Honolulu Lite

by Charles Memminger

Monday, September 22, 1997

---

Drive oldest profession
to bankruptcy

THE question of how to wipe out prostitution in Waikiki has come up again even though I told everyone how to solve the problem years ago.

My solution was devastatingly simple: legalize prostitution. That is, make prostitutes subject to the same suffocating business rules that have snuffed out hundreds of small businesses in Hawaii.

Make them pay workers comp insurance, health insurance, walking insurance, excise taxes, income taxes, condom taxes, John user fees, stiletto heel fees and tourist education fees. Make them get smoking permits, lipstick permits and hair spray permits. Make them bid on sections of sidewalks they want to use and then make them donate money to political candidates in order assure they get the spots they want.

Make them take part in goofy public relations campaigns like "Thumbs Up, Hawaii!" Although perhaps a different part of the anatomy would be appropriate. And then, when they are on the verge of bankruptcy and considering decamping to a more business-friendly city, put them on a Blue Ribbon economic panel to try to solve the mystery of why it is so hard to do business in Hawaii.

Do all that, my friends, and prostitution will be gone from Waikiki.

But no, community and elected leaders are still stumbling around in the dark trying to come up with stop-gap ways to stop street walkers.

City Councilman Duke Bainum wants "Prostitution Free Zones" in Waikiki. Any previously convicted prostitutes caught in the "No Johns' Land" would be subject to fines. This is something like slapping an additional tax on cigarettes and gasoline. It doesn't make the commodity go away, it just means customers will have to pay more.

The Waikiki Neighborhood Board wants people with signs alerting tourists that the women standing there in fishnet stockings and dresses that wouldn't cover a bashful chipmunk are prostitutes.

Considering current clothing fads, this plan could backfire because it would help potential customers figure out exactly which ladies of the evening are interested in a commercial venture and which ones are simply tourists with no real fashion sense. ("Oh, THAT one's the prostitute!")

SINCE no one bought my original plan for ridding Waikiki of prostitutes, here are a few others that will work as well as the Bainum and neighborhood board ideas:

Howdy Ma'am Cams: Simply assign a camera crew to each prostitute to record her encounters on the street. These will be beamed directly to public-access television channels, in much the same way that highway cameras now show us which roads have heavy traffic.

With the "Howdy Ma'am Cams," we will be able to see which prostitutes are the most heavily trafficked and who is doing the trafficking. We could even have a "Harlot Watch Helicopter" guy giving up-to-the-minute reports. ("We've got a backlog on the Vixen Viaduct right now. But the John Jam has cleared up on Strumpet Street.")

The publicity will either scare potential customers away from the prostitutes or launch a new hit national TV series for Hawaii. (Madam P.I.?)

Deputize all tourists: When tourists land at the airport, give them vouchers for free Mai Tais and badges that make them official deputy sheriffs with the power of arrest. How are the prostitutes going to do business knowing that virtually every man on the street is a cop?

And think how wacky it will be down at the Waikiki substation on Friday nights after 8,000 drunken tourists have arrested each other and are trying to do strip searches!