---

Lower toxic releases
might be temporary

THE ISSUE A report places pollution levels in Hawaii among the lowest in the country.

DECREASES in the reported amount of toxic chemicals released into Hawaii's air and waters spell better health for residents and the environment. However, imminent changes could reverse the improving trend as the military's presence and the need for more power generation grow.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reported that an overall 14 percent decrease from 2002 to 2003 places Hawaii among states and territories where the least amount of toxic chemicals were discharged. Chemical releases from 41 reporting facilities totaled 3.1 million pounds, down from 3.2 million pounds when 39 facilities gave accountings.

Releases into the ocean fell 20 percent, primarily due to the fewer reports by the Navy at Pearl Harbor. Air pollutants, largely sulfuric acid from electricity generating facilities, dropped 14 percent. Countering those reductions were increases at the Army's Pohakuloa training area on the Big Island and several other training facilities, reporting a rise of 9 percent, or nearly 21,000 pounds of lead and copper.

Military facilities are regarded as among the nation's leading polluters, yielding tremendous amounts of chemicals from ordnance that leach into groundwater and air pollution from vehicles.

The Pentagon acknowledges the problems, but is again seeking waivers from major environmental laws, arguing that they impede training necessary in the post-9/11 climate. While Congress has been amenable to exemptions for rare or threatened plants and animals, human health should not be similarly compromised.

Hawaii might be particularly vulnerable as the Army beefs up with its Stryker projects that will include more than 300 19-ton vehicles, expanded rifle and mortar firing ranges and new roads at Pohakuloa and Oahu's Schofield Barracks.

Meanwhile, growth on Oahu has Hawaiian Electric worried about power generation capabilities. HECO and its affiliates, already among the top 10 facilities for toxic releases, have been looking for less-polluting energy resources, but those are years away.

---

BACK TO TOP
|

Let local agencies
fight gang crime

THE ISSUE Congress is moving to enact tougher sentences for crimes involving gang activity.

IN response to the Supreme Court striking down federal sentencing guidelines in January, Congress is moving to encroach on state responsibilities by cracking down on street gangs with uniformly harsh sentences and subjecting them to younger offenders. Those measures are not likely to be effective in reducing gang activity.

The Justice Department estimates that more than 750,000 Americans belong to gangs. A 2000 survey of 6th- through 12th-graders in Hawaii indicated that about one in five was involved in a gang. A recent series of fights in Kalihi involving Farrington High School and Kalakaua Middle School students were attributed to gang rivalry.

The federal role should be to support state and local agencies in prosecuting such gang-related crime. Past congressional efforts to usurp those agencies' authority have been struck down as violations of the Constitution's commerce clause.

The House has passed a bill that would impose mandatory sentences of at least 10 years for a gang-related act of violence, 20 years for serious assault, 30 years for kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse or maiming and life imprisonment or the death penalty for any crime resulting in death. Judges would be stripped of any discretion in fitting the sentence to the offender.

The definition of a gang would be three people who have committed at least two crimes together, including misdemeanors, at least one of them violent. Sixteen- and 17-year-old offenders would be tried as adults and be sentenced to adult prisons.

At a conference sponsored last year by the state Office of Youth Services, federal prison officials David Dolber and Denise Bowling told of a connection between prison gangs, street gangs and youth gangs. They estimated that 40 percent of the prison population is involved in gangs, and those gangsters bring that mentality back to the streets upon their release.

---

---

---