Fight the fires, not each other

While Oahu firefighters were busy battling blazes out on the Windward side, some of their predecessors were engaged in a firefight of a different sort — a political one.

In a nutshell: The Honolulu Fire Department Retirees Association has endorsed former Gov. Ben Cayetano for mayor; the Hawaii Fire Fighters Association has endorsed Kirk Caldwell. Now, the fire chief has barred the retirees from using HFD facilities, where they have been holding meetings for years. The retirees have been making political endorsements since 2002.

It’s a shame when public-safety workers, who are often held in public esteem for the noble work they perform, allow politics to singe their collective good image. And if the senior firefighters thought they’d left the heat behind upon retirement, looks like they were sadly mistaken.

Minimum wage won’t cover rent

Nowhere in the United States can a person working 40 hours a week at the legal minimum wage afford to live in a decent two-bedroom apartment, according to a report making the rounds on the Internet, but it’s possible to make the rent payment from a 63-hour week in West Virginia and Arkansas.

However, according to a report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, a person in California, Maryland, District of Columbia, New Jersey and New York can make the payments by making a minimum wage and working at least 130 hours or more a week.

Hardest of all is Hawaii, where a minimum-wage worker would have to be on the job 175 hours a week in order to pay the $1,647 monthly rent from 30 percent of the weekly income. Unfortunately, that is more hours than there are in a week.