Don’t be so quick
to criticize
Don’t be so quick
to criticize
In Leningrad Elarionoff’s Nov. 23 letter titled, “Not fair to bail out those who gambled,” he showed no regard for the extent of the trauma and the debilitating depression that has accompanied the 2018 lava flow we in lower Puna have endured.
No one who lives on this volcanic island — with not one, but five volcanoes — should say that some are foolish, not others, for clinging to life here. Every one of you could suffer the same fate that we in Lower Puna have, so I wouldn’t be so quick to criticize. I would check your insurance policies. Elarionoff assumes we all didn’t have the proper insurance. Some of us did. But some of you may have hidden exclusions in your policies, and you would do well to check the fine print.
Elarionoff criticized those of us who inhabit Puna in the subdivisions he thinks should have never been built here, but he didn’t acknowledge his own ineffectiveness as a council member to rectify the matter. Alas, he was a very development-friendly council member who helped to compound our infrastructure problems in Puna. The recovery I seek is the restoration of public infrastructure that we rightfully deserve. I’m sure, if Mauna Loa or Hualalai were to suddenly wreak havoc on the west side, you, too, would want to see your roads restored as you tried to rebuild, right?
Many of us lava refugees have scattered around this island and throughout the continental U.S. to heal from our trauma and try to rebuild with what we did or didn’t receive from insurance claims. But our hearts will remain in Kapoho and we look forward to the day when the disaster recovery funds that this county received go for their intended purpose: the restoration of our community, namely the roads and waterlines.
Tiffany Edwards-Hunt
Keaau
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