• Lydgate Park ponds still need rescue • Cigar industry shouldn’t get sweetheart deal • Where are the rest of the candidates? • Meet candidate Matt DiGeronimo Lydgate Park ponds still need rescue I recently had the opportunity to visit
• Lydgate Park ponds still need rescue • Cigar industry shouldn’t get sweetheart deal • Where are the rest of the candidates? • Meet candidate Matt DiGeronimo
Lydgate Park ponds still need rescue
I recently had the opportunity to visit Po‘ipu Beach Park and was well entertained by the small children playing in the water and bringing to their parents living ocean life for the parents to deal with.
It reminded me that Morgan’s Ponds at Lydgate Park used to be such a place until the mindless dredging and restructuring of the ponds there. Here we are, over a year later, and nothing has changed at Lydgate. Not only we residents but frequent visitors are asking why there has been no resolution.
I am deeply saddened that neither the County Council nor the mayor have felt the need to intervene in this tragedy. As I wrote previously, “The jewel of the Eastside has been lost” by the seemingly amateur attempts to make changes at Lydgate. Only few people still swim or snorkel at Lydgate and the lifeguards no longer do their conditioning swims there.
I’m dumbfounded that the mayor can continue to place this issue on the back burner, and that the chairman of the County Council’s Parks Committee, with his involvement in the Friends of Kamalani, does nothing.
I’m also dumbfounded that the rest of the council can also be so inactive about this issue. I don’t understand how a council that has the time to spend its energy worrying about “shall and will” should not find the Lydgate problem a bigger issue.
If there was ever a reason for a monumental change in the members of the council, this is it. If there was ever a reason for change in the mayor’s office, this is it. To bad he is not up for re-election.
David H. Stewart
Kapa‘a
Cigar industry shouldn’t get sweetheart deal
I read with deep disappointment the article promoting the cigar industry (“Kaua‘i tobacco grower says FDA would crush luxury cigar industry,” July 16).
Smoking cigars is not safe. Indeed, the National Cancer Institute has found cigars to cause disease, including lung disease, heart disease and cancers of the lung and mouth.
While cigarette smoking has been slowly declining, cigar smoking increased 37 percent between 2000 and 2006, especially among teens.
The recent Surgeon General’s report documented the sad fact that one out of five high school males currently smokes cigars. Each day, more than 3,000 kids under the age of 18 try their first cigar.
A little more than three years ago, President Obama signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act into law to protect our health and the health of our children. This commonsense law means that for the first time ever, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) can require warning labels and disclosure of ingredients, as well as ensure kids are not allowed to purchase tobacco products.
But none of this will ever be possible if HR 1639 is allowed to become law.
FDA hasn’t yet proposed one regulation that would impact cigars, yet the cigar industry is seeking an exemption from even the most basic, commonsense oversight.
Tobacco use kills 1,200 people a day. Why should any product that causes death and disease get a sweetheart deal?
Lorraine Leslie
Hawai‘i director, American Lung Association, Honolulu
Where are the rest of the candidates?
On Sunday, July 27, 2012, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser published a supplement entitled: “2012 Primary Election Voter’s Guide.” From this guide I see that there are eight candidates vying for the seat of U.S. House District 2.
However, your front page article in Sunday’s newspaper under the banner of: “Congressional candidates plan to attend Tuesday forum” quotes Carol Texeira as saying that: “All four congressional candidates have said they are to be here Tuesday.”
Excuse me. What happened to the other two Democrats and the two Republicans who are also running?
I understand from certain sources that the Republican candidates were not even invited.
How can the people of Kaua‘i make an intelligent choice when only half of the candidates are given a chance to be heard?
Shame on the Kaua‘i Chamber of Commerce.
Ada Koene
Koloa
Meet candidate Matt DiGeronimo
Aloha! Please consider this a “public service announcement” that the race for our next U.S. congressman includes a tremendous candidate that you may not have considered yet. Due to a miscommunication at the Kaua‘i Chamber of Commerce, he was not invited to Tuesday’s debate.
His name is Matt DiGeronimo. He is the forerunning Republican candidate, but no label can capture this man. He is the whole package that doesn’t come around often. His campaign has seen many lifelong Democrats and disinterested non-voters become volunteers, for Mr. DiGeronimo.
When we complain of “politics as usual” and wish for a real leader, DiGeronimo is the type of person we envision. He is a gentleman, a scholar, a humble man, a true public servant, has an engineering degree/MBA with vast experience in electrical power generation, a highly decorated and recently retired Navy officer with experiences so diverse and exciting it will blow you away, a small business owner who has assisted hundreds of business owners in Hawai‘i, and a real leader.
He is a true breath of fresh air. He has chosen not to pollute our streets (and then our landfills) with excessive signs. He has a mastery over the Jones Act that we have not yet seen and a plan which will reduce shipping costs in half.
He is prepared to fight for Hawai‘i and communicate with us from D.C. on a level that we have not seen. Seek out an opportunity to meet him before election day.
Go to www.md4congress.com for more information.
Aimee Blom
Honolulu
