[ OUR OPINION ]

Efforts should boost
security at seaports

THE ISSUE The Homeland Security Department has announced grants to domestic ports and plans to expand U.S. inspections at foreign ports.

THE federal government has been slow in providing adequate security at the nation's seaports, but an expanded effort announced this week should help protect the country at these cargo arrival points, as well as at foreign departure points. The effort includes distribution of some $300 million to port authorities and companies involved in shipping, as well as placement of American inspectors at major foreign seaports where cargo containers are loaded.

Hawaii, where 98 percent of goods arrive by ship, asked for $4 million but received only $650,000 in federal funding last year to upgrade security at its seaports. It will receive $1.5 million of the $170 million in port security grants announced yesterday by Tom Ridge, the Homeland Security secretary, while $5.5 million will go to Matson Navigation Co., and energy importers Tesoro Hawaii Corp., Chevron Products Co. and The Gas Co.

Since most foreign goods coming to Hawaii enter the United States at West Coast ports, security there may be as important to the state as its own seaports. Congress approved $58 million -- apart from the $170 million -- for a program called Operation Safe Commerce, tracking cargo containers entering the nation's three largest ports, Los Angeles/Long Beach, New York/New Jersey and Seattle/Tacoma. Ridge agreed to fully fund the program only after Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., held up the confirmation of President Bush's nominee for budget director in retaliation.

Seaport security is hampered by the practical inability of Coast Guard and Customs officials to inspect more than 2 percent of the six million containers that arrive in the United States from overseas each year. Instead, the Bush administration launched a worthwhile program 17 months ago asking exporting nations to allow U.S. inspectors at their ports to inspect "high risk" metal cargo containers for unconventional weapons before they are placed on ships.

Governments representing 20 ports with the largest cargo volume -- including Asia's Shanghai, Singapore, Tokyo, Yokohama and, as of this week, the Thai port of Laem Chabang -- agreed. Those ports account for nearly two-thirds of the world's U.S.-bound containerized cargo. The Homeland Security Department now will make similar requests to post inspection teams at up to 25 seaports based not only on cargo volume but on their strategic location as potential origins of terrorist attacks, such as countries with large Muslim populations.

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Lower kids rating
still positive sign

THE ISSUE A report on the well-being of children ranks Hawaii 22nd among states, somewhat worse than its standing a decade earlier.

THE lives of Hawaii's keiki improved during the 1990s, according to the latest report on the condition of the nation's children. Areas where island children encountered difficulties are statistically insignificant or can be attributed at least partly to the state's economy lagging while the mainland was prospering. The result is that Hawaii's overall ranking among states dropped from 14th in 1990 to 22nd in 2000.

In categories such as the child death rate, teen deaths, births by teenage girls, high school dropouts and teens neither working nor enrolled in school, Hawaii improved even more than other states on average, according to Kids Count, a project of the Annie E. Casey Foundation. The study reports that "the country made significant progress in improving the lives of American children, and it would be shortsighted to lose those gains through hasty budget cutting" of programs aimed at looking after children's welfare.

State Rep. Dennis Arakaki, chairman of the House Health Committee, suggests that cutting budgets of health and human service programs may have been responsible for Hawaii's increased infant mortality rate while the national rate declined. Arakaki says the increase is one of "the indicators of what happens when you start to do away with prevention and early prevention programs."

The Kids Count report says one reason for high infant mortality is the lack of easy access to intensive care for newborns. However, it notes that the infant mortality rate is "based on relatively small numbers of events in some states and may exhibit some random fluctuation from year to year." The correlation of budget cuts and infant mortality is a subject worth pursuing by Arakaki's committee.

During the decade, the percent of Hawaii children living in families with no parent employed full-time and year-round increased, and the percentage living in poverty stayed the same, while national figures in both categories improved. The report says part of the national improvement "is undoubtedly due to the strong economy of the late 1990s." Hawaii's children did not share in that prosperity.

A disturbing trend is the increase in families headed by single parents. While the percentage rose to 28 percent from 24 percent nationally, it grew to 29 percent from 21 percent in Hawaii.