Letters to the Editor: 8-6-17

Build it and they will come

I read the My Turn letter in the Aug. 3 WHT written by Ron Roberts and needed to express myself. Like him, I too was born before the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Unlike him, I was born and raised in Hawaii and watched the population of our island explode. There were many like him who discovered the island and moved here. Most of the newcomers are a welcomed addition and fit into the philosophy once practiced on the island that if you don’t work, you don’t deserve to eat.

Now comes the homeless population. Mr. Roberts wrote that if he were a homeless person in one of our big cities, he would beg his caseworker to give him a one-way ticket to the Big Island. The reality is, many of the homeless who have moved here from the mainland did exactly that. Once here, they contact their homeless friends from elsewhere via social media and now we have the problem in Kona.

Many of us who have lived here all our lives feel that we have an obligation to help the unfortunate. However, we do not consider someone who willfully chooses the homeless lifestyle as being unfortunate. To them we say, you don’t contribute, you don’t deserve to eat.

We read about the state and county agencies that stand in line to make life more comfortable for the homeless and consider that a waste of our taxes. The philosophy expressed by Mr. Roberts that the rich should support the homeless will be the death of our lifestyle.

Build it and they will come. Just like stray cats, feed them and more will come for the free food. Make their lives comfortable in Kona and they will arrive by the plane loads.

Being hungry is not a bad thing, it is stimulating. Expecting others to supply your necessities is a bad thing. Like Mr. Roberts wrote, I have no solution for those with mental illness. The one thing I am sure about is, I do not want my tax money going to feed and shelter those who choose a lifestyle of being homeless. Leaches survive and multiply more rapidly when they are graciously provided with free lifeblood even if it came through an agency that took it from an unwilling contributor.

Leningrad Elarionoff

Waimea

Sen. Hirono a politician to whom others should aspire

Bravo and mahalo to Hawaii Sen. Mazie Hirono. With all the criticism about lazy, blood-sucking politicians being spread for decades by the right-wing, divide-and-conquer, corporatist crowd, Mazie is a shining example of consistency, grace, and strength that many elected leaders exhibit but get little credit for. And Hawaii’s senator went the extra mile.

Mazie takes her job of representing We the People so seriously that she returned almost immediately to Congress after cancer treatment. She didn’t have to. But she understands how crucial her voice is to the democratic process — a process hijacked by a president gone wild and Republican congress teetering behind him on the cliffs of the dark side.

Mazie spoke truth to power regarding the theft that’s happening with America’s health care. She spoke wisely to the need for a fair, single-payer plan for all and said that she, as a Congress person, feels the sense of security that millions of Americans don’t, but should feel: a trust that medical bills would be doable because of good medical coverage. A single-payer system could be supremely successful, as Medicare has been, if only it was supported by a bipartisan Congress. But the Republican strategy is to strangle the Affordable Care Act to make it look like it doesn’t work when it actually has been — at least, in states where a Republican majority hasn’t been killing it with funding and other designed roadblocks.

Mazie also grilled Assistant Attorney General nominee, Brian Allen Benczkowski, about his entanglements and past actions that appear to be in conflict with the best interests of the American people.

Will the Republican Congress do anything nonpartisan, whether it’s related to health care for all Americans or protecting our time-honored institutions like a justice department that works for American citizens — not just Donald J. Trump? Sen. John McCain who, like Mazie, bravely returned to his Congressional seat from his own arduous medical journey said that Republicans are so unwilling to cross the party aisle that they’ll never get anything accomplished. That’s from a Republican who went so far as to run for president with the most extreme right-wing, loose cannon running mate in recent memory (before Trump, that is).

The clock is ticking, with the growing chance that more than 20 million fellow Americans will be left without the option of visiting a doctor, buying the medications they need, or filling the cavernous gaps that a disabled child can disappear into. If you believe that all Americans deserve the respect that decent health care provides, this is the time for you to speak your truth to power.

Janice Palma-Glennie

Kailua-Kona

Make libraries more of a priority

I would like to support the many good points made by Megan Mitchell regarding the Kealakekua Public Library. We did indeed spend many hours crafting the Community Development Plans for North and South Kona, and being able to access services locally was one of our main concerns.

It is by choice we live in rural areas, but having only one post office open on Saturday and no library within, in my case a 25-mile roundtrip, is just a hardship.

I also participated in the library survey but my wishes were not honored, so be it. I believe the fundamental issue is that our state government does not value our libraries enough to provide funds for staffing to community needs.

Our legislators need to know our public services are crucial to rural areas, the libraries in particular.

Louise Winn

Honaunau

Library Saturday schedule can work

My husband and I moved to Kona in 1998. As soon as I had the proper resident ID I applied for a library card at the Kailua-Kona branch.

Kailua-Kona operates on a schedule where they are open from Tuesday through Saturday. Unless I am mistaken, this schedule has been in effect since we moved here. Why can’t Kealakekua adopt this schedule? What is so sacred about being open on a Monday?

When a Monday legal holiday occurs, Kailua-Kona closes on the preceding Saturday which gives them the three day weekend they would normally enjoy. I don’t believe this has been a hardship for Kona residents. I believe it’s more important to be open on a Saturday because for some this is the only day they can frequent the library. So please consider allowing Kealakekua to adopt this schedule.

Geri Strigin

Kailua Kona