Editorials
Thursday, October 28, 1999

Hanauma Bay plan
should be approved

The issue: A scaled-down plan for improvements to Hanauma Bay has been approved by the City Council's Zoning Committee.
Our view: The proposal seems appropriate and should be accepted by the Council.

EARLIER this year the city came up with an extravagant proposal for a Kokohead Regional Park that encountered strong public opposition.

The proposal included a cable car leading to a scenic overlook at the top of Koko Crater and a nature learning center at the site of the old Job Corps Center adjoining Koko Head District Park.

Visitors were to be shuttled from a parking lot at the site across Kalanianaole Highway to Hanauma Bay.

The existing parking lot above the bay would be closed. A marine learning center would be built above the bay.

Some complained that the cable car proposal was too tourist-oriented and would increase traffic congestion. There were complaints about shuttling visitors to the bay from a parking lot at a park that is already heavily used.

In the face of the opposition, Mayor Harris concluded that there had not been sufficient community consultation. He scrapped the plan and sent the planners back to the drawing boards.

Now a revised, scaled-down plan for Hanauma Bay has been approved by the City Council's Zoning Committee, a preliminary step toward a final OK.

The plan would cost about $10 million. On the upper level, it provides for a building to house a marine education center, administrative offices, snack bar, restrooms and a gift shop.

The existing snack bar and snorkel concession and rest-rooms on the beach would be demolished, with new facilities, minus the snack bar, moved inland.

A trolley would link the education center and the beach. Landscaping and erosion control would be improved.

The function of the education center would be to explain to visitors the policy of the marine sanctuary and the need to protect the bay from misuse.

Even the scaled-down plan has its critics. A group called the East Honolulu Community Coalition contends it's still too expensive and intrusive.

But Alan Hong, manager of the Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve, said the education center is of minimum size and is badly needed. Richard Baker, president of the group Friends of Hanauma Bay, said this is a sound project and should proceed.

Hanauma Bay has become such a huge attraction for visitors -- it draws 3,000 a day -- that more adequate facilities to cope with the crowds and protect the bay must be provided. The new proposal, shorn of the previous overambitious features, seems entirely appropriate and should be approved.

Outburst in Armenia reflects frustration

The issue: Men carrying automatic weapons stormed Armenia's parliament and assassinated the country's prime minister and five other government leaders.
Our view: The attack was not a coup attempt by an organized force but an apparent outburst by a few men.

INDEPENDENCE came to the small, mountainous region of Armenia following the collapse of Communism eight years ago but, as in many areas of the former Soviet Union, political and economic stability has been elusive.

The resulting frustration appears to have erupted in gunfire that assailants called a coup but was more likely an isolated attack by a small group of angry men with little if any political following.

Armenian President Robert Kocharyan came to power last year with an ambitious program of economic reform, but his hopes have faded. Living standards remain low. Most Armenians earn only $10 to $20 a month.

Distressing as Armenia's problems have been, government leaders were unprepared when gunmen stormed the parliament building in Yerevan during a question-and-answer session and fatally shot Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisian, the energy minister, a senior economic official, the parliament speaker, two deputy speakers and two other lawmakers. The attackers took control of the building and held dozens of people as hostages before finally releasing them and surrendering.

Before killing Sarkisian, one of the assassins reportedly told him, "Enough of drinking our blood!" Sarkisian calmly replied, "Everything is being done for you and the future of your children." The assailant responded with gunfire.

Sarkisian's killer has been identified as Nairi Unanian, an extreme nationalist and former journalist. Two of the other assailants were described as his brother and uncle. Unanian is said to belong to the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, known as Dashnak, but the organization has denied responsibility for the attack.

Sarkisian himself once headed a nationalist group representing war veterans who fought early this decade over control of Nagorno-Karabakh, a predominantly Christian Armenian region that remains in dispute between Armenia and neighboring Azerbaijan, a largely Muslim former Soviet republic.

Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott visited Armenia before the Parliament attack to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute.

The attack on the Armenian parliament appears to have been less a coup attempt by an organized political or military force than an outburst of rage by a small group. Given the economic condition of the former Soviet republics, such explosions should not be surprising.

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Rupert E. Phillips, CEO

John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher

David Shapiro, Managing Editor

Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor

Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors

A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor