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Waipahu farmers didn't have right to use land

I'd like to comment on your June 21 article about farmers using state land on Paiwa Street for gardening purposes.

This land belongs to the state Housing and Community Development Corp. of Hawaii (HCDCH), not to the farmers using this land for their own profit.

Regardless of their intent, the farmers were ignoring the "No Trespassing" sign fronting Paiwa Street. This is a violation of the law.

The land is a rodent-infested dumping ground and hideout for other trespassers. Several times, police officers have searched for and chased trespassers through the overgrown brush and vegetation.

What gives these farmers the right to special privileges? As a working taxpayer, I'm tired of people thinking they can go ahead and use someone else's property. HCDCH should stand its ground.

N. Lorenzo

Judge Ezra made foolish ruling

This ban on longline fishing is the perfect example of why the state cannot attract more diversity to our already stagnant business environment. It's also another blow to Hawaii's fragile economy, one that is supposedly improving.

Banning the locally based longline fishing fleet from fishing does accomplish one thing, though. Longliners will leave the state and go elsewhere. Is this discrimination against Hawaii or what?

Judge Ezra, with all his education, experience and wisdom, should ask himself: "Is this ban the best possible solution to the problem at hand?"

Obviously the answer is no, as it creates so many other problems for other businesses, including major supermarkets, mom-and-pop fish stores, hotels, restaurants, fuel companies, ice companies, and everyone who eats or buys fresh fish.

Gary Ishimoto

Ruling will lure outside fishermen to come in

Your June 24 article on the longline fishing ban missed the meat of the story: the question of jurisdiction.

It's bad enough that fresh ahi, uku, walu or monchong will become prohibitively priced. What no one seems to be reporting on is that Judge Ezra's ruling is an invitation for nuke-powered, foreign-based freezer factory fleets that use purse seine nets to come here and fish.

Six months from now, the frozen ahi from Hawaii you'll end up buying in the local supermarket will have been processed by Sajo or one of the other huge seafood "users."

How could that be, you must be thinking. Surely, a federal judge's edict draws its authority from a substantial understanding of international maritime law. Wrong!

Judge Ezra has not only redistributed fishing globally but also reduced the court of actual appeal to the murky politics of economic summit meetings, and the tradeoffs that happen behind closed doors.

Vernon Lee
Marketing Director
Honolulu Fish & Seafood Corp.

National agency showed its arrogance

So, finally, it has become official. The ban on shark finning bill, which was based on non-scientific evidence, has become state law.

Although the National Marine Fisheries Service knew the truth about the biological status of the pelagic blue shark, it withheld information from the public so the ban could go into effect.

I suppose NMFS administrators have no fear of a congressional hearing to justify their arrogance.

Henry Okamoto
Retired Fisherman

Quotables "It is critical that we protect these endangered species and ensure the survival of the Hawaii-based fishing industry." Patsy Mink CONGRESSWOMAN FROM HAWAII As she announced passage of a $1.2 million budget amendment that would hire at least 25 of the observers that U.S. District Judge David Ezra ruled must be on board all local long-line fishing boats to monitor any endangerment to sea turtles "She walks into a room and, to everyone there, she is Kauai. How do you put a value on that?" Gini Kapali KAUAI ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Saying Mayor Maryanne Kusaka must go on overseas trade shows because she personifies the Garden Island

HGEA shouldn't defend arbiter's decision

In her May 27 letter, Hawaii Government Employees Association President Jeanette E. Matsumoto supported the arbitration panel's recent award of pay raises to HGEA members. Her argument that the panel's award is based on "evidence" is merely a rationalization of a flawed arbitration process that gives public workers unions an unfair advantage over the state.

Matsumoto and the two panel members who supported the HGEA awards should ask themselves why it was necessary for Governor Cayetano to drastically reduce benefits for welfare recipients, human services, health services and funding for the University of Hawaii over the first four years of his administration, if the state could fund pay raises.

The fact is that, during that time, the state administration could pay for the arbitrated pay raises only by saving over $560 million through Employees Retirement System savings, debt service restructuring and refinancing, and spending restrictions.

Moreover, it is clear that the arbitration panel -- by focusing specifically on the HGEA case --did not take into consideration the impact of the awards applied to all state workers across the board. Nor did the panel consider the additional funding needed to comply with the federal court's orders in the Felix consent decree case.

Neal Miyahira
Director of Finance
State Department of Budget and Finance

Hirono fails in attempt to demonize WSJ

Add Lt. Gov. Mazie Hirono to the list of Hawaii Democrats who have felt compelled to personally answer the charges of the now-infamous Wall Street Journal editorial (Letters, June 21).

While it seemed appropriate to have a press secretary issue a short, concise rebuttal of the more damaging charges within that editorial, the recent parade of high-ranking government officers all sending the exact same letter to local newspapers has made me suspicious.

Even more immature and reprehensible, however, is Hirono's new race-card footnote to the proceedings, wherein she asks if WSJ's label of "Bamboo Republic" for our islands might be related to our proportionately large Asian-American population.

As Hirono assuredly knows, the term "Bamboo Republic" refers to a dictatorship posing as a democracy in a tropical setting; it defines a political system, not an ethnic preponderance.

Bret Heilig

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