• Removing trees is scaring the ‘aina • Amenity fees target tourists • Remembering Harry Boranian • County wastes money Removing trees is scaring the ‘aina Recent rains caused huge amounts of mud to run off the side of the
• Removing trees is scaring the ‘aina • Amenity fees target tourists • Remembering Harry Boranian • County wastes money
Removing trees is scaring the ‘aina
Recent rains caused huge amounts of mud to run off the side of the roads and in to the ocean. The state and county highway divisions should be held legally accountable under the Clean Water Act for this non-point source pollution. Instead, they are asking to be exempt from current legislation before the state legislature (HB 903) for all of the pollution they create by using last-century techniques for maintaining roadsides.
Their procedures are to slash, scrape, spray and kill all plant life. This gives us the scraped mud scars along all of our roads (i.e. on Kapa‘a bypass or by the new fire station).
Wherever you see red dirt, know that it goes to the ocean. Worse, they are responsible for causing landslides along the highway in Kalihiwai and Hanalei. By cutting down all of the trees, the roots which hold the hillside together rot, letting the rocks to tumble.
Look where they did not cut the trees. No landslides.
Scientific research and court cases have upheld the liability of the tree cutters in causing landslides. So what do we have now from these stupid practices? The ugly scars along the scenic highways that look like scabs with needles sticking out, and ugly mesh fences.
The highway division must stop killing our island and the ocean. Hire arborists to plant appropriate grasses, trees and shrubs to hold on to the roadsides, instead of engineers to scrape it and cover it with ugly patches. This island and reefs desire better care.
Carl Berg
Lihu‘e
Amenity fees target tourists
We recently completed our fourth visit to Kaua‘i in the past eight years. We usually stay two weeks. We have stayed at the same place each time. We find the visits there during the Midwest’s mid-winter difficulties most enjoyable. We like Kaua‘i!
During our visit there was a report in The Garden Island newspaper that that in January there was a 10 percent spike in visitor’s to the island (92,163). Given that the population of Kaua‘i is about 65,689+, that is a substantial change in the population. You do handle that very well from a logistical point.
What bothered me this time is that apparently all hotels are adding a $15 per day amenity fee to the bill. I find that disgraceful. The economy is good now and the tourist visits are up substantially. Why do they do this?
That is a penalty for those who want to stay in Kaua‘i. In the future, we probably will not come to Kaua‘i. It is not a huge fee, but it does add up for anyone considering a long stay. It is the idea behind it that has annoyed me. Shame on them! I hope that this bad idea will be reconsidered.
Bill Kern
Norton, Ohio
Remembering Harry Boranian
I was saddened when I read in the TGI obituary column of the passing of fellow frequent letter writer Harry Boranian.
Although our paths only met through the pages of this forum, I felt a kinship similar to the kinship I experienced when another frequent letter writer, Horace Stoessel, passed away last year.
Mr. Boranian was a World War II veteran, plus a civil service director in Honolulu in the 1970s under Frank Fasi and on the Big Island in the 1980s for Hawai‘i County. As you can see, he not only served his country, but the county and state as well.
I remember reading a letter Mr. Boranian penned last July concerning the military and allowing both men and women to serve together on submarines. Sounded like fun to me!
Mr. Boranian states “A good reason not to mix sub crews is that many of the men have wives and families at home. Separation is bad enough without the worry of your husband or wife being tempted while at sea.”
Agree or disagree, I always looked forward to an opinion article from a fellow frequent letter writer Harry Boranian. RIP, Mr. B.
James “Kimo” Rosen
Kapa‘a
County wastes money
At the County Councils Committee meeting on March 20, University of Hawai‘i Professor Chip Fletcher, an expert on beach shoreline erosion, testified about the conditions past, present and future of our shorelines.
His long range forecast for areas near our ocean was pretty bleak. With global warming and the sea level rising in the next 20 to 50 years, he said that those locations will certainly be under water. He also cautioned that with the rising sea level will come rising ground water which will exacerbate the problem.
Ironically proponents of this multi-use path “that runs by the coast” once heard Professor Fletcher say not to harden the shoreline but this multi-million dollar white elephant has still been pushed no matter what experts might say to the contrary.
Even at $5.2 million per mile (the highly controversial Wailua segment costing triple that!) the insanity continues. Why hasn’t an audit been done to find out why this path is costing so much money? Even proponents of the path should want to know why the cost per mile is about five times the cost of the new 2.1 miles of highway that was just finished by KCC — amount of material and labor taken into consideration for both projects.
As Joe Rosa said, the bike/walking path along Wailua Beach that he helped build 35 years ago was accommodating to the few who used it so why now build a $2 million Taj Mahal along the same area for the few who will use it? AND upset the entire Hawaiian nation for treading on their sacred grounds?
More and more it becomes obvious that we need an experienced county manager to take care of all these problems — waste management, the golf course, the Kilauea Gym leak, the path, and on and on. If he didn’t do the job that the mayor and the council told him to do he could be fired, unlike the system now in place.
Since we are burying ourselves deeper and deeper in these problems why not at least try a new system instead of doing the same thing over and over wrong and expecting a different result?
Glenn Mickens
Kapa‘a
