the COVID-19, Emme worked with Filipino leaders, health professionals, community members, and University of Hawaii-Manoa faculty, staff, and students in the FilCom CARES public-information campaign to address the need for Filipinos to get vaccinated.

Emme, a co-chair of the FilCom CARES public-information campaign, along with Agnes Respicio, Malate Ph.D. and Dr. Lyla Prather, said in a joint statement, “Our call to action is this: We cannot sit back and be disengaged from this worldwide/statewide struggle. We must educate ourselves on the facts through native/non-English speaking languages and dialects. We should check with our doctors first for what’s best for us. And we should not be afraid to step forward and do right by our loved ones and the world.

”At the time, Filipinos were the fastest growing sector with COVID-19 infections, comprising 21% of confirmed COVID cases and a death rate from the virus at 24% in Hawaii. There was apprehension then among some Filipinos to get the available COVID-19 vaccinations.

“Now is the time to reach out to our fellow Filipinos, determine what their concerns are, and provide them with accurate information to make the best choice for them, their families, and the community at large,” the statement said.

As a journalist, Emme reported on the Filipino community in the late 1980s when President Ferdinand Marcos and family were in exile in Hawaii. It was a divisive time in the Filipino community and Emme helped to make sense of it all in her coverage, providing insight to the larger Hawaii community as someone who grew up in the Filipino community.

Misalucha, a long-time advocate in the Filipino community, said Emme “wore her culture proudly on her sleeves.  She always advocated that children born in the U.S. with Filipino roots should touch bases with their roots.  She did that.  I think one of her proudest moments was when she did a documentary about the 100th anniversary of Filipino immigration to Hawaii.  It allowed her to showcase all that was near and dear to her heart.  Emme’s legacy will live forever.”

Childhood
Tomimbang Burns was born in October 1950 and grew up in the Kalihi-Palama and Kaka’ako areas. She attended Central Intermediate School and Farrington High School and later gave back to her high school alma mater, funding programs for aspiring Filipino doctors, nurses and journalists. At Farrington she was a cheerleader.

She attended Leeward Community College and graduated from UH Mānoa in 1973 where she received a bachelor’s degree in secondary education. In 2014, she was honored with the UH Alumni Association Distinguished Alumni Awards in recognition of her outstanding alumni accomplishments.

At the event she said, “The AA degree means so much to me because those two years at Leeward really defined my life and got me to UH and got me through the UH. So, I am grateful to the community college system,” she said. “Having gone to Leeward and going to the UH, a great institution with everything that armed me for who I am and what I have done in my life. I think that was the real prize.”

Emme was raised by her father Tommy Tomimbang, after her parents’ divorce. Her father was the founder of the first Filipino-language radio station (KISA) in the U.S.

On her legacy, Garcia said “Emme showed that anyone – even someone from a humble background – can make something of herself or himself if you worked hard and believed in what you are capable of doing.  She made us all proud. For young Filipinos, she was a trailblazer and a role model, someone who demonstrated that you can be seen as a talented and respected journalist who just happens to be Filipino.”