Attorneys help attorneys
in our state Legislature

Your Feb. 7 editorial regarding the House bill on car insurance really hit the mark. When I first read about this legislation, I scratched my head. I couldn't figure out how allowing more lawsuits would lower costs or how such a bill would benefit me. But auto insurance is such a complicated thing, I assumed that our legislators knew what they were doing.

You are right. Attorneys are the only ones who would benefit from such a proposal. I couldn't figure why our legislators would even consider such a thing - but then I remembered that many of them are attorneys.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks lawsuits are a wacky way to solve problems. Let's come up with some real solutions to our car insurance woes.

Gail Kelley
Kapolei

State librarian has made
some serious mistakes

Bart Kane's idea of outsourcing library books seemed like a good idea at the time. Sadly, it hasn't worked out that way.

From a management standpoint, it appears Kane lacked adequate "buy-in" from his own staff. What he probably had was their fearful acquiescence.

From a business standpoint, he lacked "due diligence" or he might have discovered that Baker & Taylor was encountering serious problems on the mainland.

From a customer-service standpoint, Kane seems not to have asked, and is not asking, patrons for their comments.

Just as medical patients complain that they receive inadequate care when treatment decisions are made by HMO cost-cutters without medical training, library patrons are complaining that clerks in North Carolina cannot make the best book-buying decisions for local residents.

Although Kane has accomplished some very good things during his tenure, this deal is a serious mistake.

If he continues insisting that it's "my way or the highway" - he should be replaced.

Loren Ekroth

Kailua

Governor has mixed up
his hiring priorities

For more than a number of months, there has not appeared to be a regular maintenance program on the Pali Highway. On speaking to a Department of Transportation supervisor, I was told there is only a maintenance crew of six and its members cover the area from Middle Street to Makapuu. Vacancies exist in that division but they are not allowed to hire more personnel.

Yet the governor recently appointed two individuals to the Airports Division as special assistants, with a combined yearly salary of $123,000. For that amount of money, at least five vacancies could have been filled in the highways maintenance section.

Explain that to the public, Governor.

Faith P. Evans
Kailua

State bureaucracy covets
more taxes from its citizens

With a $40 million unused building at the University of Hawaii, only 25 cents on the dollar spent directly on a public school student because of a bloated bureaucracy, and bookkeeping that would be laughable in a private enterprise, you'd think everyone would now realize how virtually useless most of state government is.

In spite of these massive wastes, our state House proposes to raise that which has been killing our local economy: taxes.

How incredibly brilliant the thinking is among elected officials.

Gene Dumaran

Are you sure that Hawaii
is known as Aloha State?

The virulent anti-gay sentiment in the "Aloha" State continues to amaze me. The letters to the editor in response to your three-part series on same-gender marriage and domestic partnership issues in Europe (which were excellently written and clearly objective) treat your publishing these articles as if you endorse Denmark's and Sweden's stance on same-gender marriage simply because you reported it.

It's rather like saying you support the genocide in Bosnia because you publish articles about the war there.

It's hardly your fault that the attitudes of Denmark and Sweden are tolerant and accepting of their gay and lesbian citizens.

Ken Scott

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Same-sex archive