It was inevitable that in this election year, Daniel Grabauskas, the executive director of the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation (HART), would step down.
Not that anyone should shed a tear for anyone who gets paid $282,250 to say aloha.
Unfortunately for Grabauskas, there are too many top politicians this year who need to blame someone other than themselves for the failure of rail construction to stay on budget or on time.
HART Chairwoman Colleen Hanabusa, who is running for Congress, needs to show she is decisive and is willing to take action to correct out-of-control spending. Of course, she will resign from HART after being elected.
Mayor Kirk Caldwell can read the poll numbers and knows he could lose re-election if he doesn’t do something about rail and do it now.
Where has he been the last four years while rail has come in billions over budget?
Garry P. Smith
Ewa Beach
President, chancellor should be separated
Twenty years ago, Kenneth Mortimer was both president of the University of Hawaii system and Manoa chancellor.
The Faculty Senate Executive Committee (on which I served) regularly discussed with him whether the two positions should be separated.
Mortimer saw his conflicting obligations: He had to be both impartial as between campuses and yet partisan toward the Manoa flagship.
The offices were split.
Today, each campus has a chancellor advocating for the special needs of that unit. The system has a president who can appreciate the big picture and treat the campuses impartially. Set up in this way, each campus has its champion and the president is like a neutral judge. It can work well.
UH President David Lassner has returned to the old arrangement, at least temporarily (“UH president picked to serve as Manoa chancellor as well,” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 19).
If it ain’t broke, don’t break it.
Ken Kipnis
Professor of philosophy, University of Hawaii
Homeless village site at risk of storm surge
The plan to create a “plantation style” village to house the homeless, on the rightly named Kahauiki peninsula at Keehi Lagoon, all looks so very good on paper (“Modular houses near H-1 will go to the homeless,” Star-Advertiser, July 15).
But in truth, it is all so very wrong.
The plan is very good, and I am 100 percent in favor of it, but the village will be built in a very inappropriate place.
For one, this peninsula is wholly within the old tsunami inundation zone, not to mention the expanded new one. It is also an accentuated storm surge zone, because it is an estuary (where streams meet the sea), and storm surges are increased in estuaries.
Contemporary and enlightened zoning policy, informed by updated science and environmental principles, should never allow building in tsunami inundation zones, especially in this period of global warming.
Dwight Kuaika Jendrusch
Pauoa
Goals of life include finding a purpose
We all have a purpose in life. Most of the journey in our lives is finding that purpose.
I find it hard to believe that the homeless have lost their purpose in life to be productive members of society. I understand that some homeless individuals have medical or mental issues that need to be addressed. For the other homeless individuals who can work, a mentor could provide them with the tools that they need to get a job — obtaining identification, transportation, clothing, assistance to attend job fairs and fill out applications.
Are there area businesses that would hire these individuals at entry level positions? There are job openings at almost every store I go into. The city parks department could have the homeless work to maintain the parks because of job vacancies.
At the end of the day, it’s about self-worth and having a purpose in life.
Cathy Lamoureux
Waikiki
Highway management in Hawaii is alarming
The 21st Annual Highway Report by the Reason Foundation found that Hawaii in 2012 spent $90,000 on administration costs for every mile of state road — the worst of all 50 states.
Kentucky spent less than $1,000 per mile on administrative costs. Hawaii ranked dead last in cost effectiveness of the state highway system and in urban interstate pavement condition.
Does the governor respond by leading the charge to clean up our bloated, bureaucratic state Department of Transportation?
No. He proposes to defer new highway improvements — because we allegedly don’t have the money. Really?
Further, the governor has the gall to propose raising our gasoline and weight taxes and the vehicle registration fee, to the tune of $83 more per year for the typical Hawaii motorist.
Hawaii residents should be alarmed by this.
David Sharpe
Ewa Beach
FROM THE FORUM
Readers of the Star-Advertiser’s online edition can respond to stories posted there. The following are some of those. Instead of names, pseudonyms are generally used online. They have been removed.
“Neighborhood battles back against crime” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 15:
>> What Hawaii Kai needs is a resident like the rifle-toting Walt Kowalski, aka Clint Eastwood, as shown in the movie “Gran Torino.” Nothing works better than a rifle pointed at your face and the icy warning, “Get off my lawn.”
>> You are aware that it was a movie, right? No director is going to have Clint Eastwood arrested on-screen for terroristic threatening or various other legal violations.
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“UH professor uses balloons to improve storm forecasts” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 15:
>> The old weather balloon, outfitted with current “state of the art” equipment.
>> The mathematics of storm modeling is hugely complex and very fascinating.
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“Genki Sushi’s scallops are source of hepatitis A outbreak, state says” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 16:
>> Dang, I just ate there yesterday. I hope my hep A shot works.
>> I hope they give more information on the actual products like country of origin, distributor and packer. Sometimes these products are sold under different brand names.
>> The hep A outbreak traced to the imported frozen scallops only shows how much the people of Hawaii are put at risk when dealing with foreign- sourced food that is not properly handled or inspected.
>> I always wondered why the (Genki Sushi) face had a frown.
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“$78M HECO project approved” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 16:
>> The HECO executives should see the software the state uses. Sixteen-year- old software is brand new to them.
>> Once we start getting charged an additional fee, it never goes away. They’ll just move it to another line-item fee.
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“School panel puts off leaders’ raises” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 17:
>> Kudos to the Board of Education committee for asking the tough questions before approving across-the-board salary increases. The superintendent’s response that they’ll begin to look at measuring individual performance implies that they have been less than diligent in reviewing Department of Education executives.
>> When the schools are in the top tier, then we can talk raises.
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“Nonprofit claims nature is out of whack in Hawaii” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 17:
>> If Hawaii cannot handle increased population, make it such that people won’t want to move here or stay here. Stop building “affordable housing” and people will start moving to the mainland and people won’t want to move here. Stop building hotels so that room rates will be so high that only the affluent can vacation here.
>> In the world of good, better and best, we have a long way to go. This nonprofit collective is doing very valuable work shining a light into areas that need more attention.
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“No quick solution to the cat-and-mouse game between the city and the homeless” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 18:
>> Doing the same thing over and over again is insane. Lock ‘em up if they are breaking the law and send home the ones who are not from here and have no means to support themselves. It’s time for some tough action.
>> What if the city and state each had big water trucks that had a water cannon mounted so that they could go and “clean the sidewalks” at different times of the day and night? That could be a way to “clean up” this mess.
>> Hey, and what’s-his-name can come with his sledgehammer and hammer those food carts, too.
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“Bill to regulate Uber, Lyft becomes law” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 18:
>> Government only knows how to strangle businesses with more regulation; it doesn’t know how to reduce unnecessary regulation. Uber and Lyft have effectively proven that the current regulations are unnecessary. But instead of learning, the government punishes all with more red tape and higher costs to operate, which ends up getting passed to customers in higher prices.
