• News release failed to tell whole story • NAMI vigilant about helping mentally ill • Change how our government works • Almost all the trees are gone News release failed to tell whole story The Feb. 1, news release
• News release failed to tell whole story • NAMI vigilant about helping mentally ill • Change how our government works • Almost all the trees are gone
News release failed to tell whole story
The Feb. 1, news release by Eric Seitz, personal attorney for Mayor Bernard Carvalho, is an irresponsible effort to distort and ignore the issue currently confronting the mayor.
Hawaii Revised Statutes Section 78-9 provides that the position of a state or county employee is to be vacated if such person invokes the privilege against incrimination contained in our federal Constitution in a matter involving government affairs or property. The lawsuit filed by the county auditor near the end of last year included an allegation that the mayor and another county employee did make such an invocation. On Jan. 13, Ken Taylor and I wrote the mayor inquiring if the allegation was accurate. When we received no response other than the matter was being researched, we wrote on Jan. 28, a letter to county officials to initiate the provisions of HRS Section 78-10 for enforcement of Section 78-9.
On Jan. 29, we received a letter dated that day from County Attorney Alfred Castillo. Mr. Castillo referred to our letter of Jan. 28 and making no denial of the alleged facts stated without offering any citation of authority that it is our position that HRS Section 78-9 is arguably not applicable and may be unconstitutional.
We believe that Section 78-9 clearly sets forth established state law and policy and the undenied facts of the mayor’s invoking the self-incrimination privilege would justify his removal from office.
Glenn Mickens, Ken Taylor, Kapaa
NAMI vigilant about helping mentally ill
As our community now contemplates the sober events which unfolded this week at Roosevelt High School, it is important that we understand these events in their full context.
Awareness of undetected or undertreated mental illness is the primary barrier for families and the community in realizing solutions for and resilience against the violence, addiction, homelessness and shattered lives often associated with mental illness.
Despite the apparent linkages and access to services which were in place for the young man involved in this week’s tragedy, our system and strategies for supporting him and his family failed, and he and police officers were unfortunately injured.
As a nonprofit working to provide support and awareness regarding mental illness and the impact on families and the greater community, the National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI) Hawaii continues to advocate for a system, for youth in particular, which does not criminalize mental illness but supports systems of care for our community, families and all stakeholders to more fully understand and execute vital supports and interventions — before it is too late. Please contact NAMI Hawaii for support, information and resources if a member of your family is struggling. It is the mission of NAMI Hawaii to provide this for family members and loved ones of those with mental illness. Please call NAMI Hawaii at 591-1297 or visit us on line at wwwnamihawaii.org/contact-us
Jerry Coffee, Clinical director, The Institute for Human Services Inc. Honolulu
Change how our government works
As I peruse the Hawaii Legislative website, available to all at www.capitol.hawaii.gov/upcominghearings.aspx, I am amazed and awed at the brain power of our legislators!
I mean, 149 hearings scheduled in one day! Excuse me, but how in the world can these people honestly hear and consider 149 bills in one day? As I scroll through, there are bills for drones (a.k.a. unmanned aircraft), firearms, how to take away home rule from the counties, lots of tax stuff, how to take away ag lands, space station, bottle fee, unreported children, unions and on and on.
OK, what I am really getting at here is how can our representatives make informed choices when they have all of 2 minutes to hear a bill and make decisions that could impact our health and welfare and safety and environment, etc. Oh, sorry, there are actually times where there are 10 bills scheduled, and then one minute later another five bills. This is baloney!
We need to change the way our government does business. Some of these representatives don’t even read the bills their constituents bring to them for their endorsements. How can they? They don’t physically have the time.
So, all I can pray for is that you with your computers, please log onto the Hawaii Legislature website, and look through those bills, read them, submit testimony and be darn quick about it because they only give you a day to do it! What it boils down to is the government really doesn’t want you to be informed, certainly doesn’t want you to have time to read and digest and make meaningful contributions to your hometown laws, or they wouldn’t have this mad dash to the finish line every new year, then sit around and chew their cud the rest of the time, while we are floundering at home.
Sara Steiner, Pahoa
Almost all the trees are gone
People should take a drive down Aleka Loop. Wasn’t one of the conditions for CVS was to keep as many of the coconut trees as possible? There seems to be hardly any left at all. Planning commission sold the people of Kauai down the river again.
Philip Burton, Kapaa
