• Thanks to Kapaa Rotary • Courtroom has final dairy say • County should streamline operations, not change tax rates
Thanks to Kapaa Rotary
I would like to extend a huge thank you and my gratitude to the Kapaa Rotary Club for their community service work in June. It sincerely touched my heart that complete strangers would give their time and energy to help me in a time of need. And thank you to Jakki Nelson, wahine extraordinaire, for organizing the work day.
Julie Mann
Kapaa
Courtroom has final dairy say
A July 20 letter in The Garden Island Forum (Money splits island) caught my eye. The author advocates growing and exporting traditional crops such as breadfruit, lichee, longon and papaya.
Since kalo is usually exported as poi, I wondered if breadfruit could be fed to livestock then exported as pork, beef or milk? And which crop and processed food would return the most profit to the producer?
A quick scan of research indicates that total digestible nutrients in breadfruit compares favorably to soybeans and other pulses. I have come across no reports that compare Hawaiian plants to kikuyu grass as proposed for hay and pasture at the much discussed Kauai dairy farm. For over 100 years, the carrying capacities of various grasses have been studied at the Santa Rita Experiment Station near Tucson, Arizona. And for 50 of those years, kikuyu grass has been studied there — in a climate much like southern Kauai.
Cows may be the highest and best use of those acres. And milk may return more profit than other farm products. And permitting agencies may still strangle this baby in its cradle. The fate of the dairy may not depend on whether native plants or imported plants work best to control odors downwind and control runoff to the beach.
The farm may depend on which lawyers convince which judge that the dairymen should (or should not) be given a chance to prove they can be a going concern and control pollution at the same time.
Bob Ray
Poipu
County should streamline operations, not change tax rates
I do not think the County Council should waste its time and money changing the tax rates. They have more important things to do, don’t they? I thought the reason that taxes are charged to property owners are to pay for the county services provided, not just because they assume the people can afford it. A unit sitting empty is not using as many county recourses, so it should get a lower rate than others, not higher. Look at saving money on county operations and stop ripping off the homeowners, visitors and taxpayers of Kauai.
John Robinson
Kalaheo
