The state Department of Public Safety is caught between a rock and a double-hard place (“Packed in,” Star-Advertiser, March 16).

It cannot control the number of inmates sentenced and committed by the courts. Meanwhile, the population grows with no end in sight except for the prospect of federal oversight, and then the state will have no choice but to comply.

Public Safety staffers are also citizens who live in the community and do not want to expose their family and friends to any “violent” offenders due to early release.

I applaud Director Nolan Espinda for bringing this matter before the Legislature and the people of Hawaii before it’s too late.

Fred Hyun

Waialae Iki

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Poisoning rats not a solution

It’s time for solutions other than suggestions already disproven.

Despite the best intentions of state and federal officials, no amount of poisoning will have any appreciable effect on Hawaii’s rat population (“Poison can help species, officials say,” Star-Advertiser, March 14).

My grandfather studied Hamakua Sugar’s rat problem in 1925. Undertaking a concerted effort to eradicate as many rats as possible, exterminators killed 141,000 in one year. The result? No appreciable decrease in sugar damage.

Michael A. Lilly

Pacific Heights

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Either too much or not enough

So we have two leading candidates for president of the United States: Donald Trump, who always says what he really thinks no matter how offensive it might be; and Hillary Clinton, who never says what she really thinks no matter how revealing it might be.

Lucky us.

Bob Lamborn

Nuuanu

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Early learning for parents, too

While poverty has a negative effect on children’s early learning, as pointed out in “Early education is great start but poverty reduction is true holy grail” (Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, March 13), the lack of knowledge by parents about early learning is also a major contributing factor.

Neurologists tell us that 50 percent of a child’s neuron brain cells are developed by age 5 through sensory stimulation. However, too many of our parents are unaware of this.

Our educators and elected officials should consider developing and funding a curriculum in high school on parenting, including the physical and mental needs of children, ways to effect sensory stimulation, basic skills preschoolers should have by age 5, and so on.

Educating our future parents, a child’s first and most important teacher, would have a huge positive impact on student success in learning and in reducing poverty.

Bill Punini Prescott

Nanakuli

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‘Innovation’ can be taught earlier

A new University of Hawaii lab aims for innovation (“New UH-Manoa lab aims for innovation,” Star-Advertiser, March 5)?

I’m sorry, but this is what we need to offer in pre-K and every grade after that. It should be just as much a part of learning as a touch-screen tablet and a Wi-Fi connection in 2016. By the third grade, all curiosity has been sucked out of kids and by seventh grade they are brain-dead.

Those who want STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) courses will always get what they want, no matter what obstacles we adults throw in their way. It’s the majority of the other students we neglect.

Test a future mechanic on cars, not biology, a cook on cooking, not algebra.

Gary Dubrall

Kapolei

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McDermott unfit to be a legislator

Silver-tongued state Rep. Bob McDermott is at it again (“Lawmaker lobs profanities at fellow Republicans,” Star-Advertiser, March 15).

Now that he has failed at his unhinged, raging battle against marriage equality, he has turned on members of his own party. Their crime? Daring to collaborate with their colleagues across the aisle in the Legislature to solve our state’s problems.

Most ironic of all, he commands his party members to “start acting like a (expletive) Republican,” which apparently nowadays consists of bullying, lobbing derogatory profanity at colleagues, throwing temper tantrums and obstructing every legislative effort by any opponents.

Like his GOP colleague Donald Trump, whom he apparently seeks to emulate, McDermott continues to demonstrate he is not fit to hold public office.

His West Side constituents would be wise to vote him out, come November.

Jeff Merz

Waikiki