Cataluna: Wait, who is going to catch illegal dumpers?

Let me get this straight:

The city’s pilot bulky-item reservation system is working, according to the city. Nobody who doesn’t get paid by the city says it’s working, but the city says it is. The mayor stood in front of a pile of discarded junk left along the sidewalk to say so himself and to quote some carefully worded statistics.

The tonnage of bulky items collected is up 37% over the previous month!

Which is an odd thing to boast about when you’re talking about piles of trash along city streets which, one would hope, in paradise, would be closer to 100% pile-free.

And let me get this straight:

Mayor Kirk Caldwell says the responsibility for catching illegal dumping rests on us, the citizens who have nothing better to do than sit at home all day and night and watch the street to see if a dude with a truck full of dirty mattresses comes by and starts flinging them out willy-nilly like hard candy from a parade float.

And, wait, wait. Let me get this straight: When we see illegal dumping, we should try to get a photo, video and the license plate numbers of the illegal dumpers, and then we are to call the police because they’ll take care of it.

Even though the police chief just said a couple weeks ago that the department isn’t going to be working on small stuff like home burglaries anymore because they just don’t have the manpower.

Um …

So Burgie McBurglar can break into your house and steal your bed, and the whole thing can be caught on security camera, but the cops don’t have the time to track that down; however, if Dumpie McDumper leaves a mattress on the sidewalk outside your house, HPD and the city Department of Environmental Services is gonna swoop in like Hawaii Five-0 and take them down?

This is impossible to get straight because it is completely twisted and nonsensical. Honolulu has become Crazytown.

Caldwell’s quote wasn’t just maddening, it was mad. It was angry and accusatory, like the whole stretch of island from Foster Village to Hawaii Kai is out to sink the program and make him look bad.

“Don’t just watch it happen and then complain at the neighborhood board or to your favorite local media,” Caldwell said. “Complain to the people who can do something about it.”

Mr. Mayor, sir, this is the big knock on you and your administration. You don’t listen to people. Maybe the city CAN do something about it, but that doesn’t mean they WILL, not unless the favorite local media gets involved and a story gets out that makes you shame. Not unless the stalwarts at the neighborhood boards start making phone calls and writing letters and showing up at City Council meetings. Only then it seems the people who can do something about it actually do something about it.

One theory floating around is that Caldwell is trying to make the situation as untenable as possible so that the community gives up and agrees to start paying for trash pickup. It’s a twisted theory, but not more twisted than trying to say something is working when it just isn’t.