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Josh Green’s emergency housing plan “Build Beyond Barriers” reminds me of a Mickey Rooney movie.

In Rooney’s 1939 movie “Babes in Arms” with Judy Garland, the town has housing problems threatening to destroy it.

“I think our time has come,” Rooney says, inspiring his friends to get off their duffs and stop this from happening. “Let’s put on a show!”

And indeed, they do. From scratch. Through desperation and with perspiration, they worked together and did the impossible. Nothing stopped them. They saved the day.

I can picture Josh Green saying, “Let’s put on a show,” and I mean this in a good way. Lord, we sure can use this kind of optimism and can-do spirit. 

Of course, we don’t live in a Mickey Rooney world. Yet the main idea behind Gov. Green’s emergency housing plan’s strategy is to bring in more Mickey Rooney and less Mickey Mouse-like trivialities that gum up the works.

That’s why his plan is called “Build Beyond Barriers.” In the governor’s eyes, disagreement over processes is a huge barrier. “I don’t think war over process is going to help anybody,” Green recently said.

In other words, it’s our time. Let’s toss the distractions, get on our feet, and build us some houses. 

In fact, though, the housing plan is all about process — two kinds to be exact. 

One, litigation, is exactly the kind of process war that Green wants to avoid, but it’s probably unavoidable.

The second is a process that needs to be in place if there is any chance that the housing plan will work. For now, call this a group process.

For both grandiose and practical reasons, litigation is not going to go away. Big picture, the plan raises key constitutional questions about the proper use of emergency powers, the basis of the governor’s plan.

That gives someone challenging an emergency order a leg to stand on. It’s a wobbly leg in the sense that there is a decent chance she might lose that argument in court because when it comes to using emergency powers, governors have a lot of latitude.

But, hey, so what? A lawsuit is a potent weapon even if you lose because lawsuits mean delays, and delays can give you leverage.

Green’s jaw-dropping plan is to build 50,000 houses in five years. Five years!

More power to him, but in Hawaii nothing important, like say a wildfire mitigation plan, gets done in five years.

Litigation slows things down. Good chance that delays work for the opponents and very much against the governor’s goals.

That has a lot to do with the recent changes Green made to his plan.

The governor has tried to appease the opponents by converting them from warriors to peaceniks. He has made the process more transparent, increased the opportunity for public participation, and added Hawaii’s laws about cultural and environmental protections back into the process.

A peace offering? An attempt to get an armistice in the war against process? Will it work?

Possibly, but I’d bet against it because the process warriors may still have the will and wherewithal to fight. And there is no sign yet that the opposition is backing off their lawsuits.

I love the term “working group.” It tickles the senses the way that saying the terms “chocolate cake” or “Spam musubi” tickles the taste buds. 

Anointing something as a working group does not mean they will actually work. Here is a summary of the tons of research about groups: how they work is mysterious and unpredictable.

To give you a more immediate reality test, our Legislature just set up six “working groups” to deal with brush fire hazards. I’m betting that there are no more than six people in Hawaii who think brush fire tragedies will be averted because the legislators are now on the case. 

We’re skeptical about legislative working groups because they have a bad history.

The challenge for the housing work group, though is different. It’s that the group has no history — no rules, no customs, no norms, or tested procedures, all of which are necessary to make a group function in a timely and fair way. 

Sometimes a working group works because that kind of openness and newness creates a flexibility and mutual respect that starting from scratch can encourage.

At other times, this lack of process can cause disagreement and time-wasting battles when there are not set ways to resolve them — process wars with no processes to stop them.

Believe me, I understand the way existing rules can stifle and destroy. After all, I worked for the University of Hawaii for over 40 years. I also know from my past conflict work that making a new group work is extraordinarily difficult and time consuming.

The working group damn well better work because it is the linchpin. The housing plan cannot succeed unless that group succeeds.

Group success depends as much on the art and science of process expertise as it does on housing expertise.

“Beyond Barriers” does not want a Mickey Mouse and can’t expect to find a Mickey Rooney. So, how about an alternative Mickey as a guide? Mickey Jagger.

Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones have been together for over 50 years. They still rock.

How have they stayed together for so long? , traditionally when the band members disagree, the have learned to defer to each other’s strength.

Also, they have lasted so long because of, as she puts it, “their grounding in the blues.”

“The blues,” McCall says, “taught them — really how to be economical. How to be concise. How to be epigrammatic. And you saw that both in the way they wrote their songs and the way they wrote their lyrics. They were always right to the point.”

Concise, not talking too much, getting at the heart of things, and knowing when to shut up and listen. That sounds like a first-rate model for the housing working group to follow.

Making “Beyond Barriers” work. Like Jumping Jack Flash, it’s a gas.