Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

Questions galore about state's priorities

Print the facts. Compile the current data of the compensation and retirement packages for the governor, appointed state officials and our legislators. Is the vesting period for public school teachers and other government employees the same?

State auditor, where are you? How about comparing the compensation and retirement packages for all state employees, including our politicians?

If there is a budget, there is money. The critical decision is how we the citizens want the pie cut up. Is education a priority or not?

The governor is not taking the recommendations of the fact-finding panel seriously and not listening to citizens. The panel did its job and followed the collective bargaining process. What is Cayetano's process?

Can he keep the teachers happy by sending them to the Marriott Ihilani Resort and Spa for a retreat and cooling-off period?

Bob Asato
Mililani

Army won't leave if ousted from Makua

Senator Inouye may have spoken prematurely when he said that the Army would leave Hawaii if it could not train in Makua Valley (Star-Bulletin, Jan. 10). He made similar dire predictions that the Navy would leave the islands, I recall, if it lost Kahoolawe.

Obviously, this never happened. Kahoolawe was returned to the people of Hawaii and the Navy is still here. Therefore, I would be very surprised if the Army left because its soldiers could no longer train in Makua Valley.

We must address the required clean-up of Makua Valley. Good neighbors clean up their messes.

The Army's lease of Makua runs out in 28 years, so we must begin assessment now. The first step is what the community has been requesting for years: We need a complete environmental impact statement.

Fred Dodge
Waianae

Bishop interim trustees deserve thanks

"Unsung" so aptly describes the accomplishments of the interim trustees of the trust estate formerly known as Bishop Estate and now known as Kamehameha Schools. They are Adm. Robert Kihune, the Rev. David P. Coon, former Honolulu Police Chief Francis Keala, banking executive Constance H. Lau and attorney Ronald D. Libkuman.

During the recently concluded mediation and settlement process, these five were called upon numerous times to make difficult decisions which greatly affected, and will continue to affect, the future of the trust and the welfare of its beneficiaries.

Distinguished among them is Libkuman, who served as the spokesperson for the group and participated in the process on a daily basis -- routinely continuing late into the night. The success of the mediation process is in large measure related to his efforts.

The pre-determined term of the interim trustees expired with the turn of the year. Kihune and Lau will continue to serve as permanent trustees, while Keala, Coon and Libkuman will move on to other pursuits.

To all five who served so ably and unselfishly: 'Owau me ka ha'a ha'a e mahalo nui loa.

To the departing three: Aloha pumehana.

And, to the remaining two, soon to be joined by three new faces: Imua Kamehameha.

Clyde Matsui, Jim Duffy and David Fairbanks

Editor's note: Clyde Matsui was the court-appointed discovery master in the state's lawsuit against the five former trustees of the Kamehameha Schools. Jim Duffy and David Fairbanks were court-appointed mediators in the case.

Bishop Estate Archive
Kamehameha Schools

Thankful he's not a Democrat

As the liberal sharks gather around Governor Bush's cabinet nominees, I'm reminded of the adage that if you swallow a live toad in the morning, nothing that happens the rest of the day will seem so bad.

Which brings me to my point: Each morning, I give heartfelt thanks that I am not a Democrat.

I do not have to support the savaging of personal reputations. I do not have to defend the most corrupt administration in the history of the republic, nor defend the actions of a defeated candidate who attempted to steal an election through trashing election officials and laws.

I know what the meaning of "is" is. I know that government spending is not "investment" and that tax refunds are not "spending."

I understand the concept of personal accountability. I value honesty, truth and integrity and do not face any pressure to compromise principles for political reasons.

And I do not have to defend a hopelessly incompetent state administration that steered Hawaii away from the biggest economic boom in the nation's history. In summary, I don't have to face that toad each morning.

Robert R. Kessler
Commander, U.S. Navy (Ret.)

Crosswalk crashers must be punished

March 26, 1994, was a beautiful day with clear skies, bright sunshine and light trades. On this day, there were three separate incidents in which pedestrians were run down by cars.

My wife -- who was crossing the street, in a crosswalk, with the green walk light -- was one of those victims. Today, several years later, she is still severely plagued by the aftereffects.

Crosswalks mean nothing to those who care so little about the lives of fellow human beings. There have been many occasions when I've stopped at a crosswalk to give pedestrians the right of way and the impatient driver behind me started honking the horn.

Sometimes, he or she pulls out and passes on the left or right side in order to race through the crosswalk, nearly running down pedestrians who haven't yet stepped up on the curb.

Pedestrian-activated traffic signals, or any other form of traffic signal that tells a person when to cross a street, will not make any difference until impatient drivers who have so little respect for others receive a few expensive traffic citations, and a few days or months of jail time.

