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Sewer improvements
warrant fee increases

THE ISSUE Raises in city sewer fees are projected to extend through 2015.

RESIDENTS who have not seen an increase in sewer fees in 12 years now face accelerated charges through the next decade as the city tries to catch up with essential repairs and improvements.

Though the increases will be hard to take, the bleak alternatives -- continued spills that pose risks to human health and the environment, disruptive emergency fixes and costly fines -- are even worse. Years of neglect, housing growth and raids of the sewer fund for other purposes leave the city with no choice.

City Council members heard the bad news this week as the administration projected how much money it will need to bring the sewer system up to standards. Though the Council already knew Mayor Hannemann would propose increases, at least one of them, Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi, expressed surprise that raises would extend 10 years instead of six as suggested earlier.

She and her colleagues should not have been taken aback. While placing the blame for the fund's shortfalls and the system's neglect on former Mayor Harris, most of the Council members can be counted as complicit since they approved his actions. They should now find the backbone to accept Hannemann's straightforward plans, as politically painful as that might be.

The city has been struggling with a 1995 federal consent decree that requires improvements at its treatment plants and with persistent sewage spills because of aging infrastructure. Further demands also will be placed on the system as new homes come on line.

Upgrades will cost the city millions in the next few years, but estimates for potential federal and state fines for noncompliance are upward of $1 billion. Additional funding pressure comes as the city's debt payment for next year alone will be $46 million, increasing to $151 million in 10 years.

Fees would go from the current average of about $33 a month to more than $80 a month in 2015. The increases might be tough for city officials to confront, knowing there will be grumbling from rate payers. That might be why one pointed to a pending lawsuit as a concern, but placing the onus on the environmental groups pressing the suit isn't fair. They have not sought monetary damages; they simply want the system fixed to eliminate spills, which number in the hundreds and involve millions of gallons of sewage polluting the ocean and streams. Neither should the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency be faulted; it is applying the law as it should.

The mayor understands this and has taken up the gauntlet his predecessor dropped. He has met with the EPA and might order an audit to figure out how best to attack the problems.

Although fee increases will hurt, residents should acknowledge that the mayor's initiative will better the city in the long run.

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‘A true pastor
of souls’

THE ISSUE The newly appointed bishop-elect of Honolulu will return to his island roots.

Hawaii's Catholic community welcomes a "local boy" to his birthplace with the appointment of the Most Rev. Larry Silva as bishop-elect of the Diocese of Honolulu.

Born in St. Francis Hospital in Liliha and baptized at St. Anthony Church in Kailua, the 55-year-old Silva has extended family and friends in the islands to which his great-grandparents immigrated from the Azores in Portugal. These ties should help him as he leads the 250,000 members of the church in Hawaii.

Silva, who will be ordained later this summer, has an unassuming manner that belies the serious mission he will undertake. At a news conference this week, he said the church's "profound truths" cannot be taught in "sound bites," suggesting that Catholics must re- embrace the depths of their faith.

Silva assessed his new posting as uniting his two loves -- the priesthood and Hawaii. Oakland Bishop Allen Vigneron described him simply as "a true pastor of souls."

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