Rarely do people approve giving up any of their freedoms, but most residents of troubled Kalihi public housing projects are embracing a curfew following a period of nighttime violence. An alternative should be found to assure peaceful evenings without restraining their rights to come and go as they like.

The Hawaii Public Housing Authority imposed the curfews more than a week ago at Kalihi Valley Homes. The curfew is enforced between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., requiring residents to register with their project's office to leave or enter the premises before or after the period. A similar curfew is being discussed for nearby Kuhio Park Terrace.

Residents generally have welcomed the curfew, saying no gang violence has occurred since it began last Thursday. In the week leading up to the curfew, a Kuhio Park Terrace man was hospitalized with injuries from a fight in Kalihi Valley Homes, a Terrace man described as a gang member tried to start a fight in the complex, and a 19-year-old was shot in the face at Kalihi Valley Homes, incurring shotgun pellet wounds.

“;Your safety is my primary concern,”; Denise Wise, executive director of the state Public Housing Authority, said in a notice to Kalihi Valley Homes residents in initiating the curfew last week, “;and until we are sure that the violence has stopped, this action has become necessary to provide you with a sense of security in your home.”;

The American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii has expressed “;serious concern”; about the curfew, questioning its constitutionality.

“;Keeping residents here under house arrest ... is not the way our government works,”; said ACLU attorney Daniel Gluck.

Such a sweeping curfew is rare, even at government-run housing. Most of the ACLU challenges have been to juvenile curfew laws, on the basis that they deny youngsters the right of liberty. In 2007, the town of Princess Anne, Md., abandoned a proposal to enact a juvenile curfew law after the ACLU objected.

But Wise has said the curfew is temporary, providing “;an opportunity for cooler heads to prevail”; while her agency collaborates with residents and police. They said the violence seems to have stemmed from hostility between gangs at the two housing projects, but that may be an extension of longtime violence.

“;We never had peace like this in 20 years,”; Kalihi Valley Homes resident Robert Manning told the Star-Bulletin's Gary T. Kubota.

Two police officers have been stationed at the two projects since the recent violence.

This cool-down curfew has allowed a temporary, welcome peace; law-abiding citizens in the projects must seize this opportunity to take back their homes from the hoodlums. They must work with state public housing officials to find a solution to deal with the criminal elements and bring the curfew to an early end. The government has no business enforcing a permanent timetable for people to leave or arrive at their homes.