Road work planned this week in West Hawaii
Road work planned this week in West Hawaii
Alternating single lane closures are planned this week in both directions on Highway 11, between mile marker 102 in Hookena and mile marker 109 in Kealakekua, for roadway pavement reconstruction, according to the Hawaii Department of Transportation.
Alternating single lane closures are also planned in both directions on Highway 190, between Uluoa Street and Old Kona Village Road, for pavement striping and guardrail installation, according to the department.
Crews will be working from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. All work is weather permitting.
Students rally at Capitol for cool schools
HONOLULU — Nearly 500 high school students and teachers rallied Thursday at the Hawaii Capitol and called for legislators to cool off classrooms.
Students from Campbell High School in Ewa Beach carried signs and said air conditioning is needed to improve conditions for learning.
“It gets like 90 degrees in the classroom,” said junior Precious Guieb. “It makes you feel like fainting or falling asleep.”
Campbell junior Amanda Thirion said she had attended schools in Oklahoma, California and Louisiana. All had air conditioning.
“Never have I seen this lack of concern about the student environment,” she said. “It isn’t a coincidence that my hottest class is also my lowest grade.”
Just a dozen of Hawaii’s 255 public school campuses have central air conditioning. Another is midway through a conversion.
The Department of Education has installed ceiling fans and solar-powered ventilators to try to improve conditions.
“I empathize with everybody who has to sit in a hot classroom,” said Ray L’Heureux, assistant superintendent in charge of school facilities and support services. “We’ve got to get that turned around.”
Over seven years, four campuses have received air conditioning. Campbell High is fourth in line.
The rally was a field trip for the students. They’re making a yearlong effort to encourage funding for air conditioning.
Barriers considered for turtle-watch bottleneck
HONOLULU — Highway congestion caused by people stopping to view Hawaiian sea turtles at Laniakea Beach likely will be addressed with concrete barriers, state Department of Transportation officials said.
The barriers could go up by the end of the year despite objections by residents to block cars and buses from parking along Laniakea Beach.
DOT consultants Wednesday promoted the plan at a meeting of a group formed to study solutions, the 19-member Laniakea Task Force. About 100 North Shore residents attended and most did not support barriers, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.
Barriers across a 1,000-foot beachfront stretch on the mountain side of the highway will be installed pending review of community comments, DOT officials said.
Former state representative Gill Riviere said the agency has disregarded public comments.
“The task force was absolutely ignored of its opinion,” said Riviere, a former task force member. He attended Wednesday for one of its current members, Kawika Au.
Seven members who voted for the barriers supported the idea only as a one-year trial, Riviere said.
Resident said blocking all cars from accessing Laniakea is too drastic and the area is the first true stretch of beach accessible to the public east of Haleiwa.
DOT highways administrator Alvin Takeshita said building a parking lot would be more costly and complicated than residents realize. A parking lot would fall outside the state agency’s role, he said, and would be a multimillion-dollar “hard-core” project requiring numerous local and federal permits.
Windsurfer pulled from water off Hookipa Beach
WAILUKU, Maui — A 30-year-old man was in serious condition at Maui Memorial Medical Center after a rescue off Hookipa Beach Park.
The Maui News reported the man became separated from his windsurfing board and appeared in distress.
Maui County Fire Services Chief Lee Mainaga said a lifeguard spotted the man having difficulty just after 3 p.m. and set off an alarm for Paia firefighters.
Mainaga said a county Ocean Safety lifeguard used a rescue board to go to the man’s aid and brought him to shore.
The windsurfer was treated by lifeguards until firefighters arrived at the beach.
Firefighters transported the man over rocky shoreline and trail to medics.
Remains tied to woman missing since 1979
LIHUE, Kauai — Kauai County investigators said human remains found in Hanalei are those of a woman missing since June 1979.
Twenty-year-old Nancy Ellen Baugh disappeared 34 years ago and was feared kidnapped and possibly murdered.
Her 27-year-old boyfriend, Paul “Sonny” Featherman, was found dead in their home. He had been killed by a shotgun blast to his face.
Featherman worked at the Hanalei Bay Resort.
Baugh’s partial skeletal remains were found in March 2012 and identified through forensic DNA testing.
A cold case task force made up of investigators and attorneys from the Kauai Police Department and the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney reopened the case.
The county is asking anyone with information about the case to call acting Lt. Bryson Ponce of the Kauai Police Department.
By local and wire sources