A.M. Bitner

Quotables "These pictures are not about the kind of beauty you see with your eyes. I want people to look beyond the surface and see people for who they really are." Mark Kadota HAWAII ARTIST Whose blurry portraits are on view in an exhibit at the Honolulu Advertiser Gallery "I'm puzzled about why Honolulu would volunteer to host this meeting. Is it because state officials don't follow events outside?" Walden Bello PHILIPPINES PROFESSOR On the May conference of the Asian Development Bank at the Hawaii Convention Center, which will likely attract protests

Traffic cameras are invasion of privacy

I encourage the uneducated, unenlightened masses to read George Orwell's chilling vision of the future, "1984," or to at least see the movie. In this world there is no privacy or freedom.

Government cameras monitor the people's every move.

How can someone compare Oahu's traffic-monitoring cameras to this Orwellian nightmare? Easy. An Orwellian society will not materialize overnight. It will be gradual, so gradual that the people will not realize what is happening until it is too late.

I am by no means accusing government officials of trying to initiate such a society in Hawaii, for they are too shortsighted to see their folly. Big Brother has to start somewhere, and spying on citizens in order to prosecute traffic violators is the logical beginning.

Or is it only the beginning? As you read this, cameras are being used to spot criminal law violators in Chinatown. It doesn't take a weatherman to know which way the wind's blowing.

Even the American Civil Liberties Union says that it is OK to use these traffic cameras as long as they are used only for traffic safety and nothing else. I disagree. When the project succeeds -- as it probably will -- in nailing traffic violators and making the roads safer, it will be seen as a reason to expand the surveillance.

To sacrifice our basic freedoms for the sake of the law would mean the end of the very society that the laws were designed to protect.

No longer the land of the free, we will be the land of the watched.

Roy Frank Westlake

Columnist indulged in racist diatribe

I was somewhat surprised at your publication of the Jan. 11 column by Emil Guillermo. A more racist polemic would be hard to imagine.

His thesis was that any minority person who believes in individual rights and personal responsibility instead of group rights and victimization -- in other words, who is a conservative -- is also a hypocrite.

Guillermo thereby joins Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton in their efforts to sharply divide the American people into two classes: namely black, Hispanic and Asian vs. everyone else.

Unfortunately the recent election would seem to indicate that they are having some success. While this may be good news for the Republican Party -- 56 percent of whites voted for Bush and, among white males, the proportion was even higher -- it is a tragedy for America.

Affirmative action is one of the litmus tests for liberals. Only those who espouse group rights over individual rights are pure at heart.

Unfortunately for these folks, the tolerance of the majority has run out; it no longer cares to be discriminated against.

We are luckier in Hawaii, since everyone is a minority -- not that race doesn't matter, but the overt race-baiting of Guillermo is pretty much confined to the lunatic fringe.

W.B. Thompson

City should not acquire park property

We were recently notified that the city is considering the acquisition of the Paradise Park property for a new city park. Our home is next to this property and we object to this idea for the following reasons.

Do we need it? No. Adding a park of this nature "to protect and preserve a unique ecological and environmental asset" at the expense of the taxpayer, especially when the city is short on funds, is irresponsible. The present conservation zoning designation already is protecting this asset quite well.

Can we afford it? No. According to Mayor Harris, our property tax rates will go up this year because there isn't enough money to meet existing obligations. Where will the $3.95 million to acquire the site come from, not to mention dollars for any improvements? Furthermore, assuming responsibility for a park means the city will be liable for injuries and damages occurring there.

Will it be maintained? Probably not. Park maintenance must include, at a minimum, surveying and fencing the property along all private property boundaries, repairing all access roads and parking areas, keeping restrooms clean and supplied, hiring security guards to ensure visitors leave when the park is closed, monitoring the park for pig hunters and wild dogs, and being responsible for water run-off.

The city must focus on maintaining our existing parks, not on adding new ones.

Carol A. Holt

Teachers are struggling within an ineffective DOE

I was glad to read Robert Mumper's Jan. 13 letter in response to my Jan. 6 View Point. He certainly is correct that teachers should work hard and care about students. However, hard work in an effective system will do more for students than hard work in an ineffective system.

If Mumper is unaware that the Hawaii school system does special education wrong, then he must not know about the Department of Education's contempt-of-court status, the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and Americans with Disabilities Act, or Title 8, Chapter 56 of the Hawaii Administrative Rules.

These laws require schools to help special-needs students as much as possible in their regular classes and not segregate them.

However, the vast majority of Hawaii schools disobey these laws and harm thousands of children. This is immoral. The important thing is that parents should know about the law and insist that business-as-usual be changed.

John Mussack

---

Write a
Letter to the Editor

Want to write a letter to the editor?
Let all Star-Bulletin readers know what you think.
Please keep your letter to about 200 words.
You can send it by e-mail to letters@starbulletin.com
or you can fill in the online form for a faster response.
Or print it and mail it to: Letters to the Editor, P.O. Box 3080,
Honolulu, Hawaii 96802. Or fax it to: 523-8509.
Always be sure to include your daytime phone number.