A caveat about joys of smaller schools

Mary Anne Raywid made an excellent argument for smaller schools in her Sept. 4 "Other Views" column.

Anyone interested in the logic behind closing smaller schools should read the BOE-adopted "An Action Plan to Meet Hawaii's School Facilities Needs," which suggests the closing of schools and purposeful overcrowding of others to justify the need to use multi-track scheduling.

However, at our state's only multi-track school in Mililani, the smaller school environment has only increased the need for full-time security guards, many vice principals, counselors and advisers, as well as professional movers every 45 days to move classrooms. In other words, the statewide plan to reduce facilities costs only increases administrative costs.

The logical solution would be to redistrict to distribute populations and make full use of existing facilities, or to use the school-within-a-school approach when that is not possible.

Laura Brown
Mililani
Via the Internet

Criminalization of drug use is the problem

Your Aug. 23 editorial on the need for treatment of "drug offenders" calls for a major shift in our thinking about drug policy from a criminal justice approach to the more sensible one of public health.

However, the language in your commentary represents a bias that also needs to be shifted. You used the term "drug offender" no less than five times in your editorial.

A more appropriate description is "drug law offender," for it is the laws that are causing the problem of prison overcrowding cited in the editorial, not the drugs.

Hopefully, the governor and Legislature will look seriously at alternatives to incarceration during the coming legislative session. It has become obvious that filling our prisons with drug law offenders is getting us nowhere in dealing with the problems of substance abuse.

Donald M. Topping
President
Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii
Via the Internet

Trustee selection process is in turmoil

The current attempt by some members of the Hawaiian community to delineate a method of appointing Bishop Estate trustees, hopefully in harmony with Bernice Pauahi Bishop's will, is necessary.

The state Supreme Court was selfish in withdrawing from this role. The justices appointed unqualified people and, when an uproar resulted, instead of censuring these inappropriate appointees, as the rest of the Hawaiian people were doing, they abdicated all responsibility. They said, in violation of the will, "It's the probate court's kuleana."

At present, each of the former trustees is under a unique legal cloud. The sitting trustees are interim and legally vulnerable. And one former trustee, Henry Peters, is seeking re-admission.

If Peters succeeds, he will simply be a spoiler -- using his insider's knowledge, from both Bishop Estate and the Legislature, to sabotage other trustees whom he doesn't approve of.

No one needs this, least of all the beneficiaries of the trust.

Mike K. Pettingill
Waipahu

Bishop Estate Archive

Quotables "It just looked like big ol' boulders falling down, like rain coming from the sky." Chloe Woodington HICKAM ELEMENTARY SCHOOL FIFTH-GRADER On getting caught in the Sacred Falls rock slide. The 9-year-old girl's injuries required the amputation of half of her left foot. "There is absolutely no reason why we have to suffer at the expense of a football team that represents American colonialism, heterosexism and the subjugation of women." Lane "Kawika" Collins UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII GRADUATE STUDENT One of the many motorists who got stuck in a major traffic jam before last Saturday's UH-USC football game at Aloha Stadium

State should release funds for homeless

I don't understand the politics behind the governor's decision not to release funds for the state's homeless programs. But I do understand its impact on homeless guests at the Institute of Human Services.

Less money means fewer staff to oversee the safety of the guests at the shelter and fewer social workers to offer mental health counseling, drug treatment counseling and case management. There will be no consistent preschool and after-school program for the children of homeless families.

It costs IHS $64 per person, per month, to offer a place to sleep, three meals a day, hot showers, mail service and message service, and counseling and educational opportunities. It will cost the state a whole lot more if the nearly 400 nightly IHS guests all land in the prison system.

Governor Cayetano, please reconsider and release the money for the homeless programs.

Catherine Graham

What motivates armed forces today?

Bumper sticker seen on automobile inside Camp H.M. Smith, Aiea, Headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief U.S. Forces Pacific: "Killing is my business/And business is good!"

Could the owner of that car possibly have been a member of the U.S. Army "Delta Force" or the Texas National Guard which took part in the killing of more than 80 men, women and children at Waco in 1993? Business was indeed "good," wasn't it?

A military which can be and is used against its own people is a military to be justifiably hated and feared by the nation at large. It's good my watch is over. Otherwise I'd be in the brig.

Richard Rowland
Ret. Colonel, U.S. Army

Hirono blames monster she helped create

Lt. Governor Mazie K. Hirono is alive! Immediately after the 1998 election, it looked like the Democrats had put Hirono back into her closet, to reappear in 2002 in time to run for governor.

Now she sends in a Aug. 16 letter to the editor in order to educate columnist Richard Borreca that "altering the course of government does not happen overnight."

Hirono would have us believe that there is little she or Cayetano can do to change the government and economy that they and their Democratic Party created in over 40 years of dominance in Hawaii.

The fact is that she and Cayetano created the very monster that she now says they cannot control. Public worker union demands, election paybacks, nonbid contracts to friends -- all of this seems to be something Hirono cannot conceive as being quickly changed.

If she can't handle this, how will she act as our governor?

Don Arakaki
Ewa Beach

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