CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / MAY 30, 2019
Mayor Kirk Caldwell gives his seventh State of the City address at the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Ho‘okupu Center in Kewalo Basin Harbor.
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While reading Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s commentary urging passage of additional taxes on hotels, I laughed or gagged at nearly every sentence (“Increase Opens in a new tab tax on hotels, not Opens in a new tabresidences Opens in a new tab,” Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, June 2).
A shorter version, omitting all the disingenuous wailings about trying to avoid tax increases, the hollow complaints about the city’s nondiscretionary obligations, the feigned concerns about the visitor industry and the excessive burdens visitors impose on our island, and the politicians’ customary foil requiring somebody (else) to pay their “fair share,” would read:
“The City and County needs more money. So, rather than raise property taxes on those of you who can vote or otherwise make elected officials uncomfortable, I propose that we raise the rates on outsiders.”
Robert Maynard
Kailua
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