Cut UH athletics, not languages

The University of Hawaii is said to be $31 million over-revenue from tuition.

The rail project is $900 million overbudget and the project manager gets a huge bonus every year, and rail is not even close to being finished.

The university provides education for people in a constantly changing world. This changing world is the reason for 17 new degree programs and it shows the UH is keeping up with our fast-paced world.

So unless your head is buried in some sand generated by the rail project, don’t talk about cutting academic programs.

I like athletics but if anything is to be cut, that is the program. Norm Chow makes $550,000 per year and all he does is lose.

How much is the search for a new athletic director costing? What about the legal fight with Gib Arnold? Total all those and you’ve got the cost of 17 new degree programs, with some left over.

Judith Pettibone
Makiki

Cars cost more than rail project

I find it ironic how so many opposed to rail keep saying how expensive it is when cars are so much more expensive.

On Oahu last year, we consumed $6.1 billion in petrol, and if you add car insurance, parking, safety checks, car registration, maintenance and repairs, cars are much more expensive than rail.

Even with the current projected cost overruns, car insurance alone will cost me more than rail will cost me by far.

Terrence Ching
Palolo Valley

Lack of signal is a clear danger

The death of Shari Naomi Afuso is a tragedy that did not have to happen.

I use that intersection regularly and with great trepidation. It is needlessly dangerous.

Unlike many other Mililani intersections, there are no left-turn signals, even though there are left-turn lanes.

Meheula just past Kuahelani curves and dips, with the result that if there are any vehicles driving north, the southbound driver’s view is totally blocked.

I have never understood why the one Mililani intersection that badly needs "left turn on green arrow only" does not have it. The housing area a half-mile down has a left-turn signal on a straight flat section of street, almost no traffic and a clear view.

Please do not let Mrs. Afuso’s death be in vain. Install the left-turn signals that should have been there all along.

Mary Macmillan
Mililani

Williams goes but not Cheney?

It is very refreshing to see NBC holding Brian Williams accountable for his lie.

The fact that it was the helicopter before his that took fire, and not the one he was riding in, certainly changed the outcome of the war in the Middle East and probably put our troops in more danger and ultimately cost many of them their lives.

It’s a good thing Dick Cheney was only vice president of the United States and not a news anchor when he lied about weap- ons of mass destruction.

Mark Ida
Salt Lake

Let Oahu stew in its own mess

In a brief about an undersea cable that would allow "population-dense Oahu to share energy produced on the neighbor islands," the Star-Advertiser wrote: "The state Legislature began paving the way for such a cable several years ago" ("PUC might lose say on undersea cable," Newswatch, Feb. 9).

Since only the Big Island has a viable alternative source of energy — geo- thermal — the burden would fall primarily on us.

Hawaii Electric Light Co. already rips us off. Now Oahu wishes us to "share" our geothermal with the mess that is Honolulu.

It is bad enough that state government on Oahu has confiscated most of our tourist taxes to allow state bureaucrats to live and party like rock stars; now these paper pushers want our energy.

Those who live on Oahu should live with the bad choices and the lunacy they have created.

Arthur Warren
Keaau

Connector ads inappropriate

Turn on any TV station to see the slick, expensive advertisements for the Hawaii Health Connector.

These ads bear an amazing resemblance to the flood of earlier ads for "the train." Well-groomed, well-clothed, well-spoken actors plusbeautiful locations beg the questions: What’s the point? What’s the costs? Why now?

Who authorized this extravagance? Stop the bleeding now. I for one do not believe another red cent should be spent on thissquander and the Hawaii Health Connector.

Dunning Sewell
Pearlridge