Letters for Friday — October 22, 2004

• War in Iraq

• Ohana Kauai

• County manager

• Plunking preferred

War in Iraq

Iraq: The greatest liquidation sale!! If you want to find out what’s really going on Iraq, and I am speaking to those of you – especially those of you who have loved ones fighting and dying in George Bush’s get-rich-quick war-please read Naomi Klein’s article in the September issue of Harper’s magazine, “Baghdad Year Zero.”

If you find this truthful please xerox copies and pass them out to others who will do the same. I believe the truth will out. I believe in the American people.

Bettejo Dux

Kalaheo

Ohana Kauai

I have been trying to get as much information as possible on the property tax charter amendment. While I appreciate the work that these citizens have done to try and get a handle on the rising property taxes, I found Lowell Kalapa’s article in the October 20 issue of The Garden Island to be very helpful. I know he has long been involved in educating the public to tax issues and I feel he is qualified to give us all some good advice. I also believe he is nonpartisan in this issue.

I am a longtime property owner on Kaua‘i, so I am very much affected by rising property taxes. At the same time, I am also a small business owner who rents commercial property. I believe Mr. Kalapa is correct in his analysis of how the lose of property taxes will only be shifted to an increase in other taxes and costs that will directly affect all local residents, renters and homeowners alike. It will also affect small businesses like mine, which already must charge higher prices to cover tax and insurance costs, and compete with the influx of large corporate businesses that threaten our small island lifestyle.

Therefore I am voting “no” on the Ohana Kauai charter amendment and urge our elected officials to expedite the property tax reform they have already begun.

Katie Pickett

Kilauea

County manager

One modest idea whose time has come on Kaua‘i, in my view, is the idea of a council-county manager form of government.

The mayor’s role has become too big for one person. The charter defines the role essentially in terms of serving as executive head and supervisor of a government that now has a budget exceeding $100 million and a work force exceeding 800. Yet the charter does not require candidates for mayor to demonstrate the skills, training, or experience required for managing the administration. The mayoral race is competitive in the same sense as a beauty contest.

In addition, demands on the mayor to attend to ceremonial duties, public relations, keeping the political base happy, or promoting his own whimsical projects constantly siphon time and attention away from the duties mandated by charter.

The Achilles heel of the current system is that no one can fire the mayor. This means that accountability in government is problematic from top to bottom.

A large part of the mayor’s task is to insure accountability in the administration. Yet, with the exception of major mayoral malfeasance, no one is likely to succeed in holding the mayor accountable for defaulting on his responsibility. Anyone who follows council meetings on Ho’ike has seen examples ad nauseam of council’s inability to exercise effective oversight of the administration at all levels.

(I’m not suggesting that changing the system will automatically solve the problem of council oversight—only that a change would make a solution possible because the manager would serve under contract to the council.)

The recent practice of designating the administrative assistant to manage the administration on a daily basis does not solve the problem. The assistant lacks the authority to implement independent decisions based on his own professional judgment.

It comes down to this: Can the county any longer afford to have a politician as the head of a complex and costly government? Or should we move the mayor across the street to be the leader of the politicians on the council and then let the council employ a county manager?

The Charter Review Commission will answer this question one way or the other in the measures it proposes (probably for the 2006 ballot). If the idea of changing to a council-county manager system resonates with you, now is the time to tell the commission how you feel so they can include your testimony in their initial deliberations.

Horace Stoessel

Kapa‘a

Plunking preferred

Recently a friend informed me that a volunteer at the Primary Election Voting place refused to accept his ballot because he had not checked all seven boxes for County Council candidates.

He told the volunteer he only liked one candidate and wanted to leave the rest of the boxes blank.

Only after talking to a supervisor of the polling place was his ballot accepted, with one candidate checked.

The volunteer was wrong to meddle in this citizen’s personal vote choice.

Do you ever wonder how those same people get re-elected – those same council members who have caused this island’s problems? (with non-stop, uninterrupted approvals for big development) Yet, as always, just before an election they claim to have solutions to fix the problems they created. Or, they start taking credit in their campaign babbling for solutions that came from outraged and diligent residents testifying year after year before their quasi council.

They get re-elected because we accidentally re-elect them by the way we vote.

These reruns already have their hundreds or thousands of supporters whose ‘favors’ will be accommodated if they get re-elected, and they depend on us to check all seven boxes to get that extra edge. So, why give them anymore votes?

When you check all seven boxes for County Council candidates, you weaken the chance for the candidate your truly want to win.

The power to getting your candidate elected is by voting for only one. Check only one box, maybe two if you feel strongly enough about another candidate.

No worry about those six unchecked boxes. Leave ’em blank!

E. Dunbar

Lihu‘e