• Every child left behind
• Bus service praise
• From awkward to upright
Every child left behind
The recent decision to furlough Hawai‘i’s keiki 17 days a year is completely unacceptable.
Educators have been working diligently to improve the historically low ratings of public education in Hawai‘i and changes are occurring. Yet test results show that 65 percent of 2008 high school graduates entering Kaua‘i Community College lacked skills in reading, writing and math for college transfer-level courses; 31 percent lacked even basic level skills.
Seventeen furlough days will reportedly leave Hawai‘i with the fewest instructional days in the nation and knock the legs out from under the improvements we are starting to see.
There is no doubt we are in a difficult economic situation. It has resulted in painful cuts that have already left holes in our social safety net that we all will pay for in the future. Yet the decision to furlough our children does not have to stand; there are options.
We applaud Sen. Hooser’s call for a special session of the state Legislature to address this unacceptable situation.
A rally organized by parents is being held from 3 to 4 p.m. Friday at the State Office Building in Lihu‘e. Wear your school colors and join your neighbors in demanding that this shortsighted decision be reversed.
Gini and Tim Bynum, Kapa‘a
Bus service praise
Our Kaua‘i bus system deserves much praise for its outstanding service to non-drivers and non-automotive owners.
Their service allows me to attend meetings of my Y’s Men’s Service Club, YMCA board meetings and lately teaching swimming classes at the YMCA as a volunteer.
It enables me transportation to the Princeville Health Club where I swim almost daily.
Whenever I ride the para-transit bus or the city bus, I am always impressed by the caring manner of the drivers when assisting the elderly with packages or offering correct directions to island visitors. They carefully wait and watch to make sure that patients arrive safely to the door of their homes.
They demonstrate professionalism in their concern for the safety and consideration of all riders and are excellent examples of the “spirit of aloha.”
Donna Shultze, Kilauea
From awkward to upright
How will the Board of Ethics extract itself from the awkward position it now occupies?
In June the board dismissed three ethics complaints based on Charter 20.02D pending its receipt of and concurrence with an opinion from the county attorney. One member, without whose vote one complaint could not have been dismissed, later said that he was mistaken when he voted in favor of dismissing the complaint, asserting that 20.02D prohibits attorneys serving on boards/commissions from appearing before county agencies in behalf of their clients. Have the complaints been dismissed or not?
In September the board took a similar provisional action in response to a request for an advisory opinion, only this time the board, contrary to its actions on the complaints, told the requester to stop appearing before the Council until it determined the right way to administer 20.02D.
The chairperson says that the solution lies in reaffirming the position taken by the board in March, 2008, when the board gave an attorney permission to continue representing clients before county agencies and purportedly based its decision on a legal opinion from the county attorney.
This proposed solution relies on two questionable assumptions: that a county attorney opinion must be accepted as authoritative regardless of its content and that this particular opinion justified the board’s decision.
The first assumption overlooks the fact that the charter designates the county attorney as the county’s chief legal adviser, not its only adviser, and the fact that the county frequently employs highly-paid legal advisers from Honolulu. If the board has questions about the quality of legal advice received from the county attorney it has the right, if not the duty, to seek a second opinion from a qualified neutral party. It does not have a right to turn over its decision-making role to the county attorney in blind faith.
The second assumption is simply mistaken. Even if the opinions received by the board since March, 2008 were flawless (which they are not), they still do not justify the board’s 2008 decision or provide guidance in the cases now awaiting a final decision by the board. The opinions merely conclude that 20.02D cannot be read in a vacuum without specifying what statutory and circumstantial details should fill the presumed vacuum.
I believe the solution is for the board to affirm the plain meaning of 20.02D and to justify any exceptions it makes to applying it in the pending cases.
Hrace Stoessel, Kapa’a
